Sticking the Boot In
This weekend I was at Carrot Crunch, the largest Blood Bowl tournament in East Anglia.
It was a great tournament, really well run with a bunch of local, and a few less local, coaches. Just shy of 50 Blood Bowlers in a big hall with good facilities. What a good way to spend the weekend.
Except, I didn’t play normal Blood Bowl.
In a few of our local tournaments, there is a special award called the Norman Boot Award. This trophy is given to the coach who records the most fouls during the event. There are other tournaments that have most fouls awards, and I feel that every area has that one coach who is more committed go fouling than any other. In our local scene, Mr Norman is that person. As far as I know, he has won every previous Norman Boot. 1
I decided I wanted a Norman Boot.
The Team
I had a good think about what team to take. I knew the best two ways to maximise fouls was to either 1) take The Black Gobbo, or 2) take pile driver. The Black Gobbo allows a second foul action each turn, and Pile Driver gives a free foul following a successful block action. A combo of the two would be the dream.
Access to devious skills was the key. I tried sizing up an Orc team, but couldn’t quite get the roster I wanted. I knew I didn’t want to use Goblins, as that is the usual Norman team. Chaos Renegades was a possibility, as was dwarves, but I in the end I settled on Underworld Denizens.
Why?
Because they have access to devious skills on strength 3 players, they have cheap bribes, and they have both a Gutter Runner and a Skaven Blitzer, two perfect Blood Bowl players.
I took a Troll, a Gutter Runner with Block, a Blitzer with Two Heads, a Thrower with Leader, three Linerats with Pile Driver, four Goblins and three Snotlings. I had two Team Rerolls, one dedicated fan, four (yes, four) bribes, and a biased ref.
Embracing the foul
I knew the plan going into the tournament. If there is a player down, foul it. If there isn’t , blitz with Pile Driver. Ideally get based up to use multiple Pile Drivers in a turn. Then worry about the usual Blood Bowl ilk like blocking and picking up the ball.
As game one started, I realised actually doing this required a huge mindset shift. My turn order and sequencing needed to be almost entirely inverted, starting with the fouling and ending with the ball. More so, blitz targets were no longer identified by who had the ball or which was the juiciest target, but instead by who could a Pile Driver rat reach, and were they easy to get down onto the floor.
This was not good Blood Bowl. I lost four of my six games playing like this. Every use of Pile Driver left me one player down to defend the next turn. I had to turn down viable hits on the ball carrier in order to maximise fouls per turn. I even turned down one turn touch down attempts in order to get a three dice block with my Pile Drivers. 2
But oh boy it was fun. Every block with Pile Driver was followed up with the excitement of a foul. The four bribes meant that I was fouling all the time but barely being sent off. I even enjoyed the puzzle of figuring out the optimal way to a three dice blitz on an inconsequential lineman.
The best in-game moments of the weekend were those couple of turns where I achieved the maximum four fouls! Insane.
The reactions of my opponents was great too. A mixture of confusion and fear, some of them genuinely didn’t know how to approach it. In theory, they could move their ball with less caution than normal, but good Blood Bowl habits stayed and cages were formed. Which was fine by me, as long as I had a player on the floor to stick my boot into.
The two games that I won were very different affairs. The first was against a Goblin team that just imploded. None of the usual goblin shenanigans paid off, and each turn ended in a prompt turnover. The second win was against Chaos Chosen, and I managed to remove half their team, and use the Gutter Runner to pick up in several tackle zones before scoring. I did that twice! Insane.
In both those games, the priority was still fouling, and getting the ball and the score was just a bonus.
The best part of the day was keeping track of the other fouling coach’s score. The tournament organiser would come round the room and give us updates on how the other was doing. Between games, we would discuss different tech. Pile Driver can be used in your oppos turn, bribes don’t cause a turnover, you don’t need to use assists for fouls. We egged each other on, and pushed each other to the very last. Other coaches would ask us how we were getting on, and gave various incredulous responses to the total tally of fouls.
At the end of the day, I won the Norman Boot. I snatched it away by just one foul, at 119 to 118. That was almost 20 fouls per game. 3
That will always be one of my most memorable tournaments, and the Norman Boot is an award I am extremely proud of. The camaraderie and competition was unparalleled, and the fact that it ended up with only one foul in it was a perfect way to end the day.
I would recommend any Blood Bowl coach looking for a different tournament experience to try going for one of the alternate awards. Touchdowns and Casualties are the more usual ones to go for, but fouls or most injured are more out-there challenges. Either way, having a target other than just sinning opens up the whole experience, and makes for a very interesting day.
That said, it will be back to business as usual for the next tournament…
Quack