Blood Bowl - Official Website Up

So Overall Differences from CRP
• 23 teams and 10 CRP stars + Guffle. Human catchers now 60k, Halfling treemen have Timmm-ber, Gutter Runners have Weeping Dagger, Argue the Call, Piling On requires a TRR, No Wizards
• Special Play cards, MVP random from 3 players, Expensive Mistakes, Offseason & Redrafting

From here:
www.thenaf.net/2016/11/from-crp-to-bb2016/

Does anyone who ordered from Doc's have any idea about when they will ship?

Sounds like long term league rules have changed as well, per Death Zone.

Something like the only thing that carries over from season to season is FF + money in the treasury. When a team starts it's second season the coach uses cash to buy players from the season one roster. It's not forced retirement, but not all the players go from season to season.

Note: I haven't read the rules yet so am probably leaving some particulars out, but I think that's the gist.

The new post game MVP selection rule is questionable.

It was a random d16 roll, so dead players or those who didn't even play could be awarded MVP. This made for interesting narratives.

Now, a coach picks three players and randomly rolls which of those three get the 5 SPPs for MVP. This is really powerful. Teams such as Chaos and Lizardmen are going to shine.

I never thought I would say that I'd rather stay with the digital versions.

It sucked when your MVP went to a star player or dead dude, but was very Blood Bowly.

I'm gonna hold back final judgment until I get a copy of everything and maybe even get a few league games in. But I will say I thought LRB 6 was an amazing ruleset and it is tough to see how these changes make it better at this point.

Jake you can come over and play mine!

What it appears like to me, since the game still clocks in around 2-3 hours, is that maybe they have attempted to accelerate team development so leagues don't have to run as long?

Gone are the days of playing long and multiple season to try and get skills on your Chaos Warriors. Now one of those four is gonna get 5 SPPs on top of anything else they do in-game. Progression of desired characters will happen quickly.

Teams that used to take a long time to reach their stride will now do so much earlier. Will you have fun playing against those teams shortly after they hit that point though? I dunno, but will be interesting to find out.

Da Bid Dabid wrote: It sucked when your MVP went to a star player or dead dude, but was very Blood Bowly.

I'm gonna hold back final judgment until I get a copy of everything and maybe even get a few league games in. But I will say I thought LRB 6 was an amazing ruleset and it is tough to see how these changes make it better at this point.

Jake you can come over and play mine!

I'll bring my Astrogranite board. Or maybe I can teach you the first edition rules. LOL

Video with all the changes in the new set from the CRP.

**Disclaimer: I haven't watched it yet to confirm quality. However, it's just a talking head so more audio than video.

After a shit weekend, I came home only to run off to my FLGS before unpacking. Blood Bowl was waiting for me...
After some successful tourney winnings, I had $120 worth of gift certificates burning a hole in my gamer pocket. A hole that was getting larger and larger since January! I knew GW was threatening a new BB back then, so I made a commitment in Q1 - I would use collected gift cards for the new blood bowl. Incidentally, my gift cards were awarded from DreadBall tournaments...

I left the store with BB, Death Zone, and surprisingly, "I-will-never-buy-another-copy-of-this-in-my-life" White Dwarf.

GW quality through and through. I spent the morning drinking a pot of coffee and reading content.

Context: I read everything under the lens of an old 3rd edition BB player, BBTM player, and BB/BB2 video game player. Other than my little four man league on Xbox One, I haven't played in a proper BB league since 1994-95. I've probably played a dozen one-off (Orcs vs. Humans) games from 1996-2016.
I also read everything under the lens of a DreadBall fanatic.

While others here have described edition changes better than I, I'll offer my criticism on.... aesthetics.

I miss the saturated colors of earlier editions. The new BB is too dark, and too "serious." Whereas earlier editions' illustrations and models ranged from crude to comical - the humor was always visible and upfront. Not so much with the new and shiny. It's too bad, as the White Dwarf issue interviews Jervis (creator/designer) and he stressed the origin of BB. It's SATIRE. I prefer my satire and parody to be a little brighter. Funny can still be found in the rulebook. The fluff and sidebar content is well written; hammy and funny and satirical and just about perfect. It's the visuals for me. They don't exactly match.

Still; the illustrations are professional. No doubt. A lot of imagery has migrated from the video game, and that makes cross-over sense.

As a DreadBall player, I'm conflicted. DB is certainly designed on the shoulders of BB, and has a lot of advantages: cost, time, table space. Each is literally HALF of it's inspiration. DB's different setting helps, but YMMV. It may be my 30 years of BB familiarity, but I really dig the BB humor. DB makes an effort, but it's not nearly as robust or polished. Again, some people may be turned off by the often juvenile BB humor. Not me!
There's no denying; GW craftsmanship is superior. IMO, GW seems to be the industry leader on miniatures. Their print material is practically perfect too. Mantic? Not so much.
So there are trade offs.

I'm curious to see what gets more table time for me in 18 months. GW/FW needs to release models for the teams listed in Death Zone (season one). Until then, new coaches will be primarily playing Humans, Orcs, and Skaven. Yes, I know third party minis are out there. But I'm pretty sure new players aren't going to go that route. Once there's a fair amount of options, I'll work with the FLGS and get some sort of league started. Tourneys? I'd rather not, but if that's how my region will scratch a BB itch, I'll organize one.
DB tourneys are almost like clockwork for me (once a quarter), but I don't know if there will be much traction in the future. DB 2nd edition should help, but the elephant in the room now may still be there. Plus, there's the new edition of Guild Ball and a new edition of Grind on the horizon. Sports board gaming is a tight space. I've invested too much time and energy (and $) with DB, so I'd like to see myself rolling dice with it for a while. My DB league may disagree.

Jeff - to your concern about advancement: Death Zone seems to stress a "shorter" season. Each coach squares off against other members twice, then playoffs. DZ also presumes coaches will be able to play TWICE A WEEK. Christ, I wish I could play two, 2.5 hour games of BB a week...

I too prefer the more colorful, zany models and illustrations from earlier editions. Partially why I haven't bought in on the new set. I collect teams that have a more second edition look. So, modern rules, second edition aesthetic I suppose. I mean, check out these two dwarf teams.

1) new, upcoming GW



2) Iron Golems dwarf team


The above have the padded armour look carried over from the second ed, but with modern updates. Also, every model is unique and full of character. This would be my dwarf team.

Here's the second ed team for reference:


As far as fluff, I actually wouldn't mind it if DB leaned a little more serious. 40K has shown that grimdark can sell, and I wouldn't want DB anywhere near that level, but let BB be satire and DB be a bit more grim. DB is already living in BBs shadow, let's not let all aspects of DB linger there.

Mr. W,
I hear ya on grim dark. My rub with Mantic's take on DB fluff; it's tries to be a little of both (serious and not) and I'm not sure it succeeds at either. It almost seems confused with itself.

On the GW model front: If I were to buy that pictured IRON FORGERS team and field them for the new iteration of BB, will they be allowed at GW sanctioned events? You know, in case I plan on traveling to a UK tourney?

Mr. W

1) Would be cool if DB could pull off dark satire. More like RollerBall, Repoman, Robocop or something. That's what I would hope. Not sure they can pull it off though. Any idea who's writing the 2e fluff? Put that in their ear.

2) Unfortunately, no. So yeah, you'll need to have at least one GW team in your collection. If you play in Nottingham at Warhammer World, that'd be pretty cool. However, the BB World Cup, or more locally the Chaos Cup (Chicago) are NAF not GW so don't require GW only minis.

I could just check the inter webs, but to keep this thread (death)rolling - is the Chaos Cup at Adepti-con?

UPDATE: Nope. Not at Adepti-con. Hmmm... Two trips to Chicago in one year?

No. Like David S. Pumpkins, Chaos Cup is it's own thing.

I'd wager it's the second biggest BB tourney in the world. Keep in mind there's a large gulf between 1 and 2. Where The BB World Cup may see 900+ coaches, Chaos Cup will usually field south of 100. Still Chaos Cup is a big deal and international players do attend as well as key personalities (all the major pod-castors) in this niche game. Jarvis himself has made the trip over and Tom Anders of Impact! is always there.

Local tourneys have seen a slight uptick with BB2 videogame players interested in trying their online success on the tabletop. Add the new BB release to those and I'd guess that Chaos Cup may actually go over 100 next year.

chaoscup.com/

I'm assuming they will sell figures for the Star Players?