Blood Bowl: Team Manager Tournament Report
Anchorage, Alaska | Two-Player
Time: April 2, 2023 – May 4, 2023
Players: Ben and Jen
Drafting - As previously described in a post on 4/1/2023, we drafted the teams as follows:
Team Ben draftees:
• Champions of Death {Undead}
• Skavenblight Scramblers {Skaven}
• Athelorn Avengers {Wood Elf}
• Gouged Eye {Orc}
• Nurgle's Rotters {Nurgle}
• Reikland Reavers {Human}
Team Jen draftees:
• Chaos All-Stars {Chaos}
• Grudgebearers {Dwarf}
• Lowdown Rats {Goblin}
• Zharr-Naggrund Ziggurats {Chaos Dwarf}
• Black Fangs {Vampire}
• Naggaroth Nightmares {Dark Elf}
Play Structure:
The tournament was a single elimination bracket, with matchups created to ensure each initial game was between two teams drafted by different players. We used rankings from our 40+ plays of the in seeding the bracket.
Play proceeded to the championship, with one team receiving a bye at the semi-finals stage. We considered a ‘losers’ bracket challenger here, but decided this tournament was ready to conclude!
Open Play Round:
Game 1
First game of the tournament involved Nurgle’s Rotters, hosted by the Goblin team – the Lowdown Dirty Rats. The lumpy malformed jumped out to an early lead. Those dirty rats must have cheated their way to victory as the refs were clearly paid off. As one after another of the followers of the God of Pestilence were thrown out, the pitch was flooded with goblins for days. Even so, disease was rampant and the Plague bearers were close to victory! Only a final tackle of a Rotter by a Troll put the goblins into the next round.
Goblins 31 Nurgle 28
Game 2
Playing in the sylvan glades surrounded by flora and fauna did not help the Wood Elves hang onto the ball this day. Even winning the final cup could not help the Avengers defend their Anarchy Championship from 2021. The Bull Centaurs played a big role and the second string stunties were in the game by the Blood Bowl as the Ziggurats had a healthy lead that was not to be overcome.
Wood Elves 23 Chaos Dwarves 35
Game 3
Cold mist hung low over the pitch when the Reavers came to town to take on the Black Fangs. Despite homefield advantage, the humans steam-rolled the vampires. Thralls were tossed left and right as a chainsaw was seen on the pitch, along with many a wooden stake. Vampires 20 Humans 42
Game 4
In the third game in a row, the lower seed was triumphant! The All-stars had massive Star Power and still just eked out a win over the capable but slow to react Champions. The mummies were especially inefficient this time around, and the coach blamed the recent raiding of tombs in eastern Khemri. Undead 38 Chaos 44
Game 5
Another game, another upset. Although some say the low ranking the Orcs received may have been the result of yet move treachery by the Gouged Eye. At any rate, The Eye ran the table breaking out to a 20 point lead based on High Stakes Week. The Nightmares tried to make a match of it, but two Skaven Mutants -- BoneCrusher and Headaplitter – joined claws with the orcs to lay the smack down. The troll bedecked in red and white went on a massive tear, injuring three players in including two players in the Blood Bowl and only being thrown out once, for a change! Dark Elves 26 Orcs 60
Game 6
Jen had high hopes another upset was in the works. The Dwarves took a lead and had strong Star power. They showed a penchant for taking control of the pitch, and standing firm. But the Scramblers just out cheated them. They bribed, stabbed, and ran too many ratmen on the pitch, and the crowd supported them. They sprinted like they had life depending on it (and they often did!) squeaking out a tournament fixture victory with six cheating incidents! Skaven 42 Dwarves 36
Quarter-Finals Round:
(3 games, winner with most points gets a bye to finals)
Game 7
Our first quarter final matchup had the Lowdown Rats coming up against their bigger cousins, the Gouge Eye. The Eye had just come off of an impressive victory, but the Rats came into the match cocky. The fouled and ran with the ball; trippe dup Orc Blitzers , and signed more than one Star Troll and other Beastly allies. The goblins developed a slew of upgrades, including bombs, an offensive coach, a tackling coach, dodging tactics, and more. The Gouge Eye focused on satisfying their rabid fanbase. That said, without for fortuitous cheating, the orcs would have been swept in the first fixture. It took 7 point of star power from cheats to eek out a victory in the Chaos Cup!
Then, with no star players, the Eye took the Spike Magazine Trophy and with the help of a Rat Ogre (traitor) took the Goblin Leeg trophy as well. Still – the game was close. The final Bowl arrived and each team put in their best. A total of 6 incidents of cheating were counted, and in the end it was the harder hitting (and very lucky) Orcs that won the day this time – moving on to the semi-finals.
Orcs 42 Goblins 28
Game 8
The second quarter final matchup was between the Skaven of Skavenblight and Ziggurats of Zharr-Naggrund. A classic speed vs brawn matchup – and both teams have nastiness to spare! Star players were hard to come by, and the Skaven lost a number of matchups due to effective cheating by the Ziggurats. It was a close match, decided by a deft move by freebooters to keep the Skaven out of the end zone in the Bloodbowl. The Dwarves hit harder and managed to hold onto a close victory, advancing to the Semi Finals for the first time! Chaos Dwarves 34 Skaven 30
Game 9
The last quarter final was a rivalry match between the star of the Empire – the Reikland Reavers, and the scourge of the Wastes, the Chaos All-Stars. Reikland hosted the playoff match against the All-Stars, and the match started off with the fans on the side of the home team. Soon however, the Chaos All Stars had recruited many star players and were staffed to win going into the final round.
Then the referees showed both yellow and red cards to the Chaos team… surely the Reavers bribed them! Then the men in stripes tossed out another couple of All-Stars for cheating. Can you believe this!? In the end the Blood Bowl trophy was a tie… and the Reavers won out with final fan support and upgrades 9-7! It could not have been closer – and the boys from the Empire move on – with the result definitely in doubt. Humans 34 Chaos 34
Semi-Finals
Game 10
After their victory at home (aided by the deep purse of the Emperor, no doubt) the humans traveled to the blasted Dark Lands east of the Empire. They brought eight star players and ringers with them. Following behind was a long wagon train of fans, merchants, wizards, sponsors, and others looking to make money off the April Anarchy 2023 semifinals.
They were confident of victory, suffering from hubris after winning Holiday Havok 2022. The Dwari Zharr, or Chaos Dwarves, cheated, fouled, bribed and pummeled their way to winning all four mini tournaments and yet still took A VERY narrow victory over the Reavers.
The Ziggurats will be facing off against the orcs of the Eye in thier first finals!
Chaos Dwarves 28 Humans 27
April Anarchy Finals 2023
Game 11
The Dwari-Zhurr marched to the Badlands to take on the Gouged Eye. The winner would claim the championship title for 2023.
First round every player missed their tackles and the Eye edged ahead with “Rivalry week” kicking off the Finals!
In the Dungeon Bowl the orcs failed to land a single tackle! What a disgrace, halfway through the finals and the Choas Dwarves were out muscling the Orcs. As a result the Ziggurats took the lead. However, the Orcs tie it up in the third round - the Far Albion Cup- at 22-22.
The Blood Bowl was a tight matchup, and the lack of hitting by the Eye turns out to be a ploy! This actually seemed to confuse and hurt the Dwarf games plan. The Chaos Dwarves sent every man to the Blood Bowl, and the Eye cleaned up on smaller highlights. With the right team upgrades the Gouged Eye won the Tournament 33-37!!!
Orcs 37 Chaos Dwarves 33
The orcs stated they were going to “take da trooffi and start a tour of da Badlands, to encourage all other Tribes to proplee show respekt to propa’ Gits”. We are sure this was the start of what has become known as the Bloody May Uprising.
 |
| A coach has to have a serious look |
That’s it another annual month of April Anarchy in the books. Jen continues her overall domination with a 66% win percentage, but Ben finally gets a tournament victory in his pocket with the Orcs.
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