The last two Blood Bowl tournaments I went to I took Goblins & Chaos Pact.
It's been a long time since I've played Orcs, which is probably my favorite team in Blood Bowl.
Not just because it's a good solid team with nice development potential in a league, which come to think of it, I may never have played orcs in a tournament: only in leagues. But also because I just really like orcs.
Orcs also have a lot of interesting builds.
Do you go for solid power of 4 Blitzers & 4 Black Orcs, with Thrower & Line orcs? or do you go for the unreliable, but versatile Troll & Goblin additions? Some people favor 2 throwers, others recommend skipping the expensive thrower and relying on the blitzers for a running game.
Personally, I don't like the play style of a slow grinding cage. I tend to play more lose, with a floating defense and short passes. I just find it more fun, and orcs can do this pretty well. They don't excel at it however, not with agility 3 and no proper catchers. So I've opted for taking more rerolls than most would normally take, plus, if you've read my game reports you know my luck with dice: I need the rerolls!
Rather than list the team, I'll just put up the roster (click for larger):
I chose the basic skill package of 6 regular skills, which are marked with an asterix.
I may still change it, but at the moment this is what I'm thinking. I'd have liked to get kick in there, but can't really see how to do that compared to how useful the other skills are.
Only 3 Black Orcs, where most would take 4, but I do want the troll, and with Orcvis on the team, if I dropped a reroll to up a goblin to a Black Orc, that would mean I'd have no goblin on the field if I wanted the 4 Black Orcs on the field to start, and goblins really are valuable in a lot of situations.
I gave them names from The Who, one of my favorite bands. No particular reason, it's not like it has any tie-in with the team name. But 'The Ox' just seemed to fit a tall lanky troll, and the Black Orcs took the other band member names: no offense to Kenny Jones (I also really like Small Faces).
Wish the team luck! In a day and a night I'm off with a friend for a road trip to Vegas. So, likely no updates until Monday.
To tie The Who & road trips together, enjoy the music:
It's been a long time since I've played Orcs, which is probably my favorite team in Blood Bowl.
Not just because it's a good solid team with nice development potential in a league, which come to think of it, I may never have played orcs in a tournament: only in leagues. But also because I just really like orcs.
Orcs also have a lot of interesting builds.
Do you go for solid power of 4 Blitzers & 4 Black Orcs, with Thrower & Line orcs? or do you go for the unreliable, but versatile Troll & Goblin additions? Some people favor 2 throwers, others recommend skipping the expensive thrower and relying on the blitzers for a running game.
Personally, I don't like the play style of a slow grinding cage. I tend to play more lose, with a floating defense and short passes. I just find it more fun, and orcs can do this pretty well. They don't excel at it however, not with agility 3 and no proper catchers. So I've opted for taking more rerolls than most would normally take, plus, if you've read my game reports you know my luck with dice: I need the rerolls!
Rather than list the team, I'll just put up the roster (click for larger):
I may still change it, but at the moment this is what I'm thinking. I'd have liked to get kick in there, but can't really see how to do that compared to how useful the other skills are.
Only 3 Black Orcs, where most would take 4, but I do want the troll, and with Orcvis on the team, if I dropped a reroll to up a goblin to a Black Orc, that would mean I'd have no goblin on the field if I wanted the 4 Black Orcs on the field to start, and goblins really are valuable in a lot of situations.
I gave them names from The Who, one of my favorite bands. No particular reason, it's not like it has any tie-in with the team name. But 'The Ox' just seemed to fit a tall lanky troll, and the Black Orcs took the other band member names: no offense to Kenny Jones (I also really like Small Faces).
Wish the team luck! In a day and a night I'm off with a friend for a road trip to Vegas. So, likely no updates until Monday.
To tie The Who & road trips together, enjoy the music:
10 comments:
Good luck! I am working on a Blood Bowl team for a 3 game tournament in May. Going the route of Orcs also, we have skill package options (not 6 sadly like yours). Right now I had a rough sketch of 3 Linemen, 4 Blitzers, 4 Black Orcs (block to all Black Orcs for free skills), throw in 3 rerolls and maybe Bloodweister babes...we have 1.1 M to spend.
A road trip to Vegas to play Blood Bowl, it doesn't get much better. Can't wait to see how you get on; best of luck in the tournament!
Hope you don't mind I comment on the roster?
I do feel you are spending too much in rerolls, though I understand due to not playing orc-y, you are gonna need them. IMO 3 should be enough - either 2 + leader (which would get you a 4th black orc) or 3 normal which frees up a skill (tournaments with skills packs like this, skills are at a premium!)
I would put your second guard on a blitzer, the black orc with guard will just get hit first since he has no block to get rid of his guard. Having 2 unskilled black orcs isn't a terrible thing, on defence they go on the line with your troll to take the licks, so you can save your better pieces to break open the cage. Otherwise I see you putting blitzers or black orcs with block on the line and losing them to blocks followed by fouls.
If you can bring yourself to ditch leader & block on one of your black orcs, you could then give a blitzer Dodge. Having a blodger is not to be trifled with, if you opponent has no tackle/wrestle they will need open stars to get him down.
Personally, I would be dropping one standard reroll to take a 4th black orc, and sticking with pretty much your original skill selection (except 2nd guard would go on blitzer)
Regardless I'm sure you will have a blast - Orcvis will definitely add something to the team. Good luck, may nuffle leave you alone all tournament!!
Styx: Good luck at the tournament! Personally, I favor a thrower. For just 20k more than a lineorc you get surehands. That right there can save a lot of rerolls just picking up the ball. Also helps on defense, if you knock the ball out of someone's hands, you have a better chance to pick it up when it's still in opponent TZs. Even if you never throw the ball, it's still a good investment to my mind.
Michael: Thanks! :)
Tristan: Not a problem at all, happy to have the input. There are so many ways to do orcs it's worth considering all the options.
Originally I had the 2nd guard as a blitzer, but that is when I had only 2 Black Orcs (I had 2 line orcs instead of the 3rd BlOrc & 2nd Goblin). A Blodging blitzer does sound good, but from what I've seen there are always a tackler or two, so I'd worry I was sacrificing 2 normal skills for one double skill that would be easily countered. If there is no tackler on the other team that'd have a lot of potential, I just haven't seen any team without it yet.
I have agonized over the 4th Black Orc. It is very tempting. The thing that made me go with 3 though is the 'Zelvis'. Every team gets one on their team for free. He's a pretty impressive player. It makes my team 12 players, which means someone has to take the bench. If I drop a reroll to upgrade the 2nd goblin to a Black Orc, and put out on the field Zelvis, troll, 4 blitzers, 4 black orcs, thrower, then that means the goblin is on the bench. A goblin is a great utility piece, he can cheaply do troll-prod duty, use stunty dodge to get to a dropped ball, be thrown... on an orc team he is really worth more than his 40k. To have him on the bench would limit the options, but same for the thrower. And I'd hate to have a pricey Black Orc on the bench. But the extra reroll is useful while a cheap 2nd goblin waits safely on the bench. Anyway, that's the reasoning behind the 3 Black Orcs.
I was thinking a Black Orc with guard would be useful on the line when I receive: gives the Troll a 2die block against another Big Guy, but you might be right, could be better on the blitzer where it was before, for greater ability to bring it where I need it.
Actually, if I drop leader, I could just give guard to another blitzer and keep the black orc guard -skills limit to 2 per player type not total.
Thanks for the suggestions, still a lot of last minute changes to consider :)
I like where you are going with the team - thats exactly how my son plays his Orcs and they can be brutal.
I think you have loads of flexibility there, my only comment would be to consider dropping Leader on the Thrower and add Accurate, that will give you more flex (and less re-roll requirements) when you play your short passing game.
Good luck - I hope they play as great as they look :-)
Big fan of The Who here, thanks for posting that vid. You made an old lady happy!!
My twopence worth is: if you stick with the line up, and bearing in mind your penchant for short passing,3 rerolls are enough and you could give the thrower accurate. He has the pass reroll anyway and is more likely to succeed in his endeavour then. Otherwise good luck, have fun and with the team name in mind I think third place would be appropriate!!
How did you get on?
I had a lot of fun, but a real adventure getting back home, so been too tired to write up the first of the game reports- but I'll do that soon, probably one for each game. To keep a balance between no suspense or spoilers, I'll say I lost a bit more than won but all the losses were very close games and all games were fun- though in one I was ready to kill my thrower who failed 3 times to make a roll with an 8/9 chance of success ;) but he redeemed himself soon after... more to come :)
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