SKABB Gutterbowl 2023, Chaos Cards Folkestone 17th July 2024

At our recent Dungeonbowl tournament with the news of the GutterBowl release having just been revealed, we discussed the possibility of arranging a tournament on the release day so that we could all play together for the first time.

As it happened, the logistics meant that arranging it for a couple of weeks later worked out better and also gave us the time to all actually read the rulebook. This was officially the first ever NAF Gutterbowl tournament in the Universe. See the confirmation of this below from NAF Honcho Stimme. 

10 of us took part - 9 from our league and the honorary SKABBer, Bob (phuqster), who dashed up from Brighton as soon as he finished work to join us.

This was the first time we had used Tourplay for an event and it worked really well. It meant not needing a laptop along with us, being able to run an event paperless and the draw being available for everyone to view as soon as it was done. Some of this was not necessary when we were only a few feet away from each other but for a larger event it will be really useful.

We had come up with the ruleset prior to the official rules being released and we based them on our previous Sevens events. This meant positional allowances were halved (rounded up). There were no additional skills and a budget of 750,000. The first round was to be played on the streets, the second in the sewer and the final randomised. 

As I've been playing a lot of Dark Elves in preparation for the World Cup I took them with one witch, one assassin, two blitzers and five linemen.

Game 1 v Oli (eldritchfox) playing Underworld

Game 1 was drawn in advance so you knew who you were playing. This in theory gives you time to prepare but I'm not sure how useful that actually is at GutterBowl.

I was up against fellow SKABB commissioner, Oli. He was taking Underworld with a Rat Ogre, all the skaven positionals and a seemingly infinite supply of goblins. 

Kicking to him, he scored mid way through the first half, the stalling rule meaning that he was effectively forced to do so.

I had 2 turns to try to equalise. However I'd permanently lost my witch and a blitzer meaning I was down a lot of useful skills and 2 of my 4 players with the extra point of movement. 

I tried to dodge my assassin through into scoring range but she tripped leaving me without the possibility of scoring. The only consolation was being able to foul the rat ogre to death. 

In the second half I drove up the pitch and managed to get the equaliser giving him one turn to attempt to get a winner. He successfully worked out the chain push logistics and his thrower got the 6+ pass over a market stall to the gutter runner who caught it and started to run away. 

The logistics of the pitch and the way that I had set up meant that he'd have to dodge through 2 tackle zones and contend with my assassin shadowing the runner to score. The gutter runner failed the first 4+ dodge leaving us with a draw. 

In hindsight to counter the one turner I could have probably made it more difficult with 3 players in a row in the middle zone making it impossible for them to get through. It would have meant leaving one of the wide zones uncovered but I think had I set up off centre it might have meant that that particular wide zone was not a feasible option anyway due to the terrain needing a few extra points of movement to get around. I'm sure this is something that will be looked at in more detail by better players than me.

The game ended 1-1 with me casualties showing as 2-2 (although I forgot to log the rat ogre foul casualty on Tourplay and apparently it is no longer possible to edit it). All the other first round games had ended in a win to one side or the other. 

Game 2 v Marianne (yantz) playing Black Orcs

Marianne had stepped in last minute after a drop out and needed a crash course on Gutterbowl on the way to the venue. She also was a bit under the weather but was very sportingly filling in so that we could all play a game. 

She'd not played black orcs in a while, but had a roster comprising a troll, 3 black orcs and again a seemingly infinite supply of goblins. Removals were thin on the ground for me, despite my constant fouling and I didn't manage to get a numbers advantage as I received and scored. Leaving her with two turns, she managed to through a goblin down the middle corridor avoiding the sewers who successfully landed and rushed in for the equaliser.

This was the only game when my assassin managed to do something good when she stabbed a black orc on the fourth attempt and managed to knock them down. I'm not sure if it was the right roster choice, as shadowing only proved useful once. I might go for the runner if I ran them again in this format. 

Kicking to Marianne, a black orc picked up the ball and marched up the pitch. I had the black orc marked and was running a witch elf down the side to intercept when time was called and we were unable to finish the game. I think Marianne likely would have got the victory if we'd had a bit more time although as it would have taken her at least two more turns to get to the endzone, I had at least one more shot at taking the ball carrier down.

This is the first time we've run a tournament in an evening and to get in three games, we had to cap each round at 1 hour. Looking at the times on Tourplay, the majority of games finished in 45-55 minutes although there we are few that were cut off or just on the hour mark. The shorter game time, fewer players and the ground helping with removals make it a speedier game but I think with all of us getting used to the new environment they were more likely to push the time limit.

The game ended 1-1 with Marianne getting the only casualty with a goblin foul.

In this round, four of the five games wneded as 1-1 draws with the only victory being Damian beating Bob 1-0 in a battle of the wood elves meaning he was the only player with 2 wins.

Game 3 v Bob (phuqster) playing Wood Elves

This was the third time I'd played Bob in a NAF ranked game, with the previous two being a 1-1 draw at OctOgre and a 2-0 defeat at our Summer Sevens event last year which Bob went on to win with his ogre team. We've also played 6 times on FUMBBL apparently with Bob having won 4 of them and my 2 victories being with secret league teams which I'd probably say don't really count. I certainly don't remember them - what I remember are the last two which have been comprehensive victories for Bob.

With some elf-on-elf action, you might have thought it would be a high scoring game, however Nuffle thought otherwise. The kick off table gave us sticky sludge meaning that for this drive there was a +1 modifier to pick ups (largely irrelevant when all the players on the pitch are 2+ agility) and meaning that passes cannot be made.

I quickly removed a lineman and then with the wardancer on the floor, proceeded to put the boot in on 4 consecutive turns unfortunately never managing better than a stun. Most of the fouls were done with my witch elf which probably wasn't the best use of my resources however with no sendings off, wasn't as silly an idea as in regular BloodBowl. 

I had the ball down one of the side passages with my blitzer and a reasonably good elf screen. I decided I wanted to give Bob as few turns as possible to score back against me so I placed my blitzer just out of stalling range. Unfortunately this meant that they were just in the range of the wardancer to get up and make three dodges, a leap and 2 rushes for a one dice block which knocked the ball loose. We both agreed after that this was probably a bad idea as scoring in 2 turns with 7 players and the obstacles is not as easy a proposition as 2 turns in regular BloodBowl. 

The second half was a case of removals and turnovers. Again we rolled sticky sludge for kick off meaning we played the whole game unable to pass.

We both tried some sewer surfing which assisted with getting players out of the action - I managed to dodge in for a one dice block to be able to push Bob's wardancer into the sewer which caused them drop the ball, otherwise I might have found it difficult to get it off them. 

Towards the end of the half, Bob's three remaining players had the ball and dropped back deep. I manouvered round in a pincer, meaning he wouldn't be able to get away on his final turn and I'd have a shot at a blitz. My only hope was a pow on his wardancer and the ball spilling into the sewer with a favourable ball retrival from the sewer monster. I got the pow and the ball did indeed go into the sewer, unfortunately I didn't have the movement to collect it and score, so it ended a 0-0 draw although 4-2 to me on casualties.

The final round saw one other 0-0 draw and two games decided by just one touchdown. Damian managed to win on the top table to go 3-0 and be crowned The Greatest GutterBowl Player in the Universe (at least until someone else puts on a Gutterbowl tournament).

Craig finished 2nd cementing his place as BB Variant King as he placed 1st in both our recent Dungeonbowl Tournament and Dungeonbowl League.

I really liked GutterBowl as an alternative way to play BloodBowl. It was a lot quicker and more brutal and the obstacles provide a nice way of having to rethink the game without it being a significant change to what we are used to. It is likely we will run a GutterBowl season after our current league so it will be interesting to see how it plays out with players gaining a few skills.

If anyone wants to view the rosters or results, Tourplay has them all here. The race split was 2 wood elves and then one each of skaven, dark elf, chaos renegades, norse, ogres, black orcs, underworld and chaos dwarf.