NAF Championship 2024

For me, the NAF Championship is THE BloodBowl event of the year. It was the first large event that I went to, and it holds a very special place in my heart. As the English Major event, you know that there will be a lot of very good players there - and it is always good to catch up with people you don't see frequently as they live in different parts of the country to you. It is the one event that I always try to make no matter what.

The excitement begins at Warhammer World the night before for the Sevens event. This year I was the spare player for the event, so I didn't get to play but I did get to wander around talking to people, watching games, admiring the pro painted flings and vamps in the cabinet and enjoying a lemonade or two.

The games for me then started on Saturday morning after reliveing my wallet of a penny or two with some of the on-site vendors.

I had taken wood elves, having played them for a season in the SKABB league. It was an 11 player roster with a treeman, wardancers with tackle and strip ball,  two catchers - one with sidestep, a thrower with leader and two linemen upgraded to have dodge. I had two re-rolls (three if you count my leader) and an apothecary.  

Game 1 v Bruce (bowzer)

I was drawn against Bruce who I had played at the Bromley Skull Cup in August last year. It was an enjoyable match with my dark elves against his undead and I was pleased to get a chance to level the score in our series of games.  

Bruce was playing goblins with Ripper but no bribes. He also had a lot of diving tackle, and I hadn't realised just quite how annoying a skill it is until this weekend.

I won the toss and elected to receive, planning to score quickly and get his chainsaw sent off. Somewhat annoyingly for me, scoring in turn 3 the chainsaw successfully argued with the referee that he hadn't done anything wrong and was setting up for the rest of the half. 

The goblins moved up the pitch, guarding the ball quite well and fending off any attempts for my wardancers to dodge or leap in and steal the ball, so we went into half time at 1-1.

Kicking to the goblins, they were removing my players and both wardancers were soon MIA. It was looking desparate until one of my dodge linemen managed to dodge into a cage on a 6+ to hit the ball carrier. I didn't get a knockdown so I decided to use my final re-roll and managed to get an excessive double pow.  With the ball going loose, my cheeky elves were able to recover and move it up the pitch to get a winner and take the game 2-1.

Game 2 v Jose (elplanet4)

For my second game, I was drawn against a new member of Team England. I'd not come across Jose before but I am very pleased I have now. He had played the very good speedingbullet in round 1 and he paid me the compliment of saying was a little bit disappointed to draw me round 2 as he'd been hoping for an easier game. I think his entire knowledge of me may have been my win at Glowbowl, but it's still a nice thing for him to say anyway.

I had also been initially disappointed to draw him, as I knew him by reputation but on reflection, it is always good to challenge yourself against the best players. 

As well as being an exceptionally good player, Jose is also an exceptionally lovely human being. It was a genuine pleasure to play him for both reasons. 

Jose had lizardmen with the classic build of putting  block on all of the saurus, and managed to get the ball and guard it well, moving up the pitch methodically and managing to crowdsurf one of my wardancers from 4 squares out who had the audactity to try to steal the ball. 

In my turn 7 I had a shot at leaping into the cage on a 6+ for a two dice block on the skink with the ball from my tackle wardancers. Not holding out much hope, I moved players in to cancel assists and declared the blitz. The leap succeeded and the wardancer took the skink down with tackle. The ball then bounced to the wardancer who caught it in tacklezones, dodged away and rushed so that the lizards were limited to a blitz and unable to push my ball carrier in a position to be able to get a second hit. 

Sending a linemen into scoring range and positioning my thrower by my wardancer for a potential hand off, I was hopeful of going into half time level, if not in the lead. Unfortunately for me, a blitzing saurus knocked the ball loose and a skink recovered for the touchdown. 

I had a shot at a one turn touchdown and using 2 re-rolls I was able to push my sidestepper the three squares into my opponent's half that was needed to put him into scoring range. The thrower went over and collected the ball but fumbled the pass so I wasn't able to get an equaliser. 

I opted to score quick - I find it a lot easier to defend than receive with elves, and there's no way to win the game without scoring twice - and Jose had said that he had expected me to do so based on how I had been defending. 

I do manage to knock down the ball carrier, but I'm unable to recover and Jose slowly and methodically removes my players and gets into scoring range before scoring with no turns for me to attempt to reply. 

This was a great challenge as a game, and I'm really glad I got to play Jose. I'm not disappointed in any way with the loss, especially when he managed to win the whole tournament! As he won it on the strength of schedule tiebreaker, I'd like to claim that I assisted his victory! 

Game 3 v Steve (skitters)

For the final game on day 1 I sat down opposite Steve who was another great opponent. He gave me a small chocolate bar as a gift (which I gave to my daughter when I got home as she had demanded I bought her something and I wasn't sure the things on sale were really what she would want!). 

He had humans with Zug and an ogre. It was a bit of a sacrifice in terms of skills to fit him in, however it proved worthwhile, at least in our game.

Again I chose to kick, and I started losing elves quite quickly. I tried to pop the ball loose but had no luck in doing so and Steve got himself into position and scored on his turn 8. Once again, I had a shot at a one-turn touchdown, but I was only able to get two of the required pushes so tried unsuccesfully to knock some linemen off the pitch.

Receiving the ball, I didn't have enough elves to protect it properly and it got knocked lose on a re-rolled two dice block, I tried shenanigans to recover it but they didn't pay off and ultimately I ended up losing the game 2-0.

I was a little down after day 1 as I had hoped to lose at most 1 game in the weekend (the dusty bin 3-2-1 record was my target) but knowing that one of the losses was to an exceptionally good player made it a bit more bearable, as did the grape juice that I had to drink that evening.

One of the best things about the NAFC is all of the people there and I had good chats with many other coaches and as the games got further into the past, the disappointment became more abstract and I was looking forward to a second day of BloodBowl.

Game 4 v Philip (king_ghidra)

I was aware that Philip wrote the BloodBowl content for Goonhammer but hadn't met him previously. 

He had brought snotlings along with Ripper, two pump wagons and two bribes. As we sat down and chatted, he was telling me that this was exactly the match up he had hoped to avoid. As the game progressed, it became obvious why.

I elected to receive the ball and scored in 3 turns to get the first pump wagon sent off. I then turned over the ball by dodging into the snotling cage (only a 3+ due to the stilty being the only player exerting tacklezones), stealing the ball and running off for a second touchdown. During this drive, Philip had been working out the best way to try to stop me but forgot to move a snotling before trying to do a block with the pump wagon, meaning it failed it's really stupid roll. 

A blitz on the next kick off meant I was able to get a number of my faster players into the snotling backfield prior to my turn 8 which allowed me to again turn the ball over and go 3-0 up just before half time. 

The mistake with the punp wagon is  the sort of mistake that we all make on occassions but it's obviously more frustrating when things are already going your way. Philip was a bit down, but hopefully he still managed to enjoy the rest of the match - especially when snotling shenanigans started happening. 

A throw team mate needing Ripper's special re-roll allowed the snotlings to get a quick score and a slight mistake by my elves (who were probably starting to get a bit too cocky) nearly allowed the greenskins to take the ball away which would have made the game 3-2 and much closer than it ended up being. I was able to survive and score another to make it 4-1 and the game out of reach. It became 5-1 after a failed Throw Team Mate left me able to recover the ball and send it up the pitch.

Obviously you know when you take snotlings to a tournament, they could be hit or miss - and I was watching Philip's play as I'm intending to take them to a tournament soon myself.  I enjoyed the game - and not just because of the scoreline - Philip is a great guy, and I hope that we meet again at a tournament soon when perhaps the dice allow a more even contest.

Game 5 v Nick (nick1066rugby)

Having spent the whole lunchbreak doing NAF rep duties, I hadn't had time to catch up with my league mates or to eat my lunch. As a halfling in disguise, I needed to eat asap and I was munching on my sandwich as myself and Nick got our game underway.

He was a lovely guy and a fun opponent - friends with a number of people we know from the Essex Blood Bowl scene - and was playing lizardmen. 

I kicked the ball and deep kick allowed me to swarm and try to separate his team. With a couple of removals he was able to cage up nicely, progress up the pitch and fend off any attempts I made to pick off the ball carrier. Nick scored in the middle of the first half leaving me a lot of time to score. I had told him before he walked it in that I didn't mind him stalling out, but he gave me a few turns rather than forcing me to try a one turn touchdown. 

I managed to do this, although it involved a lot more dice than I would have liked to roll and I didn't feel like I would be able to stall, so allowed Nick chance to get a second before the break. 

I managed to limit him so that there was only a saurus in scoring range, and amazingly the ball was handed off to him in a tacklezone that he caught - unfortunately for Nick he failed the dodge away and we went in level at half time. 

I wasted no time scoring my second at the start of the second half. I wasn't confident about having the players left if I didn't, and so I expected to at least get a draw out of the game at this point. 

However I managed to cage dive and get a 2 dice block with my tackle wardancer who go the ball loose. A fortunate bounce for me allowed me to scamper away and actually get a third to win 3-1. A result that was not really reflective of the game, but more reflective of what sort of nonsense wood elves can get up to if their opponents don't manage to get them off the pitch.

Game 6 v Craig (hellbentginger)

This was my fourth NAFC and the second time when I had faced a leaguemate in round 6. I think it is actually quite nice to do so, as I think you're much more likely to have a fun game with someone you've played before as you'll know each other well enough to know the social boundaries and be much more able to relax. As such, this was probably my favourite game of the weekend (closely followed by the game against elplanet4). 

I was out for revenge after Craig's orcs had wiped the floor with my tomb kings at OctOgre Cup 2. After 8 touchdowns in my first two games of the game, I had made significant ground in the running for most touchdowns and I ask Craig if he'd kindly let me score 8 more to get the trophy. Somewhat disapointingly, he didn't go for that idea. I actually ended up 5th, three short of the eventual winner who also had a massive advantage in the tie breakers.

I always want to come away from an event at least even and being on 3/0/2, with Craig on 1/4/0, neither of us was able to go home with a losing record. This also helped me to relax a bit and playing on the table next to David halfabrain from Bromley who was hoping to pick up his second NAFC stunty cup made the atmosphere quite enjoyable.

As with all of the games where I had a choice and the opponent didn't have any secret weapons, I chose to kick the ball. Craig's undead picked it up and crowded round the ball. I decided there was no point playing wood elves without trying the ridiculous, and so I leapt over his screen on turn 1 for a 1 dice block on his ball carrying ghoul with my strip ball wardancer. He rolled a skull which I re-rolled and not for the last time in the game, the ball popped out favourably for me. 

I managed to pick it up and after a few turns, I had the ball not far from his endzone, screened well and able to stall out - especially as I had somehow managed to knock out 3 players whilst keeping all 11 of mine on the pitch. 

It was a sign of how much we were going at this that I used all of my re-rolls by turn 2. It was a sign of how bad Craig's dice were that he had used all four of his by turn 3.  With the players advantage, it wasn't until late in the half that he was able to send anyone towards my ball carrier, but the best he could do was force me into a 2+ dodge with my catcher just before half time. I had wanted to ensure a turn 8 score so that he only had one chance to recover his knockouts, and I managed to do so.

Receving, I was going for a quick score to hopefully wrap up the game, but the tide started to turn a little and a failed dodge allowed the undead to get two dice on my ball carrier after a few other successful rolls.  At this point I was expecting the game to end up as a 1-1 draw. 

In the car drive up, I had been telling Craig about how many 1-1 draws I'd had playing undead in tournaments - 5 in 10 NAF tabletop games. At this point, all of Craig's 4 draws (including all 3 games on day 1) had been 1-1 and we'd been joking about it as the weekend had gone on. It seemed almost inevitable.

However, an exceptionally fortunate bounce when the ball went loose, meant that it bounced to my thrower who managed to catch it, even in 2 tacklezones. Horrendous luck for Craig, but I was still not in an amazing position. Some good dice on my turn allowed me to dodge out my thrower, having earlier  knocked a player away from my catcher leaving them still marked but much more likely to catch the ball. With the use of inbuilt re-rolls I was able to complete the move and score my second.

With a consolation touchdown failing despite a successful ghoul pass, the final score was 2-0 to me in an exact reverse of our only previous NAF ranked game.

Conclusion

Finishing 4/0/2 was probably better than I hoped for, especially when one of the losses was to the tournament winner. It was also my highest ever finish at the NAFC - 48th out of 279, so in the top 20% of coaches. 

I enjoyed playing wood elves, even when they weren't working. The fact that you almost always have some shenanigans you can try means you've always got a chance.

Looking at my roster, the two things I'd consider changing are probably whether or not to take the treeman and changing the sidestep skill on the catcher. They are both functional at certain moments, but other things might be better throughout the game. 

The tree soaked up a number of hits against the bashier teams, although was often either rooted and stranded, or on the floor unable to get up.

The sidestepping catcher I would be less inclined to drop. Despite it not working on the two occassions I tried it, if you can keep them safe until half time when kicking, you always should have a shot at an equaliser and this could be big in some games, and can entirely change how they play out if it is successful.

I won't be playing them in a tournament again for a while as I'm working my way through all the teams I've not yet played, but I will be looking forward to playing them again at some point after that.