SKABB Season 11 Playoff Final

Last night, was the playoff final for SKABB Season 11. This was been my vampires (Pitchfork Pines Preschool) and Oli's khorne (Stonefolk Skullhunters). Before I get into talking about the match, I want to add some context.

Oli is the person who got me into playing Blood Bowl much more frequently and seriously. He was at the first tournament I ever played in 2017 that two school friends had convinced me to go along to. I took ogres as I thought I'd do badly anyway, and ended up with the wooden spoon. A week or so later, I go to collect a parcel from the post office and he's working there. We have a good chat and I say that I'll try to join up the league after my wedding is out of the way as that plus a long honeymoon meant I couldn't put a lot of time into playing the game for a while.

We have played far more times than I can remember, both in person and online, in both competitive and friendly games. We've had games before tournaments where we've talked about strategies for the teams which have almost certainly helped me to win more games and potentially was crucial in my tournament wins.

Looking at the stats before this game, we'd played 13 times across various SKABB leagues - including variant leagues - with Oli having won 6 times and me 7 times. In NAF tournaments we've played 7 times with 2 wins to Oli, 2 draws and 3 wins to me. So that's 20 recorded times. If we add in the unrecorded, it would definitely be somewhere around 100 in total, if not more.

The two teams we are playing in the play-off final have played twice already last season. Oli won the league game around 3 games into the season by destroying my team. I later managed to win in the cup, so these teams are as evenly matched as our overall records as well. 

Oli has been running the league as long as it has been called SKABB (I joined in the first official SKABB season) and also it's predecessor before that. He recruited me to help run the league very early on as I was super keen due to loving the game, stats and organising things. I don't ever remember being asked but would have jumped at the chance if I had been. 

This was the third playoff final for each of us. I had made it in my first season with orcs and in season 3 with elven union, losing both times. Oli had won the league with norse in season 2, and was a runner up with tomb kings in season 5. 

Both teams we are playing were second season teams with a legendary player on each side. Deathmouth, Oli's khorngor with 15 touchdowns, 5 casualties and 6 MVP performances has just attained legendary status. He/she/it has Block, Sure Hands, Two Heads, Extra Arms, Big Hand and Guard. 

For me, my vampire runner Vida the Gnome Hater had Block, Dodge, Sidestep, + Movement + Armour and recently learned how to fend. She had scored 34 touchdowns across 2 seasons and has rightfully been named MVP 4 times. 

My vampires - named after my daughter's previous favourite TV show, Super Monsters had been victorious in the Gobbledigook Glass last season. and I wanted to see if they could go one better this season. The Glass is the knockout competition for the teams that don't quite make the playoffs. I had previously called it the most important competition as it was the one that I had won previously. 

On the day of the game, I decided to get into my cup final suit. I forgot to tell Oli I was doing this, as he mentioned immediately upon seeing it when he came to pick me up. He was then shortly distracted from this by being trash talked by my 5 year old daughter. I had sort of explained a bit about the game when she was looking at a dwarf deathroller that I am currently painting, however her explanation of what I'm going to do to Oli's team was a little confusing. She did then put a spell on him to make him lose with her magic superhero fairy wand, though. It's good to know she's got my back. 

Oli had asked if we wanted to share dice during the game. I had no issue with this, although I did feel like he might have somehow hexed them after the number of 1s I rolled in my first few turns! 

We did the coin toss to see who had the choice between kicking and receiving using Oli's Charlie Victor kick off coin with heads on one side and tentacles on the other. I chose tentacles as tentacles never fentacles.... (in the same way that tails never fails) and things started going badly for me as for the first time ever, tentacles had fentacled and Oli got the choice. 

I therefore ended up kicking, allowing Oli the first hit on my team. He quickly removed some players, and I quickly ran out of re-rolls with my first dice roll being double skulls and a lot of 1s for bloodlust as clearly I'd forgotten to feed my vampires earlier in the day. The khorne do have both their dirty players sent off for fouls - one on a thrower who they injured. I used my apothecary on to keep them in the game, rather than relying on them regenerating. I had 1 thrall left on the pitch by the time Oli scored (and he seemed  bit disappointed to have left me that one thrall).

I had managed to save one re-roll for my one turn touchdown attempt. I manage to get the pushes I need to move my runner forward - although some how had not calculated exactly how many I needed correctly and I still can't work out why! I manage to successfully pass the ball ball to Vida, my star runner and I was able to keep the re-roll as sure hands on my thrower allowed me the free re-roll for the pickup. The pass and catch are good, and Vida makes her way deep into the khorne half, but she fails the first dodge through the backline and we're 1-0 down at half time.

I receive in the second half and on my first turn, a heroic thrall named Griffy takes out the bloodspawn. Admittedly he hadn't done any damage but he had been very well behaved, never failing to do what was asked of him in the first half, and so getting him off the pitch definitely helped remove a threat. Wanting vengeance, the khorne team take out Griffy on their very next turn but the trade was definitely in the favour of the vampires.

We keep manoeuvring until we have a decent shot at the endzone near the end of the half. A blitz on one player and then a hypnotic gaze on another, followed by a rush into the endzone means that Vida scores the equaliser. The khorne had 2 turns left but weren't able to capitalise and we go into overtime. At this point, we'd managed to retain 4 of our re-rolls to the 1 that the khorne had, although they do get one from the kick off table at the start of overtime. 

Tentacles fentacles yet again, and the Skullhunters obviously chose to receive, although they are now down a few players at this point with I think all bloodseekers, two khorngors and one lineman on the pitch, compared to what was a full complement of vampires and a number of thralls, After a few turns, I have a reasonable shot at the ball carrier with a hypnotic gaze on a cage corner, so I take it. With a re-roll the ball comes loose and I am able to get it to Vida who swifly runs away. 

This is where I do make a number of mistakes. My first is not counting the squares as I am in blitz range of an unmarked khorngor. Fortunately there is no pow, even with a re-roll. My next mistake is where I elected for Vida to stidestep to. I went to the sideline which resulted in me being pinned in, whereas if  I'd gone a square in, whilst I would have been marked without the khorngor needing to rush, I would have been more easily able to dodge away.

My final mistake was when I was looking to blitz the ball carrier free with a blitzer, I could have ordered my turn better so that a failed bloodlust could have still been overcome - as it was, I send the blitzer off for a snack and have to dodge out my runner.  Fortunately, I went unpunished for this mistakes and my luck holds, as I make a 3+ 2+ dodge into the endzone works and we are 2-1 up. 

Oli has some turns left, but khorne aren't a team that can easily score and when he's down a few players, it is perhaps even more difficult to do so. I manage to hold them off for my vampires to be declared champions! 

The crowd erupted, fireworks filled the skies and the locals started planning an open top bus parade in my honour. Either that, or Oli shook my hand and said well done. I'm not entirely sure which of these outcomes happened, and we may never know, so let's just go with the first.

(Photo was taken by David Macey who has been taking photos of a number of teams in our league).