Berlin Open 2019

Roster

As we were using the world cup rules for this tournament, I went with the following roster.

2 Blitzers (2xBlock)

Kroxigor (Block from game 3)

3 Catchers (3xDodge)

5 Lineman (Wrestle+Strip Ball, Wrestle from game 3, Wrestle and Block from game 5)

3 RR

Apo

Game 1 vs goblins

Sweltering heat

Fungus the loon started the game by killing one of my blitzers (two squares off the LOS). I had to use my apo and I could luckily place the blitzer in the reserve box.

My turn 1 then saw one catcher stunning himself. Not the greatest of starts.

I managed to leap in to the goblin cage and knock the ball down. It scatter to the back of the cage and one of my catchers managed to pick it up. Sadly, I rolled a snake eyes for the dodge. If that wouldn't have happened, I might have ran away with the game as I already had a screen set up (including a diving tackle blitzer).

The half ended in a 0-0 tie, which I guess I was happy with. I still had a chance, if my KOs came back.

They didn't and the heat made another player sit out the half. I had five frogs to his ten goblins. Oh well, I could still win, it's just a matter of staying posi - BLITZ! and the kick was in the open, close to the LOS. Great...

I actually managed to recover the ball and move it down the pitch towards one sideline.

Ball recovered after the blitz

Goblins scored in turn 15 after recovering the ball and handing it off to a goblin that ran out of reach for my players.

We then set up for turn 16 and after an early turnover a goblin was thrown, picked the ball up and made two GFIs for the 2-0 win.

End 0-2

It was a fun game though. I didn't feel out of it, not even with just five players on the pitch. That snake in the begining cost me the game.

Game 2 vs orcs

I kicked deep and the orc thrower failed to pick the ball up. This meant that I could swarm my opponents half and cut his team in half. I was able to score in a couple of turns and was then up 1-0 at halftime.

I figured that I had this game in the bag and got a bit over confident. I had the possibility of a 3+ pass, followed by a 2+ catch and a dodge with re-roll for an early 2-0. I wanted to score quickly before I started to lose players and maybe even push for the 3-0.

Inaccurate pass (the black orc was on the floor at the time of the pass)

Sadly, the pass failed with the re-roll and we had a fight for the ball. The ball ended up in the hands of the orcs and they scored in turn 16.

I should of course have played it safe and waited for a better opportunity or waited until there was less time for the orcs to score, even if it went wrong.

Ended in a 1-1 draw

Game 3 vs nurgle

Deep kick from the frogs and the nurgle team peddled back to form a cage and screen combination.

I put him under pressure and more or less nothing went wrong for me, but it was the opposite for my opponent.

Kick off!

I could score in the first half and managed to score again in my drive.

Not much to say about the game really. My dice were incredible.

End 2-0

Game 4 vs chaos

It started with a kick that landed on a chaos warrior on the LOS, that caught the ball. I could then block the warrior and block another player on to the ball. It bounced over the LOS and in to the hands of a catcher.

Catcher catching a ball

I scored quite early and my opponent almost made 1-1 before half time, but he'd overseen a lineman behind the kroxigor that could leap and make 2 GFIs for a one die blitz. It resulted in a push and the beastman with the ball was pushed off the field (my opponent thought he was safe).


The ball scattered perfectly for me and I could scope it up for 2-0 at halftime.

Frogs on their way towards the endzone

I then went for an early 3-0 and my opponent answered with 3-1 shortly after. And yes, you guess it, I more or less immediately went for 4-1. The next kick off was a blitz and a catcher caught the ball. This could end 5-1, but no, my opponent knocked the catcher down and managed to break away with the ball. An early turnover for me meant that I could stop the 4-2 score, but it didn't really matter in the end.

End 4-2

Game 5 vs chaos

I got to kick and I started the half carefully, not wanting to go all in from the get go. I was also a bit scared of his mino with claw.

His mino stunned a lineman and that was more or less all he did for the rest of the game. It was out of position after being knocked down once and my opponent couldn't use his blitz action on the mino.

The chaos team went down a sideline and I forced him to score quite early, leaving me enough time to score in the first half, or that was what I thought at least.



In his last turn, he managed to stun a catcher, which left me with one scoring threat, a blitzer. I needed a leap, a blitz and then a 3+ pass followed by a 3+ catch. I got to the catch, but sadly didn't make it, which meant that my chances of a win was somewhat diminished.

I scored mid second half and figured that I would attack my opponent and hope for at least a draw.

Sadly, I didn't managed to knock his ball carrier down although I managed to leap in to the cage. A push (ball carrier had sure hands) from my strip baller followed by a skull in turn 16 meant that my opponent only needed two GFIs for the win. First GFI was a 1, but my opponent had a re-roll left (which he almost used for a failed GFI for a blitz on my ball carrier to stop my score). The second GFI wasn't a 1 and the game ended 1-2.

A fun game against the tournament champion. Could easily have gone either way.

Game 6 vs slann

My opponents roster was similar to mine, but with four catchers and 12 players. No apo and only two re-rolls. I was hoping that the lack of re-rolls would hurt my opponent's chances.

The game started with a blitz and my kroxigor taking out one of his dodge catchers.

The only score of the game. The pass was thrown from the position of the green die

My opponent started with the ball and made a 4+ pass in turn 2, which was very risky considering that I had two catchers in the vicinity, in case of a fumble. This meant that I had loads of time to score back, but things didn't go as planned. My kroxigor decided to bonehead three turns in a row, which meant that I had forgone a blitz and there was a hole in my line.

This meant that my opponent could put me under pressure and the ball changed hands a couple of times. One of the times was due to my opponent forgetting diving tackle on my blitzer and instead of leaping away, he dodged (the catcher had sure hands, so the leap was as good) and rolled a 1, used a re-roll and rolled a 2. I just put my blitzer down and saw the horror in my opponents eyes. That alone is reason enough for playing slann at the world cup.

My opponent recovered that ball later in the half and decided to stall in range of my strip ball wrestle lineman. Not the best decision and the half eneded 0-1.

My plan for the second half was to bash him, trying to get ride of his blitzers (especially his wrestle strip ball one). I KOed both his blitzers and had the man advantage. I caged and went down a sideline. Sadly, my opponent could leap in and get the ball on the ground (needing a pow), which he did thrice. The last time even saw him punt the ball in to my half.

I had one chance in turn 16, needing a 4+ pass, 2+ catch and a 3+ catch (hand off) to score. Sadly, it wasn't meant to be and I lost the game.

I was annoyed, but I was to blame. I should have protected the ball better and a draw would have been a fairer result.

Conclusion

I ended the tournament on 2-1-3, which I'm not too happy about, but my games were fun and I'm sure that slann is the right team for me at the world cup. I'm still working on the roster though as there are so many possibilities with slann. Next tournament for me will be kknD, also using the world cup rules (four games, 1&2 day 1 and 3&4 day 2).

Thank you for reading!