Blood Bowl - Gnarly Green Guys versus Shitsberg Stealers

Vera was back in town this week and suggested we play games! I feel like we haven't played games in MONTHS. She suggested trying out the new version of Blood Bowl (Third Season Edition - 2025). I played a LOT of Blood Bowl (Second Edition) back in the late 80s. Like a LOT!!! It's probably one of my most played games ever! I have not played it in the last 35 years, however! 

My team - the Gnarly Green Guys! 

#1 Hotlicks Wobblespot (Goblin Lineman) 

#3 Dirk Blood (Goblin Lineman) 

Also #3 (apparently!?) Norg (Troll) - I mean who's going to argue with a troll if it shows up and is wearing the same number as one of your other players...? 

#4 Leon Cankersore (Goblin Lineman) 

#7 Bill S. Pestmain (Goblin Lineman) 

#10 Ted "Wildboar" Grogan (Goblin Lineman) 

#15 Fungusface (Goblin Looney - with Chainsaw) 

#16 S. Maulfart (Goblin Lineman) 

#28 Dagadyr (Troll) 

#48 Bop (Goblin Pogoer) 

#67 Chaz Goldensnott (Goblin Hooligan) 

#69 Jean Klean (Goblin  Fanatic - with Ball and Chain ) 

Vera's team - the Shitsberg Stealers. 

I kicked off in the first half... 

Before the ball even landed on the far side of the pitch, Greg the Shitsberg Stealers troll started hammering on #3 Norg the Troll stunning him! 

A trio of Black Orcs from the Shitsberg Stealers ganged up on The Gnarly Green Guys other Troll, #28 Dasgdyr! 

Dasgdyr sprang back up and with the aid of #69 - the ball and chain fanatic - Jean Klean - took down one of the gargantuan Orcs. Bill S. Pestmaim ran into to foul the downed Orc! 

A serious melee ensued mid-field. 

#15 Fungusface - the Goblin Looney - was flailing his Chainsaw all over the place, meanwhile a pair of goblins from the Shitberg Stealers, snuck around the side and made a run for the end zone! 

#28 Dagadyr cut the little goober off and knocked him into the dirt, the ball scattered into the crowd... 

... who threw it out into the middle of the pitch! 

#48 Bop - the Goblin Pogoer - went after the ball... 

... and ended up injured and recovering in the dugout for his troubles. 

#69 Jean Klean - the Goblin Fanatic - drove one of the Shitsberg Stealers Orcs clear off the field with his spinning Ball and Chain ! 

One of the other goblins from the Shitsberg Stealers snatched up the ball and sprinted for the end zone, scoring the first touchdown of the game!! 

Furious and angry, the Gnarly Green Guys just kept beating on the Stealers... 

#28 Dagadyr - one of the Gnarly Green Guys trolls kicked one of the Shitsberg Stealers orcs while they were down and was thrown out of the game for fouling! 

(Whoopsie! Lesson learned! Don't use the big guys for fouling!!!) 

#7 Bill S. Pestmain - Goblin Lineman for the Gnarly Green Guys - grabbed the Stealers kick and quickly passed it to  #48 Bop - the Goblin Pogoer! 

The Goblin Pogoer bounded up the field with the rest of the team trying to clear the way! 

The Goblin Pogoer bounced right over the Stealers goblin lineman! 

The ball was passed off the the Gnarly Green Guys captain, #1 Hotlicks Wobblespot, who ran it in the the goal, tying up the game just as the squigpipes sounded to mark the end of the first half of the game!! 

The Shitsberg Stealers kicked off to the Gnarly Green Guys to start the second half of the game! 

Once again, it was the Gnarly Green Guys' Pogoer, #48 Bop, that took the ball up the field. bouncing past, and OVER, the Shitsberg Stealers defensive line. 

and scored the Gnarly Green Guys second goal, putting them in the lead!! 

The Gnarly Green Guys, roared with delight... and it was now the Shitsberg Stealers that were roaring with frustration and anguish... 

Recieving the next kick-off the Shitsberg Stealers' goblins tore up the field with reckless abandon, and only to be brought down right at the scoring line by the Gnarly Green Guys! 

The Gnarly Green Guys recoved the ball and passed it to their pogoer who, once again, bounded up the field like the mad bastard that he is... but did not make it to the Stealers line before the Squigpipes sounded!!

Vera having a good laugh at the absolute madness of it all! 

we realized after the game, I probably should not have been using both the Fanatic and the Looney throughout the game - as BOTH had illicit weapons that would have required bribing the refs... they accounted for the majority of the Stealers injuries - which included THREE of the orcs AND their TROLL!! 

It was fun to revisit the game after so many decades. Blood Bowl (Second Edition) was probably one of my MOST PLAYED games EVER!! I played SO MUCH of it back in high school. I personally ran two or three leagues, and played in another league or two... plus so many "exhibition matches" between leagues and teaching the game to people at the Wizard's Corner (Saskatoon's first game store - which I'd worked at through high school). I was playing multiple games a few nights a week and more on the weekends... for months... 

It's nice to see how it's evolved... but in many ways is still the same. It's nice that I could, in theory, still play with all the teams I had (or... at least... most of them). 

(I did do some accounting, though, and realized that picking up a pitch and the rules and a set of the dice and tokens to play with current players... would end up costing exactly the same as buying a starter box... which includes all those things - PLUS TWO TEAMS!? - and a SECOND set of the dice!) 

Am I going to buy in and start playing again...? I don't know... I've been wanting to repair and touch-up the old miniatures for ages. There's a part of me that would like to strip and completely repaint and rebase a lot of them... but I also kind of love the old paint jobs and feel a lot of nostalgia for those teams that played so many games back in the day... I'll probably leave them as they are (but maybe clean them up a bit!) 

April Games

 I actually played GAMES in April! 

Well... not until the second half of April (after my projects and final exam were finished!)... and it wasn't a LOT of games... and there were no miniature games... or war-games... but there were still games!? So that's something! 

Saturday, 18 April 2026 

MORGAN actually suggested doing something Saturday evening - which was surprising in itself, as they usually want little to do with us! I can't remember the last time they played a game with us - let alone the last time THEY SUGGESTED playing a game!!

We played a pretty quick game of Carcassonne - with just the base game... Despite Amanda and I splitting a 50-point megalopolis, Morgan ended only a few points behind! I just snuck ahead of Amanda at the end of the game by ruthlessly cutting her out of the farming... 

After wards we played a few games of Retro Loonacy. I won the first game. Morgan suggested we play two more - best two out of three...? It's like they didn't even CONSIDER that Amanda could possibly have won a game... As it turned out Morgan won the second and I won the third. While Amanda very often DOMINATES at a lot of other board games... Loonacy is not one of them. 

Afterwards we all watched a couple episodes of Resident Alien! 

Friday, 24 April 2026

Initially we'd planned to have friends over on Friday to play Wingspan - which we have not played in ages.... Amanda had played it a couple times last year with some of her friends... but I have not played it since June of 2024!? (Despite that, I did finally pick up the latest Americas expansion for Amanda's birthday earlier this month! It is still one of our MOST PLAYED GAMES ever!) 

But there was a late-season snow storm on Friday (THE THIRD ONE in as many weeks!?) so that got cancelled... but since Amanda had slated that time in as "play board game time" I convinced her to give Sagrada a try... 

I picked up Sagrada a while back. It was on sale... I realized later it was probably on sale because there is a slightly newer version out now... but I think it MOSLTY plays the same...? Earlier in the week I'd watched a how to play video. 

While she was eating supper, I tried a couple of quick solo games - the solo play version is very quick and easy enough to play, but difficult to win! I totally didn't read how to determine the target score for the first game so wasn't even remotely close... 49/109

The second game I scored lower... but was closer to the target score... 44/73

After Amanda had finished supper and ran some of the pizza I made over to Morgan who was house-sitting for a friend a few blocks away and busy studying for their final exam for English the following morning... we sat down to try out a game. 

We got part was through the second round and realized Amanda had been doing placement all wrong... (Started in the wrong place... didn't place the next few panes adjacent to already placed panes...) So we called them "practice rounds" and started over again... 

So much fun was had utterly destroying me the first time, Amanda decided we needed to play a second game... which she also won... 

Amanda suggested we bring it on our little vacation together the following week... though I wasn't entirely sure WHEN she was hoping to play as the "vacation" was her going on a work conference and me tagging along for fun... and, looking at the itinerary, I'm pretty sure she was supposed to be doing stuff from 7am-8 to10pm, depending on the day. The spa that the conference was held at seemed an odd choice, considering the very full itinerary, I'm not sure when the participants were supposed to make use of the spa facilities... maybe they figured most of the participants would be men and they'd be  bringing their wives and the wives would want to make use of the spa facilities...? I wasn't entirely sure what **I** was supposed to do for the four days...!?

And again... that was it... 

Maybe next month I'll get out the toys and play with them! Seriously, it's gotten to the point where I'm thinking about solo games again! 

We'll Always Have Paris...

And... maybe Amsterdam...?

So... plans have changed and it seems we may not be travelling to England after all... I've been kind of bummed out about that, as it was the part of the trip I was MOST looking forward to... 

This kind of came about because Paul from Wargaming and Other Distractions (who has been posting lately about a recent Mordhiem campaign you should really go and check out!!) was kind enough to point out that the UK had had some very recent policy changes that we might need to look into regarding dual citizens and entry into the UK... The VERY short version of a long and ridiculous story ends with Amanda being Amanda and deciding to get to the bottom of it, which ended with her speaking to someone in the Home Office in the UK and after GIVING THEM HER NAME AND PHONE NUMBER explained the situation and they said, 'Oh, yeah, you are for sure a dual citizen and will need a British Passport to enter the UK from now on"... 

Unfortunately, Amanda does NOT HAVE a British Passport and we weren't 100% sure she was going to be able to get one in time... so we decided to drop that leg of our planned journey... 

We are still heading to Paris (for Amanda's conference!), and Amanda, not wanting to be short-changed on her vacation time, has decided we need to tack on a visit to AMSTERDAM!? (and a couple MORE days in France!) 

In other news... I am finished school for the term, so hopefully there will be more hobby happenings and a bit more activity on this blog! 

If you want to read about how school went, head on over to the Art Blog:

English Robin on a Brake Cable - a post on the Art Blog about a final project and things I've been up to for the last little bit! 

(I have a couple more books about Canadian battlefields in the Great War inbound, but I'm not sure I'm going to make it to too many... Vimy, for sure, though!) 

Bolt Action - Hungarians Head East!

Last fall... in, like, October...!? Vera and I played a game of Bolt Action. I took a bunch of pictures and planned to do a game report... and this has now been sitting in my drafts for... almost six months...!? 

So I thought maybe to have one less thing in the drafts folder, I'll just go ahead and publish it with minimal commentary! 

I was playing Soviets, Vera was playing a mix of Hungarians and Germans. 

The Soviet force that I used. 

I didn't get a picture of her force.

Hungarian armoured car rolled on and shot up totally hidden snipers, killing the observer... because... that's a thing that happens...? 

Bulk of the Soviet force advancing to meet Hungarians moving through the area. 

More Soviets on the flank. 

Soviet Artillery catches the Hungarians in the open! 

Soviet AT guns light. up one of the Hungarian tanks! Whew! Lacking any armour of my own, it would have been super not great if this tank had been allowed to roll around knocking out my AT guns and then roll around knocking out EVERYTHING else that had no real method of dealing with it! 

Then it was the Soviet's turn to get caught in the open by artillery... probably the Hungarian/Germans... but could be the Soviets... who knows.. 

Soviet right flank takes position in the woods. 

Soviet right flank also taking position in the woods, while AT gunners hide behind their sunshields in the open! 

Super-duper pinned Soviet Sniper just won't leave! 

POW! Soviet AT Gunners light up the Hungarian CV-33! 

Luckily one of the crew was able to bail... 

Hungarians rush the Soviet centre positions supported by an armoured car. 

This roll looks really bad. I have no idea what it was for... probably something important! 

Having suppressed the Germans and Hungarians opposite, Soviets on the right flank move up rushing from one covered position in the woods to another. 

Fire from the Hungarian armoured car and infantry taking its toll on the Soviets in the woods nearby. 

Soviet Infantry on the left flank move to support the center. 

Savage close fighting in the woods between Hungarians and Soviets! 

Soviets on the right flank keeping their opposites pinned down. 

More Soviets rush into the woods to help hold the center of the line! 

AT guns exchange fire with a Hungarian MG team that finally dragged their gun to a firing position in the woods opposite. 

Weight of numbers carries the day in the center! 

Soviet AT Rifle and Hungarian armoured car exchange fire.

The fire-fight on the Soviet right flank intensifies as Hungarian paratroops, who were seriously pinned down in the initial Soviet artillery barrage, finally rallied and made their way through the woods to join the remaining Germans. 

I'm not sure how this ended... seemed like things went well enough for the Soviets...? I have a feeling, though it likely ended up as a draw as so many Bolt Action games have - as you need to be ahead by two or more victory points to claim victory. 

It's been a while, but I still think about digging out some of the WW2 projects started (or pick up again) a year ago... but I find I have limited time these days and so many Age of Sigmar things that are a more pressing concern! We'll get back to it some day!