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Pirate Teams

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Pirates

Long Drongs Slayers

Black Ark Corsairs

Ogres

Captain


Famous Teams
Sartosa Spleenrippers who were first mentioned in Blood Bowl magazine 101. Salty Sea Dogs and Reefwald Mermen both featured in BB Magazine issue 6

Background
The island of Sartosa lies just off the coast of Tilea. At one time it was a peaceful place whose Tilean inhabitants farmed the lands and led an idyllic life. Over the years as the great oceans of The World filled with pirates of every race Sartosa found itself at the centre of great naval battles. Corsairs from Araby plundered the island, then Undead hordes, Norse, Dark Elf Black Ark Corsairs and Long Drong’s Slayers Pirates all ran amuck on the small island.

After war all but vanished from The World the few remaining pirates all gravitated towards Sartosa and made it their home. To say it is a peaceful place now though would be wide of the mark. The taverns are always full, and the streets are plagued with thieves and treacherous, murderous denizens. Undead ships from the Vampire Coast still try and invade the island from time to time, but the once great enemies all unite to drive away the Undead hordes.

Bloodbowl had been played by the pirates of all races for years, though they used to play at sea; when one ship boarded another the crew would play a version of Bloodbowl known as All At Sea and the winner would make off with the other ships treasures.

Once settled on the island the Pirates of Sartosa later played a smaller version of the game known as Dune Bowl, each in their individual races. Ogre teams, Norse teams, Araby Teams, Dwarf, Dark Elf and so on. But when the Undead Pirate ships came back the races would unite, taking the best Dune Bowl players from each team and form a Pirates of Satosa team to beat the Undead interlopers in to submission. Now Pirates of Sartosa teams can be found throughout The World combining the greatest pirates that ever sailed the seas each led by one captain who has the unenviable task of trying to keep this motley crew from slitting each other’s throats in their sleep and making off with their teammates treasures.

Rationale
This was for me one of the hardest rosters to get right and to be honest I am still not totally happy with it. I wanted to draw inspiration from the All At Sea and Dune Bowl articles from BB magazine 5, 6 and 7, as well as drawing from the existing fluff in the Warhammer world. So the linemen are basically Araby Corsairs, so share the same statline as the Bedouin from the Araby list. Long Drong’s Pirate Slayers were a must, and they were kept the same as those from the Slayers team. After reading as much as I could find about Sartosa I found the the Black Ark Corsairs (a dark elf pirate) also plundered the small island numerous times in its past so they were included. I kept their stats in line with the Warhammer unit’s fluff, slightly faster than normal Dark Elves, though I reduced their Av to 7 for fear of the team being too good. The Pirates often hire Ogre mercenaries as shipsmates to help with the heavy lifting etc… on board the ship and this fluff can be traced through Dreadfleet as well so they were included. I also gave all the positionals Animosity as although they are working on the same team these different races would never trust each other so that felt fitting. This left me with the tricky task of choosing the Pirate Captains skills. I felt Leader was a must have skill but after that I was fairly stuck. Having read everything pirate related that GW has produced it seems their depiction of captains (with the odd exception) was always extremely tough players, so I went with GS access and St 4 to represent a battle hardened warrior.

Season 2 Changes
Pirates played 450 games with a win percentage of 55%. The team is performing as a tier 1 team, no change required. Although I suspect they are punching above their weight and with a greater number of games played their stats will see them move to the Tier 1.5 range.

Season 3
579 games played with a win percentage of 55%. This is performing as a tier 1 team still. The team was meant to be tier 1.5 however the 2 elves in the roster are likley elevating this roster above its expected level. I will not lock this in just yet incase it is too good, though I suspect everything is fine.

Season 4
with 601 games being played this year and a win percentage of 57% I am happy with how the team is performing, a large number of the games this year were also by 1 team that is performing way above the others in terms of win percentage, I am happy there is no problem with this roster and it is now locked.

Team design, rationale and background by Garion
Player art by Knut Rockie coloured by Garion
Icons by Neubau, harvestmouse & Cowhead