Hi gang,

As much as I’d love to think that I have > 300 ‘friends’, I know that many of you have added me to make sure you catch news about upcoming online NAF events. With this in mind, I thought that a blog would be a good place to mention that as of the end of the RTTNAFC (this time next week and playoffs, essentially), I am handing the organisational reigns over to Twelfman. You might want to ‘friend’ him and look out for his announcements in blogs and elsewhere. For those of you that don't know Alex, he's relatively new to FUMBBL but very keen, and he's been doing some good work for the NAF of late. I’m sure he’ll drive online tournaments forward to bigger and better things!

I’ve had a great time and a lovely run looking after the online NAF project, but there has always been a large team behind the scenes helping me out. Hopefully you’ll indulge me if I thank some of them publically, as I think this has been a great example of a volunteer community effort making a cool thing happen. Shoutouts ahoy!

Christer / Kalimar: When I first approached Christer more than three years ago with the idea of running a Road to the NAFC style tournament on FUMBBL, I was pitching for (and expecting) a progression, RRR type of thing in [L], or in my wildest dreams [R], that I could publicise on the front page. That BigC was open to something more and then put the time and effort into coding all that you can now see and do is fantastic, and none of it happens without his permission and hard work. He has also been exceptionally patient with me when I’ve not understood or broken something along the way, for which I’m very grateful. ;) Thanks also to Kalimar for some early client coding that let us run bits of rulesets in the way that we have.

NAF committees, past and present: I imagine it was seen as a bit of an unknown or a risk to do this in the early days, so many thanks to those on Beppe and latterly Sann’s watch for letting us do it and basically having the confidence to let me get on with it with little fuss. We’ve also had lots of advertising via official NAF media channels, so thanks to various media types for the exposure. I know that online rankings are still on the NAF agenda, so for those of you that are keen on those, please be patient with the team, they are thinking about them! :)

Staff: Joemanji / Geggster were an invaluable early sounding board (this was all Joe’s idea to begin with as an ex-NAFC organiser), and as time has gone along, the online NAF staff have done a fantastic job of sharing the burden of forfeits and generally keeping the thing ticking over. easilamused, Prez, Chavo, happygrue, pythrr and spubbbba have all got other online / BB responsibilities of one sort or another, but they’ve found time to also be a great help to me. Thanks, guys!

Community help: WhatBall did us a lovely logo, gjopie was a whizz that helped with the group page coding and Wreckage produced a brilliant team tournament leaderboard. Many of you have contributed ideas, fluff and generally been really engaged with the whole thing. Thanks.

Real life TOs: We’ve has some excellent quality Blood Bowl stuff to give away over the past couple of years. In exchange for a bit of advertising, the donated prizes we’ve been given have been awesome. Free tickets, pitches, dice, all of that stuff, it’s been really helpful. I’m glad you’ve trusted me / us with your good names.

Participants: Thanks to anyone that has played in an online NAF tournament, or recommended us to a friend, on your local forum, whatever. Playing Swiss, resurrection BB online over six weeks is different to either your normal FUMBBL or TT BB experience, and it’s cool that so many of you gave us a go.

Anyone I’ve forgotten: I am an idiot, apologies!

No-one ever volunteers their free time to help out to get thanks or ‘credit’ (and they’d quickly realise that it’s an error if they did), but I do really appreciate the help I've mentioned above, wherever it has come from.

When the RTTNAFC draws to a close, I’m going to take a little bit of a FUMBBL holiday. Between keeping online NAF ticking over, editing the GLN, running a league and the other little jobs I’ve done over the past few years, I’m experiencing a bit of cumulative burn out. I hardly play these days and I’ve taken to feeling that the site is work when I load it up, rather than play. I’m sure that will pass swiftly, and you’ll see me looking for a game soon enough. I’m looking forward to getting the buzz back.

I’m really happy that the online NAF thing has been a success so far. I feel like we’ve increased the profile of the NAF, tournaments and ‘real life’ BB online (perhaps one or two more of you have picked up a miniature in anger as a result). I hope we've also bought previously tabletop only coaches to the site to play. I know one or two have them have stuck and are really getting deeply into all of the BB FUMBBL has to offer, which is ace. I’ve no doubt Twelfman is going to absolutely smash it and break new ground with the format, and I look forward to experiencing it as a punter when he does.

Many thanks!

Phil / Goo.