As the official champion of WINTER MAYHEM 2015, I suppose it is my envious responsibility to do a write up for all to read. If you are not aware, Winter Mayhem is the name of the winter Blood Bowl tournament hosted by the BBLOC – the Blood Bowl League of Calgary. This club has an assortment of very fine coaches who are not only very skilled, but are incredibly welcoming and casually competitive. They set the perfect atmosphere for a weekend of gaming full of dirty jokes, rolling dice, and swapping stories from the turf. If you haven’t taken part in some of their events, you are certainly missing out. Lucky for you that PowTown is only a few months away!

THE BUILD
For me, much of the fun of any tournament is the constant theory-bowl that rattles around in my head as I decide on race, skill choice, and general strategy. The parameters of roster creation were as follows:
Teams receive 1.2 million gold to construct their roster and every team must include a star player included in the 11 player minimum. Rerolls, apothecaries, coaches, cheerleaders, bribes, and fan factor can also be purchased as part of the team.
Skills could be purchased, with different tiered teams getting a different number of points. A tier 1 skill (Block, Frenzy, Kick, Strip Ball, Sure Hands, Dodge, Leader, Guard, Mighty Blow and Claw) would cost you 2 points and all other skills cost 1. Add two points if you would need to roll a double to select it, and an extra point if someone else on the roster already had that skill.
Undead, Wood Elf, Amazon, Chaos Dwarf, and Lizardmen could spend 9 points. Dwarf, Orc, Norse, Dark Elf, and Skaven had 11 to spend. Thirteen points were available to High Elves, Humans, Pro Elves, Necromantic, and Khemri while Slann, Underworld, Chaos Pact, Nurgle, Chaos, and Vampires could access 15 points. The stunty races (Goblin, Halfling, and Ogre) had a whopping 17 points to play with, rounding off the 24 official teams that were available.

THE FIELD
I don’t have unlimited access to races, but I do have Orcs, Humans, Norse, Lizardmen, Dwarf, and Slann miniatures painted up and ready to go. I played Orcs at the 2014 Winter Mayhem tournament and Slann were my aliens of choice for June’s PowTown. I was really tempted by the 4 Blitzer + Griff possibility that the Human’s could offer, but in the end I gave into the lure of ubiquitous block featured by the Norse squads.
Apparently, I wasn’t the only one. In total, out of 18 teams, there were no less than four Norse teams! In addition, the field also included two each of Orcs, Halflings, Khemri, and Human squads. Throw in single entries from Chaos Pact, Necromantic, Dark Elves, Dwarves, Skaven, and Lizardmen, and you get a great tournament! Wilhelm Chaney and Griff seemed popular choices, as was Deeproot. In total there seemed to be quite a lot of bash going around! Not only that, but casualties caused by fouls were being counted towards your total for the weekend. My choice of team with squishy AV 7 was starting to make me nervous.
MY TEAM – THE ASTORIA ICEHAWKS
2x Ulfwerener (220K)  block and block (a total of 2+3 skill points)
2x Blitzers (180K)
2x Runners (180K)  dodge and tackle (2 points for dodge and 1 for tackle)
1x Throwers (70K)  sure hands (2 point)
5x Linemen (250K)  dirty player (1 point)
1x STAR – BOOMER EZIASSON (60K)
3 Rerolls and 1 Apothecary with 10K spent on Cheerleaders
Taking block on both of the Ulfwereners was a no-brainer. It helped me all weekend long and was responsible for several key turnovers in my favour. It was an immediate choice that I never regretted.
I know many people talk about how the Thrower isn’t really worth taking, but he was gold for me. With the addition of Sure Hands, he was a threat to run or throw. I used Sure Hands every drive to either grab the ball on offense or to scoop it up after a turnover.
Dodge, Tackle, and Dirty Player were all moderately useful. Dodge allowed me to keep manoeuvring, tackle helped bring down Griff once, and Dirty Player certainly took a few opponents off the pitch. Nice choices all.
The plan for the apothecary was to use it immediately on the first KO of the match. It helped keep the numbers advantage early in the match. People were surprised that I used it on a KO, but I felt it helped me overall. I really didn’t need a fourth reroll with block on every player, so it gave me a bonus that buffered the low armour value of my players.
With 12 other players, 3 rerolls, and an apothecary already in the bank, Boomer truly felt like an add-on bonus. I liked that he could take a hit, and had the ability to throw an occasional bomb. His job was to muck up the line and if he had the opportunity to fumble a bomb, he would likely take a few people out.
The biggest question in my mind was whether or not to hire the Snow Troll. His assets are well known, but I felt that his inconsistencies were too great to overlook in a tournament format.

THE MATCHES
The tournament itself was scheduled for five matches, three on the Saturday and the final two on the Sunday. My first draw was against “The Hotrockstars” a Lizardman coached by “Handsome” Chris Cameron which featured BOTH Slibili and Hemlock. So much speed and strength directed by a highly competent coach. We exchanged touchdowns, leaving me as defender as the turns sped along through the second half. A valiant goal line stand wasn’t enough though as Chris punch through the Norse like wet tissue paper. I didn’t sustain many casualties in the process, but he had me just about as pinned as an Amish dress. He decided to let the final two turns run down until all I could to was base Hemlock on my goal line. I couldn’t even muster enough movement with my blodgy runner to blitz him! On his turn 8, instead of dodging out with the reroll, he chose to blitz with a saurus that needed a single “go for it” roll to push me away from the ball carrier. Murphy’s Law kicked in like the fluorescent lights at last call, and Chris rolled a one. Of course. He had earned the win but had to settle for a 1-1 tie because of a stall tactic that he had committed to for one turn too long. It’s worth noting that Chris finished 2nd overall with 3 three wins and two ties. The other tie? It was against another Norse team piloted by my brother in a 1-1 game where Chris could have ended it early but chose to stall too long. Live and learn I suppose!
Game two was against the rarest of breed – a girl blood bowler, and a mighty fine coach at that! She was playing Norse with a team named the “F---in’ Broncos”. Unfortunately for Trysch, her armour broke early and often leaving the game out of reach for her. Despite it all, of the three times I faced Wilhelm Chaney, Trysch’s star werewolf gave me fits. He got everywhere and kept running the ball to places I couldn’t reach. I’d like to think that she would have probably beaten me handily if one or two of those armour breaks went against me instead of her. In the end I managed five casualties and three touchdowns on my way to a 3-0 win. Of special note was the fact that Trysch and I actually got to talk models, sculpting, and painting while we played. She is an artist who uses green stuff to customize her models with. I wish more coaches were chill enough to let the dice fall where they may and just have a good conversation while they played.
Saturday rounded off against Ken and his humans, the “XXX Pornstars XXX”. Ken opted for a four blitzer plus Griff build which featured a human catcher. The one glaring omission was the lack of sure hands on his players. His plan was to form a picket fence sideline cage with Griff holding the ball. The catcher would drop back to retrieve the ball and eventually hand it over to the human star player. Ken had a very specific and effective plan – the sign of a good coach. Unfortunately, Ken kept dropping the ball either on the pickup or the catch. He had the speed and the strength to keep Griff safe in that sideline cage, but just couldn’t get him to safety. He had to set up his fence first though, which allowed me a seam to exploit, splitting his team in half. The numbers advantage was too much and Ken’s ladies took four casualties en route to a 3-1 Icehawk victory.
Saturday was kind to me. I ended the day with two wins and a tie with seven touchdowns for and two against. I had also out-casualtied my opponents 9-3. This last part shocked me as my AV 7 was actually holding up. When it did break, I was getting stunned and knocked out instead of maimed. I will be the first to admit that luck was truly on my side. I figured that it couldn’t hold and that I was destined to a rough Sunday. I was in the running for a couple of awards, but I truly didn’t think I had a chance, especially when I found out that my morning draw brought the “Cogswell Cogs” Necromantic team to my door.
Werewolves are fast. Michael had two along with Wilhelm Chaney, rounding out a very effective trio that could stack the pressure on any team. I had played Michael at the last PowTown where his Amazon team tuned my Slann up fairly easily. I wasn’t sure I had much of a shot in this game. It all started quite well for me as he wasn’t able to break my armour in any significant way. The real turning point though was when Chaney grabbed the ball early in the first half. He went at my UIfwerner, blitzing him while he got caught standing near the sideline, thinking that the Norse had werewolves like his. When I told him that we had the same strength and that he should only be rolling one die, you could almost feel fate grab a hold of the dice for him. He rolled a “both-down” result. Now Chaney doesn’t have block, but he does have wrestle. Both players went down and caused a turnover. Soon after, Boomer finally paid some bills and threw a bomb into the middle of five necromantic players. One went off and two others lied prone on the pitch. From there, my dirty player went to town and did as much damage as he could before he got sent off. Control was mine for the rest of the game, where I finished with four casualties, five foul attempts and a score of 2-1. Michael was able to score with one of his werewolves in the dying seconds of the second half despite a serious numbers disadvantage. It was a sobering reminder of just how potent his speedy offense could be and how lucky I was to earn the win. On a side note, Michael won the “Best Painted” award for his converted 40K Necron team. I don’t know enough about his models to tell you all about what they were, but they were as intimidating as heck, with nasty tentacles and pincers and probes galore. Some really nice customized reroll counters and prone/stun markers really separated his models from the rest of the pack.
Remember that brother of mine that I mentioned before? He was also making some noise in his games and had managed to post an identical record to mine – four wins and a tie. We got matched up on the top table, playing for glory and bragging rights at Thanksgivings and Christmases for years to come! The Astoria Icehawks needed to meet their Norse brethren, the “Edmontonville Flesh Eaters”. Justin and I had chatted many a time leading up to the tournament talking about different options and builds. He favours the Snow Troll and chose not to take any Ulfwereners, opting to free up cash to hire Wilhelm. It had worked for him to that point, obviously, but I was hoping beyond hope that the Wild Animal trait might just kick in for me.
The final match was played in sweltering heat, giving us one more issue to contend with. The dice would certainly be a factor in this game. I had to kick off to him though, something I didn’t want to do. I usually like to kick off to the opponent in a typical match. However, Norse are squishy and easily removed from the pitch. If they can get their licks in first, usually it can set the tone for the entire game. After a few rounds of smashing, and an errant bomb from Boomer, I had several men in the KO box and Justin scored. Two turns was all it took. It was looking like a long game was ahead of me, and a longer lifetime of “remember the time...” stories.
My team all came back though and Boomer became the only casualty I gave up in those first two turns. My large bench helped keep me in this game and I was grateful for not spending more on my star. I pushed to the right sideline, forming a bulkhead and pocket that I could sit in. His troll and blitzer based my thrower and downed my own blitzer. Things looked grim until an 2-die uphill block against the snow troll freed my ball carrier enough to advance the ball far enough ahead to be safe. From there, Justin was under pressure to come after me. Two quick turnovers turns in a row from bad blocks left his team on their backs, Justin cursing his luck. I took my time to score, hitting anything that bothered to stand back up. He did have a final shot at me while I stalled, and immediately I thought of Chris. His blitzer could only manage to base me though some ineffective pushes, and I was able to knock him over and step over the line for my first touchdown.
Very soon after, Justin had to kick back to me again. With a slight numbers advantage, I was able to push to the right one more time, scoring again through exploiting blown blocks. By this time, I had turned his thrower with sure hands into a casualty, severely impeding his ability to tie up the game. The final game, a nail biter if there ever was one, was over. A 2-1 victory for me, featuring only two casualties earned versus one casualty suffered. On top of a swanky trophy, I also earned the right to take home a beautiful, custom made, official Winter Mayhem board. It was put together by the very talented Jack from Maelstrom Game Mats. You can look him up on twitter at @mdsgamemats, visit his webpage at Maelstromdesign.ca or email him directly at mgm@maelstromdesign.ca. Really top notch product that had many of us drooling. It is a very significant piece of swag that I will display with pride wherever I have a chance.
In the end, I will admit that I diced my opponents at nearly every turn and somehow managed to avoid the casualty box. I only took four casualties over five games and it made the difference for me. If you can stay on the field, you have a very good chance of winning the game. Lair, the fabulous organizer and extremely talented coach, got his Norse pitch-cleared by some Orcs. If it can happen to Lair, then it could have certainly happened to me just as easily.
In any case, if you are interested in coming on out to a Calgary tournament, the BBLOC guys do a great job. Make some time and join us at PowTown in June or for the next Winter Mayhem where lady luck finally leaves me and I go from champ to wooden spoon wielder!