My own personal #1 rule about throwing is don't throw the ball on your first turn unless the current carrier is in a dangerous situation or the ball will be safe when it arrives at it's destination. As with everything, there can be exceptions, which you'll learn with experience.

#2 rule: don't assume that the pass will go exactly where you want it to (even when using elves). I've seen a number of times when the throw is fumbled, and the opponent easily gets the ball. If possible, try to have some kind of safety net for a) fumbled throws, and b) inaccurate throws. (of course this isn't always practical).

#3 rule: Try to keep your throws as short as practical. Remember, even though diagonal movement costs the same as horizontal or vertical movement, passing ranges are calculated using the actual distance. Also, sometimes you might want to go for it to reduce the pass range+ category - you'll have to learn that for yourself.




please note: these rules are like the pirates code, as mentioned in the film "pirates of the Carribean": they're more like guidelines. There are times when you'll need or want to break them, but you'll learn when those situations are from experience.

When receiving the kickoff, if the opposition has a player within range of retrieving the ball, try to move a player next to the ball (preferably in front of) the ball BEFORE attempting to pick it up. This is a safety measure, and some teams need it more than others. As a general rule if your retriever is ag3 or less and doesnt have sure hands, you should take care.

Unless your ball carrier is VERY unlikely to fall over, try not to use him to blitz or block - it's usually a risk you don't have to take, and because he will drop the ball, the opponent will just be able to pick it up, and then you've got to defend when your team is set up to attack.

One thing i see newbies diong more than i think they should is just running one catcher though a hole they make in an opponents line. This leaves him very succeptable to being blitzed and knocked down, and so he can't receive the ball without moving first.
My personal suggestions are as follows. I think there are tree main ways to send catchers through a hole you've broken.
The first is to send multiple potential catchers through the hole you've made. Because he only gets one blitz, he can only knock down one of your catchers. He can however, surround, or at least put TZs on the others, making you either have to catch with penalties, or move first, meaning you can'm move once he has the ball. The following method is one solution.
When you send your catcher through the hole, move other players through as well, but move them so that they prevent the opponent from blitzing your catcher. Make sure not to be base to base with the opposing players, unless the opponent can't blitz through if your guy gets blocked.

The third option is to move your catcher through with a cage around him. In the previous method you're guys were close to his, whereas in this, they're close to your catcher. In one sense this is the stronger of the two, however, if the opponent blitzes your cage you'll either have to block that player away, or dodge with your catcher.

You only get one blitz per turn, so use it wisely. When planning your turn (yes, you should be planning most of what you'll do) you need to work out what you want your blitz to do. There are numerous different things to do with a blitz, depending on the situation.


Offence Blitz Moves:
- Punch a hole in the opponent's line to move through
- Blitz to roll yuor cage forward


Defensive Blitz moves:
- Blitz the opponent's ball carrier
- Blitz to try to put tackle zones on the opponent's ball carrier
- Blitz your opponent's catcher if it's likely the ball will be thrown to them


Blitz moves to do any time:
- Blitzing a player into the crowd (remember to move away again, otherwise you might also get pushed into the crowd)
- Blitzing to set up a block (possibly into the crowd)
- Blitzing to try to knock down a key opposing player or to tie up another of their players
- Blitzing to free up one of your key players (such as a catcher, the ball carrier, or a player with a sick skill)

(if anyone has any more suggestions for this list, please PM me)

Important note:
I personally feel that blitzing with big guys is generally not a great idea. All big guys have some restriction which means that there is a chance they won't take their action this turn. In the case of a blitz, this uses up your only blitz for the turn. Also, not many big guys have block, and none of them can use a team reroll, so they tend to fall over a lot, which ends your turn.
On the upside however, they're usually your strongest player, and so will get 2 or even 3 dice to choose from, making them quite effective blitzers even without assists from your other players.

I believe Block is the most useful skill because:
a) it's available to almost any player
b) it will save you a lot of rerolls (and frustration)
c) it makes one dice blocks far more reliable
d) it can be very effective for knocking down opponents
e) it makes your guy harder to knock down



When choosing skills for your players I would suggest that you look at http://fumbbl.com/skills.php to see what other coaches select as their first skills for their players. The majority of the coaches on this site are quite good, and generally have a pretty good idea of how to play the game well. The skills that rank highly (for your team's race) are generally good skills for you to choose.
You will notice that block ranks very highly in most lists. There are of course exceptions: Dwarves and Norse already have block on most players, and goblins, halflings, skinks and big guys can't access block unless they roll a double on their skill roll.

As a generalisation, positional players cost more than linemen, so having too many positional players will leave you with not much money to buy important things like rerolls and fan factor.

I personally don't like Big Guys too much, especially for starting teams. They cost a lot, which means that you don't have as much money for the rest of your team (including rerolls and Fan Factor), and they're unreliable. All big guys suffer from some kind of stupidity, which means that they won't always do what you want them to. Plus they can't use team rerolls, so if they fail something, your turn is over.

While new players can be bought after you first game, rerolls cost double! So you might as well buy them when they're cheap - you'll need them eventually anyway.

Rerolls can be used by almost anyone in your team no matter what they're trying to do - a goblin blocking a treeman, or a Mummy attempting a really long pass to score. In that sense they're more better than skills like block or pass. The exception is Big Guys, who can't use team rerolls at all.

Fan factor has a huge effect on the game of bloodbowl. It may seem like a waste of money, but on average every 10,000 you spend on fan factor will be re-earned in 6 games (of course it's not quite this simple, but not far off).
You don't need fan factor 9, anything above 5 is pretty good - use it to even out your spending so you make the most of your starting cash.
The extra money you win is very important to teams with expensive and/or fragile players, such as ogres (expensive), halfings (fragile), and elves (both).
Fan Factor also affects kickoff table rolls. Four off the 11 kickoff table results are affected by fan factor, so whoever has the higher fan factor is more likely to get a beneficial result.

If I had to use one word to sum up the art of blocking it would be "assists". These are incredibly important! Read the section on "Assisting A Block" in the Living Rulebook (page 21). If you watch a replay of two good bloodbowl coaches playing, you will probably see more than 50 assists in a single game.

In my opinion, it is usually far better to throw one block with two dice than two blocks with one dice. You have a better chance of knocking the opponent down, and there is far less risk of your player going down.

I'm not going to go into depth here, because it's covered fairly well in the Living Rulebook. Keep in mind though, that you won't learn everything about assists just from reading the book, you'll have to play a few games.

One thing a LOT of newbies do (and i did it too - still do) is making their make-or-break move first.
If it works, then that's great, but if it doesn't, you could leave the opponent open to score, or get the ball off your guy.

I know new players have a lot to take in, and that sometimes your excitement will get the best of you, but i think you should try to compose yourself and do your safe moves first.

The reason this is so important is that your turn ends as soon as you fail a dodge, ball pickup attempt, one of your players falls over in a block, or you try a pass which lands on the ground.

1) stand up guys on the ground if they're not going to blitz or dodge away.
2) Make any moves which don't require any dice rolls. (this includes setting up assists)
3) Now you have to weigh up between your important actions, and your fairly safe actions. Eg. you might have two actions available to you: a 2dice block using a guy with block, or a one dice blitz on the ball carrier. You will need to learn where to draw the line (and you will in time).
4) consolidation actions. Eg. If you knocked the ball free of it's previous carrier, you might want to put some tackle zones on it if you can. This will make it harder for the opponent to pick it up.
5) fairly risky moves. (this inludes one dice blocks, 2+ dodges etc which aren't very important).
6) rediculous moves (eg 2dice against blocks, 5+(or worse) dodges etc).
I actually think that a lot of the time you shouldn't eve try these. You're usually better off having your guy prevent the opponent's player from moving freely.