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Vorian wrote:
Lots of rule changes, seem to be mostly good ones. Love the new humans and griff

How do you know what changes have been made?

They are out there in the BB discords, there's lots of pages from the rulebook leaked.

Agility and Passing being distinct stats seems the most obvious thing.

Blitz and PD changing to 3 + d3 free players moved seems a great change too.

Really not sure adding stat complications is good or necessary at all.
But limiting the benefits of Blitz is better.

Edit; adding extra stats seriously limits the potential of star players unless they rebalance how league levelling works, including the TV prices of upgrades.

Please i need see that new orc team!!

zamerion wrote:
Please i need see that new orc team!!

My guess is that we will see a Warhammer Communite preview within 48 hours.

BB relies more than other GW games on a fairly static ruleset as it's probably the closest to a 'board game' that GW produces at present. Significantly changing the rules are going to lead to a lot of community hand wringing, BB's community is very tightly knit given the tournament scene and how they basically kept it alive for 10-15 years of GW abandoning the game. I can easily forsee a scenario where the NAF ends up having to run both 2016 and 2020 leagues/competitions and it being a massive cluster.

Not sure why they didn't make these changes in 2016 if they thought the game needed updating At least then was a fresh start for the game under GW and they wouldn't have invalidated 4 years worth of Spike magazines/BB rules.

I'm real nervous about this, especially considering how badly proofread and written the generals handbook was. On the plus side the models look good, not that thrilled about seeing orcs again but I guess these teams are beginner friendly.

I really like the current iteration of the game though, and I did want to see chorfs/vamps and the rest of the teams released for the current game. I sure hope I like this new edition....

 Thargrim wrote:
I really like the current iteration of the game though, and I did want to see chorfs/vamps and the rest of the teams released for the current game. I sure hope I like this new edition....

Yeah that's what annoys me themost, if they'd finished off the 2016 teams then I'd have been rather laissez faire about this, as it would mean 2016 could continue to be played with all the teams. Now we're going to end up in a weird split situation, where the only way to play Vamps, High Elves etc in 2016 is with the basic CRP rules that came in the initial 2016 release without them having had the benefit of an update - which is fine but a missed opportunity for those teams.

I've no doubt those teams will be the first to be dealt with in 2020 as all the old plastic kits for the other teams will remain in production (unless GW has gone totally mad) but still.

Also not a fan of the new cover art, I much preferred the 2016 style.

The Bodyguard there makes me think the Human team is the Human Noble team on the 'My dugout' app, which means the Orcs would be the Savage Orc team.

The Savage Orcs never really felt OP to me - heck, the savage orcs mostly trade a point of armour for Frenzy, and the Black Orcs trade a point of armour for Thick Skull.

The Human Nobles though have a positional that's 4x that has Block and Guard to start for 90k gp, and their Catcher is S3 and AV7 and starts with Pro...

We'd have to see the new team roster I guess.

That's probably the source of the leak

https://imgur.com/a/X95RNmk

I quite like the art, similiar to 1st and 2nd edition

Looks like 14 models plus a coach per side in the new starter

Surprisingly I think I see a troll on the board, the pose is the same as the current plastic troll. (I really dislike the pose of this troll) I do see what looks like coaches in blue plastic. Also at least 6 goblin sized units for the orc team. I hope they just unveil this stuff on the community site this week considering how big this leak has been.

Could these new Human/Empire models include a plastic Griff ? Something similiar on the Orc team? Varag? A troll?

I'm actually a bit pissed about this news. I've been playing BB since the mid-90's with 3rd edition, watched it evolve into the game it is today, and have enjoyed playing in numerous tournaments over the years. It is a fantastic game that was neglected by GW for some time and the fans really kept it alive and improved upon the rules without any support from GW.

Then three years ago or so the "new" GW decided to bring back the game with all new models. While I was not a fan of the move to larger miniature bases, requiring larger game boards, for the most part the rules were copied from the Living Rulebook at the time that had been kept alive and refined by the fans. BB was in a good place with renewed support and the new edition did help bring in some players which is always a good thing.

But now GW has gone beyond a few gradual refinements. From the pictures I have seen, players all have a new "passing" characteristic, skills have been changed, and team positionals' costs have been adjusted, sometimes dramatically (and why the move to increments of 5k gold GW?).

While I expect a new edition of 40k every couple years, BB is a game that really should be left untouched other than only minor refinement tweaks when deemed necessary (ex. Piling On requiring a reroll was a good change IMO; same with Human Catchers decreasing in cost). This strikes me as another GW cash grab, and I hope the fans and organizations like the NAF really think twice before adopting these new, unproven rules.

There looks like there's a big guy for the Humans in the middle there, too. The Human Noble team from the dugout app could take two ogres, so idk?

Just in case anyone was curious and hadn't seen it yet, the noble team is:



Though it looks like the Noble (whatever) player says Noble Blitzer, so maybe the Blitzer will replace the princeling as another 0/4 piece with the thrower being 0/2? Or maybe takes the Ogres out as well.

Ogre looks pretty weak. Did they change how strength works with the latest edition? From what I remember, ogre-sized players were S6. S4 was for BOs, CWs etc.

Sorry guys, it's all my fault. I was thinking today how affordable and easy to play Blood Bowl was for a GW product, and my heresy has prompted GW to action...

2020 continues to suck.

Highly doubt GW would have the talent to write a good rule for the new edition.

Wondering if the new boards and templates will be the same size as bb 2016.

I don't think the scale changed so the board and templates are likely the same. They look the same size in the images. The dugouts are definitely smaller this time around. I am worried the inclusion of big guys will drive the cost up. If it drives the cost up past 140 bucks then I can't see this box selling that great. The current starter is 115 USD.

I'm not so sure on the ruleset changes......the current ruleset is fine (though admittedly I feel it takes too long to play a full game, which is why I generally play 7s or Blitz Bowl). If they can recreate the experience if the current game in a time frame that is closer to 60-75 minutes I would be on board.

I think the Humans looks excellent though, and regardless of what happens with the new rules at the very least I will pick up the humans for 7s and Blitz Bowl duty.

I can see them going for $140-$150 based on their recent products. Hooray for the new GW.

 Thargrim wrote:
I don't think the scale changed so the board and templates are likely the same. They look the same size in the images. The dugouts are definitely smaller this time around. I am worried the inclusion of big guys will drive the cost up. If it drives the cost up past 140 bucks then I can't see this box selling that great. The current starter is 115 USD.

That is a good point, if they try to charge as much for this as say the Warcry starter that was loaded with terrain I could not see it really selling.


Also, and I know this weird to say this.....but I am seriously wondering if this leak was intentional by GW. The reason I say that is that it was digital Gen-Con this weekend and we say a bunch of previews for Legion, X-Wing, Marvel Crisis Protocol, etc....and I wouldn't be that surprised for GW to drop something like this in attempt to get people's attention back to them.

I've often thought leaks like this are sometimes part of a marketing plan. Not sure if my memory is failing me but usually they have shown things at gencon, this time around I don't believe they were present.

But yeah if this costs as much as the warcry set i'll be astounded. Only way this will work out is if the big buys are discounted as part of the box and are more or less free. Plus this rulebook is hardback, unlike the one in the current starter.

As for how long this game takes to play, I see little in the leaks that suggests it'll be any quicker. It's mostly a slight modernization of the rules. Some parts of the game might be a bit smoother but it's still 16 turns for each player.

JWBS wrote:
Ogre looks pretty weak. Did they change how strength works with the latest edition? From what I remember, ogre-sized players were S6. S4 was for BOs, CWs etc.

Normally Big Guys are Strength 5, so yeah a Strength 4 Ogre is a little underwhelming.
Hoping for a typo considering a Str4 player with a nega-trait like Bone-head is an incredibly poor choice.

Only str 6 players I recall was the halfling/wood elf treeman, a STR 4 ogre is underwhelming...unless the ogre for this human team is now cheaper. A cheaper ogre that takes up less team value and can take skills without causing bloat could still be useful. But it does mean they lose some initial muscle at the start of a league. a +STR stat increase also now adds much more cost to the players value than it did before. I think it was something like 80k.

 Thargrim wrote:
I've often thought leaks like this are sometimes part of a marketing plan. Not sure if my memory is failing me but usually they have shown things at gencon, this time around I don't believe they were present.

But yeah if this costs as much as the warcry set i'll be astounded. Only way this will work out is if the big buys are discounted as part of the box and are more or less free. Plus this rulebook is hardback, unlike the one in the current starter.

As for how long this game takes to play, I see little in the leaks that suggests it'll be any quicker. It's mostly a slight modernization of the rules. Some parts of the game might be a bit smoother but it's still 16 turns for each player.

I hope that they will realize that this is a specialist game and charging as much as the other starters (that have a bunch of terrain/etc) wouldn't exactly make it fly off the shelves. Especially as most of the Blood Bowl players I know are quite happy with the current ruleset and most tournaments out there are run independently of GWs involvement. If the box is 125 I wouldn't consider that too outrageous......any more is too much in my opinion.

Just glancing over things I think you are right, it doesn't look like the game appears to be much shorter, which is a bit of a bummer to me. I often have a hard time fitting in a full game of Blood Bowl and I think many players are in a similar position. Looking at a few summary lists overall the changes look pretty decent though and I'd be willing to give this edition a shot.

 Vain wrote:

JWBS wrote:
Ogre looks pretty weak. Did they change how strength works with the latest edition? From what I remember, ogre-sized players were S6. S4 was for BOs, CWs etc.

Normally Big Guys are Strength 5, so yeah a Strength 4 Ogre is a little underwhelming.
Hoping for a typo considering a Str4 player with a nega-trait like Bone-head is an incredibly poor choice.

Whoops, you are right, the Ogre is supposed to be S5 and I made an error.

Surprised to see much negativity, people are talking as if blood bowl were a perfect game. There were problems with it and most changes seem pretty good.

The biggest seems to be the passing, but allowing Agility players to be Agility players and throwers to be throwers just seems sensible.

On almost any team that had throwers available they were at best a mediocre choice and at worst never to be taken. Now they have a role.

Changes to kick off events just tone down how much of a swing they introduce and given how much they are complained about, I can't imagine many people don't like this nor the fact they will stop having their players killed by rocks.

Outside of those, the changes (that we know about) aren't particularly big. The core of the game will remain pretty much the same.

Chopstick wrote:
Highly doubt GW would have the talent to write a good rule for the new edition.

Well, according to the late-2018 gaffe by Cyanide Games, they’ve been working together on this and there will be a Computer Blood Bowl to go with it.