Hi guys and gals,
I have had the idea of converting Blitzball from Final Fantasy X into a miniatures game for some weeks now, to bridge the gap between my friends love of the game and my love for miniatures. The discussion came up from when me and a group of friends were discussing BB and how much it sucks that we can't play against each other, so I said I would work on creating some rules to turn it into a miniatures game so we
can play against each other and have a ton of fun doing so!
I haven't really given it much in depth thought or even typed anything up yet as it is very early in the planning stages. So with that I thought about posting it here, where I can get imput, ideas and help from those who are interested on my favourite hang out, Dakka.
This is purely for fun, I won't be mass producing the rules or making any money out of it, so this will completely be a community project.
As no minis exist for BB eventually I'll be looking to find something suitable to convert to represent players and the actual ball. So, lets see what I have so far in the ideas department.
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Blitzball is played in a giant dome filled with water with six players on either side, a keeper, two defenders and three forwards. Like most sports games, the aim is to score more goals than your opponent. Each player in a team has a statline which consists of Hitpoints, Speed, Endurance, Attack, Passing, Block, Catch which determine what each player excels at and in which area they are weaker. These stats each have a value (exactly like our beloved wargames). So a typical statline would look like this:
Svanda
Hp Sp En
Atk Pa Bl Sh Ca
100 60 10 10 15 14 14 8
HP - How much stamina the player has. The more a player does whilst with the ball or using special abilities the more her
Hp will drop. So those with a higher
Hp will be able to play longer and contribute more to the game.
SP - How fast a player is.
EN - How tough a player is. This comes into play when a character is tackled, if this number drops to 0 from a tackle, then they lose the ball and the opposing team now has possession.
ATK - How hard a player hits when tackling. This number can be increased with special abilities and directly paired against the opponents EN.
PA - A players skill when passing. Obviously the bigger the number, the further a player can pass the ball. As Blitzball in in a giant dome of water, when working out if a pass is successful, water resistance factors in here, slowing the pass down.
BL - How well a player can block the ball. Compared against the
PA and
SH skills, if successfully blocked, then you gain possession of the ball.
SH - How accurate, powerful a players shots at goal are. The higher this number the more likely a shot will score a goal. Again, water resistance lowers this number as it travels across the dome.
CA - Directly related to gaol keepers. This is their ability to stop the ball when it's hurtling towards them.
When all of these are used, there is also a random factor behind the scenes that adds or subtracts numbers from these stats, meaning that you can never be 100% sure if whatever you''re trying will succeed. So, how will these play over into a miniatures game? The basics are already there,
ATK vs END,
SH vs
CA ect, that is pretty self explanatory. It is what is built upon this basic method that is going to determine the games fun for me, my friends and any of you that follow along and decides to give this a go.
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I figured that working on the players before movement, board ect would be the best choice. So I'll start there. The stats of each player need to be part of the game and make each moment exciting and not having players disregard one stat as worthless because it doesn't do as much in-game. So, here is my thought on how each of them could work on the table;
HP - As in the video game, this will be used when special abilities are activated reducing the hitpoints as a cost to lay them. Perhaps once the
HP drops below a certain level, other stats begin to degrade too for example:
HP drops below 1/2, the player loses 2 points from their endurance or speed. This represents the player getting fatigued. Each turn, the
HP could restore a certain amount if a played doesn't have the ball to represent the player not exerting himself as much. This could further be developed by the idea of if a opposing played is within two squares (squares for now) then the
HP doesn't restore as much as the played doesn't get to rest, she's having pressure put on her.
SP - This will be dropped to single figures, with 6 being the average. My initial thoughts on this is that a player will be able to move, pass and finish movement to give the impression of moving and then finding a better position after they have passed the ball. A few tactical options could open up with this feature. Moving into base to base with a opponent will initiate a tackle.
EN - Very basic. When being tackled, compare this with your opponents
ATK and whoever has the highest number at the end of the tackle, is the winner and either retains the ball or gains possession. I could put a +D3/
D6 onto this to give weaker players that small chance they will survive a confrontation.
ATK - As above. Compare with opponents EN and whoever has the highest, wins. IF a D3/6 is added to the EN when receiving a tackle, then this will also need the addition otherwise defending could be to overpowered for attackers to get through.
PA - This, along with movement will make it the most tactical aspect of the game. Passing in its basic form will be passing the ball a number of squares equal to a players
PA stat to another player. The decision to have water resistance will all depend on this I think, as low levelled player will have shorter pass ranges, meaning that the ball won't be able to be passed as far until later games, meaning less tactical plays and bunching players together (Which I'm thinking, will give support to tackles and thing). Passes and shots can be blocked by players being in base-to-base contact with their full
BL stat and players that are in the path of a passed balls will be able to attempt to block with a slightly decreased
BL stat.
There is also the option of having a players
PA stat increased to tackle the water resistance problem but I can think about that at a later date, basics for now.
BL - As above. Used when blocking a pass or shot to the goal. As above, can attempt to block if a mini is in the path of a passed or shot ball.
SH - Directly compared against a keepers
CA stat when the ball reaches them. There will be no restrictions on who can shoot or where from.
CA - Only used by keepers, this will be compared to an attackers final
SH stat too see if a keeper can successfully keep a ball out of the goal. There is also the chance that a keeper may only block the ball and not actually catch it in the video game. Not sure how this can be represented on the table but is defiantly something to think about.
So that is the very basic idea of how the stats can work with each other in game to give a sense of skill amongst players. But these are open to any changes you can think of and any that pops into my head over the coming weeks (They will change, it's inevitable)
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And the final part for now is how to draft a team. I love
TCGs, it is what got me into wargaming as my
FLGS (When it was open) sold both Pokemon and Warhammer, so every weekend when I'd play Pokemon at the store, time between games had me ogling pretty models and winning a tournament (With my all grass poison and paralysis deck) got me a shiny voucher that I spent on a Space Marine Attack Bike.
Anyway, my idea was to have a Gil system. Each player will have a stat card and a ranking of Basic, Intermediate and Professional to show their starting skills and abilities. At the start of a season, a coach is dealt five face down basic players and that wil be their team. If they don't like the players they have, they can choose to use Gil to buy more face down cards and hopefully get better players or by more experienced players to give them a Star player. In theory this could add a real sense of randomness but also a little control t build a team and with the option of earning more Gil during the season (Not sure how yet) and the ability to sell players, could end up a very in depth management system to go alongside the table.
Of course all this is sstuff I have just thought of, typed up and hit submit, so questions, ideas, rants, hate is all welcome!!
There is much more to come, so stay tuned.
Finalized rules.
