This article was written for a previous version of the Blood Bowl rules and has some outdated information in it. You might still find it contains some useful information.
There is now an an updated Blood Bowl 2020 Second Season Amazon Starting Rosters article.
Amazon Starting Roster Overview:
Amazon teams are blessed with cheap players who are hard to knock over. This makes them one of the more effective teams at low team values. Their team rerolls are also cheap which also helps along with all the team skill rerolls. Your choices really are if you want to start with more rerolls or more players and there isn’t much really in the way of starting the team that you have to decide to start without.
Reroll Heavy TV1000 Amazon Starting Roster:
| Quantity | Player / Item | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| 5 | Linewomen | 250k |
| 1 | Thrower | 70k |
| 1 | Catcher | 70k |
| 4 | Blitzers | 360k |
| 4 | Rerolls | 200k |
| 1 | Apothecary | 50k |
| Total | 1,000k |
This is my favoured starting roster for an Amazon team as I like starting with a lot of rerolls. The team has eleven players and also an Apothecary which is a pseudo twelfth player. You could elect to have another Linewoman instead, though the Apothecary can save you the cost of one of you more expensive positional players.
Starting with all four Blitzers is really a must in my opinion, they are the core of the Amazon team and starting with both Block and Dodge is great. Their strength skill access is also the most important on the team, so having them from the outset gives the maximum time to generate SPP.
As you start with four rerolls, you could just max the team out with Linewomen up to the needed eleven. You do have 40k left over from doing that though which will let you upgrade two of them to Throwers or Catchers as you see fit. There are arguments for starting with both Throwers, both Catchers or one of each. Early on though you will want to score with your Blitzers to get Guard as soon as possible. Which is more effective to start with between Throwers or Catchers really doesn’t make much difference because of that.
You could also drop the Apothecary which would let you afford all the positional players, though I being able to save the cost of a Blitzer from game one is more valuable in my opinion and you can also use it to save a player from a KO if you wanted to risk that.
Player Heavy TV1000 Amazon Starting Roster:
| Quantity | Player / Item | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| 6 | Linewomen | 300k |
| 1 | Thrower | 70k |
| 1 | Catcher | 70k |
| 4 | Blitzers | 360k |
| 3 | Rerolls | 150k |
| 1 | Apothecary | 50k |
| Total | 1,000k |
This is really a slight variation from the previous roster in that you exchange a reroll for an extra reserve, giving you twelve players and an Apothecary. Unfortunately you are 10k short of getting one more players so I would use that leftover 40k to upgrade two Linewomen into a Thrower and a Catcher. I think one of each is handy to have in case you need to do a quick score. The Pass and Catch skill rerolls could be critical to have, especially as you have given up one of your team rerolls for that extra player.
While I personally prefer the four reroll roster, this one does have more merit if joining into a league where you are playing more developed teams. You can use your inducements to get an extra team reroll and that extra player is more likely to be needed as well. You could get even more players by dropping a Blitzer though I think this would be a mistake, the team performs so much better when you have them all at your disposal.
TV1000 Amazon Starting Roster Summary:
I’ve given the two main starting options for the Amazon team, there are minor considerations for each, mainly to do with the Thrower or Catchers and it is really down to personal preference. There aren’t really many other teams that can start with a lot of rerolls and in effect twelve or more players. Due to this Amazon teams are probably one of the most straight forward and easy teams when it comes to deciding what you want to start with.
Wow, I would not have expected this. For me the only way to start with an Amazon team is:
4x Blitzers (90) = 360
2x Catchers (70) = 140
2x Throwers (70) = 140
3x Linewomen (50) = 150
4x Rerolls (50) = 200
Total = 990
With 10k banked for an Apo
If you want to be safe, switch one Reroll for the Apo, but I see no reason not to take all the positionals at the start, since you can easily do so and they’re better than linewomen in every way.
The thought behind it is that an Apothecary can save you the cost of a Blitzer. Having the extra Pass or Catch doesn’t really make that much difference early on either when you are usually going to be concentrating on scoring with the Blitzers. Those extra positionals on the pitch also increases the likelihood that one of them gets injured too!
Starting that way your next purchases are going to be the Apothecary and then some more Linewomen, so starting with those extra Linewomen and the Apothecary isn’t like you are starting with players you are going to want to get rid of later like with some other teams. At the end of the day though it is just my personal preference, if something different works for you then by all means stick with it.
I think a lot of it comes down to the sort of league. If you’re going into the Perpetual leagues like in FUMBBL or Cyanide, it makes no sense to go with the Apoth as you always can burn the team if things go bad too soon.
I think that would be a good thing to touch up on the articles if you revisit stuff for BB2, as that will bring an influx of new blood I’m imagining.
Any chance of an article on the Brettonian Team for BB2? I know it’s a bit early as we still don’t know how similar it will be to the various concepts that have been floating around for awhile.
Regarding BB2 perpetual leagues I heard an interresting concept on keeping the TV artificially low.
A linewoman with 1 skill (block/wrestle) is still cheaper then a Blitzer, so maybe only take 1 killer blitzers and ditch the rest will safe you 120 to 60K. That can be an interesting inducement.
I see your point, and if I knew my first game was going to be v.s. some heavy bashing team, I might reconsider my starting lineup, but even then, I think the extra thrower and catcher are going to be worth it.
None of your players is very fast, so you’re fairly easily outpositioned; with both throwers & catchers, that’s less likely. In addition, having only one of each means your opponent has to get rid of only two players to seriously disrupt your offence.
The Amazon offence is typically caging the ball and running it. Passing doesn’t play a big part in that at least the way that is typically recommended and how I play them.
Personally, I like to take advantage of the cheap re-rolls;
4 Blitzers – 360k
7 Lineswomen – 350k
5 Re-rolls – 250k
40k – Banked to guarantee you an Apothecary after the first game.
If you find yourself in a situation where you are forced into the passing game, the re-rolls offset the lack of pass or catch, but also come in handy for caging and shutting down the opponents offence.
I can see some merit to that. What I will bring up about it though is that you have a Dodge reroll on every player and four players with Block. Do you really need five rerolls? I imagine there are a lot of times you don’t use them all up, though getting outnumbered is a more likely issue due to the low armour.
Me, I don’t see a reason to build a team with more than 3 rerolls. If you have extra money, get that apo.
One Thrower can be useful in the long run as an extra option, but they’re really not that useful to start with. If they had Sure Hands, they’d be an easy pick, but now that Pass skill is mostly fluff. An extra gameplay option is nice, but it’s do undependable until you build them up, and by then you realize you’re not really using their passing skills ever.
But both Catchers really are useful to take along, because while they suck as Catchers, they’re your only Agility access players. That means they become your blodger + Sidestep + Diving Tackle man-markers against other Catcher types. So they should be in the team from the start.
Blitzers are, of course, non-negotiable.
How’s about this:
4x Blitzers (90) = 360
2x Catchers (70) = 140
1x Throwers (70) = 70
5x Linewomen (50) = 200
4x Rerolls (50) = 200
3x fan factor (10) =30
Total = 1000k
The plan is to have a catcher in both wings to keep the options open and either swap the thrower for the extra Linewomen when kicking or keep her as a reserve.
It’s pretty hard to pick a bad starting roster for Amazons and you could get plenty of success with that set up. I could possibly drop the Fan Factor to start with to be able to get that Apothecary as soon as possible.
Hey I started a Campaign with an Amazon tv1000
5x Linewomen
4x Blitzers
1x Thrower
1x Catcher
4x Rerolls
1x Apo
Im off to a good start, and I have over 600k cash in my bank, what do you recommend me doing with it?
Hard to say as you’ve really got everything you need already. I’d probably just save it to use for inducement in harder matchups.
I’m going to be starting a new online game with some friends and I’m “borrowing” your Reroll Heavy TV1000 Amazon Starting Roster.
Since I’ve never played this before, any basic guides for your build I can find or a link to something?
Thanks!
My current 2017 roster is:
2x Throwers
2x Catchers
4x Blitzers
4x Linewomen
1x Apothecary
1x Reroll
My strategy involves alternating each Thrower per game to gain SPP and use two Catchers to run TDs with 4 Blitzers on the field. This way, each Catcher gains SPP and gets skill increases. The Blitzers could
help do Hit and Run while positioning the ball carrier into a death gauntlet where the
Catcher can grab the ball.
The Linewomen help assist with tackles and hopefully gain SPP through casualties.
Hopefully I can increase each player into the best.
My ideal team is ST5 AG5 Linewomen, AG5 MV8 Catchers, and AG5 MV8 Blitzers with Throwers being ST5 AG5 and MV8. This way the team puts out all the stops and prevents most players from succeeding at a TD.
While a plan, still a plan!
eh, computer says no.
Still is this for a local league or online? If local, go with your mojo. If online, linewoman die, but they die faster with low rerolls. I would ditch the non blitzer positionals and the 12th players for plus 2 rerolls (3 total) if you lose players in game one, thats okay , you can save up. if not, you can buy extra’s after game one or 2.
in the format you wrote, you will be hardpressed to buy the rerolls if you lose even one player. just a thought though
Hmmm…
So drop one LW for another reroll. I can do that except I have to place all positionals on the field and hopefully not incur losses.
This is local, yes, for a league. I’m starting up a team so we’ll see how I go.
I’d go for another reroll though and risk it.
i concur if its for a local league. remember. a linewoman with loner is just very dedicated in not rerolling the block result, but otherwise there is really no difference. its perfect for a power LOSwoman..
Got it. Thanks.
I’ll revise the roster.
Best Roster for the Cyanide version is:
1x Blitzer
10x Linewomen
3x Reroll
1x Apo
1x Stadium upgrade
This will put you at 130k left and 790 tv.
The reason you dont start with all 4 Blitzers is because your linewomen can level up and get Block, which will raise their cost to 70k, as opposed to the Blitzers’ 90k for the same exact skills and stats. This will allow you to keep your team value much lower than normal and you will get a bunch of inducements every game. It take longer to level up but it is worth it.
Thanks for your input. The advantage the Blitzers have is that they have normal access to strength skills to be able to get Guard as soon as possible. It will take a lot longer to get Block and Guard on a Linewoman and having players with Block + Dodge + Guard is invaluable in my opinion. Playing online in mass player leagues with team value game matching really skews things though.
After having looked closely at Inducements while doing in depth work on Halflings and Goblins, Amazons have really started to stand out as one of the few other teams that can really make serious use of them (and one of the only really viable non-Stunty options). A team of all Linewomen and three or four rerolls is looking at having 250-300k in Inducements right from the start. That’s a ton of Dirty Trick cards and/or a Wizard to surgically strike the field as needed, while having a solid core of no frills no nonsense bodies to give the opponent no easy pickings (unlike the aforementioned Stunty teams).
I know some consider the Blitzers a must have and the other two positionals as “good enough” but here we’re taking a hard stance on TV management and frankly none of the others are priced well enough to make the cut. The pass/catch skills costing 20k simply means there is no real incentive to go there and the Block costing a staggering 40k puts them firmly out of contention as well. Sure the other players have access to other skills on normal rolls but we’re focused on TV management which means we don’t actually want to gain that many skills. Literally Block/Wrestle on everyone and then hopefully little to nothing else (maybe keep a guard on a double roll). If they gain more skills than that? Fire them and start with a new Linewoman.
It’s an extreme management style to anyone who hasn’t played Gobbos or Halflings but it’s quite interesting to do on a team where each member can stand on their own vs a normal player (which stuntys can’t do).