A decade of Blood Bowl

[mamutas]

And as it is, today was my last Blood Bowl 2 game. Nearly 1500 hours spend in it (and 496 hours in BB1 before).
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For the last decade I probably played at least a game per week, at some point being in 5 competitions at the same time. I nearly quit it a few times after particularly bad stretch of games, but I never did.
When folks ask me "what games do you play", at some point I stopped saying "Blood Bowl", for the reason I don't consider it a game anymore. It is the way!
All thanks to a French coworker who introduced me to TT BB in 2005 and gave me a few minis to paint, just for fun.
And huge thanks to all here at BBTactics.com - this site is my BB home. You are a tough crowd, as my Spike winning rate shows, but you were great opponents and I am looking forward to meet you on BB3 pitch!

 

[Bloodsplatter]

Yo Mumsy...
I've not played BB2 for as long as you have, but I've been around the block so to speak...
Recently I've been playing in Big Crunch, and UKBBL, living in the centre of the known universe... England...
I've just read the email from UKBBL.
They like everyone else are struggling with BB3, the inability to run a league with the current tools available...
They are winding up their BB2 league...
In the hope that their coaches will transition to BB3 in some kind of familiarisation arrangement, prior to Cyanide fixing the admin tools issue in the next few weeks...?months.
I bought BB3 prior to release.
Like everyone I'm disappointed by the game.
From my point of view as a player, I'm never sure on a block what's going to happen..
The icons on the players are too small and indistinct, as are the percentage markers, and the little block screen has gone.
The ability to type into Bloodbowl 2 during the game, to express my glee/frustration/etc, or just to randomly blaspheme has gone and its replaced by some puerile faces which is useless.
BB3 has had some pretty poor reviews in the games press.
I fail to see how BB3 is going to attract any noobs, or to bring back dormant coaches.
I'm certainly struggling to see the way forward.

 

[TravelScrabble]

I first came across Blood Bow being played in a GW store sometime 1995/96. At the time Warhammer was my game, and I was pretty anti american-football so even though we eventually branched in Necromunda and Gorka Morka, and bb looked fun, I never played. Fast forward 17 years or so and I was looking for something turn based I could play around 6am while my two youngest rugrats kept me half busy. Saw BB1 on sale, got the nostalgia itch, and found BBTactics. I was there for the launch of Big Crunch, which will always be the golden age of BB2 for me. I was learning the game and Big Crunch had a great mix of hard nosed coaches and fluffy fun. But it started to fall off over time. I also got into OFL, which was modded to include all the teams and star players and even glittering prizes (mutations on elves, yes please!).

When BB2 along I refused to switch for about a year. I was perfectly happy with my BB1 leagues, the game didn't have all the teams and it had no league tools. The launch was not as bad as BB3, but there was a lot of opposition to switching. A year on BB2 had most of the teams, and although it was still inferior to BB1, it had the momentum and the player base and I made the switch. About a year or two after BB2 was released there was a swell of enthusiasm for the game. When Legendary Edition came out we had objectively the best version of the game on PC that we've ever had (FUMBBL notwithstanding. This was my silver age of Blood Bowl. The fluff never quite came back in the same way, but streaming had become a big thing, and hanging out with coach and watching BB streams together was a new way to enjoy the game). The OFL was reborn, and clan league was a new way to play the game for me. Nothing lasts forever. BB2 had a great run, but even before BB3 was announced it was beginning to lose steam.

10 years in and I have 1800 hours in BB 2 and 5877 in BB1 (most of that is just the game running in the background though, I'm sure I've actually played more BB2). At least 1 game a week almost all of that time barring a couple of months off here and there when I was moving a couple of times. This time I'm jumping on the release of BB3, mostly because I've lost a lot of motivation to play CRP rules and am looking forward to trying something new. I'm disappointed in the release of BB3, but BB is and probably always will be a game that is carried by its players. They set up the leagues, they make the community content, they fix the game when needed (online or off). The reason I'm still playing after 10 years is that this is the most pleasant, fun and chill gaming community I've ever encountered and the game is deep and engaging. I'm sure I'll be playing for another ten years.