1) What’s your name and where do you come from?
My name’s Tom, and I am from Calne, where I have lived for my entire life.
2) Tell us a little about how you came to play Blood Bowl and your experience in with the game and wider hobby.
I got introduced to bloodbowl probably in my mid teens by some of the guys at calne gaming club (my usual wargaming crew), as a fun, quicker alternative to the other, full-evening tabletop wargames I usually partake of. Whilst it has never been my “primary” hobby, it’s always been there as a fun and social couple of hours to spend with friends.
3) What Blood Bowl achievement are you most proud of?
The achievement I am most proud of? Back in the day when the “Khorne” team was “Khorne Daemons”, I managed to score a touchdown with a bloodthirster, which I was pleasantly surprised by (as was my opponent – thanks Jack!) Oh yeah, I also managed to win the “bloody manic” award at the bloodbath tournament last year, which I was chuffed with.
4) What’s your favourite team and why?
I’m a chaos player at heart, in basically any game I play, and more specifically Khorne (chaos Daemons, world eaters, Daemons of chaos, chaos warriors….), so I’m going to have to say the Khorne team (though if they ever actually release a Slaanesh team I could be sorely tempted to give them a go).
5) Tell us about the team you’ve brought into Season III. Did you select it for purely competitive reasons, or were there other factors involved?
I redrafted my season 2 team and took them into season 3, on the basis that they did well enough to be promoted from Division 2 to First Division. As previously mentioned, I am a Khorne boy, through and through, which is why I initially selected them.
6) What was your thought process behind your roster selections, skills taken and how would you describe your playstyle with this team?
When I first drafted “the bloody fists” for season 2, I chose block for 2 of my bloodseekers (for punchy reliability) and mighty blow for the other 2 (to get proper damage in), with sure hands on the khorngor, so I actually have someone to score with. In terms of stat ups once the season has started, I am unfortunately like a kid in a chocolate shop – I love me a random skill roll (which is why my team is such a bloated, unfocused mess, unfortunately. It’s one of the things I am going to work really hard on improving in season 4) .
My playstyle? Violence, as much and as often as I can (when you have 10 guys with frenzy on the pitch, that’s pretty much a given, right?), with the philosophy that if the opposition has nobody left standing then scoring becomes much easier.
7) What are your expectations for this season? Do you have any particular goals you’d like to achieve?Who are you backing to win each division this season?
My expectations going into season 3 were to try and get a mid-table finish (this, clearly, has not panned out so well for a myriad of reasons, not least the ridiculous level of skill present in division 1) Going in, I had no real thoughts about who could win each division – i was rooting for Scott and jack in division 3, and Dan 1 in division 2 as my good friends.
8) What’s one thing you’d change about Blood Bowl?
Get rid of dwarves, nobody needs them!! In all seriousness, though, I think the current iteration of bloodbowl is in a pretty good place, and I’m looking forward to seeing what James Workshop does when the next version rolls around later this year. Saying that, I do miss the possibility to get stat ups and secondary skills based off a dice roll that you used to get.
9) What Pitch is your favourite (rules, artwork, whatever)?
I absolutely love the chaos pitch and the Khorne pitch – not to play on mind, they might be some of the most unplayable pitches they’ve ever designed, but they look good. You can never really go wrong with the classic pitch (either the grey or green side). The Ogre pitch though might (in my opinion) be one of the nicest pitches to play on, just for how clear and easy to see everything is.
10) Outside of Blood Bowl tell us a little about your life and main passions?
Warhammer 40k would, I suppose, be my first and greatest hobby of 25+ years now. I am seriously enjoying the tenth edition, and last year I got back into the tournament scene with various red and spiky armies (side note: basically everything I paint ends up being red, it’s basically all I can do!), shout out to Mark Vickery and the Winchester Rogue Traders for the awesome events that they put on. I’m also a huge Magic the gathering fan, and can often be found in bargammons on a Monday evening for their commander nights. Outside of all the nerdy stuff, I love live music and gigs, and try to attend as many as possible. I am also a huge fan of going to the cinema, where I watch anything and everything (God bless Cineworld Unlimited…).
11) Pirates or Ninjas?
Why not both…. Or ninjas. Ninjas are cool.
12) What’s your favourite film?
That’s tricky – as mentioned above, I watch a LOT of films. Terminator 2 is just about a perfect film, as is Aliens, but gun to head, I would probably say Mad Max: Fury Road.
Some great answers there. Thanks for sharing Tom 😊
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