Clempzen Razorcats vs Couronne Crusaders

My spirited Clempzen Razorcats faced off against the Couronne Crusaders last night at our weekly Blood Bowl league night. The Crusaders are another human team coached by a veteran and well-respected friend who puts his fantastic painting skills on display at Lou Rollins Miniatures. There is also a blog post over there called Hobbyist vs. Gamer that features some more pictures that were taken during this match. The Razorcats are still pushing to get enough games under their belt to qualify for this season's Spike! Magazine bowl playoffs. They were around a 300K underdog to the Crusaders and spent their inducements on a team training reroll, a Bloodweiser Babe, and three dirty trick cards.

The Razorcats had to kick first and immediately played a Kicking Boots card on their lineman, Dakwan Bowzers, for more accurate kickoff results. The Crusaders scooped up the ball and began a push to their right. They looked to be in position to make a quick score when the ref was distracted and a 12th man, Nuke Dabomb, snuck on the field (Illegal Substitution card) to add an assist. The Razorcats were able to pop the ball out, recover it and switch sides of the field. The Crusaders backpedaled to halt the counterattack. They pressed the Razorcats towards the sideline, but the ball carrier, Taj Void found an opening and made a lateral move across the field. He was pursued by the Crusaders' nasty, break-tackling orge, Kalidorgrom, but ended up just out of his grasp. With the clock running out, Taj handed the ball off to an open catcher, Nuke Dabmob, for an almost certain go-ahead score. But there are no certainties in Blood Bowl. The catcher fumbled the hand-off and suffered the insults of 11,000 booing fans.

In the second half, the Razorcats got the ball first. The thrower, Taj, had the ball and the offense began probing the left side of the field for weakness. However, the line soon collapsed and the pocket was flooded with Crusaders. The Razorcat line was in disarray but was able to push defenders away from their thrower. Taj scrambled from the pocket and completed a pass to their strongman blitzer Ceejay Splitter who made a break for the end zone. The Crusaders made a last ditch effort to stop Splitter, but were unable to tear the ball from his grasp and Splitter blitzed his way into the end zone for a score.

The Crusaders lined up to receive the kick-off and went to work on the right side of the field. A bulldozing Kalidorgrom roared down the field and pummled Taj Void into the turf. The Crusaders botched picking up the ball though and the Razorcats began to believe that they would be victorious. The Razorcats were probably too aggressive in trying to pressure the loose ball as it stretched their defense a little too thin. The Crusader thrower snatched up the ball and completed a pass to their blodging catcher, Marneus, who rushed up into scoring position behind Kalidorgrom. The Razorcats' Taj had a chance at knocking the ball from Marneus, but was unable to pull the ball away from him. After that, the best that the 'cats could do was to create tackle zones that Marneus would need to dodge through for the score. On the final turn of the game, Marneus paid homage to the deceased Crusader Katica as he dodged through traffic and found his way over the goal line for a touchdown. The game ended in a 1-1 draw. A most enjoyable game.