But even the least risky moves are subject to fail, so whether I botched a simple move or pulled off a miracle play, I had a hard time figuring out if it was because of my management skills or plain luck. A more practiced player is going to have a greater sense of how to manage risk, and the game will reward that behavior. This isn’t to say Blood Bowl 2 is devoid of intentional player input. The result is an amorphous mess of players on the board, hardly representative of genuine football tactics and instead an impromptu trade of slapdash reactionary movement. This starts a frustrating loop: I evaluate the field, make a plan, execute, and trip up. Whether moving a player, picking up a ball, or attempting a short open pass, everything has a chance to fail, and once it does your turn is instantly over. My best laid plans were usually upset by bad rolls during menial actions. Blood Bowl just doesn’t have a great way to teach its abstract, abundant rules. If you understand the basics of American football, it’s fairly simple to intuit. Conversely, breaking through these clusters opens up holes in the opponent’s defense, which allows for ball carriers to fly through or makes passes easier to complete. Positioning athletes together grants stat bonuses, so building clusters around players you want to protect is encouraged. My favorite component of Blood Bowl 2 is evaluating player movement. You’re encouraged to tackle, maim, or kill anyone, whether on offense or defense. Notably, the ball isn’t reset after every turn-one half is just a single football play drawn out over the course of eight turns. Each athlete has a specialization, meaning their stats allow them to move further, make them stronger, or give them special abilities that come into play on specific die rolls. You take turns performing up to one action with each athlete, often moving, blocking (which is essentially tackling), and passing.

Players position their athletes similarly to football players on the line of scrimmage. Functionally, Blood Bowl is fairly simple.

Teams pulled from the Warhammer races do a lot of punching, grunting, and bleeding, just never enough to fill an entire stadium with their blood, thank goodness. Blood Bowl is a turn-based fantasy board game that loosely resembles American football.

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