Welcome to our DreadBall blog. We are fans of the futuristic sports game DreadBall and always look forward to our next match! Please look around. Read posts about the hobby, tactics, or events. Come back often, or better yet – follow us!
May all of your sixes explode,
Geoff, Andrew, and Lee
Here are reference cards for some Cyborg players that are not part of the standard Cyborg roster. I used these players to great success at Adepticon 2019.
Mantic Games’ Rob Burman is a DreadBall enthusiast and advocate. He has questions for Coaches. E-mail him, and let your opinions be known. You may expand your team revenue!
From Rob’s 4/21/20 Mantic Blog Post – DreadBall Historic Matches:
“I’d also like to hear from YOU! Take a look at the questions below and e-mail me at robert.burman@manticgames.com
Make sure you have the heading ‘DreadBall Feedback’. I’ll randomly choose one person that emails in to win a £25 voucher for the website too.
Thanks in advance for all those that respond. Please bear in mind, these are just general questions and don’t necessarily mean that any of them will actually happen 😀”
Or… Just follow this link:
Quarantine Coaches! Alert!
Paint All The Minis is hosting 72 hours of online convention goodness from April 11-13, 2020.
Tickets, Vendors, Q&A guests, and swag details can be found here
Among the cool virtual bits in digital swag bags is this STEAL AND DEAL:
ENTIRE FREE PDF Rulebook for Dreadball from Mantic Games plus 25% off Dreadball minis
What a great time to lead a comrade into the locker room! And once everyone is there, maybe you can finally decide on that team uniform color!
A refrain from this BreadDoll editor; Tradition is important. The seasonal ebb and flow of a DreadBall league is greatly enriched when deference is made to ritual. Often, the ritual is bizarre, unorthodox, and unsettling. And occasionally, it’s just down-right embarrassing. The CORT DreadBall league has many rituals, but none as embarrassing as winning the Sacko.
Celebrating excellence is easy, and expected. CORT Coaches are sport fanatics, and everyone acknowledges the levels of mastery needed for any competitive championship; strategy, tactics, development, collusion, and chemical tolerance (legal / illegal). Add a dance with Lady Luck, and the best rise to the top. They are distinguished.
Opposite first? The worst. Whereas it is a point of pride to be steward of a CORT DreadBall League Championship trophy, it is a black mark to babysit the last place CORT DreadBall League Sacko. The two Coaches with the lowest team ranking after regular season play are granted a final match. While their colleague progress into the playoffs, the worst of the lot play to determine who really came up short.
For CORT’s ninth season of league play (ICE-NINE), the Sacko match was Coach Steve & his Zees versus THIS BREADDOLL EDITOR & his Crystallan.
Coach Name: Steve / Team Name: Apes / Team Type: Zees (They’re all Jacks, yo)
Coach Name: Andrew / Team Name: C.U.N.T.S.* / Team Type: Crystallan
Below is tale of the tape. A Rush Report in pictures, and every image is suspect. Not only are the images poor quality, the match memory is from before a planet Earth pandemic.
The Sacko has a new home until the end of season ten. Long live CORT!
Last week a change to 3-on-3 to use cards to replace the massive pile of tokens was put forward. This week we have those cards for you to print out and try.
The cards are designed to be printed as mini cards, 2″ x 2.75″.
Each Coach starts with
Here is a PDF file with all 50 cards laid out in sheets.
This PDF will also be available on the Documents page.
And don’t forget the back of the card.
Amended Action “Tokens”
Currently, the DreadBall 3-on-3 rules utilizes a boatload of Tokens:
Each coach starts with 25 Action Tokens (18 standard tokens and 7 sin bin tokens)
Rebs cannot spend 2 action tokens on the same player on consecutive turns.
You can play any number of Action cards (still max 1 per player per turn) when it is your turn to play an Action token, but you still have to play a token either before or after or between playing Action cards.
While you could still use tokens if you wish, BreadDoll is making some nifty cards to use in their place. They are a little easier to manage, easier to distinguish different types, and future proofs for a few other little twists we are developing. While they are in fact cards, they will still be referred to as “Tokens” so as not to create confusion with the DreadBall Action cards. It’s important to be able to distinguish between the two.
The total number of tokens will still be 25, but the breakdown is slightly different.
The 25 tokens now consist of:
5 Sin Bin
2 Activate and play another token
3 Activate and draw a card
15 Standard Activation
As you may notice, there are few new types of tokens. The sin bin and standard activation tokens have dropped in number to accommodate the new types.
The Activate and play another Token is somewhat self explanatory, and really powerful. Being able to play two activations together is always strong in 3-on-3, but is usually limited to when you double a pick up or catch, or play an Action card—which can be difficult to come by. This gives you two opportunities per match to make a decisive and potentially game changing play! It should be noted that you can’t use both of them together, ie, you can’t play Activate and play another token to activate a player, then play your other Activate and play another token. Trust me, it’s not the most efficient use of it anyway.
The Activate and draw a card token gives a little more utility and flexibility in playing the game. It can be difficult to spend actions on drawing cards and give your opponent essentially two uninterrupted activations. Sometimes it pays off to stock pile action cards to do a lot in a single activation later in the match, but you have to be careful not let your opponent steamroll you in the meantime. When you play an Activate and draw a card token, not only do you get to Activate a player, at the end of the players action, you may also draw a DreadBall card. Oh the options! But be careful, you only get three for the match, after that you have to earn the cards the hard way!
Anyway, our resident awesome thingie maker, Geoff, will be putting together a file for the tokens. Print them out when they are available and give it a go!
Tis the season. The season for Slams. The season for Strikes.
The 2020 North American DreadBall Circuit begins its soft launch at Adepticon. For Coaches unaware, Adpeticon is a boutique gaming convention with a focus on miniatures and war gaming. It’s a perfect venue for Mantic Games, and DreadBall is well represented.
Two DreadBall events are scheduled. An Alpha and an Omega; one will chronicle a beginning while another capstones a grand finish. An attentive Rules Committee has listened and learned. Rules have been adjusted, tweaked, and modified to maximize fun and competitive blood-lust.
The Last is first. Adepticon celebrates a year of accomplishment with a Big Championship – The Adepticorp Cup! Any and all Coaches are welcome to play on Friday March 17, but those who won a 2019 North American DreadBall Circuit (NADC) regional tournament get a pass. The DreadBall Governing Body (i.e. Digby, i.e. Rules Committee) trimmed and tightened the tournament language from previous years. The main difference? The 2020 NADC rules packet scales back on team building. Only recommended team builds are allowed, and thereafter only 80mc in inducements. This approach lowers the bar of tournament entry while focusing on tactics. The NADC rules packet can be found in our Documents page.
Before a champion is crowned, a contest for growth is conducted! League in a Night returns for a third year. On Thursday, March 26 – Coaches strive for experience. How quickly can a team develop into a unstoppable force? After two years of feedback, Digby has leaned into the format, making it even more distinct from the Adepticorp Cup. There’s a bit of customization allowed in the beginning, and larger payouts after each match. Tactics are obviously still important, but now there’s a meta-game to strategize. The League in a Night 3 rules packet can be found in our Documents page.
Because both events are co-sponsored by the BreadDoll, participating Coaches will receive a set of Home / Visitor cards.
This BreadDoll editor also happens to be the Tournament(s) Organizer. While bribes are always welcome; here are a few things to keep in mind / reinforce for competing Coaches:
While these items are mentioned for Adepticon, they’re valid for almost any tournament.
If Adepticon is not possible, find another session of organized play. If that’s not possible, organize one yourself! DreadBall is very tournament friendly, and you already know that DreadBall Coaches are pretty darn friendly themselves. Reach out below if you have any questions, comments, concerns, or bribe suggestions.
There are some Abilities that can be confusing. Abilities that modify or change the way Threat works are often misunderstood. In Part 1 we looked at Gotcha and Threatening as well as the the basics of Threat. In Part 2 we will look at the Keeper and Stench Abilities.
The Keeper Ability allows a Guard to project 1 Threat onto any hexes in the Strike Zone that are in their front arc as long as the Player with the Keeper ability is also within the Strike Zone. This is a goal tender Ability meant to allow a single Player to better protect a Strike Zone.
The Gotcha Ability does not improve the Keeper Ability. If a Player has both Keeper and Gotcha Abilities they still only project 1 Threat on the hexes of the Strike Zone in their front arc, not 2 Threat. The Player with Gotcha would still project 2 Threat into their regular Threat Hexes.
Stench projects a negative modifier of 1 into all adjacent hexes of the Player with the Ability. Any Opposing Player in one of these adjacent hexes is affected and suffers a -1 modifier on all tests.
Stench does not apply Threat. Stench applies a separate negative modifier that stacks with Threat. Stench does not stack with other Stench. As you can see in the image the negative modifier is still only -1 where the Player’s Stench Abilities overlap.
A Keeper with the Stench ability would project 1 Threat to any Strike Zone hexes in their front arc (as long as they were in the Strike Zone) and the Stench modifier would stack with this in any of the Keepers adjacent hexes increasing the overall negative modifier to 2.
A Keeper with the Stench and Gotcha Abilities would project 1 Threat to any Strike Zone hexes in their front arc (as long as they were in the Strike Zone) and the Stench modifier would stack with this in any of the Keepers adjacent hexes increasing the overall negative modifier by 1. The adjacent hexes in the Keepers front arc would be under 2 Threat from Gotcha so the total negative modifier in these hexes would be 3.
When things get in the way….
You and the gang head out for a nice “friendly” pick up game of the greatest sport in the galaxy. The players are gathered, but what’s this? The usual playing space that you use for a pitch is a cluttered mess! After carefully cutting the locks on the warehouse, you’d think the least they could do was leave some open play space for DreadBall…..geesh!
It is an inevitable fact, when you don’t have access to professional venues, things are going to try and get in the way of your game. However, rather than stopping the action, it can be a way to add to the fun!
Obstacles in DreadBall 3-on-3
Below you will find rules for incorporating the first three types of obstacles players typically run across in their pickup matches of DB. Obstacles help add variety to pitch layouts, and can come in handy when using non-“standard” pitches as well. But more on that at a later time.
Veterans of the game will recognize the first two types as having been originally introduced in Xtreme. The third type is something of a necessity for defining when using some non traditional layouts.
Tall Obstacles
The first type of obstacle, is the Tall obstacle. Tall obstacles are typically things like support columns, large shipping containers, pillars, etc. Even the strike post, is considered a Tall obstacle. Tall obstacles block the ball path when trying to make a throw or scatter, in much the same way as an opposing player or wall. Additionally, a Tall obstacle can not be moved through nor can it be Jumped over.
Short Obstacles
The second type of obstacle, is the Short Obstacle. This category can include other types of obstacles as well, such as traps, but typically includes things like crates, debris piles, dead bodies….that sort of thing. Short obstacles can not be moved through, but they CAN be Jumped over. Additionally, Short obstacles do NOT block the path of a ball being thrown or scattered.. However, a ball that ends its movement on a Short obstacle must be scattered immediately.
Impassable Wall
A third obstacle type is an impassable wall. Impassable walls, obviously, can not be moved through, and also block the path of the ball in the same manner as walls in regular DreadBall. This needs additional defining only in the sense that there may be more walls than usually found on a standard DB pitch. Pick up games will sometimes be played on pitches that have unusual angles in the walls that might make it difficult to ascertain if another player is eligible to make a Throw to a specific target. Simply draw an imaginary line from the hex of the throwing player to the target hex. If it crosses a hex with an impassable wall, or even simply a boundary wall, then the throw can not be attempted.
Anyway, there is much more to explore in the way of obstacles. Don’t let them get in the way, but make it part of how you play!
