The DreadBall blog with sugar & spice!
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
Magnetising your DreadBalls is a fun and practical hobby project. You drill a hole in the bottom of your ball and glue in a magnet. You drill a hole(s) in your miniatures’ bases and glue matching magnets in the bases, taking care to align the polarity correctly otherwise the magnets will repel each other instead of snap together as desired. (Check out this article on magnetising your bases: LINK)
There are a few options when is comes to the DreadBalls that are available.
In this tutorial I’m going to use my custom, 8mm, ball as the example but the exact same process can be used with all the different balls.
NOTE: If you decide to use the smaller, 2nd Edition, ball(s) I’d recommend gluing the ball into it’s base and letting the glue dry before continuing to step 2 of this tutorial.
So you’ve chosen your ball and need a hole to put the magnet in. Use a pin vise and a 2mm drill bit to make your hole. You can use a marker to put a little dot where you want the hole to be or you can “eyeball” it but you probably want the magnet in the center of the ball’s base.
Don’t drill too deep. The magnet I’d recommend using is 2mm x 1mm so the hole only needs to be 1mm deep. If you use a larger ball you could use a longer magnet (such as 2mm x 3mm) in which case you’d drill a bit deeper. When you are finished drilling your ball will have a nice hole in the bottom.
Now that your ball has a nice hole to put a magnet in, it’s time to glue in the magnet.
For the official 4mm or 6mm balls I’d recommend using a 2mm x 1mm neodymium magnet. You can get these magnets on Amazon and eBay or you can Google about for other sources. Many game/hobby stores carry magnets as well for just these types of miniatures hobby projects.
When magnetising a larger ball you can use a longer magnet. I use a 2mm x 3mm magnet in my balls. You can buy longer magnets or just stack the 1mm thick magnets to make 2mm x 2mm or 2mm x 3mm sizes.
Magnets have polarity, a North and a South pole. For compatibility’s sake I suggest gluing the magnet into you ball with the North pole towards the sky. If we all do this then all our balls will snap to each other’s bases. To determine the polarity of your magnets see this previous article: LINK
Regardless of whether or not you choose to make sure your balls compatible with everyone else’s, make sure you glue the magnet in your ball and base in matching orientation. You don’t want your base to repel your ball.
Use superglue. I like Gorilla Glue brand but any will work fine. Squirt some glue out on a piece of paper or card and then use a toothpick to apply the glue into the hole you drilled. Making sure the magnet is in the orientation you want and then push it into the hole. Use a non-magnetic tool or the table top to make sure the magnet is flush with the bottom of the ball.
That’s it. Once the glue is dry you have a magnetised ball that will snap on to your magnetised base when your player picks it up. Paint it up all pretty-like and play DreadBall!
May all Coaches have their favorite prone MVP rise, and with a Free Action.
Pitch Protocols: Team Analysis—Matsudo Tectonics
Overview
At first glance, the Matsudan seem like the perfect blend of strength and skill….everything you would want in DreadBall team! However, they are not with out their drawbacks, DreadBall is a fast paced game after all, and these tubby lizards can have a hard time keeping pace with the opposition.
Strengths
Obviously, the great Strength of the Matsudan is a key advantage. Loaded with Guards and Jacks to take full advantage of this attribute, the Tectonics can live up to their name and rock their opposition for sure with a devastating Slam game.
Additionally, the Matsudan all start with Grapple. This is an excellent ability, that can really give an advantage to shifting opposition players around the board.
Lastly, the Tectonics all start with Steady. This can make them very difficult to deal with, as since they all have pretty decent armour, there is a pretty good chance they stay standing and rearing to come after you for revenge!
Weaknesses
Move….4. Speed…5+. The big weakness for the Matsudan, is that they are not getting anywhere fast. This can sometimes make it difficult for them to take full advantage of their great Skill. Matsudan Jacks will often have to resort to a Throw on the run, or have trouble reaching the deep strike zone all together. It’s not uncommon for Matsudan players to have to make either a second action where their opponents only need one, or have to risk some Dash rolls in order to try and preserve action tokens. This can put a real drain on their resources and how much they can hope to accomplish in a Rush.
No Strikers. While this need not be a huge disadvantage, and can be off set by the tremendous skill of the Matsudan, lacking a scoring specialist can still be a hindrance. One less dice on handling the ball can certainly add up, especially if your having to move on top of it. A Jack throwing on the run from short range is already down to one dice, and forget bonus strikes without coaching dice! And while it’s not the most likely set of occurrences, Matsudan Jacks can turn into prime targets for Bashy teams…if they take them out, you can’t score!
Also, I’d be remiss not to mention that they are Honourable, meaning you can’t intentionally foul with them. This means no sucker punches, so you will have to plan your slams accordingly. If you like to play dirty….this may not be the team for you!
Strategy and Tactics
There are many approaches to victory for the Matsudan…they can play to score, or they can play to kill. They can do equally well at both. As such, nearly every strategy is open to a Tectonics Coach.
However, to mitigate getting stretched on the pitch, consider adding or developing a Keeper on your roster. They can pay HUGE dividends for the Matsudan and keep them from wasting actions chasing the ball around the pitch. Baring that, perhaps keeping at least one Jack on each end of the pitch will give you some options too.
Be sure to make use of Sprint where applicable, it’s an action that sometimes gets forgotten is the hustle and bustle of dishing out pain. But for slow teams, you sometimes need to spend an action solely for the purpose of repositioning a player for future use. And while far from an “all the time” type of play, you may look at “risking” a Sprint for a pick up on your Matsudan Jacks. Yes, it’s only a two dice pickup, but on Skill 3+ it’s not the worst odds, especially if you have a card in reserve to burn for a reroll if necessary. It’s a great way to try and add some extra range to your plays where appropriate.
Lastly, don’t fall for your own strength. Many times bashy teams get caught up in slamfests, and in their eagerness to reach out and hurt as many players as possible, they stop spending actions on marking players. Now, certainly there is some wisdom in causing as much havoc as possible, and there are definitely many scenarios where support may be overkill. BUT, if there is a KEY slam that you absolutely HAVE to have for a play to work, don’t succumb to hubris and stack the odds in your favor. What matters more? Making more slams, or making them count?
I’m very proud of the base system I have settled on for my DreadBall minis. I call what I use now my Mark V base system (as it’s the 5th version I’ve made). You can read about the evolution of the design in my first article on bases: Base Design
Most people that see my bases like them and I’d like to share the 3d (STL) files here for anyone that wants to use them.
The bases are designed to be used with magnets. Specifically Neodymium magnets. The main, central magnet is a 10mm x 1mm disc magnet. The magnets for attaching the ball are 2mm x 1mm disc magnets (the ball will also require a matching magnet).
Neodymium magnets come in different strengths from N35 (weak) up to N52 (strong). I prefer the stronger magnets and try to use N50 or N52 for my bases.
You can find the magnets on eBay and Amazon with a bit of searching. Here are a few links to get you started.
So now everyone has the files and have printed the bases. Everyone has acquired magnets and are ready to put the bases together. How do we ensure that my bases are compatible with all of your bases?
As you are probably aware, magnets have a North and a South pole. This is the polarity of the magnet.
It is unlikely that your magnets with be marked to indicate which end is North and which South so we’ll need to determine the polarity ourselves. Thankfully once you have done this once you can simple use any previously assembled bases as a guide for the future.
The easiest way to determine the polarity of your magnets is either with a bowl of water and some foam/styrofoam or with a string.
String Method:
Water Method:
Once you know the polarity mark it on the magnets with a sharpie (or similar) so you don’t lose track.
Now that you know the polarity of your magnets use the following diagram to glue in your magnets.
If you follow these instructions then all of our bases and balls will be fully compatible when we meet up to play. We will be able to share bases and balls as needed.
If you have any questions please comment on the article or email me at geoff@breaddoll.com
Adepticon 2019 is a wrap. Many DreadBalls were launched. The most balls out in a singular match was undoubtedly – CLASH OF THE GIANTS.
This humble BreadDoll editor has sung the praises many times. It was a title first, and a tournament format second. In its fourth year, Clash of the Giants saw a major 2019 facelift as it transformed from a non-sanctioned tournament that encouraged Giants into a singular six-Coach session of Ultimate. Ultimate, with GIANTS!!!
In what will hopefully become a late night convention classic, Clash of the Giants is intended to get Coaches to sit down, unwind, and embrace the chaos that only Ultimate can serve. If swingy dice are thwarting the best laid plans during a tournament or league play – ha! Wait until time is spent on the Ultimate pitch. It’s a “beer and pretzel” affair, and it encourages king-of-the-hill smack downs both literally and metaphorically.
A mild effort was made to limit the madness, and no Event Cards were used.
Facilitating speed of set up, all Coaches had pre-constructed rosters to select. Adepticon 2019 had six options: Kalyshi, Martians, Forge Fathers, Mutants, Veer-Myn, and the Male Corporation. Each roster was built to 1000 mc, and each roster included a GIANT!
As mentioned in previous posts, Clash of the Giants would not limit itself to the nine officially released Mantic Models. No no. A Mantic convention event needs to be a spectacle. Giants help, but NEW GIANTS are even better. Culled from the Deadzone miniatures line, four figures were selected for conversion. A fifth miniature was pulled from Mantic’s good ol’ Mars Attacks line. Easily accessible, visually complementary, and quick to convert – these Giants made their public debut at Mantic Night and quickly got to work!
Stats for these beasts will slowly trickle through the BreadDoll blog. For now, we’ll leave Coaches with two.
Night Terror
Role Guard
Movement 6
Strength 3
Agility 4
Speed 3
Skill 5
Armour 4
Abilities: Threatening, Ram, Uncontrolled
Value 225 mc
Stage 1A
Role Guard
Movement 4
Strength 4
Agility 4
Speed 4
Skill 5
Armour 4
Abilities: Stubborn, Grizzled, Mutation*
Value 260 mc
*Mutation – Roll a coaching die at the start of the player’s activation. The player manifests a random mutation from the Mutant’s Advancement table for the rest of the round.
As anticipated, chaos ensued. Three Giants rushed into the middle of the pitch for some break dancing. It was a slaughter house.
After only three rounds, one Coach had risen to the top! Adam Kinne and his Kalyshi held a defensive posture and scored when the opportunity… STRUCK! Adam won a set of Clash of the Giants cards.
Adepticon’s Mantic Night finished with winners and losers and and one BreadDoll editor with lots of notes. Clash of the Giants will return this summer at Gen Con. Keep reading the BreadDoll as we tease the other three new Giants making a clash-dance appearance.
Adepticon 2019 was this past weekend. I was lucky enough to attend for my 5th year in a row. Ever since my first trip to the Chicago area back in 2015, Adepticon has been my favourite gaming convention. I’ve met so many good friends while attending these conventions and as always part of the greatness of the convention is getting to see them all in person again. There were several opportunities to play DreadBall at Adepticon this year and I took advantage of all of them
Thursday night was League in a Night. BreadDoll takes credit for creating this event last year and it was back again in 2019. With 12 coaches participating, this year was twice the size of last year.
Not only were there twice as many coaches, in my opinion this years was twice the fun. League in a Night is a relaxed, fun event. Four rounds of DreadBall are played using the League rules for DreadBall.
I’m happy to say yours truly pulled out a win in the end having the best winning record (4-0) if not the highest ranking team in terms of megacredits.
If I could only play one DreadBall event at Adepticon it would be League in a Night!
I will quickly mention Deadzone since I played in the tournament on Friday. As you may not have heard of Deadzone, it’s another game by Mantic, a skirmish game set in the DreadBall Universe. Deadzone tends to take all it’s best ideas from DreadBall ( 😛 ) and the Nameless have now made their way over I painted up a Nameless team. I lost but I won best painted. I had fun. Moving on.
Saturday was the DreadBall Adepticorp Cup. This is the North American DreadBall Championship tournament. There were 10 coaches competing this year. While it’s not the most coaches I’ve seen participating for the North American title, the competition was fierce! Over the course of four rounds I went 3-1-0 and pulled off a tournament win and the Championship by a very, VERY narrow margin. TWO fan check was the difference between winning and losing.
Results:
Additional awards:
After the Adepticorp Cup we only had a couple hours until Mantic Night. It has become a BreadDoll tradition now to run a game of DreadBall Ultimate during Mantic Night which we did again this year. I will leave it to my BreadDoll colleague to provide the details since he was running it but Ultimate was played and everyone playing had a blast! Here are a few pics.
Adepticon was amazing! I am already looking forward to the next one in 2020. If you can come I highly recommend it. And if you do and you want a game of DreadBall just let me know, we’ll make it happen. There’s no such thing as too many friends or too much DreadBall!
Play like you Practice
Tournament gaming is not really my bag. Still, it can serve as a useful challenge in a variety of ways to improve your personal playing style. It’s been through participation in tournaments that I’ve been able to develop a variety of tactics and strategies I may never have taken notice of otherwise.
Tournaments represent a great opportunity to step outside of your local scene and pit your DreadBall expertise against new faces and approaches to the game. The results can be eye opening. Folks who swear that the Castle is unbeatable, find it crumbling despite their efforts to the contrary. Coaches who insist Strikes are where it’s at, find themselves being ground out by bashy squads. And proponents of a brute force approach…..get circles run ‘round them by those favoring finesse over muscle.
Sometimes, people just simply get good at playing a certain type of coach, learning their individual ins and outs. When faced with new, unknown opposition, the game can radically change.
All this, to simply state, you are a result of your habits. You play the same people, teams, play styles, etc. You start to simply play the game a certain way. That’s where tournaments can shake things up, by turning what you think you know, on its head.
However, maybe traveling to a tournament isn’t in the cards for you. That’s fine, just try and adopt some of the same concepts into your regular games to keep things fresh, and give yourself the opportunity to expand your skills.
Anyhow, enough rambling from me. Don’t get caught up in just “chasing wins”. Explore the game, and all it has to offer. It will enrich your DreadBall experience, and in time, the wins will start rolling in too!
Next week, the 2019 convention season launches for us at the BreadDoll.
Adepticon is here! It’s a pretty special convention; tightly curated to highlight miniature games. It’s not as sprawling as Gen Con, but it’s not as small as regional events. Adepticion is the Goldilocks of gaming.
DreadBall is well represented. As such, the BreadDoll is there too. We’re sponsoring three events and like always – Coaches participating in BreadDoll sponsored events get swag.
First up; League in a Night 2! Thursday March 28, 2019. 5pm. Coaches are going to settle down an evening of team development. It’s a four round slug fest of strikes and slams. And, experience is marked along the way. I adore League in Night tournament formats. In this humble BreadDoll editor’s opinion, league play is the superior way to enjoy DreadBall. No tournament format can replicate a league setting, but League in a Night comes pretty darn close. League play is an entirely different beast from “normal” tournament formats. “Resurrection?” No no no… If a player is injured in league play, they’ll feel the consequences in future games. Unless of course, a Coach rolls a 6, 7, or 8. Or, if a Coach wants to spend 40mc on an injury re-roll. What’s hurts more Coach? The back injury of your level 3 Striker, or your thinned out pocket book? League in a Night tests different skills sets and requires different strategies. A battle (ahem, match) can be lost, but a Coach can still win the war (ahem, league). Launch the first ball with a vanilla starting team, and promote roster growth for a high team value. Competing Coaches get a set of Home / Visitor cards from the BreadDoll.
Second is the MAIN EVENT: Adepticorp Cup! Saturday March 29, 2019. Sometime in the morning… Adepticorp Cup is the North American DreadBall Circuit (NADC) Championship tournament. Any 2018 regional winners are awarded a seat at the tournament, but even scrubs like me can buy a ticket and reach for glory. As League in a Night demands specific straggles, so too does Adepticorp Cup. Whereas “Leaguers” are tasked with developing a team through a meta growth tournament, Adepticorp Coaches need to do their homework long before their first match opponent is determined. Power gamers rejoice, because the Adepticorp Cup rewards those who “roster-bate.” Coaches are issued 1200 mc and an empty bench. Have at it! With the exception of a few omissions (Martians, Rejects, Giants), Coaches can build their team to theoretical perfection. Coaches that actually respect the game and its hobby aspect also literally build their team. What You See Is What You Get, otherwise known as WYSIWYG. Anything less in my opinion, and the Coach is just a Chump. Competing Coaches get a set of Home / Visitor cards from the BreadDoll.
Lastly, it’s BIG TIME. Saturday March 29, 2019. Sometime during the bacchanalia known as Mantic Night, six Coaches will compete in Clash of the Giants! For its fourth iteration, Clash of the Giants moves from its Mid-Atlantic roots, AND it gets a serious facelift. Clash of the Giants was a popular non-sanctioned tournament in Washington D.C. that celebrated the beautiful (and beautifully neglected) Giants. Coaches were rewarded if they added a Giant to their rosters. Fun was had by all, but after the 2018 tournament – the winds of change had blown. Clash of the Giants 2019 is now an Ultimate Match. Coaches will choose from a selection of pre-built teams. They are lean, mean rosters that happen to include – Giants. And because Clash of the Giants is a spectacle, there’s even more. MORE GIANTS! DreadBall’s deep line of miniatures include nine Giant models. Clash of the Giants will introduce FOUR NEW GIANTS. Rosters are top secret. However, the BreadDoll will offer one image to whet any Giant appetites.
Only six Coaches will get to experience the big brawl at Mantic Night. But do not fear! The new Clash of the Giants only debuts at Adepticon! If any Coach wants to participate in a colossal convention contest, Clash of the Giants will be offered several times at Gen Con 2019.
The Coach who Conquers will receive a set of Ultimate turn cards, and the Champions of League in a Night and the Adepticorp Cup will get a fresh set of BreadDoll dice.
Good luck Coaches. BreadDoll editors look forward to meeting as many of you as possible. For those that won’t cross our launch lines, come back to the site for a Adepticon Rush Report.
May your team’s Medi-bot never earn an MC out of you, and may your heart never give out. May the ten toes of your feet steer you clear of all misfortune, and before you’re much older, may you hear much better toasts than this.
Happy St. Patty’s Day to all Coaches across the Co-Prosperity Sphere.
Cheers!
Adepticon 2019 in Schaumburg Illinois (outside Chicago) is just over 2 weeks away. There are several DreadBall Events going on you won’t want to miss if you are going to be there.
You can find the RULES & REGS for the tournament and League night on the documents page.
Don’t worry if you want to play but haven’t pre-registered. You can register at Adepticon when you get there or just show up with your entry fee at the correct place and time and there will be a seat for you.
