A brawling battle over the dining table

At a loose end on a lazy Sunday afternoon, my son Jackson and I got down to a brutal game of Deathball 2.0. And the idiotic laughter from both of us kicked in within the first 60 seconds..

WHAT IS DEATHBALL?

Deathball 2.0 is One Page Games version of the classic Games Workshop Game Bloodbowl only far less complex and since we're using the 3D printer to craft up the teams here, a hell of a lot cheaper too. 

Even though I've never played the table top version before, I have gotten into the PC and Xbox One editions and so has Jack, so deciding to play this was an absolute no brainer. All I had to do was print out five players for me, five players for him and a ball, mark out a basic pitch on the dinner table, grab some dice and print out the instructions. 

Jackson picked it all up in less than five minutes and suddenly the clash was on. Pitting the Southside Smasha Orcs: 

Up against the grace and agility of the East Albury Custodes:

You'll instantly notice that one player from each team seems to be taking a nap. This is because 10 year old's can get very carried away in a game like this. Nothing a dollop of superglue can't fix later on.  I also haven't finished painting various parts but nobody cares when the dice is rolling and the action is happening!

The orcs have the ball but the Custodes are trying to wrench it free!

Now for our first game, we played a very basic version of Deathball - all players were equal, which meant you were at the mercy of the gambling mechanic which can bring you great highs and crushing lows in record time.  The amount of turns we chewed through (there's 60 in an average game) where the dice failed and the other player took control was staggering, sometimes nobody moved for a few turns due to the rolls. 

Having evaded some of the orc players, Red the Greatest races for the touchdown line (the tape down the bottom)

We also added the rule that if someone scored a goal, the other player received an obstacle to put up on the field wherever they chose. Which explains why there's a Mazda Rx7 model parked in the middle,  Jackson opting to park it there to make things much more difficult for me when we reset the field. 

Get past the car and go go go!

Since it helped him score the next goal, I felt it only fair to add my own obstacle into the mix, namely another Mazda Rx7 model that's a long way from being finished. Now things really got interesting in terms of getting the ball out of trouble!

 And in true fantasy football spirit, there were plenty of injuries..(and I don't just me the players snapped off their bases!)

But there could only be one winner..

The Custodes did put up a great fight but my orcs held on and won the game 2-1 even with a pair of rotary powered Mazda's getting in the way. For the both of us, there was a tonne of laughs the entire way which made printing out and painting up both teams more than worth it. Because of this Jackson now has a great interest in other table top games and I'm looking forward to what else I can find that will work for the both of us through One Page Games.

WHERE TO GET THE PLAYERS

The Custodes - Cults 3D

The Orcs - Still trying to work out where I downloaded them from originally months ago..

The ball - Self designed. Will find the file and upload it somewhere. In the meantime you can use this one! Now uploaded on Cults 3D!