Entry 5
Transcribed by his goblin scribe, Ian H. McKinley
WHADDYA MEAN, “NO PRE-SEASON”?
No! Go away!
I meant it you little maggot! Not now! Bugger off!
I don’t care if I’ve gotta contract!
Woe betide he who in his pride and arrogance angers the little Goblin scribe. For this latter shall write what he seeth fit into the most valuable chronicle of the prideful and he shall urinate in the “chicken broth” of the arrogant. He he he.
What’re you doing, scratching on the parchment with me not sayin’ anything?
“The Minotaur has sent a letter, boss, asking what’s going on.”
Now you’re ridin’ my ass? First it’s the Gobbo scribe naggin’ and naggin’ me, and now my Accounts Gobbo’s harassing me? By the Holy Puke of Gork! I swear I should just throttle you all.
What? Like pay back everything?
He can’t demand that? I’ve blown it all on that pack of useless featherweights!
He can? He’ll do what?
That accursed contract’ll drive me mad! Alright, alright, you ready scribe? Okay, begin. Hang on, how does that stupid “Baron I’m the Worst” do it? If that idiot can do it, so will I. Okay, begin.
Good day everyone.
So, yeah, the Bytown Maulers have started the season and I, Gorn N’hleg, have gotta bring you all up to speed on what’s happened over the first few matches. So, there’s two things you gotta know off the bat:
Thing one: the league we’re in didn’t allow for any pre-season matches. That’s a big deal actually, because usually an unfriendly or three’ll help your team work out the kinks in their play away from the watching eyes of the Ultras. But OHHHH NOOOO they couldn’t allow us a pre-season this year, could they? It was all about some plague makin’ the rounds or something. Anyway, the Maulers started play, kinks and all.
Thing two: I was right. I mean, there was never any doubt about that, but just in case you read this and start gettin’ the wrong idea, I’m tellin’ ya, I was right.
Okay … so … the team’s really shitty.
Yeah, it ain’t my fault or anything. They’re just crap Blood Bowl players. As in really crap. You know that business about Black Orcs bein’ good brawlers and bein’ able to smack down opponents? Well, it turns out, Brawler is a poor-Orc’s Block. What this means is, don’t play frickin’ Amazons or Norse out of the blocks.
“Hey boss, that’s a good one!”
Huh? What’re you on about, scribe? Now shut yer gob!
What’s that?
Ah, yes, my Goblin scribe just complemented me on my – what was it, you little shit? – yes, “turn of phrase.” Yes, ha ha! I’m so very funny. As I said, “…out of the blocks” a completely planned play on words … er … turn of phrase … regarding the fact that regular Orc Blitzers know how to lay down a block whereas these useless maggots haven’t a frickin’ clue! Gork as my witness I was about ready to let the gold pieces evaporate on the Ultra’s anger and go back to coaching the ROUGE et Ork!
“Boss, you okay?”
“Boss! Boss! The apothecary’s given you a shot of his elixir! Are you okay now?”
Sorry everyone. I, er, had a spell. No! That’s it! A wizard cast a spell on me! But I’m all right now. By Mork’s Holy Balls, I’m better than all right. I’m Gorn N’hleg! I’m brilliant!
Where was I?
Yeah, right. Look … if you’re in a league that allows you to plan your games against whichever opponent whenever you like, as opposed to bein’ on a fixed schedule, then take it from me … don’t plan games against Amazons or Norse! Got it?
It was all promising enough at the beginning; we played the Onlookers, a team of Woodies with their frickin’ Wardancers. I won’t bore you with the details, but there were two take-aways:
Take-away One: By the Holy Snot of Gork, Goblins might be masters at picking their noses, but they’s useless at picking up balls! We blew nearly all our team training (Editor’s Note: re-rolls) on just trying to pick up the frickin’ boarskin! Now, I know, I know, I hear you throwin’ my words back at me: “But you don’t normally hold with having the ball business!” Yeah, yeah. But look, I also said havin’ the ball allowed you to draw in your opponents so you can crush ’em. Especially against Woodies, it’s important you get the ball or the refs allow all sorts of ass-shaking at the end of the pitch and they give you red cards if your Boyz keep hitting the Mork-damned line-elfs after the whistle’s sounded for some reason or another. Anyway, that happened a couple of times to us against the Onlookers.
Anyway, despite it all, the Ultras left the stadium happy. They agreed with me that hurting Goblins only counts has half a point. So we got a tie. We hurt three of them. They hurt four of us, but two only count for half. So, a 3 – 3 draw. The Ultras ain’t gonna keep cheering for a team that can’t out-slaughter its opponents, so that’s a worry, but they all seemed to like the last few minutes when a Goblin was actually able to pick up the ball and, for some reason or another, threw it to another Gobbo, who ran up-field with it without fouling anyone. Anyway, as I keep sayin’ the ball attracts the best opponents, and a frickin’ Wardancer … have I already said I hate frickin’ Woody Wardancers? … anyway, he tried to jump over Killie Jefferz’n, but Kille ain’t to be jumped over so easy, and BAM! Down goes the frickin’ Wardancer! The Ultras loved it.
But just because Puss Jak’z’n wagged his ass in the end zone at the end of the game don’t mean nothin’. It took all the power of my personality and reputation for violence to convince the Ultras we’d managed a tie because of the hurt Gobbos counting for a half, see?
Take-away Two: I told you I was right. Well I was. Take the apothecary in your team build! The freakin’ Woodies hurt Alegz Sin’KILL’t’n and actually KILLED Ad’aam Bigkill! The apo prevented Ad’aam from meeting Mork and Gork in person, so you see, a freakin’ apo’s worth every penny. Luckily Alegz only missed one game.
Also talkin’ about bein’ right … well Gobbos DO break easy! We’d have won the game if it wasn’t for those little shits whining about broken legs! So here’s the best advice I can give you … do like I do and make sure ahead of time that the Ultras agree that Gobbos only count for half a casualty. Otherwise the most fanatic of your supporters’ll think you lost games you actually won.
Now’s a perfect time to refer to that great Blood Bowl sage, Taureau Amiral, who said in his Art of Coaching:
1.4. There are six domains to master in order to stack the deck in your favour.
1. Yourself
2. Your Opponent
3. The Teams
4. The Pitch
5. The Strategies
6. The Tactics
I like quoting this part of Taureau Amiral’s work, because it’s wrong!
Hehehe. You know, scribe, I kind of liked being contractually obligated to quote the Minotaur from time to time. I can pick and choose his bits of wisdom at a time that suits me and make him look like an idiot pansy!
Anyway, there ain’t six. There’s … what comes after six? … yeah, right … SEVEN domains to master. In addition to the six the Minotaur goes on and on about, there’s the supporters : the Ultras! I’ve already said they’s the lifeblood of your team. I mean it. You gotta get out ahead of ’em. Some wise guy’s gonna whine about the number of times there was ass-wagging in this end zone or that, or about how you got out-thumped. But if you tell ’em ahead of time a Gobbo’s only worth half a casualty – which it absolutely, one-hundred percent IS – then you can keep the Ultras on-board when Woodies send two of your Boyz to the infirmary and two of your Gobbos, when you’ve only sent three Woodies to theirs.
Anyway, it worked.
The next match was a snooze-fest. Against Elven Union bastards. They hurt a pair’o Gobbos, but by that time the Ultras were on-board, so our hurtin’ one Elf allowed me to again claim it was a tie game. At least nobody did any ass-wagging at the end of the pitch. By Gork’s Ear Wax, I hate that stuff!
Anyway, what pissed me off about this match was that the one, single, measly casualty we did – TO FRICKIN’ ELVEN UNION, no less – was that it was FRICKIN’ Gobbo Konvisse Yeux! The Boyz did nothin’!
Then in game three we came up against an Amazon team, the Seaway Sisters. The less said about this game, the better. Yeah, I used the schtick about Gobbo’s only bein’ worth half a casualty, but it was starting to wear thin. The crowd turned on us. Something about them havin’ nicer asses to wag in the end zone than us. Anyway, like I said in the first take-away, don’t play teams loaded with the ability to block or dodge! We was lined-up to waggle some ass in their end zone but they dodged past the Black Orcs like the Boyz was air and that was that. Well, not quite, before that Amazon waggled her ass in the end zone at the end of the game, a Boy couldda brought her down; but Charlzt’n Huuuz tripped up on a pair of skulls left on the pitch by some idiot and NOW! that was that.
So here’s the thing. This team’s FREAKIN’ USELESS!
BEIN’ ABLE TO BRAWL DON’T REPLACE BEIN’ ABLE TO BLOCK! I lost count of the number of times (Editor’s Note: the Boss has trouble counting after two) a Boy used his Brawler training to turn a Both Down into a Skull!