Only where the rulings for each skill are concerned. I don't have the books in front of me at the moment, unfortunately, so I don't have an easy way to check. Direct hire has the benefit of allowing you to consistently play the star player (you're otherwise depending on your treasury having enough in it or your opponent having a much higher team rating than you), while the inducement has the benefit of the star player not taking up part of your roster. Models with the Loner (X+) special rule (most Big Guys have it as well) need to perform a roll when using a Team Re-Roll, the target being the value of X. If the roll is failed, the player cannot perform the re-roll, and the Team Re-Roll is spent regardless of pass or fail. It's often recommended that one of the first advances a player with this trait has them taking the Pro skill. Rather than try to roll what is typically a 4+ to use a team-wide resource, Pro grants a once-per-turn chance for that player to re-roll the result on a 3+ without tapping into said resource. For some teams, especially those that pay a pretty penny for them or can't afford to buy very many when drafted, that is a huge deal.
I'm wondering how things will change with Season 3. I think we only have the one Warhammer Community article to go by, but it has some interesting clues. Maybe this time around the changes to the teams will be more substantial. When taking a Star Player, which option do you usually go with? I found this chart on some NAF website (https://member.thenaf.net/index.php?module=NAF&type=statistics). Not sure how good it is, but it's interesting: As was mentioned earlier, the stunty teams are right at the bottom, alongside the Black Orcs for some reason.
That kind of statement is a very big reason why I'm leery of anything that comes out of WarCom that isn't a model preview. Until we have a complete ruleset in front of us to read through, I'm not interested in whatever breadcrumbs they try to feed the ducklings with. Once in a blue moon I'll bring out Glart Smashrip as an inducement, but for the most part my gaming group doesn't really use star players when re-rolls and wandering apothecaries are more valuable. We have some of the models (I have all of the Skaven ones myself), but it's far more likely that they'll be used as regular team players instead if they don't otherwise stand out like a sore thumb. Such is the case for Dribl and Druul in my Lizardmen collection as regular Skinks.
I can understand that, but I'm having fun with the breadcrumbs. The wait shouldn't be too long as they are slated for release sometime this year. Are Star Players not really worth it, compared to re-rolls and apothecaries? Are there not any Star Players that can carry a team? Is it typical that people forgo Star Players, or is something that is more meta for your gaming group in particular?
As inducements, it depends a lot on what you already have and what your team is up against, in addition to the differences in team value between your team and your opponent's. - If you paid for 3 or less re-rolls at team draft, or don't have many players with skills that confer re-rolls, you'll want re-rolls. - If you're against a bash team, you'll want apothecaries. - If you're short of a lot of players from the previous game, you'll want journeymen (essentially your most accessible player type with the Loner trait added). - If you don't want to risk having valuable players be unavailable to you due to being in the K.O. Box, you'll want Bludweiser Kegs. Star Players kind of fill that awkward niche alongside Special Play cards where you're otherwise not hurting for players, re-rolls, or apothecaries but still have a hefty difference in team value. The thing to remember too is that Blood Bowl is a "team" game - outside of vampires, no single player in the game can do everything, let alone well (and even vamps need support at times, even if it's just as a convenient snack on the pitch), so relying on a single player (even a Star Player) to carry the day is bad strategy overall. Stunty teams might get the biggest shot in the arm by having a Star Player with them, but even they have to play with more than that to stand a chance of winning. It really depends on the game you're intending to play. If you're looking to do some silly All-Stars exhibition game, go for it! If you're looking to do a league where the development of your team is almost a roleplay element in itself, you'll probably run into issues. My gaming group does more of the latter, and since neither Star Players nor Journeymen can earn SPP (essentially experience points) for their actions, we tend to either use them as scrimmage fodder or not use them at all.
Interesting. Are Vampires considered the best players (excluding Stars)? While still needing help from teammates, are they the most capable single-handedly? That makes sense. So you guys are essentially putting together your own sort of "star players" in the form of SPP evolution. That does sound like fun.
By default, your average Vampire player (with the sole exception of Vampire Runners, who are much more specialized) has the best starting attributes of any non-Big Guy player in the game. Any other team would kill to have access to players with both ST 4 and AG 2+ right out of the gate, and Vampire teams can just get them (to a max of 6 vamps plus the vargheist and cheap thralls to fill the rest of the roster). On top of that, their Vampire Runners are one of a select few players of that specialty in the game that start with ST 3, whereas most others start at ST 2 at best. The only caveats are that all Vampire players have the Bloodlust (X) trait as a counter-balance, and need some work to get the skills they need to really shine (in particular, Vampire Runners don't start with Dodge or Catch, and Vampire Blitzers don't start with Block). A player with the Bloodlust (X) trait must roll a d6 when activated, gaining a +1 to the roll if declaring a Block or a Blitz. If they meet or beat the value of X, the player may act as normal. If failed, the player may still act as normal, but if they are not adjacent to a friendly player by the end of their activation, they drop the ball if they're carrying it, lose their tackle zone until your next turn, and your turn automatically ends. Otherwise, if adjacent to a friendly player at the end of their activation after failing the Bloodlust roll, that friendly player is treated as if their armour was broken and rolls for injury, with any results of a Casualty automatically being treated as a "Badly Hurt/Back Next Game" (this does not end your turn unless the one being munched on had the ball).
https://www.goonhammer.com/blood-bowl-third-season-team-stock-report/ @ChapterAquila92 what do you think of the article? Agree or disagree? Who are the biggest winners and losers of the new edition?
I will want to read the rules for myself, but Goonhammer is usually pretty on-point when it comes to assessing Blood Bowl teams and tactics. For my own part, I've echoed a few of their concerns before, and like they said there's only so much you can compensate for GW's insistence on the "One Box Mandate" that they've been pushing in their games. Even before reading the article, and knowing what is in store for my Kislev team from Punga Miniatures if I keep playing them as a regular human team, I pretty much announced to my group that they may instead be redrafted as Imperial Nobles when we start up our 2026 league season. For now, however, there's at least talk in my group of homeruling excess players being grandfathered in for redraft until either retired or killed.
I'm surprised by their strategy. I would have guessed that they'd want to sell as many boxes as possible. Maybe trying to make the game more accessible to new players? Question, even as is, do the team boxes still not have enough lineman? Would you not need a second box anyways?
I'm not going to pretend to know what GW thinks, but they've been on a "no model, no rules" kick for the past decade, and only a bare handful of their games have communities that can and will push back if they believe that such changes are detrimental to the game itself. It's quite likely that they're discontinuing the "generic" FW booster packs that aren't specific player types, however. At 12 players for most team boxes, with at least half of the players being specialists, yeah, most would need a second box anyway. I've mentioned before that Lizardmen have it especially bad on that front, as you only get 4 skinks per box, and yet even after maxing out your other players (6 saurus, 2 chameleon skinks, 1 kroxigor) you still need another 3 to have a full team of 16 and more if you need to hire journeymen (which again have to be skinks). If you want an official GW single-purchase team box for Blood Bowl (because let's face it, you can get any team in full from a 3rd party company like Punga or Greebo), you're more or less looking at stunty teams like halflings, gnomes or goblins, and those aren't beginner-friendly to play outside of a "midget" league.
I can understand that, but in this case there are models, the customer just has to buy more of them. That should be a desirable outcome for Games Workshop. You're right, that's a pretty bad situation right there. Definitely not part of the Old One's Great Plan (if that even exists in Blood Bowl lore). I do love those silly Snotlings though. Looks like such a fun box of models.