Welcome back, sports fans! The fifth season of the Rain City Games Open Blood Bowl League is about to begin!
League communications will be conducted through a private channel on the Rain City Games Discord server.
League Format
For this fifth season, the league will use the current Blood Bowl: Third Season Official Rules. For this first league using Third Season Official Rules, we will not be using any other rule books (including rules from previous versions of Death Zone)
Each two week period of the league will run Tuesday to Monday fourteen days later, and coaches will be expected to play their bi-weekly match sometime during that period. Official time slots will be made available for in-store matches (usually on Wednesday evenings), but coaches are welcome to arrange alternate times with that week’s opponent if needed.
Ideally, all matches will be played at the Rain City Games Vancouver location and it will be each coach’s responsibility to work with Rain City Games staff to coordinate table reservations, however coaches are allowed to use other venues, though they obviously won’t be able to make use of any supplies, dice, boards or minis that Rain City Games can provide.
Regular Season Matches
Each bi-weekly period, coaches will play a single League Match against a different opponent as assigned by league officials.
Exhibition Matches (AKA “Friendlies”)
As per the new Third Season ruleset, coaches may self-organize to play friendlies with other opponents, however nothing will be gained or lost as a result of any friendlies played.
Post Season Matches
At the conclusion of the Regular Season, the top eight teams will take part in a single elimination “Upper” tournament, playing one opponent per week, to determine the winner of the Rain City Games Open League and the Douglas Splotch Memorial Trophy. Assuming there are more than 8 league participants, if there are at least 4 teams that don't make it into the top 8 cut, all remaining teams will take part in a single elimination “Lower” tournament, playing one opponent per week to determine the winner of the “Lower” teams.
League Standings and Scoring
A team’s rating in the standings will be calculated as follows:
Additionally, a team can earn extra points in the standings as follows:
If two teams are tied in points at the end of the regular season, the tie will be broken based on how well painted each team is, as decided by the league commissioner.
*Should it be determined that both coaches were equally responsible for not scheduling their match, both teams will be awarded 0 points.
Requirements and Fees
There will be a $40 league entry fee, payable upfront. Payment must be made by 6:00pm on January 14th. After paying the league entry fee, should any participant also purchase at least $50 worth of Blood Bowl products from Rain City Games, they’ll receive a one-time $15 discount on their purchase.
* For this fifth league, any participant that took part in Rain City Games' 4th Blood Bowl league will only be required to pay $10 for their entrance fee, due to that league fizzling out long before it could be concluded.
Pitches, dice, and other supplies will be provided by Rain City Games for coaches to use in-store. Additionally, Rain City Games owns a handful of teams of miniatures and can provide them for in-store use to any coach that does not have their own, but coaches are expected to have their own miniatures by the end of the regular season.
All miniatures used must be official Games Workshop (GW) miniatures with the following restrictions and/or allowances:
Rain City Games has the following teams available for use in-store:
Each coach will be required to sign up for a TourPlay.net account to register their team and track their team’s progress in the league.
Lastly, each coach will be expected to join the Blood Bowl channel of the Rain City Games Discord server. All league announcements will be made there.
Rules of Play
For this league, only rules found in the Blood Bowl: The Official Rules - Third Season Edition rule book will be used.
Bounties
Placing bounties on individual players will be permitted during the league. The following rules will apply:
*At any point, should a team’s treasury be unable to pay out all active bounties it has placed, whether due to an Expensive Mistake or otherwise overspending of the earmarked funds, all of the remaining money in that team's treasury will be removed by The League Commissioner's office. Additionally, as punishment, thugs from the League Commissioners office will severely injure a random player on the offending team (roll on the Casualty table and apply a +3 modifier). The offending team will not be allowed to place any more bounties and the League Commissioner’s office will still fully pay out any of their current bounties to any legitimate claimant.
Team Construction
Teams will be constructed with 1,000,000 gold pieces as per the Official Rules.
Eligible teams include the following:
Tier 2 teams are allowed an additional 25,000 gold pieces to construct their team. Tier 3 teams are allowed an additional 50,000 gold pieces to construct their team.Tier 4 teams are allowed an additional 75,000 gold pieces to construct their team.
Finally, after construction, the team’s coach will designate one player as their team’s captain as per the rules on page 155 of the Blood Bowl: The Official Rulebook - Third Season Edition.
Re-Drafting Teams
For this first league using the new Third Season rules, there will be no re-drafting of any teams.
Prizing
The coach of the winning team of this fifth season of the Rain City Games Open League will have their team’s name added to the Douglas Splotch Memorial Trophy. That coach will also receive a $75 Rain City Games gift card.
Additionally, the coach deemed by the league’s commissioner to have the best-painted miniatures will receive a $25 Rain City Games gift card.
$10 will be added to the prize pool for every participating team in the league beyond the twelfth. This extra prize pool money will increase the gift card prizing with 75% of it going to the champion and 25% of it going to the best painter.
