Thrudball 2013 Review

After a six-year absence, mostly enforced by the tournament falling on my wedding anniversary, this year I made it back to Bognor Regis for the Blood Bowl extravaganza that is Thrudball.  Organised by the irrepressible Frank Hill, Thrudball is an annual charity tournament held to raise funds for the Roy Castle Lung Cancer foundation, and has now raised over £17,500.  As it was during the school holidays, I was able to make my leisurely way down on Friday afternoon, accompanied by 3 fellow Cakebowlers from Wiltshire – another 6 were making their separate ways despite me taking the school minibus.  It did mean that there was lots of room for tents, BBQ equipment and beer, so that was all to the good.

We were second to arrive, pipped only by Antipixi (another maths teacher!), who had almost pitched his tent, but we made him take it on a couple of laps of the field before we decided to make camp where he had already started.  More gamers arrived, with about 16 campers in total, and a few locals and less hardy folk in hotels joining us for the Friday evening entertainment.  I’d brought a BBQ, and encouraged people to bring food, which meant that we had about 1500 burgers between us.  Quickly demolished, amid card games, drinking and talking nonsense, all the while waiting for the Essex entourage to show up on their breakdown truck, having failed to navigate the M25 successfully before their car blew up.  Glowworm (left) had brought some very minty vodka, possibly to immunise himself to wearing a lizardman costume all weekend after some impressive fundraising.

The sun shone the next day, as our genial hosts showed up with bacon sandwiches for all campers, and the player numbers swelled to around 50, representing 19 of the 24 races, with teams chosen for 1200TV including skills.  Before each round Thrud was auctioned off, with the winner choosing which table he would add his brand of mayhem to (top 10 tables were immune!).  At lunch (pies, lots of pies!) the pugel sticks were unveiled, and competitors could get a bit of practice in before the serious tournament at the end of the day…

More BB after lunch with rounds 2 and 3, and around 5 coaches were on 3 wins at the end of the day (unlikely my Underworld’s 1-1-1).  16 mighty competitors then paid £5 to enter the pugel stick contest, and Hudson ended up Combat King after a knockout competition.  This was followed by the impressive auction, for which people from all over the world had donated prizes, including the amazing huge block cushion dice made by Lunchmoney’s mother, and bought by Hawk.  The auction alone made over £2,000, almost all of it from those attending the tournament (and a fair amount from Frank himself!).  After the auction there were many more games, as groups played Munchkin, Poo, Perudo, Photon and others, before we fired up the barbecue again at about 11 o’clock, to bolster the not insubstantial buffet dinner.

I was playing Hawk the next morning (well, getting beaten up by his Undead), so we used the massive dice for every Blitz action, and they rolled pretty fairly after bouncing off the walls of the bar!  Best painted took place after round 4, some tremendous teams accompanied by another excellently large buffet, and another impromptu game of American Football.  By round 6 only Joemanji was on 5 wins, but when Lycos turned him over in the final game no-one was sure who would take the Thrud title.  Frank had decided to use strength of schedule as the tie breaker, and as Joemanji had been on top table most of the time he was crowned the champion.  Duttydave’s clown ogres took the classic combo of best painted and most casualties, and Canteloup (or more specifically his M10 sprint Gutter Runner) was over the moon with most TDs.  There were a good selection of other prizes, including a best French fouler, and most Thrudlike, which was awarded after a hard fought round of Saturday night shenanigans, including most marshmallows in the mouth and best belch (classy, no?).

This was a tremendous weekend of Blood Bowl and baloney, and I very much hope it’s not 6 years before I return (with a better team, next time…)