A serious curveball: I got some Rumbleslam in recently. It served as a great reminder of how good the game is.

It was a great game, with an excellent back and forth across the match. I ran the Thousand and One Fights team, which is a bunch of desert cats that play up a lot of movement ability and bleed. He played the Calaca Cabala, which is a bunch of skeletons that actually want to get knocked out so they can come back from the “dead.” We also had a few superstars in the mix so that we could play at 1.5 million dosh (points in the form of paying your team).

Early game saw my speed allowing me to more readily isolate models and take out a few of his weaker unit quickly, which had me feeling almost mean!

It didn’t help any that he kept flubbing his rolls while I kept spiking high. I pinned one of his models by the end of the first round (of five) which had me in a considerable lead.

But as the match wore on, his darn superstar really started to make a difference. By the end of the match, he clawed his way back to a draw—just barely!

It was an excellent game and reminded me why I love it and why I don’t play it much. It’s a very thinky game, with a lot of positioning and forethought involved, which makes it more like Blood Bowl and less like Blitz Bowl. That is to say: it goes over my son’s head still. But man, it’s a great game. There’s so much to consider and successfully playing your team can be so satisfying.

In the image above, you can see a black cat—the Rostani Thief. I failed to grab a photo, but at one point he used Shadow Step to move four squares and then climb the turnbuckle. He jumped off five squares and hit an enemy, taking them down. The turnbuckle attack then gave him a free shadowstep for another four squares of movement. He then… moved four more squares using his basic move action, which is limited to an already solid 4 squares per turn. You can imagine how this unfolds into a shockingly wide cast of actions, abilities, and combos that allow for a really deep well of options to play with.

It’s great and I want more!

I don’t know if the game is truly balanced. This is a TTCombat game and… honestly, I don’t think they’re amazing at managing their games. That’s a shame, but among friends? Absolute blast.

Plus you get to shout “It’s time for Ruuuuuuuuuuummmmmbllllllleeeeslaaaaaaaaammmmm” as obnoxiously as possible. What’s not to love?