FUMBBL, the online Blood Bowl league

We are coming down to the end of the run. What seems locked in and what is up for grabs? Any last minute runs incoming?

Amazons - Yuri has a commanding lead. But what is that? KFoged on 7/2/0? So not settled yet…
Black orcs - fxiii with a great score. But Beltroniko coming at 6/3/0 - on a path to even higher finish.
Chosen - burns87 has a decent score of 6/6/3, we usually see higher for them at the end. But no one is near that top. Time to rush?
Chaos dwarf - locked in by doclystria.
Renegades - now this is just brutal. Two teams at 13/1/1, and Malmir edging out letdreamsdie on squad total. Dreams dead.
Dark elf - MartinSeptim on top, can be ousted by perfect endings from Burtblahblahblah or Bazakastine.
Dwarf - looks locked in by Willking.
Union - Bazakastine sits on top with 2 games left to play. A trio of coaches could get 7 straight wins and compete for it.
Gnome - locked in by Norn.
Goblins - burns87 has this one too, a couple of challengers could get here if they dont lose any games…
Halflings - sweep is on top with 5/4/6, something that has put flings in the gauntlet before. But Spelledaren is behind on 6/1/1, just needing a few more games.
High elf - doclystria on top, but Sir_Sully with 8/0/1 is poised to take it.
Human - wotan83 on top, but there are a few challengers that would need perfect ends to compete.
Nobility - Jinamero82 has an incredible 12/3/0, but still not safe from HenningEksteen at 9/0/1.
Khorne - Malmir has the lead with just 10 games played. Dacoach has a solid start and a good chance if there is time to play 15.
Lizardmen - almost fully locked in by MTM.
Necro - looks locked in by SickAsEggs at 13/2/0, but Malmir has 5/0/0…
Norse - locked in by SideshowBob. Poor Sp00keh missing out with 13/2/0.
Nurgle - Malmir has the lead with 14 games. Behind that Spinball and littlestone look to be in a good position.
Ogre - locked in by SideshowBob with 12/3/0. Wow! MTM can challenge Yuri for 2nd place.
Alliance - fxiii on top, but a trio of challengers can reach with a good end.
Orc - almost locked in by Knolly. Willking can steal with 6 wins.
Undead - locked in by Malmir. Galentio in 2nd unlikely to be budged.
Skaven - solid 11/3/1 from MTM at the top, but Tuga has 10/1/0.
Snotling - locked in by SideshowBob at 12/0/1 I’m sure. Wide open behind that, drclaes currently in with 6/3/6.
Tomb Kings - doomington has the lead, but would lose it to Spinball if the last two games there are victories.
Underworld - Beltroniko looks safe at 11/4/0, but Menzogna has 5/0/0.
Vampire - Norn at the top after 14 games. Spinball and Beltroniko can challenge.
Wood elf - locked in by fxiii

The Mary's Land terrible terrapins fist off against the Biola University vultures in a a match that was decidedly one sided as the Terrapins decided to give vent to their anger after a largely disappointing regular season.

The Terrapins ended up starting the game receiving and driving quickly to one sideline. While the game started off with a early removal of Vanessa Gaithersburg, who was badly hurt after sprinting into the Vulture's backfield, the Terrapins quickly pivoted to the other side of the field moved down with Harmony One-Love delivering a knockout punch to the chaos warrior Jaden Penberthy. The Vultures desperately tried to contain the Terrapins offensive drive that threated to break through their line. However, with a key takedown from the tail of Harmony One-Love the Terrapins were able to not only regain the ball after a quick block by the Vultures knocked it out, they were able prevent any any blitzes on the ball carrier. Asked after the game how Harmony's tail had become so dominate after many games of ineptitude, the Kroxigor only had one word, "Unicorn".


Harmony One-Love trips yet another beastman, reveling in techniques taught to her in the jungles of Lustria

The drive continued with an uncharacteristic foul by Keith St. Michael's that badly hurt resulted in a badly hurt Jonah Alvarez. This was quickly up by a foul by Angela Landover that sent Jet Pokossy to the bench with a damaged knee. In the end, all of the fouls by the skinks and knock outs by the Saurus were too much for the Vultures to overcome. While the Vultures were able to scrap and prevent a second score, the ending of the game was never in question.

Asked after the game about the strategy of fouling the opponent coach Lancelott only said that, "while they had tried to play a more clean game in the past, the Terrapins had often been placed at a disadvantage due to the approach of other coaches to the beautiful game." While this is certainly a departure from the Terrapins usual clean play, it certainly seems to have gotten results in this match and remains to be seen if this is a new trend for play moving forward. With only a few contest left in the season and the Terrapins on the edge of elimination for the postseason, any advantage they can get would certainly be considered as necessary for success.

I want to share a personal project I’ve been working on for quite some time: Jervis, an open-source Fantasy Football engine that aims to deliver a faithful implementation of the Blood Bowl 2020 ruleset.

Originally, the goal was simple: build an AI for Blood Bowl. But over time, the project has evolved into something broader. A hybrid that includes both a robust rules engine and a brand-new client UI.

I’m well aware that similar projects have appeared in the past, and most (if not all) have fizzled out. So, healthy skepticism is probably warranted. That said, the project is far enough along that I feel comfortable sharing it with the world.

Project links

1. Source Code - GitHub
   
2. Web Client: WASM-based, requires a modern browser.
   
3. Desktop Installers: Tested on Windows and Mac. Linux build available but untested.
   

The core UI flows work, and most common actions are implemented, albeit not fully tested. Expect bugs, weirdness, and inconsistent UI. Documentation (including a list of known missing features) is available here: https://github.com/cmelchior/jervis-ffb/tree/main/docs

For a quick test, open the website, click on "Dev Options" (in the top-right corner), and select "Start Manual Game" (this runs a game in a mode that also allows you to select dice rolls).

Key Features (UX)

1. Scalable UI: Will scale to any size, but currently focusing on 16:10 / 16:9 screen formats.
   
2. Full Undo Support: CTRL+Z works at every stage. Even across dice rolls, if the rules permit it.
   
3. Multiple Game Variants: BB11 and BB7 are already supported. The goal is to eventually also support Dungeon Bowl and Gutter Bowl.
   
4. Multiple Game Modes: Hotseat and Peer-to-Peer play are supported, both against human and AI opponents (currently a proof-of-concept “Random” AI).
   

Key Features (Technical)

1. Cross-platform UI: Current builds target Desktop (Windows, Linux, Mac), Web, and iPad. Android support is possible but not prioritized.
   
2. Modular Architecture: UI and rules are fully separated, which enables AI agents and makes the UI pluggable.
   
3. Flexible Action System: Game Actions, like asking for skill usage, can be controlled by the server, or by clients, either automatically or manually.
   
4. Kotlin Multiplatform: Technical foundation enabling all of the above. Probably only relevant if you are a developer.
   

What is Jervis not?
The aim with Jervis is not to be a team or league editor, only a play client. This also means it needs the capability to import teams from various sources. Right now, only importing from the FUMBBL API is supported.

What is the impact on FUMBBL?
At this stage, none. Jervis is a standalone project, still far from complete. The intention is not to compete with FUMBBL, but to create something that could complement it, whether as an alternative client, an AI agent, or as a broken mess of unfinished ideas on GitHub.

What are the next steps?
The project remains a work-in-progress, with several priorities ahead:

1. Expand Rules Support: Expand engine capabilities to handle advanced rules such as Giants and Dungeon Bowl layouts with rooms and features. Focus on challenging rule interactions rather than every skill. Multiple Block and Ball Clone is already supported. This is, in part, because I was hoping BB2025 would drop, which could provide some more guidance for the project.
   
2. UI Scaling: Create a client UI that works seamlessly from iPad to 4K displays. Likely requires a distinct UX for touchscreen vs. mouse/keyboard.
   
3. Timer Support: Implement flexible timer mechanics, handling edge cases like latency and complex actions (e.g., timing out mid-Multiple Block).
   
4. Full Server Implementation: Allow two web clients to play against each other without requiring a desktop host.
   
5. FUMBBL Replay Conversion: Finish a prototype that converts full FUMBBL replays to Jervis format. This is a critical step for training a competitive Blood Bowl AI using reinforcement learning, which currently seems like the most promising approach.
   

What is the timeline?
This project has already taken hundreds of hours and will require many more. A full rules implementation feels possible next year. A somewhat decent AI will take longer.

If you’ve made it this far—thank you. I’d love for you to give Jervis a try and share your feedback or bug reports.

If people find this interesting, I will probably, in the future, create separate blog posts about specific subjects like how to implement timers or UX trade-offs.

– Ilios

CIBBL is starting up recruitment again, as we are in the final round of the last season of the 13th year.

Come and join a league with around 130 unique rosters.

Are you ready to create your own myths & legends?

CIBBL is one of the largest custom-roster scheduled leagues on FUMBBL and one of the largest active scheduled leagues on FUMBBL.

More importantly it is the place where stories are born!

CIBBL (CabalVision Inter-regional Blood Bowl League) is a seasonal fluff-heavy league, with regional play, cups and inter-regional ranked play, making use of CRP + SL teams and CRP+ rules, along with some modifications, edits and possible extras. CIBBL uses a unique, personal ruleset.

For more information, see the group HERE.

We are looking for committed reliable coaches to join CIBBL, but your journey is up to you. We are looking for you to join our next Winter Season, the start of the year, where coaches are playing 'friendlies', before heading in to the real deal with the other seasons.

Maybe you want to create fouling history with goblins? Perhaps you want to chase the longest winning streak in the league? To us the games are important but the stories & rivalries are what make CIBBL unique.

Up for the challenge and willing to embrace the CIBBL universe? Send a PM to C0ddlefish and/or myself if you are interested!

Any questions or comments, please feel free to pop in at our Discord hideout or bring them up in private by PM.

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"Top league to be a part of - really fantastic staff.
The best part; loads of spectators for all your games and if you’re new they will cheer you and boo your opponent all the way!

Great fun - join today!

When that guy pronounced that he had invented Blood Bowl, this is the sort of thing he was envisaging. CIBBL brings the game to life just that bit more with a real feeling of story and history to it, all so well put together and maintained by the CIBBL staff.
Loads of great coaches and loads of different teams make you want every FUMBBL game to be a CIBBL game." (Sweep12121)

"Best league I've ever been part of!" (Garion)

"Top admin staff and coach community, top tournament structure, top fluff and extras, top new teams and stars...top fun!" (Rbthma)

"CIBBL/BIBBL > Game of Thrones" (The_Carthaginian)

"I think the nicest thing I can say about CIBBL in terms of leagues etc is that I never ever thought I would play in a proper scheduled one. And CIBBL in terms of fumbbl-wide looks to me to have filled a void I didn't even know existed." (ArrestedDevelopment)

"As a new player with no idea what I'm doing, I have found CIBBL to be an exceptionally welcoming and friendly community, regardless of whether it's chattering in the Discord, spectating games (either in real-time or using the new Rewind functionality of the Cabalvision boxes) or losing them. Most fun you can have on FUMBBL!" (datom)



- CIBBL -

'Blitz 'Dem', the preeminent periodical for all things Blood Bowl, having been published by diligent grotz since 1964 IC, brings you the key facts from the opening Gameweek of the inaugural season of the Greenskins Draft Rumble.

Grats to Awambawamb's Vygr for winning the All Star Swiss I

As scheduling may be an issue we have gone for a Sprint over the summer.

All Stars Summer Sprint!
Runs August 1st to midnight 14th September.

Regular KOs or a Swiss will return in September.

All teams that compete must be created from the All Stars roster of (almost) all stars.
Create a team here.
Sign them up HERE

You get 4,000,000GP to build your team.

For the Summer Sprint there is no schedule. Play as many games as you can/wish before the end of the season.
Results are taken from a team's best 'sprint' of 6 consecutive games.

You may enter up to TWO (2) teams.

Each team may only play vs each other team twice.

But only TWO games between the same two coaches will count.

Teams may use Gamefinder to find matches. They may also use Fumbbl discord #lfg or site PMs.

All Star Swiss I games played on or after August 1st will also count towards the Sprint.

Any questions, just ask.

Good luck and have fun!

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Let's get it going!

Congratulations to our most recent winners:

Gafiiis (RRR 643 with Amazons),
DaCoach (RRR 638 with Chaos Renegades)!

There are currently 5 teams missing to start another Royal Rookie Rumble! As soon as the required number of teams is reached, a new tournament will be started and all participating coaches will be notified via PM. If you are interested in joining, read here: Rules and then apply here: Application Please be aware Only teams from the Competitive division with 0 games played will be accepted. Every coach is welcome but the "Rookie" in Royal Rookie Rumble refers to the teams, not necessarily to the coaches! INDUCING STAR PLAYERS IS DISALLOWED IN RRR GAMES! Prizes Winner gets 100,000 gold pieces and a record on the coach profile.