The Bloodbowl Dictionary

The original content for this Bloodbowl Dictionary kindly donated By PurpleChest A searchable version is also available on the 145 discord server

If you have an entry please add it in alpahbetical order following the formatting already established:

Name - Discription, please use italics for terms at already exsist in the dictionary.

A

AC / Ass. Coach - Assistant Coach, either on a team's roster or as an inducement.

Admin Dice - A joke/belief that admins get better dice results.

All Mens/All Mans - Going base to base contact with all of your players. Alternatively lining all your players up on the LOS for kick off.

Apo - Apothecary

Artillery - A bomber with Hail Mary Pass.

AV - Armour Value often followed by the number required to beat it eg AV9+

B

Backlining - Lining your players up at the rear of your half on kick off, except the three on LOS, often as a way of trying to stop a OTTD. Also Fence.

Bait - A player or players placed to pull opponents into a weaker position.

Ball Carrier / BC - The player carrying the ball, or the player that usually carries the ball for a team.

Banger - A coach very likely to use bash teams and seek casualties

Base - To be in contact with an opposition player, to be in in oposition players tacklzone, often the act of moving your players into those tacklezones.

Bash - The playstyle or types of roster that hits things hard hoping for removals. Examples include Orcs, Dwarf, Undead etc. These teams often have no other way of playing. See also Banger a coach who usually plays bash teams.''

BB - 1. Blood Bowl, 2. Black box

BB3 - Blood Bowl 3, the third iteration of the Cyanide videogame that is mostly based on BB2020 rules

BB2016/2016 - Blood Bowl 2016 ruleset, used until Second Season

BB2020/2020 - Blood Bowl 2020 ruleset, used until the Third season

BB2025/2025 - Blood Bowl 2025 ruleset, released in the Third season

BBT - Black Box Trophy, a multi team FUMBBL Tournament, often with the number of the season after eg BBT9

BH - The Badly Hurt result for injured players

Black Box - FUMBBL's Random scheduler the equivilent of BB2/3's spin

Bloat - Of TV management - anything sub par that over inflates team value, examples include too many rerolls, useless random skills etc

Blodge - Both skills Block and Dodge on the same player.

Blodgestep/Blodgestepper - Block, Dodge and Side Step skills on the same player

Blorcs - Black orcs

Boat - A Defensive Kick Off setup protecting 5 players from the possible turn 1 blitz, see also the rule of 5.

BUB - Big 'Un Blocker. A player on the Orc roster

Bunker - 1. An extremely well defended cage. 2. Bunkers, a type of defensive kick off setup ''

C

Cage - Five players in the shape of the pips on the 5 side of a dice, with the Ball Carrier in the middle and variations of this. See also X cage

Cage (side) - A cage where two players cover the ball carrier on diagonal corners but the other two are not needed because the ball carrier is up against the sideline. Often seen as an inferior option and high risk for surfing

Cage Diving - Leaping or dodging into the cage to try and sack the ball Carrier

CAS - Players suffering a Casualty

Chain (push) - Using a block action to push another player, or players, after pushback or knockdown.

Chain Surf - Pushing one player into another so that the second player is pushed off the pitch.

Charge - The 20205 ruelset's name for the Blitz! Kick off event

Cherry Pick - To seek games exclusively with new or low ranked opponents

Chevrons - A defensive kick off shape

Chorfs - Chaos Dwarfs

Claw Pomb / Claw Pomber / Cpomb / Cpomber - Historic term for a player with the Claw, Mighty Blow and Piling On skills

Cow - Minotaur player

CRP Rules - Older table top rule set used in Blood Bowl 2

Cycling - Of player and TV management, the process of rolling a random skill on players only to sack him and buy a replacement if it was not very good

D

Dancer - Wardancer - a player type of renown on a Wood Elf team

DC - 1. Disconnect (online) 2. The skill Diving Catch

Delves/Delfs - Dark Elves

DF - Dedicated fans

Diagonal Blocking - On the line of scrimmage or in other line formations, blocking diagonally rather than straight-on, to allow lateral pushes and secondary blocks.

Diced - Losing because of dice results, or thinking you have been. To be the subject of a dicing

Dirty Git - The skills Dirty Player and Sneaky Git on the same player.

Do It Sometimes - The only universal rule in Blood Bowl. A reluctant surrender to the fact that there are no rules that you can apply to Blood Bowl that aren’t wrong to apply in some situations.

Dorfs - Dwarves

Double - Historic term for a Secondary skill

Double Screen - A formation with 2 layers of spaces players to stop dodging and leaping through more effectively.

DP - The skill Dirty Player

Drive - An offensive play, starting when the ball is kicked to the recieving team. Ending with either a Touchdown or the end of the half

DT - Diving Tackle

Dumb Square - The squares in the endzone and on the sideline, where if the Ball Carrier gets knocked down can result in a 5/8 chance of off-field scatter

E

Elf BS - successful risky plays that involve high agility/passing. Alternatively perfectly ordinary plays you dislike the opposing elves doing

Endzone Tripwire - Mythical tripwire that lays across the endzone that seems almost certain to trip anyone who trys to Rush onto it to score. The persuasive yet ultimately irrational belief that rushes to score always end in failure.

Equity - Your teams assets and chance to win.

EV - (from chess) Expected value, describes the long-term average level of a random variable based on its probability distribution. Used in Blood Bowl to justify tactical decisions.

F

Fence - see Backlineing

Fling - A Halfling Player

Fodder - Non crucial players used to protect positionals, see also meat shield

Forlorn - A race yet to win a Major Tournament

Frenzy Opportunity - Ironic name for a Frenzy Trap.

Frenzy Trap - A set up where after a two die block (or one die), the frenzy means a push will lead to a 1 die block (or worse)

Frog - To successfully target with the Zap spell, which turns them into a frog

FUMBBL - Free Java-based Blood Bowl/Fantasy Football site.

G

GFI - “Going For It” - Pre-2020 term for Rush

Greed - Trying to maximise your damage output to the detriment of your gameplay, on-field position, or ability to score. Eg sending your team in for assists on blocks and fouls, resulting in neglecting the ball carrier. Or, choosing a Push on the first block of a Frenzy Surf, instead of a safe Pow, and rolling Skulls on the second block

Ground Blitz - A Foul

H

Helfs/Helves - High Elves

High Roll - Seeking of achieving success through long-odds plays

HMP - Hail Mary Pass

Hybrid - A loose roster type categorisation. A team with a balanced mix of bash and dash e.g. Human, Necromantic Horror

I

Imps - Imperial Nobility roster, also 'Nobs

Inducement/s A selection of things that you can hire as one off in a game to try to reduce the gap in TV between teams see a list of inducements here

J

Juggs - The skill Juggernaut

K

Keg - The inducement Blitzer's Best Kegs. Previously Bloodweiser Keg

Khemri - The Tomb Kings roster

KO - A player who is Knocked Out

L

Leader Caddy - A player with passing skills access, used mainly to have the leader skill for a cheaper reroll.

Line Fodder - Players, usually cheap and replaceable, used primarily to take hits, especially on the LOS. See also meat shield

Lino - A lineman. Usually the players on the team that you can take 0-12 or 0-16 of

LOS - Line of scrimmage, the 7 squares in the middle of the pitch upon which both teams must set up at least 3 players on the start of a drive (if they can)

M

MB - The skill Mighty Blow.

Meat Cube - A mass of players clumped together with no gaps, often allowing chain pushes.

Min-max - Building teams with minimal Team Value for maximum impact. Typically this might include a lot of unskilled linemen with one or two killers or a killer and a runner. Often minmaxed teams have a larger number of games played than the TV would suggest.

N

NAF - Nuffle Amorical Football, the Unofficial Official organisation for Blood Bowl tournaments both in lore and Reality. Uses resurrection style play and uses teirs to balance teams.

Negatrait - A trait with only negative effects for the player with it such as Bonehead & Really Stupid.

Nobs - Imperial Nobility

Noob/Newb - ''A new player, probably looking for the 145, FUMMBL's learning league

Nuffle - Luck God specific to Blood Bowl

Nuffled - Losing because of dice results

O

Offset (LOS) - Putting the three LOS players on one side instead of the middle.

One Turner - a player built to score one turn touchdowns. Alternatively the act of doing a one turn touch down.

Opponent Score - Also known as strength of schedule (SOS). A common tiebreaker in tournaments.

OTTD / 1TTD - One Turn Touch Down

Overdogging - Using treasury to buy inducements when the larger team

P

Perm - A permanent Stat decreasing injury

Pixel Hugger - Someone who is scared of having their players killed or injured, to the detriment of their play.

Potato - Potatoing, doing a potato. A Ball Carrier running off by themselves ahead of the rest of the team in a desperate attempt to get close to scoring. It often signifies a loss of control of the drive. There are some for whom potatoing is the main form of offence but it is considered a poor choice unless it's your only choice, in which case it is a good choice

Power Apo - Using an apothecary early in the game to turn a KO into a Stun. Occasionally an early BH.

Pro Elves - Alternative historic name for the Elven Union roster

Progression - A format of Blood bowl described in the rulebook as League play, where players earn star player points and progress to level up. They can also be injured and killed and these injuries sustain to the next game. For many this is the standard way of playing blood bowl. The alternitive is resurrection style

Q

Quad Skulls/Quads - Rolling Skull+Skull on a 2 dice block, rerolling it, and getting Skull+Skull again. The chances of this are 1/1296

R

Rage quit - A player conceding/disconnecting a match without notice following negative events

Removal - whenever a player leaves the field during a drive

Resurrection - A type of league or tournament format where there is no roster development or other consequences of the games played during the tournament. It is called matched play in the rulebook. There are no deaths or long-term injuries, no SPP gained, no money gained, etc. You use the same roster for every game. Races are split into tiers to aid game balancing. The alternative is progression

Reverse the Field - getting most/all of your players past the opposition and defending the stall.

RNG - Random Number Generator that produces the dice results online

Rogre/Roger/Rodger - Rat Ogre

Rowdy - aggressive and possibly foolhardy play

RR - Reroll

Rule Of Five - A Defensive Kick Off shape protecting 5 players from the possible turn 1 blitz.

S

Sacking - Hitting the ball carrier to get them to drop the ball.

Safety - From US football, a player that hangs back to defend break throughs. Also 'Sweeper'

Scoring threat - A player in scoring range, especially one moving into scoring range late in a drive.

Screen - Using players spaced apart to protect space and/or the ball carrier.

Scum/Scumming - See Overdogging

Secondary Block - A block made possible by pushing a defender by a previous block.

Server time - (FUMBBL) the time displayed in the top right corner of the website, by which scheduling is arranged. Also BB time.

SF - The skill Stand Firm

SG - The skill Sneaky Git

SI - The Casualty result Serious Injury

Sidecage/Sideline Cage - A Ball carrier on the edge of the field protected by two other players diagonally in front and behind.

Snake Eyes - 1+1 on a roll of 2D6. Or 1, rerolled into 1. Also Snakes, ol' snake eyes

Snowball - when an early advantage causes the game to become one sided

SPP - Star Player Points

Stall Square - 2 from the endzone and 2 from the sideline, thought safe to be knocked over without off field scatter.

Stalling - Not scoring when you have the the ability to do so in order to score on a later turn and thus denying your opponent more turns on their drive.

Stunty team - A roster mainly of players with the Stunty trait. Also a Tournament definition for tiering.

Surf - A player pushed off the pitch into the crowd

Switch - Pulling the defence toward one side, then moving the team and/or ball to the other side of the pitch

T

TD - Touch Down

Tents - The skill Tentacles

Team Value - A measure of the value of a given team in gold

Tilt - When a player loses composure leading to poor decisions and play. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilt_(poker)

Trap space - A deliberate gap used to lure unwary players into hard-to-defend positions

TT - Table Top, playing BB in person

TTM - The skill or the action Throw Team Mate

Turtle - To sit defensively protecting the ball and make no attempt to score.

TV - Team Value

U

Uphill - When your opponent gets to decide the outcome of your Block dice

V

Vanity Pass - An unnecessary pass made solely to generate Star Player Points (SPP)

Venga bus - A Cage formation With Ball Carrier and another player inside a stretched X shape.

W

Withdrawn Offence - Retreating all players on offence to reduce attrition and concentrate dice rolling on less turns. Also 'Dakka', 'Italian Defence' See here for full explanation

Woodies/Woodys - Wood Elves

Wrackle - Wrestle and Tackle skills on the same player

Wrodge - Wrestle and Dodge skills on the same player

X

X-Cage - five players in the shape of the pips on the 5 side of a dice, with the Ball Carrier in the middle.

Y

Z

Zap - The wizard's spell Zap. See 'Frog'

Zons - Amazons