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Wargame of the Month: Guild Ball!

By David

Our Wargame of the Month series returns this April featuring the fantastic Guild Ball from Steamforged Games!

To help you check out this brilliant fantasy football game we've got a great 10% off wargame of the month special on across the range, excluding the latest releases, and we'll be doing a series of blogs about the game, the guilds and heaps more.

So let's take a closer look at what makes Guild Ball one of our favourites…

What is Guild Ball?

Picture the epic scenes from Gangs of New York when the Natives face off against the Dead Rabbits in a battle for control of the Five Points, throw in a football and bingo, that's Guild Ball!

It's a medieval fantasy football game where powerful guilds engage in proxy wars on the sports field for control and influence. Teams of 6 players, including a mascot, compete against each other to control the ball and score goals or just to take out the opposing players and win through violence.

Along with fantastically detailed miniatures what sets Guild Ball apart from the venerable fantasy football games in the market is it's sleek modern rules design and game mechanics. Players alternate activating a single miniature and have to carefully allocate resources like influence and momentum in order to pass, kick goals or fight opposing players.

One of the most unique aspects is each character has its own playbook, which details the different results from successful attacks. Plays can be as simple as doing damage to opposing players but can also include pushes, dodges, knockdowns and powerful character plays. This means some characters specialising in dishing out damage or knocking down their opponents when others use dodges and pushes to dance around while maintaining control of the ball.

Each guild has a general playstyle but depending on which captain and miniatures you choose to field within your team you can still adapt to use a more skill or brawn focused play style, allowing for heaps of different strategies.

How to get started with Guild Ball

One of the best things about Guild Ball is that you can try it out for free, as there are paper miniatures, rules and character cards available for download on the Steamforged Games website. This means you can try out the game and a couple of different guilds to see what playstyle you prefer.

Once you've chosen your guild then you'll be wanting to pick up some miniatures, especially since the models look awesome. Each guild has a 3 model starter set which is $52.99 rrp and forms the core of your team and then you can add additional players from between $23–50 each, depending on the size of the miniature. So a full 6 player team will cost you around $130–140 depending on your model choice.

An even better option is the Kick Off! 2 Player Starter Box for just $99.99!

This boxed set includes everything you need to playing the game against a friend; a fantastic 3'x3' double sided high resolution cardboard Guild Ball pitch, rulebook and captains guides, tokens, templates, dice and 2 full 6 man teams, the rowdy Brewers or the tactical Masons. Both teams in the Kick Off! box set are pre assembled coloured plastic miniatures, which means that you can start playing straight out of the box. Stay tuned as we'll be doing an in-depth review of this starter set soon

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