Deathball is a popular gladiatorial pit-fighting variant that is played mainly in the Kingdom of Morica, ruled by Dark Duke Henry the Red, also known by his official title of Duke Scaldis II.
Morica is a dark realm, famed throughout the Netherhells world for its bloodthirsty citizenship and warmongering politicians. In such a climate of cruel violence Scaldis II has secured his people’s loyalty and support with Deathball. Using the games to provide tribute to Baal (Fallen One and patron of Scaldis), Scaldis pits teams of slaves, prisoners and gladiators against those of their neighbouring dark lords in massive blood-soaked crowd-pleasing spectacles. The team’s objectives revolve around the placing of heads, hearts or even the (inflated) other organs of sacrificial victims into stone goals or onto mighty altars, while at the same time killing and maiming as many of the opposing dark lord's fighters as possible. In Deathball, deaths are frequent, and the “ball” is always the secondary consideration.
The competing teams of Prisoners, Slaves, Dark Servants and monstrous creatures are pitted against each other with only the minimum of weapons to rely upon. Some sort of ball , magical item or even occasionally a live sacrificial victim is placed in the arena and the two teams must fight each other to place the tribute into a stone altar carved into the face and gaping maw of the Dark Duke's patron Fallen One. The more blood that is spilt and sacrifices placed upon the altar, the more rewards the winning team's master will receive. Any surviving combatants may even one day earn their freedom and the right to serve the Dark Duke as one of his Lieutenants.
The game is designed as a glib and simple bash affair, particularly suited to those who enjoy drunken board games with friends and big piles of food to snack upon. to download the rules, simply right click and save the appropriate file below, or alternately, open them in a new window and print them off.
at the time of writing, the rules are a playtest version, and you will have to improvise such things as the violence dice, which is not hard, until they are available properly.
TO DOWNLOAD THE FREE RULES IN A WORD DOCUMENT FORM (.DOC) RIGHT-CLICK HERE AND "SAVE TARGET AS"
TO DOWNLOAD THE FREE RULES IN A pdf FORM (.PDF) RIGHT-CLICK HERE AND "SAVE TARGET AS".
NEW! VERSION 1.6 CONTAINS AN ALL-NEW PLAYER CHART, WHICH INCLUDES ALL THE NEW MONSTERS AND RACES I COULD THINK OF!
yOU WILL NEED aDOBE ACROBAT READER TO READ THE PDF FILE, IT'S FREE!
Downloadable Arena!
DEATHBALL IS USUALLY PLAYED IN MASSIVE CIRCULAR ARENAS, AND THEREFORE YOU WILL NEED A CIRCULAR PITCH!
FORTUNATELY, STUART WITTER, PAINTER AND ARTIST, HAS PROVIDED A PRINTABLE ARENA YOU CAN USE UNTIL YOU BUILD A 3D ONE. YOU CAN DOWNLOAD THESE JPGS FOR LATER USE OR PRINT THEM OFF DIRECTLY - THEY ARE QUITE LARGE FILES, RANGING FROM 900KB TO 1.3MB SO DIAL-UP USERS BEWARE!
ARENA PART 1 ARENA PART 2 ARENA PART 3
ARENA PART 4 ARENA PART 5 ARENA PART 6
If you have any feedback about these rules, ideas for games or new creatures to fight with, go to the forum of doom and make a comment in the deathball section!
