One of the oldest tricks in the book is the bribe. Don’t listen to anyone who tells you otherwise, everyone has their price especially on the Blood Bowl pitch. These rules are to be used in conjunction with the special play cards and the Ref rules found in the first Blood Bowl Compendium.

There are two prime instances during a match at which a sympathetic referee would be most welcome. The first is when you make a penalty roll to send off a player with a secret weapon. The second is when ‘Arguing the Call’ with the ref because he obviously doesn’t know what he’s talking about – sending off you man, the shame of it!

The method for making a bribe is the same in both cases:

1. Announce that you are going to bribe the ref.
2. State how much you are bribing him with and deduct it from the treasury.
3. Make your roll with the appropriate modifiers.

Irrespective of the result, the money is now gone and cannot be reclaimed even if the bribe fails. Also, you may never spend more money than you have available in your treasury.

A coach makes penalty rolls after a touchdown is scored or when a half ends for each Secret Weapon his opponent’s team has fielded. This is to see if the ref sends the player off. The coach rolls 2D6 and tries to score equal to or more than the weapon’s penalty roll value to have it sent off (page 18 of the Blood Bowl rulebook).

Wouldn’t it be good if the ref took a closer look? Right…

Following the Making Bribe directions above, when you are about to make a penalty roll you announce your bribe attempt. For each full 10,000gp you spend on the bribe you may add +1 to a penalty (i.e. 30,000gps = +3 to the roll). Note that the bribe only applies to one particular penalty roll and you should state which weapon it is for before rolling, if there are more than one roll to be made. Of course, there’s nothing stopping you making bribes for each penalty roll, so long as you have the money available.

In addition to this extra scrutiny by the ref, he is now less likely to accept an opposing coach’s arguments to the contrary. So, if your opponent argues the call with the ref he must subtract -1 from his dice roll for each full 10,000gps that you spent on the bribe.

Obviously attempting to bribe the referee does carry certain risks. If you roll a double for the penalty roll (before any modifications) the referee is so incensed by your actions that he expels the Head Coach from the game. This does not affect the result of the bribe in any way and the ref could still send off the offending player because of it.

As Head Coach you most important job is to yell and shout at the referee if he makes a call against your team. To represent this in game terms you are allowed to argue the call when the referee does any of the following: sends off one of your players, issues an illegal procedure call against you or bans the use of a secret weapon.

Normally you would roll 1D6. On a 1 the referee expels you from the game. On a 2-5 he ignores you and his call stands and on a 6 he actually accepts your argument and reverses his decision. But wouldn’t a little gold lend weight to your argument? My thoughts exactly…

When you are about to argue the call for whichever reason, you may decide to bribe the ref. Follow the procedure as stated earlier. This done, roll a D6. For each full 10,000gps spent on the bribe you may add +1 to the dice roll. The bribe will only last for this one roll so if you argue the call later, there’ll be no bonus unless you bribe again.

If arguing the call because a weapon has been banned you may find yourself on the receiving end of a bribed ref and so be on a negative modifier. You must remember to take these into consideration when working out the final result of the call. However, no matter what modifiers there are, a natural roll of ‘1’ is still always an expulsion and a natural ‘6’ is always a reversal of a decision.

If for whatever reason your Head Coach is expelled form the game you may not argue any more calls or make any more bribe attempts during that match.

Head Coach McCleod of the Almighty is disgusted because his Star Player, Haksel Rose, spent the whole of the first half of the match KO’d because of a Dark Elf Assassin’s poisoned knife. About to make a penalty roll he announces that he’s going to bribe the ref to send off the offending Dark Elf. He spends 50,000gps from his treasury for a +5 modifier and throws 2D6 scoring an ‘8’ with +5 for the bribe this becomes 13, enough to have the miscreant sent off.

His rival, the Head Coach of the Black Warlocks argues the call and decides to bribe the ref also if only to lessen the chances of being expelled upon failure. He spends 20,000gps. In total the modifiers are +2-5=-3. He rolls a D6… a ‘6’, automatic success! Coach McCleod curses vowing to get that dark Elf and the ref had better watch out too!

OK guys, there it is. Now… where’s my cut?