Blood Bowl: Team Manager – The Card Game FAQ
248 questions players ask · Updated Nov 13, 2026 · Full rulebook
General
Setup
- Which Staff Upgrade cards are taken out of the deck at setup?
- Which Star Players go into the Star Player decks at setup?
- Can a team draft a Star Player from a race it does not play, and how is it marked?
- Is there a limit on how many free-agent Star Players you can play?
- Does the team logo on a Star Player card do anything?
- How do you tell starting players from Star Players?
- How are Team Upgrade cards set up and drawn during play?
- Can a Team Upgrade be applied to a Star Player who is not from your team?
- How is a two-player game set up for tournaments, headlines and highlights?
- How many highlights are drawn each week in 2-, 3- and 4-player games?
- In a five-manager game, do tournaments have alliances?
- Can every manager in a game play a team from the same division?
- Is my discard pile kept face up or face down?
- What does the 'Salary Cap raised' Spike! Magazine card do at setup?
- Is the Human Catcher's lack of a passing icon a misprint?
- Do a Star Player's team name or playing it for its own team give any bonus?
Team Management 101
The Game Round
Matchup Phase
- Can a manager get locked out of all but one matchup?
- How many matchups can one manager commit players to in a single round?
- Which side of a highlight can a manager commit to?
- Can a third manager commit to a highlight that two managers already contest?
- Is there a limit on how many of your Player cards can go to one highlight?
- Must a manager commit every card in hand, and what happens to unplayed cards?
- In what order do a committed player's When Played abilities, skills and matchup actions resolve?
- Must a player's skills be used left to right, and can optional ones be skipped?
- Can a skill that was skipped or could not be used be used later?
- If a ball carrier with a downed Pass skill is downed, does he drop the ball before the Pass skill resolves?
- If a player is downed partway through his skills, do the remaining skills still resolve?
- Which abilities stop working when a player is downed?
- Does a downed player keep a skill granted by a coaching upgrade such as Passing Coach?
- Do a player's downed skills trigger when his own failed tackle downs him, or when a card downs him?
- What happens when an already downed player is downed again?
- Does a downed player keep his cheating icons and tokens?
- What happens when the cheating token pool runs out?
- Which cheating token does Rat Ogre check after a successful attack?
- Can a whistle token be removed to save a player from ejection?
- Can Regeneration trigger each time the player is downed, and when is it rolled?
- If a Spike! Magazine card injures a downed player, does it still apply when his Regeneration succeeds first?
- Can Regeneration save a player from a Frantic tackle that rolls two downed results?
- How does Thick Skull's roll interact with a Frantic tackle that rolls two downed results?
- Does Spree let you commit a second player and resolve that player's When Played abilities?
- Can a Regeneration Coach Response interrupt a Bull Centaur's immediate second tackle?
- Does losing the ball to Passing or Strip Ball trigger Sure Hands or Dump-Off?
- What happens to the ball when its carrier is tackled down, even if he regenerates?
- When a Guard takes a tackle aimed at the ball carrier, who keeps the ball?
- Can a player with Passing pass the ball to a teammate?
- What does a two-icon Passing skill do, and does the order cards are played matter?
- How does a player pick up the ball in the card game?
- Can the ball be passed or dumped to a downed player?
- In Dump-Off against Orcidas Sponsorship, which resolves first and what happens to the ball?
- When a Human Blitzer tackles, does he get the ball from his gained Pass?
- Does a Human Blitzer still gain Pass when Flooding Causes Soggy Pitch downs both players?
- Is a player injured when a tackle succeeds against a standing player with two hits?
- Can you tackle a downed player to injure him, and can one player tackle the same opponent twice?
- Can Piling On hit the same opposing player again in a matchup?
- What counts as a different opposing player for Piling On, including in two-player games and after a Guard takes the hit?
- Can a manager tackle any committed opposing player, or only the most recently committed one?
- In a tournament, can several managers gang up on one manager?
- If a tackler is downed by his own tackle, does that count as a successful tackle for abilities that need one?
- Can a player with Guard use Guard when he is the one being tackled?
- Does Guard protect a player only at the matchup where it is used?
- When a Guard takes a tackle for a teammate, who counts as successfully tackled, and can the original target's Fend trigger?
- When a defender's Guard takes the tackle, do the attacker's remaining skills still target the original player?
- When a Dodge ability forces a reroll, which dice are rerolled, and who chooses them?
- Are Response abilities mandatory?
- Can Response cards be used alongside a Matchup Action, including on the same tackle?
- How many Matchup Actions can a manager use per turn, and are Responses limited?
- Where can a Matchup Action be used: at any matchup, or only the one you committed to?
- Can a manager resolve a Matchup Action after he has passed?
- Can a manager use an upgrade between two Piling On tackles?
- When two managers have abilities to use at the same moment, who resolves first?
- Can a manager use his turn to stand up one of his own downed players?
- Can a player moved to another matchup keep his downed state and use downed abilities there?
- If a card moves a ball carrier to another matchup, does the ball go with him?
- Do downed players still count at a highlight for the payout and Star Power?
- If a manager wins two zones or two lines show the same reward, are the payouts combined?
- If you are the only manager at a highlight, do you collect every payout on the card?
- Can a manager collect a tournament payout with no player there?
- Are tournaments matchups, and do highlight-only effects work at tournaments?
- Does a tournament use a ball?
- In what order do the highlights go in the row?
- In what order are matchups scored, and what happens to a matchup nobody joined?
- In a two-player game, which highlights get scored when managers commit players to more than two?
- Can a manager commit more than six Player cards when Spike! Magazine gives extra cards?
- Can a Downed skill that throws a teammate into a matchup break a headline's three-player team-zone limit?
- Does Violence at an All-Time High resolve before a player's downed skills?
- Who gets credit for an injury from Violence at an All-Time High, and does the tackler count as injuring?
- Do injury bonuses from an upgrade apply to the injury roll made after Violence at an All-Time High?
- How many cards do you draw and discard when a card has two Sprint icons?
- Does the ball token add 2 Star Power to its carrier before a tackle?
- Does Writhing Tentacles apply at a matchup where your player is present but not part of the tackle?
- Can a Coach upgrade grant a skill to a player who already has it?
- Does a blank face or an X on a tackle die count as a failed tackle?
Scoreboard PhaseExpansion
- Can Bite-Bite move an ejection token to a player who already has an ejection token at the same matchup?
- Do enchanted footballs add the automatic +2 Star Power at the Scoreboard Phase like regular footballs?
- When you draft a Freebooter, must you remove a player from your roster?
- Do you still shuffle your deck and discard pile when you decline to remove a card for a Freebooter?
- When a Freebooter reshuffles my Team deck, which cards are shuffled in?
- When a Freebooter and other Star Players are drafted together, in what order do they go into the deck?
- Is the player card that a Freebooter replaces removed from the game?
- Does a Star Player drafted as a Freebooter lose its Star Power because a card must leave the roster?
- Does a Star Player given the Freebooter ability by a card count as a Freebooter for end-game scoring?
- When a player with several cheating tokens is ejected, what happens to his other tokens?
- Can you look at the cheating tokens on a player who is injured?
- Can Dump-Off be used by a player who was ejected for cheating?
- At a tournament, does the Dwarf upgrade that gains a Fan for a downed-player disadvantage count once per opponent?
- How is a tie for winner at a tournament broken?
- How are ties in total Star Power resolved at a highlight?
- Does a manager still collect the team-zone payout, or win or lose a matchup, if all his players there are downed?
- If only my team has players at a matchup, do I collect every payout on the card?
- If all your players at a matchup are injured or ejected before payouts, do you still collect that matchup's payout?
- In a 3-5 player game, if only two teams take part in a tournament, does the second team get the runner-up payout or the loser payout?
- If your opponent is ejected, does Offensive Firepower still need a 3 Star Power margin?
- Does the arrangement of Staff Upgrade payout icons, in a row or a pyramid, change how many cards you draw?
- When do upgrades and star players won in the Scoreboard Phase take effect, and can a newly gained upgrade be used that round?
- Are upgrades you win kept face down until the reveal, and do Staff and Team Upgrades stay face up afterwards?
- How many Star Players do you draw from a payout, and where do the rest go?
- When a payout gives several Star Players, upgrades or staff upgrades, how many do you keep?
- If you win payouts in two different matchups, do you draw for them together, and do you keep one card or two?
- Are the team-zone payout and the central payout combined when you draw cards?
- Is there a required order for collecting payouts across the team zone, the central payout and the winner?
- In what order do Scoreboard Phase abilities that award fans resolve relative to Determine Winner?
- Can two copies of Cheerleader each give fans in the same Scoreboard Phase?
- When a manager wins a highlight and gets the same upgrade type from both a team zone and the central payout, which payout is collected first?
- On a highlight that pays out contracts, who collects them, and are they revealed during the game?
- Can Gryphon-ade apply to Star Players still in the improvement pile during the same Scoreboard Phase it is revealed?
- How many times does Withering Workout trigger in a Scoreboard Phase?
- When is the Cheerleaders staff upgrade used during the Scoreboard Phase?
- When is the Pom Pom Girls staff upgrade played in the Scoreboard Phase?
- Can Best Players in the League count matches played before you acquired the card?
- What counts as a friendly Star Player for the Best Players in the League staff upgrade?
- Does a tournament runner-up count as a winner for abilities that need you to win?
- Does the Skaven two-fan loss upgrade still pay if their only committed player is ejected during scoring?
- Do you discard anything when you collect a losing tournament payout?
- Does the first player token (golden coin) pass to another manager each round?
- Do a player's printed abilities, such as a Scoreboard Phase ability, still work while he is downed?
- Are cheating tokens refilled each round?
- Can a manager draft Star Players from another team in the same union?
- Where do the cards played at a matchup go after the Scoreboard Phase, and do ejected players still count?
- Can you use a Freebooter ability to remove a Star Player you drew in the same payout?
Winning the Game
- How is a tie for the most fans at the end of the game broken, and who wins if the TMU suspends the tied managers?
- What prize does a player get in a two-player tournament when they are alone?
- When are End of Game fan bonuses scored, and do improvements gained in the final week still count?
- Do two copies of an End of Game card that scores per Freebooter each count every Freebooter?
- Does an upgrade lose its End of Game fan if you exhaust it for a matchup action in the final round?
- Are ties for runner-up at a tournament broken the same way as ties for the winner?
Additional Rules
- When several abilities trigger at the same time, in what order do they resolve?
- Do tournament runner-ups count as winners for Offensive Firepower?
- When a Response grants a skill such as Pass or Cheat, does that new skill resolve after the player's printed skills?
- Does the Player Limit stadium penalty apply when a third player is committed by Spree or a Rotter ability?
- How many matchup actions or response upgrades can I use per committed player?
- Does a card that triggers when I lose a matchup also trigger at a tournament?
- Can a staff or team upgrade ability target a downed player?
- Can a downed player without the Regeneration skill use Regeneration if a Regeneration Coach card is in play?
- When Flooding Causes Soggy Pitch conflicts with Dauntless, which one applies in a tackle?
- How many sent-off players can Withering Workout replace in a round?
- How does Frozen Phantoms' Possession work, and does the possessed player switch sides?
- Can both copies of Morg 'N Thorg (one per league deck) be played in the same round?
- Does the Coaching upgrade's extra tackle icon work on a player who has no Tackle icon?
- After a player is moved to a new matchup by Throw Team-Mate or a similar ability, can he use his skills there, and is he still downed?
- When Hired Wizard's Down result hits, must you down a player at the matchup where the wizard is used?
- Are Response abilities on cards mandatory, or can you choose not to resolve them?
- Can you choose when to use an exhaust-cost Response such as Eshin Assassination Coordinator?
- What happens when One Ear Goblin is tackled and injured?
- Can Lord Borak discard cheat tokens from opponents' star players?
Optional Rules
List of Named Abilities
- Can Cornelius Krieg take the hit for a player who is not on his space, and who receives the cheating token?
- Can a Guard player protect a player who is at a different matchup?
- Can a standing player with Guard protect the target of an attack?
- How do Tackle, Dodge and Guard fit together, and does the Guard player's strength change the tackle result?
- Can Fend stand up a downed player when the Fend player takes the hit through Guard?
- Does Dump-Off trigger when the ball carrier is about to be downed by a tackle?
- Can Dump-Off be used after Strip Ball or a Passing move?
- Can a Passing skill move the ball to a different teammate than the player who used it?
- Can a manager use the Sprinting skill when he has no cards left in hand?
- Is Morg 'N Thorg, or another named neutral Star Player, a Freebooter?
- Can the Minotaur use its Response when it is downed by its own failed tackle?
- Does Eshin Assassination work against a player with Stand Firm?
- Can a second Morg 'N Thorg commit to a matchup once the first copy has been injured or moved there?
- Can Writhing Tentacles' Star Power reduction last for the rest of the round?
- Can Piling On trigger when a tackle uses only one die?
- Can a player dump off the ball to himself?
- Does One Ear's ability trigger when he is downed by his own failed tackle?
- Does Rigorous Training apply when a player is downed by his own tackle, as well as when tackled?
Blood Bowl: Team Manager – The Card Game: Foul PlayExpansion
- Do Foul Play's Team Upgrade cards replace base-faction upgrades, and do I need them if I also own Sudden Death?
- When Skeezy becomes the ball carrier and moves to another matchup, what happens to the ball there?
- Does Bomber Dribblesnot's response check a player's modified star power, or only the printed value, against star power 2 or less?
- When a Stunty player is tackled, does he take the tackler's modified star power or the printed value?
- Can a Goblin Spree trigger off another Spree?
- Does Rothorn's tackle Response keep working after a successful tackle injures a downed player?
- When the Corrupt Ref moves, is that before or after disease tokens at midfield are applied?
- Does the referee's discard of face-up cheating tokens depend on whether a manager receives a penalty?
- Does a manager without a face-up cheating token get the Corrupt Ref's penalty only when he has players at the Ref's matchup?
- Does Beast of Nurgle's Immobilize stop every player from passing, including the Nurgle team's own players?
- When a player is ejected, are the penalty effects from his cheating tokens still resolved?
- Are stadiums placed once for the whole game, or redrawn each round?
- Is there a stadium under a tournament card?
- Can the Corrupt Ref move onto a tournament card?
- How can more than one disease token be at midfield?
- Does a player's disease token reduce his star power immediately, before he tackles?
- Can disease or infection tokens reduce a player's star power below zero?
- Can I play with five managers using the Foul Play expansion without its extra rules?
- Does a downed player still have to cheat after a failed skill?
- Are the Foul Play Spike! cards used instead of or in addition to the base cards?
- Does Morg N Thorg get the Fouling skill in leagues other than Foul Play?
- How many Spike! Magazine cards do you use with five managers?
- Does a Team Upgrade that assigns a cheating token trigger the cheating penalty?
- How do you combine a stadium payout with the team zone payout?
- When are penalties applied relative to payouts and improvements?
- When does a referee-assigned revealed cheating token take effect?
- Is cheating mandatory at a stadium where cheating is banned?
- Does a face-up cheating token from the Corrupt Ref count as cheating at a no-cheating stadium?
- How does the Huge Bribe card work with penalty cards?
- How does the Fouling effect work when it targets the opposing manager's hand?
Blood Bowl: Team Manager – The Card Game: Sudden DeathExpansion
- When can Regeneration be used, and can it be tried again after a failed attempt?
- How is the Spike! Magazine deck set up for a two-manager game when Sudden Death is in play?
- When one tackle leaves two downed players with downed skills, which manager's skills resolve first?
- When can Regeneration Coach be used relative to a downed player's other downed skills?
- Under the Dark Elves team upgrade, who chooses which tackle result applies when the opposing roll is against your higher star power player?
- Can a Response interrupt a Bull Centaur's immediate second tackle?
- Does Vampire Blood Lust trigger when the Vampire tackles a downed player and injures him?
- Does Bloodlust trigger when a Vampire is tackled and injured by an opponent?
- Can a Vampire's Smash 'Em, Bash 'Em trigger on a target that has Regeneration?
- Does Sudden Death change the number of rounds in a game?
- When are fans from an Enchanted Ball collected during the Scoreboard Phase?
- Can one player hold two Enchanted Balls at the same time?
- If a player with Sure Hands holding two Enchanted Balls is tackled, does he keep both?
- If an ability moves the ball to a matchup that already has a ball, what happens?
- Can Ravenous Hunger's Tackle matchup action be used on a player at a different matchup?
- After a successful Regeneration, does the player use his standing skills again?
- Does a player holding the ball lose it before attempting Regeneration after a tackle?
- Does an Enchanted Ball's skill count as the player's own skill for effects like a headline bonus for players with Sprint?
- Does Hack Enslash's tackle response trigger if he is himself tackled?
- Can Luthor's response stand a downed player who just dumped the ball to him?
- Must Hypnotic Gaze be used when Luthor is played?
- Do 'printed abilities' on Subliminal Advertisements and Luthor include the skill icons on a card?
- Can Underhand Dealings gain fans from cheating tokens at a matchup your team is not in?
- How many fans do you get when the contract token pile is exhausted?
- Can a player use downed skills when downed by a card or upgrade rather than a tackle?
- Can a ball carrier tackle during the Scoreboard Phase if the enchanted ball hands it over then?