Blood Games 2025-26 Recap

Posted: Sun May 03, 2026 7:42 am

Blood Games! Slow 2025-26 version – Final Recap
AKA “Don’t Mess with Texas”

Turn 10 of the August 2025 Blood Games is in the books, and the ending was WILD!!!

Congrats to Mithril, Howlin Wolf and Darque for the mini tournament ending while you were still Top 3. Condolences to Floyd and TDO who experienced the Turn 9 Curse.

I would explain, but there is too much, so I will sum up. The top 3 warriors at the end of turn 9 were:

TURDUCKEN TALON 2378 LU 6 3 5 55 ARCAN BBQ 2025 (236)
PROTECTOR 2357 ST 8 1 4 89 HELL'S SENTINELS (234)
GATEKEEPER 2359 PL 6 3 4 67 HELL'S SENTINELS (234)

The Final 3 :

ORM 2301 PR 8 2 4 124 NORSEMEN (228)
HEMOSTASIS 2155 AB 8 2 4 88 BLOOD GANG 825A (214)
TRI-KLOPS 2484 WS 7 3 4 60 MOTU (246)

A 100% change in the Top 3. Wow. What happened? And why? Let’s look at what questions were dominating our thoughts as we waited for the results.

QUESTION #1: How often do the top 3 in round 9 all end up graduating?

About 1/3 of the time. In the last 18 contests, the top 3 have all graduated 5 times. Interestingly, in the slow mail-in BG (like this one), there has always been at least one warrior in the top 3 who ended up not graduating.

Take Away: It definitely sounds like the Slow Blood Games just work different. We are now 3 for 3 in Slow BG top 3 changes in turn 10. Take it for what it’s worth.

QUESTION #2: What’s the most likely way for a top 3 warrior to get displaced?

A simple Loss (without dying) is the most common way for a lower ranked warrior to displace a top 3 warrior; this happened to 8 of the top 3 over the last 4 years. Death is the next most common method, happening 5 times (sometimes more than once in the same round 10 turn!). Finally, 2 warriors won their final fight, but lost due to recognition points.

Take Away: 2 deaths. 2! In round 10 and both perpetrated by Mithril (who hails from TX, hence the sub-title) really changed the landscape. Combined with a vulnerable PL Gatekeeper (who lost his fight but didn’t die and ended in 4th) made it possible for the following 7 to jump into graduation territory.

How did our contenders fare?

Orm (Mithril) PR 7-2-3: Has an open Blood Feud available to challenge Protector. Needs a kill to graduate. 8-2-4 would put him in 2nd place (or possibly 3rd but no lower).

Result: Blew through TDO’s likely Avoid and killed Protector in a single minute.

Hemostasis (Howlin Wolf) AB 7-2-3: Has 4 (!) open Blood Feuds, but none against a top 10 warrior. A kill by Hemostasis, combined with a non-kill win or loss by Gatekeeper, and no kills by Basilisk or Orm, would put him in the #3 spot and displace Gatekeeper. A semi-long shot, but Hemostasis has 2 things factors in their favor. First, AB’s are more likely to graduate than any other style (13 of 18 BG have seen an AB graduate), and second, Hemostasis is managed by Howlin Wolf who has pulled this off before. But I’m not bitter.

Result: HW does it again! (He’s pretty good at this game). Killed Warrior Games of Movie Puns in a random match that I guess signaled cosmic justice, as Blood Gang had 2 open feuds against this warrior. HW said he didn’t like any of his 4 matchups, which begs the question of how scary it is when HW does like the matchup.

Tri-Klops (Darque) WS 6-3-3: A long shot, but still mathematically possible. Tri-Klops needs a lot of help but has an open Blood Feud against The Shadow of Killing Ground and can be feuded by Khorvinus. Needs Gatekeeper to lose, as the PL will likely win on recognition if they have the same record.

Result: Blood feuded The Shadow of Killing Ground (anyone knows who ran this team?) and got the kill, neatly leap frogging Gatekeeper based on wins and taking the last graduation spot.

Basilisk (Gentle Ben) BA 8-1-3: Has an open Blood Feud available to challenge Gatekeeper and needs a kill to graduate. At 9-1-4, none of the lower ranked warriors could beat him on the first tiebreaker (wins).

Result: Successfully blood feuded Gatekeeper and got the win, but not the kill. Finished 9-1-3 in 5th place. Top Basher.

Eyrunia (Khorvinus) ST 7-2-3: Being the 2nd ranked Striker means Khorvinus is secretly (or maybe not) hoping for Protector’s demise to have a shot. Has an open Blood Feud available with Tri-Klops, but Wall of Steels are notoriously hard to kill especially this late. Needs a lot of help but isn’t mathematically eliminated. If Protector is eliminated, and Gatekeeper loses, could grab the 3rd spot on recognition.

Result: Beat Soarin’ Ashroot of Wyldrage Atdoom’s blood feud but didn’t get the kill. Finished as the top Striker at #5.

William L Weller (Riff-Raff) PS 7-2-3: Everybody wants to see the Piker graduate, right? I know I do! For WLM to graduate, everyone just needs to “be like three little Fonzies here. And what’s Fonzie like?” Cool. Just be cool, Honey Bunny. Nobody even has to die, except the NPC that no one will miss. Then, WLW takes over the #3 spot based on Wins, and this will all just be a happy memory.

Result: Avenged his turn 9 loss to Den’s Piker Terri Cramps but let him live so could “learn somethin’”. Got the kill statement, then showed mercy to his opponent. Like the 49’ers not understanding the new OT rules in the Super Bowl, he clearly didn’t understand the goal here. Finished #7 as the top Piker at 8-2-3. Morale victory. Hazzah!

Dry Rub Noble (Floyd) WS 6-3-3: If this was any other manager than Floyd, I’d say that DRN could be the proverbial wild card. Has an open Blood Feud versus Protector, and a kill would open 2 potential spots (also leaping Gatekeeper on record) for DRN to sneak into the top 3, giving Floyd 2 graduates. But Floyd’s superstition about not messing with a good thing is well known, and he likely won’t tempt fate. Could still graduate with a kill, and a Gatekeeper loss.

Result: Floyd surprised me and did attempt the blood feud against Protector, but his challenge was 2nd in priority and he never got the chance to frustrate TDO’s Avoid. Lost to Watcher of Hell’s Sentinels in one of the Least Read fights of all-time.

Honorable Mentions: Alex DeLarge (Chief I’s AB) and Yakety Sax (Pauly’s LU) both got round 10 kills to finish in the top 10.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this iteration of the Blood Games franchise as much as I have. The anticipation of results is as much fun as the actual game itself! Especially when your Piker missed it by that much. Dammit, Den!

Riff-Raff
TEABAG Ambassador to Alastari
Self-Proclaimed Blood Games Historian

Expert Poster Joined: Jan 09, 2004 Posts: 79 Location: NJ

It was most incredibly wild, that turn 10. Gotta say I loved it Smile

Expert Poster Joined: Jan 09, 2004 Posts: 79 Location: NJ

On a side note, the poll isn't working heh. Giant yes from me, mostly because I know the 2nd time around all 10 of mine will be dead by turn 5 (that's a prophecy)

Posted: Sun May 10, 2026 5:10 am

Yeah I realized too late the Poll function wasn't working. Tallow was kind enough to repost the poll on the Discord channel :

https://discord.com/channels/1005545197448478911/1361009102557282355

Expert Poster Joined: Jan 09, 2004 Posts: 79 Location: NJ

Wait, did I miss a dig at my 49ers too?!?!?!?! OT Rules, bah, that was a fantastic decision by a head coach who wants to one day be known as the coach who made the most super bowls, dominated, and lost in the end, he's going for martyr sainthood!!!!