MD7: Branded Beasts 1 - 2 Feckin Elves (RayXXX)
Well Ray's pending skill turned out to be +ST on his Sure Hands runner
and he also bought a Witch.
I replaced Jill Ette (-MA) with Pete Zahut. No inducements for either side.
I chose to receive and a jammy kick to LoS on my left flank coupled with a Perfect Defence event meant I only had one 2d block available and that was nowhere near the ball, plus his ST4 runner was one of the 2 players covering the ball. Again I really should've set up to negate a possible bad kick off event but it didn't occur to me.
Needless to say the 3 blocks I got resulted in two crappy pushes and a both down for my Wrestle goat Ken T. I couldn't clear the ball of TZs to try and pick it up. Maybe I should've risked a 1d with RR, but I was running out of time and was a bit flustered by such a mess of my T1.
Meanwhile on Ray's T1 he KO's a CW and stuns a goat picks up the ball and makes it safe. Here we go, what a great start.
On T3 Pete Zahut makes his first meaningful contribution to the team by KOing the ST4 runner, although next turn the Elves are able to score. 1-0.
My CW returns, but the ST4 runner doesn't, plus they've used their 2 RRs already.
Riot on kickoff gives me an extra turn to try and equalize, but again five 2d blocks only result in 1 elf down (his witch is the only player with dodge too), but Moe Torola does at least pick up the ball at the first attempt.
Better luck next turn and we stun & KO two elves and advance a half cage with two potenital receivers in range, but one mistake in my positioning allows a 1d blitz on Moe and its
, ball on the ground but surrounded by chaos players.
Next turn we make a few hits and dodge Moe onto the ball but he fails the pickup.
T8 and by now my recievers are marked but still in 2x GFI range, so a blitz on one of the markers free's up Roe Lexx for a hand off. Moe Torola successfully manages to pick up and then hand off to Roe Lexx who trots to the EZ for the score, without needing a RR. 1-1
Both his KOs return for the 2nd half, and we both get a RR on kickoff.
For about 4 turns I manage to defend pretty well and he has to retreat the ball carrier back deep, but just when I think I'm getting on top I miss the opportunity to totally isolate his 1 reciever in range and the goat marking him is blitzed away. Cue the handoff, pass and TD. 2-1.
The Elves get another RR on kickoff and I have 4 turns left to equalize.
Too many pushes again prevent me from making too much progress down the pitch and with 3 turns to go I decide we need to throw caution to the wind, so we knock over one of his blitzers and go into contact with two of his columns but with my Chaos in a heavily-manned cage, and my Guard CW central at the front.
A slightly early tunrover then gives me about four 2d blocks available to advance the cage and run the ball carrier through and some support, but unsurprisingly we roll four lots of
results and a fifth
when I decide to use a re-roll on the vital one.
That route is now blocked so I run two receiver goats round the other side to hopefully be available for some kind of passing play on T16.
Sadly we never get the opportunity because an elf is able to blitz round the back of cage and take down the ball carrier, and to really screw it up for me the ball bounces to one of my CWs who fails the catch and it then bounces to a double-marked elf who does catch it. Two successful
1d blocks then follow to free their ball carrier who dodges away to safety. Leaving me no way to blitz on T16 without dodging into TZs, which fails. Game over.
All the dice were slightly in Ray's favour, but not by much. It was the timing of the crucial rolls that didn't go my way, rather than the amount this week. Plus a few errors from me, as usual.
Something's got to give soon.
No level ups for the 2nd game running, with rookie Moe Torola scoring the TD and the MVP going to Ken T (wrestle goat) who is also now on 13 SPP. No CAS for either side, so at least no injuries for me this week.