Monk's Marauders vs w00t w00tThe Marauders are at a significant TV disadvantage coming into the match, receiving 800k+ in Inducements. Knight Adavar, a Blitzer, is missing the game due to a broken leg suffered last match, but he gives an inside tip on a good drug dealer. The remaining three Blitzers all get +STR from their potions, while a catcher and another blitzer get +AV. Helmut shrugs philosophically as his AV potion fails to work, knowing his team will be bringing Bloodweiser Babes, a Wizard, and a Halfling Master Chef into the match as well.
The Wood Elves, for their part, bring in a newly skilled Catcher named Ethilhain with +2 Movement, master of the fabled One Turn TD. The Elves win the toss and elect to receive as sweltering heat pours over the stadium.
They get a bit of help with a Quick Snap, moving their threat one step closer to the end zone, while the kickoff goes out of bounds, allowing them to directly hand it to Ethilhain. Blitzing the inept defenders out of the way, Ethilhain easily waltzes into the end zone.
Turn 1: Monk's Marauders 0 - 1 w00t w00t
The demoralizing score coupled with the oven-like heat causes a Human Blitzer and Catcher to pass out, while an Elf lineman of weak constitution suffers the same fate. The Marauders line up ready to put a beat-down on the line of scrimmage, hoping to knock out an elf to make up for only having 10 men on the field, but the Wood Elves rearrange into a Perfect Defense, moving away from the brutish Blitzer and Ogre on the line.
Helmut the Thrower is handed the out-of-bounds kickoff, and the Marauders surge to the right side of the field, away from the Treeman. While they fail to achieve any knockdowns, they do pull beefy Blitzers and Dagg Silent the Ogre into a formidable cage while moving their newly minted, doped up Catcher downfield a bit. The Elves begin swarming, surrounding the cage and sending Marauders face first into the astrogranite.
The Marauders have little they can do about this development, and a Blitzer leads the way against a Wardancer too close to the cage, knocking her down. The rest of the cage moves another square closer to the endzone while the new guy dodges downfield, hoping to get open for a score. The Elves promptly respond by crushing him between a pair of linemen, Badly Hurting the doped receiver and eliminating the Marauder safety valve. They send another couple Linemen to the turf and back off, leaving a 1 square buffer to keep the strong humans at bay.
The Marauders attempt to begin peeling back the defensive line of the Elves, but Bertolf the Blitzer rolls double skulls, reroll be damned, and the coach is too busy bemoaning his luck to remember the Wizard waiting in the stands. The Elves begin closing in, bringing in the Lineman and Treefolk from the other side of the field and fracturing the leg of Awrod the Virtuous, Lineman on corner duty.
The Marauders respond by standing up the players who had fallen previously, creating a little more space around the cage. This time, the coach remembers to signal the Wizard, who hurls a Fireball right at the cluster of Elves on the Marauder flank, KOing a Catcher and knocking Beechbranch the Treeman flat on his back. The Elves scramble to cover the hole created, and send a Wardancer to stun another Lineman on the corner, but it isn't enough- Bertolf's Blitz knocks out the Elven Lineman in his way, and the cage moves back to midfield and into w00t w00t territory, Dagg Silent and all.
Most of the Elves run upfield, forming a screen between the rapidly diminishing Marauder cage and the endzone as the Wardancer sends another Lineman to the KO box. The Marauders reassert the cage, pushing the Wardancer away and bringing a Lineman up to reinforce, but then get greedy as Seneschal Sigric the Blitzer tries for a KO on the edge and winds up costing his team a reroll and leaving a big hole in the cage when he gets double skulls.
The Elves are quick to pounce, moving Beechbranch where he can directly threaten the back of the cage and blitzing Helmut, sending him down on the turf. To the surprise of everyone, however, the Wardancer who did the deed fails to pick up the ball as she follows up on the block, and Dagg Silent experiences deja-vu from his match against the Skaven as he once more finds the ball in his meaty mitt, in the middle of a great press of bodies. The Elves swarm, hoping to knock the ball loose next turn and get another TD.
The Marauders respond quickly, getting Sigric back in the pile and generally standing Humans back up and punching Elves away from Dagg. Dagg himself is not one to let everyone else have all the fun, sending the Wardancer flying away from the action. The Elves quickly get back in the midst of things, howerver, putting four elves on Dagg and Sigric, Beechbranch blitzing his way into the pile for their last action of the half, threatening Dagg.
Last turn of the half, surrounded by Elves in a confusing mish-mash of bodies, the Marauders stop thinking with their artificially bulging muscles and start thinking with their heads. Sigric and Dagg both have Guard, allowing Bertolf and another Lineman to get some good blocks in, Bertolf getting a Lineman out of the action entirely and random Human getting an Elf away from Dagg. The Ogre, with the help of a reroll and a critical success, hands off to Sigric. Manfred the Bawler, seeing his opportunity, gives the pile a good shove, and Sigric pops out the other side, two elves threatening him and a clear path to the endzone. Fortunately, Sigric scored +1 Agility on his last levelup, and he has no problems dodging away and going in for the score as time expires.
Halftime: Monk's Marauders 1 - 1 w00t w00t
Buoyed by the success, the Marauders shrug off the sweltering heat and the players who can still stand return to the pitch, ready to receive, albeit still at a 10-11 player disadvantage- Operation Do Unto Others has been a catastrophic failure thus far. The kick is high, allowing Helmut to get under the ball (although he can't handle the catch.) This time, the Humans win the battle on the Line of Scrimmage and form a defensive cage to their left. The veteran Catcher moves to assist Dagg and Bertolf as the Ogre takes one for the team, bringing the Treeman down with him.
Wood Elf spirits are restored as Beechbranch regains his feet without incident, however, and they blitz the cage, knocking out the corner lineman and bringing loads of pressure to Helmut and his buddies. Bertolf blitzes away from Beechbranch and KO's an Elf Lineman, and Helmut pushes away his pressure, allowing Sigric to take point as the rest of the Marauders come back to reinforce the cage. Well, most of them, anyway- Dagg spends his turn standing back up while the Catcher gets tripped up dodging away, landing in a heap next to the cage.
The Wood Elves retain the initiative, running into melee and pushing Marauders back, hoping to collapse the push quickly while they retain the numbers advantage. Unfortunately, a Wardancer blitzing from behind fails a crucial GFI and is knocked senseless, leaving the pitch. The Marauders take advantage of the brief reprieve to shove forward, moving the cage up another square. The team Wrestler attempts to bring down the Treeman to free up Dagg Silent and his invaluable Guard, but fails to do more than make Beechbranch sway back and forth a bit.
Interestingly, Beechbranch immediately throws a block against Dagg, pushing him back but declining to follow up, presumably in an attempt to bring the Treeman's great strength to the pile as the Elves are having significant difficulties with the Strength and Guard of the Blitzers in the cage. They manage to crumple the front corners of the cage with a Wardancer and Lineman, but although Bertolf is surrounded at the front of the cage he still sends his opponent down for the count, forcing a Turnover.
From the Marauder standpoint, it appears Operation Do Unto Others is back on the table as there are many elves in melee, although an uncomfortable number of them are directly threatening Helmut. Dagg gleefully blitzes into the thick of things, removing one of the dangerous elves, and Humans generally win their matchups. Regrettably, Helmut decides it's too risky to try and dodge forward with the rest of his cage, instead electing to punch away the Wardancer. A lineman dodges to fill the gap- well, fails to dodge, which might actually be better as his prone body prevents any kind of followup. The Elves blitz their Wardancer adjacent once again and knock over some outlying Marauders, but can't crack the front wall of the cage, fortified as it is by potion-addled Blitzers and the Big Guy, with plenty of Guard to go around.
The Marauders take advantage of that formidable line as they push forward another square, gaining their first numerical advantage as Dagg sends a Catcher to the KO box. A Lineman helps free up Helmut so he can follow the protection, the Catcher doing duty protecting the back of the cage. Beechbranch tries to start bulldozing his way through Linemen into the back of the cage, while at the same time the Elves call it quits on the front lines and dodge back a square, denying the Humans free hits and hoping to slow down the cage long enough to run out the clock.
Their efforts are in vain as Sigric blitzes a Lineman down, opening up a path down the sideline. Helmut, Dagg, and a couple more humans move deep downfield, but the Catcher fails to dodge away from Beechbranch and the turn is over. The Elves get in front of the cage, but can't bring up enough help as a Lineman fails his GFI roll and is KO'd, leaving w00t w00t at a serious disadvantage. Sigric stuns an Elf and Helmut runs up to the goal-line... and stops. No need to give the Elves more than one turn to score, and the meantime is used to shove a Catcher out of bounds, Badly Hurting him. The Elves can't do much more than dodge away to avoid any further injury, and the Marauder's sole Cheerleader goes wild as Helmut runs in for the go-ahead score!
Turn 16: Monk's Marauders 2 - 1 w00t w00t
The Sweltering Heat and the long drive takes its toll, and Dagg goes to the dugout exhausted. The Marauders have already seen the One Turn TD wonder, and this time get in a better defensive line. Unfortunately, they only have 9 players to cover the entire pitch with, none of whom have Tackle and three of whom are needed on the Line of Scrimmage. They do their best, but there is a gap.
Ethilhain, w00t w00t scoring specialist, lines up on the sideline eyeing a nice gap with only one TZ on it. The Elves only have 10 players on the field between the Sweltering Heat and the attrition they just suffered on the pitch, but they only need two players- one to give it to Ethilhain, and Ethilhain himself.
The kick is deep, landing next to the end zone line, but the Thrower scoops it up with no problem, lofting it to Ethilhain with ease. The stadium roars as Ethilhain races to his target (giving the defense unnecessary encouragement,) three Dodges and two GFI's away from a score. He dances, he prances, he dodges, he stretches...
TOUCHDOWN
Final Score: Monk's Marauders 2 - 2 w00t w00t
All things considered, this match gave me some swagger as my decisions were generally good, and without the One Turn TD shenanigans I would have won it! A little more luck, another player on the pitch (curse you Sweltering Heat!) and I might have pulled it off- I suppose I'll need to invest in some players with Tackle to mitigate future occurrences. I expect everyone will have cause to curse Ethilhain- dude only saw the field for 2 plays, turned in 2 TDs.
I'm quite pleased with the chain push that sprung Sigric for the equalizing TD in the first half, I felt very clever for seeing it. I really didn't expect it to work- I needed a 3+ on that handoff, not to mention Dagg needed to not be a bonehead. He was pretty good about that all game, I think he only failed once and I covered that with a reroll.
At the end of the day, nobody suffered any permanent injuries, and Helmut caught MVP for orchestrating his heroic second half grind down the field. I've been blessed by Nuffle to have two very good games in a row against skilled opponents.
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Topic: Bay12 Blood Bowl League - Season 14 Signup - TT S6, SF (Read 256295 times)