It's Tuesday night, let's commence preparations for grumblinggggggggg!
Match 6: Smelly Ba*ds - Skaven
The gap between the two teams turns out to be 140K, which means keeping a hold of that 14th Player/Rotter has not cost the Lords any extra inducements. Phew. The Skaven coach takes one look at the Lords roster and promptly induces a second Apothecary to deal with the inevitable casualties.
Looking over the Skaven's roster it becomes clear that there are three potential problem players to consider. One is a Strip Ball Blitzer, the second is a Guard lineman and the third is the Rat Ogre, who has Claw... That thing is going to be a serious problem if it's not dealt with fast.
The Lords win the FAME roll and the coin flip. Briefly recieving is considered to allow first shot at the Rat Ogre, but the long term 2-1 game plan takes priority. The Skaven set up agressively and the ball lands short. Immediately the Rat Ogre proves to be as problematic as suspected, landing Jensen (NW) and a Rotter (Barry!
) into the KO box . But during this drive the Lords do not stand idlely by and CAS a Gutter Runner (Caza's first Casualty!) and a Lineman (Arnold - Rotter). Then KO another lineman and force the Skaven to score on the second turn.
No players recover from KOs, but fortunately that deep bench means the Lords can still field 11 players. The Skaven are also able to keep at Nuffle's 11. The ball lands deep and a Riot Breaks out - moving the Skaven's turn counter back to 1. Cool despite the crowds chaos Montez collects and successfully passes the ball to Jams for the team's first ever COMP! Jams then moves up close behind the line and the Lords gear up to exterminate some pests. Which they do most admirably. The biggest problem is still the Rat Ogre, who is taken down but not injured.
As predicted the Rat Ogre starts to run rampant, CASing Roscopp and removing him for the rest of the game, then KOing Rocco and another Rotter.
But Caza is on a massive offensive drive and has also managed to sneak under the radar as a threat. While he is the single most dangerous player on the Lords team, the Skaven have failed to notice that he's CAS'd a second player and KOd another two this drive. After the Rat Ogre is removed from the pitch by Caza the drive becomes academic and requires only a single dodge roll to slot the ball home on turn 8.
Due to the riot there are two sets of KO rolls made before the second half. The Skaven do nothing impressive with their turn, scoring a COMP and KOing a Rotter but Jensen is still unable to return to the pitch. Fortunately, while the Lords have 1 man injured and 2 more unable to recover from the KO they still have 11 men on the pitch thanks to the decision to keep Boris for a match! The Skaven on the other hand have just 9, but the bad news is - one of those is the Rat Ogre who recovered from the KO.
The ball lands very short, almost at the LoS and a second riot breaks out amongst the fans. Clearly these teams are not fond of each other... Cooper opens up by CASing a linerat and Caza knocks over the Rat Ogre, but fails to injure it. The Lords are also unable to push through and foul the Rat Ogre because they failed to knockdown enough of the skaven line. Sure enough the Rat Ogre starts churning through the Lords players turning out KO after KO. The Lords try and keep up the numbers but Cooper (the beast) fails too many Really Stupid rolls and ends up stuck 12 squares away from the action. On turn 4 of the drive the Rat Ogre stuns his sacrifical rotter and next turn ploughs into the remaining maul of Lords (6 Players!) stunning the last standing Nurgle Warrior. This means that the Rat Ogre is stood next to the ball carrier and there is a giant pile of skaven cancelling assists. The Lords think about it a bit and decide to go with two 1 dice blocks to set up a chain push and get the Rat Ogre out of the way. It works out fine and Jams scores his second TD of the match. But the Skaven now have 3 turns to retailiate - so it most likely will be a draw.
The Lords field 10 men, while the Skaven are down to 8. Caza sets up deep backfield to blitz the last Gutter Runner who is bound to get through.
The ball is kicked and lands on the far left field, but all of the Skaven have hung out on the right. The Thrower collects the ball and after counting the range on the Pestigors stops 9 Squares away from Montez. This is 7 Squares away from the LoS.
Rather unsportingly (imo) the Rat Ogre attacks Jams with it's blitz instead of a Rotter or Bodini, despite the fact that it requires 2 GFIs to achieve this manuever. The Lords suspect that the Skaven are attempting to eliminate the TD scorer out of spite.
The Lords retaliation is fast and decisive, Caza KOs the Gutter Runner and the Lords stun a couple of linerats. Then they reveal the big mistake in the Smelly B's play. The Thrower is 7 squares away from the LoS and Cooper is standing there unmarked. 4 + 2 GFIs = Tentacles on the ball carrier! Sure enough Cooper proves how amazing he is at move actions and gets right up there with Jams tucked in next to him.
Pinned in place by Cooper, the Skaven thrower is forced to make a long bomb attempt into an empty square and hope that it either scatters to one of his own team or the Lords fail to recover it in their last turn. He tosses the ball over the top of Cooper, who to the amazement of the crowd intercepts the ball, effectively ending the hopes of the Skaven team. Unforuntately the Beast is 7 squares away from the End Zone (sucks eh?) and then fails it's really stupid roll to hand off the ball to Jams. The Skaven are unable to knock over the beast in their final turn and that ends the match!
Final score: 2-1 to the Lords and 4-1 in casualties.
MVP landed on Arnold - the rotter who got a CAS and he rolls a normal skill.
Jams goes up to 17 SPPs and rolls an 11... This would normally be a no brainer, but it's not so clear cut here.
The problem is, he has about 3 - 4 matches left before the end of the season. This means there's almost no chance he'll hit 31 SPPs. Additionally he already has Extra Arms, so is effectively AG4 for all of the important rolls anyway, so the +AG makes him "AG5" for pick ups/catches and 4 for Throws/Dodges. So, due to these two factors it's not as desirable a result as it could have been. Block is a seriously tempting decision at this point.
70K winnings are rolled and the Fourth Pesitgor is bought, leaving 60K for either a 4th Reroll or blowing on coaching staff/cheerleaders
So what would people do?
Here's the squad now
2 NW
1 NW - Block, Guard
1 NW - Block
1 P - Block, Mighty Blow
1 P - Block
1 P
1 P - Extra Arms + AG or Block (6+5)
3 Rotters
1 Rotter - ST4
1 Rotter - Block or Dirty Player (Normal Skill)
1 Beast
3 Rerolls
5 FF
60K in the Bank.
A few stats:
Record 4-1-1
TD Difference: 10F - 6A = +4
CAS Difference: 17F - 4A = +13
Average TD per Match = 1.667
Average CAS per match = 2.833
Average COMP per match = 0.167
Average INT per match = 0.167
Highest CAS = Roscopp with 6
Highest TDs = Caza and Jams with 4
Highest COMP = Montez with 1
Highest INT = Cooper with 1
Total SPP gained = 90 which is 15 SPP per match (who needs to play "Elfball"?)
Total earnings = 370K which is 61.67K pm
Total +FAME = +3 which is 0.5 pm
Total Rerolls left unused at the end of a half = 5
Total number of times Foul Appearance worked = 3 (1 of those was rerolled, the other two stuck)
FF went up 5 out of 6 matches
