Without even noticing, today I played my 901st match. And my 900th match, and they both went pretty badly, but that's another lesson I keep forgetting, like a drunken gambler - the best way to get over a bad match is probably not to play another match, just like putting another coin in the fruit machine after you've lost your month's wages isn't going to make you a millionaire.

Still, there's some things to salvage. Although I'm up to losing 50% of the matches I've played this year, that's still better than 2020 (61% lose rate), or my first 500 matches (71%). The other thing I've contented myself with is that while the two teams I have in the Box Trophy aren't doing great, they're doing better than their corresponding teams from the third Box Trophy (the only one I've managed to complete so far).

Humans:
DDLWLLLLWDL - 2 wins, 3 draws and 6 losses, vs the 12 Very Angry Men, who managed
DDLLLLLDLLL - and didn't win a single game until their 27th match.

Dark Elves:
LWLLLWLLL - 2 wins and 7 losses, which isn't great, but again, the Nice Chaps did
LLLWLLLLL so that's double the win rate in 9 games (although going from 11% to 22% really doesn't feel wonderful)

I'm coming to the conclusion from all this that Dark Elves may not be the team for me; they seem to keep getting hurt, although my humans are faring worse (5 dead in 12 matches, vs one niggled and two -ST elves), which has also been fairly demotivating. Every time I get a player with more than 5 SPP, it seems like the death knell is sounding. Serves me right for taking Guard on a blitzer like I said I wouldn't, maybe?

So after hoping to finish the fifth BBT this year (I had plenty of time to do 15 matches at the start of the year) I'm giving up on it now. Better to play teams you enjoy, than feel beholden to a choice you made last year that doesn't bring you happiness. I've had my time in the heady altitude of a CR above 150, and for now, that time has passed again. With any luck, I'll pick better goals next time around...