“Mirkwood Maulers 3 - 1 Woodmen of Druadan Forest
http://fumbbl.com/FUMBBL.php?page=match&op=report&id=1951790

Having spent the first campaign to find the Lords of the Ring away in their woods training, the Woodmen of Druadan Forest felt ready for the challenge of the second campaign. They were rewarded with an nice even match up with some LotR veterans, the Mirkwood Maulers.

The opening to the game went fairly well for WoDF. They received and managed to secure the ball after a bit of a scuffle and then opened up the scoring midway into the half. There was an opportunity to stall, but the decision was taken not to do so, on the grounds that you're rarely safe from a couple of wardancers and a few woody catchers. The Marauders hit back with an equaliser after a nice drive, to leave the score 1-1 at the break.

Second half the Marauders received and instantly made inroads into the WoDF half of the field. Having failed to defend well as a unit at the end of the first half, WoDF took the decision to try to pressure the as yet unpicked-up ball. With a couple of GFI's they managed to get their ST4 blitzer on the two unskilled lino's next to it and tried to get another blitzer there too. The second failed in his task on a dodge and managed to badly hurt himself in the process. Bravely the Marauders managed to one dice block the oversized blitzer to the ground and move the ball to safety. The score was almost academic at that point, but with a lack of re-rolls the Marauders couldn't afford to stall and so the score went to 1-2 with 6 turns left. While WoDF managed to deal with the treeman fairly well again, they couldn't seem to get any forward momentum into the opposition half. Eventually both wardancers were removed to the KO box, but the blodge catchers were still a huge pain in the ass for the WoDF. The ball bounced around in the middle of melee, which lasted a few turns and eventually ended up in the hands of a woody catcher who threw it into an empty corner of the field. The only hope was left was a last turn pick-up, pass, hand-off manouver and the players were duly positioned for the task ahead. However before they got a chance to try their last ditch attempt, yet another greasy little weasely woody catcher dodge through a number of tackle zones, picked up the ball and ran it in for a third Marauders TD in their turn 8.

Overall it's fair to say the best team won on the day. WoDF feel slightly disappointed that they failed to remove some players at the start of the game, which would have made everything easier from there on. But it just wasn't to be and the Marauders class told as the game wore on. Well played Purp and thanks for a fun match.

:EDIT: sorry but i started calling the other team marauders when they're actually maulers. silly me. no offense meant. i changed them in the forum post but can't be arsed to do it here too ATM.”