“Fringe Cup - SEMIFINAL

Our undead face Wietse's pro elves who recently got to cruise past Purplegoo's fail-flings 5-1 in an exhibition match to earn them money and SPPs, while we were up against Russo's murderous vampires with a horrific tendency to foul the crap out of our players. We lost a skilled up mummy that day while the elves were dancing with the halflings!

We get one handicap (palmed coin, bleah) and choose to kick. They run both catchers into our half with the ball behind a screen of players at the half way line. We go for a 3d blitz with a mummy vs one catcher, using a reroll to knock him over, but can't hurt him. They instead pass to the other catcher (marked by a single zombie) who makes the touchdown at a cost of 1 of their 2 rerolls.

They kick off with a blitz- yuck! Fortunately the ball is landing deep, and a good recovery turn from us sees a mummy MNG a lineelf, our tackler wight stun their dodge catcher nearest the ball, and our ghoul grab the ball and pass it a few steps to safety in the hands of a wight surrounded by our team. On their turn they use up their last reroll and manage to get an elf KO'd failing a dodge. We push forwards, MNGing their spare thrower with a mummy on the way.

The elves are soon down to 6 on the pitch, but still engineering attempts at the ball, even as we step backwards a couple of steps to keep the ball carrier surrounded by our team. The following turn we make a burst towards the far side with our wight, wall up against most of their team, and even -AV injure their guard lineelf (apo fail). Their non-dodge blitzer dodges out from between two of our players for a 1d blitz but it's a skull! We push forwards and make a loose cage with our extra players, but it's not stopping them trying for the ball. On turn 8 they make a 1d block to make space and then blitz over our ball carrier, badly hurting him (regen), then getting 3 players around the ball. We clear a little space, put a ghoul in the endzone, but can't make the pickup in a tackle zone and the half ends.

At half time all 5/5 of their KO'd elves wake up, disastrously, giving them 9 vs 11 for the second half. We collect the ball and start moving forwards slowly, as the elves back away: we are playing super carefully - losing the ball would be disaster at this stage. On turn 2 we badly hurt one of their catchers with a mummy and the following turn they avenge themselves badly hurting a rookie zombie. On turn 4 with a blockless catcher 1d blitz they pick both down and very briefly knock the ball out of our ghoul's hands. We secure it, then foul the catcher, managing to get a zombie sent off in return for a stun.

Turn 5 and we manage to -MA injure their blodge blitzer and it's 6 elves vs 9 of us as we advance into their half of the pitch as carefully as possible. By turn 7 we have the ball by their endzone and fairly safe, though their DP has KO'd our other ghoul. They don't go for a wild attempt at the ball on their T7 though their DP manages to KO himself dodging away from a mummy. We score and 1/3 of their elves wakes up, making a 1 turn attempt impossible.

*** EXTRA TIME ***
Their 2 KO'd elves remain sleepy, as does our frenzy ghoul, plus they are chosen to kick. With 5 vs 11 it doesn't look good for the elves- to make things worse they get a bad kick letting us handoff the ball to our wight... pretty much their best bet was hoping for a blitz to steal the ball! We then pick a both-down with a 3d block with our mummy, seriously injuring a dodge elf. On turn 2 we throw 6 blocks on their sidestepping blitzer before he finally goes down, then niggle him with a foul, leaving 3 elves on the pitch.

But that doesn't stop them as they manage a 1d blitz on the ball carrier, knocking the ball into 'just' two of our tackle zones. Using their final reroll their catcher is just about able to reach it, grab it, and then get about 3 squares into our half. We assemble a 5 strong team to get a 3d blitz with our tackle wight, knocking the ball free, though not picking it up ourselves. A mummy then KO's their dodge lineelf with a both-down 3d block, leaving two elves on the pitch.

They won't give up however, going for -3 dodge past a tackler one turn and when we drop the hand off the next turn they go for a -2d blitz vs a wight that sees their elf KO'd. We foul the final elf (a catcher) for a KO, clearing the pitch and run the ball upfield to stall out the last few turns making it 2-1 on turn 8.

The elves have one turn to somehow get that coin toss as two of them walk onto the pitch for the kickoff. But they can't make the miracle happen and the win is ours!

GG Wietse!”