“I always underestimate vampires.

For some reason, I assume that they're going to be constantly failing their blood lust rolls, will be lost without their thrall support and will inevitably fail their blood lust just as they're about to score. That's what happens when I play vampires, anyway.

But this wasn't the case here - at least not in the first half. JuggerGonzo seemed perfectly happy to send his vampires off with nothing but themselves for company and although I kept waiting for the turnovers, they just didn't come - not from failed blood lust, anyway.

We began with me receiving. It was very sunny, but fortunately that didn't last - a blizzard came in instead! So no long bombs them. I did manage a couple of short passes though, and the poor catchers were forced to do some running for once in order to score.

Then the vampires did their thing. They were a bit slower than the wood elves, what with no going for it in the snow, but they were certainly relentless. And JuggerGonzo was using hypnotic gaze like a maniac to make gaping holes in my defence. Needless to say, I wasn't able to stop the score.

Then the blizzard blew itself away and I could get back to the business of throwing some long bombs - except that the first one I tried was a double fumble. Luckily though, I was slightly better prepared for it than usual, was able to get the ball back off the vampire who had stolen it, and give it another go - JuggerGonzo helping out by rolling four skulls in a row on his first block of the turn.

No chance of a one-turn in the final vampire turn, and we moved quickly on to the second half. And the vampires moved quickly on to score while the wood elves wandered around like a bunch of amateurs.

But by now the vamps were finally starting to lose their thralls, and at the same time, the wood elves were taking no casualties whatsoever, allowing me to get enough players downfield to mean there was likely to be at least one open target for the long bomb.

But the vampires weren't giving in without a scrap and equalised once more.

So it came down to my final two turns. I collected the ball and made sure the thrower was safe, put five players within reach of the endzone and hoped there were going to be no more fumbled passes...

JuggerGonzo did what he could, dealing with every single one of the receivers, either by knocking them down or by hexing them with hypnotic gaze - meaning I couldn't throw to them and then run on. In the end, I was forced to make a lucky blitz to free up a wardancer, run him into the end zone and then go for it with the thrower to make the pass.

I failed the go for it. But only once. And the pass was caught for the dying-seconds win.

So finally a win after an ugly losing streak of five games. It was a close thing, but that just made for a fun and exciting game. And mostly I'm just glad the blizzard went away so I was able to flex the old passing muscles a bit.

I don't often play against vampires, and now I remember why. ST4 and AG4 is an amazing combination and to have it on six players (only five today though) is amazing - especially when one of them also had +ST and +AG! And it was great to see a coach who really knew how to use hypnotic gaze. It didn't always work, but it certainly gave JuggerGonzo his first score and made that final turn a real nightmare.

So the win brought back some fans, which was nice, but expensive mistakes again stole half of my winnings. I do think it's kind of harsh that I can't even keep enough gold for a replacement wardancer without risking losing it.

Oh well. Fun comes at a price, I suppose.”