“Letter from King Orfin Maledread II to his son, Prince Luthor Maledread

Dear Son

You may be suprised to learn that I yet live, your poisons having been slowed by the services of a half dozen clerics of goodness, truth, and justice. By their sacrifice on the alters were our high priestesses able to divine a cure from scrying the pooling life fluids, and have administered a temporary cure, albeit at the cost of my total hair loss and skin turning blue. My rage was tempered by the knowledge that your fortune has run out with your team of ne'er do wells, and that pitiful Wood Elves brought you near to your knees! Oh how my high council laughed at your misfortune, as did I, before I reminded the council that you are still a Maledread and that mockery of you is of me also. My new council convenes tomorrow whilst the old one sit contemplating the error of their ways - on the end of sharpened stakes outside the castle gates. Their rotting corpses should serve as warning to those who would defy me - as you continue to do so! Beware son! My revenge comes, and that right soon!

King Orfin Maledread II

Letter from Prince Luthor Maledread to King Orfin Maledread II

Dear Father

I am... pleased... to see you live still. It would pain me to know that you had died so easy and my own fate, as King, might be determined with such simplicity. Perhaps there is a lesson to be learnt here, taught by father to son.

Use stronger poison.

On the field of battle, the Wood Elves were not so much blessed, but less cursed than I. At key moments their luck held, and mine was lacking, along with less key moments. Indeed, if there were an element of chance involved in simply walking on the field I fear that we would have fallen foul of the accursed god, Nuffle, and on the way down impaled ourselves on the grass having found that it had turned hard and brittle from days in the sun, and had our eyes poked out.

The elves were nigh on invulnerable. We were able to knock one out briefly, despite the Ref turning a blind our thanks to our pre match bribe. Unfortunately, our players foul like new born kittens, wearing furry mittens and booties. The only injury came to them from a singular failed leap - their Wardancers nigh on laughed at tackle zones, and overall, Nuffle shone with fortune on them whilst for us the end of the game could not come fast enough - to know that, should your blocks miraculously not fail, that they would not have any effect but knocking an Elf down for it to get up soon after, whilst my own team was more or less fully lying down for most of the game is frustrating. Despite scoring early in the 2nd half, the game was rendered a non contest half way through when almost everything I tried - save standing players up - ended in failure, and my interest simply leaked away. I was stood by chatting with the lads at the final whistle, thinking on how to torture them to provide better motivation for the next game. The two touchdowns we did score were from deep, run, handoff, pass score affairs. A previous attempt had failed on the edge of the end zone. No such critical failure for the Wood Elves save for one failed jump. Their blocking was impeccable, they outblocked us, outdodged us, had no trouble handing off or passing for the most part, and our fellows were like decomposed Zombies with no arms or legs.

Things can only get better - at least, despite being down to 10 players next game, we did not lose.

Fare thee well father. I have wisely chosen to ignore the celebratory bouquet you sent as a) We did not win and b) We found the bomb hidden therein. Trust not goblins to do an assassins work - they are crude, and besides, they'd forgotten to put the gunpowder in.

Your son, Luthor

================

Challenge from: Opponent initially vs a -20ts High Elf team. I suggested this one as being closer, and was only up on TR thanks to having 80k in cash/

Fourth game on the trot where, although not completely on the receiving end of a thorough dice mauling, I nevertheless suffered. Not breaking av7 all game, save for 1 ko, is pitiful, whereas the Woodies popped mine a few times, and certainly for Stuns. I'd hoped by the end of the first half, after failing a gfi to score, but scraping a late score anyway, things might turn around. The four fouls I'd committed with the ref were completely a waste of time.

The second half started well and by turn 2 I was 2-1 up. That was more or less when my luck disappeared for the rest of the game, and by turn 6, I'd turned off. When 3 turns on the trot fail with bad blocks, your opponent doesn't miss a pow all game (ok, maybe so, but it felt that way) and dodges weren't far off perfect, whereas my rr were being burnt through thanks to my AG5 guy not being able to roll a 2 or more to catch a ball, that sort of thing, well, all you can do is hope you suffer no more cas, thank the opponent for the game and find another one, hoping your luck will, whilst not improve, certainly not stay so crap. I was at 51% luck for a turn or two in the match, but the luck score didn't really change regardless of luck or failure for both teams. Luck overall, especially in the 2nd half was with the Woodies. It goes that way sometimes.

Just wondering when I'll get my turn :)

Thx for the game - I think I'd guessed from early on what it would turn out like - as I mentioned, last four games now have been pretty rubbish for me, scraped a win here n there and a couple of draws, so it could be worse :D

Team fields 10 next time, has an extra reroll. Hoping to get better luck, regardless of what the nonsense luck meter says :)
”