DreadBall: Some Thoughts on the Forge Fathers.

I've played 3 solo games with the Forge Fathers, 2 against Marauders, and 1 against Humans.

The bearded Guys have 2 obvious weaknesses: Short Movement, and very vulnerable Strikers; with a Speed of 5+, they are prone to miss their Dodge, which is their only answer to Slams, and a couple of Jacks can easily bring Down, and even injure a Forge Father Striker (and a Jack is expendable for a Foul, should he be sent off).

To compensate for that, they have a good Strength of 3+, and their Guards are Steady, which means they will not spend any time on the floor.

To succeed, the FF will have to exploit their strengths to the utmost, and as they are not likely to score a lot of Strikes, a main objective should be to keep the opponent from scoring.

I am going to try an inital line-up of as many Guards as possible (normally 3 for a basic team) and only one Striker to handle the ball. My main tactic will be to grab the ball with the Striker at first given opportunity, and hold on to it by defending the Striker at all cost.

When the FF is the Home team, the Striker will be positioned close to the center of the Pitch, maybe a bit to the right, as the ball is most likely to end the Launch on the right side of the Pitch.

When they start as Visitors, I'll place the 3 Guards, and 2 Jacks to pose threats to every possible hex (save one) the ball may end up in on launch, to hopefully make opponent miss picking up the ball, then let the Striker come from behind the line and grab the ball. If, say, a Human Striker should get the ball and break through the line, he may score, but the line-up should make it possible for our Striker to grab the ball upon re-launch

When ball is secured, the Guards and Jacks should form a protective gauntlet or 'cage' around the Striker, and hopefully they'll hold out until the Striker sees an opportunity to break out and make a Strike attempt, for which some of the (hopefully) accumulated Coaching Dice should be used.

After making the Strike attempt, the Striker will most likely be thumped by the opponent, and should he be injured, the replacement is ready on the Subs Bench. I'll NEVER have 2 FF Strikers on the Pitch, as it will be impossible to protect both.

I'll try these tactics at least 2 times against each of the teams from Season 1, to see if I'm on the right track, here...