One of the great aspects of the Kingdom of Neridia is a game they play called Battleround. It is a game they use to train their soliders. Essentially, the point of the game is to use four "sets," or possessions, to get the ball from your end of the field into the opponent's end zone. However, the person carrying the ball may be attacked by the other team using any skills they may possess. The first team to fifteen points wins the game.
On my recent visit to Neridia, there was a Battleround tournament going on, and so my friends and I thought that we might participate. We needed six people to build a team, and we had five: myself, my longtime friends Kabaka and Myrick, and two new friends, Berlapin and Verhanna. We had no idea where to find a sixth person, so on a flyer, I asked Baron Algorian of Brisbane if he might be willing to compete alongside us, and, much to his credit, he agreed, even though he realized that it would be difficult to win with adventurers of low experience as his teammates. Our team was rounded out when Squire Jokarius agreed to help us out as well. We would compete under the name of Team Glyph, since that is the group that Myrick, Kabaka, and I are members of in Ravenholt.
The opposition we would face would be Team Felix, a team made up of many weasels and my friend Chester, who is a human fighter. They were a team of much high skill and experience than us, and so the referees gave us a handicap. We would only need to score four goals to win the game, and they would need to score five. We decided not to play until fifteen because it was getting late, and there were monsters wandering about that we would eventually need to fight.
Each team needed to put only five people on the field at once, with two reserves and a medic. They declared the weasel Beckett as their healer, and we declared Verhanna to be our healer. Our strategy was fairly simple. Given that Baron Algorian could take the most damage of any of our players, we simply handed the ball to him every time and let him run with it.
Unfortunately, the weasels weren't going to make it easy on us. They took down Baron Algorian quickly by swinging many dagger blows at him, and we were not able to score on our four sets, and so the ball was turned over to the weasels. They scored with a fair amount of ease, and before long we were down by a score of three to zero. We decided on a change of strategy, and instead of handing the ball to Baron Algorian, we surprised them by giving it to me.
I took the ball and ran it down to the end zone, but was forced out of bounds just before it. Having the ball near the end zone, we accidentally came up with a brilliant play. Jokarius took the ball and attempted to make a lateral pass with it, but our player bobbled the ball, and knocked it up in the air. Baron Algorian make a spectacular dive, and managed to grab the ball and shovel pass it into the end zone while falling to the ground. In the end zone, I jumped up for it and cradled it in my arms, but was hit for fatal damage as I was falling to the ground. I may have been bleeding out, but at least we had scored.
Verhanna healed me up, and then Myrick came up with a brilliant trick play for our next possession. Myrick grabbed the ball and then cast an imprison upon himself. Baron Algorian and I then tried to push him forward into the end zone, but the play was whistled dead. The referee ruled that pushing an imprisoned person was body contact, and therefore illegal. We would have been kicked out of the game, but then our team would no longer be able to play, and so the referee was lenient.
As it turned out, it didn't much matter. We tried to hold off Team Felix, but it did us no good. They were able to defeat us soundly by a 5-1 margin. Even though we were defeated, though, I must say that the game was excellent training, and was also very enjoyable. I believe it would benefit many kingdoms to adopt Battleround as a way of training their soldiers. Until that day, though, I guarantee that I will be back to Neridia some day, to play Battleround as well as defeating the Varykites.
Scribed by Seronia on the 29th day of April in the year 602.