Mike here. James wants me to write about Fightball strategy. This despite the fact that I've never, ever, ever beaten him. See, we designed this game while I had a broken arm, snapped in mid-hurl on the dangerous curling ice of Northern Seattle. And he took advantage of me, oh yes he did. He beat me like thirty games in a row, and I never psychologically recovered from that. Now just looking at him gives me the willies. Okay, that happened before we designed the game too, but....

Anyhow, I'm going to walk you through basic strategy for Fightball, so you don't end up like me. The basic Fightball strategy is to make plays that have shot values of 10 or more. Early on, that'll be hard enough. Learn which Player cards work best where, and try not to get caught up in the math. As you get more experienced, try these strategies.

Burning Cards: If you think you're winning, quickly deal your cards into the discard pile. Aim for getting your Buzz card out before your opponent can complete plays. If your opponent starts to burn cards, change your goal to completing a few select plays.

Choking the Paint: When your opponent puts a Shooter into your Red zone, immediately drop one or more Blockers into that play. Use your own off-color Balls and long-distance Shots on those plays to make them dead zones.

Controlling the Perimeter: The eight Green court cards are common areas, but not if you quickly drop Shooters on those spaces. A few successful Green zone plays with point-boosting specials can be a lot less effort than working the Blue and Red zones.

Intentionally Fouling: Sometimes, giving up a point helps jettison cards. You may want to keep your discard pile as is, so if you can afford the one-point penalty, deal a troublesome card onto a completed play. For that matter, deal as many cards as you want onto that play, since the first foul cancels cards above it.

Playing to the Specials: Whizbang plays like Human Pyramid and the Sudden Death-Double Shot combo require effort, but they're sometimes worth ignoring other plays to pull off. Just make sure you succeed, or you could end up with very few points.

Individual Deck Strategies
Now, I'll take you through each deck and what it can do. Each deck has a unique mix of Players and Special Effects which you can use to perform trick shots. You won't get them to work all the time, but when they do, you'll vault ahead of the good-for-nothing James ... um, your worthwhile opponent. Here's what each deck is good at: