Today we ask: what the fuck is Exy?
Exy is a fictional sport from the All For the Game series by Nora Sakavic described as the bastard lovechild of ice hockey and lacrosse. It is infamously uncleared described in the books despite games sometimes taking up whole chapters.
Today I address the 5 most pressing rules because I skipped therapy this week and need an outlet.
Q. 1) What does an Exy court look like?
Exy is played on something the size and layout of a soccer pitch but with plexiglass walls and ceiling. This is shorter but wider than an American football field but much larger than an ice hockey rink.
This is unfortunately demented because there are only 6 players per team on the court at any given moment whereas soccer has 11. For scale this is how much space the 22 players on a soccer field have.
Now imagine that's 12 people. You see the problem.
Also the ball in sports like lacrosse or hurling moves very, very fast and can travel long playing fields. Hurling, an Irish traditional sport and IRL sport where the ball moves fastest, has 15 players per side on a field only 10m longer than a soccer pitch.
This in mind as we move onto those walls.
The nonshatter plexiglass walls and ceiling would be for safety given how fast that ball would be moving. Ice hockey has walls but no ceiling b/c pucks don't get into the air or bounce as much as balls (though it has happened and yes people have been injured)
However the concept of walls and a ceiling in a sport where a ball would move as fast as an exy ball would move is HILARIOUS.
Those cosest equivalents, lacrosse and hurling, that I mentioned are both outdoors with nothing to rebound off. This would be chaos murder pinball!
Q. 2 Is exy played indoors or outdoors?
This is a controversial one with fans of these books because having read the series several times I can only offer you my best educated guess.
As stated above, the court itself is a self-contained murder pinball box so stadiums could be open to the sky like football but descriptions of stadiums like Evermore sound as if they are closed roofed like hockey or basketball. Smaller, high school level etc, might need to be multipurpose/adaptable and therefore outdoors (as seen in book 1 in Millport)
Q.3 What are the actual rules of play?
Again, exy as written was "rules light" to put it mildly.
We can gather its got similar contact rules to ice hockey with the same contempt for people fouling the goalie or players not "in play". There are allowances for momentum and like ice hockey or roller derby there are multiple refs watching the game at all times because it moves so quickly.
These refs are outside the enclosed court area unlike hockey, more like roller derby that way, and we can assume from other multiple ref sports that there is a head ref for final decisions.
No offside though rule so its got that going for it (I'm still gay even after that joke)
Play has to stop to open the court doors because of the murder pinball aspect of the balls motion around the court. Refs can call a halt as they see fit. A player can call a halt to play if they are injured and can not continue the half. Play halts after any goal. Teams can use any halt to make substitutions but can only call a halt for the purpose of substitution once per half.
There are six positions striker, backliner (defensive line), goalkeeper, and dealers (offensive and defensive).
Q.4 What the fuck are dealers?
Dealers. Yeah. No one really knows so I apply best sports logic.
This brings us back to exy having only 6 players on a soccer-sized pitch. Soccer has mid-fielders to bridge the gap between forwards and defenders but the ball would be much slower than exy. Hurling (fastest irl ball sport) has 15 players.
Despite having more players, hurling has the positions half-back or half-forward, which are halfway between midfield and either full-forward (striker) or full-back (defender). This is the only logical model for what the difference between an offensive and defensive dealer is.
Do with that what you will.
Q.5 What is the protective gear like?
The armor is often left out of fanart i think because people it would be as bulky as football or ice hockey armor.
They'd ha e to use something like lacrosse armor for maneuverability. It would be made out of thick padded mesh. Helmets with face guards are an obvious must have.
In lacrosse only goalies wear hard plastic throatguards but since its murder pinball, everyone gets one
That's all I've got folks. I'm doing outing myself as a Sports Gay™️ now.
