Protection

Jono, I do understand your 'no pads needed' stance.

It's not so much a stance, that sounds political. I genuinely believe that I'm as likely to lose an eye as I am to end up wheelchair bound from a dislocated neck. I accept I'm in the minority, but I don't have a problem with losing teeth or a scarred face (more common occurrences), your point about showing newer players the "safe" way again assumes that I have not considered what I believe to be acceptable risks on the court, I am in my head (rightly or wrongly) doing my thing.

All I'm asking for is clarification that mallet-to-body is still a foul (including the face), if it's not then I guess I feel like I've brought this discussion up too late and soon I'll be forced to wear a face cage because it'll be added to the rules for safety reasons and because mallet-to-body is now an integral (or "expected" as people like to write) part of the game (cue new slew of rules about slashing, mallet interference, supposed intention, obscuring the view of a player with your mallet, etc).

Mallet to the face = same number of players playing, more players wearing cages but still more facial injuries. What's going on?

This has little grounding in my opinion, the additional incidents of mallet-to-face may very well be the result of the face-caged players with a narrowed field of vision (especially peripherally) causing more incidents.