Mick Zaford, the leader of the clan
The Zafords are an important clan from Pandora.
Background[]
They have thick roots on Pandora, being one of the first settlers to arrive there. They operate from The Holy Spirits just outside Overlook. They have always been at odds with another well-known clan, the Hodunks, and their tentative truce was shattered when ex-Hodunk Scooter murdered Lucky, son of clan leader Mick.
Appearances[]
The Zafords as a clan appear in Borderlands 2 at odds with the Hodunks. For this, they are willing to hire any mercenary to attack the other clan. This leads to the Clan War quests. While the entire clan as a whole appears only in Borderlands 2, a member appears in Borderlands. Lucky Zaford who is Mick Zaford's son runs a bar called Lucky's Last Chance Watering Hole in the Dahl Headlands is a part of the clan.
A Zaford clan member appears in the intro for Tales from the Borderlands unearthing a loot box before a generic bandit assassinates him with a Skullmasher.
Trivia[]
- With Tector Hodunk appearing in Tales from the Borderlands which takes place after Borderlands 2, it can now be confirmed as canon that the Hodunk clan survived while Mick and the Zaford clan were exterminated in Clan War: Zafords vs. Hodunks.
- The Zafords are a Pandoran mirror of Irish people, as shown through their main base of operations (which is a pub called The Holy Spirits), thick Irish-like accents, attire, and their shamrock emblem.
- Along with the "hillbilly"-like Hodunks, the Zafords resemble a commonly-stereotyped group of people that have been and/or are subject to discriminatory treatment, especially in America. In the 1950s, Irish-Americans became the object of widespread discrimination for their predominant Catholicism. Among the stereotypes associated with the Irish is a tendency towards alcoholism. which is reflected in the Zafords' Holy Spirits bar.
- "Zaford" is a reference to the Gearbox level designer Zach Ford.