Pretty rare for me to even get hit by fulings in the plains. I wear full fenris set, and after they finish circling around me a few times and decide to attack, I block/parry the strike and kill them with 2 blows from my silver knife. 2 star fulings are the only ones that can hit through a block, but there is no mistaking them from other fulings so I dispose of them with ranged. One should be consuming Wolf Skewer, Bread & Turnip Stew at least for the plains, or something equivalent. It doesn't take long to perfect block/parry, and once you do there is very little to fear from anything in the plains or swamp.