Blog Posts from "LANDodger Blog" - Gameriot.com

Goodbye, GameRiot!

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 19:39:47 -0400

It is a sad day, friends. Or a happy day, if you aren't my friend and hate seeing my name on the frontpage.

I'm leaving GameRiot.

I won't get into the specifics of what happened, but as of March 31st I'm no longer a staff writer. I know that some people followed me here from LANDodger. And I hate to put you through the hassle, but I'm going back to LANDodger for the time being. Please, won't you be my neighbor?

(By neighbor, I mean dedicated reader and friend, of course.)

I wrote a little more in-depth about the situation in my first post back, and took a quick look at the future.

Basically, if you enjoyed any of the content I've been putting up for GameRiot, I'd suggest heading over to LD or using the RSS feed, etc. I'll continue writing there until I find a more permanent (read: paid) home. And if any potential employers are reading this, I'm available for freelance work, as well.

See you on the other side.

CGS Announces Wuhan Optical Valley Electronic Sports Stadium

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 21:10:38 -0400

The official name for the facility sounds like a bad April Fools' joke, but the facility itself is real. The CGS is building a training center for eSports.

You can find the official press release here.

Cliff Notes Version:

"In a groundbreaking move for eSports, Championship Gaming Series, the only worldwide professional gaming league, the government of Wuhan and the Wuhan Hi Tech Group, today announced the creation of the world's premiere eSports training center and professional gaming arena at the Wuhan Optical Valley Electronic Sports Stadium. This initiative marks a new step forward for the digital entertainment industry in Wuhan and the worldwide professional gaming community.

In addition to serving as the training center for the CGS Wuhan Dragon team, the new facility will be the location for the upcoming CGS 2008 Pan-Asia Final from April 30 to May 3."

We expect attendance at the upcoming CGS Pan-Asia Final to exceed 125,000 over the course of the Final which not only demonstrates the magnitude of the event, but also underscores the value which this state-of-the-art facility will bring to professional gaming.

- CGS Commissioner Andy Reif

It's obviously a big step for eSports. Even though online competitions are easier for the competitors, the future of competitive gaming is undoubtedly LAN competition. Having a place dedicated to practicing in a LAN environment is a great asset.

Despite the apparent benefits, I'm not sure what to make of the facility. What service will it actually provide? Will it just be a huge LAN center? Will there be staff there to actually teach/coach players? Are there going to be regular or semi-regular events held so people can get more playing experience? All of the above?

These questions will probably be answered in the coming days (or weeks, months) as the Stadium starts to take shape. For now, I'm definitely curious to see what the CGS has in store. I hate to bring up the idea of money, but they're not building this out of charity. There has to be some tangible benefit for the CGS to invest those kind of resources, and I'm wondering what the "business model" is, so to speak.

Still, it's an exciting announcement, and a good sign the the CGS is dedicated to building a league and not just throwing money around. They're by no means perfect, but embracing the community and helping foster growth from the ground-up seems like a much better plan than raining money down from above, Pacman Jones-style.

Hopefully we'll see the day where this becomes the standard, and we'll have eSports stadiums in different nations across the world.

(And I'm sure everybody would be playing WoW there, too.)

Chicago Chimera Draft Report Card

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 10:45:36 -0400

I'm gonna mix things up a bit for the last Report Card. Instead of breaking down each pick individually or in smaller groups, we might as well tackle Chicago's whole draft at once since four of them were Source players. Instead of delineating each pick, we'll tackle them as a group.

But before that, let's talk about their new FIFA player, Yfran "Eafra" Garcia.

"GOOOOOOOOAL!" might be a rare sound for Chicago this season.

Chicago picked him up with the last pick in the fourth round, and he should fill in well for Andrew "Anomaly" Brock, and he comes with some red flags, despite winning the Combine. He's inexperienced under the bright CGS lights, and he managed to score all of one regulation goal during the Combine tournament. He beat Peekay and KreeganBG 5-4 on penalty kicks in his first two matches, scored his only goal in a 1-0 win against Stermy, then defeated KreeganBG again on PKs in the Finals, 8-7.

For anybody keeping track, that's a 1:1 ratio for goals-in-regulation to championship trophies. I can't decide if that's a good thing or not.

The scoring during the challenge matches was a little different, but it's unclear how much of that was due to the goalie's lower difficulty. The tournament organizers wanted to experiment to see if they could increase the scoring; Yfran went 2-1-1 in those matches, defeating WiZaKoR and Barmoa, tying Novusnaim, and losing to Juanqui.

All in all, I don't think he'll be a superstar - this year, anyway. He should hold his own, and if the Combine is any indication, by the end of the season he'll be the leading expert on the psychology of Penalty Kicks.

Grade: B

- Source Team

Just to make sure we're on the same page, Chicago drafted:

Round 1 (#6): Matt "Stevenson" Stevenson
Round 2 (#12): Erik "da_bears" Stromberg
Round 3 (#1: Pasha "Lari" Lari
Round 5 (#30): Albert "hahN" Hahn

I was on board with Stevenson. After that, dkt lost me.

In my opinion, this is the problem with the phrase "if it ain't broke, don't fix it"; people use it as a justification to be complacent. Something worked last time, so there's no reason to change.

Some things need to be fixed, but it's not wrong to look ahead and avoid nails in the road.

This, of course, is silly. The only way to succeed in sports is to keep adapting as an individual, a team, or even on the franchise level. Players have to fix things that aren't broken because their opponents will break them in the very near future. One of the most important things in competition is staying one step ahead of your opponents, strategically or in terms of talent.

In other words, the phrase isn't a warning against change; it's a warning against unnecessary change.

Now we just have to figure out whether change was justified for Chicago.

In a word: yes.

Counter-Strike was their weakest game last season. They had a mediocre run during Region 1, followed by a poor showing during the World Finals. In terms of results, they simply haven't been on top, and they didn't show improvement in the time between the Season and World Finals like the rest of the Chimera members.

The bigger problem for Chicago is what everybody else has been up to. Look at the Source landscape. The Chimera finished behind Los Angeles and San Francisco during the CGS last season. Carolina beat them handily during the World Finals, despite Chicago having their five starters together. Dallas just came off a CEVO-P championship. That leaves 3D, a team that finished behind them by a couple rounds and almost certainly upgraded through the draft by adding the best AWPer available and a strong leader.

Basically, every single opponent was already better than them or improved significantly during the offseason.

I find myself asking myself this question: who is Chicago going to beat next season? I haven't come up with a solid answer. New York and Dallas? San Francisco, if they implode? Even when I'm feeling generous, I don't think the Chimera is clearly better than any of those teams.

That's not to say they don't have talent. Corey "tr1p" Dodd and Matt "Stevenson" Stevenson are a great start to any team. But I'm not sold on da_bears, Lari, and hahN as the best available players to pair with them. Let's break it down a little bit.

Pasha is easily one of the most under rated players in CS, I don't care about stupid stats either. I've watched this guy have rounds that have single handedly won it for us.

- Chicago GM Brian "dkt" Flander, on Pasha Lari

Of those, the pick I really don't understand is Lari. He might be under rated. He might be under appreciated. Unfortunately, he just wasn't the best AWPer available.

He's a good role-player, don't get me wrong, but n0it and Funshine are both more talented. Chicago would be more dangerous with either of those guys in the lineup in the same way that New England is more dangerous with Randy Moss instead of Troy Brown. Lari plays his role well and fits in. He'll even win you rounds or whole matches once in a while.

And I'd still draft n0it or Funshine over him ten times out of ten because they simply have another gear that he doesn't.

I would understand the pick from a chemistry standpoint if n0it or Funshine were disciples of NightFall's School of Social Interaction (Rule #1: Flame, Flame, Flame), but they're not. They're good guys. They're humble, low-key, team-oriented players. They wouldn't come in with an attitude and ruin Chicago's chemistry.

I'm a little higher on da_bears. He'll be replacing grt in basically every way: AWP, rifle, and call strats. In a response to his blog post, dkt explained d_b's addition by saying, "Dabears is a versatile CS player and a terrific in game leader. He brings positive energy and can switch up his game with either awp or rifle. He has an extremely high CS IQ and tbh, after watching him play all summer, I felt like he fit in extremely well with this line up."

I always knew that if Grt would get taken early, I would go with Erik. Dabears proved to me during the regular season how special of a player he was and I also knew that if I didn't pick him this round, Jax would pick him right after me.

- Brian "dkt" Flander on new Chicago member Erik "da_bears" Stromberg

That's a curious statement, considering he played with three of those guys last season during the CGS (Stevenson, Lari, tr1p) and didn't seem to fit in at all. He had a .528 FPR and a -38 K/D ratio. While eSports statistics aren't very trusty, I think we can all agree that he wasn't having a major impact.

That doesn't mean d_b is a bad player, because he's not. On other teams his stats are much better, and he's talented enough to deserve a spot on a CGS team. But based on what he did during Season 1, any claims about how he'll fit in with the team seem a little specious.

Moreover, despite being talented, I don't think you can win with d_b as your third-best player. I wouldn't make the same claim about grt, who is a better fragger, in my opinion.

d_b's true value is his versatility: he can rifle, AWP, call strats, and has good in-game awareness. The problem, to me, is that with all the talent in the league, he looks like a "jack of all trades, master of none" in a field where almost all his opponents are masters in at least one area. I think he'll be out-AWPed by the best AWPers and out-shot by the best riflers.

He was an attractive pick for Chicago because he can fill the three holes grt left, but I don't know if that was the best choice in that spot. Why not pick up Juan, a master of team organization and decent rifler (and which would have hurt New York, as well)? Or n0it, who we covered before? I'd be much more comfortable with this team if he was Chicago's fourth-best player, but they had to take him early because Dallas would have taken him to fill their fourth spot, and I think dkt reached to draft the guy he wanted.

da_bears will fill some of these for Chicago, but will he do it well enough for them to beat the other Source teams??

Again, he's not a bad player, but I don't think it was a good value. He's an asset, but not enough of one to justify passing up players that would have a bigger impact on the team by specializing more in one area.

The one aspect that Lari and da_bears share is familiarity with tr1p and Stevenson. They've all played together and they're known quantities.

Viewed through that lens, hahN might have been the strangest pick of all. He has no pre-existing chemistry with those players. He's a complete unknown when you add him to those four guys.

The only sure thing is that hahN is a talented player. He's an impact rifler, but it's hard to say how he'll fit in until we see them in matches. I honestly don't have much more to say about the pick other than we just have to wait and see. For somebody that placed a high priority on taking players with existing chemistry with his first two picks, dkt's choice of hahN in the last round sure came from left-field. I'm not ready to call it a bad pick, but it was odd, to me.

Overall, I think dkt could have simply done better. He didn't pick up bad players. I just don't think he picked up the right ones.

(And, as always, I could be horribly, horribly wrong, and will admit as much if they do prove me wrong. Which I hope they do. I'd much rather fail as a predictor of success than be right about a team possibly going 4-8.)

LD's Draft Grade: C+

For me, the Chimera's draft comes down to two simple ideas.

The first thought is what we've just covered: I have no clue why dkt made the player choices he did in Source. I'm left with nothing but questions and guesses about what might happen.

When I look at their Source team on paper, I simply can't get excited about it. I think they're a mortal lock to finish in the bottom half of the division, if for no other reason than somebody has to lose the matches and the rest of the league seems more talented.

We can't hand out wins and losses based on paper-talent. 3D's proven that over the seasons, and Carolina definitely confirmed it with their Region 1 to World Finals turnaround. Sometimes things click and a team takes off, and sometimes they fail when they seemingly shouldn't.

That being said, I think they would have been better off drafting n0it, juan, Mustang, or Classified, to name a few. Even 3D's departed Jimmy "liN" Lin would have been an interesting fit. He has playing experience with Stevenson from their days in EG, and he would have filled the AWP/rifle/strat-caller role.

For the upcoming season, I think Source is Chicago's Achilles Heel.

Which leads to the second idea: it might not matter how good the Source team is, anyway.

Let's make a clear distinction: I'm not in love with their draft, but they still have a dominant team. They're strong in both DoA games, Forza, and they drafted a good FIFA player. Even if the Source team tanks and finishes 0-12 (which simply won't happen), they'll still be a force in the league as long as the Source team isn't losing those twelve matches by twelve rounds a piece.

In other words, look for Chicago to be in contention for a World Finals spot even if their Source team doesn't pan out. They're the returning champions for a reason.

Carolina Core Draft Report Card

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 08:20:41 -0400

Writing witty intros might be my favorite part of these articles. But since the Core's Report Card is long enough without an intro, I'm going to sacrifice my pleasure for your sanity.

Don't make me regret it by going insane, anyway.

Starter's Draft

Round 1 (#5): Eric "General E Live" Earley (Forza)
Round 2 (#11): Hoang "sOnNy" Tran (Source)
Round 3 (#17): Mark "Masternook" Torrez (Source)
Round 4 (#23): Andrew "Anomaly" Brock (FIFA)
Round 5 (#29): Kat "Mystik" Gunn (DoA F)

Taxi Draft

1. Corey "kaM" Hanes (Source)
2. Brent "ReX" Diampilis (Forza)
3. Erik "kabe" Kabe (FIFA)
4. Bill "Tom Brady" Menoutis (DoA M)
5. Michael "Hare" O'Toole (Source)
6. Vanessa "ladyface" Castle (DoA F)

- Andrew "Anomaly" Brock

This pick reminded me of The Simpsons episode where Lisa goes out with the hopelessly nerdy Ralph and ends up breaking his heart when she reveals it was only out of pity. The confrontation was captured as part of a show they were attending, and Bart, being a good brother, rewinds a tape of the event to show exactly where Ralph's heart broke into pieces.

wikimedia.org

Upon further review, Ralph is surprisingly bald. At least Anomaly has a full head of hair.

In this case, Ralph would be Anomaly, Chicago would be the happy Lisa, and Carolina would be the angry, vengeful Lisa that crushed Ralph's will to live. And obviously I would be Bart, sadistically replaying that moment over and over again while cackling wildly.

(I don't really take pleasure in his unhappiness, but you have to admit it was a pretty memorable moment.)

For Carolina, the good news is that Anomaly had a great performance in the Combine to back up his dominant World Finals. I wasn't totally sold on him before the action in Austin. My concerns were simply a matter of caution; his dominating performance at the World Finals didn't seem fluky, but I couldn't get over that 4-8 record during Region 1 without a little more evidence. We had two data points on opposite ends of the spectrum.

Of course, when he finished fourth, I found myself completely unsurprised. That means I'd like to officially announce I'm hopping on the bandwagon. He has the talent to be a legitimately great player in FIFA this season.

That being said, there are concerns with the pick because he's coming from the Chicago Chimera. Will he be happy? Can he play his best for the team that used to be his sworn enemy?

Honestly, I don't think anybody can answer that until the season starts.

People say he's a professional, and I agree with that assessment of his character. I don't think you could find a more respectful or dedicated person.

The problem is that, no matter how hard we try, sometimes it's impossible to completely separate our professional and personal lives. Merely calling him a professional is not incontrovertible proof that he'll continue to play at the same level he did with Chicago; happiness isn't a rational decision. Like it or not, I think we have to admit that, despite the quality of his character, there's a chance he'll be unhappy with Carolina and his passion for the game might suffer because of it.

I offer that not as proof, evidence, or even an argument that his game will decline with Carolina, only that it might - despite his best intentions.

Stashing the hypothetical situations, I think he's going to fit in with the Core. The reason is just a little more complicated than "he's a professional".

The team has a reputation for being arrogant and generally hard to get along with, but I spent time around the players during the World Finals when I did coverage for Carolina's site, and that's simply not true for all the players. In my experience, the DoA members, Mystik and Offbeat, are welcoming and easy to talk to. Phantom seemed really laid-back. I didn't even have problems with the CS guys.

Granted, I wasn't trying to beat their brains in five months ago, but the point is that I think Anomaly will find people to connect with. That also means I expect him to be just as good as he was during the Combine and World Finals.

Plus, if they're smart, the players will make an effort to reach out to him for the good of the team. You want this guy on your franchise for as long as you can hold onto him. Show him some love, and help him help you!

Grade: A-

- Eric "General E Live" Earley

Hello, Sponsorships!

GEL was one of the best racers heading into the Combine. I'd say his stock dropped after a somewhat lackluster performance, but he was still the fifth pick overall and the third Forza player taken. That's pretty close to where he should have gone. Muffinman was probably the consensus #1 pick, and then GEL should have been ranked between second and fifth on all the GM's draft boards.

Honestly, there isn't much to say about this one. It was a good pick in the first round, and GEL should team up with Joe "Phantom" Tackett to form a good racing duo.

On a side note, I'm excited for this pick because his handle is often shortened to GEL, as I've written. Just once, I want him to win a huge race, stand up and yell "I AM SO GELLIN!"

I hope this isn't too much to ask.

Grade: A

- Kat "Mystik" Gunn

It's not every day you can draft one of the Combine tournament winners in the last round. The Chimera drafted the FIFA champion in the fourth round, and that game has as much scoring as a nursing home fresh out of Viagra.

I understand the game in question is DoA Female and Vanessa wasn't participating because she was a Franchise Player, which is tantamount to holding a hat-size contest without inviting Barry Bonds, but Mystik still outperformed every single DoA Female in the competition. As a reward, she got to sit through four and half rounds in absolute terror that culminated in her admission that she didn't think Dolven would draft her. I just hope that pick came with a free bottle of Mylanta; it looked like she might need it.

Perhaps the only thing weirder than her availability in the final round is the fact that people were genuinely surprised Dolven chose her.

In the days leading up to and immediately after the draft, I've heard Dolven connected to every other viable option in DoA Female. Jax was worried that he would take Phoenix. Dolven was also supposedly the reason that Lake was forced to take Belle in the third round instead of waiting. And despite choosing Mystik over Raspberry Tea, I know some people that swear it was basically a coin toss.

This is all contrary to his self-published wish list, which clearly puts Mystik next to the "1".

Not even Scooby Doo can solve the Mystery of Dolven's DoA Female Rankings.

I'd love to solve this mystery, but I'm stumped. Dolven has shrouded his true intentions in such a deep fog that not even a plucky group of teenagers and a strangely intelligent dog could unmask the original plan.

The only thing I'll say is that, if you watch the draft, he certainly didn't look like somebody getting his first choice with his last pick. He looked strangely resigned to his fate.

For comparison, when Darkstorm unexpectedly fell to Moto in the second round, 3D's GM looked excited enough to knock Warden and Striker off the stage, grab the mic, and scream "I TAKE DARKSTORM, SUCKERS!"

I admit this means almost nothing, in the grand scheme of things. It's certainly not any kind of concrete evidence. But it makes me wonder if there's truth to the rumors that he wanted a different DoA Female, but in the end couldn't pass up the value Mystik presented in the last round.

That's all speculation, though. Mystik was the choice, and based on talent it was the right one. I don't know that anybody will compete with Vanessa this season, but Mystik does have a chance to separate herself from the rest of the pack. Drafting her in the last round was just gravy.

Grade: A

- Mark "Masternook" Torrez, Hoang "sOnNy" Tran

I hope these guys are comfortable playing together, because I can't see either of them playing for a franchise other than Carolina.

Torrez is generally reviled for his days as a trash-talker in the community, and even though he's mellowed as old age takes hold, it still comes out every once in a while. Plus, there's the unfailing confidence (some would say arrogance) that gives birth to the trash-talking.

Let's just say the other GMs weren't clamoring to draft him while he was available. The possibility of bad chemistry far outweighed any benefit, even if he was technically more skilled than the person he would have replaced.

And while we're on the topic of bad chemistry, I suppose we should bring up sOnNy, the man who took the phrase "burning bridges" to another level.

I love comparing eSports news to other sports or general occurrences in life because it provides a barometer, but I still don't think I've seen anything like this. He blatantly bashed two GMs (Alex Conroy and Dave Geffon), insulted the players on San Francisco, and in the process probably killed any chance of joining the community-oriented Los Angeles compLexity. That's four franchises down. He gave some modicum of support for hahN being drafted, so maybe dkt doesn't hate him yet.

(Clearly, sOnNy's work is not finished.)

ohiovalleypolitics.com

sOnNy was here.

The real kicker is that he even planned ahead. He insulted the entire Pandemic Source team in his rant, which alienated their manager, Chris Lemley, who just happens to be a frontrunner for a GM position if the CGS expands. In other words, he's burning bridges that haven't even formed yet. He's just carpet-bombing everything that even looks like it could be a bridge in the near future. It's simply amazing.

The reason I bring this up is because Dolven can simply repeat same draft strategy regarding Source that he employed this season, provided the CGS uses the same format in future drafts. He can put both players back into the draft pool with impunity; I don't think there's a GM in the league that would risk the rebellion from his/her Source team (and possibly the entire fanbase) that might come with choosing either player. That's a nice option to have for Carolina.

In terms of drafting, sOnNy's pick was probably a better value. He's still undervalued as a player, in my opinion - I don't think he was on anybody else's radar, even before napalmed his connections with possible employers. In terms of talent, he fits in nicely being taken after grt, but before da_bears and Mustang. That's just about right.

Dolven probably could have waited to draft Torrez until the fourth round if he wanted to make absolutely sure he got Anomaly, but in the end I think he got both players he wanted. Just a minor note.

Grade: B

- Taxi Draft

I'll be blunt: I don't see a single player in the Carolina Taxi draft that could end up playing for them during the season.

The Source players, kaM and Hare, probably have the best chance, but Carolina's CS team shouldn't have any big stumbles. They're already used to playing with each other, and Dolven would have to be desperate to risk breaking up that chemistry.

Kabe, ReX, and Tom Brady are all solid players, but they shouldn't challenge Anomaly, GEL/Phantom, or OffbeatNinja. Those are arguably Carolina's three strongest games, and their starters aren't going anywhere, barring some emergency.

Grade: C+

LD's Overall Grade: B+/A-

Truthfully, I wasn't in love with this draft when it happened. Outside of the Anomaly selection, it wasn't flashy. There weren't drastic changes like New York and Dallas, or drastic non-changes like Los Angeles. It simply didn't stand out.

The more I thought about it, though, the more it grew on me like some kind of mental fungus.

In the end, I came to the conclusion that Carolina took the second-best team in the CGS last season and upgraded FIFA and Forza. And that obviously doesn't include the sneaky-upgrade in Source from replacing Adam "Elusive" Messner with Cyrus "org" Habibi. It technically didn't happen during the draft since "org" was called up during the CEVO season, but it's still a change from their roster at the World Finals, and simply put, org is a better player than Elusive.

Did Carolina pick up the kind of impact talent that New York did? As a whole, no. They couldn't, for the simple reason that the fifth pick isn't as valuable as the third.

But look at their team. Show me a glaring weakness. I don't know about you, but it doesn't take me much effort to imagine every component finishing in the upper half of their respective games. It might not work out that way, but there isn't one game where they're clearly going to struggle next season.

That's a scary prospect.

Their strength on paper doesn't guarantee a victory any more than 3D's excellent draft does for New York, but it comes down to this: if you want to beat Carolina next season, you're going to have to be strong in almost every game.

And if you're one of the (many) people that hates to see Carolina win matches, you might want to start mentally preparing for a long year.

Worst ISP Contest

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 01:17:17 -0400

I want to run a friendly contest. Let's see who among us has the worst ISP. We'll measure this by two factors: connection speed, and highest offered speed.

I'll start us off.

Highest offered connection speed: 1.5 Mbps

Actual Connection speed at 9:00-ish Pacific Time, with no download clients running, no internet browsers running, and no programs updating:

Yes, that's right, apparently my ISP can't even crack triple digits on some nights.

Game, set, match.

Dallas GM Unplugged

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 22:40:03 -0400

One of my favorite things about eSports is the honesty and accessibility of the people involved. The sport is still small enough that players, managers, and officials can generally answer fan mail, or talk candidly about the league and their teams without issuing overused platitudes like "both teams played hard".

I don't think I've seen a better example than Alex "Jax" Conroy's post-draft chat on the Dallas Venom's website. The talk lasted for about two hours, which was crazy. Most importantly, the answers are honest and funny; Jax is great in front of the camera.

There will be a zero-WoW policy at the CGS [for Dallas].

- Jax, warning Dallas' first-round pick who loves to play WoW.

I wanted to take notes on the whole thing, but then I realized it would take me about four hours to constantly go back and make sure I got quotes right, etc. I had to bow out after an hour, but it's worth the tiu. There's some great information and commentary from one of the most laid-back, personable guys I've ever had the pleasure of meeting.

It's billed as "Jax Talks Draft", but he really talks about the Combine, Draft, players, Dallas Venom, the CGS league as a whole, DirecTV, broadcasts, and direction.

To whet your appetite, here are some my notes from the first hour. This isn't even a full list; just comments that I found interesting.

-----------

Dallas-Related Predictions

Venom's Finish: We're a playoff team, for sure, I think we're a world final team. Thought that last season, too. Prediciton for Venom: Top 2.

Dallas DoA Female Michelle "Phoenix" Pleet: Will be the first person to take down Vanessa.

"I'm going to make a bold statement right now. I think that Phoenix has a chance, a really good shot, of being the first person to take down Vanessa. And that's a bold statement, I know, you can hang me for that, but I really think Phoenix is really good, and I think she's putting in enough time."

Dallas Forza Duo of CHA0S and Muffinman: "As of now, we would beat anybody in the league in Forza."

[Note: "As of now" was important in the context -- he mentioned that the season might be completely different once all the squads have an extra two months of practice under their belts.]

-----------

Ciiaaaaayyyaaaa! I love saying your name ... I feel like I'm doing an Indian Tribal Dance.

- Jax, poking fun at a user's handle on the CGS site.

Dallas' Source Team

On de_train: "We're awful at train. I'm gonna go ahead and say we're probably the worst Train team in the league."

On de_nuke: "I'm gonna go ahead and say we're the best Nuke team in the league."

About Josh "Dominator" Sievers: "I think Dominator is a lunatic. I love him though. He's great, he's just crazy."

- [Note: Earlier, Jax talked about Dominator's love of hunting] "A little thing you don't know about Josh "Dominator" Sievers: he's known as the finisher. When he and his friends kill an animal, it's his job, I guess, to 'finish him'."

- "[In a pug], I actually out-fragged him by quite a few. When I'm in the zone, I'm in the zone. Josh is still a great player, he just couldn't keep up."

Replacing Corey "kaM" Hanes and Derek "exodus" Heidinger: "Derek and Corey are best friends, and I knew if I had to replace one of them, I'd have to replace both and open up two new spots."

- Would like to see custom maps, to see how teams adapt/learn.

- "I pug with the team sometimes when they really need to bring in the muscle."

------------

- "I'm actually a very good dancer."

- "And I'm not gonna dance on camera. But I dunno, CGS, win a couple matches, you might see that moonwalk."

San Francisco Optx Draft Report Card

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 03:48:01 -0400

Of all the drafts, Kat Hunter's most resembles a lit fuse with a boat full of dynamite at the end.

That doesn't mean they're on a one-way trip to destruction. Any number of things could defuse the situation. But once the season's over, we're going to look back at the draft and think "wow, look at all the shrapnel that pick caused", or they're going to sail off into the sunset. There isn't a middle option.

Will it pay to be bold, or shall the meek inherit the CGS?

To be honest, I think she was the gutsiest general manager of the group. She had the fourth pick, a team that nearly made the World Finals, the most dominant individual player in the CGS, a charismatic FIFA player, a decent DoA 4 Male, and the second-best CS team. Skittles and Beisbol were the only PGR team to beat ch0mpr and JasonX when they pulled off a clutch T-bone against the 10-0 Chimera duo. It was such a stunning move that thecgs.com published a whole article about that one facet of the match.

Essentially, Hunter had a lot of reasons to play it safe. Take back the CS players, get by in DoA 4 Male and FIFA, and hope to upgrade in racing with a top Forza pick (Beisbol didn't attend the second Combine) or two.

Instead, even when she could have brought back old teammates, she elected for new blood.

I'm not in love with the specific choices but I think she had the right general philosophy. GMs shouldn't stick with "good enough" when they think "better" is available. Put another way, in a choice between "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" and "I know this is daring, but I believe it'll help our team", I'll take the second choice every day of the week.

We won't know whether she was right until after the season, but I'd rather have six general managers that are willing to take risks to make the leap from above-average to great than six GMs that are willing to be merely good season after season.

Bring me championships, or bring me death.

(For the record, I prefer championships.)

Starter's Draft

Round 1 (#4): Chris "NinjaCW" Harris
Round 2 (#10): Garett "grt" Bambrough
Round 1 (#16): Kevin "Sackamonjaro" Uribe
Round 4 (#22): Chad "Miximup" Neil
Round 5 (#2: Mike "paradox" Stanowski

Taxi Draft

1. Brandon "WildChild906" Childress (Forza)
2. Jared "Cali Jared" Reyes (DoA M)
3. Grant "Griff" Hall (Source)
4. Nathan "Nate" Bachus (FIFA)
5. Lauren "L337Lauren" Berggren (DoA F)
6. Trevor "p0s" Randolph (Source)

- Chris "NinjaCW" Harris

Hunter went into the draft needing a DoA 4 Male, two CS players, and two Forza drivers. The fourth pick was too early for Source because one player doesn't account for that many points. Valuable, sure, but not as much as DoA or Forza.

Of those two, I can't fathom why she chose DoA 4 Male.

thecgs.com

Offbeatninja's face says, "There's only room in the CGS for one player with 'ninja' in his handle, and that's me"

If NinjaCW was still available in the second or third round, go crazy. I don't disagree with her evaluation of the player. He was a good choice, it was just way too early. There were potentially great racers available in Nic "Darkstorm" Brownrigg and Eric "General E Live" Earley, and moto (the only GM that still needed a DoA 4 Male) probably wasn't going to pick DoA until late in the draft. He was committed to rebuilding his CS team, which has the same meaning to New York that compLexity's Source team does to Los Angeles.

The worst part is that NinjaCW probably won't come in and destroy his competition. There's a good chance he'll finish in fifth place with something like a 4-8 or 5-7 record, and a minus-X point differential. That's not a knock on his skill; it's a testament to the strength of the other players. The top four players in DoA Male are a step above everybody else, and if you need proof of that, NinjaCW is coming off a 0-10 performance against Perfect Legend in the Combine Finals. Not so good.

Again, Harris is a good player and he deserves to be in the CGS, but you need early draft picks to be rock-solid, not risky.

She could have waited until the last round and picked up a similar player, or even the same one if she got lucky, at a much lower price. Worst case scenario she ends up with DaveCheppelle, a fan favorite and former Optx player, who puts up a slightly worse record but still hangs tough against the big opponents as he's proven he can do.

Grade: C

- Kevin "SACKAMONJARO" Uribe, Chad "miximup" Neil

Despite choosing DoA Male in the first round, Hunter still ended up with two decent racers. I don't think they're on the same level as Darkstorm or GEL, but they should be able to keep the matches close at the very least, and she only used her third and fourth-round picks to get them.

One interesting thing about her draft is that it seems almost predetermined after she chose Harris in the first round.

Breaking it down, in the second round she had to choose "grt" because Chicago would have redrafted him two picks later.

That set up a huge need for Forza, and Lake still had two spots open. If she didn't take a driver with the third pick, she might have lost out. Hence, Sackamonjaro.

In the fourth round, she had a choice between Forza and Source. The only team with a need for Source was Chicago, but I don't think paradox was ever on Flander's radar, as evidenced by the people he was drafting -- old teammates and proven commodities. At that point she might as well take another Forza racer, just in case Lake decides to get one new racer and not redraft both GTO and chavisan.

That left her last pick, which had to be Source.

Essentially, once she made the surprise pick in the first round, there were such big needs or such little demand from other teams that the only logical course of action was the one she took.

As it played out, she managed to nab a racing duo that will keep SF in the matches. I still think the first-round pick will hurt SF in the end, but these guys should return good value on late picks.

Grade: B

- Garett "grt" Bambrough, Mike "paradox" Stanowski

I made references to explosions and shrapnel in the intro.

Meet the potential dynamite.

thecgs.com

Can the Source team complement Vanessa, or will she be SF's Lone Ranger?

The other draft choices were essentially moving sideways. NinjaCW should come close to replicating DaveCheppelle's performance from last season. He might have a touch more potential, but it's not a big difference, especially when you factor in the tougher competition for this year's DoA Male division. In terms of expected points, even if he's more talented, he might not bring home more bacon.

The racers should be a slight improvement, but the point system was altered to diminish Forza's impact (the 5-3-1 scoring system was replaced with 4-2-1), and the field is deeper. Again, even if the players are technically better, I'm not sure how many additional points it's worth.

That leaves the Source picks.

The best case scenario is obvious: grt and paradox step in and dominate. There were chemistry issues with San Francisco last season, and though they didn't show up ingame it needed to be addressed. Even sOnNy, in his blog post that spared nobody from criticism and flaming, admitted that it was a needed change.

On the other hand, the worst case scenario is that their in-game chemistry, which was second-to-none before the Draft, turns to slag when they try to mix in grt and paradox with the existing personalities and styles. Somebody ends up unhappy or uncomfortable, and all of a sudden you've turned the second-best Source team into the fifth-best team because their competition has improved so much.

That, Optx fans, is not good. The only question is figuring out which scenario is more likely.

Personally, I think they're going to be fine. They'll be able to use the two months before the season to iron out the kinks and mesh their styles together. Even though the returning players have a unique style, they've never come off as "my way or the highway" players, to me. If their chemistry ingame or in real life starts to break down, they should be able to recognize what it is and make the decision that's best for the team.

Source will still be a tight game because of the newly improved franchises, but I still see the Optx as one of the stronger squads.

(Plus, they get a little bonus for making one of the most shocking picks of the night when Kat chose grt and stole him from Chicago. As a fan, that was delicious.)

Grade: B

Taxi Draft

Looking back, Kat's best value from the draft might be her last pick: Trevor "p0s" Randolph. He's more valuable to San Francisco than the other franchises because of his playing history with the team. If something goes wrong and the Source team's chemistry falls apart, p0s can step in and bring some stability to the squad. That's a huge bonus.

Griff was also a good choice as a Source backup. People overlook him, and there are limitations to his game. It's no secret that he wouldn't beat fRoD or n0it in an AWP contest, and I'm not sure how many guys he can strictly "out-aim", either.

bbc.co.uk

Eckstein might sacrifice himself for the team like Griff, but when Big Papi is coming in, you jump.

That being said, he's a player you want on your team. He's basically David Eckstein. You can stick him in the lineup and he's going to practice hard, play smart, and make everybody around him better because of his positioning, communication, and attitude. I wouldn't describe his game as "flashy", but for a Source team that already has plenty of pizzazz, having an option like Griff - somebody who will sacrifice himself and his stats without a second thought - is a nice fallback.

CaliJared was a good pickup in the Taxi draft. He's got experience in the CGS, and he can hold down the fort in DoA Male if NinjaCW wasn't available. WildChild is a solid racer; if there were two more franchises in the league he would probably be starting. Both solid pickups.

Grade: B+

LD's Overall Draft Grade: B-

Even with the good ending, I just can't get excited about this team. The more I look over the draft, the more I feel like the moves were sidesteps and not improvements, even though Kat brought in new players.

Don't get me wrong, they're all talented guys. But when I look at NinjaCW, Grt, Paradox, SACK, and miximup, I can't envision dominance. That's not a death knell when you have a player like Vanessa on your team, because she's going to do most of the heavy lifting.

Unfortunately, I think you need at least two dominant entities to make a run in the World Finals. They need to complement Vanessa; get a Scottie Pippen to her Michael Jordan.

The most likely candidate is the Source team, and right or wrong I think that's how most people will grade this draft at the end of the season. If they go downhill, people will always question her choices. If they continue to excel, she'll be praised for making the tough decisions and staying ahead of a curve filled with the other (much-improved) teams.

All that's left is to sit back and enjoy the show.

A Curious Poll

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 22:30:12 -0400

I was wandering the Internet, once again looking for love in all the wrong places, when I came across a poll on the Birmingham Salvo's website. I'm not sure how long it'll be up so I'll include a screenshot of the results, as well.

Basically, the poll asks which Region 1 GM had the best draft strategy at the recently-completed Combine in Austin, Texas.

Mind you, this is different than asking who had the best draft. They just want to know who had the best strategy.

The results of this poll are confusing, even by eSports' standards.

At the time of this writing, the results were nothing short of baffling, even for the Internet. Moto led the poll at 39%, with Jason Lake a distant second at 25%. Alex "Jax" Conroy, doing his best impression of Ron Paul, brought up the rear with a measly 2% of votes.

Frankly, I'm not convinced people read the poll correctly. We don't have to look any further than the recent holiday, Saint Patrick's Day, to understand the root of the confusion. After all, Patrick is the patron saint of Drunk Polling*.

With that in mind, perhaps they thought the question was about raft strategies. This makes more sense, as noted shipwrights Dave "moto" Geffon and Jason "1" Lake would naturally win such a poll in a sea-slide.

Or, with alcohol on the brain (read: alcohol in the brain), maybe they mistook "draft strategies" to mean draft (draught) beer. Again, Jax would lose this in a landslide, as his drinking motto is "CHUG CHUG CHUG". And by this I don't mean he drinks alcohol quickly, I mean that he acts like a passenger train when he gets drunk. Trust me, you haven't truly lived until you've seen Alex Conroy try to give a piggy-back ride to ten people at once while providing sound effects and imploring people to hop on board the the Jax Money Train.

Barring these alcohol-induced misunderstandings, I can't make sense of the results.

Jax had the worst team in the league last season. He brought in five new players, including arguably the best Forza player and best DoA Female player in the draft. He made two savvy Source pickups on guys that should come in and immediately mesh with the existing team. And he picked up a FIFA player with the last pick, not bothering to use a higher choice in a game worth few points.

Apparently, all that isn't enough to crack the elusive 5% barrier. He even drafted sWooZie onto his Taxi Team. You'd think he'd get the Adande Bump (cousin to the Colbert Bump), but no. Clearly, the fans think his draft strategy of "improving the team" was a step in the wrong direction.

Of course, that leads us directly to Dave "moto" Geffon, Captain of the good ship Desire, Discipline, Dedication. He followed a similar draft strategy and is currently dominating the poll, playing the role of Barack Obama to Jax's Ron Paul.

Both GM's put a priority on Forza, and waited until the last round to pick up the player that would have the smallest impact -- for Moto, this was DoA 4 Male, where everybody else had a player secured. In the middle, they addressed their needs in Source.

These similarities are good for a 37% margin of victory for Moto. Even the resident draft homers (Carolina, Chicago, and Los Angeles, who all returned a majority of their players from last season) are beating Conroy by a wide margin.

Based on these results, I can only conclude that, for the community, the hierarchy of draft strategies goes:

1. Improving the team
2. Returning old members

10. Improving the team

As a last resort, GMs should clearly focus on improving the team, but only if returning the old members and improving the team aren't viable options.

For me, the only way this would get more entertaining is JaX making a blog post titled "I love fanboys", where he rants about moto's Source picks, calls Pandemic online, and insinuates all the other GMs are complete idiots.

Introducing the Flammatory Scale

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 05:30:06 -0400

If humanity made a car fueled by personal attacks, the eSports community would be the new OPEC. Even politicians would eat our flaming, irrational dust.

And just like oil companies probe the oceans for new reserves, I often sift through the dark seas commonly called "forums", hoping to hit the mother lode. I don't make as much money on my discoveries, but they do bring me immense pleasure.

There's only one condition: they need to be special. Run-of-the-mill flames don't do anything for me because they're too predictable. There's petty bickering, misunderstood and misrepresented thoughts, and gradually it dies out after the obligatory "alright, im gunna say this then I'm done with this thread, no use argueing with somebody so retarted" -- which is promptly followed by at least one more post from the same author.

Beverly Hillbillies? In color? That's just not right.

Every so often a post comes along that raises the bar and makes me feel like the Beverly Hillbillies: unearthing millions of dollars in oil with a single shovel-load of dirt in my own backyard.

The only question is exactly how much the treasure is worth. Nobody knows. Is one Ming post worth one NightFall rant? We need to figure this out. It's time to introduce a grading system. The gaming community is practically drowning in hatred; the least we can do is sort through the muck.

Right now, I'm calling this system the Flammatory Scale. I have four guidelines to determine where a specific post or thread will rank and what it takes to be the best, but this is going to be a community-wide effort. LANDodger needs you. Send in ideas if you don't like the name. Send specific posts to be graded. Send guidelines/rules you feel should be added.

Yes, we can build this thing together. Yes, we can bring communities together and bridge the gap between 1.6 and Source, Melee and Brawl. Yes, we can even unite PC and Console gamers, because it's the common dream of all gamers to bring your opponent to tears. YES WE CAN!

So, without further ado, here's the beginning of the Flammatory Scale, and the inaugural post for ranking: Hoang "sOnNy" Tran's blog on the Carolina Core's website.

1) There has to be a history.

Essentially, the newest post has to be the first in a line of bad blood, all of which will be revisited thanks to the new development.

The bad mojo can be personal or team-wide. For instance, flames sprout up anywhere NightFall posts on a CS forum. He could post on some obscure, CAL-Open team site under an alias registered to a fake e-mail using a pseudonym and a fake IP address, and somebody will still follow the trail back to him.

It's not his fault, per se. He's just a shark swimming along the forums. There just happen to be hundreds of pilot fish that follow him wherever he goes, except instead of being adept swimmers they're adept at starting flame-wars.

It might look like a shark but it's really NightFall prowling the Source forums.

For a team example let's use, oh I don't know, the Carolina Core. Just for kicks. There's plenty of bad blood surrounding Carolina's CS team. Ksharp could join and be instantly hated. For a gaming corollary, I think it's like a Terran base being infested by a Zerg Queen. You don't come back from that. You just start saying "FOR THE CORE" and sacrificing yourself. No matter where you go, or where you were before, you're a part of the GDMF Core and that's that.

(As a side note, I wish to send my condolences to Anomaly. I think the phenomenon might extend beyond the Source team. If you ever run into him, don't actually run into him. He might explode.)

2) The post needs a catchy title.

This is self-explanatory. You have to draw in the audience. The history of bad blood feeds the flames, but the title brings people into the fray.

On a lark, let's use the title "i love fanboys". It's close to perfect. We (any potential readers) are morally obligated to discover what fanboys the poster is referencing. It could be us! And we must defend our honor, because we are clearly not something as hideous as a "fanboy". At the very least we are fanmen, but more likely the poster is a complete idiot and we will have to set the record straight.

If he's referring to some other party, then we simply bookmark the thread and watch as the offended party jumps in to defend themselves against this most heinous accusation. I recommend popcorn, a two-liter of Diet Soda, and a script that refreshes the page automatically every sixty seconds.

3) The post must be brutally honest to the point of being rude and unacceptable by the rules of normal social interaction.

"With all due respect sir, I'm about to say something mean and I'd like it if you didn't throw me in the brig."

There's a simple test for this one. I call it the Star Trek Litmus (STL).

Basically, take any portion of the text and imagine it's a subordinate talking to his superior, like Commander Riker talking to Captain Picard. If you feel the need to put in "with all due respect, sir" in front of the phrase, it passes.

The only time you use phrases like that are when you know you're about to say something disrespectful. Like "With all due respect, sir ... you're the stupidest person I've ever met."

To illustrate, let's use a passage from a blog post titled "i love fanboys" written by Hoang "sOnNy" Tran from the Carolina Core. I've numbered the sentences that pass the STL.

"[1] im kinda disappointed in moto for actually thinkin juan and nickn0it is gunna be his cs team's savior. come on now.. [2] juan is an average strat caller and im being nice. [3] n0it is somehow the top awper? nah i dont think so. [4] moto dropped his 2 weakest link and drafted 2 more weak links. watch for ksharp, volcano, and mikey to carry"

That little paragraph has six sentences, and four of them made the grade. I'd call that an unsustainable ratio, but it's clearly not. Here's more inciting goodness:

"baahahah [1] i seriously dont know what jax was thinkin. i've been playin cs for 7-8 years. i've played against the best of the best in the world in 1.6 and source. i know what team is good and what team isn't. and honestly.. [2] venom/optx/3d has the weakest cs teams in the cgs. [3] i dont know why they drafted so many players from pandemic. [4] they're good online. [5] they're bad on lan. [6] i just dont get what the GMs were thinking..all of them over like hahN and hanes? sorry, but experience wins.

[7] jax kept his 3 weak links and drafted 2 even worse players.. [8] ppl actually think mustang is better than hanes? classified better than exo? yea, online. now i dont blame kat for doing what she had to do..her team fought way too much and something had to be done. but pham has been playing really good lately and paradox isn't even close"

Obviously you wouldn't use the same phrase eight times, but Tran's bringing the heat. And I might have been lenient with only marking eight sentences.

4) The arguments and information have to be slightly skewed.

freefoto.com

Virtual flames and real fires have one thing in common: when you're the one being burned, nothing else matters.

People will always defend themselves against attacks. But if the information even seems incomplete, biased, or in any way unfair, they'll drop whatever they're doing to launch a counter-offensive. At the very least it goes straight to the top of the "To-Do" queue.

For instance, in the last paragraph sOnNy claims that Pandemic is good online but bad on LAN. This is a strange claim considering their performances are similar in both situations. Let's take a gander:

- Online Finishes

3rd, CEVO Season 5
4th, CEVO Season 4

- LAN Finishes

1st, CPL Summer 2007 (no CGS teams in attendance)
3rd, DigitalLife (w/CGS teams)
4th, Newegg LANFest (w/CGS teams)
3rd/4th, CGS Combine (Single-Elim w/CGS teams)

Good online and bad on LAN? With all due respect, they seem pretty consistent to me.

The other major example is calling Optx one of the weakest CS teams in the CGS. One thing I love about SF: they're going to stick up for themselves. The departed Trevor "p0s" Randolph was the best example of that attitude, but moE and warmach1ne are picking up the slack in the comments for sOnNy's post.

Overall Blog Score for sOnNy

sOnNy's blog passes all four criterion with flying colors. More importantly, it has other great qualities. Here's a quick list of things that receive bonus points:

- Sarcastic title.

- The sign-off is one of the best taunts I've seen in a long time. "Keep feeding me fanboys...inspire me" sounds like something Kevin Spacey's character in Seven would say. The mental image comes complete with an evil grin and maniacal laugh.

- GMs usually post "good blog!" or something similar as one of the first comments ... in this case, Mark Dolven only said, "Oh sonny ..."

- People that had absolutely nothing to do with the original post, e.g. Core staffers, got involved in the argument.

- It inspired at least one blog by an Optx member.

- Two non-CGS managers commented (Lemley from Pandemic and McCaine from Guardians).

- At least three people made their first post in that comment section (OMT, amico, Dglmstr).

Honestly, I'm not sure if anybody can top this. NightFall has the potential, but he might be the only person reviled enough to score more points.

Still, I don't want to give it a perfect score because we don't know what everybody else is capable of, and the effects of this post are still going. New blogs are springing up left and right.

Right now I'm giving the post a 9.3 on the Flammatory Scale, with potential for a 9.7 if everything breaks right. If the post is removed, that's surely worth a tenth or two, and we'll have to see how much this post affects the real season. If it helps start a brawl, we might have to give it a 9.8.

Think you've got something that rates higher? Think this should rank lower? By all means, speak your mind. Let's see what the community has to offer.

Sandbagging in the Combine?

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 18:05:01 -0400

There's one thing that's been bugging me about the CGS Combine. I've had dozens of conversations about the draft with eSports analysts, players, and fans, both during and after the action in Austin. Every so often, whispers of sandbagging come up.

Ugh.

For anybody not familiar with the term, sandbagging basically means intentionally playing under or misrepresenting your skill level. I'm familiar with the term through golf; a sandbagger is somebody that artificially inflates their handicap, giving them an advantage in tournaments by playing against weaker competition or receiving more strokes.

I'm not sure if sandbagging is technically the right word, but you get the idea. The rumor is that some players were "going easy" or not playing at full-throttle.

I think that's bad for fans, teams, and the league.

For one, it completely screws up the reactions to and merits of actually winning. The most obvious example is Raspberry Tea finishing second in DoA 4 Female and still going undrafted. I'm not saying this is the case, but her situation takes on a new light if her opponents didn't really care if they lost. They wouldn't purposely throw the match, of course, but there's a huge difference between "meh" and a burning desire to prove you belong in the league. Again, I'm not saying this happened, it's merely a hypothetical.

After a brief detour, we're back on track with CGS coverage.

I think the CGS tried to cut down on that phenomenon by withholding Franchise Players from the Combine tournaments. They still played in challenge matches on Sunday, but there wasn't a reason for them to play on Saturday since they had a guaranteed roster spot. Those six players had nothing to prove and nothing to gain on the first day.

Unfortunately, the same might be said for some of the (at that time) unprotected players. There were some tough decisions about who to protect at the end of the first day, but some people were "in the clear". It doesn't take a genius to realize that at least one or two people from each franchise were mortal locks to be retained, even if they didn't perform well during the Combine.

Even more worrisome, what happens if some people knew they were being protected, or going to be redrafted, before the big shebang on Sunday?

Let's say that Player A is being targeted by a GM. Before the Combine even begins, Player A has a guarantee from a GM that they'll be drafted. When that player gets to the tournament, it's actually in his (I'm going to use "his" instead of "his/her", to simplify) best competitive interest to sandbag. The longer Player A lasts in the draft, the better his teammates will be thanks to his eventual franchise using higher picks on those players. Only one person, the GM that guaranteed him a draft pick, will know his "true" strength and reasons for the disappointment.

On the other hand, if "A" comes into the Combine and simply destroys everybody, he gets the same draft spot guarantee, but he might be drafted in an early round when other valuable players are still available to his new franchise. Player A ended up hurting himself by making his new franchise use a higher draft pick.

Essentially, the problem is that a player with a draft guarantee has no competitive reason to keep going full throttle and play every match like it's life or death. Dropping a spot in the NBA, NFL, or MLB draft can cost a player millions of dollars. Dropping six spots in the CGS draft just means you have, presumably, a better teammate.

This is the worst case scenario, and it also implies intent to subvert the competition. I want to stress that this is just a hypothetical. I don't think anybody purposely tanked just to hurt the other franchises.

At the same time, I think the opportunity is there if anybody wanted to be that devious, and more importantly it doesn't have to be a worst-case scenario to be a bad situation. In my opinion there should never be a reason, or even a hint of one, for a player to "take it easy" during any official CGS competition. There should always be something on the line, whether it's a draft spot, money, a championship trophy, or something else.

Even with that, I want to be clear that this isn't a "if the CGS doesn't fix this next season, they're going to die as a league" issue. I'm not that upset about the sandbagging. But I do think it hurts the league by cheapening the results from the Combine.

Sadly, there's no ironclad way to fix the situation. No matter how many rules you put in place, somebody will try to break or ignore them. The Minnesota Timberwolves made an under-the-table deal with Joe Smith, and lord only knows how many wink-wink situations there were at the recent NBA trade deadline when players were traded to a new team, released for salary-cap reasons, and then resigned with their original team.

For the CGS, even if they can't prevent sandbagging I wish that the opportunities weren't quite so prominent and inviting. When fans look at the results they shouldn't have questions about who was really trying, and who didn't have anything to play for.

Memories of a Grandfather

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 02:14:03 -0400

One benefit of having a blog is there aren't many rules. There's no "SPORTS" or "MARKETPLACE" in big, bold letters at the top of my section dictating what genre I have to cover. I need to write about gaming most of the time for both professional reasons (which are obvious) and for personal ones (I might give myself a stroke if I don't vent emotions through text), but there are no hard barriers. The lines that keep me on topic can be wiped away by a whim.

Tonight, I'm feeling a bit whimsical.

I haven't written much in the last couple days. There are a couple half-finished articles sitting on my desktop, but they're just collecting electronic dust. Most of my mental energy, of which I have precious little, has been spent thinking about my grandpa; he died early on Saturday morning.

I'm not quite sure how to describe the relationship between two related people that are separated by six decades of age. It's hard to bond with somebody when their basic life experiences are so completely different, and by the time you're ready to start a meaningful, mature relationship they're already pushing ninety years old. The timing doesn't exactly promote a deep connection.

I think I missed out.

As I grow older I wonder more about life - marriage, love, meaning, happiness, all your run-of-the-mill philosophical and moral quandaries. Who better to ask for guidance than a man who's been through a world war and been married for more than sixty years? Yes, that's six-zero years. He might not know about iPods, but he probably knows a thing or two about the important stuff.

I only wish I had a chance to ask him about those things when he was better equipped for a deep, philosophical conversation, and I was more willing to tax him mentally and/or emotionally.

Nobody has concrete answers, but the conversation would be more than worthwhile, if only just to see what topics held his interest, which questions surprised him, and which brought out that grandfatherly, "when you're as old as I am, you'll know why that's a funny question" laugh. The reactions would have been worth their weight in gold.

Instead, I just have a lot of great memories.

I won't share them all, but I think you'll like this one. My brother and I would stay over at my grandma's house (other side of the family), and occasionally we'd all go to the swimming pool that was part of her complex.

Our grandpa would wear a fisherman's hat (for unknown reasons), and being precocious little baseball players, we'd try to knock it off his head with water-logged, spongy, pool balls. We would have used dry ones, of course, but they didn't have enough kinetic energy to displace grandpa's headwear. Or, as we said back then, they didn't have enough oomph.

So we'd whip the balls back and forth, occasionally under a guise of "playing catch", and Greg Maddux we were not. Sometimes the ball would go sailing peacefully over his head, or even the whole pool. But the most memorable times were when our mal-aimed throw would connect with a giant "SPLOK" into the side (or back) of grandpa's head. (If we were lucky the direct impact still knocked his hat off.) Grandma(s) would complain - but I don't remember him yelling at us. He'd just laugh that all-knowing laugh after a clean clip, and toss the ball back after a "miss".

It's a fitting tale, because I can't remember him ever being angry or upset. Not when we conked him in the head with a water-ball, and not when he was diagnosed with esophageal cancer and decided to forego the brutal misery of chemotherapy in exchange for being able to enjoy life. He was always able to laugh.

Looking back, I don't think "why" is any great mystery. He was simply happy. He lived the way he wanted, both in what he did and who he was as a person. He loved animals, nature, and picking mushrooms, and I remember stories involving all three. He fed the squirrels that frequented his house. In fact, he probably fed a whole family tree of squirrels while he lived there; if they could, they would surely build a statue in honor of the great food-giver.

In the end, I think the all-knowing laugh and the happiness both stem from the same thing: following your heart. Sometimes that means pursuing a dream like competitive gaming, and other times it means feeding small mammals that have no way to repay your kindness (unless you think poop is a fair trade). That's how you live to be eighty, eighty-five, and beyond, and still enjoy life enough that your smile is as quick as it was five decades earlier.

Somewhere along that line the laugh just materializes -- it comes with the territory.

I'm going to miss hearing it, even if I didn't know him that well; I don't know what he thought about the Iraq war, or if he was scared during World War II. Heck, I don't even know his favorite color.

As it turns out, the specifics probably aren't as important as the big things, anyway. Those I do know. I know he put the happiness of others ahead of his own, and took pleasure in the small things. I know he loved his wife, and was beyond patient with children that threw projectiles at his head. I know he valued the quality of his life, and didn't measure quality by the size of his bank account.

And I know he was loved, and will be sorely missed.

Belle Becoming Bulletin-Board Belle?

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 00:24:31 -0400

Megan "belle" Ceder's skill level has to be the most talked-about subject in the aftermath of the CGS Combine. Suffice it to say that most of the talk has been along the lines of "Lake should be fired" and "belle sucks". If this comes as a revelation to you, perhaps you'd also like to know that people are attaching funny captions to cat pictures.

I couldn't help myself. I had to throw in an LOLcat picture.

The flame fests rarely grab my interest, but the other side has been steadily reeling me in; there are a significant amount of people claiming Belle is much better than people give her credit for.

I can't deny that chance. I hope it's true, to be honest. I've always been a fan of the underdog, and I like it when they prove people wrong.

But I wonder if the pro-Belle camp is pushing a little too hard. At what point does it become self-defeating to publicly build up your players? Put another way: when does it start to become bulletin-board material for the other gamers?

When you're dealing with competitive people, the slightest slight against your opponents, or even singing your own praises, has a way of energizing the very people you seek to mentally beat down. Guarantees and trash-talk put you on a pedestal, and at that point everybody looks up and tries to bring you back down. It happens every time Rasheed Wallace runs his mouth, and if laughter could get you thrown out of the NFL, Jon Kitna would be getting the Pete Rose treatment after he predicted the lowly Detroit Lions would make the playoffs.

With that in mind, if I was a DoA Female, I'd be printing out Jason Lake's 3^rd-or-better guarantee and gluing, stapling, taping, or permanently etching it onto whatever people use instead of bulletin boards these days. Them's fightin' words.

I don't know if they need or want the extra motivation, but after hearing so much about Belle's improvement this offseason and how she's going to impress people, I don't think it's out of the question that her opponents will actually be gunning for her. (Especially Mystik. If anybody's gunning for somebody, it has to be the person with "Gunn" as her last name. Just sayin.)

I have no idea if any of that will come to pass. Everybody could be oblivious to the hype or maybe they just don't care. But even if it's just business as usual in terms of motiviation, after the back-and-forth between supporters and detractors it'll be interesting to see where Belle finishes.

And it's just one more reason why the season can't start soon enough.

New York 3D Draft Report Card

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 14:37:43 -0400

What's a perfect draft? Is it looking back ten years from now, when all the players have reached their potential, and realizing you would have made the same choices? Or is it easier than that - is a perfect draft just making the best choices at the time, because nobody can possibly predict the career paths of fifty gamers?

To be honest, I'm not sure. I don't know if that question even has a rational answer. But right now, my gut tells me that 3D came damn close to having a perfect draft.

New York came into the Combine with two major questions. They had a gaping hole where their Forza team should be, and they had a perceived hole where their CS team was playing - never has a team received more criticism and flames for being mediocre.

Hey, you're in Moto's spot!

Five draft picks later, and I think Dave "moto" Geffon is ready to stand on the deck of the USS Lincoln with a "Mission Accomplished" banner hanging in the background.

Moto's draft had everything: a solid first-round pick, steals in the second and fourth rounds based on the amount of talent those players had, a third-round pick that could've gone higher, in my opinion, because surely somebody needs one of the best team leaders in Source history. And in the last round, where the talent is supposed to be dwindling, he picked up an experienced player that went 5-7 last season, had a good offseason, performed well in the Combine, and now has about a thousand reasons to play out of his mind.

There was only one person I wanted him to draft that he didn't take: Me. But that's alright, because I'd make all my opponents look like Vanessa - and after each crushing defeat I'd write snarky, mean things about them. I'm not worth the drama.

Stater's Draft

Round 1 (#3): Dan "ComeBackDan" Otto
Round 2 (#9): Nic "Darkstorm" Brownrigg
Round 3 (#15): John "juan" Mumm
Round 4 (#21): Nick "n0it" Nowakowski
Round 5 (#27): Cardell "Dave Cheppelle" Thomas

Taxi Draft

1. Paul "Rabies" Santoro
2. Barrett "Smokinu" Bonnar
3. Heather "Sapphire" Mumm
4. Philippe-Olivier "PEX" Crepin
5. Jimmy "Nikon" Pike
6. Jake "Mojo" Valianes

- Dan "ComeBackDan" Otto

I don't know if anybody else was confused, but just so we're clear Otto is known as both "ComeBackDan" and "XXXDanXXX 1337". I'll be referring to him as ComeBackDan because 1337-speak when out of style in 1337 (the year), but I've seen him referred to as both monikers.

Truthfully, this pick surprised me. I thought Darkstorm was the obvious choice after his performances at the Combine and in the online qualifiers. He seemed like the clear #2 Forza player to me.

We'll get to him more in a minute, but it's not like Otto is chopped liver. ComeBackDan did well for himself during the tournament. I don't know if he came back as much as he was front-running, but here are some of the guys he beat on the first day: ReX, GeeTeeOhh, sx240, SACKAMANJARO, Phantom, Da Vinci. That's a partial list and it still has three starters and three taxi players. He and JasonX burned through the lower bracket.

thecgs.com

Otto's LAN win should help him perform under the lights of the CGS.

But the big bonus for Otto was his win at the Nissan Sentra Forza tournament in Los Angeles. "LAN proven" is a title most racers didn't have.

I still would have gone with Darkstorm, personally, because I think he was far more likely to be chosen during the ensuing picks, but as it turns out, that wasn't such a problem.

(Also, I stumbled across this piece of news about Otto's win at the Nissan Sentra tournament. Take a look at the last line. I feel your pain, Dan.)

Grade: A-

- Nic "Dark Storm" Brownrigg

This pick might have been the best value of the draft.

When we look back at the end of the season, it might even be the defining pick for three franchises. If he performs like the second-best Forza player (which is where he finished during the Combine), it'll have a huge impact for the two franchises that passed him up, San Francisco and Los Angeles, and the one that finally drafted him. SF and LA both had needs in Forza, too, and went in a different direction. That could come back to haunt them.

Basically, Brownrigg was widely considered a first-round talent. Every time he was passed up, my reaction became more surprised. Moto went with ComebackDan and I was surprised. Kat Hunter went with DoA 4 Male, and I was absolutely shocked. Then LA passed him up in the second round, and I was practically comatose.

NinjaCW (SF) and Warden (LA) are good players, but are they really going to earn their franchises more points than one of the best available Forza racers? Really?

Based on where this pick happened and the effect it could have on the NY franchise, I think it was the steal of the draft and the best pick of the night.

Grade: A+

- Jon "Juan" Mumm and Nick "n0it" Nowakowski

I know people have been disappointed in 3D's Source results the last few seasons, but let's not lose sight of the fact that they've still been a .500 team even when they're struggling. It's not like went 0-12 in CEVO-P. They might not have been as good as people hoped (or expected), but they were still decent.

Now they're adding one of the best AWPers in the game in Nick "n0it" Nowakowski. If you're not convinced about n0it's skill check out his terrorist half on this demo against compLexity. He dominates outside on T side of Nuke.

One demo isn't a good sample size, but at the same time it's obvious the skill is there and you'll find more of the same in other matches. For a quick reference, his Gamesense stats are better than guys like David "zid" Chin and Matt "Stevenson" Stevenson - and now he's playing for a team with more talent. That's not a knock on Mustang, Griff, and paradox, because they're all extremely good players. They all got drafted, for pete's sake, but at the same time, I'd rather have Ksharp, Volcano, and method. It wouldn't surprise me if n0it's stats like Frags per Death increase simply because of the uptick in his teammates' skill.

Basically, on pure skill I had him rated as the best Source player in the draft pool after the protected players were announced. Even if you don't agree with that, adding a zid/Stevenson caliber player in the fourth round is a great value.

I christen this linchpin, Jon "juan" Mumm.

But despite what n0it brings to the team, Juan is the linchpin.

Most of the drafted Source players are coming into established situations. They don't need to overhaul the team, they just have to work on chemistry and fitting in to whatever role they'll be playing for their new team. The Optx drafted Garett "grt" Bambrough to lead their CS team, but even he will be fitting in with moE, clown, and warmach1ne.

I think Juan is in a completely different situation. He's coming into 3D and people are going to look for him to "fix" everything - setups, chemistry, strats, or whatever else was the cause of 3D's bizarre malaise. He's not fitting in, he's making sure everybody else fits in. That's a big job.

Personally, I think he's up for it. He has a playing history with Volcano, and I'm sure he knows the other guys on 3D by extension. I don't know if he'll turn their whole team around in a week or even a month, but I think he's going to break down every scrim, every match, and every strat until they're all on the same page.

If, or when, that happens, they've got enough talent to beat any team. And by "any team", I mean every team.

Grade: A

- Cardell "DaveCheppelle" Thomas

I have a hard time imagining Cheppelle being a star in a deep DoA 4 Male division, but he should hold his own, like he always seems to do. He went 5-7 last season and he had a good showing at GVN. In all the results I've looked at I've never seen him destroy a tournament, but I've never seen him get plastered by his competition, either. He's always hanging around near the top.

With all the talent in DoA Male I don't even know if he'll break .500, but he has experience against all the players and in the CGS. That's important; the transition from LAN or online play to the CGS is more difficult than some people think.

He only cost a fifth-round pick, and he should be able to keep 3D in most matches, at the very least. That's a good value, to me.

Grade: B

- Taxi Team

I thought moto had a decent Taxi draft, nothing more. I like Rabies and Smokinu. I'm not sure how much playing time either guy will get, but they're good insurance policies for DaveCheppelle and a Forza player. They're backups for a reason, but they'd be able to step in and not submarine 3D's playoff chances.

The CS picks were interesting. Pex and Nikon aren't huge names in the community, but they do have sleeper potential. They're probably underrated by the community at large, especially Nikon.

Sapphire and Mojo shouldn't have much of an impact during the season. They're backing two of NY's best players in coolsvilla (#2 DoA F last season) and WiZaKoR (Franchise Player).

On a side note, I'd like to quickly apologize to Sapphire for giving her a sex change during the Live Draft Blog. When she was chosen I listed her as (DoA M). Sorry about that. We don't have an edit button yet. Turnabout is fair play, so you may refer to me as a (Writer F) in a media outlet of your choosing.

Grade: B

LD's Overall Draft Grade: A

If you haven't figured it out yet, let me come out and say it: I think moto had the best draft of 2008.

That being said, there are two important things to keep in mind.

1) Nobody wins a championship on paper (aka the 2007 Patriots Rule).
2) A great draft doesn't mean he has the best team.

Yes, he drafted extremely well. I'm not sure he could've done better. But there was also a reason that NY had the third pick. They needed to improve. Let's not confuse all the excitement surrounding their draft with a guarantee that they'll be World Championship contenders.

On the other hand, I think their outlook for Season 2 is bright. They brought in a bunch of talent, and I think it was the right talent for their needs. We'll have to see how the season plays out, but for now, if you're an NY3D fan you have to be excited for the regular season.

Let's just hope the "Mission Accomplished" banner serves Moto better than it did President Bush.

CPL Denies 'Vicious Rumor' of Death

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 13:34:51 -0400

In what's become a familiar refrain the last few months, the CPL is once again denying allegations that they're ceasing tournament operations.

The news originally broke in a clearly worded, unambiguous press release on the thecpl.com, but despite the clear nature of the post the CPL is hard at work convincing people that they are, in fact, still alive. They offered this official rebuttal:

It's just a flesh wound -- we're not dead!

"We went through this same argument a few weeks ago, and it's just as false now as it was then. This isn't the first time a vicious rumor like this has spread, but it is the first time it's been done with an officially sanctioned post on thecpl.com. And while some of the allegations are true, rest assured that the CPL store is still up-and-running, Angel Munoz still has his CPL e-mail account, and CAL is still slowly withering away under our guidance.

Regarding the post, in the last few weeks CPL staff members, notably Emperor Munoz, have sensed a great disturbance in the Force emanating from the Netherlands. We're not sure, but we believe there could be what seems to be a chance of the possibility that Martijn Bloemheuvel might have infiltrated our system using an advanced mind-computer control technique. Maybe. Again, we could be wrong. But we definitely believe in the possibility of the chance.

Regrettably, we cannot offer any further comment as this is now a legal issue, and our legal counsel will now aggressively hunt, track, and definitely sue anybody that was responsible for this or even mentions the words "CPL" and "dead" in the same sentence."

Despite the strongly-worded release, the community remains unconvinced. Gamers are well aware of the CPL's recent struggles with falling attendance, obscure game selections, and the myriad problems with payouts. If you followed the progression of the CPL's struggles, the news of their closing is merely the logical ending to a steady downward trend.

Still, the CPL is going to great lengths to dispel that notion. When pressed for comment, a high-ranking CPL official said, "what reason would we possibly have to close our doors? The community's anger doesn't scare us. Get some money and organization, aka power, and maybe then we'll listen."

You thought F.E.A.R. and World in Conflict were obscure titles? Wait until you see our 2009 CPL events featuring Tecmo Superbowl, Madden 2003, Wii Sports, and Counter-Strike 1.3.

- Anonymous CPL Official

"We've been operating the same way for years and still had huge turnouts. Worst case, all we need to do is move from game to game and mine those new communities for money. We know there's still profit in the gaming community. Sure, we've turned gamers upside down and shaken out the loose change, but we know there's some money hidden in the couch."

When the questioning became probing and intense, the CPL official became equally more irate, questioning the community's loyalty and gratitude for the tournament that "made teams famous". It culminated in the official standing and screaming "You want me on that wall, YOU NEED ME ON THAT WALL," before storming out the room.

As he left, he could be heard muttering something about cake and quietly singing,

"And believe me I am still alive.

I'm doing science and I'm still alive.

I feel fantastic and I'm still alive.

While you're dying I'll be still alive.

And when you're dead I will be still alive.

Still alive!

Still alive!"

It was a fitting end to the questioning, as his departure marked just one more time the CPL treated its constituents with disdain, leaving them searching for answers and wondering about their future.

An Indictment of the Community

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 19:32:40 -0400

If you haven't had a chance to watch Jason Lake's post-draft analysis on the compLexity site, I highly recommend it. He answers some pretty tough questions and does a good job of explaining the reasoning behind some of his picks. I don't necessarily agree with his opinions, but it was certainly provided some good information.

When I was watching the video one thing really disappointed me, though. Right before they got to the questions, Lake had to request that nobody send in anything about his relationship to Megan "belle" Ceder.

That's a pretty sad indication of the community's maturity.

We know that Belle played for Lake in Season 1 and was redrafted to much criticism, but enough people made the quantum leap of idiocy from "questionable pick" to "Jason Lake must be having an affair" that he had to specifically ask people not to send in stupid questions. That's flat-out depressing.

I mean, it's one thing to call Lake stupid. I don't believe he is, but if you want to go that route I won't blink an eyelash. But to insinuate, or blatantly state, that he's cheating on his wife (with whom he has two kids) with a player who's also in a relationship (with 3D's general manager, Dave Geffon) based on a draft pick is astonishing. It's dumbfounding ... on second thought, it's just plain dumb.

What really burns me up is the pure immaturity of the whole thing. The only reason people say something like that is for the "shock" value. It's the same as an eight year-old kid saying "****" on the playground to impress his friends by showing how cool he is, then giggling because he's such a rebel. Sometimes I wonder if the community is filled with immature eight-year olds, and too often it seems like that's true.

In the end, I just have one request for anybody that seriously thinks the only reason Belle was chosen was because of an intimate relationship with Lake: if you're going to make an unsupportable, completely ridiculous claim, do my blood pressure a favor and just say, "I am a rational, mature human being who isn't completely obsessed with sex."

Thanks.

LA compLexity Draft Report Card

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 17:56:07 -0400

Of all the drafts, compLexity's was the most bizarre. People kept telling me during the Combine that Lake was going to redraft Belle. I thought there were clearly other people available, so I played it off as a joke, "naw, he wouldn't do that."

Wrong.

Of course, I also thought he'd get two new Forza players and that he might pass up Perfect Legend in the first round. Basically, if you want to predict anything Jason Lake will do, just ask me about it and do the opposite of what I say.

Was LA one player away from a title run last season? Let's hope so, or else their draft won't be a happy memory.

Still, I can't help but look at the standings and wonder what the heck is going on. Dallas finished last and picked up five new players in the draft. New York finished fourth and took on five new guys, as well. San Francisco finished third; they have five new players. Even Carolina and Chicago picked up two and three new guys, respectively.

LA drafted one new person.

I can understand taking on one person if your team was one piece away from a championship last season and looked good in the offseason, but even the teams in that position made more changes. Don't get me wrong, Perfect Legend is a big name to add, but he's not Vanessa. He's not going to come into DoA 4 Male and 5-0 people. The talent pool is way too deep.

Instead of bolstering the roster with new talent, Lake essentially brought back the same team that finished second to last. And by some measures, they were actually the worst team in the league last season. LA recorded more wins than Dallas, but their point differential was dead last. Yikes.

If that wasn't enough, their biggest asset from last season, their Source team, just came off a mediocre (at best) performance in CEVO-P, didn't look that great during the Combine, and has to play against newly retooled teams that benefitted from adding very talented players from the draft pool. In other words, their bread and butter from last season is looking more like toast. I'm not predicting doom and gloom, or even a sub-.500 record, but for the first time in CS history the caliber of the players available to a team was no longer directly tied to that team's financial situation. Everybody could make their version of an All-Star squad. The gap is closing, fast.

Anyway. There are more questions, so let's break down the picks one by one.

Starter's Draft

Round 1 (#2): Carl "Perfect Legend" White
Round 2 (#: Matt "Warden" Dickens
Round 3 (#14): Megan "belle" Ceder
Round 4 (#20): Javier "chavisan" Gutierrez
Round 5 (#26): CJ "GeeTeeOhh" Nelson

Taxi Draft

1. Dennis "da Vinci" Seifert
2. Cynthia "Raspberry Tea" Escamilla
3. Justin "sunman" Summy
4. David "Taikou" Piatt
5. Nicholas "Peekay" Depalmer
6. Mason "mason" Dickens

- Carl "Perfect Legend" White

Dear Carl,
You didn't have to master every character on the box.
Signed,
Your opponents

I have nothing to complain about here. This was the obvious pick, and it was a good one.

There are a couple concerns about White worth mentioning, though. One of PL's strengths is his versatility with different characters; he uses up to seven. The CGS is limiting him to three for the season. I don't know how it will affect his performance if it does at all, but it could change things for him mentally. Even a little dip in confidence because you're not using your "normal" character in a situation could be the difference between winning and losing.

The other question is how he'll react to being on stage. Personally, I don't think it's an issue. He did just beat NinjaCW 10-0 (5-0, 5-0) in the Combine Finals. Then again, the CGS stage is a different beast, and he didn't perform as well under the bright lights of the CGI. But I think he'll be much improved this time around, and he should be a top player in the DoA 4 Male division.

Grade: A

Matt "Warden" Dickens

I wasn't surprised that Lake took Warden, but I was a little surprised about when. The second round seemed a bit early because I'm not sure anybody else had interest. Going by franchise ...

- Kat Hunter picked up both players she used during the Challenge matches.

- Dallas had their eyes on da_bears.

- New York was definitely pursuing Juan to fill a need they've had since Rambo left.

- Chicago and Carolina were both more interested in returning their players from last season than picking up new blood.

Basically, Lake probably could have waited until after the second round for Dickens.

For me, the kicker is Lake passed a great player to get Warden; Nic "Darkstorm" Brownrigg was still available. I had him going in the first round of my mock-draft as the second-best Forza player available, and I know other guys like ReDeYe had him similarly ranked. He finished second in the Combine tournament. The guy fell into Lake's lap in the second round ... and then he fell into Moto's lap a pick later.

How much of a value was Darkstorm in the second round? I'm not sure if you can see it on the CGS's recording of the draft, but watch Moto's reaction when Lake passes him up. He was already finished writing his pick before Warden was being interviewed.

I'm not condemning Lake's choice of keeping the CS team together considering their history and chemistry, but based on who was available and my perceptions of the interest in Warden, I don't think this was a good choice at this spot. Drafting is about value, and Darkstorm was almost certainly worth more points to the LA franchise than Warden.

Grade: C-

Megan "belle" Ceder

People are gonna, you know, question my picks, but you need to know that as a general manager we have quite a bit more information than the average fan because that's our job, and I could not be happier.

- Jason Lake, in his post-draft analysis.

Let's face it, the talk about Perfect Legend and Warden was the rollercoaster buildup before the drop. We could all see this coming, and we know this is where the ride really starts. So let's throw our hands in the air, pray one more time that the restraints are working properly, and submit to gravity.

Oh, belle.

All the arguments I've heard for Belle are variations on the following:

A) She's better than she used to be.
B) She beat other players in the Combine.
C) Lake wouldn't have drafted her if she hadn't improved.

What's missing from these arguments? Any kind of global perspective. The word "better" is relative. And sorry to all the people defending Belle, but the question isn't whether she's better than she used to be, the question is whether or not she's good.

I'm not convinced she is. She still lost 4-5 to Raspberry Tea, and 2-5 to Kasumi Chan during the Combine. Better? Definitely. Better than what Mystik or Raspberry Tea could do? Not so definitely. Don't forget, they should've been improving, as well. Just compare Mystik's performance during the World Finals and compare that to Region 1. We haven't seen as much as R.Tea, but she got second during the Combine.

Does anybody think Belle is capable of that? Her play during the Combine, including her wins, make that seem unlikely. Judging from those performances she has a long way to go before she's challenging her peers from last season.

And that's what really bugs me about the pick. On a personal level, I'm glad that belle has kept her focus, ignored all the blatant flames and worked on steadily improving her game. She's dedicated, hard-working, and able to ignore all the negativity. Those are qualities you want from your players. Unfortunately, from a performance standpoint it doesn't matter whether belle is better than she used to be, it matters whether she was the best choice. I don't think she was. Period.

(And I hope she proves me wrong.)

Grade: D

Javier "chavisan" Gutierrez, CJ "GeeTeeOhh" Nelson

Maybe I didn't do a good job, maybe I just built compLexity another World Championship. None of us will know til June or July, but I have some aces up my sleeve, and these ten are the exact ten that I decided to draft.

- Jason Lake, again in his post-draft analysis.

I don't understand these picks. Belle got most of the attention, but Lake redrafting his racers was just as confusing when I think about it.

First, there were players with better finishes available. Miximup (SF) and da Vinci (LA Taxi) were both on the board during the fourth round. Da Vinci made the Lower Bracket Finals, and Miximup lost in the Lower Bracket Semi-Finals - two rounds after both GeeTeeOhh and chavisan were eliminated.

Moreover, I question the value of keeping together a racing duo that didn't perform that well during last season. They finished second in record, but only third by point differential. That comes with an 0-4 record against the two best racing teams, Chicago and Carolina. I'm sorry, I just don't think these guys were the second-best team from last season, and it'll probably get worse with the incoming talent from the Forza community.

Let me put it this way: who are they going to beat? CHA0S and Muffinman? Ch0mpr and JasonX? Look through the teams. I can't find one pair of racers where I'd consider LA an obvious favorite to win. I'd take Chicago, Carolina, Dallas, and New York (who just got two first-round talents in Forza) over LA. San Francisco is close, but I like SACKAMONJARO and miximup. So sorry, LA fans, but as Mike McD would say, "if you can't spot the sucker in the first half-hour at the table, then you are the sucker."

Again, I hope they prove me wrong. I don't wish ill-performances on anybody. But I just don't get it.

Grade: D+

Taxi Squad

I don't think LA will make this many calls to their taxi team, but they've got some good players available.

Here's where I thought Lake beat the rest of his GMs. I really like his taxi squad. He did a good job of picking up insurance policies. If belle or the racers do go downhill, he can swap in da Vinci or R.Tea and he should see an uptick in performance. They're both good players, and you could easily argue they deserved to be drafted as starters.

The one notable absence is sWooZie. I thought he was going to be LA's first taxi choice, hands down. I would have bet money on it, or at least a small portion of my pride. I might not have put a garbage bag over my head like one DoA 4 competitor did after losing a side-bet on a match, but I would have considered it.

In some ways I was even more surprised he lasted until the second round, when Jax scooped up the budding media star. That guy probably gets more hits on every vlog than I have in my entire writing career. I'm pretty sure that's an indictment on my lack of self-promotion, but still. The guy is a huge asset for a franchise.

Grade: A

LD's Overall Draft Grade: D+

If you watch his post-draft chat, Lake says that he got ten out of the ten players he wanted. I don't think that's spin, I think he's being completely honest.

That confuses me. Let's recap.

Going into the season, I think their biggest asset from last season, Source, will be relatively weaker thanks to the other teams picking up new players.

Their second-biggest strength, KreeganBG in FIFA, could easily be limited by the basic functions of the game and its point differential.

The racers, their third-best component from last season, face the same problems as the Source team with the added questions about the transition to Forza.

We all know about the concerns regarding Belle.

And even their biggest pickup, Perfect Legend, will be playing in a top-heavy division with three or four other candidates to take first place.

There are so many questions surrounding this team that I can't even see them in the playoffs. In fact, I when I look at what Dallas and the rest of the teams did, I think there's a good chance LA will have the first pick in next year's draft. Obviously there's a reason we don't hand out championships based on what a team looks like on paper, but I don't see any obvious strengths, no matter how much they've been working in the offseason.

None of this is meant as a condemnation of Jason Lake's intelligence or ability to run a franchise. His history with compLexity is enough evidence to disprove any doubts about those, and I have all the respect in the world for him. Even when he first signed guys like Warden and Bullseye I respected his vision and commitment to gaming. I thought he was pretty revolutionary, actually. There's no doubt in my mind that he's got what it takes.

The issue is that I think he had a golden opportunity to mine new talent for a team that finished in fifth last year, and he passed on that chance to redraft players that had mediocre (at best) finishes or probably weren't on the radar for other franchises.

In the end I hope LA proves me wrong once again and makes the playoffs, but I'm not confident they will.

Dallas Venom Draft Report Card

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 14:34:04 -0400

I just got done watching a few episodes of Heroes. I'm a sucker shows that give people special powers like being able to walk through walls or shoot electricity from their hands. I guess regeneration is alright too, if immortality is more of your thing.

Right now, I'd pass on all of those. You can keep your mind-reading, ability to fly, and invisibility. What I really want - nay, what I need - is really fast fingers. I've got a million words to write about the draft, and a billion thoughts. I was hoping to see the sun during March, and even a hundred words a minute just won't cut it.

(Plus, I'd be a god in Guitar Hero, and who doesn't want to serenade the ladies with "Through the Fire and Flames" on expert, then complain it was too easy?)

To kick off the post-draft analysis I'll be taking a look through the teams and grading their drafts.

Who knew a guy named "Muffinman" would put the sting back into the Dallas Venom?

Starter's Draft

Round 1 (#1): Justin "Muffinman" Anderson
Round 2 (#7): Michelle "Phoenix" Pleet
Round 3 (#13): Kyle "Mustang" Cummings
Round 4 (#19): Carson "Classified" Holt
Round 5 (#25): Bardia "Barmoa" Moayedi

Taxi Draft

1. Isidro "novusnaim" Sifuentes (FIFA)
2. Adande "sWooZie" Thorne (DoA M)
3. Derek "exodus" Heidinger (Source)
4. Justin "heatwave" McKay (Source)
5. Nicole "SweetKisses" Elwood (DoA F)
6. Yevgeniy "sx240" Kroshkin (Forza)

Breakdown

- Justin "Muffinman" Anderson

I think everybody near the draft process knew that Alex "JaX" Conroy was taking Justin "Muffinman" Anderson with his first pick. At one point during the Combine Muffinman was racing with his teammate-to-be, Kevin "CHA0S" Parrish, and in the span of thirty seconds three people made a "nice Venom racing duo you have!" joke to the Dallas GM.

Usually it's not good when the other general managers know your every move. The only exception to that rule is when there's a pick so obvious that nobody will believe your denials, anyway. Could you imagine the Cleveland Cavaliers trying to tell other teams they weren't going to draft hometown phenom LeBron James? It just ain't happenin'.

Muffinman isn't on LBJ's level of dominance, but he was a clear choice. Pairing him with CHA0S could give Dallas the best Forza team in the league. They're so talented they might even be this year's version of ch0mpr and JasonX. It's no guarantee, but even Jason Lake wouldn't have passed up that chance.

Well, maybe I shouldn't go that far.

Grade: A+

- Kyle "Mustang" Cummings; Carson "Classified" Holt

The most interesting portion of Jax's draft, in my mind, was his CS picks. If the Source team plays well during the season, Dallas fans might have to thank two very strange people: Kat Hunter and Kevin Wang.

Kat Hunter, San Francisco's GM, was directly responsible for at least one of Jax's selections. She chose Garett "grt" Bambrough, formerly of the Chicago Chimera, during the second round. If she doesn't make that pick grt doesn't make it out of the round, anyway, because he was going to return to the Chimera two picks later.

Dominate.

- Muffinman, when asked how he'd help Dallas get into first place.

But he was gone before Chicago's GM had a chance to pick him up. With grt unavailable, dkt had to switch gears and take Erik "da_bears" Stromberg, who basically replaces grt as the team's versatile AWP/rifle player.

Who else just happened to plan on drafting da_bears wit the next pick? Da Jax. Since he wasn't available, Jax went with Plan B (assuming he had a Plan B) and chose a Pandemic rifler, Kyle "mustang" Cummings. It was an interesting chain of events, to say the least.

The other person with an effect on Venom's team is Kevin Wang, a former Dallas player. He was removed for contract violations, and Eric "Brawwwr" Neer took his place on the team. Brawwwr ended up being a key piece for Dallas during their CEVO-P Championship, and when Jax made him a protected player he said that Neer "reinvented his CS team". I'm not sure where Dallas would be without him, but I don't think they'd be looking for glue guys like Mustang and Classified. They'd need another star to pair with zid and dominator, and that's not a good position to be in.

As it stands, they added two great pieces instead of needing a superstar. Classified and Mustang are both low-ego, team-first players that would fit on pretty much any team. They're easy to get along with, and more importantly they're "glue" guys ingame. They don't need the spotlight, they just fit in wherever a team needs them, and that's exactly the kind of players that Dallas needs to surround brawwwr, zid, and dominator.

Grade: A-

- Michelle "Phoenix" Pleet

He came in via the taxi squad and completely changed the team around, changed the heart and soul of this team, and went on to win us a championship a couple weeks ago.

- Alex "Jax" Conroy, Dallas GM, on his player Eric "Brawwr" Neer.

Phoenix should immediately replace Raspberry Tea's production from last season, if not surpass it. Pleet had a good, but not great, Combine, and even thought Tea finished second in the Combine I think it was the right call. Over the course of the season Phoenix should be a better player.

The price of a second-round pick was a little steep, but if Jax doesn't take her in the second round I think Carolina would have. He didn't overpay and got an upgrade for his DoA Female.

Grade: B+

- Bardia "Barmoa" Moayedi

Barmoa wasn't on my radar, but he had a decent Combine performance. He lost 1-2 to KreeganBG in the tournament, and he handled himself well during the rest of the event.

More importantly, I think he's got the right set of intangibles. I got a chance to hang out with him a little bit after the draft, and he seems like an incredibly dedicated, motivated person. That counts for just as much as talent, especially considering FIFA players are still adjusting to the 2008 version of the game.

It wasn't a home-run, but it was the fifth round. There aren't any home-runs there.

Grade: B

- Taxi Squad

Honestly, even the taxi picks were good additions. sWooZie will provide immediate dividends for the franchise's overall exposure and marketing. He's also extremely close with Master, Dallas' Franchise Player.

They brought back Derek "exodus" Heidinger during the taxi-draft, and if something doesn't work out with the new pickups he should have instant chemistry with his three former teammates. The same goes for Justin "heatwave" McKay. He has tons of playing experience with brawwwr and Classified, and he's another guy that will fit in with whatever team he's playing for. I only wish he had the opportunity to do it in a starting lineup instead of a taxi squad, but I think his time will come.

Grade: B+

LD's Overall Grade: A-

Overall, JaX had the second-best draft of the night in my opinion, and that's only because moto snagged enough talent in five picks to start another CGS franchise. For 2008, Dallas should be above-average in both DoA areas, middle of the pack in FIFA and Source, and very strong in Forza.

The scary part is that's a conservative prediction. They could be much, much better. No matter what happens, I can't see them finishing in last place again, and that should be welcome news for Venom fans.

What a Combine

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 16:36:12 -0400

What an event. I don't know if I've ever been busier in my life. Between doing all the coverage, making new friends, and talking for hours and hours about eSports I barely had time to sleep. And that's not a figure of speech; I really didn't have time to sleep.

Let me put it his way: I hate flying because it's uncomfortable (I'm 6'3" with long legs) and even the slightest chance of falling from the sky makes me nervous enough to thwart any attempt at relaxation. On the way home I slept on both flights.

Then I got home and slept an extra sixteen hours, from 10am Monday to 2am today.

Sixteen hours! That's enough time to write another thirty or forty posts at Combine-speed.

Anyway. I'm going to take it easy for most of the day. I've tried to write a couple things, and my mind is outright rejecting the idea of strenuous thought. Hopefully it'll be back on track tomorrow, because I've certainly got a lot to write about. I'll be recapping each team's draft and assigning it a grade, along with some other general thoughts about the CGS, and lord only knows what else. I still have some stuff to say about the CEVO playoffs, and I'll probably resurrect that before it really become too late.

For now, I just want to give a sincere thanks to everybody I met and spoke with at the Combine. I won't even try to list everybody, because my still-addled brain is trying to figure out what day it is and if I should be tired or awake.

Instead, I'll just say this: in my opinion one of the most, if not the most, rewarding things in life is making bonds with people. It's why I write, and it's what I love to do. You can keep your office job that makes you ungodly sums of money. I'll take five friends, the feeling that only comes when you're around kindred spirits, and a game of Monopoly.

Well, maybe not Monopoly; that game sucks. But you get the point.

So to everybody that I met and talked to, thanks. To everybody that read the coverage (and commented), thanks to you as well. Hopefully we get a chance to meet sometime down the road, if we haven't already.

I just hope you don't mind if we do it with a less hectic schedule. The next time I sleep sixteen hours, I want it to be spread over two days like usual.

Chicago Chimera Draft Capsule

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 12:34:13 -0500

Note: Today, I take a look at the last team in my Draft Capsule series. In case you missed the others, here are the previous five teams:
Dallas Venom
LA compLexity
New York 3D
San Francisco Optx
Carolina Core

Weeeeee are the champions my friend. And we'll keep on fighting to the end! We are the champions, we are the champ--

... oh, hello there. I didn't see you come in. You'll have to forgive my singing; I was just thinking back upon the Chicago Chimera's season and reliving the warm fuzzy memories. The trophies, the matches, beating the Carolina Core, the confetti, beating the Carolina Core, the confetti again. Wherever the Chimera went, the Carolina Core came along and there was confetti afterwards. They even shot it out a cannon!

I don't know what a Chimera is, but it must be fearsome to win the CGS!

Looking back, Chicago's sheer dominance was hard to predict. They were only 8-4 during the regular season. That's good, but they weren't invincible. Even the PGR team lost once, which seems unthinkable when you read all the accolades and superlatives given to the pair of players. They're deserved, don't get me wrong, but the regular-season version of Chicago was not the same as the World Finals version, as evidenced by their going 5-0 record in the playoffs (Region 1 and World Finals) with only one close match.

ch0mpr and JasonX raced like they were in Batmobiles. Anomaly stepped it up in the World Finals, even beating out Peekay for the most improved FIFA player (an unofficial award, sadly). Kasumi Chan got comfortable on the big stage and started destroying people in DoA 4 Female. Blackmamba did the same. It was a perfect electronic storm of greatness.

I don't know if I've ever seen another team click like that at the same time. And I really don't know what their GM, Brian Flander, was feeding them during the offseason but I'm confident with a two-week training course I could win a Pulitzer Prize.

But every happy, made for Hollywood movie-ending has to start with some bad times. Let's do this thing. The last Draft Capsule.

-----------------------------------

Season 1 Draft Picks

First Round (#5): Wesley "ch0mpr" Cwiklo (PGR)
Second Round (#: Jason "Jason X" Exelby (PGR)
Third Round (#17): Evil Geniuses (Source)
Fourth Round (#20): Marjorie "Kasumi Chan" Bartell (DoA 4 Female)
Fifth Round (#29): Jeremy "Blackmamba" Florence (DoA 4 Male)
Sixth Round (#32): Andrew "anomaly" Brock (FIFA)

-----------------------------------

2007 Regular Season Statistics

	Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
JasonX/ch0mpr	1st	11-1	84 - 24	+ 5.00
Blackmamba	3rd	6-6	41 - 39	+ 0.16
Kasumi Chan	3rd	6-6	42 - 41	+ 0.08
Source	3rd	6-6	119 - 120	- 0.08
anomaly	4th	4-8	17 - 32	- 1.33
The Chimera	1st	8-4	303 - 256	+ 3.92

Post Season Statistics (2-0)

- Chicago Chimera 25 - NY3D 22

WiZaKoR 2 - Anomaly 1
coolsvilla 5 - Kasumi Chan 3
3D 9 - Chimera 10 (OT)
Cali Jared 3 - Blackmamba 5
BadAXX/DoubleB 3 - JasonX/ch0mpr 6

- Carolina Core 21 - Chicago Chimera 22

Mystik 5 - Kasumi Chan 2
Peekay 2 - Anomaly 0
Offbeat Ninja 5 - BlackMamba 2
Core 5 - Chimera 13
Phantom/Rex 4 - JasonX/ch0mpr 5

2007 World Finals Statistics

	Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
ch0mpr/JasonX	1st	3-0	22 - 5	+ 5.66
Blackmamba	1st	3-0	15 - 1	+ 4.66
Kasumi Chan	1st	3-0	15 - 3	+ 4.00
anomaly	1st	3-0	9 - 3	+ 2.00
Source	5th	1-2	24 - 29	- 1.66
The Chimera	2nd	3-0	85 - 41	+ 14.66

Individual World Final Results

ch0mpr/JasonX 8 - Legit/M3talX 1
ch0mpr/JasonX 8 - Daveyskills/NeoJake 1

-----------------------------------

What Went Wrong in 2007

The season started off on the wrong foot for the CS team, that's for sure. The US border guards decided that shaGuar and grt were too dangerous/intimidating/Canadian to enter the United States. That left their CS team douwn (the Canadian spelling, I believe) two players. Da_bears and sunman filled in admirably, but their CS team didn't set the world on fire. And the pair of spurned players didn't set the border patrol station on fire, either, which would probably be the American thing to do.

This picture wasn't taken during 2007, but it might also fall under "things that went wrong."

The full team was together for the World Finals, but they didn't perform well. They were the one weak link in the Chimera's otherwise impenetrable armor. You have to wonder if that was partially a result from the lack of game-time as a team. This could very easily not be the reason, but at the same time I don't think we can discount the chance that their poor play was an aftereffect of not playing together during the regular season.

Honestly, other than that things have gone smoothly for Chicago. Their first two picks combined to form some kind of super-mega PGR team with an absolutely ridiculous +60 point differential. I'd say those picks paid off for Chicago.

Anomaly was a disappointment during the regular season. His record was incredibly poor, and until the World Finals it didn't look like there was much chance of a turnaround (more on this later).

I'm not sure we can call Blackmamba a disappointment. He only went 6-6, but then again he was only a fifth round pick. It's one thing to look back and compare his regular season to his performance in the World Finals and WCG. Of course those accomplishments overshadow his pedestrian regular season record, but I don't think you can call a 6-6 record from a fifth-rounder in a deep game "a disappointment", per se.

Kasumi Chan battled some nerves through the season, but like her DoA teammate she ended up with a decent record. She had her fair share of big wins against the other players, and that was before she drank the special Chicago Kool-aid and became a DoA monster in the World Finals.

Speaking of which ...

-----------------------------------

What Went Right in 2007

Oh, the things I could list in this section. I could probably make a whole 3,000 draft capsule just on what went right for Chicago. But let's see if we can pare it down a bit.

thecgs.com

Posing with trophy = big upgrade over posing with dkt pad.

Well, they won. A lot. The 5-0 playoff record is pretty nice. What's more impressive is how they did it. They shellacked everybody in the World Finals. I'd say it was like a knife through warm butter, but even that seems like an understatement. If you've ever played sports, it's like hitting that perfect shot where you catch whatever ball you're attempting to hit (golf, baseball, soccer, tennis) on just the right spot. It's so perfect you're only tangentially aware there was any resistance at all.

Kasumi Chan and Blackmamba put up ridiculous statistics in DoA. JasonX and ch0mpr were absolutely untouchable - unless they wanted to be touched, which was also a bad thing for their opponents because it signaled a violent collision that always worked out well for Chicago (by design). And they somehow managed to fit NY3D's Matt "WiZaKoR" Wood into an Andrew "anomaly" Brock skin-suit. I'm not sure how that happened, but I refuse to believe it was the same guy playing in the World Finals that accumulated a 4-8 record in the regular season.

I covered a little bit of what went right in the other section. The chronicles of the PGR team are well-covered, and we should mention they won the PGR competition in the Individual Championships. The DoA players both returned good value despite playing far better during the World Finals.

I mean, really, Chicago went 8-4, and 13-4 if you include the extra games. What went right in 2007? Just about everything. Their "weaknesses" were mediocrity (DoA) or in a game with a tiny point differential (FIFA). And their strength in PGR carried the day. It was a surprisingly simple formula for dominance from the Chicago team, and they executed it to perfection.

-----------------------------------

Franchise Player - Jeremy "Blackmamba" Florence

If I was Brian "dkt" Flander, Chicago's general manager, I'd be a little cheesed at the CGS.

ggkthnx.com

Mamba's Secret Revealed! He can move his hands faster than the speed of light -- that's why he's good at DoA!

It might come as a surprise that Flander would have any reason to say a bad word about the league. His team won Region 1. They took home the World Championship. Every player on Chicago made the eSports equivalent of A-Rod's salary. Of course, all that is on top of the other benefits like paid travel, general notoriety, and everything else that comes with trying to push eSports into mainstream culture.

So what would be my beef?

Simple: the timing of the announcement for Forza 2 compared to announcement of the Franchise players.

I understand the reasons for the switch. And really, we all knew this was going to happen at some point. If they didn't switch from PGR to Forza, they'd switch from Source to CS 2. Or DoA 4 to Tekken. Somewhere along the line a game was going to be replaced because it wasn't graphically appealing enough anymore or the competitive aspects (such as an in-game camera) were overshadowed by a new release.

I accept that. In fact, I think the CGS has to change games just to survive.

What I don't like is the timing; in one fell swoop the CGS undercut Chicago's most dominating players, and they didn't even give Dkt enough time to adapt or see what his players could do on the new game.

Basically, imagine the same situation playing out, except Chicago doesn't have Blackmamba as a fall-back option. Who do they keep in that situation? Take a huge risk on Forza? A player almost certainly playing for second place in DoA 4 Female? It wouldn't be a CS player or Anomaly.

I think the only reason the switch's effect on the Franchise Players didn't get more attention was because the only team it really affected just happened to have the World Finals MVP as a back-up option. But I think if they're still playing PGR, ch0mpr would be the Franchise pick, not Mamba. And if BM wasn't there, Chicago would have a very tough decision.

Thankfully, he is here, and he's a good choice. I've gone over the DoA Male division about a million times before, so we'll skip the long spiel this time. For anybody new to the draft capsules, I'll just say that it's going to be interesting to see how the DoA Male division plays out with three franchise players and Perfect Legend almost certainly joining the fray. If you want to know more, feel free to head to Carolina's Capsule or Dallas' Capsule where I discuss the effects a little more in-depth.

The only things that worry me are the 6-6 record last season and the somewhat lackluster LAN performances during the offseason. He hasn't been consistently on top like Master and Offbeat, but of course that's mitigated by the huge WCG championship.

All in all, I think this was the only way DKT could go. And it was a good thing he had three worthy candidates.

-----------------------------------

Draft Strategy (Included in every Capsule)

I suggest taking a gander at this if you haven't read it already. I only omitted it from the Capsule because these are going to be long enough without the extra words. But if you have any questions about why certain players were chosen, this should help explain it.

Or it could do absolutely nothing -- but I hope it helps.

-----------------------------------

LANDodger's Picks

Personally, I think Chicago has some of the easiest choices for their Protected Players. All we have to do is look at their results in the World Finals. Who do you think they're going to keep?

Actually, don't answer that. Who cares what you think? Here's what I think:

Jeremy "Blackmamba" Florence.
Marge "Kasumi Chan" Bartell
Wesley "ch0mpr" Cwiklo
Jason "JasonX" Exelby
Matt "Stevenson" Stevenson

Toughest Omission: Corey "tr1p" Dodd

thecgs.com

Winner gets a trophy; loser gets a hug.

Truthfully, I think Kasumi Chan is the most secure pick out of the four non-franchised players. People forget that she came into the original Combine with a lot of hype. She was considered a top DoA player regardless of gender. The problem during the season was her inability to perform under pressure, and she still managed a 3^rd place finish with a 6-6 record.

I think you saw Kasumi Chan's true potential during the World Finals. She admitted she was more comfortable there because she was more accustomed to the pressure, and it showed in her results. She was every bit as dominating as Blackmamba. You could even make the case that she should have won the MVP award instead of her teammate.

All the wins were impressive by score, but the best was probably her 5-1 victory against Caronlina's Kat "Mystik" Gunn because of the caliber of the opponent. Mystik was having a great tournament in her own right, and Kasumi had almost no problems during the match. If you've read San Francisco's Capsule you know that I compared Vanessa to Babe Ruth. Well I saw some of same characteristics in KC's last match that I do in Vanessa's matches: timidity and hesitation from the opponent; killer instinct and aggression from the victor.
I'm not going to say Kasumi Chan is as good as Vanessa after one match. But for one match, she was doing a damn fine imitation. I think Chicago has to keep her, if only to find out whether she can sustain that kind of dominance. Even if they think it's highly unlikely it's worth a protection spot.

Moving on to the other players, I think Flander has to keep ch0mpr and JasonX and hope they make the transition to Forza. I don't see a viable alternative because of his draft pick and their reputation in the league. Even if he could come up with those, I'm not sure the other players are worth a spot. Anomaly had one great tournament, but it was only one great tournament. The Source team was the weak link at the World Finals, and I don't think it's a good risk to keep two or three guys from a team we last saw three months ago and hasn't played a meaningful game against the on-the-rise Venom or Core since then.

I'm not thrilled about keeping the PGR guys because there are real concerns about the switch to Forza. What convinced me was imagining a draft with them back in the free-agent pool. Is there any way either racer would make it back to Chicago in the first round? I say no. And if that's the case, they're definitely worth keeping. Even if you want to replace one of them, by the time the draft rolls around to Chicago three or four racers will be off the board. The "sure things" will almost certainly be gone, and at that point you might as well roll with the guys you know can perform, concerns or not.

Anomaly is back in the draft pool in my scenario, and that's just a matter of pure points. FIFA 08 will undoubtedly take after its older brother and have a low average margin of victory, and I think building a cs team around Stevenson is a better choice than keeping Anomaly and hoping he continues to play like he did at the World Finals.

The last issue is Stevenson. Frankly, I chose him over the rest because I think he's the most talented. He can AWP, he can rifle, and he's just an impact player. I wouldn't put him in the class of fRoD, Devour, and the really elite players, but he's just a step below that in my opinion. Think along the lines of Derek Jeter, as opposed to Alex Rodriguez or Barry Bonds. Steady, consistently great, and you can still build a team around him.

-----------------------------------

The Near Future

Almost ... Done ... we can do it!

The draft scenario for Chicago with my picks is pretty obvious. It's going to be Counter-Strike early, often, and late. They need four players, for pete's sake!

The good news is that the other franchises should be occupied with other concerns like picking up Forza and DoA players. When his colleagues are fighting over resources in the other games, DKT should be able to hand pick his first two CS players out of a nearly untouched field.

With that in mind, the picks that come to mind are two guys from Pandemic: Jon "juan" Mumm and Nick "n0it" Nowakowski. I think they're a little bit better than the rest of the field - although that also depends on who is released by the other franchises - and they're right up there with Stevenson in the Tier 2 CS players.

Of the two, I'd probably go with n0it. Juan's incredibly valuable to any team that picks him up, but you don't need a brilliant CS mind to win games. It sure things easier on everybody, and it would surely help any team, but it's not a prerequisite. On the other hand, if you don't have a dominant AWPer capable of going against Devour, fRoD, ksharp, zid, brawwwr, and Moe, you're in big trouble. I think n0it is the pick for Chicago.

After that it's harder to know who will be available. You have to watch out for the former Chicago players: grt, shaGuar, and tr1p. All of them should find homes, and it might be Chicago to keep some semblance of chemistry intact. The only reason I don't include Lari is because I have n0it taking his job, and I don't think you want either of those guys rifling for you when the situation might call for only one AWPer, especially on offense.

The other option is to take juan in the first round and either hope n0it makes it back around, or DKT could grab Gary "Funshine" Laurita. Funshine isn't a household name for most people, but he's one of the most underrated AWPers. Well, underrated by fans, anyway. The people that have to play against him probably rate him very accurately - among the best AWPers in the game.

Truthfully, I'm not sure where FIFA fits into his draft. It's probably going to be a wait-and-see pick. He doesn't have to rush and grab a player. The best course of action would probably be sitting patiently until he was able to get good value on a player that fell too far in the draft. I don't think that would happen before the third round, though, because he would absolutely need to start grabbing CS players as soon as possible with four spots to fill. But sneaking in a soccer guru in the third round is definitely plausible. By that time the best CS players should be drafted, and then he can bargain-hunt in the last two rounds to fill out the squad.

All that being said, the fate of the Chimera rests mostly upon the shoulders of their formerly fearsome Forza front-runners. DKT could bungle the draft like Chris Wallace running the Memphis Grizzlies, but if ch0mpr and JasonX continue their PGR form it won't matter with Blackmamba and Kasumi Chan backing them up.

If the two racers don't maintain that dominance, then we'll probably see something akin to how Region 1 played out last season: down-to-the-wire races for playoff spots and an exciting postseason, with the Chimera somewhere in the thick of things but not clearly dominant.

Carolina Core Draft Capsule

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 23:31:54 -0500

Note: Today, I take a look at the fifth team in my Draft Capsule series. In case you missed them, here are the previous four teams:
Dallas Venom
LA compLexity
New York 3D
San Francisco Optx

During the season each team in the CGS developed a feel. It's not surprising. All sports franchises have them. The Yankees are the Evil Empire, the Cubs are the Lovable Losers, and the Red Sox are the Insufferable Champions.

Every once in a while teams cultivate a more sinister image like the Bad Boys iteration of the Detroit Pistons. The JailBlazers in Portland fall under the less-than-nice category, too. And who can forget the Insufferable Red Sox?

The Carolina Core: It's time to go nucular.

In the CGS, the NY3D were the workmanlike, respectful, take-care-of-business team from Season 1. You'd be hard pressed to find a negative, or even instigating, comment from one of their members. As I mentioned in their draft capsule, I felt like the Optx were the risk-takers, breaking the mold and going with their instincts. They almost reminded me of the Oakland Athletics with the Moneyball revolution.

You can't define a team like a mathematical equestion since it's a subjective quality anyway, but I'm especially flummoxed about the Carolina Core. I have no idea where to put them.

The franchise and its General Manager, Mark Dolven, were torched coming out of the draft. Nobody thought they had a chance. Everybody looked at the Source team and Peekay and collectively scratched their heads - while collectively typing their latest flame post.

Usually the "nobody believed in us" plotline sets teams up for a perfect scrappy-underdog story. People love those stories. They eat up plotlines about players that are dropped because nobody believed in them, guys that come back from personal injury or drugs when everybody wrote them off, et al. We love seeing people overcome adversity when the odds are stacked against them. It's the most basic theme for a "hero" story.

There was only one problem for Carolina. They were the first scrappy-underdog team in history that everybody loved to hate. People at that stuff up, alright. They just spit it back out again among a chorus of accompanying "BOOOOOO!"s. Carolina managed to mold the physical challenges of being David Eckstein with the off-the-field problems of Barry Bonds.

It wasn't something that developed over time, either. It started during the draft and continued all the way to the World Finals where they were booed at every introduction. In fact, I'm sure some people are still booing quietly in their heads even as they're reading this.

Why were they so reviled? It's hard to say. It could have been the confident, screw-the-world attitude. Or maybe it had to do with all the winning. There's only one thing for sure: it sure didn't seem to bother them when it came time to play.

Let's go back and relive the season, Carolina. I promise I won't boo too loudly.

-----------------------------------

Season 1 Draft Picks

First Round (#6): Ryan "OffbeatNinja" Ward (DoA 4 Male)
Second Round (#7): Joe "Phantom" Tackett (PGR)
Third Round (#1: Katherine "mystik" Gunn (DoA 4 Female)
Fourth Round (#19): Brent "Rex" Dimapilis (PGR)
Fifth Round (#25): Nick "peekay" DePalmer (FIFA)
Sixth Round (#36): Pandemic (Source)

-----------------------------------

2007 Regular Season Statistics

	Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
Offbeat Ninja	1st	11-1	59 - 27	+ 2.75
Phantom/Rex	3rd	6-6	60 - 48	+ 1.00
Mystik	4th	6-6	36 - 41	- 0.42
Source	5th	5-7	103 - 117	- 1.16
peekay	6th	1-11	15 - 41	- 2.16
The Core	3rd	6-6	273 - 274	- 0.06

2007 Postseason Statistics (0-1)

- Carolina Core 22 - San Francisco Optx 19

Vanessa 5 - Mystik 0
Stermy 3 - peekay 1
Optx 10 - Core 9 (OT)
Beisbol/Skittles 1 - Phantom/Rex 8
Dave Cheppelle 0 - OffbeatNinja 5

- Carolina Core 21 - Chicago Chimera 22

Mystik 5 - Kasumi Chan 2
Peekay 2 - Anomaly 0
Offbeat Ninja 5 - BlackMamba 2
Core 5 - Chimera 13
Phantom/Rex 4 - JasonX/ch0mpr 5

2007 World Finals Statistics

	Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
Source	1st	4-0	46 - 25	+ 5.25
Mystik	2nd	3-1	16 - 10	+ 1.50
Offbeat Ninja	2nd	2-2	13 - 13	0.00
Phantom/Rex	t-5th	1-3	17 - 19	- 0.50
peekay	t-7th	1-3	9 - 11	- 0.50
The Core	2nd	3-1	101 - 274	+ 5.75

Individual World Final Results

Offbeat Ninja 5 - The Tactical 0
Offbeat Ninja 3 - Tetra 5

-----------------------------------

Notable Wins

Source: LA (10-
Mystik: Kasumi Chan (5-4, 5-0)
Offbeat Ninja: Blackmamba (5-3, 5-3, 5-2); Master (5-0)
Rex/Phantom: BadAXX/DoubleB (8-1, 8-1); Chavisan/GeeTeeOh (8-1)
peekay: Stermy (3-1)

Overall: Chicago (22-21); LA (27-16)

-----------------------------------

Notable Losses

Source: LA (6-12), SF (5-13)
Mystik: Kasumi Chan (2-5); coolsvilla (1-5, 2-5)
Offbeat Ninja: Cali Jared (4-5)
Rex/Phantom: ch0mpr/JasonX (3-6, 1-; Beisbol/Skittles (1-
peekay: WiZaKoR (2-6); anomaly (4-6); Novusnaim (1-7, 0-5)

Overall: Chicago (18-26); New York (18-24)

-----------------------------------

What Went Wrong in 2007

It depends on how you define "wrong", I suppose. There are four other franchises and literally thousands of fans that would have traded places with Carolina in a mouseclick.

Then again, life is all about perspective. Playing in both the Region 1 Finals and the World Finals only to lose to the same team both times has to sting a little bit. It's bad enough when you play in one heart-breaking game. Playing in two and having your heart broken by the same team is cause for a decade-long rivalry. So while the journey might have been enjoyable and rewarding as a whole, that last, seemingly insurmountable step probably made the whole experience bittersweet.

An all too familiar sight for Carolina fans from Region 1 -- but Peekay was taking notes.

If feelings are too vague for your taste, let's move on to more definitive aspects of what went wrong. I think we can clearly point to Nicholas "Peekay" DePalmer's regular season and say "this was not good". The 1-11 certainly jumps out, as does the -26 point differential.

Surprisingly, there was only one other huge source for complaint, and that was, well, Source. Their record during the regular season was an uninspiring 5-7, but the real blow was their performance in the Region 1 Finals. Their franchise lost by one point and the Source team lost by eight. Ouch. It was like the Randy Moss missed TD-pass, Asante Samuel missed interception, and Manning-Tyree Helmet Catch all rolled into one.

They performed a little better outside the CGS. They've made the CEVO playoffs the last two seasons, but fell short of the money both times. Probably not what they were hoping for. They also finished 5^th/6^th at the Newegg LANFest, but I'm not sure that result was much of a success. Devour played insanely well in a couple of those matches, basically putting Carolina on his back for whole stretches of rounds. 5^th/6^th isn't terrible, but in terms of how well the whole team played it wasn't a good showing.

That was a tasty treat compared to how the franchise fared against Chicago in the World Finals, where they went down 27-15 to the same Chimera team they lost to in the Region 1 Finals. It was almost a complete reversal from the first match. This time Carolina's Source team performed very well, and the rest of the team couldn't come through in the biggest moment. Mystik, peekay, Offbeat Ninja, and the PGR duo of Phantom and Rex managed one point each.

They had one more performance that went sour during the World Finals: Ryan "Offbeat Ninja" Ward lost the Individual Finals in DoA 4 Male. Chia "Tetra" Wilson from the Singapore Sword jumped out to an early 2-0 lead and closed the match with three straight round wins after Ward made a spirited comeback to go up 3-2.

But, in the grand scheme of things it was a great season for Carolina. As Lord Alfred Tennyson once said, "'Tis better to have won and lost then never to have won at all."

Or something like that.

-----------------------------------

What Went Right in 2007

thecgs.com

Dolven: Fired up!
Offbeat: Uh .. meditating?

Obviously, a lot had to go right for them to reach the Finals at all. During the Region 1 Regular Season Offbeat Ninja was nearly perfect, going 11-1. That tied Jason X and ch0mpr for the second-best record in the league, behind only Vanessa's pristine 12-0. The only player to beat Offbeat Ninja was New York's CaliJared in the first match of the season. From that point on, Ward went 11-0 while CaliJared went 3-8.

The PGR duo was the second-best tandem in the league going by point-differential. Rex and Phantom clocked in at +12 (6-6), while LA's GeeTeeOh and Chavisan were +4 (8-4). We all know who was in first place. It was a good finish, and even better considering Dolven only used a second and fourth round draft picks to grab them.

Despite a good second place in the Region 1 playoffs, the best thing that happened to Carolina, by far, was the downtime between that loss and the World Finals. I don't know what they did for those weeks. I'm not convinced they did much of anything except practice, to be honest. Either that or they managed to capture the essence of Game Genie and inject it into their blood streams. They looked like a completely different (read: better) team for every match except the final one.

Peekay played his heart out against Chris "ChrisyB" Bullard of the London Mint, overcoming an illness along the way. After his 1-11 record, I think most people were predicting that to be his score against the European FIFA star and #1 pick in the Region 2 draft, but he pulled off an upset win on penalty kicks through sheer determination, practice, and preparation for his opponent. The rest of his performances were a small step down, but still a hundred times better than Region 1.

Mystik managed to sustain her success a little longer, going 3-0 before running into a buzzsaw named Kasumi Chan in the Finals. Before that match she had a 15-5 round split in three matches, significantly improving upon her 5-7, -5 stats from the regular season.

Even though those guys were good, nothing compares to the CS team. They came out of absolutely nowhere to be Carolina's best component. They were 46-25 in four matches. That would have given them the best margin of victory in Region 1; they were even more dominant relative to their competition than Chicago's untouchable PGR duo was during the regular season. Now that's impressive.

Outside of that action and the Individual World Finals, Offbeat has had a great year, as well. He won the Itagaki Challenge against Vanessa, earning himself a trip to Japan and a badass sword, among other prizes.

(The sword was so bad-ass, in fact, that I ended up referring to the event as the "Bad-ass Sword Challenge" in my recaps for the Carolina website. That was Offbeat's characterization of the weapon, but I can confirm its bad-ass-edness.)

Ward's also been busy winning in the DoA LAN scene. He took third in the tag-team event at DID3 with his Carolina teammate, Mystik, and won the title in the head-to-head competition. He flipped those results at DOATEC 2k7, finishing first in tag (with Rabies) and third in h2h. Those both complement his third-place finishes at GVN nicely, though. That's five top-3 finishes. Time to clear some room in the trophy case.

All in all, it was a great season for Carolina. Not being able to finish it off on the highest note was probably a disappointment, but it wouldn't surprise me if they just turned that into more motivation during another offseason that was probably filled with practice - or Game Genie essence, whichever version you believe.

-----------------------------------

Franchise Player - Ryan "Offbeat Ninja" Ward

thecgs.com

Smile! You're the Franchise Player!

I covered a little bit of Offbeat's positives in the previous sections, and to sum it up, there's a lot to like about this pick. He's got the skills and the pedigree to be the Franchise Player, and Dolven made the right choice here.

The only other player worthy of Franchise status is Sam "devour" Chamma, but it's hard to justify taking a CS player when his impact is limited by the team-based nature of the game and you've got a guy that had an 11-1 record during the regular season sitting on your roster. For comparison, I think Jason Lake, LA's General Manager, made a good call by keeping fRoD as his Franchise Player. But even if you think devour is as good as LA's AWPer, there's a better choice staring you right in the face in the form of a rhythmically-challenged ninja.

The pick does have some risk, though. Before Offbeat's offseason LAN performances he was in a rut during the World Finals. Losing the Individual Championship to Tetra was surprising, but he also got man-handled by Blackmamba in the Finals match and lost to Berlin's THETACTICAL in the Semi-Finals. Mr. CGS wasn't looking very authoritative on the field, that's for sure.

Then you consider that two other General Managers thought their DoA 4 Male players were good enough to Franchise, as well. It's possible that they could all have a large, similar point differential. It happened in FIFA last season. The top three guys (WiZaKoR, KreeganBG, novusnaim) were almost equally dominant, and the bottom three were equally not.

The only difference is that DoA Male is a deep field. I have a hard time believe these guys will dominate the majority of the points. That means at least one GM is going to look back at the pick after their guy finishes in third. He's probably going to have some questions and second-guesses. Hindsight is always a dangerous tool, but I think it's safe to say that one of these guys won't be the dominating star performer his franchise is hoping for.

That being said, it probably won't be Offbeat. Despite his struggles during the World Finals, I've got him ranked as the best of the three DoA Male keepers, just ahead of Blackmamba and Master. In the end, those guys have the same questions. They both had worse records during the CGS season, and they haven't had Offbeat's success in the recent LANs. They've done well, make no mistake, but Offbeat's five top-three finishes is a huge achievement.

All in all, we should have seen this pick coming. The only question is whether it'll look as obvious when the season is over.

I'm leaning towards yes, but anything could happen.

-----------------------------------

Draft Strategy (Included in every Capsule)

I suggest taking a gander at this if you haven't read it already. I only omitted it from the Capsule because these are going to be long enough without the extra words. But if you have any questions about why certain players were chosen, this should help explain it.

Or it could do absolutely nothing -- but I hope it helps.

-----------------------------------

LANDodger's Picks

The question for Carolina isn't so much who do you keep, but who do you drop??? I can literally make a case for every player on their roster.

Think Peekay is an obvious choice for removal? I don't. The argument for peekay is surprisingly strong. He improved significantly during the downtime before the World Finals. I don't think we can question his practice habits, and why should we expect him to stop getting better if that's the case?

thecgs.com

How does Carolina get back to winning? I'm glad you asked.

He's also a huge reason for Carolina's excellent chemistry. He has a dominant personality, and I think any team that drafts him can't help but adopt some of those characteristics, in the same way the Celtics took on Kevin Garnett's indefatigable will to win.

Plus, I don't think it's a stretch to say that he and Dolven have a good relationship. Out of any player traits, I think the Carolina GM prizes dedication, hard work, and the ability to perform under pressure most of all. (And really, who doesn't want those kinds of guys on his/her team?) After looking at what Peekay did during the regular season, and then seeing how much effort he put in during the break and his near-miraculous turnaround at the Finals, I think you have to admit there's some chance he's going to be kept.

You don't have to agree that he's worth of a sport. Personally, I wouldn't keep Peekay. Still, there's just enough meet on the bones of that argument to make me wonder ...

Anyway. Let's put an end to the hypothetical and get to the good stuff. Here are my picks for the Carolina Core:

Ryan "Offbeat Ninja" Ward
Sam "devour" Chamma
Hoang "sOnNy" Tran
Joe "Phantom" Tackett
Brent "Rex" Dimapilis

Toughest Omission: Kat "Mystik" Gunn

I think the first four guys are solid. I'd be very surprised if those were off-beat (little Carolina pun for you).

The first two are definite locks. The third player, sOnNy, was huge during the World Finals. He played as well as Devour and he did it more consistently. When somebody can perform that well on the biggest stage, I think you have to keep him, and I know Dolven appreciates being able to play under pressure.

Phantom is an accomplished PGR and forza player, and he's turned up in a couple "Best Forza Racers" lists I've seen, publicly and privately. He was also an early pick in Season 1, so it shouldn't be a surprise to see him here.

That leaves Rex. I have to admit I'm not sure about this one, but I think it's the right way to go. Look at it this way: the four teams in front of Carolina all have big Forza questions. Right now, I've got three of them drafting a racer in the first round. That means when it comes to Carolina they're already down to the fourth-best choice. And, heaven forbid, if Carolina doesn't draft Forza in the first round their new player will be closer to seventh or eighth-best. Is that really a big upgrade over Rex? I'm not even convinced he's worth dropping for the fourth-best racer. He might not be as good, but the difference isn't worth a first-round pick to me. Personally, I think they'd be best served holding onto both PGR guys and focusing elsewhere.

If Dolven goes that route he can take the best FIFA player on the board or the best DoA Female. Neither should be taken with the first four picks, which means he'll be getting good value for late in the round. Heck, he could even start to rebuild his CS team if he really wants to hit that early in the draft.

The only reason I'd drop three CS players is because I think they're replacable. Or, at the very least, I don't think other teams will be clamoring to pick them up. There's a good chance that Dolven will be able to redraft at least one CS player if he wants to.

That's also the same reason I had Mystik just outside the protected list. It was a tough choice. She has talent, potential, and marketability. Dropping her only makes sense because of the people drafting before Carolina. I don't think any of the teams will be looking for a DoA Female in the first round when she'll almost certainly be competing for second place, at best. Rex, however, could go in the first round if he performs well at the Combine, considering what teams are looking for and his performances during the season. The risk of losing Mystik in the first round is much, much lower.

-----------------------------------

Near Future

thecgs.com

Dolven: FIRED UP!
Mystik: Happy-go-lucky.

The crazy thing about Carolina is they really weren't far from being World Finals Champions. I know, the score was ugly ... really ugly ... but I think we can chalk that up as a bad day. Blackmamba beating OffbeatNinja 5-1 seems like an abnormal result considering how they both played before and after the Finals. Same goes for Kasumi Chan and Mystik. Forza's skill gap is much smaller than PGR3, so Phantom and Rex should be able to close the gap through nothing more than the situation, if nothing else.

I could go into more details, but in my opinion everything that could go wrong for Carolina did go wrong. I don't think we can look at the 27-15 result and say they need to blow up the team when they basically played Chicago to a draw during the Region 1 Finals. It took a complete collapse from the CS team to let that one slip away. Who's to say which result is more indicative of the future results?

In other words, I don't think they need to blow up the team. They need some smaller upgrades. With that in mind, the game that jumps out to me is FIFA.

Carolina should be able to wait on Mystik beyond the first round, to be honest. There are three other teams that already have DoA Females accounted for, in my opinion. I envision Chicago, New York, and San Francisco sticking with their players from last season. That means only LA and Dallas will be in the market.

But LA should be drafting Perfect Legend in the first round, and almost certainly a Forza player in the second. Mystik isn't worth it for LA. Dallas should take Forza in the first round, as well, and after that they could take DoA F or CS. Personally, I'd lean towards CS since I have them dropping three players. They will basically get the cream of the crop and can hold off on DoA Female.

That would allow Dolven to take the best FIFA player available and still have a great shot at getting Mystik back through the draft. Carolina would have strengths in FIFA, PGR, DoA M, an average DoA F player, and two good CS players. They'll have to make up a little ground in CS, but with the depth of the talent pool that shouldn't be an impossible task, and I don't think you want to draft DoA Female too late considering the talent pool is a little thinner.

Basically, the way I see it, Carolina should be looking to be strong in FIFA, PGR, and DoA M, and hang on for dear life in DoA Female and Source. I'm not sure they'll break any record in the last two games, but as long as they can keep the games close their talent in other areas should be able to pull them through to victory.

Whether that earns them a promotion from Bridesmaid in the Finals to full-fledged, wedding-gown wearing, ring-toting bride is a question only the season will answer. But we after last season's performance, let's all agree not to count them out right after the draft, alright?

San Francisco Optx Draft Capsule

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 04:55:29 -0500

Note: Today, I take a look at the fourth team in my Draft Capsule series. In case you missed them, here are the previous three teams:
Dallas Venom Draft Capsule
LA compLexity Draft Capsule
New York 3D Draft Capsule

I have to admit I've got a soft spot for San Francisco. I'm not ready to leave my heart there since I plan to keep using it for a while, but they've certainly gotten into my good graces by finding a weakness in my usually crass, arrogant, standoffish personality. They appeal to my love for people that think for themselves, and I'm putty in their eleven pairs of hands.

Their GM, Kat Hunter, chose EFG as her Source team. I, too, believed Source teams could compete with the big, bad 1.6 teams, and EFG was the only team with a primarily Source background taken in the draft. She also chose a Quake player to play FIFA, ignoring the common sense that says railguns and soccer balls don't mix. I respect that.

Time to get Optxized ... by some weird scope thingy.

But what really sealed the deal was when one of their players literally went against the grain. During a PGR race, Erika "sSK1TTL3Ss" Galegor purposely reversed course to help her teammate by ramming headlong into their opponents like a lemming with a driver's license. It was my favorite moment from the CGS, bar none, because it sounds like something I would do. Or, more accurately, it sounds like something I'd talk about doing before chickening out. And I admire people that have more stones than I do. Good job, Erika!

(Yes, I am a giant wuss.)

It doesn't end there. People think coL's CS team is invincible, but the Optx continually push them to, or over, the brink in every match. SF's PGR duo played the role of David to Chicago's Goliath, handing ch0mpr and JasonX their only CGS loss in the history of mankind.

Basically, if you transported the Optx through history, I'm sure they'd be the ones that proved the Earth was round. We'd be celebrating Trevor Randolph's journey across the ocean blue in 1942 - and if history played out the same way we'd also be accusing him of genocide, but I prefer to look on the bright side.

With that in mind, let's take a deeper look at how San Francisco stole my heart. It's Draft Capsule time.

-----------------------------------

Season 1 Draft Picks

First Round (#1): Vanessa "Vanessa" Arteaga (DoA 4 Female)
Second Round (#12): Nolsen "beisbol" Perez (PGR)
Third Round (#13): Alessandro "stermy" Avallone (FIFA)
Fourth Round (#24): Cardell "Dave Chapelle" Thomas (DoA 4 Male)
Fifth Round (#25): Erika "skitt1es" Galegor (PGR)
Sixth Round (#36): EFG (Source)

-----------------------------------

2007 Regular Season Statistics

	Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
Vanessa	1st	12-0	60 - 8	+ 4.33
Source Team	2nd	6-6	117 - 102	+ 1.25
Dave Cheppelle	4th	5-7	42 - 49	- 0.58
Skittles/beisbol	4th	4-8	48 - 60	- 1.00
Stermy	4th	4-8	19 - 35	- 1.33
The Optx	2nd	6-6	286 - 254	+ 2.66

2007 Postseason Statistics (0-1)

Carolina Core 22 - San Francisco Optx 19

Vanessa 5 - Mystik 0
Stermy 3 - peekay 1
Optx 10 - Core 9 (OT)
Beisbol/Skittles 1 - Phantom/Rex 8
Dave Cheppelle 0 - OffbeatNinja 5

Individual World Final Results

Vanessa 5 - Perpetiel 0
Vanessa 5 - Hitomi1 0

-----------------------------------

Notable Wins

Source: Venom (14-4); Core (13-5)
Vanessa: Too many to Name
Dave Cheppelle: Blackmamba (5-0); Cali Jared (5-2)
Skittles/beisbol:ch0mpr/JasonX (5-4); Phantom/Rex (8-1)
Stermy: Novusnaim (5-4)

Overall: Chicago (25-1; Carolina (26-19); Dallas (31-22); NY (28-13)

-----------------------------------

Notable Losses

Source: LA (9-10, 9-10, 8-10); Venom (5-13)
Vanessa: None
Dave Cheppelle: Blackmamba (0-5); Offbeat Ninja (2-5)
Skittles/beisbol: ch0mpr/JasonX (1-
Stermy: KreeganBG (0-5, 1-4); Wizakor (2-5)

Overall: LA (18-2

-----------------------------------

What Went Wrong in 2007

The Optx got on my good side, but tournament officials didn't seem to feel the same way. These guys had a myriad of run-ins with admins. There was the aforementioned Reverse Course Race which resulted in a match pause, penalty, and a restart. I still give ‘em props, but the end results probably wasn't what Skittles was hoping for.

Lionel Hutz, here to help with your CEVO dispute!

Her PGR partner, Nolsen "Beisbol" Perez, also committed a faux pas when he touched his controller before the admins gave the all clear. For anybody not familiar with the CGS' rules, there's a countdown prior to each race. At the end competitors can grab their controllers. Admins paused the match in progress when they realized Beisbol grabbed his controller too early. They restarted the match and disqualified him for the "false start". Skittles managed to claim second, but it was still a 3-6 loss for San Francisco.

Their third infraction came during the recent CEVO-P season in a match against x3o. The Optx were down 8-9 heading into the last round and all their players were killed in the deciding round. That's usually a bad sign; this time around, it was strangely okay. An x3o player was defusing the bomb when he stopped due to a miscommunication. If he continued they would have won the round and the match. As it happened, the bomb blew up to make the score 9-9.

The problem was that no Optx members were around to witness the miracle. They all disconnected from the server when they thought they lost the round.

A whole brouhaha followed. Admins came in, x3o didn't want to play the overtime, rules were analyzed, the forums revved into high gear, and editorial teams got to work. After all the chaos, San Francisco received a warning for unsportsmanlike conduct for leaving the server and CEVO ruled that the overtime had to be played ... which SF promptly lost, anyway. Oy.

They didn't have many big disappointments on the field, to be honest. Their PGR team was 4-8 but their point differential was only -12. For comparison, NY3D's team was also 4-8 and their differential was -32. The record wasn't impressive, but wins and losses only matter for the individual games. Point differential is what matters for the franchise, and -12 isn't a team-killer.

Stermy was the most disappointing pick when we weight results against cost. Kat used a third-round pick to get him. He was the first FIFA player taken and went three spots ahead of Matt "WiZaKoR" Wood. By all accounts Stermy is an incredibly hard worker and great for the franchise, but that's pretty much a textbook candidate for a mulligan.

The biggest disappointment for performances outside the CGS was probably the Source team's early exit from Digital Life. They went 0-2 and lost to the zomblerz 7-16 in the Lower Bracket when they played on Inferno. Other than that it was pretty smooth sailing, which leads us to ...

-----------------------------------

What Went Right in 2007

Well, that #1 pick seemed to pay off. I'll cover that more in the Franchise Player section, but suffice it to say I don't think Kat Hunter has any regrets.

SportsIllustrated.com

This photo shows two things: a large part of what went right for SF, and their desperate need for a team hat-straightener.

Dave "DaveCheppelle" Chappelle (just kidding, his real name is Cardell Thomas) had a solid DoA season, finishing 5-7. He's been consistently good for most of the year. He took 4^th at GVN recently, and you can find his recap of the event on San Francisco's website. He was drafted as the last pick in the fourth round, so in that sense he returned a pretty good value. Blackmamba was availble, but he only finished 6-6 during the CGS season. Cardell's performances aren't anything to get really excited about, but they certainly weren't something that went wrong, either.

We covered Stermy and the PGR tandem in the previous section, so the only thing left to cover is their Source team.

It's a little crowded at the top with Carolina making a strong push and Dallas winning CEVO-P, but I still think we have to rank the Optx as the second-best team in the game. They're consistent against even the best teams. They made the Finals in CEVO-P after they sent coL to the Lower Bracket (LB) in the first round, the Guardians (#1 seed) in the second, and Pandemic in the third. Pandemic won their first two matches against Carolina and Dallas, by the way. They had a similar run at Newegg LANFest that culminated in sending LA to the LB. They lost in the Finals for both competitions, but I wouldn't classify their performance "disappointing" as a whole like DigitalLife.

What's most impressive is their ability to take the best team, compLexity, into overtime. Here are some of their recent results, head to head.

Round 1 CEVO Playoffs: 10- (OT)
Week 5-2 CEVO Season: 10-9 (OT)
Newegg LANFest Play: 16-12 (12-round halves, OT)
Newegg Grand Finals: 10-13, 6-13
CGS Season 1: 8-10, 9-10 (OT), 9-10 (OT)

In total they're 3-5 with five overtime matches and another match decided by one round. Outside of the Newegg LAN Finals they play to a draw in almost every match. When you add that up with their consistent performances against the other teams and their second-best point differential during the CGS Season, you've got a strong, strong case for the second-best team in Source.

Not bad for a sixth round pick, huh?

-----------------------------------

Franchise Player - Vanessa "Vanessa" Arteaga, DoA 4 Female

I'm not sure what to say here. Nobody can complain about this pick. It's an easier decision than taking LeBron James with the first pick in his draft year.

I could rehash how dominant she is by listing stats, tournament victories, and other achievements but we know most of those already. Even if you don't know specifics you grasp the big picture. At this point everything is a cliché. Even pretending to joke about her inadequacies (she gave up eight rounds - everybody panic!) seems way too obvious.

There's only one option. It's called the Tiger Woods treatment, named after the most recent iteration in sports commentary. Basically, for some players there comes a point where you run out of superlatives. Everything that could be said, has been. Describing his other-worldly dominance, talent, and drive for the umpteenth time doesn't add much to the discussion.

One large difference between Vanessa and Ruth: waist size. Suck it in, George!

In lieu of that we start looking at his impact on the game and analyzing things from a historical perspective. I think we're at that point with Vanessa. So rather than go over the details one more time I'm going to draw the closest comparison I can: Vanessa is the Babe Ruth of the DoA 4 Female division.

As sports grow in popularity the gap between #1 and #2 gets smaller and smaller. For every Alex Rodriguez there's an Albert Pujols. Pedro Martinez had Randy Johnson or Greg Maddux. Peyton Manning, Tom Brady. Even Tiger Woods has a good, but not great, record in match play where he's matched up 1 v 1 against another player. One player might be definitively better than the other, but they don't outstrip their counterparts by a gap the size of the Grand Canyon.

Babe Ruth did.

In his first year with the Yankees he hit fifty-four home runs. That's more than a list of whole teams managed to accomplish. Let's just say there wasn't another player like him in his generation. In fact, nobody was even close. When you compare him to the rest of the players of his era, he's probably the most dominant player in the history of baseball. And that's not even counting his pitching statistics.

I get the same feeling watching Vanessa. If you haven't seen her in action, it's something else. She makes the game look so easy. She's always in complete control of the match. When she loses a round it seems like a fluke rather than a shift in momentum, and it's usually followed by a revenge round where she dominates twice as much.

But the biggest effect is that you can almost sense the hesitation in her opponents. It could be my mind playing tricks on me, but even the avatars don't seem comfortable. Maybe it has to do with simple aggression; people play more passively because they aren't as confident. Whatever the reason, the gap between Vanessa and her opponent comes through very clearly.

Will somebody catch up to her? It wouldn't surprise me. People see a challenge and step up their game, and the other players are undoubtedly talented. Kasumi Chan ran through the World Finals competition, and Mytik had a great showing there, too. It doesn't even have to be one of them. Aomebody new could come along, or the other players from Region 1 (coolsvilla, belle, Raspberry Tea) could do it. Nobody knows what will happen, or when, and for now there's a positively Ruthian aura surrounding Vanessa.

And I'm sure moto hopes that history repeats itself and Kat Hunter sells her to New York.

-----------------------------------

Draft Strategy (Included in every Capsule)

I suggest taking a gander at this if you haven't read it already. I only omitted it from the Capsule because these are going to be long enough without the extra words. But if you have any questions about why certain players were chosen, this should help explain it.

Or it could do absolutely nothing -- but I hope it helps.

-----------------------------------

LANDodger's Picks

Kathunter.com

One more thing I would do if I was Kat Hunter: change my name to Kat Lover. Beware of PETA!

It's interesting how many ways a dominant player affects a team. I'm not Kat Hunter, but if I was her (and I decided that selling Vanessa to New York wasn't worthwhile), I'd look at Vanessa as a huge draft cushion.

We all know her impact in the matches, but Hunter can also afford to take some risks in the draft. If they turn out well, they could have a dominant team. If they turn out poorly Vanessa will still mitigate any of the damage and they should have a chance in the playoffs. She can take more risks simply because she has the most dominant player in the CGS that's not switching to Forza 2 next season.

That being said, I think she should use that cushion. Here are my picks for San Francisco:

Vanessa "Babe Ruth" Arteaga (DoA 4 Female)
Yazan "clown" Ammari (Source)
Laurent "warmach1ne" Keoula (Source)
Mohamed "moE" Assad (Source)
Ryan "phamtastik" Pham (Source)

Toughest Omission: Trevor "p0s" Randolph

We know one person has to leave from the CS team - unless Vanessa wants to pick up a new game, which I find unlikely - the problem was choosing which one. Pham impresses me when he plays, but it's essentially a toss-up between him and p0s.

The tie-breaker for me was p0s' attitude. I don't think we can discount the psychological effects of being released. If I was the only player released from my team, I'd probably install rear-view mirrors on my monitor to see my GM's reaction every time I messed up. Then again, I'm a wuss. Other people might become motivated instead of fearing for their job. It's a natural reaction, and we see it in different levels of sports. NBA players (especially rookies) don't play as well when they're afraid that every mistake will get them sent to the bench.

From what little I know about p0s, I have no doubts that he'd be able to handle going back to the draft pool and come back strong, or even more better, if the Optx re-drafted him.

I'm sure there are more questions, so let's talk about the other players.

Why not Stermy?

I've seen a couple people rave about Stermy. Some have done it to me, personally, and it's usually accompanied by unflattering remarks on my intelligence. I understand his good points. He's marketable. He's a great guy. He works his tail off, putting prodigious hours into FIFA or whatever game he's currently striving to master. He won his playoff game last season.

I get all that. I really do. My question is this: is he irreplaceable?

Frankly, I don't think so.

FIFA is surprisingly deep. There was the big three last season of WiZaKoR, KreeganBG, and novusnaim. One of those players is franchised, and the other two have a good chance at being kept. Novusnaim was Dallas' best performer by point differential and named their MVP. KreeganBG pushed WiZaKoR all season and almost went to the Individual World Finals instead of him.

Then you have Anomaly, who played like a man both possessed and much improved at the World Finals. There's plenty of talent coming in, led by Matija "Jevrej" Biljeskovic. It's easy to argue Jevrej should have been drafted last season, let alone could have been. I don't want to get into all the incoming players, but it shouldn't shock anybody to learn there are experienced, capable people showing up for the Combine.

In other words, unless Stermy can consistently compete with the top three (which seems hard to believe given his 1-7 record against them last season)what does Kat lose by releasing him back into the draft pool? If somebody rushes to pick him up it comes at the expense of one of the other players that might be just as good. There's more than enough talent to justify cutting him loose, in my opinion.

Stermy.blogspot.com

That melancholy, introspective look won't save you from the draft pool. Sorry.

Why not DaveCheppelle?

As I mentioned earlier, his performances have been solid. Unfortunately, he falls into the same category that Stermy does. I don't doubt his talent, his drive, or his value to a team. I just think there are similar players available.

Truthfully, DoA is more crowded than FIFA. There are four players at the top (Master, Offbeat Ninja, Blackmamba, Perfect Legend) and practically a horde of guys beneath that. NinjaCW, Rabies, Rikuto, sWooZie, Perfect Legend, Cali Jared, Escaping Jail, Tom Brady (not the Tom Brady), and DaveCheppelle will all be fighting for three spots. That's nine guys off the top of my head. The spots are up for grabs, and the difference in talent isn't worth a protection spot. Basically, he's replaceable - and it wouldn't surprise me if he was replaced by himself in one of the late rounds.

Why not PGR (Forza)?

This is the big question, to me, and I'm going to answer it in a round-a-bout way. The argument against the racers is as much an argument for the Source team, so let me tackle that question instead.

Essentially, I think the Optx are a unique team among the CGS franchises. In the last Draft Capsule I spent time looking at 3D's individual talent and lack of team results. The Optx are the model that 3D should strive for. They maximize their talent - they have so much chemistry even Bill Nye is taking notice.

(I can't believe I just made a Bill Nye joke. This might signal the end of my writing career. I'm not even sure people know who Bill Nye is -- don't worry, there's a picture coming up.)

When you watch them play their movements are coordinated, decisive, and comfortable. They complement each other perfectly, and it never seems like they're out of position or putting themselves into an awkward situation, e.g. pushing because the strat calls for it, even though they'd rather play passively.

I'm not sure you can risk messing with that. We already have to remove one player because Vanessa is the Franchise pick. By points, the Source team was San Francisco's second-biggest asset. Switching out two people might be just enough to foul up the chemistry. In a crowded Source field where coL is on top, Carolina is charging hard, and Dallas just won CEVO-P, the margin of error is frighteningly small.

Instead, she can keep both of those intact (mostly), and take the risk of dropping the racers.

There are a couple extra things to keep in mind. The first is that some Forza players are claiming the gap between racers isn't nearly as big, and they're predicting much closer matches on the whole. I think Vanessa comes into play here, as well. Even if Forza proves to be as important as PGR was in Season 1, Kat Hunter can risk that because there's a huge point cushion thanks to DoA Female. The goal is a championship, and for her team I think the best chance of making that happen is getting a good FIFA player, a solid DoA 4 Male, and then trying to find some late value in Forza - none of which seem impossible.

-----------------------------------

The Near Future

Bill! Bill! Bill! Bill! Bill Nye, the Science Guy (science rules!)

I'm going to go out on a limb and predict the games for all five of San Francisco's picks. This could backfire on me like selling Babe Ruth, but it'll be fun either way. Here's how I imagine their draft playing out:

Forza - FIFA - Forza - Source - DoA Male

I've wavered between taking FIFA first and second, but I think this is the safer prediction.

Taking Forza in the first round is prudent because she can still get a top-3 racer. Last season the third pick was JasonX, and after that the results were pretty muddled. Rex and chavisan were taken in the fourth round, CHA0S in the third, and even Skittles went in the fifth. They all returned good value. Beisbol, GeeTeeOhh, and BadAXX all went in the second round, and none of them were significantly better than the first three guys I mentioned.

After that it's FIFA, in my opinion. She can wait on Forza because most franchises should take care of that need early in the draft. The difference between a second and third round pick in Forza might only be one driver. It's worth the wait if she can draft a top-notch FIFA player with the second pick. Personally, I think the best option would be the aforementioned Matija "Jevrej" Biljeskovic, and not just because his name is worth about 300 points in Scrabble. He's a big name in the FIFA community, he won the online qualifier, and he's a proven commodity with enough skill to take on the best players.

The only question for me is availability. Carolina or Chicago could take him in the first round, and if Dallas and New York leave their FIFA spots open Kat Hunter should probably take FIFA in the first round to make sure she gets a top player - especially if it's one of the guys that Dallas or LA dropped. She can bargain hunt a little in Forza during the second and third rounds before using the last two picks in the two games with the deepest talent pools. But right now I think taking Forza is more likely considering I have her dropping both her players into the draft pool.

Predicting the draft picks is actually harder than doing it for protected players since you really have to know what the other five franchises will do. I have no such knowledge, but no matter what they do if Kat keeps Vanessa and four Source players she should have great flexibility heading into the draft. If people are heavy on Forza, she can take FIFA. If they're heavy on FIFA, grab a top-3 racer. She has a lot of options depending on what the other GMs choose.

That's a good position when you already have the most dominant single player in the CGS.

Related:

New York 3D Draft Capsule

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 10:33:22 -0500

Think back over the last year. What franchise (pre- and post- CGS draft) received the most attention from the community?

It wasn't Chicago and their CGS Championship squad.

It wasn't Carolina, who came in second place twice and might be responsible for the single most vitriolic reaction in the history of the GotFrag forums, stemming from their picks during the first CGS draft. That's a claim to hang your hat on considering those forums make Philadelphia fans look like inviting, warm, and tolerant, even after they booed Santa Claus.

I only see one D! Everybody Panic!

I don't even think it was compLexity, despite them winning every LAN in sight, failing to win a CEVO Source championship for the first time in the history of the Universe, and the recent controversy.

No, I think the most talked about team was Dave "moto" Geffon's New York 3D.

Let's go over some details. How many RectoOoOoooOOOr (I'm guessing on the amount of "O"s) threads were there? Enough that every CS fan knows exactly what I'm talking about despite the clearly vague title of "Rector threads". They came in such bulk that even CostCo was envious.

In other forum happenings, "Cheap Source Tricks" managed to eclipse "Pham is #1" as the most popular (read: annoying) phrase on GotFrag for a little while. I'm not convinced we've seen the last of that one, either. It might just be marshalling its forces for a second attack like Orochimaru from Naruto.

GotFrag even rolled out the editorial team not once (Should Rector be Cut?) but twice (Did New York Lose its Three D's?). I know I covered their struggles throughout the season. That's enough to give them the title, and I wasn't even counting how many people ask for Ksharp's config. I've been to their forums. It's so bad that I've literally thought about the merits of making a forum switchboard or answering machine.

(For anybody wondering, it would look something like:

"We're sorry, Ksharp can't come to the forums right now. He values every one of his fans, so if you'd like to leave a message he'll get back to you as soon as he can. --- If you're looking for his config, press Link 1. If you'd like to challenge him to an AWP duel, press Link 2. If you'd like to ask him on a date, e-mail a picture and short essay to lookin4love@.com. For all other inquiries, please press pound.")

And now that we've clearly established there's an overabundance of New York-related content, the only thing left to do is make one article that puts them all to shame. I'm laying down the gauntlet. It's time for the New York 3D Draft Capsule.

-----------------------------------

Season 1 Draft Picks

First Round (#4): 3D (Source)
Second Round (#9): Chris "BadAXX" Bjorkman (PGR)
Third Round (#16): Matt "WiZaKoR" Wood (FIFA)
Fourth Round (#21): Barry "DoubleB" Brady (PGR)
Fifth Round (#2: Jared "CaliJared" Singer (DoA 4 Male)
Sixth Round (#33): Tanya "coolsvilla" Underwood (DoA 4 Female)

-----------------------------------

2007 Regular Season Statistics

	Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
WiZaKoR	1st	10-2	37 - 14	+ 1.92
coolsvilla	2nd	7-5	42 - 35	+ 0.58
Source	3rd	6-6	111 - 111	0
Cali Jared	5th	4-8	38 - 52	- 1.17
BadAXX/DoubleB	5th	4-8	38 - 70	- 2.67
The NY3D	4th	6-6	266 - 282	- 1.33

2007 Postseason Statistics (0-1)

Chicago Chimera 25 - NY3D 22

WiZaKoR 2 - Anomaly 1
coolsvilla 5 - Kasumi Chan 3
3D 9 - Chimera 10 (OT)
Cali Jared 3 - Blackmamba 5
BadAXX/DoubleB 3 - JasonX/ch0mpr 6

Individual World Final Results

WiZaKoR 4 - Davisso 2
WiZaKoR 2 - ChrisyB 0

-----------------------------------

Notable Wins

Source: Venom (13-5); Optx (10-9, OT)
Cali Jared: Master (5-4); Offbeat Ninja (5-4); sWooZie (5-0)
coolsvilla: Mystik (5-1, 5-2); Kasumi Chan (5-3, 5-2)
BadAXX/DoubleB: Carolina (5-4)
WiZaKoR: Peekay (6-2); Novusnaim (3-2, 4-2); Stermy (5-2)

Overall: Dallas (28-17); Chicago (25-24, OT); Carolina (24-1

-----------------------------------

Notable Losses

Source: coL (7-11); Chimera (5-13)
Cali Jared: DaveCheppelle (2-5); Master (0-5)
coolsvilla: Mystik (3-5); Kasumi Chan (3-5); Raspberry Tea (0-5)
BadAXX/DoubleB: Chicago (1-8, 1-8, 3-6); Carolina (1-8,1-; SF (1-
WiZaKoR:KreeganBG (0-1, 1-2)

Overall: Chicago (15-31); SF (13-2

-----------------------------------

What Went Wrong in 2007

I know 3D watches Naruto. Referencing
Orochimaru (and using his picture) is
called appealing to your audience.

Let's not beat around the bush. We all know what's coming, so we might as well get straight to the Source team.

I've made this point before, but I wouldn't classify 3D's season as a disappointment. I'm not expecting titles from them anymore despite their obvious talent. They've actually been eerily consistent with their performances. Their round split in the CGS season was 111-111, in CEVO Season 3 it was 100-100, and in CEVO Season 4 it was 89-79. They've been within two games of .500 all three seasons. I don't see any surprising results there, do you?

The seven game losing streak is something that went wrong, but let's not lose too much sleep over it. Every team gets a run of bad luck, gets in a funk, or just runs into a buzzsaw (when you do all three it's called being the Miami Dolphins).

If you take a look at their schedule for CEVO it's easy to see why they started the season so poorly. There wasn't an easy match in the bunch. For their first seven matches 3D played all six playoff teams and Devastation, who arguably should have been a playoff team. If their schedule was more balanced their season wouldn't have received half the attention it did because people like streaks. We like teams that win twenty games in a row and then lose ten. Or, more accurately, we like to talk about them. Winning two games, losing one, and repeating that until you get the same 20-10 record is much more boring.

That being said, their lack of wins against the dominant teams is still troubling, and it extends beyond CEVO. They placed third in the Newegg LANFest tournament, proving they can beat the top teams, it just doesn't happen as often as 3D fans would hope.

Other than that the big disappointment was clearly the PGR duo of Chris "BadAXX" Bjorkman and Barry "DoubleB" Brady. Geffon used a second and fourth round pick, respectively, to draft the two players and he didn't get much in return. They finished in a tie for the worst point differential in PGR, the most important game in the CGS' scoring system.

The only pick outside the Source team that went really wrong was CaliJared in the fifth round. It wasn't so much that he did bad, but more who was still available; Jeremy "Blackmamba" Florence, Chicago's Franchise player, was taken with the next selection in the draft. Whoops.

-----------------------------------

What Went Right in 2007

I'm cashing in any goodwill
from the Naruto mentions
by using this photo of Ksharp.

Believe it or not there were good aspects of their season. They just didn't get as much publicity.

Even 3D's Source team got in the action. After their disastrous start they ripped off five straight wins to end the season. The big shocker is they gave up nine total rounds in those wins. Nine rounds! I'm not sure it's possible to look at some simple match results and judge whether or not a team is pissed off, but those 10-1 wins sure seem like some mix of vengeance, anger, and vented frustration to me. We'll see if they can keep that up into the Combine. It would make moto's decisions more interesting if they can keep playing that well.

They also got good value on some of their draft picks. coolsvilla finished as the second best DoA Female during the season, and moto only used a sixth round draft pick to add her to the franchise. Her performances included some big wins over Mystik and Kasumi Chan, a good sign for the upcoming season.

CaliJared also showed flashes of brilliance when he started off the season 3-0, beating Master, OffbeatNinja, and sWooZie. That continued his solid play from the Combine, but his season was all downhill after that and he went 1-8 the rest of the way. Still, he showed good potential for a fifth round pick even if, using the stupendous powers of hindsight, Blackmamba would have been a better selection.

Of course, Matt "WiZaKoR" took home the Individual Championship for FIFA at the World Finals by defeating Davisso and ChrisyB. It capped an all-around magnificent season for the FIFA player, and earned him one of the best CGS headlines when they called him the "Wizard of Windsor".

And, not for nothing, coolsvilla apparently makes a mean cookie. You might not think that's a big deal. You would be wrong.

(Yes, that was a shameless attempt to earn myself a cookie.)

-----------------------------------

Franchise Player - Matt "WiZaKoR" Wood, FIFA

I'd like to recommend this hat for NY3D's
Wizard. It doesn't light up, and it's not
tacky in any way. I promise.

To me, this was the biggest curveball of all the Franchise Players. I wouldn't have bet my soul on Ksharp, but I would have seriously considered it. He's been synonymous with 3D for ... honestly, I've stopped keeping track, but it certainly seems like forever. Sometimes I don't even remember that he retired. That period of history is just as lost to me as the Dark Ages.

There's also a case for Volcano, in my opinion. There's no denying his impact on the game. He's an excellent rifler and an above-average AWPer, making him versatile in addition to highly-skilled. I have Ksharp and Volcano ranked as 1A and 1B on the team, to be honest. My CS background might be playing into entering Volcano into the discussion, but I think you have to look at his role on the team, his impact on the game, and at least consider it.

That might have taken place, but in the end moto's choice was New York's FIFA star. Even though I'm a little surprised, I certainly wouldn't say it was the wrong choice.

In fact, it was probably the right one. It's never a bad decision to protect the #1 player in one of the games, and Wood undoubtedly takes that title from Season 1. If you skipped the statistics portion of the Capsule, he was 10-2 during the Region 1 regular season, and 10-0 against people not named KreeganBG. He won the FIFA portion the CGS Individual World Finals. That's a pretty big victory when you take into account the size and depth of the FIFA talent pool outside the United States.

Still, everybody knows the limitations of FIFA as a CGS game. There just isn't much opportunity for a blowout win. A dominating performance in FIFA (3-0) and a narrow loss in CS (8-10) only net (FIFA pun!) the franchise one point. If the Source team or the Forza team happen to have an off-day, WiZaKoR will need to break out the remote-controlled, Bugs Bunny soccer ball to help make up the deficit.

That's a tough position to be in as a franchise. Ideally, the Franchise player is somebody that can pull you out of a hole. They're the clean-up hitter, the ace of the pitching staff, the go-to scorer, or any other sports phrase you care to use that means that a team relies upon him/her. When that player's impact is limited by the game, any other weakness is going to seem like a glaring, inescapable hole.

The other concern is the early impression that it's going to be even harder to score in FIFA 08 than the previous version, which is sort of like saying somebody has developed a tougher style of concrete. The original was hard enough, thanks.

On the other hand, the FIFA players admit they say that every time a new version comes out, and it just takes some time for people to learn the tricks of the new game. Then the scoring goes up, just in time for next year's version of the game to debut. I'm sure 3D hopes that comes to pass (I might run out of FIFA puns soon) but even with those issues WiZaKoR was a good pick. It was surprising as well, but the guy beat all challengers at the World Finals and the Region 1 regular season. What more can you really ask for?

-----------------------------------

Draft Strategy

I suggest taking a gander at this if you haven't read it already. I only omitted it from the Capsule because these are going to be long enough without the extra words. But if you have any questions about why certain players were chosen, this should help explain it.

Or it could do absolutely nothing -- but I hope it helps.

-----------------------------------

LANDodger's Keepers

The Wizard of Windsor, seen here without
his totally cool, non-tacky wizard hat.
(photo from 3dny.thecgs.com)

This Capsule is a little delayed, and this section is the reason. It's been mental torture trying to figure out what to do. The only idea I never considered was dropping Ksharp and Volcano. I even wondered if moto could use hypnosis to convince people his franchise pick was really Ksharp, and he was going to drop WiZaKoR.

After chastising myself for being both impractical and stupid, I settled on the three aforementioned players early on in the process. They're no brainers. That left two spots, and my train of thought doesn't look like an organized track from A to B as much as it looks like a drunk guy suffering from vertigo laid a bunch of figure eights on top of each other with an old-fashioned "we're running out of track" movie-gap thrown in. Some thoughts went around and around and around, and others ended rather abruptly.

Fairly early in the process I came to the conclusion that coolsvilla was a solid fourth choice. She didn't dominate during the season, but she was the #2 DoA 4 female, and she had the aforementioned dominating performances against Kasumi Chan and Mystik. She got 5-0ed by Vanessa, but so did everybody else not named Vanessa.

Unfortunately, I still had two players in consideration for the last spot. Then I talked to a fellow writer and bumped that up to three contenders. And, well ... one thing led to another, we had a little too much wine, and now I'm blowing up the Source team completely. Here are my picks:

Matt "WiZaKoR" Wood (FIFA)
Kyle "Ksharp" Miller (Source)
Sal "Volcano" Garozzo (Source)
Tanya "coolsvilla" Underwood (DoA Female)
Chris "BadAXX" Bjorkman (Forza)

Toughest Omission: Jimmy "LiN" Lin

I'm pretty sure people are going to question this. I don't blame them. If you don't want to drink the kool-aid, I'm okay with that. But it's as close as I'm going to get to a solution and I'm going to argue for it with the ferocity of a hundred extremely fierce hyenas.

I was going in circles about keeping LiN or method, or both, but I couldn't make a decision. I'd talk myself into leaving one of them off, then reverse course. I was fighting against myself.

The true turning point in my mental mess of figure eights came when I asked myself this question: why is core of the CS team worth saving?

I couldn't come up with a good answer.

They're all good players, but that's actually the problem. When we look at the roster and gauge the individual skill they seem like a really good team. But they're not. They're a mediocre team. Something is missing, and more importantly it's not getting any closer to being found. They've been performing at a consistent level for almost a year, and there haven't been any sustained signs of improvement thus far (think Carolina Core). Why should we expect the next month, or two, or six be any different?

Then take a look at the Source scene surrounding 3D. It's an arms race. Dallas just won CEVO-P. Carolina steam rolled everybody in the CGS World Finals, and they've shown all the growth that 3D hasn't. We know what compLexity can do. The Optx has been pushing coL for a full year, taking their share of wins. The only team that hasn't shown much is Chicago, because they literally haven't shown much due to not having their full team for CGS and not being in CEVO.

Maybe we don't have to literally blow them
up. Getting new players would be okay.

Four out of 3D's five opponents have geared up or stepped up. At this point, to compete in that environment, I think New York needs to blow up the roster which clearly hasn't been able to put it all together. With the level of competition getting higher and the recent performances of the current team, I'm not sure it's a situation where they can just tinker and get big results.

If that's not enough, I think their draft situation is better if they only keep two CS players.

If moto keeps LiN instead of BadAXX he'll need two CS players, two Forza players, and a DoA Male. In that situation, Forza is a clear priority. It's worth too many points. Unless Perfect Legend falls past coL (which he shouldn't), moto would probably use his first two picks on racers. By the time he gets around to CS, it might be the fourth and fifth round. Even with a deep draft, the impact players will probably be gone. And if there's one thing 3D's Source team needs right now, it's impact players.

Instead of that, moto can keep BadAXX, who was sneaky-decent last season in the same way that CHA0S was for Dallas. He technically finished 9^th in the overall individual standings, but he was only one point away from being tied for fifth and he won four races during the season. Call me crazy, but anybody that wins four races can't be that bad of a driver, right?

Plus, we have to consider that New York played in the PGR division from hell. They had to play Chicago and Carolina six times during the season. They lost 1-8 a whopping four times to those teams. That's a twenty-eight point deficit right there. Overall they were 1-5, with the lone win being a 5-4 victory against Carolina when BadAXX took first.

Keeping BadAXX is essentially a gamble that he's going to be comparable to whoever you'd replace him with in the second round, anyway, so you might as well keep him and use that pick to upgrade the CS roster. Personally, I think that's a safer bet than backing yourself into a corner by dropping both Forza players and then being forced to take whatever CS players you can get. Even if BadAXX is merely decent they can pair him with the second-best racer from the Combine and have an above-average tandem.

The last thing worth mentioning is method. I've left him off this list completely; he didn't even make the Toughest Omission slot. Let me explain my thinking there.

People say he's inconsistent. I disagree. I can't remember the last time he performed well against a top team. That doesn't mean it never happens, but he's not oscillating wildly between dominating and being dominated. We barely catch brief glimpses of his full talent. For the most part he's very consistent from game-to-game, and I don't think that consistency is at a high enough skill level to justify keeping him.

And even if I'm misreading that and he really is inconsistent, is that somebody worth keeping? Source was incredibly competitive last season, and if anything the competition is becoming tighter. The pack is building, and there's less separation between compLexity and the sixth team than ever before. Inconsistency is not a viable option, even with method's considerable potential.

The last point is that he's been playing for a year. When will the inconsistency end, if that's really the problem? At this point I think we have to admit he might never be the 1.6 method. I sincerely hope he proves me wrong, pulls a Sunman and gets back to his former self. But right now I don't think he's worth the risk.

-----------------------------------

The Near Future

It's all about the racing games .. unless
you're getting creamed 13-5 in CS.
Then it's all about CS.

Alright. Hopefully you're convinced about my plan of action. If not, I've got one last chance to convince you; let's take a look at some of 3D's picks.

They've got excellent flexibility in the first round because they can react to whatever Dallas and LA do while still filling a need.

I'm expecting Dallas to draft a Forza players, and LA to grab Perfect Legend to ease their DoA woes. That leaves moto in the perfect spot to add a top-2 Forza player to pair with BadAXX. It's impossible to say how they'd do, but considering some of the new talent in Forza it's conceivable 3D would end up with an above-average racing team. If Dallas or LA go against those predictions, 3D can pick up Perfect Legend for DoA 4 Male or the best Forza player. It's a win-win.

But assuming Dallas and LA stick to my plan (which is certainly no given, considering I'm one step above a retarded monkey), I think moto should complete his Forza duo. It'll be a good pick in terms of points, but it also leaves him in good draft position for later.

Specifically, the bonus is that NY would only have CS an DoA Male left to fill. They're both extremely deep, and DoA has almost no demand. If LA takes Perfect Legend, the only other franchise in need of a DoA Male player will be San Francisco (I doubt they'll keep their current player, DaveCheppelle). Right now there isn't a "must-have" candidate for either franchise in that category. Both would do well to draft other needs since they're virtually guaranteed to get the player they want.

Which means moto can use his second, third, and fourth round picks to fill out his CS team. Those would be #9, #15, and #21 overall, and there should be plenty of talent available.

In my opinion, the best case scenario is that he picks up Jon "Juan" Mumm with the ninth pick. Juan's been leading Forbidden/Pandemic for a few years now, and if I was looking for a strat-caller and leader for a newly-built Source team he'd be #2 on my list behind Rambo. Saying that might make me the president of the Official Jon Mumm Fan Club, but the results don't lie. For the last year Pandemic has done nothing but rack up solid finishes in CEVO and whatever LAN they attend.

Juan's biggest impact for 3D wouldn't be his fragging ability, even though it's certainly above-average. He'd basically be a CS smart-bomb, directly targeting the area that's plagued 3D the last year: maximizing talent. Basically, I think he's got the best chance out of anybody to get 3D on firing on all cylinders even if they pick up two more guys that have no experience playing together, which is good considering I just hypothetically blew up their team.

The next two Source picks are far too hard to predict, but the key to success lies with those first two choices, anyway. They'd be strong in FIFA, average (at least) in DoA Female, probably subpar in DoA Male, but most importantly they'd have an above-average racing duo and a well-prepared, talented Source team.

I don't know about you guys, but after dropping three CS players that seems like a good result to me.

LA compLexity Draft Capsule

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 09:53:44 -0500

I love writing these Draft Capsules. Not only do I enjoy writing about eSports and the action, but I consider it a test of my intelligence to see how many Protected Players I can correctly predict, and there are few things I love more than a good test of my intelligence. They usually don't end up going very well, but that's beside the point. It's not my fault they're all rigged to discriminate against dumb white males.

Count on two things in LA: smog and fRoD.

The draft is coming at a perfect time for me, too, because I'm tired of talking and thinking about the bribery allegations surrounding compLexity. Don't get me wrong, I think it needed to be covered and I said what I thought had to be said, but it was still like a piece of food you've chewed for way too long. It loses the flavor that made it interesting, it becomes completely untenable, soft, and disgusting. Blech.

So I'm continuing to put all that nasty controversy behind me with the second Draft Capsule where I take a look at the LA compLe...

... aw crap.

Well. It was fun while it lasted.

-----------------------------------

2007 Draft

First Round (#2): compLexity (Source)
Second Round (#11): CJ "GeeTeeOh" Nelson (PGR)
Third Round (#14): Adande "sWooZie" Thorne (DoA 4 Male)
Fourth Round (#23): Javier "chavisan" Gutierrez (PGR)
Fifth Round (#26): Phillipe "KreeganBG" Stoyne (FIFA)
Sixth Round (#35): Megan "belle" Ceder (DoA 4 Female)

-----------------------------------

Region 1 Stats

Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
CS:Source	1st	10-2	124 - 95	+ 2.42
KreeganBG	2nd	9-3	31 - 15	+ 1.33
GTO/chavisan	2nd	8-4	56 - 52	+ 0.33
sWooZie	6th	2-10	31 - 57	- 2.16
Belle	6th	0-12	4 - 60	- 4.67
The compLexity	5th	5-7	246 - 279	- 2.75

Individual World Final Results

LA compLexity 10 - Berlin Allianz 7
LA compLexity 10 - Rio Sinistro 6 (Finals)

-----------------------------------

Notable Wins

Source: Core (12-6); Venom (12-6, 11-7); Chimera (12-6)
FIFA: WiZaKoR (1-0, 2-1), Anomaly (5-1), Stermy (5-0, 4-1)
PGR 3: Optx (8-1)
DoA M: Master (5-3)
DoA F: None

Overall: San Francisco (28-18, 24-23, 23-22)

Notes

- That's about what we expect from the Source team. CS actually had small win margins due to the game format. Even the four round margin against the Venom is huge.

- KreeganBG accounted for both of WiZaKoR's losses during the season. Yikes!

- The PGR 3 duo didn't have many big wins. That was their only 8-1 victory, and they fared poorly against the big teams (more on this in a sec).

-----------------------------------

Notable Losses

Source: Chicago (8-10); Carolina (8-10)
FIFA: Novusnaim (1-3, 2-3)
PGR 3: Chicago (1-8, 3-6); Carolina (1-8, 3-6)
DoA M: Blackmamba (1-5, 0-5); CaliJared (0-5); OffbeatNinja (2-5, 2-5)
DoA F: None

Overall: Chicago (15-26, 16-27); Carolina (16-27, 17-24); Dallas (22-23, OT)

Notes:

- The Source team was just a couple rounds away from a perfect 12-0 season.

- KreeganBG had WiZaKoR's number, but Novusnaim certainly had Kreegan's. Those were two of this three losses on the year.

- GeeTeeOh and chavisan got crushed by Carolina and Chicago. More on this later.

- sWooZie also had a tough time with the top players, struggling to put up rounds against Mamba and Offbeat.

-----------------------------------

What Went Wrong in 2007

Strictly speaking, not a lot. The quantity of things in the "fail" column was very low. The problem was that the few things that did go wrong went really, really wrong. It was like my brother's golf game. He hits it 300 yards due East on every hole. On the holes that happen to head that direction, it's good times all around. On the other 75% of the holes we're hunting Callaways in the thicket.

Sometimes it only takes one problem to
sink a ship, eh Titanic?

Before we get to the nitty-gritty, I have to confess that I'm not sure how to break down the DoA performances. On one hand, we need to talk about the bad things. On the other hand, they've been brought up so often that I don't have much to add, and even worse it's become hard to distinguish between personal attacks and assessments about a player's performance. Just writing something like, "belle was really bad during the season" has an emotional component (in my opinion) because of all the vitriol from the community during the season. In some ways it's hard not to have a visceral reaction.

So, I'm going to do my best not to pile-on, and I want us to be clear that anything I write about their performances does not reflect on their worth as human beings. From what I know, they're both great people.

Unfortunately, I don't think we can come to any other conclusion than Belle and sWooZie cost LA a shot at the playoffs. Chicago, the top scoring team, accumulated 293 points during the regular season while LA totaled 246. The difference between the DoA players on the two franchises was 48 points. If we switched their DoA players, in other words, the point situation would be an almost exact reversal with LA have 294 total points.

My last comment related to DoA is that in some ways, it's hard to say which player hurt the franchise more. Belle scored fewer points, but she was a last-round pick. LA drafted sWooZie in the third round. WiZaKoR, Blackmamba, coolsvilla, CHA0S, Novusnaim, Dave Chapelle, and future LA players chavisan and KreeganBG were all available. When you look at the results those players put up in their respective games, that's a tough pill to swallow.

Of course, any talk about their DoA players is ignoring the current elephant in the room: the allegations of bribery against Warden and the Source team. There hasn't been any official fallout yet, but one has to think it's still a possibility, and that's a big, dark cloud on even the sunniest horizon. I'm not even convinced the community has heard a plausible denial yet, let alone one that satisfies the majority of the questions created by the incident.

Nothing to see here. Just an elephant.
(Awww, look at the cute baby elephant!
He's so cu-wu-wu-wute!)

Other than that quick comment, I'm content to let that elephant stand in the room. We all know it's there, let's just acknowledge its presence, feed it some peanuts and move on. There isn't much we can do to move it right now, anyway. It's an elephant for pete's sake.

The only other sub-par portion of LA's season was the Source team's performance in the recently-completed CEVO-P playoffs. They had a rough time during the regular season, finishing with single-digit wins for the first time in Source, and they were quickly eliminated from the playoffs after Carolina beat them in the lower bracket.

The team that sent them there was the San Francisco Optx, who have become something of a thorn in compLexity's side. The Optx also sent coL to the lower bracket during the Newegg LANFest, and though coL came back to beat the Optx in the Finals that time it's clear that Moe, Pham, clowN, Warmach1ne, and p0s can beat coL on any given day. They were evenly matched throughout the CGS season, as well, where coL won 10-9, 10-9, 10-8. All wins, but very close matches.

-----------------------------------

What Went Right in 2007

Trophies for everybody in compLexity! And
no, those aren't golfers, those are CTs
lobbing grenades. Yeaaaah.

Don't worry compLexity fans, there were plenty of good things about your team. The most obvious is that they took home some pretty big awards.

- Jason Lake was voted the CGS General Manager of the Year by the other five GMs.

- LA Source won the Individual Championship at the World Finals.

- The Source team also won Season 3 and Season 4 of CEVO-P, and were the champs at the Newegg LANFest and DigitalLife.

- But more importantly, Warden received my unofficial award for "Most Entertaining Blog Post" because of this subtle (and I'm sure unintentional) dig at 3D: "We lost to 3D today so I think that was a bit of a wake up call that we need to start changing some things because people are clearly noticing our tactics and adapting to make things hard on us." Apparently, your strats are good to go until you start losing to 3D.

(On a side note, I've been savin' that baby for months. I keep imagining them leaving the scrim after losing, and there's dead silence in the coL house as everybody comes to grip with the reality that "good lord, we just lost to 3D". The silence is broken only when Rambo squeaks out, "... we need to talk", like a significant other starting a break-up speech. It's the little things in life.)

But besides all the titles for the Source team, Lake made some legitimately great picks during the draft, too. KreeganBG in the fifth round was an absolute steal (little FIFA pun for you), and the PGR players (GeeTeeOh, chavisan) that he picked up in the second and fourth rounds teamed up to finish second in the league in the most important game. The Source team paid obvious dividends, even as a first-round pick.

There were other important things outside the games, as well. Jason Lake continues to do a marvelous job building the coL community through such initiatives as Random Acts of Kindness, the Digg Project, Stumble Upon Project, Introduce Gamers to a Hot Girl Project (aka Talk Nerdy to Me), and the Manhattan Project ... wait, that might be something else.

sWooZie also turned into one of the most charismatic people in the CGS, churning out quality Vlogs and Blogs. He's one of those people where you can't imagine anybody not getting along with him. In that way he was still an asset for franchise despite not performing well on the field.

In the end there were plenty of things to love about the season, but in the same way there were plenty of things to like about the Patriots season. So close, yet so far.

-----------------------------------

Franchise Player - Danny "fRoD" Montaner, CS:Source

"Who has one thumb that looks like it's a
foot long and is the Franchise Player for LA?
This guy." (photo from thecgs.com)

I can't argue with this one at all, and I don't see how anybody could.

Moving through the other games, KreeganBG isn't the best player in his game (though he's close), and more importantly FIFA was a low-scoring title. Nobody knows what's going to happen to the PGR players. It's way too risky to keep one of them. The struggles of LA's DoA players are well chronicled.

That leaves us with Source, and the only other person in the running for the Franchise tag was probably Ronald "Rambo" Kim. But have you seen fRoD's stats? Rambo's certainly a key piece to the Source team, like a steering wheel is a key piece to a car, but good lord, fRoD might be the engine, brakes, frame, transmission, tires, radio, bumper, moon roof, and chauffeur rolled into one.

His frags per round in Source is 1.027. The next closest player on coL is Marcus "zet" Sundstrm
Tyler "storm" Wood
Phillipe "KreeganBG" Stoyne

Toughest Omission: Matt "Warden" Dickens

While writing this I've oscillated between keeping the PGR duo and dropping KreeganBG, only keeping one of the PGR guys, or even going with a straight Source protection. To be honest, I'm still not confident about this, but I think it's the only realistic option.

It came down to two things, for me.

A) Dropping the PGR players was hard, but I'm not convinced they were as good as their 8-4 record indicated. Their point differential was only +4. Over the course of the season, that's not very much. That's not the big issue, though. PGR has such huge point swings that a team could have two bad matches ruin their margin for the whole season.

No, the scarier part is taking a look at their track record (little Forza pun for you) against the top teams (by point differential), Chicago and Carolina.

LA v. Chi/CAR: 0-4 (8 - 2

LA v. SF/NY/DAL: 8-0 (48 -26)

There's certainly something to be said for taking care of business against weaker teams, but they didn't come close to beating either of the Eastern powers. That's not what you want from protected players. I think they're both above average racers, but KreeganBG was better relative to his competition, and after looking at those scores I think the Source players are safer.

B) The biggest motivation for keeping the Source team might be that they're the face of the franchise. These guys are the face of compLexity, despite sWooZie's effort to take that title through sheer likability, humor, and a cross between chutzpah and gravitas.

Their Source team has a huge influence outside of the CGS, as well. It's strange taking that into account considering we're talking about LA as a CGS franchise, but what happens if Lake replaces two players and their chemistry goes in the tank? I don't think Jax will lend him Storm for the upcoming LANs, no matter how nicely Lake asks him. compLexity's performance at events like Newegg, DigitalLife, and to a lesser extent CEVO, all have ramifications on the franchise. Winning gains exposure, fans, and sponsors.

That being said, I think it's worth keeping KreeganBG in lieu of Warden. Losing one player isn't much of a threat to the Source team's chemistry, and Stoyne was a dominant FIFA player during the first season. More importantly, it gives compLexity some modicum of flexibility during the draft. If I was a GM, nothing would please me more than to have my brethren lock themselves into ignoring all Source players because they kept their whole team. Knowing what the other GMs will do can easily change a decision or two during a draft, and just having one Source slot open would be a wise tactical move by Lake.

Be honest, which Storm would you rather
have on your team?

Even with all that, there's one more question. Why Warden? Put another way, why not Storm or zet?

There are a couple reasons. I think zet gets in because he's a huge draw for the franchise. His name brings credibility and fans from Europe, and throwing him back in the draft pool when LA will need to draft Forza and DoA is just asking for trouble.

That leaves Storm. In short, I think he plays a similar role to Warden, and does it just a little bit better. Warden is more of an entry fragger for coL, but I don't think there's any physical reason Storm, or somebody else from the draft pool, can't take that position. On defense both players provide steady rifling, and I think Storm's highs are a touch higher.

There's a sneaky component to the choice, too. Put yourself in the shoes of a GM for a second. You're on the clock, the draft is going well, and you're looking to fill a CS slot. Warden and CS Player X are both available. Heading into the Combine you had them both rated equally. Who do you choose?

Is it even a hard choice? Call me crazy, but I'm going with Player X, provided he hasn't been accused of trying to bribe anybody recently, too. Warden's name, for better or worse, is now attached to the scandal for a lot of people in the community. Unless there's a clear skill gap between Warden and the second-best CS player, he might be persona non grata for every team other than LA. And with the depth of CS, it might take a while to get to the point where that gap is readily apparent and worth justifying the possible community backlash.

Basically, if coL does put Warden back into the pool, they could get him back pretty cheaply. Just something to keep in mind.

-----------------------------------

The Near Future

As I mentioned earlier, LA's in a tough spot if they have to fill all four spots for Forza and DoA. There's a lot of potential for things to go wrong.

There is one safe pick, though, and I think it might be the biggest no-brainer of the draft: Carl "Perfect Legend" White.

Dallas won't take him with the first pick because they have Master locked up. So when coL comes-a-knockin' with the second pick there's going to be a player capable of hanging with Blackmamba, OffbeatNinja, and Master staring them right in the face.

There will be a significant temptation for Lake to draft a Forza player because of the point system. He must resist that temptation at all costs. If we take a look back at least season's draft, the PGR players were mixed when we compare draft position to results. JasonX, Phantom, and GeeTeeOh went in the second round. CHA0S (3^rd round), chavisan (4^th) and Rex (4^th) went even later. Those were some of the best racers, both by points and by record. Even with GMs prepared to focus on the racing title, there should be value in the second and third rounds.

But there's only one Perfect Legend. He took first at DOATEC 2007, beating out Master, Offbeat, and Blackmamba. He was second at DID3, behind only Offbeat. Those are just some recent results. His full history is littered with more top finishes. Basically, if LA doesn't take him, San Francisco or New York will. He can change the whole landscape of the DoA Male division.

If we assume coL will take White with that pick, that leaves LA with:

Source: fRoD, Rambo, zet, Storm, (Empty)
FIFA: KreeganBG
DoA M: Perfect Legend
Forza: (Empty), (Empty)
DoA F: (Empty)

All of those guys can compete for the title in their respective games. They're one player short in Source, but you'd be hard pressed to find a better starting four than those guys. KreeganBG finished 2^nd last season, and we just recapped a bit of what PL can do.

That's a good start for a team. The only key piece missing is some Forza racers, but they don't even have to be stars. If the rest of the roster does nothing but break even, it should be a long season for LA's opponents.

Related: Dallas Venom Draft Capsule

Dallas Venom Draft Capsule

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 07:30:39 -0500

Welcome to my first Draft Capsule!

I was expecting a round of applause. Your confused silence leads me to believe you're unsure of what exactly a Draft Capsule is. Never fear, for I have a simple answer: it's everything you need to know about a team heading into the Combine (March 7^th-9^th).

In the coming days, I'll be releasing one for every CGS franchise, starting with the lowly, pathetic, almost-a-waste-of-oxygen Dallas Venom (just kidding, they weren't that bad - we'll get to that later), and moving up the ladder until we reach the paragon of winning, the WC3 (World Champion Chicago Chimera).

In Season 1, their bark was worse
than their bite ... and snakes don't bark.

More specifically, I'll be taking a look at each team's performance in 2007, breaking down almost everything along the way. I'll point out some notable wins and losses (due to either the quality of competition or margin of victory). And I'd be remiss if I didn't peek at some results outside of the CGS, too, to see how players have been doing since the season ended.

Of course, no Draft Capsule would be complete without a look at the draft. So we'll talk about the Franchise Players, who might end up as Protected Players, and some of the tough choices each GM will face. I'll also include draft strategy based on where the team is picking, and offer picks based on likely scenarios for the first round or so.

In other words, this should be a good compendium of anything and everything Dallas. Enjoy, and if Dallas isn't your cup of (Raspberry) tea, check back each day for a new team!

-----------------------------------

Region 1 Stats

	Finish	Record	PF - PA	+/- per Game
Master - DoA M	2nd	8-4	49 - 36	+ 1.00
Novusnaim - FIFA	3rd	8-4	37 - 19	+ 1.50
Raspberry Tea - DoA F	5th	5-7	39 - 38	+ 0.06
CHA0S/IndigoF. - PGR	6th	3-9	38 - 70	- 2.67
CS: Source	6th	3-9	94 - 122	- 2.33
The Venom	6th	4-8	257 - 286	- 2.33

-----------------------------------

Notable Wins:

Master: Blackmamba (5-3, 5-0); CaliJared (5-0)
Novus.: Peekay (7-1, 5-0); KreeganBG (3-1)
R. Tea: Mystik (5-0); coolsvilla (5-0)
PGR 3 : Carolina (5-4)
Source: Optx (13-5)
Overall: Carolina Core (22-21)

Notes:

- Master utterly dominated Blackmamba during the season, which is interesting considering how he struggled against Offbeat Ninja (next section).

- Novusnaim was +11 against Peekay in two wins, and +7 in his other six wins.

- Raspberry Tea had a lot of lopsided scores when you throw in her 0-5's against Vanessa and her 5-0's against Belle. You don't usually see swings like that, but if she gets more consistent ... watch out.

- The PGR and Source teams didn't have much to write home about. The PGR win over Carolina is included because of the strength of the opponent. The CS team's win over SF came out of nowhere, and as you can see from their season stats, wasn't indicative of how they played throughout the year.

-----------------------------------

Notable Losses

Master: Offbeat Ninja (0-5, 1-5)
Novus.: Wizakor (2-4, 2-3); Stermy (4-5)
R. Tea: Vanessa (0-5, 0-5, 3-5)
PGR 3 : Carolina (1-; Chicago (1-8, 1-
Source: 3D (5-13); coL (6-12); Optx (4-14)
Overall: New York 3D (17-2; San Francisco Optx (22-31)

Notes:

- I'm not sure how Master beats Blackmamba by a combined score of 10-3, and loses to Offbeat by the combined score of 1-10.

- Novusnaim came close to beating Wizakor twice, which is a good sign for his potential as a Protected Player.

- You can really see how PGR and the Source team struggled. The Source losses are especially big. Off hand, I think they were three of the four biggest losses during the CGS season.

-----------------------------------

What Went Wrong in 2007

Well, just about everything, really. They were a last place team, after all.

Dallas needs more from Master -- seen here
chillin' out, maxin', relaxin' all cool 'n all.
(photo from thecgs.com)

Our talk about Dallas' disappointments has to begin with their first-round pick, Emmanuel "Master" Rodriguez, in the same way A-Rod is the first name brought up if the Yankees are falling short of expectations.

Master finished 8-4 with a +12 point spread, which isn't bad by any stretch of the imagination, but he wasn't the star Dallas needed him to be. And the losses to Offbeat Ninja by a combined 1-10 score were certainly a cause for more concern. I'm not sure there's a good explanation for those games, and if you're a Dallas fan you just hope they're anomalies and move on.

Again, Master didn't play poorly, he just didn't make up for Dallas' shortcomings either. Which, when we look at those, put any true complaints about Master in proper perspective. He might not have lived up to first-round status, but Dallas' Source team and PGR duo were legitimate disasters.

The Source team was an especially big blow because Jax used his second-round pick to take them. GeeTeeOh, Rex, and chavisan were all on the board, and almost certainly would have been an improvement over IndigoFerret. To say nothing of the other Source teams that ended up beating the Venom by a more than healthy margin.

For PGR, CHA0S returned value as a third-round pick but IndigoFerret didn't get it done and they could never get over the modest hump to mediocrity. Indigo's bad showing was partly intentional as he sometimes played the role of designated kamikaze-driver at the beginning of the races, but he still returned the lowest point total of any PGR racer (check out the individual rankings at this page, courtesy of Carolina.

For more perspective let's put it this way: after playing PGR and Source Dallas entered the last three games in a five point deficit, on average. That means Master needed to dominate like Vanessa and 5-0 everybody just to get back to even. Yikes. It's possible, but you better hope you're not facing Vanessa, WiZakoR, Blackmamba, OffbeatNinja, or KreeganBG, who all have a good shot at making that an even bigger deficit. Considering those players are all on different teams, you can see how easily a season can go down the drain.

If that wasn't enough, Dallas was also the first franchise in the history of the CGS with major "off the field" problems. Of course, I'm referring to Kevin "aZn" Wang's principled stand against the evil nature of paying gamers a guaranteed salary in (GASP!) Source. The saga culminated in the termination of his contract, much to his relief (I guess).

It's impossible to say how much that affected their Source team, but it's surprisingly easy to poison a team's chemistry with a bad attitude. This is pure speculation on my part, but I can't help but notice their disastrous CGS campaign, a disappointing performance at Newegg LANFest where they didn't make it out of group play, and contrast that to their recent CEVO-P Championship with aZn's replacement.

And not only did they have that ignoble "first" honor, but they were also the only US team to not have a competing representative at the CGS World Finals.

All in all, it was a rough season.

-----------------------------------

What Went Right in 2007

It's hard to be egotistical when you're
giving the camera the "crazy eyes".
(photo from carolinacore.thecgs.com)

That being said, it wasn't without a silver lining or two.

In some ways aZn's termination might have been a blessing to both parties. The benefit for him is pretty obvious, but Dallas, in addition to adding a dominant AWPer that has confidence but not an ego, gets the option to keep their new player (more on this later) who just happens to have a CEVO-P Championship to his name, now.

As part of that feat, Dallas defeated the San Francisco Optx in the Finals. But the most impressive thing about their title run might be how close they came to defeat. The Carolina Core were beating them 9-2 in the Lower Bracket, putting them one round away from elimination before Dallas rallied to win eight consecutive rounds, including one in overtime, to win the match. They pulled off a similar feat in the third and deciding map in the Finals against the Optx, who just happened to be the second-best Source team in the CGS last season going by point differential.

That takes skill, but more importantly, it takes oodles of chemistry. It's easy to give up, or even just mentally lose your edge, when you're down 2-9. Coming back from that shows how much how confident they have in themselves and their teammates. That, along with the natural chemistry that evolves from trust and faith in your teammates, is a huge bonus when you consider how close the CGS Source teams finished last season.

In another good sign, Master performed well outside of the CGS season, too. He took second at DOATEC 2k7, finishing behind Perfect Legend but ahead of DoA 4 notables like Offbeat Ninja (3^rd), Blackmamba (9^th), and CaliJared (16^th). He also took first when he teamed up with Perfect Legend in the DID3 doubles competition.

CHA0S also paid dividends, as mentioned. He ended up as the third-highest scoring individual racer, more than justifying the third-round pick Jax used to draft him.

The biggest positive for Dallas during the 2007 CGS season was Novusnaim, though. He was drafted in the fifth round and turned in the best stats on the team by a healthy margin (+1.5 points per game). His impact was somewhat limited because FIFA is a low scoring game, but it was great value for a late pick.

-----------------------------------

Franchise Player - Emmanuel "Master" Rodriguez, DoA 4 Male

There's good news and bad news with this one.

The good news is that Jax made the right pick. I don't think there's any question Master is the Franchise Player. He's huge in the DoA 4 community. He's personable, marketable, likable, and any other positive word that ends with -able. Oh, and people seem to think he has some smidgen of skill - perhaps because he has a tendency to win a lot. In terms of making somebody the face of the Dallas franchise, he's the natural choice (although I wouldn't mind seeing a guy with a Mohawk, aka CHA0S, being the face of the franchise, just for fun).

This is Carl "Perfect Legend" White. You'll
be seeing him around. Hopefully on a day
when he looks less annoyed.
(photo from dallasvenom.thecgs.com)

The bad news is the pick has a huge risk factor.

There are a few reasons for this. The biggest problem is that DoA Male is deep. Really, really deep. First, there's a "Big Four" comprised of Master, Offbeat Ninja, Blackmamba, and Perfect Legend. Perfect Legend is the only player that wasn't on a CGS team last season, but he's arguably the best of the group. That's saying something considering Master's track record, Offbeat's 11-1 record in the CGS Region 1 regular season, and Blackmamba's World Finals MVP award and WCG title.

The really scary thing is there's plenty of talent beyond the top four. Dave Chappelle went 5-7 during the CGS season and finished 4^th at GVN4, just behind Offbeat Ninja. NinjaCW won GVN4, placed 7^th at DOATEC, and made Perfect Legend's list of players to watch out for. And that's still just scratching the surface. You'll probably be hearing names like Silent Legend, Tom Brady, Rikuto, Rabies, and we can't forget the other CGS players, CaliJared and sWooZie. It's a mess ... a huge, talented mess.

In essence, Master could be a legitimately great player and still end up around 7-5 with a bit of bad luck. Ouch.

The other reason the pick carries some risk is that two other franchises kept DoA Male players. Drafting is all about value. With the deep talent pool and two teams already having DoA Male players, it'll be much easier to get good value on a DoA Male player later in the draft than, say, a Forza player. Dallas won't be in a position to take advantage of that opportunity, should it arise.

All that being said, Master was still the right call. He's the man for Dallas, and there's no doubt about it. I said he could go 7-5, but nobody should be surprised if he posts a 10-2 record while the other guys in the deep talent pool beat up against each other and stay packed together.

I'm just not sure which scenario is more likely, and I think the ideal Franchise Player comes with a little more of a guarantee.

-----------------------------------

Draft Strategy

I suggest taking a gander at this if you haven't read it already. I only omitted it from the Capsule because these are going to be long enough without the extra words. But if you have any questions about why certain players were chosen, this should help explain it.

Or it could do absolutely nothing -- but I hope it helps.

-----------------------------------

I'm putting my reputation on the line.
That's right, my wager is $0.

LANDodger's Keepers

I'm not sure how to introduce these. Perhaps some kind of drumroll? Fireworks? We need hoopla!

Unfortunately, I don't have any. So here are the people I think Jax should keep once the Combine rolls around (I included the franchise player for the sake of having five people on the list).

Emmanuel "Master" Rodriguez - DoA 4 Male
David "zid" Chin - CS:Source
Eric "brawwwr" Neer - CS:Source
Kevin "CHA0S" Parrish - Forza 2 Motorsports
Isidro "novusnaim" Sifuentes - FIFA

Toughest Omission: Corey "kaM" Hanes - CS:Source

Basically, this gives Dallas a great base to work with, which is exactly what they want in addition to their first pick. It starts with Master, potentially one of the best DoA Male players. We just got done covering him, so let's look at the other choices.

The most controversial pick is probably leaving out kaM (or another Source player). Instead of addressing his virtues directly, let's look at who we took instead: Novusnaim, CHA0S, and brawwwr.

Novusnaim was the third best player in FIFA last season, and he was named Dallas' MVP. Even if he regresses slightly with the new version (which is by no means a given considering his past success and his work ethic), he should still be above-average. He was neck-in-neck with WiZakoR and KreeganBG, and even though FIFA didn't generate as many points last season, I'm not convinced they'd be able to replace his points through the draft. He finished behind both of those players, he's certainly in the same area, and any time one of your players competes for the best record in his/her game, it's probably safe to keep him.

The other player is CHA0S, and I think Dallas simply has to protect him for a few reasons. The first is that everybody is going to looking to take racers early because of the point system. GMs and the media have talked about how important PGR ad nauseam. Everybody knows the stakes.

That means any racer you can keep is an advantage, because they're liable to get snapped up once the draft starts. And despite their poor finish as a team, CHA0S finished third in individual points in PGR last season, behind Chicago's unstoppable duo. Again, we can't just assume he's going to get worse in Forza. In fact, one important person thinks he's an even better racer in Forza.

Add it up and you come to the conclusion that if you leave out CHA0S for a Source player, there's a good chance he won't be there in the second round.

Plus, thanks to owning the first pick, Dallas can supplement him with the best Forza player on the board - an area where there's sure to be some new talent - which would give them two above-average Forza players. I don't think I have to explain the value in that.

Then we're left with zid and brawwwr being chosen over kaM. zid is an obvious choice as the team's strat-caller and a great AWPer, but brawwwr over kaM might raise some eyebrows. Here's why they should keep brawwwr: it's easier to build a team around him.

Wise man say: "Easier to hit big target in
scope than little man in distance."
(photo taken from, uh ... 1995)

One change I've noticed over the last year is that more and more players are picking up AWPs. Having two dominant AWPers doesn't create a problem for teams; it's a luxury. I don't think there's any clearer indication of that than the number of players that have changed from primarily using rifles to at least mixing it up. The phenomenon includes Volcano, Method, Rambo, Stevenson, and clowN, just to name a few. When we look at positions, a team can AWP at Mid and B on Dust2, Ramp/Upper and Outside on Nuke, and one at each site on Inferno. There's plenty of space, and the map dynamics allow, or even reward, the tactic.

Then there's the matter of available players. I can name two AWPers expected to be in the Combine that could replace brawwwr: Funshine and n0it. But the list of available riflers is much deeper: kaM, Dominator, exodus, Mustang, paradox, juan, Sasquatch, misty, sunman, da_bears. And that's leaving out everybody on the other franchises that might get dropped, as well. There's a ton of options.

And finally, if you watched the Venom during the CEVO-P playoffs, I don't think you can say that kaM is clearly better than brawwwr. They each had huge rounds for their team, and brawwwr even handled himself well with a rifle in a few situations. For reference, brawwwr had a +9 K/D ratio in the playoffs, while kaM had was -10.

It's a small sample size, and Hanes is surely the bigger name in the community, with a history of tournament placings back to 1.6's glory days, but I'm not convinced he's noticeably better than Neer. Without that clear differentiation, I'd rather keep the player who is more versatile and harder to replace.

-----------------------------------

The Near Future (the Neer Future?)

There's one more point I wanted to make that didn't make it into the "What Went Right" section, but I alluded to it in the beginning after the tongue-in-cheek comment about Dallas almost being a waste of oxygen.

Simply put, there's a distinct chance that Dallas' 4-8 record is an aberration, and not an indicator of how good they were as a team.

One of the basic tenets of sports statistics is that margin of victory (the difference between Points Scored and Points Allowed) is a far better indicator of a team's strength than W-L record.

Basically, a team that wins a lot of close games is just getting lucky. Think about all the times you've been in a close CS match, soccer game, or baseball game, etc. There's almost always one play, one bounce of the ball, that could have changed the outcome. A football that bounces towards the sidelines instead of into the hands of a defender, etc.

Because of that, luck plays a huge factor in close games, but that doesn't show up in a team's W-L record. It does show up in their Points For/Points Allowed, though, because close games are simply worth less.

When we take a look at Dallas' place in the CGS standings, the thing that should jump out at you is that the LA compLexity finished higher (with a 5-7 record) despite having a larger points split (-33 for LA to -28 for Dallas). Basically, there's an excellent chance the Venom weren't the worst team in the league last season, and they're still getting the #1 pick. That's a good thing.

And based on my projections for their protected players, it should pay off. If they pair CHA0S with a top Forza racer, their lineup will look like this through six picks:

Source: Brawwwr, zid
Forza: CHA0S, #1 Pick
DoA Male: Master
FIFA: Novusnaim
DoA Female: (Empty)

They'd have above-average players (at worst) in at least three categories, including the all-important Forza, and they can either use their second pick to acquire a DoA Female or further solidify their CS:S team, which has an excellent base. Let me reiterate that there's plenty of Source Talent available, too. How does a roster of Brawwwr, zid, kaM, paradox, and mustang strike you? They'd be able to hold their own, that's for sure, and a roster like that isn't out of the question.

Obviously, the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry. But even though Dallas finished 4-8 last season, they're keeping five talented players just like every other franchise. If they can take full advantage of the first pick, it's easy to envision a quick turnaround from cellar dweller to playoff contender.

Tune in tomorrow as we move one notch up the standings and I take a look at the LA compLexity!

CGS Extends, Expands Online Registration for Forza, DoA Male

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 07:26:34 -0500

The CGS announced earlier that they're expanding the registration slots and extending the schedule for Forza 2 and Dead or Alive 4 Male online qualifiers.

The reasons behind the changes are fairly obvious; a horde of people signed up, with even more missing the deadline or unable to get a spot because they were taken. That was enough to make the CGS reconsider how big their online qualifiers were and how long they lasted.

So, if you have any desire to play either of those games professionally, I suggest you grab a spot while you still can. In the worst case scenario it's a good playing experience. The best case scenario could end up with you on a flight to Austin with some financial help courtesy of the CGS.

And in the super-duper best case scenario, you'd get to meet me at the Combine! What more could you possibly ask for?

Good luck to everybody!

Basic CGS Draft Strategy

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 06:44:29 -0500

I'm writing Draft Capsules for each CGS team as we approach the Combine. I just finished the first one (to be published shortly) when I realized it was really, really long. Apparently I had a lot to say -- so much that I felt the need to take out this part, which I wanted to include in article for each team as a general guideline. But I think giving a link and saving on space is a better choice at this point.

Basically, the goal of this is to lay down what I think are some general guidelines and thoughts behind the upcoming draft. I'll be using these to gauge player values, and choose between closely ranked players when I do my predictions for each team's Protected Players, as well.

But first, let's get one thing straight: there's absolutely no way to accurately predict the Protected Players. Even the GMs don't know who they're going to keep. I'm sure they have some idea, of course, but there are too many variables. What happens if one of their start PGR players drives like a drunken monkey in Forza? Or what happens if a good FIFA 07 player can't handle the nuances of manual controls in FIFA 08 and gets scored on more than Eddy Curry and Zack Randolph -- which would surely be a sight to see, considering they hold the tag-team record for worst defense? Those are questions that simply can't be answered until the Combine, where we'll finally see these guys in action. And don't forget, the Protected Players will be revealed after all the action so the games will matter. A lot.

Eddy gets driven on so much he should set
up a toll booth to help with repairs.

With that in mind, I'll be keeping the same rough values for players, even if they're playing under a different title than they did last season. Any assumptions we make about a player's skill at this point could be void with another week of Combine training, anyway. Rather than throw out wild guesses, it's probably safer to assume that a slightly different game won't turn ch0mpr into a Floridian retiree that hasn't even sniffed the speed limit in years. There will surely be small changes, but if a racer is above-average in Project Gotham Racing, chances are he won't be completely terrible in Forza, in much the same way that CS players are pretty good at any kind of first-person shooter.

The other point I want to stress is that drafting is about value. The best example I can give is a CS player. Let's take shaGuar from Chicago. Great player - a legend, in fact, but even with those titles he's not irreplaceable. Just looking at guys from Pandemic, Devastation, x3o, Guardians, et al, it's easy to find at least a handful of players (probably more like ten) that could compare to shaG. They might not be discernably better -- they might not be better at all, in fact -- but the difference between him and one of possible replacements probably isn't as big as the difference between Kasumi Chan and a DoA 4 Female replacement.

Kasumi Chan is a bit of an obvious example, but I think you understand the point. Value is determined not only by the skill of the player, but by how scarce the field is. And, truthfully, how many points that game is worth, as well. shaG, through no fault of his own, plays a smaller role in earning each points simply because the other four people on the team are pretty important, as well. In terms of bang for your buck, upgrading from the sixth-best DoA player to the third-best is a huge difference, while doing the same in CS isn't worth as much. These are important factors to consider when we're figuring out who to keep.

Hope you enjoy the Draft Capsules!

I am Angry

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 21:22:20 -0500

I don’t know what happened, but I think the stats for the CGS Region 1 disappeared off the face of the planet. Even the CGS site doesn’t have them anymore, and I’ve been up, down, through, back, and forward in search of something. I even tried to manually manipulate the URLs, to no avail. I’m pretty sure I’ve clicked every link that was there, and I’ve clicked some of them enough that they’re probably starting to recognize me, like the guy behind the counter at your daily Quizno’s stop who starts making your sandwich before you even open the door.

In fact, I dare you to click on their “stats” tab to try and prove me wrong. Seriously, I dare you. But let me offer a warning: you might never come out again. There is no destination, just a series of doors that lead to places you’ve already been or didn’t want to go. Want Region 1 results? You get redirected to World Finals results. Region 2 Results? Nope – World Finals results for you. Game Stats? World Finals Game stats. It’s a maze with no damn exit, which is clearly the worst kind of maze. You just keep clicking around in circles like a retarded mouse.

(And it’s a virtual lock that somebody will post a link in the comments and include a snarky comment like “I found this in five minutes”, at which point I will beat myself to death with a rusty spoon. Of which I have plenty, thanks for asking.)

There is no larger point to this post, other than to say that I am angry. Please forgive the disturbance.

coL/Dev Aftermath: The Controversy

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 17:14:47 -0500

I don't understand how baseball writers keep pumping out content on Barry Bonds and steroids. It's only been a few days since the story broke about Warden's offer to Sasquatch, and I'm already starting to get tired of thinking and writing about it.

Of course, when it seems like when I'm at my lowest point, something new comes up to pique my interest again.

A picture of when things were simple.

And maybe it just seems this way, but I can't help but feel that every new development in our eSports story raises more questions instead of providing more answers. I keep rereading the posts, going back to make sure I didn't misunderstand some critical point, didn't miss a crucial inference, in the futile hope that the reason none of this makes sense is because of me, not because the explanations are almost impossibly hard to believe.

Sadly, even after rereading everything, the only thing that's become clearer since the beginning is that any hope for the unadulterated truth is looking more and more like a pipe dream, at best.

Don't misunderstand me. I don't really blame Jason Lake or compLexity for taking the general stance of denial and "no comment". General Managers should protect their players, and we should expect them to do it, too. We've seen it from Lake before in his defense of Belle's performance when he basically said (on numerous occasions) that people should blame him for the situation.

But even if it's expected, man oh man there are so many questions.

Warden's Intentions

Let's take the latest installment of controversy. In a forum post on the LA compLexity's website, Jason Lake confirmed the veracity of the log, but qualified that by saying that coL already knew of Devastation's missing demo, adding that they were trying to "provide Dev an ‘out' to save face via a FF before they were handed a league enforced FF loss by CEVO (which was the end result)."

In other words, the log that Sasquatch provided was real; we've just misinterpreted the motivations for Warden's offer.

I'm not sure that matches up with what Warden said. For reference, here's the text of what transpired:

Devastation`sasquatcH> were you serious
Devastation`sasquatcH> or joking
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> serious lol
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> we just want a chance to play in playoffs
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> in **** situation
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> looking for some mercy
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> only one of us can make play offs
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> lookiung like ya'll, we'll play for ya'lls money
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> half half
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> we're legit
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> if we win 5k, 2500 ur way
Devastation`sasquatcH> were considering it
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> ok
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> would appreciate it, let us know
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> we could call ff and goto bed
coL[CGS]Warden[A]> and u could root for coL sat.
coL[CGS]Warden[A]>

Maybe it's just me, but "we just want a chance to play in play offs", "looking for some mercy", and "only one of us can make playoffs/ lookuing [sic] like ya'll, we'll play for ya'lls money" don't sound like quotes from a man that knows he's about to receive a forfeit win.

Moreover, how does this offer make any sense if we believe Mr. Lake? If compLexity knew about the missing demo, they knew they'd have a spot in the playoffs. They're supposedly doing Sasquatch a favor by saving Devastation from the humiliation of a league-mandated FF-loss, and in return for that favor Devastation will give them ... ? A twenty-five hundred dollar invoice? Talk about being ungrateful. If we assume that coL knew about their impending forfeit win, they were basically offering Devastation an "out" and $2500, all while receiving absolutely nothing in return because they already knew they were in the postseason.

Now I've met some really nice people in my time, and by all accounts Warden, coL, and Lake have a lot of genuine friends in the industry, but I find that offer pretty hard to believe. That goes double when we include the phrasing and the wording in the conversation, which we now know to be true.

So green, and so much trouble, sometimes.

Media's Integrity

In some ways, Jason Lake's initial response (and all his responses, to a lesser extent) to the allegations reminded me of how the CPL handled their response to the post by Martijn Bloemheuvel - heavy on the disdain and insinuation, a little light on the actual facts. The major difference was that instead of attacking the source of the information (Sasquatch), Lake was calling the media's credibility into question.

Either way, it's a way of addressing the issue without directly refuting the points. Here are the first two comments Lake made on the LA forums:

Feb 22nd --"Guys, I won't be commenting on alleged clips of a IRC chat during a 3 hour conversation. If I did that, the same people (media people) who are posting such nonsense would all be fired with the logs I have from them talking about their bosses, the fans, etc.

We simply won't be baited into commenting on such nonsense. See you in the playoffs."

Feb 24th -- "On the contrary.. I know the TRUTH of the story... I'm not a desperate media site starving for business... I know exactly what happened directly from the CEVO admins... what Matt did was trying to save Dev the embarrassment of an eminent FF loss... not trying to bribe someone. In addition, Dev openly admitted they wouldn't play Saturday even if they made the playoffs..they had other plans... If his intentions had matched the media allegations, I PROMISE you I would have fired him in a second.

We don't answer nonsense stories from the new tabloids of "journalism" because in real life team brands survive and media comes and goes, Sad our audience is young and doesn't realize how "media" is truly controlled. Has your favorite site changed? Check who owns it.

Either way, it's a sad situation we wish hadn't happened. I'm very sad about it because I know a very good person who has taken a lot of undeserved hate over the years is being targeted again.. and unfairly again. We're definitely sorry for the problems it has caused, and wish our fans, CEVO and Dev the best in the future."

Talk about firing on all cylinders. He even brought up the ridiculous flames Warden's received throughout his career due to his weight. While I agree those people are generally just above pond-scum on the intelligence scale, I'm left with questions about the rest.

If Warden's intentions were pure, why wait two days to say anything? I can't speak for them, but I know if somebody accused me of trying to fix a match and the community was frothing at the mouth, but my actions were really an act of charity, I'd be screaming it at the top of my textual lungs anywhere I could. To translate Howard Dean, "Not only am I going to New Hampshire, I'm going to South Carolina, and Oklahoma, and Arizona, and North Dakota ... and WASHINGTON, AND MICHIGAN, AND THEN WE'RE GOING TO WASHINGTON DC TO TAKE BACK MY REPUTATION ... YEAAARRHAHAHHAHR!"

(Sorry, I've always wanted to do that. Back to being serious.)

It comes down to this: I don't think the principle of not being baited into a comment is worth much when the version of the truth you're withholding would be infinitely preferable to the "rumors" currently floating around.

I don't want to get too heavily into the questions about the media's credibility because I think it's an easy way to get both distracted and riled up. But I did want to touch on it briefly.

Essentially, I don't think the media acted irresponsibly. I might not be the most unbiased source considering I've managed to dupe a large group of people into thinking I'm funny or intelligent (trust me, the joke is on you), but Lake is doing what he must in an effort to protect his players and his franchise. If that entails questioning the media's credibility, then so be it. What I know is that sources were checked and double-checked, and all information was corroborated. People from both sides of the dispute commented on the situation, along with others who had first-hand knowledge of the situation and what happened. There was no dissenting opinion behind the scenes, it was just the opposite; there was a confession.

Still, I don't blame him for being upset. I would be too. For reference, imagine yourself going to sleep with a franchise you've built with years of effort, money, and plain old elbow grease. Then you wake up in the morning to see this story broke over the night. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't be thanking the sun for coming up and putting a big smile on my face. It's upsetting. Not because the media shouldn't have run the story, but because of the sheer fact that it's an upsetting situation.

Be careful when you hold one of these.
You might become an enemy.

CEVO's Response

Yes, I'm still concerned about their reaction, or more accurately non-reaction, to this whole thing.

Basically, I'm worried about the ramifications this decision will have on the future. If that IRC log isn't enough evidence, what is? It's a critical issue because you don't have to bribe a whole team to throw a match. In next season's CEVO-M Finals, what happens if two evenly matched teams meet up, and one team offers a single player some extra money to tank? It's certainly a more cost-effective solution. Could they really talk about it over IRC without fear of any kind of punishment?

Or, even more worrisome, what's going to stop them from making the offer? If all they have to do is cast reasonable doubt on the log or their intentions, it's not a hard proposition when IRC logs aren't officially accepted as evidence. There isn't much to lose from just an offer if they can deny the whole thing and escape with nothing more than a warning.

Right now, we know that the conversation between Warden and Sasquatch was real, and no matter what the intentions were behind they offer, they were still made in an attempt to subvert CEVO's rules - either by advancing coL to the playoffs when they would have otherwise missed the cut, or by hiding the outcome of a request for Devastation's demos.

One is certainly worse than the other, but neither one is good for the league, in my opinion. And right now I'm not even sure coL received a slap on the wrist. The warning seems more like a glare than a punishment.

CEVO officially announced they were still looking into the matter. Personally, I hope there's a little bit of a stiffer punishment coming - not because I want to see coL punished or because I dislike Warden or anybody associated with the franchise, but because I think the situation merits a harsher response.

The Future

At the end of his latest post, Lake says, "We're all doing the best we can to push this eSports thing forward. Let's work together."

I couldn't say it any better myself. Everybody, from the media, to teams and players, to your average Joe in the competitive community, is working together to advance eSports. That push comes in various forms -- through getting news on Digg, broadcastings games on TV, or just supporting teams, franchises, and leagues. But we're all in this together, and we should be working together. I'd like nothing more than to see that happen.

There's just one problem. Somebody that's supposed to be working together with us has been lying, and I'm not sure how to deal with that. If we're really working together, we need to do what's best for the sport and what's best for the community, and I don't think hiding the truth of this situation falls under either of those categories. That's not directed at compLexity. Whether you believe them or Devastation, it's clear that somebody isn't telling the truth, and in either case the reality has huge implications for eSports. Either Devastation is lying about Warden's intentions and knowledge (e.g. he really was offering them an "out" while knowing he was about to receive an FF win) or compLexity is lying about their version of events. Reputations, and more importantly the integrity of a whole league, ride on which version is true.

If we're really working together, I think the first step is addressing questions that demand answers.

Movie Making Tutorial from 3D's DchozN

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 18:13:08 -0500

If you're like me, you've got all your demos (including the one where you may or may not have been deathmatching with Ksharp and knifed him three times) sitting in a folder or on a DVD somewhere, just waiting for the day when you're motivated to make a little movie of your time in eSports.

But we can't be bothered to make a movie now, we've got a scrim!

Oooh, and we've got the WoW raid in a few hours.

Then there's anime to watch, idiots to flame on the forums, food to eat, beds to sleep in, and maybe even a date to go on. In other words, who the heck has time to make a Source movie, considering you don't even know where to start?

Enter DchozN, the experienced, talented, expert movie-maker for New York 3D.

He's released the first part of a DIY movie-making guide, and it's perfect for anybody that wants to start the process but had no idea where to begin. The next installments will be more advanced, but if you're interested in the topic and don't know anything about the process, Part One should be a perfect resource for you.

(And me.)

coL/Dev Aftermath: The Match

no.spam@gameriot.com (LD_Mike) — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 17:25:10 -0500

I started writing this yesterday, and I was going to include it in a piece with the controversy surrounding Warden, Sasquatch, and the infamous match.

Then people threw some extra kerosene on the fire -- gallons and gallons of kerosene --- along with a firecracker or two, and I changed my mind. There's so much to say about the other situation that this subtopic completely lost its place. If nine out of ten words were going to be about the "bribery", or whatever we want to call it, I might as well make it 10/10 and take the misfit words out.

But I still wanted to weigh in on CEVO's decision regarding the actual match, so let's take a quick look at that. This will deal with everything regarding the actual forfeiture of the match, e.g. Sasquatch's lack of demos, the packeting, match pausing, etc.

I hope you're game for CEVO talk; this is just Part One.

CEVO's official stance was that Devastation forfeited the remaining rounds after the pause due to Sasquatch's failure to produce demos during the standard twenty-four hour window. That resulted in a 10-8 win for compLexity.

I have small complaints with this ruling. The first is that it doesn't follow any of the listed rules in CEVO's official page. Here are the rules governing missing demos.

10.40 Evidence Requests

20.30 Player POV (First Person Demos)

Sasquatch didn't turn in a demo, and the rules are pretty clear:

"If a player has been requested to submit demos to an official for whatever reason, the player has forty-eight (4 hours to comply. If the player does not have the requested information, THE FOLLOWING PENALTIES WILL BE ENFORCED:

1st Offense: Warning + match overturn ...

...If a player fails to start their demo prior to the beginning of match play, any round not recorded in the demo will be overturned and rewarded to the other team."

The window is something of a technicality since the forty-eight hour standard would have interfered with the playoffs, but according to the letter of the law, the match should have been overturned and a warning issued to Sasquatch. Neither of those happened. The match went into the record books as 10-8, and no warning was issued to Devastation or Sasquatch.

But besides the actual wording, I disagree with the thought that the match should be decided with rules and regulations instead of Colts, AKs, and AWPs. I'm aware this flies in the face of the first sentence, which clearly states "for whatever reason", and Sasquatch's demos were requested to verify his money. My only qualm is that Sasquatch's money wasn't an issue. His team had won five rounds in a row, and he offered to take the worst-case scenario. If we're going to ignore the exact wording of the rules, we might as well get some dramatic CS out of it, as fans.

Still, I realize I'm not arguing from a position of strength, here. I'm not presenting this as an argument that CEVO did something wrong, just as something that I would have liked to see. I want to know who would have won that match if they had played out, and I think CS fans would agree.