I'm just going to come out and say it. There's really no way to beat around
the bush.
I lost a strat game.
I suppose it doesn't matter that I beat that self same opponent just a
heartbeat before...with my monitor off and my abacus as a CPU. That's not
important right now. When you're the man to beat, and you get beat. You go
run and
hide in shame.
Here's the deal. I had the pleasure to play Jim Downs of AGN fame. Of course
you cave-dwelling semi-blind milk fish have no idea what AGN is, so I'll
tell you...after an ice cold Absolute Peppar.
The All Gamers Network
http://www.allgames.com is a handy video oriented
gamers resource. With 240 seconds of gaming providing daily helpful and
interesting tidbits on current releases and various live shows such as Game
Time,
All Games Hardware, Combat Reporter Live going in depth in a talk show style
format usually synced with live chat on IRC. It is unique in personality and
presentation.
Since you are reading this, you are a true gamer, and you should explore
your gaming universe using AGN as a resource.
Jim Downs is the bespectaled, "everything black", chappie who calmly and
rationally points out the highs and lows of all things electro-fun either
with the hyper-kinetic force of nature Scot Rubin (soon he will be able to
afford that second, coveted 't') and his sidekick Stephanie. Oh, and he
plays Battlezone. If you could call that key pounding mouse twitching
spasmodic attempt at strategy actually *playing*....am I bitter? No, but
this gin and tonic is...bleh.
Oh, by the way. I would never get into a car with either of you. And
neither should anyone else. Check out their 'Sunday Drive' clip, and you
will know why Northeast drivers are rightly feared.
Now, back to that damn motherless son of a goat and our strategy game.
The first game was a 1 on 1 on par 3. A good map. Things started out well,
there wasn't any scouting or probing. No taunting or feinting. Development
was as expected with little surprises.
Tim was rather non-chalant about the whole thing. I didn't build much, but I
did it as quick as I could. If you know the Par 3 map, you will know that
scrap isn't as bountiful as the parmesean cheese on a plate of Ernest
Borgnine's pasta. It's more scattered like dandruff on Regis Philbin's tweed
blazer. So I was not in perfect tempo..that was the beginning of my
troubles.
Being somewhat off sync, I only went out with a small expiditionary force
and encountered an armory. My Czar and a bomber didn't even get a chance to
blow up that patheitc little power-up projectionist! Here comes Jim in his
boring grizzly and blows me to pieces. As I'm floating down...frantically
remembering the keystokes to the sequence of 'what the f***, I need a tank'
I'm thinking...ugh. I need a Seagrams 7 and 7.
Even then I didn't realize that I actually had a game on my hands.
So, I did the standard base busting task force. A few bombers and my happy
tank. Par 3 is a small map, so things proceed at a good pace, there isn't
much time to reconstitute yourself after an assault, succesful or not.
Again, my tank went boom in a lost dogfight with his grizzly. And not even a
dead critical facility to show for it! Now I was getting mad and the fates
were not being friendly either. I have dual-analog service and I need that
2nd phone line to compete with Jim's T1 line, of course a very important
call came in from out of state. Sending my ping to oblivion, I swear Jim's
tanks warped everytime the phone rang, and distracting me.
I hit the speaker phone and yelled 'Damn it, I'm fighting for my godDAMN
life and honor here and I can't even hear myself think. Unless you're
spurting blood or this invloves more than a million dollars, let me be! And
I hung up.'.
So, completely frazzled, I tried sniping a thing or two. However, I forgot
that I had turned up visibility from an experiment prior and I could see
units that I couldn't hit. Oh, nothing was going right. To make matter worse
he shoots at my poor ass and I hop away like an energizer bunny on the good
crack.
I trundle back to my base, get another set of worthless pathetic offensive
units that seemed to be loaded with sugar-coated tasty choco num-num bits
instead of high energy balls of whup-ass and go on another attacking run.
Oh gee, deja-vu. I'm dead again.
However, this time I was back in the swing of things. I was one with my
keyboard and I felt the force. Actually, I had just downed a very tasty 151
and Coke and the effects were kicking in. By this time, Jim's base wasn't as
shiny new as it could have been and he was on the prowl. And I had learned
to understand how he fought. Slowly, his s-powers fell to me, then that
blasted armory, then the factory. And Jim had made a critical mistake: he
attacked me.
Jim likes to use a whole mess of tanks. A lot a tanks. And when you have a
bunch of AI tanks in a big swarm, all you have to do is fire in the center
of the swarm with your sp-stabbers and the radial damage takes effect and
damages multiple units at once. I used this understanding to wipe out 7 AI
tanks with one loadout. Had he instead used less, but stronger tanks, I
would have been in trouble. The AI - AT stabbers aren't that effective. He
traded his entire tank force for my factory and that wasn't the right move.
With my reloaded tank, I got his last wounded tank and his sneaking
constructor. It was all over after that.
Since I knew what attacking force he had had, and what attacking force I had
going after his recy. I calculated that even if he got everything I had, I
would emerge victorious. Simple math. And simple it was. I ended up with one
tank and ammo to boot, and he was on foot.
So, I won. Big deal. It wasn't pretty, I played like crap and he pretty much
played damn damn good.
Oh, careful reader. You thought I lost? Well, we played a rematch right
after. And that I lost. Now, Tim isn't going to claim that the very odd way
in which BZ decided to kill his last life was a bug...for the true warrior
admits defeat regardless of reason. The skill was putting me on foot to
begin with.
This second map was ice ice baby. As you might know, this is frought with
troubles and a pain in the ass map, a real challenge. So after I made a nice
Screwdriver with Chambord I settled in, kicked in that 2nd line and we
started again.
Now, Tim had a healthy respect for the ability of his opponent, so I went to
work with the proper build order and pipelining. And sure enough when I had
my force as I wanted, I went after the main arm where the recy is usually
parked.
Of course, this time Jim went wholehog turtle and mined the hell out of
everything. It looked like a garage sale at Chad and Gabon. There were more
miners than a DeBeers annual stockholders convention. This was ok with me,
for people feel secure in their web of mines and tend not to venture forth.
I thumped his giant fleet of mines and tanks and sent in the bombers.
Again, not so effective. Either jimbo likes blowing up bombers (which I
think is the case) or the ai just freaks when confronted with all those
choices. I had a hell of a time trying to lock in on his tank with all those
targets in my viewer. Mines, tanks, buildings, my units. Each one lit up
like a vegas casino when the thumper got a hold of them. After that abortive
attempt I go back and get a new batch of bombers and try for the 2nd run.
This time I make it all the way to the back of the arm but it was costly. I
have his recy down to this much (holding my fingers sooooo close). But I'm
on foot and all my bombers are gone again. And of course, like clock work.
The damn phone again.
Ships warping everywhere, me cursing the cruel fates, and jim not realizing
I'm on foot behind his recy. Thank heaven for small miracles, and
Jaegermeister!
Great, I say. I'm on foot, no way out. and I have no idea what to do. I was
frazzled. I had my pipeline set and units waiting, but I couldn't just send
them in because I knew jim had a penchant for killing AI units, like all
good players should. So, I tried to scoot my ass out of there over the ice
cliffs and get back in my tank. It worked, but not as expected. I had hoped
he would follow me to try and kill me and run into my waiting forces. But he
stayed put.
The next run I decided to get jim out, and I lured him with some scav
attacks. That worked and I popped his tank. But again, I didn't kill him and
my bombers were eerily ineffective. I was down to my last life and I had to
start playing with determination. Being behind in lives is no big deal, it's
the feeling that you aren't being effective is annoying. So I'm ready for
another run and boom boom boom, I wipe out another armada of his AI tanks
but my own fractricidal bomber rockets me out of my tank and I float down to
a cliff face to see the results. Maybe a snipe or two for the hell of It I
think. I begin my backup tank to my location.
However, I lose my last life when a bomber kills a tank at the base of the
cliff. Apparantly the blast wave went to the top of the cliff. Very odd and
very very discouraging.
Such an ignominious loss. A black blank boring chat screen. You lost. Lose
this mo-fo!
Would I have won that 2nd game? Well in my mind, of course! But Jim fought
like a devil and I can proudly call him a very good strat player. Of course
I take issue with the sheer number of tanks. I find them excessive and of
dubious value. Typically I play with barracks off to discourage such
behavior, but it's good to play against all people and all styles. I guess
with barracks on, there's really nothing else you can do with those pilots.
Not to cause trouble or anything, but Scot, Jim says you drive a tank like a
chinese immigrant with astigmatism...on a rainy night.
The best 2 out of three has yet to be determined and I look forward to
playing Jim again with call-waiting shut F**** OFF! and a respect for his
talents.
Anyone for a 12 year old Scotch?
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