Season 19 powered by Tt eSPORTS: Week 7 Report Card

With the end of the season rapidly approaching the final official week’s action saw desperate tactics and shock results as the final battles for the playoff positions were fought tooth and claw with no quarter asked nor given. That, and everyone wants to play scout.

SUAVE

Ending their playing hiatus SUAVE’s return was against what can kindly be called a patched up 4-25. It was a relatively meaningless roll, during which smziii got to do his sniper rating no harm at all and IPZIE had some fun on scout. After a couple of weeks out SUAVE had a couple of players that were lethargic and struggled to motivate themselves against such weak opposition and it showed in the stats, playing slightly below expectation despite the ease of the result.

Of more importance is the extent to which SUAVE now control who will make it into the playoff rounds. Due to SUAVE’s games being wildcarded they already hold 2^nd position in the table with a potential 12 more points available when only 7 secures them clear first spot leaving them 5 points to play with. They play Salty Frogs and Planet Express in their final 2 games either one of which can potentially overhaul Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers for 3^rd with 5 points or less…

Is there any doubt that IPZIE would be this cynical in his pursuit of victory? The only question is whether he perceives Planet Express or Salty Frogs as bigger threats than Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers, or whether one team is able to bid more unusual hats than the other. However with two total thrashings both IPZIE and War will surely be favourites to top rank in their respective positions, which might swing their judgements the other way.

Giant deflating football: WARHURYEAH

 

Awsomniac

Having finished their games last week the Frenchies spent a relaxing break riding bicycles, quaffing wine and eating foul smelling cheese from baguettes infused with garlic and onions. It’s their way.

Mr. Frosty: Exon.

 

Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers

Falling inexorably into the grasp of mid table mediocrity an extraordinary week for Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers sees them hanging onto 3^rd place in the ratings by a thread. Firstly they made a desperate looking move to reshuffle the roster presumably in order to assure themselves of a playoff spot. To put strong man Zebbosai onto pocket soldier they pushed  amppis out onto roamer and zappis picked up his scatter gun on the flank scout. All to ensure victory against the eminently beatable coolclan.

Then secondly having secured victory by sidestepping the banana skin in the middle of the road (otherwise known as Viaduct) they walked face first into the lamppost 3 steps away on Badlands. And this despite being gifted the first mid and round by the Dennia pyro play.

Zebbosai pretty much matched phromelo sniping on Viaduct, and the scouts predictably thrived. However ryb was curiously ineffective until the final round that Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers dominated. Badlands however was a story of mid failures compounded round after round, Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers unable to break the rock solid coolclan strat until they were well behind.

Temporarily getting a grip on mids, Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers seized the initiative, Zebbosai was dominant and Herr_P efficient clearing up in his wake. But just when it looked like order had been restored coolclan adapted to the new tactics and took two quick rounds to take the map massively against expectations. ryb was exposed and even in rounds Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers won he never really got going.

This result leaves Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers’s hopes teetering on the brink. If Salty Frogs get a map win against SUAVE, by fair means or foul, then Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers are out of the playoffs. They’re also vulnerable to a very unlikely double map win by Planet Express against SUAVE.

Eggy toast: Herr_P (Zebbosai’s scout rating is suspended now he’s back on soldier, and he’s only played two maps on that so built up no meaningful rating)

 

Planet Express

Unexpectedly handed a lifeline by Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers’s dropped map, Planet Express’s game against Salty Frogs was for both team’s playoff hopes, with either getting a massive boost by taking all 6 points. Salty Frogs’s recent form had them favoured by many pundits but the reality is that they’re very evenly matched.

On Viaduct one of the patterns of the game was Planet Express’s struggle to maintain uber charge equality, with flushy falling prey to DeGuN’s roaming. Playing with negative ubers for the first 3 rounds Planet Express managed to equalise for the final 2 decisive rounds they won.

Another was the relative lack of sniper action, with only droso, Hafficool and baud dipping their toes in with no notable success. This made for a faster paced and more entertaining match, and one in which kaptain was Planet Express’s main asset aided and abetted by sheepy dog's hand. Setlet also pumped out a mountain of damage.

On Badlands a repeat of the uber charge disadvantages revealed a more telling trend, the sixth round being the key going from last to last twice and putting Planet Express in a decisive 2 round hole with only a few minutes left. The trio of kaptain, Setlet and sheepy dog's hand shone once again in defeat.

Planet Express can still dream of the playoffs, but their hopes are the faintest as they need SUAVE to wipe Salty Frogs and then give up 5 points to them (or maybe 4, I’m not sure about the tie breaker).

Upright kangaroo: kaptain

 

Salty Frogs

Although Salty Frogs had the outstanding player of the map in the shape of NiCO god's hand, they were less consistent than the Planet Express combo on Viaduct. DeGuN’s roaming made flushy’s life hard for much of the map, but ultimately they were often playing a man down.

Hidan and baud never really got going, and without that their flank weren’t able to make an impression. That Izzy57 was so well protected suffering almost half the deaths of flushy hints at a possible relatively passive strategy in comparison to Planet Express, which would be a role reversal.

However on Badlands normal service was resumed with baud smashing all comers. NiCO god's hand restrained himself very slightly to do some extra point capping while Hidan racked up plenty of kills without producing a great deal of damage – a more deathmatch oriented performance. baud and NiCO god's hand were Salty Frogss driving force in the key 6^th round.

Going into the catch up week Salty Frogs have the best chance out of the two hopefuls to get into a playoff position. They only need to take one map or contrive 3 points from a variety of golden cap permutations to take 3^rd. If they’d won Viaduct they would have been home and dry, but this is no time for regrets.

Jelly Fish: NiCO god's hand

 

4-25

4-25’s week was mostly notable for Dikker playing scout on Badlands and getting 0 kills, 1 assist and 10 deaths. Finally with this abject performance 4-25’s lofty rating plummets out of the mid table, but stays just clear of the waiting arms of coolclan.

Vodka: gdk

 

coolclan

Well, that was unexpected. Having muffed their big chance for an upset on Viaduct and opened Badlands with Dennia on Pyro, it was looking like 6 points and a relatively assured playoff spot for Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers. What followed was a series of decisively crushing mids from coolclan, that Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers initially had no answer for, to go 4-1 up.

Despite eventually losing the lead coolclan showed considerable steel to meet Ze Knutsson Rollerbladers’s change of mid and once again take control. At 6-5 up going into the final minute everything rested on the last midfight which coolclan clinically won.

wltrs has been good all season, showing some his best form for a while, but phromelo also joined in on this map, coolclan punishing ryb in particular and also exploiting zappis. Smirre’s fragging wasn’t particularly prolific but his damage output was good. The two coolclan scouts tanked the least damage revealing their cleanup roles, waiting for the heavies to do the damage.

With post-season hopes a distant memory, coolclan can reflect on an up and down campaign (mostly down) but wltrs can safely say he’s still got it.

The sound of beady eyes: Smirre

 

Team of the week:

Pocket soldier: kaptain (IPZIE most improved)

Demoman: Smirre (also most improved)

Roamer: Rising (also most improved)

Scouts: NiCO god's hand and Herr_P (NiCO god's hand, Kiler4fun & Hafficool most improved)

Medic: Izzy57, even with Mirelin playing :O (flushy most improved)