Manager's FtF Journal -- Winter 2015

Posted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 11:44 pm

It was the best of times it was the worst of times. But more importantly, it was already time for another FtF. Could it really be time for Chicago already? Where had all the time gone? I was so unprepared--well I've done a good job prepping last year ahead of schedule so I had stuff already to go, at least in basic, but I didn't get my minis in time to get my trains done for this FtF. (Good thing I didn't bust anything, some real monsters in the various classes)
Anyway, got into Tempe around noon, but had to get my car rental (I had a couple of free days to use) and had lunch with a friend, so I didn't get to the hotel until late afternoon. By the time I was leaving, it was time for dinner and there was a surprisingly large Thursday night crew going. I think there were 15 of us including Sandy and Lee. I don't quite remember everyone, but it was a large crew. New faces were the KC and Deeders group who made the long trek from Wisconsin. For dinner we went to Claim Jumpers or something like that. I had the BBQ Stuffed Shrimp. It was pretty solid. By the time we got back, it was pretty late and we ended up going to bed. (That plus, we're old.) I was staying in a room with Otto X and Bubbaganoosh, the latter of whom hadn't arrived yet. Speaking of the hotel, the big news was that Garcia's closed down and was replaced by a new Bar/Burger kind of place. The ambiance wasn't the same, but the food was pretty good I thought.
Friday morning I had breakfast with a few D2 people that happened to be in the breakfast place. After that, a bunch of us went to the RSI HQ, also known as Book Maze. Consortium went down there in person to pick us his 16th place prize from the King of Primus contest. (I believe he took a fantasy book, and not a Harlequin Romance novel) The coffee there was great and it looked like there has been a lot more organization done in the past year. Every time I am there, I kind of want to help them sort their technical books stack by telling them what's totally outdated, but I guess there could be always that one person who is still on that 1990's version of software out there.
It was noon when we got back and the RSI conference room was open this time. We finally got moved into a bigger conference room downstairs! There was space this time! No more everyone scrunched into tables and the room smellin from all of the bodies on Sunday. I hear that RSI had to pay a little more for the conference room this time so I bought a few more roll-ups than I normally do. Hopefully everyone did too--we need to stay in the big conference room! (We had over 30 people in attendance this time out--it's good to see FtF attendance actually INCREASING over the years)
So because I am so busy in fall/winter, I didn't really have time to do my strategies ahead of schedule this time. I had my roster of 58 listed out, just needed to do strategies for them. So I spent the first few hours of the day working on my strategies. Lee and Sandy entered the room around 1:30 or so. Next up was buying roll-ups for Rookies. It sounded like people were having awful look with Roll-Ups, so I wasn't sure what to expect. I bought more roll-ups than I ever bought for Rookies before--40 in 2 sets--and they were terrible. I ended up with a rookie squad of 11--and that was including 3 crap masters. So really 8 runnable guys out of 40, which is abominable. 40 roll-ups should have given me at least 30 quality rookies or so. (If I wanted to run that much) I need to give the sheets a 3rd pass to make sure I didn't miss anything, but boy, was there nothing obvious.
After I got everything, we went to the Brazilian Steakhouse with Chief, Anarchist and Storm Lord. It was much better than the time I got sick. Missed not having Marma Duke there though. Some FtF stalwarts like Marma Duke, TGG, and OAB decided to sit this one out.
Anyway, came back to my (awful) rookies and Bloodgames. Bloodgames rolled up average. Now I had to do strategies. By the time I was done with everything, it was pretty late. (Around 12:30 AM) I was one of the last people to leave. There was problems connecting with the office, so even though Sandy was done with all the input, she had to wait for Lee back at the office. On a side note, word at the FtF was that LHI's flight was cancelled and he wasn't going to make it in until early Saturday morning...
Saturday
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I actually don't sleep well on Friday night due to nerves. So when it came time to wake up, it was hard to get up. I'm the last one out of bed, go downstairs for breakfast. And I make it down 8:30 or so. Turn 2 is due at 9:00 and I know I won't have a lot of changes for the first few classes so I'm not too worried. LHI is also there, fortunately they got him in on the 6:00 flight, so that's good.
Round 1 starts with a Bonnie loss to Terminus (normally that's a win in R1, so LHI is already having an effect) so I'm already worried this is a bad sign. I randomly decided to send 7 non-AB's chasing after style potions I don't have any good uses for--which ruins my Primus tournament records and just helps more AB's TV. Most of them lose. The bad record continues down into ADM, before picking up in Freshmen and Challengers. Like almost everyone else, my Challengers squad has been almost completely decimated by the new graduation criteria, but I did have one of the few returning TVs. (but it was a PR) My Champs crew gets crushed by DMobster's Champs crew in Round 1, my only win against him was against his Slasher. Adepts through Apprentices go surprisingly well and Rookies was neutral. Apparently there was an issue with the Bloodgames that Sandy needed Lee to fix so there was no Bloodgames print out. But it didn't matter because there was still a lot to do, Sandy was able to easily keep up with the input as there were a lot of people yelling "HOLD!" in the various classes.
In rounds 2 and 3, it becomes apparent to me that knock downs were ridiculously common. I had one Champs round where every fight resulted in a knock down at some point. I slowly start moving my warriors to use Lunging weapons and even switched some of my attack locations appropriately. There was almost immediate benefit--especially to many of my Strikers who started rolling through any of the other offensives that they could jump.
On my table Otto X had like 10 kills after the first two or three rounds. My rookies are a depressing 3-3 vs. other crapmasters. Seems like a lot of people's crapmasters seem crappier this tourney, people seemed to learn what makes a bad crapmaster roll-up, so I think it will be an even harder challenge in the future.
The tourney continues running through the afternoon. It's at a good pace and relatively uneventful. Bloodgames is still broken and soon Lee comes in and starts working on it. We get a dinner break around 6:00 I think and I went for some BBQ with Otto and Bubba. It wasn't too bad, I liked their pulled pork. I still think Midwestern (KC) BBQ is better, but this one was pretty good.
After that, we did the overnight turn. Things were still running smoothly, except for Bloodgames, which Lee was trying to fix bug kept getting interrupted for newsletters not working and stuff. Speaking of which, this is not targetted to anyone in particular, but many of you are waaaaay too demanding of your proxies these days. Just because the NL shows your next match up doesn't mean you should change things. Or you can do what OAB did and buy an internet printer/Google Cloud Printer. (Less than $40 and you could always go in with someone) Anyway, I did the overnight tourney and was out there before 11:00, I totally missed the stuff with the cops being called and don't know what happened with that.

Sunday
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I wake up pretty early because I didn't do the turns that ran in the overnight. Grabbed my stuff and went to breakfast where I went to read one of the most depressing Mail-In Bloodgames ever. None of my guys ever made it past 2 kills and even though several of my team survived, by round 8 it was apparent that no one was going to do anything and were all just lame ducks. This was a little different for me, usually I make my FtF and MI Bloodgames the same and then apply the lessons learn from the FtF team onto the Mail-In team. But the Mail-In team ran first this time. (And was the better team) It was pretty much a disaster. But the FtF Bloodgames were about to start so hopefully I could learn from the Mail-In.
Things were moving along pretty quickly and I was certain things would be done in time for us to watch football--except I forgot games started earlier here because we were in the West now. (Also, no daylight savings time) Oh well. Once things got to round 10 things were slowing down. By round 12, even though I still had a decent amount of warriors left in it, it was apparent to me that none of the tourneys were breaking my way and if I was going to TC I would have to win a lot of coin flip fights to do it and that was unlikely. Anyway, here's how the classes broke down (as I remember)

Primus: All 19 of the TVs were Aimed Blows, probably not a huge surprise to anyone. Once it got down to the Final 6, there was some variety as 5 managers were still in the hunt. But TMM's guys had the most losses to give and his two Aimers stood tall with only Chief I there to stop him in the Final 3. He couldn't and Bob and Little Girl crush fought it out in the end. (It seemed like just yesterday when Little Girl Crush was terrorizing the ADM classes and now she's maxxed)

Contenders: It was kinda similar to Primus all the way down to the Final 3, which had TMM and LHI. LHI's Burglar managed to make it to the TC fight and LHI had to leave early on a plane--so Sandy ran Contenders ahead of everyone else. In the end, Gherkin was too much for Burglar--who has arguably not been as good since his name change. Another TC for TMM.
Eligibles: This one was total TUMination as Don fought himself for the TC. TMM tried to give him a challenge but Sweater and Dazzle were perhaps too young. It was a Lunger and a Waste in the TC fight as well.

ADM: The ADM run-offs had two AB heavy hitters as A Balcony and Alucard squared off. After trading wins, Alucard needed two wins to beat A Balcony. Realizing A Balcony had better physicals than Alucard when they were both using fists, Chief I resorted to an old strategy--using a weapon! It worked the first time as Alucard was able to trade damage with a fist-using A Balcony enough to put him away--but TUM appeared to have made an adjustment in the final fight to give him the victory. What a great showdown between two of the best!

Freshmen: Only 6 TVS in this class, 5 of which were different styles. (BA, PS, SL, AB, LU) It's pretty despicable now that LU and SL can get enough skills to TV in Freshmen if you ask me! Anyway, from Round 11, I felt this was Surly's to lose, even if Uptight Man happened to be busting out. But then I wasn't sure after they traded wins. The TC fight was exciting, with Surly winning it on Parry Damage, right after Uptight Man was about to take him out.

Challengers: I really feel the Knockdown program was on full display here as the Final 4 were all Lungers. Most of the defensives just couldn't hold. One of my warriors, Superior Snotling, got knocked down 3 times in the same fight! Anyway, Super Chicken made an amazing run to a TC--while it's not uncommon for a young Challenger to reach the top of the skill line pretty fast, it's also pretty rare to see one win Challengers so soon because of all of the warriors who just have much better physicals. A very impressive TC run for Scrag with Super Chicken. TMM's Spicy Tricep was the runner-up.

Champs: Khisanth nearly had a panic attack over Chatzy as his poor proxy, Storm Lord, had to deal with his frantic run in the run-offs. The Final 3 warriors were all ABs here. 2 by TMM, one by Khisanth. Shardavan (Khisanth's warrior) was able to dispose of one AB, but not the 2nd one. I believe Storm Lord becomes the first ever non-BOB member to wear the Moose Hat in a TC fight by proxy.

Adepts: The final fight came down to a WS(Buri) against a ST(TUM)--you would think the WS would have it--but the Striker was able to pull it out in a surprise. (To me, anyway) Poor Buri got stuck with my crap master roll-up as well, which was pretty darn awful.

Inits: Early on the tourney, someone asked me "Who runs Fear Factory?" I responeded with "Var does, I think it's proxied". Imagine my surprise when Var shows up in the TC fight next to Storm Lord. He's here and alive! I guess he was hiding with the Wisconsin crew. Anyway, Var takes the fight in a ST vs. ST battle. Congrats to him for winning his first TC! He's come a long way since his return a couple of years ago. As a side note, Robert Paulsen might be everyone's new least favorite warrior name/franchise.

Apprentices: One of the few classes that seemed to not have TUM or TMM lurking deep in that class featured a battle of table mates. Assur with a kinda weird AB and Mannequin's ST. Assur took out my Lunger in the Final 3 with a first hit knock down but I wasn't sure he would be able to beat anything that could outjump him. As it turns out, he was able to dodge and riposte an attack from Mannequin's ST to secure the win!

Rookies: I'm so upset I missed this TC fight! It was the last TC fight and I got a phone call I needed to take. 20 minutes later I walk in and I get asked if I caught the Rookies TC fight. No I didn't. Apparently, TMM's AB killed Malaquar's AB in a dramatic TC final! Augh! It sounded like a FtF classic! I'm kind of surprise 2 AB's were left standing at the end, the way the tourney was breaking I was sure that a ST was going to win it....

Grudges: Team BOB defeated team Team Basher TCs by a 3-3 score via the tiebreaker.

Sorry I forgot to track who came out of the Bloodgames. But good job to everyone for not letting anyone graduate an AB!

All in all, it was a fun tourney. Of course I wish I could have done better (8 TVs, 69 warriors), but my prep totally sucked this time out and I feel like you always get what you put in, so I got what I deserved. At least most of my TVs went fairly deep so I had something to do on Sunday. (Seattle/Green Bay game looked great from what I saw!) It was good to see so many people, maybe one bad thing with the big conference room was that I walked around less and interacted with less people. I should be there in Newark and look forward to reconnecting with the Easterners who wasn't there at this FtF.

Posted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 11:46 pm

Thanks for the journal.

Posted: Mon Jan 19, 2015 11:46 pm

Oops I forgot to mention the Consortium who got the first D2 lifetime achievement award for his 1000 Lord Protectors!

Advanced Master Poster Joined: Apr 11, 2011 Posts: 394

Managerr wrote:

Oops I forgot to mention the Consortium who got the first D2 lifetime achievement award for his 1000 Lord Protectors!

And very well deserved!!

Advanced Master Poster Joined: Apr 11, 2011 Posts: 394

Thank you Managerr. Its post like this that make those who are unable to attend feel like part of the action, and I truly appreciate the time you take in writing and posting these journals. Keep them coming bro, and I'll always be reading.

Khorvinus/ Jason