1v1(v1) Multiplayer Marble Blast Tournament

Okay, I am going to clarify a few things about my group up til now:

1) I messaged both TPorter and MBOUltimate asking for their available times to play our matches. TPorter replied but failed to stick to his available times (which apparently are quite long). MBOUltimate never replied, but he mentioned his available time in the leaderboards general chat (then of course I forgot some and couldn't find it back). However, he failed to stick up to that schedule as well.

2) Both TPorter and MBOUltimate made it online a few times in the past few days and managed to completely avoid each other. From my memory TPorter was online less than MBO in the first 3 days, which might also be what Frostfire noticed, hence he put TPorter on the default elimination list. However, I was pretty sure yesterday (Friday) TPorter showed up for quite some time and MBO didn't.

This makes the situation quite complicated and would be tough to determine who will be eliminated if matches couldn't be played by the end of the week. However:

TPorter wrote: I will be on tommorow, if MBO doesn't keep his word and isn't on at the time (1 - 2pm MST) for me, I won't be happy. Those are the times I will be on, so if he isn't on, it wouldn't be fair for me to be eliminated, because I'd be the one on anyways.
Thanks.
- TPorter

I am assuming this is the agreed and scheduled time for our matches to be played. I would be online at the time. If indeed TPorter shows up and MBO fails to do so, I would vote MBOUltimate to be eliminated by default. (If Frostfire asks my opinion)

Note to TPorter: I understand life could really get in the way of MB, but I could not assume MBOUltimate is all free and just being too lazy to get online. He has his own life problems too. I am just looking at the facts here, e.g. how often do you guys get online.

This is a very tough decision because for the first days (Monday - Wednesday) MBO was on whilst tporter didn't stick to the schedule. Thursday neither of them were on. Friday tporter was on a lot whilst MBO didn't stick to his schedule. We'll hope for a match today and if there isn't one I'm considering asking Matan to flip a coin. Not meeting was more tporter's fault for the greater expanse of days, but (correct me if I'm wrong) he was on a ton friday and MBO said he'd be on at that time.

Currently neither of them is the elimination zone.

Promarbler is still in elimination zone for PQ, though I'm annoyed with mfp for having to go as soon as both of them came on (I WARNED HIM )

Hey there,
So sorry to hear about this dilemma in Group Gold. Very sorry to hear about your grandma TPorter
Anyway, announcement:
I will be away on Sunday, and will return on Monday, not sure at what time. I might return kind of late, and there is a 50% percent chance I will be unable to play MBK, my 1st playoff opponent, until Tuesday.
I hope missing the first and possibly second day of the playoffs isn't a total disaster, and I will be unable to communicate with you guys because I'll be on a trip without my computer. Best of luck to everyone, and I hope this won't affect anything about my participation as this is the last week of the tourney and time can be extended. I'd appreciate if Frostfire told me what's going to happen if I miss one or both days.
Thanks,
Eguy

All three of us are on, Frosty... Also Thistle seems to have no way of changing the player cap.

^^ blame higuy, Thistle doesn't show up on the backend, so I can't change it like I can with the other dedicated servers.

I should host some of these games, I have 50mbps down and 10-15 up

TPorter wrote: I have a couple reasons for being offline.
Tons of school work, I have had literally no time.
I didn't expect the overload of the work either.

Family time, my grandma is most likely going to die soon, sadly, trying to spend time with family.

Debate tournaments, have alot of these now, had 3 this week. Monday - Wednesday.

That's basically it, please don't complain. I might have to mow my lawn and other stuff tomorrow, if I come on, and I'm eliminated, I will get us to play, I'm not going to be eliminated just because I had to do something more important than the game.

- TPorter
P.S. I'm trying my best to keep up, but it's really hard atm.

First, sorry to hear about your grandma.

Then I'd just like to add: you've never been forced by anyone to participate in this, you signed up yourself. By signing up you are the one who made a commitment. If you don't like the way the tournament is setup, or the way in which you could be eliminated because you had 'more important things to do than the game', please just don't participate.

Although a minor issue that turns into a major one, please try to not double post. You had two posts in a row within a 7 minute time frame. It makes the forums more cluttered up and forces more pages than necessary on a thread.

So Group PQ played their matches today. Group PQ is PQ because some issues arose during the course of the game.

The highest rating method was used to determine the order of map choices. So Nihahhat picked Marble It Up! as the first map. However, this proved to be a backfire as even though mfpwnsall and Nihahhat were very close throughout the game, mfpwnsall led most the time and eventually pulled out a win.

MAP > Marble It Up!
PICKED BY > Nihahhat
SCORES > 89-73-52 mfpwnsall-Nihahhat-promarbler
POINTS TOTAL > mfpwnsall (2), Nihahhat (1), promarbler (0)
SITUATION > Indeterminable

Second map was picked by mfpwnsall, which is his clear favourite: Architecture. Nihahhat and mfpwnsall changed leads numerous times until Nihahhat grabs the last blue and yellow, edging him the win.

MAP > Architecture
PICKED BY > mfpwnsall
SCORES > 99-90-43 Nihahhat-mfpwnsall-promarbler
POINTS TOTAL > mfpwnsall (3), Nihahhat (3), promarbler (0)
SITUATION > Indeterminable

Third map choice went to promarbler. He contemplated quite some time but finally chose Zenith. Mfpwnsall took a strong lead, and in the middle of the game Nihahhat discovered his timer froze at 00:00.00 and decided to quit the game and rejoin. While he originally was at 2nd place, promarbler chased up during Nihahhat's absence and aced 2nd place.

MAP > Zenith
PICKED BY > promarbler
SCORES > 105-69-58 mfpwnsall-promarbler-Nihahhat
POINTS TOTAL > mfpwnsall (5), Nihahhat (3), promarbler (1)
SITUATION > Indeterminable

With the situation as intense as it is, randomizer decided to choose Vortex Effect, with Nihahhat taking his advantage and made another win.

MAP > Vortex Effect
PICKED BY > Randomizer
SCORES > 86-65-50 Nihahhat-mfpwnsall-promarbler
POINTS TOTAL > mfpwnsall (6), Nihahhat (5), promarbler (1)
SITUATION > Nihahhat has to win the last match in order to come #1 in group.

To this point the competition between Nihahhat and mfpwnsall is keener than ever, and randomizer's choice was the weirdest possible: Par Pit. For some PQ reasons, Nihahhat's keyboard stopped functioning shortly following the beginning of the match, while promarbler could not see his opponents. A rematch was done. Mfpwnsall, with sufficient prior practice, managed to keep the lead for most of the match. At the last 30 seconds Nihahhat was only about 2 points behind, but at last mfpwnsall went all out and increased the differential.

MAP > Par Pit
PICKED BY > Randomizer
SCORES > 90-76-61 mfpwnsall-Nihahhat-promarbler
POINTS TOTAL > mfpwnsall [8], Nihahhat (6), promarbler (1)
SITUATION > mfpwnsall is #1. Nihahhat is #2. Promarbler is eliminated.

After all, the matches have been very intense between mfpwnsall and Nihahhat. Mfpwnsall finally aced #1 thanks to his sufficient practice of the maps. Nihahhat might have got #1 had he practiced a bit of the maps that he hasn't played in. Overall, all 3 players put up a good fight and they deserve an applause.

Great write-up man, thanks for the description! Sad about all the unfortunate things that happened but now I am sure no group will ever be called PQ again..
Also the use of is absolutely killing me ROFL!

Kwill was supposed to do a write-up on the insanity in group gold, but may never have got round to it (maybe he's doing it right now?) so basically insanity happened and MBO came out on top by one point (more on that in kwill's write-up... and i mean literally one point).

So it ended up MBO and MFP were matched up in playoffs, and they decided to go ahead AND GET ON THE STICK. ( i advise all to do the same, it makes stressed frostfires into happy frostfires).

Match 1: Mfp selected Sprawl. It was even for the first half of the game, then MBO took a lead until the last minute. It was intense - I was expecting MBO to pull it out - but eventually Mfp finished his comeback and won. (note... you can see full scores on the playoff bracket found in third post)

Match 2: MBO selected bowl and basically dominated the whole game. Nothing to see here, move along.

Match 3: Mfp selected Architecture. He led most of the game by about 10 points, but then right at the end, MBO started to make a comeback. He cleaned up an entire spawn and was down by 2, headed to next spawn, when BAM - time up. Game over, 114-112 Mfp.

Match 4: MBO selected Ziggurat as a desperate attempt to pull back from his deficit. To his credit, he played hard all game and came close a couple of times, but in the end, mfp was too much for him.

Final score: Mfpwnsall defeats MBOUltimate 3 games to 1. Good games!

Now that I look back at it, I was rather close to second place, managing at least half the point or more... for all those except Arch. I had moments where I was like "wow I'm on a roll!", only to repeatedly stumble into edges and holes for the entire next minute afterwards. Bleurgh. Luck could have been much better. :C PQ really took its name after Par Pit's preload PQ'd pretty painfully.

All in all, I may have overreacted a bit at the end. Maybe have another game sometime, even if it's not for competition?

Random side note: Ratings are practically nonexistent since no ratings on the dedicated servers.

My apologies for the late write-up. I was gonna do it after dinner, but I decided to enjoy my Saturday in college and go see a movie. But I'm back now!

Climatic is not quite strong enough a word describe the final elimination match. It was intense, but for all the wrong reasons. The situations involved were shocking and the outcome made the webchat afterward get a little out of hand. This is one of those epic marble blast tales that will be remembered (not so?) fondly down the road.

First, a little backstory: Group Gold was the only group who hadn't played. The group consisted of Imperial, TPorter, and MBOUltimate. While Imperial was online and available most of the time, the other two players couldn't log on much because of personal issues. Although the three agreed to meet at certain times, either TP or MBO would fail to show. On Saturday early evening, Imperial and TP were online along with what felt like half the forum. MBO was suppossed to meet during this time, but time kept passing and he didn't log on, and the deadline to play was approaching quickly. The community assumed he simply wasn't going to show up. With Frostfire's permission, Imperial and TPorter decided to play a modified tournament: Imperial picks a map, TPorter picks a map, and the randomizer chooses one final map. Whoever gets best 2 out of 3 wins 1st. place, the loser gets 2nd. and MBO is automatically removed from the tournament. We booted up Thistle with Frostfire and I as spectators and started the game.

Match 1:
Imperial got to pick first, and unsurprisingly, he picked Sprawl. Imperial clearly feels at home on this map and he dominated from the very first spawn. (One memorable moment in the game was toward the end where a lone red gem was left in a very inconvenient spot. Both players sat still and stared at the gem from above-ground , waiting for the other player to grab it. This went on for 20+ seconds until Imperial finally grabbed it.)

Imperial: 162
TPorter: 73

Match 2:
Now it was TPorter's turn to choose a map, and without hesitation, he chose Battlecube Revisited, a map that has yet to be played in the tournament. TPorter MUST win this match to have a chance at first place. As the match begins, Imperial takes a solid upper hand, but TPorter is faring much better than the last match, staying only 10-15 points behind Imperial's score. As the match reaches its halfway point however, Imp soars ahead and TP falls more and more behind. The game ended with a strong lead by Imp.

Imperial: 134
TPorter: 82

Imperial wins the game and 1st. place, while TP gets second. This is upsetting to TPorter, who claims that he had a friend push him out of a chair and turn off his monitor midway through the match, accounting for his loss. Some debate about a rematch ensues, but it is decided against. We call it a wrap-up... until MBOUltimate logs on.

The webchat erupts with excitement and wondering how to handle this new situation. After a bit of discussion, it is decided that the previous two matches would be scrapped and the tournament match would be made with all three. All were in favor of this except TPorter. TPorter suddenly revealed that he was going to a movie with his family that he had forgotten about until now. There is some arguing about the situation between TP and the rest of the forum. This arguing continues for the length of time it takes to complete several multiplayer matches, but, to quote Kermit the Frog, that's none of my business. Eventually, TPorter logs out. As we're all scrambling for ideas, Matan reminds us why he is the admin and comes up with a brand new idea. Imperial and MBO would battle on the same two maps that Imp and TP did. Imperial was guaranteed first place, and TP and MBO would indirectly fight for second. Whoever came the closest to beating Imperial; that is, whichever player was in the match with the smaller total difference between the player's points for both rounds, is second, and the other is eliminated.

Match 1:
So, Imp and MBO go back to Sprawl. This time around, the members in the webchat are much more interested in the game given all the drama that has occured so far, so Frostfire is reporting scores constantly. Imperial wins the match by a landslide, as expected, but MBO came closer to beating him than TPorter did.

Imperial: 180
MBO: 114

Match 2
Between both Sprawl and BCR, Imperial beat TP by 141 points. In the match. Imperial beat MBO by 66 points. This means that in order for MBO to stay in the tournament, he must come within 74 points of Imperial's score on BCR. This is expected to be fairly easy, because Imperial only beat TP by 50. However, concern arises about the map choice; TPorter got to choose this map, so he has an unfair advantage over MBO, who had no say and may or may not be bad at this map. With no other option, we dealt with it. The match was crazy, with the entire community's attention focused on it and Frostfire giving updates every 30 seconds. As the match goes on, it becomes clear that BCR is not a strong map for MBO, who falls farther and farther behind. As long as the difference is less than 75, he'll kick out TP, but we all know it's cutting it really close.

Imperial: 153
MBO: 89

Frostfire does the math and I can only imagine his face when he got the results, because his chats looked freaked out. MBO needed a differential of smaller than 141 to win... the differential was 140. One point. That was all it took. When we announced it to the webchat, there were "omfg"s and ""s and "holyfreakingshitwhatdafuq"s all around. TPorter had logged back in sometime in the last two matches. When he saw the news, he got pissed and and began calling bullshit, insulting Frostfire and other members, and calling the tournament "stupid". This began an all-out flame war, many of the details I don't know about because I stopped following the chat. TPorter "forfeited" the tournament, even though he was no longer a part of it regardless. I don't know what happened in the last 5-10 minutes of the argument, but the leaderboards went down suddenly and put an end to it all.

And this was the final round of the preliminary matches went down. Fun times. If anything else happened I missed or if I have incorrect information, let me know. To everyone else, good look in the playoffs!

This community, come to think of it, playoffs could not conclude without some seriously over the top drama...expected from such a lively community we have

But Kwill it was you and I who witnessed the matches between Imp and Tporter, not Frostfire
All-round very good write-up, thanks for taking the time to do this man! Btw, is that why the leaderboards went down? You and I had been playing for like 10 minutes and I had no idea that the arguments were still going on, I stopped the moment Tporter started overreacting. Overall I commend Matan and Frostfire for managing such a tough situation, keep it up guys!

Thanks dush!

/me puts grumpy face back on

Now get back to your playoff matches

I was indeed a veryyy angry puppy.

Sorry for the dilemma yesterday everyone, I hope everyone can forgive me.
I'd like to return the favor by hosting an event on Thistle today.
We will be playing with teams, anyone is welcome. If there is an odd amount of players, we will decide then, depending on skill.

It will start at 3:00pm (MST).

You guys are amazing.
- TPorter
P.S. Depending on what happens, this might not come true.

Playoff Bracket

Check this out please. There are currently 6 players able to play their matches (and 4 waiting on those 6...) so it would be pretty great if you guys could start going. I appreciate Mfp and MBO playing their games the instant Group Stage ended (woo!) but now the rest of you have to get going as well.

HiGuy VS Mason - I understand that higuy has a bad internet and mason has time struggles. This can't really be helped so, unfortunately, we'll have to wait a bit for your match.

Imp VS Dush - Go go go go! You're both on a lot

MBK VS Eguy - I'd appreciate it if you could arrange a time, as neither of you is on much.

MBO also stated he will be unavailable for a streak of time starting this Thursday, so whoever is to play against him (loser of some match or other) should GET MOVING

Best of luck to all.

Hey, I'm back from my trip. Just read about group Gold's wild finish. That was quite an unexpected shocker for all three of them, but isn't the point differential between 153 and 89 64 points? Unless you meant 79 or 163
I can play MBK today if he is available.

mathmusicandmarbleblast wrote: Hey, I'm back from my trip. Just read about group Gold's wild finish. That was quite an unexpected shocker for all three of them, but isn't the point differential between 153 and 89 64 points? Unless you meant 79 or 163
I can play MBK today if he is available.

I think it was 79? Not sure, but even it was an error, MBO still is victorious, so doesn't matter.

Imperial beat Dushine 4-1. Write up comes in the form of recorded videos with my audio commentary.... [strike]whenever it gets [strike]encoded[/strike] uploaded.[/strike]

Imperial Vs. Dushine (Marble Blast Tournament 1v1(v1) Playoffs)

A live recording of all matches between Imperial and Dushine, hosted on my server. This was done as part of Frostfire's Marble Blast Tournament of 1v1(v1). This stage is the first Playoffs stage, with the winner progressing the the loser going to battle in the losers bracket in the hopes to progress back into the tournament.
The first match was a practice match that the randomizer chose - Eye of the Storm.
Second match onwards are the true tournament matches.

It should be noted that despite Dushine's heavy lag, he preferred to play with lag than on less lag but a harder to play on desk. In addition it was still preferred for him than any of the dedicated servers (less lag to me).

We played with Fast Powerups on. Normally when you play on someone else's server, it takes up to two seconds before a powerup that you collect becomes available to use. Fast Powerups collects and makes available instantly the powerup, so you don't have to wait the two seconds. The downside is that 2-3 powerups pickups every match will not register (5% of pickups in a match?). It also appears that on Sprawl most pickups didn't work, which is interesting as it worked fine for myself and HiGuy during testing. Go figure.

Live audio commentary was done as the plays happened, so you get the full story. Tips and tricks and (sometimes) explanation of why Imperial and Dushine played the way they did was given, as well as overall stuff. Also there is a rage somewhere

Enjoy!

Awesome matches indeed. Honestly I was really terrified throughout the whole game, and am still deeming myself to be really lucky to be able to pull out a win, because it could definitely end up in the opposite way had any one factor of the game was altered.

Both dushine and I have played numerous of matches against each other, and are very clear of the levels in which we have the best chance of winning the other person. That's why we are not at all surprised when I chose Core and Battlecube Revisited and he chose Bowl and Ziggurat. (Even the order of those two were anticipated lol) EDIT: I did not choose Blast Club as people would be expected because I was rekted by dushine in that level 1-2 days prior to the matches, and I got unnerved. I was aware that he was getting the hang of that level and also with the small size of that level it makes winning uncertain. Turned out to be a wise choice. Again, had I chose Blast Club and dushine won it, I would've lost.

One big disadvantage to dushine, however, was I got to choose the map first. After my solid win in Core, his confidence was more or less harmed. (Despite the fact that I lost in EotS first) That makes him more vulnerable in the later levels. If he chosen the level first, it would be the opposite and he might have won.

Clearly the point where everyone got surprised and the whole situation went the opposite of everyone's expectation was I won Ziggurat barely. I mean we both were pretty confident that we would win the map that we chose. For the record, I have never beaten dushine in either Bowl or Ziggurat. Both me and dushine (and probably many others) expected a 2-2 then we have to depend on the randomizer to determine the win (in which I would be in trouble). I had my average performance in Ziggurat (as usual) but it turned out dushine went for the wrong gems and did some horrendous mistakes that costed him the win.

Overall, amazingly done matches, dushine did really well despite of his lag and ping, it just so happened that Ziggurat surprised everyone. Thanks Matan for recording and commentating all the matches that we have done, it was really fascinating to watch the whole thing, and I'm sure the tips that Matan gave would be beneficial to all of us.

An Imperial vs. Dushine match recorded on IsraeliRD's YouTube channel. Now that's a match we'll be referring back to for many months to come. I think it's on par with the MBO match between IsraeliRD and Nardo Polo.

~Aayrl

Last night, I'm happy to announce, TWO matches were played!

The first was between Nihahhat and HiGuy (Group PQ & Emerald 2nd placers).

HiGuy was given first map selection. As might be expected, he chose Sacred, apparently hoping to expose Nihahhat's rustiness.
Unfortunately for Higuy, Nihahhat excelled throughout the game, grabbing up almost every blue. Higuy fell off numerous times whilst going to spawns (at one point, he fell off four times in a row, failing spawn abuse). Nihahhat held his solid lead throughout the entire match and it ended 111-77.

The second map was chosen by Nihahhat, who picked Concentric. This time expected, Nihahhat crushed (though not as bad as on Sacred) with HiGuy missing a blue literally inches from him w/ Nihahhat far away. The score rounded out at 106-79.

Nihahhat now had a 2-0 lead over HiGuy, and as a desperation pick, HiGuy chose Par Pit. I think most people listening to my updates (and it has to be admitted I agreed) HiGuy wouldn't stand a chance on Par Pit.
The game started with Nihahhat taking a 15-point lead (3x to 2x) and I thought it was all over, but halfway through HiGuy surged back. From 2 to 1 minutes left, HiGuy stayed within 10 points of Nihahhat, once overtaking him by 2 points and most of the time staying down by about 5. Nihahhat almost pulled away again as time dwindled down, but at 30 seconds HiGuy was gifted by the PQ gods with a blue-double-yellow 9-point spawn right next to him. He grabbed everything and suddenly it was a 3-point game with 20 seconds left.
With the game nearly over and down by 3, a batch of reds spawned, utterly favoring Nihahhat. Both players raced for the gems but in the end Nihahhat came out on top, 100-96.

The final match of the series was quite a thriller and one of the most enjoyable matches I've seen in a while. Great job guys!

This means that HiGuy moves to the loser's bracket against MBOUltimate, and Nihahhat moves to play Frostfire - who, if you'll remember, was spectating the previous match.
There were a few 'fite fite fite' s, but after a minute of confusion, Nihahhat and Frostfire agreed to play their matches then and there.

There were two warm-up games, the first on BAC, the second on Core. Frostfire won both of them (though barely on BAC, and it has to be admitted Nihahhat hates Core) and then they were ready.

Frostfire, as the higher seed, got to choose WHO CHOSE the first map. He decided to wait and see what Nihahhat would shoot at him.
Once again, Concentric.
Needless to say, the match was quite a thriller. When it came to it, you couldn't have said who would win. Frostfire was up by 20 halfway through but Nihahhat slowly closed the gap and then at 45 seconds he took the lead. There were a heckuvalota lead changes in those last 45 seconds, but when time ran out, Frostfire had won, 86-81. He'd also 4-0'd Nihahhat on blues (c-c-camp) but been demolished on reds.

Next was Frostfire's pick and to nobody's surprise he chose Architecture. The first game on the map (just wait) was a steamrolling of Nihahhat, quickly devolving to a 60-point lead for Frostfire. Nihahhat, however, did not know about respawns having a 25-second cooldown, and he got stuck typing in chat accidentally halfway through. Frostfire agreed to let him have a redo. Regislian came to join HiGuy spectating at this point.
Frostfire was soon regretting his act of kindness however. With a minute left and a 5-point lead to Frostfire, both players worked their hardest to get the gems. When it came down to it, however, Frostfire's greater knowledge and practice of the map came through and won it for him, 135-125.

Frostfire was then up 2-0, and in desperation, Nihahhat chose Gems in the Road, which had been played by both players a combined total of 0 times in the past two months.
Nihahhat took an early lead by about 10, and maintained till about one and a half minutes remained. He then surged on to lead by 20, and at 30 seconds left, everyone thought it was over.
However, Nihahhat caught one of those nice diseases that evolve from pressure, this one called boiling down to him thinking "I won" and playing at 50%. Frostfire made a few nice tricks and rallied up two spawns to himself - and suddenly, with 5 seconds left, one point game.
Both players now (Nihahhat in a panic) rushed at the final spawn, and although he'd nearly won it, Frostfire dropped the game, 106-104 to Nihahhat.

The final game, was, sadly, the least close of the batch. Frostfire decided on Zenith and took a hard lead at the halfway point, and maintained it through the game, coming out on top at 100-71.

Frostfire moves on to play Imperial (shiver), Nihahhat awaits the winner of Dushine VS [MBK vs eguy].

Great games everybody!

Separated into three sessions, MBK and Eguy finally finished their matches.

First map was Skate Battle Royale chosen by MBK. It was definitely more intense than anyone would have imagined as a first, because apparently the two players switched leads numerous times during the match with none of them had a lead of more than 6 points. But in the end MBK took the lead that edged him the win 89-82.

Second map Eguy decided on Vortex Effect and it was hardly a competition for him. He dominated the whole match, winning 117-83.

MBK moved on to choose Sacred as the third map as an attempt to pull out a win, but unfortunately he didn't realize Sacred was one of Eguy's strongest maps. That said, Eguy won another match with 119-97.

Hoping to earn victory with the next match, Eguy picked Ramps Reloaded as the fourth map, but strangely he made the same mistake as MBK did in the last match. MBK took a constant lead from the beginning and maintained it nicely, winning 118-92 in the end.

Tied 2-2, randomizer settled on Concentric as the final map. Both players fought hard and had very close points, though Eguy took a small lead during the game. At last MBK struggled to pull a comeback and Eguy won with 81-76, finally victorious.

Good games to both!

Imperial wrote: But in the end MBK took the lead that edged him the win 83-78 (not 100% sure, Loquendo as the only spectator please correct me if you remember)

I checked and it's 89-82 for MBK.

Imperial and I played our matches ealier today (after MBK and Eguy finished up theirs) and here are the results.

Warm-up randomizer chose BLAST CLUB and SPRAWL, both of which are known to be two of Imp's best. Needless to say he pounded me into the ground (Hey! I wasn't warmed up yet! Excuse of the day, please?) and then the matches commenced (with dush watching)

Round 1: Imp chose Skate Battle Royale as he knows I'm weak on it. I 4-0'd him on blues with some super skillshots, but in the end Imp pulled through a 89-78 win.

Round 2: I chose (wow what a surprise) Archi. Was close all the way through, at the end Imp made a critical mistake - instead of challenging me for the super jump before getting the yellow, he went straight for it and the result was myself grabbing a blue with 5 seconds left to play and taking an 8-point lead. Final score: 141-137, me.

Round 3: Wowow! Imp was clearly hoping to unveil the same weakness in me as he had in dush by choosing CORE. Like, what? Unfortunately for him he didn't realize I'm acceptable at the level, and I was down by ~10 the whole game, at one point coming within 5. In the end I lost by 19 points, 97-78.

Round 4: I chose Concentric (What possessed me at the time I'm unaware of). Complete backfire happened and in the end a nine-point loss of 68-59 put me down 3-1.

Round 5: NOW Imp played his trump card, Sprawl. Ouch. I went all out and with about 1.5 mins left I was down 96-92, hanging in there, and then - boom boom goes my computer.

Fifteen minutes later, with everything rebooted, I came back in. Imp, being the gentleman he is, allowed me a redo - Thanks imp! - but my heart wasn't in it the same way. I still played well (162-135) but in the end fell short.

Imperial wins 4-1. Good games!

So much excitement, wow. Wished I could've witnessed it firsthand. Who's still to go?

Wow, great games Frost, Imp, Higuy and Mason!!
Sorry Matan for the mistake, I was the one who said the scores
Anyway, I don't think either of us led more than 6 pts before that...
Listen to the great dragon admin instead of me Anyway, still to play: Wait... I am still to play! Me vs Regi, winner plays mfpwnsall in semis and winner plays imp in finals

Marble BlastKid - Dushine

After the warm-ups it became clear this would be quite a struggle for Dushine to be able to play up to par with his usual skill-level.

Sprawl: Marble BlastKid 146 - Dushine 140
Dushine had the first pick, and ofcourse he chose Sprawl. He hadn't played Marble BlastKid on Sprawl before so it was quite a shock to have this one backfire. Intense match.

Promontory: Marble BlastKid 104 - Dushine 104
After that Marble BlastKid chose his personal favorite: Promontory. He started off with a headstart, and up untill the last 40 seconds I thought he would win this. Then, Dushine put his: 'all-or-nothing-cap' on and managed to bring it back to a tie: 104-104.

Bowl: Dushine 115 - Marble BlastKid 101
Dushine picked Bowl, not really a surprise. Was close at times, but Dushine never really was in danger of losing this one.

Skate Battle Royale: Dushine 90 - Marble BlastKid 80
Marble BlastKid picked Skate Battle Royale next, on which he hoped to win this time, after losing on this level in the warm-up.

Playground: Dushine 134 - Marble BlastKid 93
Then, randomizer chose Playground. Dushine basically dominated the entire game.

Good games to both!

There was another match today - Nihahhat VS Dushine, elimination round!

As a starter Nihahhat chose Ramps Reloaded. Basically Dushine had a 10-point lead for the whole game, and wound up on top in the end, 113-98.

Dushine had next pick, and as expected, chose Bowl. Needless to say it was a pounding, 103-56.

Down 2-0, Nihahhat chose Gems in the Road - it was close, very close, for most of the match, but around 1 minute left Dushine began to pull away and ended up with a 110-96 win.

Good game all!

10/26/14: IMPERIAL VS. MFPWNSALL

Today, mfpwnsall and Imperial played their matches today. These matches were some of the most entertaining i've seen in a long time, and i'm still regretting not recording them. That being said, the whole situation didn't necessarily go very smoothly at the beginning.

So TPorter and I had been playing a friendly on Thistle prior to the matches. MF had previously wanted to okay his matches the next day, though for the typical efficiency reasons that we've had in the past, Imperial and MF came to a slightly bumpy agreement to play them today. Then, I decided to make the stupid decision to ask if I could watch and spectate. Being that I live within probably 50 miles of HiGuy, we knew the lag wouldn't really be much of an issue. However, TPorter wanted to spectate on the server as well, which could've led towards problems for Imperial. This turned into a ridiculous argument that would've turned into drama really fast had we not forgotten that it was over who simply wanted to watch the match. So my apologies for any trouble I may have caused, but onto the matches.

****

GAME 1 OF 4

MAP > VORTEX EFFECT
PICKED BY > IMPERIAL
SCORES > 122-104, IMPERIAL WINS

This choice came as no surprise. Imperial is very experienced on this map, and beats nearly any player who he comes into contact with on it. However, MF held up much better than I had expected him to. For the 2 minutes or so, the match was very intense, though luck simply got the best of Imperial, and MF ended up stuck on the other side of the map for several spawns. MF did begin to close the gap back up, but by that point it was simply to late.

NOTES:

4:00.00: 24-19 IMPERIAL
3:00.00: 48-38 IMPERIAL
2:00.00: 80-50 IMPERIAL
1:00.00: 99-76 IMPERIAL
FINAL: 120-104 IMPERIAL
OVERALL SCORE: 1-0 IMPERIAL

****

GAME 2 OF 4

MAP > TRIPLE DECKER
PICKED BY > MFPWNSALL
SCORES > 122-116, IMPERIAL WINS

This match was even more suprising than the last. MF held a solid lead for the first 3 minutes, but Imperial barely edged him out in the end with several impressive skillshots to blue spawns.

NOTES:

3:00.00: 35-26 MFPWNSALL
2:00.00: 80-50 MFPWNSALL
1:00.00: 99-76 MFPWNSALL
FINAL: 122-116 IMPERIAL
OVERALL SCORE: 2-0 IMPERIAL

****

GAME 3 OF 4

MAP > SPRAWL
PICKED BY > IMPERIAL
SCORES > 153-134

In a shocking turn of events, Imperial chooses Sprawl, and the results are inevitable. Imperial wins by 19 points, though this is a gap that I was sure would be much wider. MF gets off to an extremely poor start, grabbing only 13 gems by the beginning. He manages to close the gap down by 10 points by the end of the game, making a very solid effort.

NOTES:

4:00.00: 41-13 IMPERIAL
3:00.00: 61-31 IMPERIAL
2:00.00: 90-72 IMPERIAL
1:00.00: 123-103 IMPERIAL
FINAL: 153-134 IMPERIAL
OVERALL SCORE: 3-0 IMPERIAL

****

GAME 4 OF 4

MAP > ARCHITECTURE
PICKED BY > MFPWNSALL
SCORES > 137-123

In his last hope of success, MF picks Architecture, and leads for the majority of the game. Imperial then gets lucky in the ice/fan section, picking up nearly an entire blue spawn, putting an end to the matches.

NOTES:

4:00.00: 33-30 IMPERIAL
3:00.00: 62-53 MFPWNSALL
2:00.00: 84-77 MFPWNASLL
1:00.00: 108-93 MFPWNSALL
FINAL: 137-123 IMPERIAL
OVERALL SCORE: 4-0 IMPERIAL, WINNER

Great games guys, was very entertaining to watch, and I'm looking forward to more.

-RC

Aren't the finals best of 9?

Anyway, congratulations Imperial on winning the tournament!!!
Also, who's supposed to do the write up on me vs. Regi?
I thought Regi was gonna do it, but maybe he was confused and thought I would do it?
Anyway, I'd appreciate if you could clarify Frosty