Here’s CT-BogOak / CG-DeVore’s report on our match - I had a good laugh at the “Cloud being dissed” bit too! No sign of those server logs, so I’ve given up on trying to get our actual total score - there were 30 GI frags on the end of level screen, and myself and toilet reckoned we got about 20 more between us…

First game of the IQCL Division One. CT vs. GI. Old school honour at stake.

Before the kick off there was an unnerving period when there was no sign of Koopa, Reaper has been off work for the week and Kaile had disappeared over to the UK on short notice, leaving myself and Bunny to hold the fort. Regi had thought that he wouldn’t get a game with GI since they have so many members to choose from and offered to switch and play for CT the night before. This turned out to be illegal (as ruled by Kharn) and GI were short a man too so Regi switched back to play for GI. This left us back with two men and with the opposition knowing Bunny’s distinctively freaky but effective tactics. Hmm. Oh well. Koopa turned up finally so it was to be 3 vs. 4. Regi was in a cybercafé and had been having a woeful ping in the FFAs before we arrived on the server (drowning at one point!) but his ping had been settling during the warmup and at rest was a good solid 60 - 70. Tempers vaguely smouldered as I suggested that it might be for the best if Regi didn’t play for anyone but toilet maintained that he was GI and would play for GI. “We want to win after all.” This, to be fair to GI, was fair-dinkum and generally the match started amicably. Regi was ruled LPB with little objection.

The start was kinder to CT than GI it seemed and soon we had a solid grip on the level. Koopa was at RA with me and Bunny mopping the water area. The extra man was hard to live with it has to be said as dm3 is a big level to cover and something had to give but we made hay (and gibs) while the sun shone. Things got a little ropey after about 8 minutes but CT had a solid 40 (-ish) frag lead. I blew myself up and we missed a vital pent (can’t recall which GI got it) and we were driven from the water area. Ooops. GI to give them credit had kept the pressure up on us the whole time and it was a matter of time before we missed something. Suddenly we found ourselves in a world of pain as Cloud began his quad runs. Regi was going ninja and chasing Koopa and Bunny hard in the frags stakes. Cloud was raking them up with quad and for about 6 minutes we were in the wastelands of the crates area. I couldn’t believe we were letting it slip through our fingers. The thought crossed my mind of camping the crates and drawing out the respawn frags but with players like Koopa and Bunny you gotta go for it. Besides it was a classic game!

Fate has a sense of humour sometimes. It’s sick and it’s cruel but it’s funny all the same. Regi’s ping went bonkers. I could hear him choking near me in the RA and a quick check of the pings revealed a 600 ping with buckets of PL. Armed with a nail gun I attacked him thinking wryly “Well, we want to win after all!”. Bastid killed me, only to have me respawn nearby and finish him off with the shotgun. Step one of my tooling up completed, now for that RA I stepped out into the central area in my bright and shiny new red jacket and saw Quad-Cloud searching for frags with his LG. I thought “I’m dead” when he just winked out of existence. Qizmo had dissed him! I nearly wet myself as Cloud had told me in-depth how he would avoid such a fate last week! A quick battle with Spud (who was my nemesis for the whole game, goddammit) left me bruised and battered but with a dead GI at my feet. Bunny and Koopa weren’t sitting on their hands either but GI had drawn level in score terms. Cloud was back in too and GI still had the water area. I was in bad shape and snuck underwater to get the 100 health with 4 minutes to go. The 100 health was there alright so I turned to run up the ramp and in the corner of my eye I spotted something red. And circular. And much better then a measily 100 health. Bunny was attacking the water at this stage and Koopa having taken back RA was running quad.

There’s just nothing like pent for turning dm3 around. We had the water area pretty soon after but GI still attacked and we were nowhere near as fully in control as we had been at the start. I went to take quad at one point coming from the YA and met a GI coming from the other side to do the same thing. There being no quad to collect just yet we decided to amuse ourselves with a shotgun duel. Whilst ducking and diving I noticed over his shoulder that quad had respawned and, pretending to shotgun-charge him, jinked past him to snatch it! SKUUUUUUUUT! In the final minutes things were mental as we fought off GI attacks, some of which went a bit pear shaped for GI. Cloud water-zapped Spud (I think) and toilet blew up himself and Regi (who was still not having a good time with lag).

In the final analysis GI fought a hard game and I was well impressed by their lesser known members (Spud was more than a pain in my ass the whole game). Bunny rated it as the hardest game of dm3 he’s ever played and I woke up my flat mate by roaring at the top of my considerable voice at the end of the game. GI didnt make excuses but my heart went out to them because for that middle period I knew what it felt like to have it in your grasp and see it slip away.