No one would be saying anything if it weren't due to the extremely well
documented amount of hatred between players on these teams. I didn't
watch the games so I won't comment on whether or not I believe coL
threw; but I will say that V0TE had every opportunity to not drop games
against Complexity, or more importantly in this situation, Orange
eSports.
I'm not gonna lie though. After I saw that Complexity
was going to be the team that decided who moved on in Group A, I told
myself - "Well, that's the end for Gary Johnson."
Friday, November 23, 2012
Monday, November 12, 2012
Team Spotlight and Breakdown: Vitriolic Gaming
Vitriolic Gaming (vtL)
Vitriolic is a team who has been around in some way shape or form for basically the last year. They really started to come together in late January/February and have gone through many many roster changes. Miikeys has always been at the help of the project, but aside from that I think Zaxirok is the longest standing members. Of course most people will remember vtL for two things: their first round loss to Fun in the Sun Gaming (former HoN/DOTA 2 pros like Tarano, PaintitGold and Korok) in the DreamHoN Summer NA Qualifiers, and their more recent success in the DreamHoN Online Summer Championships which landed them a Top 8 finish. Their current starting lineup consists of Miikeys, Zaxirok, Parakletos, Bitchzlapped and FearTheZap. Vitriolic Gaming has attained much success thus far in the tournament having already secured a spot in the Diamond Division of HoN Tour Season One Cycle One. I have been keeping an eye on this team for a few months because of the affiliation of some of their members with the SBT (Super Beta Testers) of Heroes of Newerth, namely Parakletos and Bitchzlapped. The SBT guys are always talking about strategy stuff with S2 employees, namely wza, and run interesting lineups compared to what people are used to seeing.
Key Heroes: Sand Wraith, Chipper, Kinesis, Bubbles, Empath, Tempest, Glacius
I'm not exactly sure what the deal is with Chipper and Sand Wraith and why it's been so successful. I'm not sure if it's a situation of them not really playing vs anyone good or just that there is some secret combination between the heroes. Being the diligent researcher I am, I went into their past few games to try and uncover the secret this team is hiding. I guess it helps that Sand Wraith has always been considered the hardest of hard carries, offering very little in the early game to get to that late game stage. The thing is, with the psuedo-trilane meta, there is always one carry getting nothing but free farm. While many teams choose heroes like Silhouette and The Dark Lady to assist them come late game, Vitriolic has chosen to utilize Sand Wraith. In each game that I watched of theirs with Sand Wraith picked, Parakletos was able to get his Mock of Brilliance at around the 20 minute mark or earlier (depending on his assists and kills after getting his ult.) He maxes Desert's Curse and Deserted first, then maxes out Dissipate after. Pretty standard overall.
I don't know if people really paid attention when the hero was buffed in the past when S2 added the Bonus True Damage to Heroes under the affect of Desert's Curse. The change in this ability means he can be more influential in early team fights and helping to set up ganks with additional damage output. 45 True Damage + Standard Damage means that most Sand Wraith players at Level 9 are putting out about 115-130 Damage per hit. This will shred most supports, and because of the increased assist gold you get, it means your already stellar free farm from the safe lane is getting larger.
Vitriolic runs Chipper mid, this has good parts and bad parts. The bad part is that you're in a 2v1 lane typically, meaning that the other team likely has a ranged hero who is going to try and keep you out of experience range while their mid gets the farm. Most of the time this hero is someone like Pebbles or Magmus looking to get that fast Portal Key. The good part about this is that Chipper can CS pretty well with Rocket Barrage. Level 1 Rockets only cost 40 mana and have 80 damage, allowing you the ability to CS from a safe position while also not pushing the lane like Thunderbringer's Chain Lightning would. His E ability "Focus Buffer" also allows for massive Magic Damage absorption, up to 500 at Level 4. This is typically what vtL will max out along with Rocket Barrage. This actually meshes very well with Sand Wraith's E ability "Dissipate" as he's already getting additional Damage Reduction. The slow affected of Desert's Curse helps Chipper land Rockets as well as keeping enemies on Sawblade Showdown for a bit longer allowing for massive damage at pretty much all stages of the game.
Almost all of this teams strategies are based on AOE teamfight and initiation. FearTheZap plays a lot of Tempest and Keeper and is known to land some decent sized ults when need be. Kinesis is another favored hero of this Vitriolic, typically played by Bitchzlapped and let me say, this guy on Kinesis makes Jeppin's Kinesis look like AMXZaku's Chipper. Again, because this team plays with AOE heroes, Kinesis is able to really show his effectiveness when paired with heroes like Tempest, Keeper of the Forest and Bubbles, all of which Vitriolic can and will use when allowed to.
ZaxiroK wins a majority of his suicide lanes when he plays Bubbles as well, often times getting the Bloodlust kill, even against heroes like Silhouette. He also does the early warding for Vitriolic and typically wards the same two places in every game. One inside the pull camp trees, as mentioned earlier, and the other depends on what faction he's playing. If he's playing Legion, typically he will ward the top Rune near the Hellbourne ramp to the mid lane. A small side note: I noticed that he takes a path through the Observatory then up the ramp nearest the mid lane, then to the left towards the jungle entrance and then up next to the easy camp and will ward from the right of the pull camp instead of beneath it. If he's playing Hellbourne, it will depend on whether or not he is playing vs a jungler. If he is, he will ward the top medium camp to get Rune vision as well as block the spawn, however he places the rune in such a way so as not to have vision of the jungle beneath him. This leaves that side lane open to ganks from jungle heroes as well as roaming supports. Basically early game this is one team you won't be worrying about not being able to buy counters until 1:30 if your goal is to roam and gank.
Vitriolic's warding in mid-game is usually defensive even when their team is doing well. Miikeys tends to ward along the river throughout the mid-game, making sure that their hard carry can see everything that's going on. He also tends to ward spots "in the moment" instead of warding with a future plan. So if they are going to attempt a tower dive on the Legion's bottom tower, even if the goal is to kill people there and immediately take the tower, they will probably ward prior to. It's not always in the lane however, Miikeys will ward in the jungle as well to keep vision on the pull camp as well as possible players waiting for Vitriolic to take the bait. One thing that is very consistent is that they will ward the opposing teams suicide lane to watch for incoming TP's to help take the lane back. Vitriolic has done this upwards into the 20 minute mark in some games. Another thing I've noticed is that Vitriolic doesn't usually upgrade the chicken if they are running a jungle hero. Even when Miikeys gets 200 Gold, there is typically some delay before he will upgrade. A well time jungle gank could lead to an early courier kill.
The key to Vitriolic is mostly Parakletos, as the drafter and play-caller for the team as well as the hard carry. Bitchzlapped plays carry as well from time to time, but he typically fills the solo mid role on heroes like Chipper and Kinesis. ZaxiroK as already mentioned is just a super solid suicide player and FearTheZap does well on initiation style junglers. The weakest part of the team is actually the "captain" Miikeys, who fills the support role. Teams scheduled to play vs Vitriolic would best be served by looking for opportunities to try and keep Parakletos down and capitalizing on Miikeys often poor positioning and defensive mid-game warding. Play aggressive vs Vitriolic to put them on tilt, as they are the one of the least experienced Top 10 teams and are susceptible to teams who force them to play at a different pace than they are used to.
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Tt eSPORTS Continues to Depress
No, I'm not talking about Tt eSports being an unimpressive team. I'm talking about this being the 3rd Dreamhack event in a row where the leader of this long standing team are forced to make a last minute substitute. Before getting into the current events, lets have a little history lessson.
Dreamhack Winter 2011: MSI Beat IT! Tournament
The MSI Beat IT tournament was one of the largest HoN tournaments at the time, with an impressive prize pool of nearly $35,000 and the first time online qualifiers dictated the invitational teams. In Beat IT Qualifier 5, budding Australian powerhouse Frenetic Array was able to snag the final spot to Dreamhack Winter. Here is a VOD from Honcast back when I was a caster (special guest appearance from Sn3yking) and it's worth checking out if you would like to see how far this team really has come. Shortly before they were to attend Dreamhack they were forced to find a substitute player for BoBo, at which point they hit up DirgeSnoopy who was in the middle of transitioning to DOTA 2. They ended up coming in 2nd place at Dreamhack Winter 2011.
Dreamhack Summer 2012: DreamHoN Summer
The DreamHoN Summer tournament was the largest HoN LAN tournament to date. In the DreamHoN Summer Regional Qualifier, Frenetic Array once again showed their dominance as not only a top team in Australia, but one of the best teams in the world. They easily dispatched every team in the Oceanic qualifier and was one of three teams who were a lock to finish in the money. Around this time, many people thought they were the #1 team in the world with Fnatic transitioning to DOTA 2; the only real contest to them were Trademark eSports. Due to the nature of the Regional lock-out, Fray (who became TteS shortly after securing their spot at DHS) was forced to make a choice between LeonBlack` and Riser_ and bring BoBo_ as their 6th man. Already facing stiff competition and now being forced to use a player they hadn't used in quite some time, TteS was still a force to be reckoned with. TteS was then met with a near crippling loss when dabeliuteef was no longer able to travel to Dreamhack, something they found out literally at the airport on his way to Dreamhack. TteS once again found a last minute sub in Mynuts, and aided the team in reaching the Grand Finals once again; and once again finishing in 2nd place.
So that brings us current with Dreamhack Winter 2012 a mere 3 weeks away. And once again, in what seems to be a recurring trend with this team, roster changes are being made. Riser_ who was unable to attend DHS 2012 due to the regional lockout will no longer be attending Dreamhack Winter 2012 and will instead be replaced by Domain of Pain (formerly known as The Returners) utility/suicide player Jeppins. While Jeppins is a great player, TteS is going to have to be extremely active in the scrim scene to ensure their success at Dreamhack Winter. The only tournament still going on at the moment is HoN Tour, in which Jeppins cannot participate with TteS. While many people, including myself, believe that there is a much shorter time to assimilate a top level player to a top tier teams culture, this is Dreamhack Winter; the biggest international HoN LAN event ever conceptualized. I think a lot of people were thinking this was the year for Tt eSPORTS to finally take home the gold, but with the loss of Riser_ is it still possible?
I think not. As much as I love Tt eSPORTS, they face the loss of a key player, the addition of a new player and the inexperience of Moiravus in a LAN setting. The redeeming factor is of course the abilities of SLiCKz and Wyt` on LAN. With this setback, I don't put TteS in the Grand Finals game, falling for the first time in their history at Dreamhack to the 3 spot.
Dreamhack Winter 2011: MSI Beat IT! Tournament
The MSI Beat IT tournament was one of the largest HoN tournaments at the time, with an impressive prize pool of nearly $35,000 and the first time online qualifiers dictated the invitational teams. In Beat IT Qualifier 5, budding Australian powerhouse Frenetic Array was able to snag the final spot to Dreamhack Winter. Here is a VOD from Honcast back when I was a caster (special guest appearance from Sn3yking) and it's worth checking out if you would like to see how far this team really has come. Shortly before they were to attend Dreamhack they were forced to find a substitute player for BoBo, at which point they hit up DirgeSnoopy who was in the middle of transitioning to DOTA 2. They ended up coming in 2nd place at Dreamhack Winter 2011.
Dreamhack Summer 2012: DreamHoN Summer
The DreamHoN Summer tournament was the largest HoN LAN tournament to date. In the DreamHoN Summer Regional Qualifier, Frenetic Array once again showed their dominance as not only a top team in Australia, but one of the best teams in the world. They easily dispatched every team in the Oceanic qualifier and was one of three teams who were a lock to finish in the money. Around this time, many people thought they were the #1 team in the world with Fnatic transitioning to DOTA 2; the only real contest to them were Trademark eSports. Due to the nature of the Regional lock-out, Fray (who became TteS shortly after securing their spot at DHS) was forced to make a choice between LeonBlack` and Riser_ and bring BoBo_ as their 6th man. Already facing stiff competition and now being forced to use a player they hadn't used in quite some time, TteS was still a force to be reckoned with. TteS was then met with a near crippling loss when dabeliuteef was no longer able to travel to Dreamhack, something they found out literally at the airport on his way to Dreamhack. TteS once again found a last minute sub in Mynuts, and aided the team in reaching the Grand Finals once again; and once again finishing in 2nd place.
So that brings us current with Dreamhack Winter 2012 a mere 3 weeks away. And once again, in what seems to be a recurring trend with this team, roster changes are being made. Riser_ who was unable to attend DHS 2012 due to the regional lockout will no longer be attending Dreamhack Winter 2012 and will instead be replaced by Domain of Pain (formerly known as The Returners) utility/suicide player Jeppins. While Jeppins is a great player, TteS is going to have to be extremely active in the scrim scene to ensure their success at Dreamhack Winter. The only tournament still going on at the moment is HoN Tour, in which Jeppins cannot participate with TteS. While many people, including myself, believe that there is a much shorter time to assimilate a top level player to a top tier teams culture, this is Dreamhack Winter; the biggest international HoN LAN event ever conceptualized. I think a lot of people were thinking this was the year for Tt eSPORTS to finally take home the gold, but with the loss of Riser_ is it still possible?
I think not. As much as I love Tt eSPORTS, they face the loss of a key player, the addition of a new player and the inexperience of Moiravus in a LAN setting. The redeeming factor is of course the abilities of SLiCKz and Wyt` on LAN. With this setback, I don't put TteS in the Grand Finals game, falling for the first time in their history at Dreamhack to the 3 spot.
Friday, November 2, 2012
REAL TALK Podcast with Phil Haller, Kyle Freedman and Liv Vesterheim
Hey all! Just a short little post about an upcoming podcast that I will be co-hosting that will take place on Saturday, November 3rd and most likely each Saturday after that. The time hasn't been 100% confirmed yet but I will update this post with it as soon as I know. The podcast will feature topics about Heroes of Newerth, eSports in general as well as some real life discussions.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Sunday, October 28, 2012
HoN Insider Podcast: Why I Didn't Show Up
Edit included at the bottom of the article about how Raawrr feels like he's gotta lie to fly:
Been awhile since I'd written anything, mostly due to real life obligations but also because there hasn't really been anything worth having me write about. Sure there has been stuff going on in HoN like all of these prepubescent competitive players trying to stream snipe Swindlemelonzz, or S2's newest shitty hero, Pearl, who represents the pinnacle of poor hero design. But really, neither of those things got me fired up enough to write about them; although Pearl is getting close. I just watched a guy who has 100 games played with a 0.3 KDR go 12-1 with this hero because, even though her positioning and items were terrible, there was just no way to get to her because all of her skills are fucking retarded.
I've been watching a bit of the forums over the past 3 days, especially as I was getting ready to co-host the new Heroes of Newerth podcast "HoN Insider" with Raawr, FJ and megabever. In case you don't know, I post under the name DiscoInferno now, because I can no longer log in to the forums with The_Thrill for some unexplained reason. I was looking for topics to discuss that I knew the community was looking to hear my opinion on and also had received a good amount of questions via Skype. Along with questions on Skype I also got this message from Raawr in the group chat we were in:
[10/25/2012 12:40:00 PM] alex powell: ok guys
[10/25/2012 12:40:14 PM] alex powell: some news
[10/25/2012 12:40:29 PM] alex powell: The Show will be supported by S2games
[10/25/2012 12:41:20 PM] alex powell: this means that there are some rules
[10/25/2012 12:41:38 PM] alex powell: a) Any insult towards a Member of S2games is not acceptable.
Which I was fine with, I don't really have beef with anyone at S2 aside from one or two people but those people its because of personal issues that would probably destroy their public image, and I'm not really down with that. Apparently the "support" was going to be promotion via their "social media" which turned out to be a Honcast Facebook post (say "wooo" and twirl your finger in the air now for maximum effect) and not a post on the actual S2 Games/Heroes of Newerth Facebook. And don't give me that shit that the "Community Rundown" post was supposed to be the social media support either, because no one actually reads it. There was no in-game messaging (the most powerful of HoN's social media marketing tools) or any other official support from anyone outside of Honcast. Anyway, rewinding back to where I was reading Skype:
[10/25/2012 12:58:45 PM] alex powell: "Also the fact that they referred to the launch of HoN Tour and its failure as being a "Sneak Peek" is just outright laughable, almost to the point of being insulting to anyone who participated in it." - Quote from the post underneath this one.
[10/25/2012 12:58:58 PM] alex powell: that would be a little too much
[10/25/2012 12:59:15 PM] alex powell: i want to keep the show mannered
At this point, I'm starting to realize that Raawrr is talking to people at S2, and they are basically telling him what can and can't be said or they will drop their "support." I don't understand how that quote is bad mannered anyway. When I used to make "announcements of announcements" on the forums for things like DreamHoN Online Summer Championships people would get so made that I was just teasing them or not providing all the information all at once. This is an even worse travesty. Working on a project for nearly two years then when it launches and causes all kinds of system failures you just say "hey dudes, hope you liked this sneak peek!" people are going to get mad. I'm not even playing in HoN Tour and I'm insulted.
Either way, I just let that pass and figured I would just stick to what I do best, which is give an educated opinion using my usual Real Talk style of casting when I podcast. It's what I became known for when I was doing the Honcast Weekly Podcast and a lot of people tune in just to hear what I have to say. Not because I'm some professional player with high level insight, but because I'm an "every man's man" and I break it down Barney style for people to understand issues without the fluff. So Saturday morning comes around and its about an hour before the podcast. I'm in between awake and asleep but figure I'll go hop in the shower and fix my hair so I look somewhat presentable on webcam. Around 9:40AM I come back to the computer and see this on Skype:
[10/27/2012 9:12:24 AM] alex powell: hey, just wanted to let you know before the cast, that please dont talk number of S2's spendings, I dont want ayn trouble over something so irrelevant
To which I respond:
[10/27/2012 9:44:22 AM] Phil "The_Thrill" Haller: something they brought up to you?
And then:
[10/27/2012 9:44:28 AM] alex powell: yes
[10/27/2012 9:45:02 AM] alex powell: i want to have you on
[10/27/2012 9:45:16 AM] alex powell: cause you are probably the person with the most knowledge about comp hon
[10/27/2012 9:45:20 AM] Phil "The_Thrill" Haller: its okay
[10/27/2012 9:45:22 AM] alex powell: and s2 will also promote
[10/27/2012 9:45:24 AM] Phil "The_Thrill" Haller: I think i'll back out
So, what everyone came here to see and to debunk any misinformation:
S2 did NOT remove me from the show or require that someone else remove me from the show. I decided not to participate of my own volition.
Now the question is: Why?
Basically it was three reasons:
1. I probably would not have said anything about specifics or numbers related to any expenditures anyway, but the fact that S2 is contacting this guy and trying to trade promotion for "control" over me is pretty insulting. It's not like I was getting paid for this podcast, and I'm pretty sure I could start a one man show on my stream and get more viewers than this podcast was going to get anyway (maxed out around 180 I heard? I didn't watch until near the end.)
2. I would have most likely said some things that S2 Games would not have liked. Not because I'd be breaking the NDA but because I know the people at the company. I know what their everyday work load entails and having that kind of information means I can accurately portray why things are the way they are in Heroes of Newerth with little to no research. Ultimately this would have probably ended up with S2 contacting Raawrr to have me removed from the podcast anyway, so I figured I'd save him a step.
3. I know that I'll never work for S2 again, so doing an official S2/Honcast supported project for free no longer appeals to me. And I realized, finally, that it's kind of absurd to promote the company that let me go, not because I did something wrong, but for a mysterious reason that really was never fully explained even when I asked them about it. We're going in a different direction is not an explanation.
So there you have it guys, the full reason as to why I wasn't on the podcast this past Saturday. Now that things are starting to happen with HoN Tour, I would expect to see more posts on this blog. So keep me bookmarked and I'll tell you the real reasons why things are the way they are in this game we all love to play.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Now, the removal of Phil was last minute, because he was not replying before. If any of you have read Phils blog before, you will notice that it has its spots where you could say it was unnecessary to say things like that.
I would have removed him earlier if would have replied to me earlier. For me this is not a big loss, yes Phil knows a lot when it comes to the competitive scene, but my show will not be a center of drama and flame."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I don't know why this guy feels the need to lie to people, especially when I can provide all Skype logs he's ever sent to me. He talks about how he would have "removed me" before hand when in fact up until I removed myself, he was still 100% ready to go with me on the show. If you watch FJ's stream from before the podcast started you can hear them talk about it and how worried he sounded about me not being on. Way to make yourself look like a complete toolbag Raawrr.
Been awhile since I'd written anything, mostly due to real life obligations but also because there hasn't really been anything worth having me write about. Sure there has been stuff going on in HoN like all of these prepubescent competitive players trying to stream snipe Swindlemelonzz, or S2's newest shitty hero, Pearl, who represents the pinnacle of poor hero design. But really, neither of those things got me fired up enough to write about them; although Pearl is getting close. I just watched a guy who has 100 games played with a 0.3 KDR go 12-1 with this hero because, even though her positioning and items were terrible, there was just no way to get to her because all of her skills are fucking retarded.
I've been watching a bit of the forums over the past 3 days, especially as I was getting ready to co-host the new Heroes of Newerth podcast "HoN Insider" with Raawr, FJ and megabever. In case you don't know, I post under the name DiscoInferno now, because I can no longer log in to the forums with The_Thrill for some unexplained reason. I was looking for topics to discuss that I knew the community was looking to hear my opinion on and also had received a good amount of questions via Skype. Along with questions on Skype I also got this message from Raawr in the group chat we were in:
[10/25/2012 12:40:00 PM] alex powell: ok guys
[10/25/2012 12:40:14 PM] alex powell: some news
[10/25/2012 12:40:29 PM] alex powell: The Show will be supported by S2games
[10/25/2012 12:41:20 PM] alex powell: this means that there are some rules
[10/25/2012 12:41:38 PM] alex powell: a) Any insult towards a Member of S2games is not acceptable.
Which I was fine with, I don't really have beef with anyone at S2 aside from one or two people but those people its because of personal issues that would probably destroy their public image, and I'm not really down with that. Apparently the "support" was going to be promotion via their "social media" which turned out to be a Honcast Facebook post (say "wooo" and twirl your finger in the air now for maximum effect) and not a post on the actual S2 Games/Heroes of Newerth Facebook. And don't give me that shit that the "Community Rundown" post was supposed to be the social media support either, because no one actually reads it. There was no in-game messaging (the most powerful of HoN's social media marketing tools) or any other official support from anyone outside of Honcast. Anyway, rewinding back to where I was reading Skype:
[10/25/2012 12:58:45 PM] alex powell: "Also the fact that they referred to the launch of HoN Tour and its failure as being a "Sneak Peek" is just outright laughable, almost to the point of being insulting to anyone who participated in it." - Quote from the post underneath this one.
[10/25/2012 12:58:58 PM] alex powell: that would be a little too much
[10/25/2012 12:59:15 PM] alex powell: i want to keep the show mannered
At this point, I'm starting to realize that Raawrr is talking to people at S2, and they are basically telling him what can and can't be said or they will drop their "support." I don't understand how that quote is bad mannered anyway. When I used to make "announcements of announcements" on the forums for things like DreamHoN Online Summer Championships people would get so made that I was just teasing them or not providing all the information all at once. This is an even worse travesty. Working on a project for nearly two years then when it launches and causes all kinds of system failures you just say "hey dudes, hope you liked this sneak peek!" people are going to get mad. I'm not even playing in HoN Tour and I'm insulted.
Either way, I just let that pass and figured I would just stick to what I do best, which is give an educated opinion using my usual Real Talk style of casting when I podcast. It's what I became known for when I was doing the Honcast Weekly Podcast and a lot of people tune in just to hear what I have to say. Not because I'm some professional player with high level insight, but because I'm an "every man's man" and I break it down Barney style for people to understand issues without the fluff. So Saturday morning comes around and its about an hour before the podcast. I'm in between awake and asleep but figure I'll go hop in the shower and fix my hair so I look somewhat presentable on webcam. Around 9:40AM I come back to the computer and see this on Skype:
[10/27/2012 9:12:24 AM] alex powell: hey, just wanted to let you know before the cast, that please dont talk number of S2's spendings, I dont want ayn trouble over something so irrelevant
To which I respond:
[10/27/2012 9:44:22 AM] Phil "The_Thrill" Haller: something they brought up to you?
And then:
[10/27/2012 9:44:28 AM] alex powell: yes
[10/27/2012 9:45:02 AM] alex powell: i want to have you on
[10/27/2012 9:45:16 AM] alex powell: cause you are probably the person with the most knowledge about comp hon
[10/27/2012 9:45:20 AM] Phil "The_Thrill" Haller: its okay
[10/27/2012 9:45:22 AM] alex powell: and s2 will also promote
[10/27/2012 9:45:24 AM] Phil "The_Thrill" Haller: I think i'll back out
So, what everyone came here to see and to debunk any misinformation:
S2 did NOT remove me from the show or require that someone else remove me from the show. I decided not to participate of my own volition.
Now the question is: Why?
Basically it was three reasons:
1. I probably would not have said anything about specifics or numbers related to any expenditures anyway, but the fact that S2 is contacting this guy and trying to trade promotion for "control" over me is pretty insulting. It's not like I was getting paid for this podcast, and I'm pretty sure I could start a one man show on my stream and get more viewers than this podcast was going to get anyway (maxed out around 180 I heard? I didn't watch until near the end.)
2. I would have most likely said some things that S2 Games would not have liked. Not because I'd be breaking the NDA but because I know the people at the company. I know what their everyday work load entails and having that kind of information means I can accurately portray why things are the way they are in Heroes of Newerth with little to no research. Ultimately this would have probably ended up with S2 contacting Raawrr to have me removed from the podcast anyway, so I figured I'd save him a step.
3. I know that I'll never work for S2 again, so doing an official S2/Honcast supported project for free no longer appeals to me. And I realized, finally, that it's kind of absurd to promote the company that let me go, not because I did something wrong, but for a mysterious reason that really was never fully explained even when I asked them about it. We're going in a different direction is not an explanation.
So there you have it guys, the full reason as to why I wasn't on the podcast this past Saturday. Now that things are starting to happen with HoN Tour, I would expect to see more posts on this blog. So keep me bookmarked and I'll tell you the real reasons why things are the way they are in this game we all love to play.
¡Viva la Revolución!
Edit: I just read on Reddit this little gem from the forums:
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Now, the removal of Phil was last minute, because he was not replying before. If any of you have read Phils blog before, you will notice that it has its spots where you could say it was unnecessary to say things like that.
I would have removed him earlier if would have replied to me earlier. For me this is not a big loss, yes Phil knows a lot when it comes to the competitive scene, but my show will not be a center of drama and flame."
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I don't know why this guy feels the need to lie to people, especially when I can provide all Skype logs he's ever sent to me. He talks about how he would have "removed me" before hand when in fact up until I removed myself, he was still 100% ready to go with me on the show. If you watch FJ's stream from before the podcast started you can hear them talk about it and how worried he sounded about me not being on. Way to make yourself look like a complete toolbag Raawrr.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
HoN Tour First Impressions
After a myriad of problems with the HoN Tour software, HoN Tour has been delayed a full week.
Honestly, I can't say that I'm too surprised. S2 has been working on HoN Tour for nearly 2 years in some capacity, but almost all of it was creating the format, the website and the tournament API. It wasn't until a few months ago when the process of automating the system was even introduced and from what I'd heard the testing process only lasted a couple of weeks in the SBT client, so stress testing it was probably out of the question.
This isn't the first time something like this has happened either. Back when S2 launched the DreamHoN Qualifiers for Dreamhack Summer 2012 as well as the DreamHoN Online Summer Championships there were also issues that had to be addressed. Mostly with the fact that any time more than 5 people wanted to use the website at the same time, it would crash. Of course all of these things ended up being fixed by the time DreamHoN Redemption and Destination Dreamhack arrived, and that portal will likely be used for future Dreamhack tournaments as well. Back to HoN Tour though...
Following the announcement of the delay, a statement was released by the Competitive Commissioner Sam "Milkfat" Braithwaite on the forums and on hontour.com which I will copy and paste here:
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To begin, we would like to sincerely apologize for today's events. Due to the unexpected server errors we experienced today with the HoN Tour tournament platform, we have decided to postpone the HoN Tour Qualifiers for one week. We identified the problem and we are working to have it fixed as soon as possible.
We will re-launch the HoN Tour Qualifiers on Saturday, October 27th, due to the nature of this event and the effects these changes will have on the schedule.
All match results from today, Saturday, October 20th, will not be taken into consideration once the tournament is re-launched, in order to maintain the integrity of the Qualifiers. We are also going to re-open the sign ups for the Qualifiers, giving everyone another chance to sign-up and compete.
The schedule for the HoN Tour Qualifiers will also be changed allowing all matches to take place during the weekends. The new schedule will be posted at hontour.com by tomorrow evening.
All teams who signed up for today's Qualifiers don't have to do anything to re-enter. When sign ups open again tomorrow, anyone who missed the sign ups for this Qualifier (October 20th) and would like to sign-up for the October 27th Qualifiers should click the sign-up button found at the Qualifier's Event page.
We remind you that in order to receive a seed and to be placed in the upper divisions of HoN Tour at launch, a team should compete in the double elimination Qualifiers. However any team may participate in any HoN Tour Event Cycle by signing up and participating in a Bronze Division tournament at first.
We are still extremely excited to see everyone compete in HoN Tour and hope that today's sneak peek of the new and improved Honcast indicates the many great things to come. We will also be adding 300 silver coins to each account that signed-up for today's Qualifiers.
- Sam "Milkfat"
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A couple of big things are mentioned here that are worth talking about; the scheduling change, and the fact that all first round matches are being thrown out. Also the fact that they referred to the launch of HoN Tour and its failure as being a "Sneak Peek" is just outright laughable, almost to the point of being insulting to anyone who participated in it.
First: The scheduling change. The scheduling change makes a lot of sense. Moving everything to weekends. This is a great move by S2 and only happened because of the huge community outcry. There are people at S2 who, just a couple months ago, were completely and adamantly against any kind of rescheduling when I was trying to get a match slider implemented. The match slider was supposed to make it so that if two teams wanted to reschedule, all they had to do was slide their match to the agreed upon time and have their opponents do that same, and that info would relay to the automated HoN Tour platform. Sounded easy enough and when I spoke with the programmers they said it would be possible. I can go on here and make people look bad, but the point is they finally changed it. It just took a swarm of players instead of one competent Director of eSports.
Second: The matches being thrown out. Look, I understand that you want to get more teams signed up for HoN Tour and when that happens you're going to have to redo the brackets and schedule (by the way, I heard they changed the brackets like... a couple hours before the matches were scheduled? Someone confirm in the comments section please.) But it's gonna be pretty crappy for those teams who did play to just be like "oh sorry, you don't get the win." This hasn't had much of an outcry.. YET, but once teams who won during the first day of the "sweet sneak peek" qualifiers end up losing their first round matchups people are going to complain. The smart thing to do would be to advance those teams who won into the next round and schedule any new teams to HoN Tour against one another and inject them into the new bracket. This is assuming that the brackets will change by having additional teams and teams will face new opponents. If teams will face the same opponents then there is no way that removing team wins is acceptable.
Not everything from HoN Tour's launch was bad however. I was really excited to see the new Honcast studio and all of the new production elements that they were going to bring. The Honcast studio has been more or less done for the last 3 months, and since that time I've been patiently awaiting the moment when I could witness the power of a $200,000 studio put into place. I have to say that for a first showing I was impressed. I thought that transitions were smooth and looked nice, I though the studio looked pretty good but needed some work. Both Breaky and Tralf wore button up shirts with jackets and ties which was a nice change from Breaky wearing a Foo Fighters shirt. They also both looked very alert and rested, which is also kind of a change from normal as Tralf usually looks like he just came off a bender at the beginning of each cast.
Anyway, I know a lot of people have been looking forward to HoN Tour for a long time and there are a lot of upset people out there. I would probably be upset too if I were competing or waiting for this to launch. But the truth is, S2 still has the opportunity to fix this and relaunch next week (on Halloween celebration weekend.) They just need to commit to making it right and communicating with the players, which has been pretty fail from my perspective.
Big shoutout to MrOldShadow, Inklin, Chuck64 and Snoopy who had to deal with the shitstorm as the HoN Tour admins. Keep fighting the good fight brothers (and sister.)
Honestly, I can't say that I'm too surprised. S2 has been working on HoN Tour for nearly 2 years in some capacity, but almost all of it was creating the format, the website and the tournament API. It wasn't until a few months ago when the process of automating the system was even introduced and from what I'd heard the testing process only lasted a couple of weeks in the SBT client, so stress testing it was probably out of the question.
This isn't the first time something like this has happened either. Back when S2 launched the DreamHoN Qualifiers for Dreamhack Summer 2012 as well as the DreamHoN Online Summer Championships there were also issues that had to be addressed. Mostly with the fact that any time more than 5 people wanted to use the website at the same time, it would crash. Of course all of these things ended up being fixed by the time DreamHoN Redemption and Destination Dreamhack arrived, and that portal will likely be used for future Dreamhack tournaments as well. Back to HoN Tour though...
Following the announcement of the delay, a statement was released by the Competitive Commissioner Sam "Milkfat" Braithwaite on the forums and on hontour.com which I will copy and paste here:
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To begin, we would like to sincerely apologize for today's events. Due to the unexpected server errors we experienced today with the HoN Tour tournament platform, we have decided to postpone the HoN Tour Qualifiers for one week. We identified the problem and we are working to have it fixed as soon as possible.
We will re-launch the HoN Tour Qualifiers on Saturday, October 27th, due to the nature of this event and the effects these changes will have on the schedule.
All match results from today, Saturday, October 20th, will not be taken into consideration once the tournament is re-launched, in order to maintain the integrity of the Qualifiers. We are also going to re-open the sign ups for the Qualifiers, giving everyone another chance to sign-up and compete.
The schedule for the HoN Tour Qualifiers will also be changed allowing all matches to take place during the weekends. The new schedule will be posted at hontour.com by tomorrow evening.
All teams who signed up for today's Qualifiers don't have to do anything to re-enter. When sign ups open again tomorrow, anyone who missed the sign ups for this Qualifier (October 20th) and would like to sign-up for the October 27th Qualifiers should click the sign-up button found at the Qualifier's Event page.
We remind you that in order to receive a seed and to be placed in the upper divisions of HoN Tour at launch, a team should compete in the double elimination Qualifiers. However any team may participate in any HoN Tour Event Cycle by signing up and participating in a Bronze Division tournament at first.
We are still extremely excited to see everyone compete in HoN Tour and hope that today's sneak peek of the new and improved Honcast indicates the many great things to come. We will also be adding 300 silver coins to each account that signed-up for today's Qualifiers.
- Sam "Milkfat"
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A couple of big things are mentioned here that are worth talking about; the scheduling change, and the fact that all first round matches are being thrown out. Also the fact that they referred to the launch of HoN Tour and its failure as being a "Sneak Peek" is just outright laughable, almost to the point of being insulting to anyone who participated in it.
First: The scheduling change. The scheduling change makes a lot of sense. Moving everything to weekends. This is a great move by S2 and only happened because of the huge community outcry. There are people at S2 who, just a couple months ago, were completely and adamantly against any kind of rescheduling when I was trying to get a match slider implemented. The match slider was supposed to make it so that if two teams wanted to reschedule, all they had to do was slide their match to the agreed upon time and have their opponents do that same, and that info would relay to the automated HoN Tour platform. Sounded easy enough and when I spoke with the programmers they said it would be possible. I can go on here and make people look bad, but the point is they finally changed it. It just took a swarm of players instead of one competent Director of eSports.
Second: The matches being thrown out. Look, I understand that you want to get more teams signed up for HoN Tour and when that happens you're going to have to redo the brackets and schedule (by the way, I heard they changed the brackets like... a couple hours before the matches were scheduled? Someone confirm in the comments section please.) But it's gonna be pretty crappy for those teams who did play to just be like "oh sorry, you don't get the win." This hasn't had much of an outcry.. YET, but once teams who won during the first day of the "sweet sneak peek" qualifiers end up losing their first round matchups people are going to complain. The smart thing to do would be to advance those teams who won into the next round and schedule any new teams to HoN Tour against one another and inject them into the new bracket. This is assuming that the brackets will change by having additional teams and teams will face new opponents. If teams will face the same opponents then there is no way that removing team wins is acceptable.
Not everything from HoN Tour's launch was bad however. I was really excited to see the new Honcast studio and all of the new production elements that they were going to bring. The Honcast studio has been more or less done for the last 3 months, and since that time I've been patiently awaiting the moment when I could witness the power of a $200,000 studio put into place. I have to say that for a first showing I was impressed. I thought that transitions were smooth and looked nice, I though the studio looked pretty good but needed some work. Both Breaky and Tralf wore button up shirts with jackets and ties which was a nice change from Breaky wearing a Foo Fighters shirt. They also both looked very alert and rested, which is also kind of a change from normal as Tralf usually looks like he just came off a bender at the beginning of each cast.
Anyway, I know a lot of people have been looking forward to HoN Tour for a long time and there are a lot of upset people out there. I would probably be upset too if I were competing or waiting for this to launch. But the truth is, S2 still has the opportunity to fix this and relaunch next week (on Halloween celebration weekend.) They just need to commit to making it right and communicating with the players, which has been pretty fail from my perspective.
Big shoutout to MrOldShadow, Inklin, Chuck64 and Snoopy who had to deal with the shitstorm as the HoN Tour admins. Keep fighting the good fight brothers (and sister.)
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