The Guardians vs The Felbeasts

[Shine]

((so.... ok.... he wanted the challenge to continue, so we continued.

He didn't post.

?Can we stop now and get judged???))

[3kul]

((Like it or not, we're all still waiting on the Felbeast's official decision, and as Zerrer is the only leader of the Felbeasts (unless I have the wrong idea about the Felbeast power structure) that means that you're going to have to wait for him. That, or his fellow Felbeasts can have a good ol' fashioned coup d'état to sort this out.

If Zerrer wants to continue you can decide it for yourselves, but I'm not posting up a judgement until both sides can agree on when this is going to end.

I know it's a pain but if I post a judgement now then the losing side can say "Oh, hey, actually, we were going to say that we wanted to continue". What happens then? The winners insist on winning and the losers insist on continuing and that they didn't lose, nobody agrees and the whole thing gets so messy that it's just lost in the confusion.

Seeing as a victory for either side would win them quite a bit of bragging rights over the other I'd rather not jump the gun on this one. That's my stance on the matter, you're welcome to choose another judge if you don't like it (though to do that I guess you'd need Zerrer's approval too, so it's a bit of a catch 22 situation ).))

[Zerrer]

I'm okay with it ending.

[3kul]

Very well then, let the judging commence!

I'm judging by slightly different criteria as the usual format that we judge by is for individual challenges, the way I'll be judging you will be more like the Olympics Team Tourneys:

* Believability (out of 10)
* Powerplay (out of -10)
* Inventiveness/Cleverness (out of 10)
* Personality/Flair (out of 10)
* Grammar/Spelling (out of 10)
* Teamwork (out of 10)

Basically, Inventiveness/Cleverness is out of 10 instead of 20 which allows for the addition of 10 points for Teamwork. The overall score is out of 50.

The FELBEASTS

Believability: What can I say, believability was up and down throughout the whole thing. On an individual level, this was pretty good - everybody acted as I believed that they would (though Zerrer was a bit overly powerful for my liking). It was also strange to see that the Felbeasts have such a large army at their disposal, as nobody ever considers them to be a major group, but perhaps we've just been overlooking them for a bit too long.
(7/10)

Powerplay: This was more erratic than the believability - at some times I was marveling at the Felbeasts' willingness to take big hits and at others I was wondering just what the hell they were doing. Alakin1 and Addman basically carried the team here, both succumbing to Whiteoak's "Irony and Aardvarks" spell. Alakin1 went on to take a lot of damage in his fight with Whiteoak (which was a bit of a highlight of the match imo), showing that he could take just as much as he could give. As a side-note I was amazed to realize that it was most likely Whiteoak's spell (Divine Energy of Creation) that prevented Mantynor from decapitating him as he lay on the ground (I had to read through it a few times to realize that though, at first I was wondering why Mantynor was being so kind ). Zerrer on the other hand slipped up a number of times, most of which were caught by Whiteoak, though all in all the Felbeasts took more damage than powerplaying (the large part of the army getting slaughtered made up for quite a bit too).
(-4/-10)

Inventiveness/Cleverness: Things seemed to be going quite well for the Felbeasts to begin with - they had a well balanced army, hiring Addman was a brilliant move (and Mantynor's initial mistrust of Addman added a bit more depth to the mismatched alliance), and they had a decent plan (although admittedly the plan was a bit lacking). And then things took a turn for the worse. As soon as the Felbeasts deviated from their plan (not that they were given much of a choice, it was far too simplistic) it quickly became obvious that their assault was doomed to fail. Zerrer holds up a large portion of the army by talking to them for some reason (only doing a disservice to his own side) whilst Addman and alakin1 are forced to deal with the Guardians without their help for a while. Goron then highlights the Felbeasts' disorganization by tearing through their army in a blaze of gunfire, gore and glory. Zerrer counters Goron's plasma blade with dragon bone, a move which could've had more impact if I was actually told more about dragon bone. A minor annoyance was that the Felbeasts didn't even recognize Whiteoak, one of the most prominent members of the Guardians. Did they do any research before planning this assault?
(5/10)

Personality/Flair: All in all personality and flair were pretty good - once again, Addman and alakin1 stand above the rest. Mantynor is a character whom I previously haven't paid too much attention to, but after reading through this match I think I've got a pretty good idea of what he's like, and I'm looking forward to seeing more of him. Addman was Addman, there's no other way to put it - I was pleased to see that even though he was working for a different team he hadn't changed at all, something that I was initially worried about (needless to say I now feel a bit foolish for doubting Addman's skill ). Compared to those two Zerrer and KC11 did not stand out at all, and I didn't get much of a feel for either of them, but one could argue that this is their own style (and Addman and alakin1 did post quite a bit more than them). The plan of attack too was really lacking something, the whole 'spread their forces thin with our superior numbers' felt so... impersonal. It's the kind of strategy that can be applied to any foe, and shows that the Felbeasts put very little thought into this fight.
(6/10)

Grammar/Spelling: It's good for the Felbeasts that this was a team effort because otherwise this score could've been much worse. Addman, perfect as usual, alakin1, pretty good, though there were a few noticable grammatical errors; KC11, not too bad, but a few small mistakes here and there, and finally Zerrer... Well, not to be mean Zerrer but you really didn't pull your weight on this one. A simple spelling/grammar check could've solved a lot of your problems.
(7/10)

Teamwork: Surprisingly strong compared to the Guardians, if you'd managed to pull together a bit more you could've really wreaked some havoc. The initial division of the Felbeast army seemed like a good one, although it soon became apparent that you'd included some members who weren't active (Trot and Nasari were both no-shows) and forgotten some members who were (KC11), something that didn't really impress me. I was however impressed to see how smoothly you managed to integrate Addman into your forces, that was quite a big plus for you. Back onto the criticisms however, KC11 showed almost no teamwork skills, as rather than meeting up with the rest of you she chose to wander around in a seemingly useless manner. Also, I was surprised to see that the Felbeasts don't know each other very well at all - why is Zerrer asking Mantynor if he has any magical abilities moments before they launch their assault? I imagine that this is the sort of info that they might already know about each other (or at least, they should know it...). A somewhat neutralized good/bad point was Addman receiving instant cover from the Doom squadron as he lead the initiative to storm the Citadel, though as alakin1/Mantynor pointed out this ran their plan right off the rails, and really hurt the Felbeasts' chances at a successful assault. On a final annoyance, it was really irritating to see Zerrer hold up a large portion of the army for no apparent reason, as the only one to control them you could've talked to them and had them act in one post. You had a decent structure for good teamwork but it didn't follow through quite as well as it could have.
(5/10)

Overall Score = 26/50


The GUARDIANS

Believability: Not quite as up-and-down as the Felbeasts, but there were still a few parts that struck me as odd. The initial set-up for one thing seems far too good to be true, you would never give us Council members a chance like that . Whiteoak being over the destruction of Forumopolis and acting friendly towards Addman also seemed a bit wrong, and Goron seems to have suddenly become Blackstar's biggest badass (if you don't believe me, go over Goron's first post and replace the word 'Goron' with 'Duke Nukem' (or any other similar character) ). Darklight's creation didn't make very much sense to me, and seemed more like something that Shine wanted to happen than what should have happened. Whiteoak had only just wiped most of Mantynor's 'evil' (hence why Mantynor started acting with so much honour), how could he possibly have absorbed enough for Mantynor's sword to react so strongly to him? To be fair, those are fairly nitpickish points to make, and for the most part Shine and Mitsukai acted as they usually did, as did GBE for his one post.
(8/10)

Powerplay: Some wonders and some blunders here. I was initially worried that Shine would be overly powerful after his disagreement with Zerrer, though I was very quickly forced to abandon those worries as I witnessed the great fight between Whiteoak and Mantynor. One blow was traded for another, and it made for an exceptionally fair fight. A few things did strike me as odd though. For one thing, Eve didn't expect Addman to be a long-range fight, so why is she able to dodge his plasma bullets in time? The Divine Energy of Creation spell also sounds far too powerful to me, something which is only made worse by Shine's emphasis on how totally unavoidable it is. And then there was Goron, mowing down gnolls like there's no tomorrow. Too bad for the Felbeasts if they had some sort of counter for that, because Goron's too busy listening to their sweet symphony of death. Oh, speaking of Felbeast minions dying, I don't think that any Security Penguins actually died - losses were overall very one-sided, though it was done in a fair manner so I can't really complain about that. A special mention goes to Shine for Whiteoak's dismissal of the shades as nothing more than a glitch in his bugs caused by solar activity, I found that to be a nice touch.
(-3/-10)

Inventiveness/Cleverness: Armed Penguins... Trust the Guardians to come up with guards as dangerous as they are adorable. I am instantly reminded of Danikat's armadillo forces, and to a lesser extent battlemonkeys (though it's a bit much to say that battlemonkeys are cute...). Unsurprisingly the Guardians were as cautious as ever, they had a decent defense set up even though the shields are down. Whiteoak's juggling was both devious and confusing, and catching the enemy off guard with the "Irony and Aardvarks" spell was quite clever. Shine went on to post an ingenious response to Zerrer's major powerplay which impressed me greatly, and Mistukai helping out with a light spell was pretty clever too. I don't have much to say in the negative but both points bring you down significantly. Ignoring Mitsukai did not seem like a very smart move, as she clearly wanted to help. I was also really disappointed to see that the Guardians displayed almost no organization at all. At least the Felbeasts had a basic plan, you all seemed to split up and do whatever you wanted.
(7/10)

Personality/Flair: I feel a little biased in this criteria - not to brag but I know the four of you well enough to be able to distinguish between your styles quite easily. Shine is Shine, Mitsukai is Mitsukai, GBE is GBE and Goron is Goron, what else can I say? Your characters all display the personalities that they are so well-known for, although there were those few discrepancies that I mentioned in believability that prevent you from getting that perfect score (namely Darklight and Goron's badass attitude).
(9/10)

Grammar/Spelling: Almost perfect, but some noticeable mistakes here and there prevent me from giving you a perfect score.
(9/10)

Teamwork: I could not have been more disappointed with the Guardians teamwork here. What happened to the well-oiled machine that beat us in the Olympics? You barely interacted with each other, basically did whatever each of you wanted to do, and only four of your members showed up! GBE appeared for one post and then promptly disappeared, Mitsukai was ignored almost every time she tried to help out, and the one time that she managed to get a response out of Shine it was impersonal and vague (addressed to the penguins and 'whatever other Guardians had come outside with him'). Goron's late entry raised my hopes, but he went on to make a mostly solo effort. The few points that you do get are awarded for the minimal interaction between each other, Goron getting Zerrer away from Whiteoak and Mitsukai's attempt at helping Whiteoak when he was enshrouded with Zerrer's darkness by using her character's light spell. All in all though it really was a disappointing effort from you all, I hope that you'll pick things up for our match.
(2/10)

Overall Score = 32/50

A Guardian victory, but only by a little .

Felbeasts, you've got the makings of a decent group but you could still use a little improvement (and perhaps a few more members too), do that and it won't be long before you're considered as one of the major groups around here. As a bit of advice, the next time you consider taking on a group do a little research on their characters first, and always have more than one plan - you could have done so much better if you'd just thought things through a little more. I'll be keeping a closer eye on you lot from now on .

Guardians, I could tell you to improve your teamwork but I'm sure that you've already done that, as I know that you've been working hard to reorganize yourselves. The rest of your scores were pretty solid, and I imagine that if we were to repeat this challenge again right now we'd see a much more team-oriented effort out of you. Needless to say, it doesn't give the EC much to relax about for our upcoming challenge with you .

As a general reminder to everybody, organize your deadlines in advance and then please, for the love of all that you consider holy, stick to them