Summary: Clan X jumped out to a large early lead of 8 captures to 0. KT finally got a break with about 10 minutes to go and got a foothold. With 2one's aggressive playing KT managed to close the gap to 8 and 6 with 1 minute left and both flags being carried. A last moment death by the KT flag carrier resulted in a final score of 9 to 6 captures in favor of Clan X.

Notes: This match had the unfortunate distinction of being a worst case scenario match. First, the Open CTF Ladder was reset due to a loss of data and a lack of backup on the part of OGL. We went from a 7/0 w/l record to 0/1 with the ladder starting over. Why did we lose? First off, we had two players with decent connections. Second, Niq had bad packet loss until the last few minutes of the match. Third, one of their players was on a LAN with the server (8-28 pings average). Fourth, watch my demo. I have no better way of explaining why we lost. I'm not trying to imply that I'm some super human player capable of moving mountains (I'm not) but let's face it, 2.5 players (Niq being 1/2 of an effective player, with his lousy connect that day) doesn't stand a good chance against 4 players. Uglyness. As KraZyME said, we learned a hard lesson we did not need to learn first-hand. I agree with him and this will not happen again. The screenshot above is not representative of what really happened though. How odd...

About my severe PL. I was driving to a friend's house. He recently purchased a PII/450/TNT setup and got a cablemodem. I almost forgot about the match that night and only managed to jump online on his virgin system at the last minute. Packet loss was horrendous but there was nobody around to sub in for me. The cable company came out and replaced his cablemodem a few days later. He's had a perfect connection since then. If they had only done it right the first Time...

[kt]

04/05/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan JuDgE. OGL open CTF ladder match. JuDgE is an east coast clan so the two server rule was enforced. The BFG was not a factor as both maps played were QCTF3: The Smelter.

Surge obs POV

Summary: The server was JuDgE's choice, I forget which one. I did not participate in this match due to heavy packet loss and poor ping. Surge spectated the match and caught the action. The round itself started fairly uneventfully. It was a stalemate for the first half until JuDgE played strong for a couple of minutes in the middle and again in the last few minutes, on each occasion getting a capture. KT owned the minutes in the middle and scored three between Judge's caps. The final score was 3-2 in KT's favor.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: 04/07/1999 - Despite JuDgE not being at a severe ping disadvantage on a west coast server (Hmm.... aren't these guys east coast???) the major factor behind this game was KT's own good pings. Conditions were good and KT capped for 8 unchallenged points. The 8th capture was made with under a minute to go, when the capture limit was hit. Capture limit? Oh well, this match was over with a KT victory.

Notes: Setting up the second server match was no mean feat. To make a very long story short, we went to the second server, JuDgE complained heavily, things got tense, ugly words were exchanged, and the second round was postponed until the next day. Interestingly, after the second day's match was played one of the JuDgE guys said, "damn u guys are good." Yeah, no kidding, but thanks for the compliment. Yetisalmon also commented that the second round matchup was a very exciting one to watch.

The first round battle against JuDgE was a "coming out" of sorts for the newest member of KT, Apocalypse. I've seen him play before and I was always impressed with his all around skill. Perhaps in a small case of "performance anxiety" Apoc managed to gib himself with quad rockets at least once or twice. He finally got his groove about halfway through the match and started kicking ass. Afterwards he said he just wasn't used to playing as a member of a team. He's too used to dominating and doing it all (offense, defense, capping, quad watch, etc...) by himself, apparently. Too bad it's mid-term/finals season for him, as his availability has diminished drastically.

[kt]

04/12/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan m0bst3rs. OGL open CTF ladder match. m0b is an east coast clan so the two server rule was enforced. Everyone agreed to disable the BFG as both maps played were Q2CTF1: McKinley Revival.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: This match was played on m0b's server choice, PMville. I suffered moderate packet loss which is clearly seen in the first few seconds of my POV demo (our base flag "stutters" a lot as I watch it.) The match was not a very memorable first round because no flags were captured. This was a stalemate with the first round win going to m0b because they outfragged us 127 to 93. Check out the ping difference and the importance of the two server rule. Never forget it. The only interesting bits in the demo are when I provided a human step ladder for KraZyME to march into enemy base with the quad via secondary (the railgun room) on a couple of occasions.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: The second round was played on srf, a west coast server. I suffered effectively zero packet loss so no excuses about connection. Note the reversal in ping advantage. Although not quite as big a difference as the PMville server match, this still gives KT a decisive edge. KT scored the first 6 flag captures in the first half of the round, largely through the work of Keyser and KraZyME. Niq played strong D again and even topped the KT scoreboard with most points again. Only through perseverance did m0b managed to wrest a capture later. For the last several minutes of the match, it was a stalemate with me holding their flag and a m0b guy holding ours.

Notes: What could be a repeat of the fiasco versus Clan Kitten's Litter on the GoC Ladder, in the first couple of minutes of the demo you can clearly see a non-m0b guy playing for m0b. The obituary was "Brass [LoR] blew himself up." Hmmmmmmm............ Moot point; we won anyway. Before this match I have never actually performed a human bridge for anybody, but fortunately it seemed to work well and I didn't embarrass myself too much in front of the clan. :)

I recently switched from an old Everglide mousepad to their newest style found on their page now. I am not thrilled with their new pad and on my demo you can occasionally watch me turn from side to side for no apparent reason. That's because I'm trying to get used to the feel of the new pad to no avail. Aim was hurt a little as I tried to adjust. The problem became increasingly bad toward the end of the round and I whiffed some seriously easy shots. Still, no excuses as my old trusty Everglide was propped up against the 'puter next to me. Halfway through the second round I figured I'd just cope and finish it up as it didn't appear that m0b was ready to mount any sort of comeback. I will also make it a habit to take a screenshot of my connection quality (netgraph 1) during every match.

[kt]

04/16/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Bastards. Informal scrimmage. The BFG was not a factor as the maps played were Q2CTF3: The Smelter and Q2CTF2: Stronghold Opposition.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: B Played a good and organized game and were able to just outplay KT in an entertaining scrimmage.

Time Traveler Chasecam

Summary: Bastards once again asserted their dominance and as they gained momentum their flag captures became more and more frequent. My computer crashed with about 6 minutes left in the match. I managed to jump back in and chasecam the rest of the demo. Based on the scores shown versus the total KT points, it would appear that I managed 33 points in 15 minutes of game Time. Not too bad, but then again defense always tends to have more points than offense in a tight game.

Notes: Not much to say about this one. Somehow we got an impromptu scrimmage against Bastards and we were unorganized and unprepared for them. B is a very organized team and we didn't give strategy any thought. It was still a hard fought match, but toward the end momentum was very much swinging their way. We were slightly outpinged in general but there wasn't much to complain about, except for maybe Mike's erratic ping swings from 100 to 200.

[kt]

04/16/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Total Destruction. Informal scrimmage. The BFG was not a factor as the map played was Q2CTF2: Stronghold Opposition.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: This match was played against an up and coming clan. They show promise and should do well in the future.

Notes: This match was played immediately after the scrimmage against Bastards. KT was out for a little blood after the loss and Total Destruction were more than willing to dish it out. The teams were fair except maybe for 2one's modem connection, but all in all a balanced match.

[kt]

04/24/1999 - Knights Templar vs 99 Cent Value Clan. Informal scrimmage. The BFG was not a factor as the map played was Q2CTF2: Stronghold Opposition.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Although the match itself may indicate a blowout, victories against the 99 Cent Value Clan are never easy wins. Knights Templar did managed to outplay 99vc and won 8 caps to 0 in what was strictly an informal scrimmage.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: The previous match wasn't much fun for those involved so we decided to mix it up a bit and make the game a bit more interesting.

Notes: 99 Cent Value Clan's roster has been hurting lately. Not that their newest recruits are poor performers, but rather they may lack the team unity that some of 99vc's other players have. In this match Sigma didn't even really play in the game. Mostly he was the victim of spawn kills when his regenerated body stood there silently while in the line of fire. Where did you go, Sigma?

[kt]

04/29/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Rise to Dominance. OGL open CTF ladder match. Rise to Dominance is an east coast clan so the two server rule was enforced. The BFG was not a factor as both maps played were Q2CTF2: Stronghold Opposition.

Time Traveler POV
KraZyME POV

Summary: Mediocre pings for all was the order of the day for this matchup. A little halfway through the match is when the problems started. Three KTs were dropped from the server, I being one of them. Unlike the other two Knights who were able to reconnect, I was unable to reenter the server despite trying for several minutes. Perhaps in part due to the unstable KT connections, Rise to Dominance capped a total of seven flags, four of them when I was in the match.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: The second match proved to be slightly in favor of KT. With about 9 minutes left to go in the match, Keyser switched to spectator and I had to sub in for him. Knights Templar had a six to nothing capture lead at that point. The final score was 9 caps to 1. Combined with the flag totals from the previous server, Knights won the overall double header with a total score of 10 captures to R2D's 8.

Notes: Both teams were somewhat plagued with connection difficulties, especially on Rise to Dominance's server choice. While the arguments that ensued weren't nearly as heated as with the ones that occurred with Clan JuDgE, several in R2D walked away disatisfied with the results. Nothing about this matchup ran as smoothly as it could have and so helped to fuel the tension that was there.

[kt]

04/29/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Bastards. Informal scrimmage. The BFG was not a factor as the maps played were Q2CTF3: The Smelter, Q2CTF5: Capture Showdown, and LFCTF1: Neurotica.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Knights Templar started the game strong and capped the first three flags with no response from the Bastards squad. Somewhere along the line B gained some serious momentum. Several minutes of fast and furious action ensued. In the end B managed to not only come from behind to tie it up in flag captures, but they also managed to win the overall by virtue of the higher frag score! Nice job, B.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Again KT jumped out to an early lead but Bastards persistence kept the match from being a complete blowout. In the end they held the score to a very respectible loss of four flag captures to their two.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Plagued with some connection problems, the Bastards were unable to effectively organize offense or defense

Notes: A triple header against Clan Bastards. Notably absent was Taz, arguably one of their strongest players. Despite this slight disadvantage, they still managed to hang on strong, at least until the last map. More complaints were heard during the third match at the start than the first two, which leads me to believe that their connections had worsened a lot during the course of the games. In any case they put up a strong fight. As for KT's problems, it's the usual story. Mike's return is good, but his connection is rather flaky and doesn't provide him with the best ping. KraZy's mediocre connection is a well documented fact as his opponents have commented that they often see him stuttering and jerking around when he moves.

[kt]

05/05/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Elite Strike. Informal scrimmage. The BFG was not a factor as the maps played were LFCTF2: A Farewell to Kings, LFCTF1: Neurotica, and Q2CTF3: The Smelter.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Not much to say. KT don't play much on this map and don't have an organized strategy for A Farewell to Kings and it showed in their playing. ES played well but somehow KT managed to get a flag capture in after ES capped their first three. After that it was all Elite Strike.

Time Traveler Chasecam

Summary: Once again Elite Strike asserted their dominance and it was more of the same. Final score two to ten in their favor.

Time Traveler Chasecam

Summary: We topped off the day's festivities with a rousing game on The Smelter. For the third Time Elite Strike demonstrated why they are considered one of the absolute best clans.

Notes: Another triple header, except this Time against Clan Elite Strike. At the Time of this writing, Elite Strike's OGL CTF Open Ladder is 6/1 and first place. They actually lost to Clan Warbringers but it appears that Warbringers dropped out of the ladder, so Elite Strike is back in first place. In any case, ES is a formidable well organized clan and it shows in their playing styles.

[kt]

05/14/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Flag Masterz. An informal scrimmage. The BFG was disabled on Q2CTF1: McKinley Revival. The BFG was not a factor on Q2CTF3: The Smelter.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: About halfway through this one sided match several people from Clan Dew joined up with Flag Masterz in hopes of turning the tide against the Knights to no avail. They did reasonably well considering this isn't the biggest lopsided match the Knights have ever been in.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: The Smelter was much kinder to the mixed opposing team. With people jumping in and out of both teams at one point or another, this scrimmage was about as informal as you can get.

Notes: Finally, a new mouse. I went out and purchased a Logitech Wingman Gaming Mouse. It's the older Mouseman 96 design but slightly updated and fitted with a plug that will work with either a PS/2 or USB port. A few stylistic touches give the mouse a bit more character, but it's still the same good mouse as before. I can finally retire my four year old Mouseman 96 as I've literaly been complaining about it for a solid month now, waiting for the new re-issues.

As for this match itself... Apparently Apocalypse is a roommate or lives in the same dorm area as a member of Flag Masterz. Somewhere along the lines a scrimmage was agreed upon so here we are. Other than that, there isn't much to analyze about this matchup.

[kt]

05/16/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan LoR. OGL open CTF ladder match. LoR is an east coast clan so the two server rule was enforced. The BFG was not a factor as both maps played were QCTF3: The Smelter.

Time Traveler Chasecam

Summary: First server choice was LoR's server. They also chose blue as their color. Match started fairly well for KT but the tide rapidly turned and LoR began to increase its momentum. Fortunately the match was over before too much damage could be done.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: 04/07/1999 - Second server was Knights Templar choice. LoR again chose blue team and this Time came on stronger than before. Despite KT's slight ping advantage, LoR still managed to mow down KT and walk away with another victory 7 caps to 1.

Notes: Clan LoR is strong; there is no question about that. They are also an east coast clan which makes even pings very tough to coordinate. Just look at the differences in east/west servers. On the east server the pings were 46 to 144 in LoR's favor. On the west server the pings were 109 to 122 in KT's favor. On top of this The Smelter is a frequently played map with a known advantage for one side. Looking back now at the history of the Knights during my tenure with them, we've never played as blue team in an official match and we've never lost a scrimmage as blue either. I'm not here to gripe and complain about who took what side and who had what ping though. LoR played very well and the Knights didn't play quite as well. The events of the second server are evidence of that.

Why is blue base better? Some may argue that blue base has two possible exits for flag carrier to leave through as well as being more open. Also the red base has the backpack.

Yes, blue base has two possible exits, but one of them requires the action of opening a door while the other exit requires squeezing through a narrow corridor that is easily covered by defenders. Both of these exits are also easily covered by defenders as they are close together. As for the advantage of the backpack, that is easiy negated by the fact that blue base has the bandolier as well as much easier access to the power shield. 300 cells in a backpack are no match against 250 cells in conjunction with a power shield. Blue base also has three weapons (rocket launcher, chaingun, double shotgun) close together, which makes arming up a much quicker process than for red base, where those three weapons are scattered around. There are other minor details about red base which make it the weaker base, but I won't get into them now. This is enough.

[kt]

05/18/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Bastards. An informal scrimmage. The BFG was not a factor as the maps played were Q2CTF2: Stronghold Opposition, Q2CTF1: McKinley Revival with no BFG, and Q2CTF3: The Smelter.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Bastards outplayed Knights Templar in a fun match on the Stronghold. OJ Simpson made one of his rare appearances and put on his game face. Taz did it all and his flag running and Chum's defense made B's armor almost impenetrable. At least they coughed up one flag for a final score of 5 captures to 1.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: The number of players was upped to six fraggers for each team, making for a surprisingly dull match. Somehow despite B's ping advantage the Knights were able to play keep away the whole match and eventually won by frags. I swear I saw several players on each side take naps while on guard duty and once even spotted Apocalypse taking a leak in the corner by the megahealth. Just goes to show that someTimes he just plain crosses the line of good taste.

No Demo

Summary: Both teams eventually roused out of their McKinley induced comas and proceeded to whoop it up on The Smelter. Unfortunately it was the Bastards giving most of the whooping. Dr. Rock[B] opened up his frag clinic and everyone was invited for a free asskicking at half price. Knights still managed to do o.k. and stole a couple of flags from underneath the Bastards, but for the most part the tickets were free and the fat lady had sung. Bastards won this triple header 2 games out of three by winning this map 10 caps to 2. GG

Notes: Note my ping? Yes, this is a new trend that's been going on consistently now since Monday evening. As I write this (May 26) every night with the exception of Friday and Saturday (May 21, 22) has been a nightmare on the cablemodem. My ping is a nightmarish 200-400 to srf, where I traditionally ping 40-60. It has not been a problem during the day (on those rare moments I was home to enjoy the cablemodem) but as soon as business hours ended, the connection went to crap. The Mae-west backbone that serves @home customers in the Southland is completely saturated for whatever reason between the hours of 6pm and 1am.

Talking with Comcast technical support, they seem to be very aware of the problem and how it's affecting gamers but they claimed to have no direct control over how the mae-west backbone is maintained. The claim to be pushing the owners to try and fix the problem but ultimately they say it's out of their hands. On one hand I am understanding of the situation, but on the other I can't play the game worth crap now.

What is my theory? Someone has just subscribed to cablemodem service and has discovered how easy it is to get pornography via the net. Consequently, he sets his machine to leech pr0n all night after he gets home from work and hogs bandwidth until he goes to bed. On Friday and Saturday nights he was out with friends and therefore didn't burden the rest of us @home customers with his little vice.

Yes, that's a ridiculous story, but could it somehow have a ring of truth to it? Mae-west is perfect during business hours, when it should be the busiest with business transactions! Yet somehow when a lot of the activity should have died down, the problems begin. I don't have an answer. Well, maybe I do. DSL? Maybe.

[kt]

05/25/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan X. OGL open CTF league match. X is an east coast clan so the two server rule was enforced. The BFG was not a factor as both maps played were LFCTF1: Neurotica.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Lame, lame, lame. Watch the demo. Yet again we see why X makes my most hated clan list. Note the rate of lost packets and why the rest of the team complained bitterly throughout the match. KT lost this half 6 caps to 0.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: KT came out strong in this half of the league match against X. In the end though, with an artificially low cap limit of 4, clan X argued the rules and won this two match series. Lousy game, X, you assholes.

Notes: Yet another example why X is a bunch of sorry losers. Knowing that they were going to lose this two server match, they argued the rules and got this win. There was still plenty of Time left in the match but because of the premature ending of the level, they argued that they won. Technically they did, but any clan with a shred of honor would have played it out. The Knights would exact revenge in future matches, but this kind of low maneuvering by clans like this is inexcusable.

[kt]

05/26/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan X. OGL open CTF league match. X is an east coast clan so the two server rule was enforced. The BFG was disabled as both maps played were Q2CTF1: McKinley Revival.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Matches don't come much more boring than this, but a win is a win. On the Clan X server, both teams were shut out but KT won on frags.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: The match was a little more interesting with actual scoring going on, with KT winning the two server series 5 caps to 3.

Notes: We didn't play on Clan X's original server where we had the packet loss from hell (as shown in the previous demos against them). For whatever reason, KT did not lose another match against X for the rest of our Time on the league.

[kt]

05/30/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Elite Strike. OGL open CTF league match. Elite Strike is a west coast clan so only one server was played. The BFG was not a factor as the map played was Q2CTF4a: Outlands II.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: This match was actually more tense than the score may indicate. My POV demo also does not show some of other interesting strategies that were occurring. In the end, ES managed to sneak in with several members and stole the flag. The match ended with Elite Strike winning by a score of 1 capture to none.

Notes: Elite Strike is arguably the best active Q2CTF clan currently around. They aren't beaten often and their teamwork is exceptional. Individually most of their front line members are also all stars. Well, it did help them that their pings were consistently better and they were playing out of the same room.

[kt]

05/31/1999 - Knights Templar vs Clan Deez Nutz. Open scrimmage. Deez Nutz is a west coast clan so only one server was played. The BFG was not a factor as the map played was LFCTF1: Neurotica.

Time Traveler POV

Summary: Late night partying against DN. People were jumping in and out on both teams. In the ensuing wild melee, the KT majority team finally pulled off a close victory, 11 caps to 10.

Notes: Not much to say. It was just a wild informal unorganized affair. Lots of fun though.

[kt]

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(c)1066AD [KT]Time Traveler
Suck it down, biatch.