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Not sure how one can expect to piece together a plausible "Hot or Not" when they are unable to see the games, so shame on all of you who have indulged in such folly in the past; you're emphasizing not only your lack of comprehension but also the misguided notion that record or rpd is necessarily a right and proper barometer of performance. In the ineptitude of your inanity is provided more fodder for cretin lunatics like Mouse to level against true team players selflessly sacrificing their record to take up the slack where other spiders with inferiority complexes are huddled in the shadows like veiny, bottom feeding crustaceans trying to pick off any kill they can manage so as to hoodwink the general public into believing they are being useful. No thanks to your Hot or Not's, the ruse often works and the glamour prevails, and spiders continue to play like lobsters. Shame. Perhaps we could dub it "The Salami Effect".
Fried Liver Attack (4:51) vs. Terrorist (15:00)
Who could be surprised with this score knowing one Hellrazor was placed in the game? Zizzo came to his senses game 2 vs Treyway and inserted Clay in his stead, one of the stronger 6* spids in the league; however, what ultimately seems to be holding back this team's potential is the lack of megaman89, and I'd imagine Vegas has the odds stacked high and wide against him showing for his team this season. Perhaps Zizzo has some insider information, but it seems he took a bit of a gamble picking up mega in the 10th round - we'll see. I can't admit to having seen olde play shark.. mmm, well... ever, so I can't comment, but Sprackle plays shark identical to how he plays spider - I'm not even sure the guy knows the two ships are any different. Im suspicious, even, that Sprackle might in fact be completely blind and plays by feeling and gut instinct alone. What this results in however is a weak 8* spider and a strong 8* shark, and I approve of playing Clay, tho not Ronaldhino, over one of the 7* spids to get Sprack in there.
Dreamwin absolutely knows what he's doing with Terrorist and gets my vote for best drafter. The guy utterly took advantage of the ignorance of the shadow non-council of raters by picking up Kassius in the 9th round, who continues to prove my point every week; he'll likely be playing at 8* level by the end of the season under nowon's wing and could prove to be the critical element which makes Terrorist unstoppable - not to mention Diakka and Paradise being underrated at 8*. Even with F.L.A. fielding their best I doubt they could have tacked on more than 8:00 here. bram is a smart baser and potentially underrated as an 8* terr in a league lacking in terrs. The potential to switch bram and Dreamwin midgame if the line isn't working against a particular team could prove to be quite the boon. I am surprised to see Willby playing over Paradise - perhaps the latter wasn't in attendance or Dreamwin is trying to spread ptime in a game he knows he will win regardless; personally speaking as a spider who is always trying to play to the edge of his sharks, I am significantly more comfortable in games with Para as my shark.
Interesting stat line here how evenly spread the spider kills are for Terrorist. I think this is maybe a bad sign if one imagines having to switch dreamwin and bram, and could result in a lack of pushing power which dreamwin supplies in spid, particularly when you have not the strongest sharks.
Shout Outs: bram (28-3), Markmrw (11 kills, 2.9 rpd), the whole Terrorist spid line
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Treyway (15:00) vs Giants (11:06)
Now we're on to my favorite storyline of the week, in which renzi gets amnesti banned for 3 weeks for spamming him, thus rendering himself unable to play as there is no longer a viable 6* available for Treyway. bahaha. This at least gives Poseidon his time to shine as morph seemed unlikely to play him otherwise given that he negged almost literally every BD he had played in the week since he return. I suppose some people really need the competitive drive to play to their abilities. But I digress. renzi & amnestis' flirtations meant morph had to go with an 8 8 8 7 7 spid line vs the 10 9 7 8 6 line of Giants, and against one of the best spiders in the L, skatarius. What seems risky on paper ended up paying off, thanks in no small part to Mikkiz's impeccable terring. warportal didnt look half bad out there, showing that even in 2001 there were terrs who knew what they were doing, and Mean Gene is a solid 8* shark - ultimately Giants were outspidered, as the statline would suggest, with all of the Treyway spider crew having solid games and making up for renzi's absence. ROZAY is understarred at 7*; he and Anonym are possibly the two best 7* under spids in the game, their only competition being Kira_Yamato~ or perhaps Sulla. ROZAY is good enough in cram to make him an 8*. Shout outs to panty, who has been much improving and looked solid as a 6* out there.
Gene has since traded skatarius for hoppin/Steadman. This might end up paying off considering hoppin as one of the stronger 8* spids in the game paired with how deadly of a pusher turban can be in spid, tho I'm not yet convinced of the trade. Steadman obviously studied tapes of turban while learning to shark, so things should feel mostly similar enough as far as that goes, perhaps to the chagrin of any spids actually trying to apply pressure. I would suggest to Gene: experiment with benching Ra and Iron Survivor and trying a 10 8 8 8 6 line with Pure Luck, Rasaq, and hoppin. Behind turban's style, going with these three 8* could pay out in dividends.
Shout Outs: Mikkiz (40-3, 3 tek), Poseidon (102-55, 1 fake tek), skatarius (115-50, 0 tek)
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Pure Luck (2:27) vs. Spider (15:00)
One could be tempted to call this the blow out of the week if Spider didnt proceed to get smashed by Power in their second game. Evidently wbm was lagging and unable to play. Its difficult to envision Pure Luck succeeding without him - as the other 9* spid option, midoent, is simply not on the same level. There is not much else to say in a game where Tiny was forced to sub in for wbm.
On the bright side, Tiny wrangled himself an outstanding pick up in trading for Joeses in shark. Joe is personally my 3rd fav shark in the L to play behind, so I'm quite jealous now that he's left Treyway. Mcvicar + Joeses is the best shark duo in the L; if Tiny can't find success w the two of them then the proverbial ball is being seriously dropped, and I suggest he pick up a good pushing spid as they are two of the best sharks to push behind. Maybe shadowmere will peep his head in and you can fig out a way to get him on your team. put shadowmere behind these two sharks and the opposing team will be experiencing unending chaos in the flagroom.
Also Tiny I dont know why in the F you are playing yourself over Singer as a 7* spid, your only valid excuse is that he wasn't at the game. Play this line and you have yourself a competitive team: Heaven, Joeses, Mcvicar, skatarius, wbm, Big E, Singer, + another 7* (I am not familiar w Anon - otherwise trade for one).
Shout Outs: bitsaver (33-1, 1 tek), ro (96-22, 0 tek, tho im sure at least 7 of these kills were from shooting sharks w no reps in midbase - all hail ro, king of lobsters), blt_12 (59-14 as 7* under spid - the best new player to grace the league as of late)
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Stray (8:19) vs. Power (15:00)
Stray - this team is quite the experiment, fielding one of the strongest spid lines behind two sharks who are generally clueless out there. These, however, are definitely the types of spiders who can work around any potential shoddy shark play and still make ends meet, but its obviously not gonna be enough. Plus you have SpookedOne who will only doubly live up to his name if he doesn't have the right sharks protecting him. You need to trade mvp for a shark, bruh bruh. You have some options: Public Assassin being understarred at 7*, you dont need Major Crisis. You have SEVEN 6*'s on your team, I'm sure one of them can fill the roll, thereby enabling you to find an 8* shark - there are lots of possibilities out there. Make some moves, you could make this team a contender with the right trades, or keep your eyes peeled for the FA's (hint: the_paul, who, given the track record of ratings deciders, might even be made a 7*).
In other news, Sulla seems to have sort of turned it around this game from his abysmal performance week 1 in the 15-3 blowout vs Treyway. Its hard to blame zidane for continuing to bench himself to see what Sulla can do given his broken spid line. As far as I can see, his other viable option is to bench Nipple Nibbler for himself and okyo for hedcase8, who is certainly serviceable as a 6*. Its hard to justify benching sarger or hellkite in any situation.
From the looks of the statline and rosters, I would imagine this game was mostly won by the experience of Power's sharks over that of Stray's, and in lesser part by Ogron outperforming SpookedOne. Major Crisis seems like a weak link in 8* spid - the little I've seen him play would make him more of a 7.5 by my metric. Whereas one could make a case for every single oneof Power's spids as being understarred.
Shout Outs: Ogron (37-2, 1 tek), sarger (103-53, 3 tek's), cripple (126-45, 1 tek)
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Fried Liver Attack (9:08) vs Treyway (15:00)
This game started out something like 8-1 in Treyway's favor, so kudos to F.L.A. for keeping their heads up and bringing it back to tie the game at 9-9 at one point. Its probably a good idea to sub Poseidon at such junctures as an 8-1 lead; the guy gets bored and his play suffers - a major character flaw, he knows, but he can't seem to help it. Luckily, Lockdown is proving to be one of the stronger 8* spids in the league, and has been showing excellent aggression. Tim is also superb as an 8* and exhibits a firm understanding of the game and where to place himself at any given moment.
The terrs for either team were looking rather shaky out there, with Zizzo and Mikkiz not having the best of games. Treyway's two 7* spids, Anonym and ROZAY, combined for a total of 5 teks, outshining Clay and Ardour along the way. Trasher made life difficult for Treyway, but Henry Saari obviously couldn't handle such an aggro team of spiders and ostensibly difficult-to-target sharks in morph and Odereus Maximus Urungus, having one of the worst games of his lobster career and being outkilled by both Ardour and tj hazuki.
Shout Outs: morph/oder(~2.9 rpd each, combined 21 kills), Lockdown (92-43, 1 tek), Trasher (108-45, 3 tek)
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Pure Luck (3:10) vs Terrorist (15:00)
Destruction. I am surprised PL got as much time as they did looking at the spid lineup. Tripin goes negative for the second time, Tiny insists on not playing Singer as the 7*, and wbm is again MIA. Not much to say about this game.
Shout Outs: nowon (101-32, 1 tek), Willby (13 kills, 1 t3k, 3rpd), panty (54-27 as 6* under)
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Stray (15:00) vs Giants (2:41)
What went wrong here? If I had to take a stab at it, warportal was obviously not playing up to snuff and SpookedOne had a nice showing. I'd also imagine Iron Survivor's inexperience came to a head against the likes of Cripple and Ease, two spiders really able to take advantage of people who don't really know what they're doing. I'd wager Rough was wreaking havoc against Giant's spiders under - Legacy was potentially a poor choice over Panty, but I suppose Gene was experimenting. turban is the kind of shark who needs his spiders to be performing decently if he's to play to his potential. Kudos to mvp and zapata for holding it down, tho I still think they are going to get thrashed against teams with the right shark/spid combo's.
Shout Outs: mvp/zapata (each ~3rpd, 18 combined kills), Rough (56-34, 3 teks), Ease (68-44, 2 tek)
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Power (15:00) vs Spider (1:31)
Ouch. bitsaver obviously couldn't handle the pressure of Power's infinitely deep spid lineup vs the inexperienced and ragtag crew Spider was forced to field. This game was likely effortless on Ogron's part, who is certainly at his best when his team is doing well. Looking to next week, Commodo now has Jurassic to help out in spid, but I'm not quite sure how he is going to make it work. He might not be amiss in trying 7* Poid in shark so as to free up the extra star, but he still can't field all Jurassic, JAMAL, Ro, without putting two 6* spids in, and he doesn't even have -one- 6* option up to par. Perhaps more trades are incoming; without some serious shaking up of its core components, this team seems doomed to the pits of DT hell. Good luck!
Shout outs: Sulla (pulling it together - 3.0rpd, 1 tek), Ogron (ACE 34-0, 2 tek), sarger (80-31, 1 tek)
edit: i noticed I listed Panty as being on both Terrorist and Giants... and now i'm really confused because it shows Panty as on the Terrorist roster but also as having played in Giants vs Treyway. so, not sure what to make of it and didnt edit
Fried Liver Attack (4:51) vs. Terrorist (15:00)
Who could be surprised with this score knowing one Hellrazor was placed in the game? Zizzo came to his senses game 2 vs Treyway and inserted Clay in his stead, one of the stronger 6* spids in the league; however, what ultimately seems to be holding back this team's potential is the lack of megaman89, and I'd imagine Vegas has the odds stacked high and wide against him showing for his team this season. Perhaps Zizzo has some insider information, but it seems he took a bit of a gamble picking up mega in the 10th round - we'll see. I can't admit to having seen olde play shark.. mmm, well... ever, so I can't comment, but Sprackle plays shark identical to how he plays spider - I'm not even sure the guy knows the two ships are any different. Im suspicious, even, that Sprackle might in fact be completely blind and plays by feeling and gut instinct alone. What this results in however is a weak 8* spider and a strong 8* shark, and I approve of playing Clay, tho not Ronaldhino, over one of the 7* spids to get Sprack in there.
Dreamwin absolutely knows what he's doing with Terrorist and gets my vote for best drafter. The guy utterly took advantage of the ignorance of the shadow non-council of raters by picking up Kassius in the 9th round, who continues to prove my point every week; he'll likely be playing at 8* level by the end of the season under nowon's wing and could prove to be the critical element which makes Terrorist unstoppable - not to mention Diakka and Paradise being underrated at 8*. Even with F.L.A. fielding their best I doubt they could have tacked on more than 8:00 here. bram is a smart baser and potentially underrated as an 8* terr in a league lacking in terrs. The potential to switch bram and Dreamwin midgame if the line isn't working against a particular team could prove to be quite the boon. I am surprised to see Willby playing over Paradise - perhaps the latter wasn't in attendance or Dreamwin is trying to spread ptime in a game he knows he will win regardless; personally speaking as a spider who is always trying to play to the edge of his sharks, I am significantly more comfortable in games with Para as my shark.
Interesting stat line here how evenly spread the spider kills are for Terrorist. I think this is maybe a bad sign if one imagines having to switch dreamwin and bram, and could result in a lack of pushing power which dreamwin supplies in spid, particularly when you have not the strongest sharks.
Shout Outs: bram (28-3), Markmrw (11 kills, 2.9 rpd), the whole Terrorist spid line
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Treyway (15:00) vs Giants (11:06)
Now we're on to my favorite storyline of the week, in which renzi gets amnesti banned for 3 weeks for spamming him, thus rendering himself unable to play as there is no longer a viable 6* available for Treyway. bahaha. This at least gives Poseidon his time to shine as morph seemed unlikely to play him otherwise given that he negged almost literally every BD he had played in the week since he return. I suppose some people really need the competitive drive to play to their abilities. But I digress. renzi & amnestis' flirtations meant morph had to go with an 8 8 8 7 7 spid line vs the 10 9 7 8 6 line of Giants, and against one of the best spiders in the L, skatarius. What seems risky on paper ended up paying off, thanks in no small part to Mikkiz's impeccable terring. warportal didnt look half bad out there, showing that even in 2001 there were terrs who knew what they were doing, and Mean Gene is a solid 8* shark - ultimately Giants were outspidered, as the statline would suggest, with all of the Treyway spider crew having solid games and making up for renzi's absence. ROZAY is understarred at 7*; he and Anonym are possibly the two best 7* under spids in the game, their only competition being Kira_Yamato~ or perhaps Sulla. ROZAY is good enough in cram to make him an 8*. Shout outs to panty, who has been much improving and looked solid as a 6* out there.
Gene has since traded skatarius for hoppin/Steadman. This might end up paying off considering hoppin as one of the stronger 8* spids in the game paired with how deadly of a pusher turban can be in spid, tho I'm not yet convinced of the trade. Steadman obviously studied tapes of turban while learning to shark, so things should feel mostly similar enough as far as that goes, perhaps to the chagrin of any spids actually trying to apply pressure. I would suggest to Gene: experiment with benching Ra and Iron Survivor and trying a 10 8 8 8 6 line with Pure Luck, Rasaq, and hoppin. Behind turban's style, going with these three 8* could pay out in dividends.
Shout Outs: Mikkiz (40-3, 3 tek), Poseidon (102-55, 1 fake tek), skatarius (115-50, 0 tek)
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Pure Luck (2:27) vs. Spider (15:00)
One could be tempted to call this the blow out of the week if Spider didnt proceed to get smashed by Power in their second game. Evidently wbm was lagging and unable to play. Its difficult to envision Pure Luck succeeding without him - as the other 9* spid option, midoent, is simply not on the same level. There is not much else to say in a game where Tiny was forced to sub in for wbm.
On the bright side, Tiny wrangled himself an outstanding pick up in trading for Joeses in shark. Joe is personally my 3rd fav shark in the L to play behind, so I'm quite jealous now that he's left Treyway. Mcvicar + Joeses is the best shark duo in the L; if Tiny can't find success w the two of them then the proverbial ball is being seriously dropped, and I suggest he pick up a good pushing spid as they are two of the best sharks to push behind. Maybe shadowmere will peep his head in and you can fig out a way to get him on your team. put shadowmere behind these two sharks and the opposing team will be experiencing unending chaos in the flagroom.
Also Tiny I dont know why in the F you are playing yourself over Singer as a 7* spid, your only valid excuse is that he wasn't at the game. Play this line and you have yourself a competitive team: Heaven, Joeses, Mcvicar, skatarius, wbm, Big E, Singer, + another 7* (I am not familiar w Anon - otherwise trade for one).
Shout Outs: bitsaver (33-1, 1 tek), ro (96-22, 0 tek, tho im sure at least 7 of these kills were from shooting sharks w no reps in midbase - all hail ro, king of lobsters), blt_12 (59-14 as 7* under spid - the best new player to grace the league as of late)
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Stray (8:19) vs. Power (15:00)
Stray - this team is quite the experiment, fielding one of the strongest spid lines behind two sharks who are generally clueless out there. These, however, are definitely the types of spiders who can work around any potential shoddy shark play and still make ends meet, but its obviously not gonna be enough. Plus you have SpookedOne who will only doubly live up to his name if he doesn't have the right sharks protecting him. You need to trade mvp for a shark, bruh bruh. You have some options: Public Assassin being understarred at 7*, you dont need Major Crisis. You have SEVEN 6*'s on your team, I'm sure one of them can fill the roll, thereby enabling you to find an 8* shark - there are lots of possibilities out there. Make some moves, you could make this team a contender with the right trades, or keep your eyes peeled for the FA's (hint: the_paul, who, given the track record of ratings deciders, might even be made a 7*).
In other news, Sulla seems to have sort of turned it around this game from his abysmal performance week 1 in the 15-3 blowout vs Treyway. Its hard to blame zidane for continuing to bench himself to see what Sulla can do given his broken spid line. As far as I can see, his other viable option is to bench Nipple Nibbler for himself and okyo for hedcase8, who is certainly serviceable as a 6*. Its hard to justify benching sarger or hellkite in any situation.
From the looks of the statline and rosters, I would imagine this game was mostly won by the experience of Power's sharks over that of Stray's, and in lesser part by Ogron outperforming SpookedOne. Major Crisis seems like a weak link in 8* spid - the little I've seen him play would make him more of a 7.5 by my metric. Whereas one could make a case for every single oneof Power's spids as being understarred.
Shout Outs: Ogron (37-2, 1 tek), sarger (103-53, 3 tek's), cripple (126-45, 1 tek)
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Fried Liver Attack (9:08) vs Treyway (15:00)
This game started out something like 8-1 in Treyway's favor, so kudos to F.L.A. for keeping their heads up and bringing it back to tie the game at 9-9 at one point. Its probably a good idea to sub Poseidon at such junctures as an 8-1 lead; the guy gets bored and his play suffers - a major character flaw, he knows, but he can't seem to help it. Luckily, Lockdown is proving to be one of the stronger 8* spids in the league, and has been showing excellent aggression. Tim is also superb as an 8* and exhibits a firm understanding of the game and where to place himself at any given moment.
The terrs for either team were looking rather shaky out there, with Zizzo and Mikkiz not having the best of games. Treyway's two 7* spids, Anonym and ROZAY, combined for a total of 5 teks, outshining Clay and Ardour along the way. Trasher made life difficult for Treyway, but Henry Saari obviously couldn't handle such an aggro team of spiders and ostensibly difficult-to-target sharks in morph and Odereus Maximus Urungus, having one of the worst games of his lobster career and being outkilled by both Ardour and tj hazuki.
Shout Outs: morph/oder(~2.9 rpd each, combined 21 kills), Lockdown (92-43, 1 tek), Trasher (108-45, 3 tek)
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Pure Luck (3:10) vs Terrorist (15:00)
Destruction. I am surprised PL got as much time as they did looking at the spid lineup. Tripin goes negative for the second time, Tiny insists on not playing Singer as the 7*, and wbm is again MIA. Not much to say about this game.
Shout Outs: nowon (101-32, 1 tek), Willby (13 kills, 1 t3k, 3rpd), panty (54-27 as 6* under)
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Stray (15:00) vs Giants (2:41)
What went wrong here? If I had to take a stab at it, warportal was obviously not playing up to snuff and SpookedOne had a nice showing. I'd also imagine Iron Survivor's inexperience came to a head against the likes of Cripple and Ease, two spiders really able to take advantage of people who don't really know what they're doing. I'd wager Rough was wreaking havoc against Giant's spiders under - Legacy was potentially a poor choice over Panty, but I suppose Gene was experimenting. turban is the kind of shark who needs his spiders to be performing decently if he's to play to his potential. Kudos to mvp and zapata for holding it down, tho I still think they are going to get thrashed against teams with the right shark/spid combo's.
Shout Outs: mvp/zapata (each ~3rpd, 18 combined kills), Rough (56-34, 3 teks), Ease (68-44, 2 tek)
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Power (15:00) vs Spider (1:31)
Ouch. bitsaver obviously couldn't handle the pressure of Power's infinitely deep spid lineup vs the inexperienced and ragtag crew Spider was forced to field. This game was likely effortless on Ogron's part, who is certainly at his best when his team is doing well. Looking to next week, Commodo now has Jurassic to help out in spid, but I'm not quite sure how he is going to make it work. He might not be amiss in trying 7* Poid in shark so as to free up the extra star, but he still can't field all Jurassic, JAMAL, Ro, without putting two 6* spids in, and he doesn't even have -one- 6* option up to par. Perhaps more trades are incoming; without some serious shaking up of its core components, this team seems doomed to the pits of DT hell. Good luck!
Shout outs: Sulla (pulling it together - 3.0rpd, 1 tek), Ogron (ACE 34-0, 2 tek), sarger (80-31, 1 tek)
edit: i noticed I listed Panty as being on both Terrorist and Giants... and now i'm really confused because it shows Panty as on the Terrorist roster but also as having played in Giants vs Treyway. so, not sure what to make of it and didnt edit
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