Week 2 Review

Week 2 again ran as expected, with the exception of 20ID taking the match against Warchild in a close 3 instead of Warchild as I predicted. Also, Team Pure came out strong this week and proved they were nothing to fool around with and took a relatively 2-0 victory over World Klass Assassins. Pure also played a close game with Warchild in 12v12 on Mashtuur last Monday, with the first match being decided by 1 ticket total!

In open we saw a great shoutcasted match between Team Vitality and 2Illicit, with Vitality taking home what some considered to be a shock win. Vitality proved to have some very coordinated ground work and top notch infantry, which was able to allow Vitality to make successful pushes on both the center and 2Illicit's main when needed. Interestingly enough, during the first round both choppers were cancelled out of the equation when they both took eachother out simultaneously. This lead to a very unique shoutcast on Daqing, and I'm pretty sure nothing like that has happened on the map before in a prior shoutcast, or any map ever for that matter. Overall, Vitality's ground unit proved to be much stronger and was able to clutch it up to take the win - despite Madjihad's tea-bagging at center.

In the World Tournament, we saw a close game between Team Paradigm Shift and Team HOT, with a rather poor performance on the part of Warchild against Code7. The latter match can be blamed on a variety of factors, including using a ringer from the second team as their chopper pilot because Skauboy bailed out 2 days prior, a lack of a solid strategy on the map as well as scrimming, and unfortunately just being a weak map for Warchild in any case. The highlight of that match is definitely the amazingly talented single-guiding pilot 87 flying out of bounds during Round 1 and calmly saying on vent "OH **** GUYS I FLEW OUT OF BOUNDS AND SUFFOCATED". *tear*

Other interesting results include HOE's obliteration of The Mammies, Poppycock's win over the recently moved-down The Blitzkriegers, and lastly Spec Ops Executives'b 2-0 victory over Soldiers of Virtue.

Rumors and Speculation

The past two weeks have fielded quite a bit of rumor and speculation, as the CAL-Open Team Warchild has been looking for a commander but has yet to pick one up. Rumor has it that a top commander who is known throughout the community may be stepping up to the plate, but again it is just rumor.

TGBF has been trying to pickup a second armor guy, and after they picked up fl0w things apparently just didn't work out and he ended up leaving. Soon afterwards, TGBF picked up Buckwild who had previously played for Rebels of Mankind. Buck should definitely help TGBF after Lithoss leaves in a few weeks, continuing their streak of success.

Earlier this week rumor had it that WOG would be dropping from CAL after their request to be moved down to Open was denied. Well, unfortunately, it appears that rumor is true. After checking their roster, it appears as if WOG has quit the league and won't be putting up a fight against Delta Squad. Does this mean the move-up of another potential CAL-Open squad, that will only lead to failure? I fear for any team that CAL is considering moving up at the moment, because it appears something just isn't working out. Maybe the "three tiers" of competition that were requested by some in the community (Open, Main, Invite) was the proper way to go about things afterall. I wish all of the luck in the world to WOG in their future endeavors. They are a great team in every respect, especially in the word respect.

Week 3: Mashtuur City

Things are about to get extremely interesting entering Week 3 of the season, as the action is about to come down on the map that probably requires the most team-work in the game. Not only that, but most of if not all of the current teams sitting pretty at 2-0 are being matched up against eachother. What can this mean, you ask? Very interesting matches, most notably the what many consider to be the match of the week - Team Illicit vs. HOE. Both of these teams are considered at the top of their game in CAL-Open, although some still question both of their abilities. Both of these teams have an incredible ground core with some of the best infantry currently playing in Open. However, the main difference between the two comes down to armor. Illicit can field either Simpledeath or Redhot in the heavy armor and feel secure with it, while HOE is apparently still looking for a heavy tanker. With that said, it looks as if any tankers who are looking for a top 5 CAL-Open team this season can certainly find one in the powerful Team HOE. However, Mashtuur overall is a map where one man doesn't make much of a difference against well-executed coordination, strategy, and overall team work. A tank can be easily taken out as a factor by 3-4 well coordinated AT, or a push with armor. To take this map requires strong infantry, strong commanding and at times the most elusive part of Battlefield - sheer luck. If team A goes for North Bridge while team B goes for team A's main base, and team A somehow doesn't notice in time then team A can expect to get camped in North Bridge and capped out shortly by any good team. Mains are the most crucial flags on this map, and to lose one over one of the lesser flags can be devastating. Expect a lot of 2-0 wins this week in both Main and Open, as its usually the more coordinated team that takes the win home in the end.

Another interesting match up in open comes down to Eviscerate vs. Vitality. Vitality proved last week that their infantry don't only do 5v5 well - they can hang in 8v8 as well. Mean while, Eviscerate is making a strong presence in open so far and is expected to be a championship contender this season with strong infantry, strong armor, great team work and something not all teams in open have - a great leader, Bull. Bull has plenty of experience in leading teams, dating all the way back (to my knowledge) to the some-what legendary 101st Air team in BF1942. The only problem some teams see with Eviscerate is that they aren't the same team they have been the past few seasons, and are fielding a very, distinctly different roster. This match-up will allow the community to gauge how strong both teams really are, as it appears to be the first "real" match-up either team has faced.

Anyway, lets get onto the CAL-Main predictions shall we?