ATX - Weekend two recap

Well I would say weekend 2 was even better than the first weekend. Even the first day's matches were solid, if at times a little head-scratching on setups some of the teams brought.

I think it was Kil2 who said "STOP BRINGING THESE 50 POINT SETUPS... YOU CAN'T MAKE IT THROUGH LIKE THAT." He was pretty much right on with that comment. Only 8 of the 32 teams who lost in round one made it through to the group stages. Of those, only 3 that scored zero points in round one made it through.

How did they get through you ask? Well TEST just got very lucky with tie breakers, and is ranked 32, but did bring a 46 point setup, handicapping themselves just enough, that with a win and a THD they would end up with enough points to advance, cut off for advancement this year was a massive 67.5 points. That's only 6 points more than a round one total hell death, and was split between TEST and R.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N. with TEST winning the 32nd spot on tie breakers.

Otherwise, Brick Squad fielded 44 points, and won with a THD, giving them 70 points total, landing them the 30th spot, and faced a 50 point setup. Capital Punishment. fielded 42 points, and got a THD, giving them 72.5 points and 29th place, and faced a 50 point setup. Dark Taboo had just four points in round one, and fielded the biggest handicap of all, bringing 42 points, and scored a THD even though they faced a 50 point team.If ANY of the 50 point teams HAD won these match ups, they would not have advanced, since they only had 2 points, and would have ended up with 64.5 after a THD. Even if all of the 50 point teams had won, it would have dropped the point total needed to advance down to 66.5, still more than a max score of a Total Hell Death of 62.5. Message here is, even if you don't have any points, by handicapping your team, you can still advance.


PERCUSSIVE PIZZA TIME DIPLOMACY, 12 points last week, fielded 48 points, giving themselves a nice buffer, bringing their total up to 77 points, and getting 20th seed. I set this match apart, because even though they did face a 50 point team, their opponents could have advanced with their week one earnings of 10 points.

The rest : Choke Point, 8 points last week, Kill it with Fire, 10 points last week, Black Legion., 20 points last week, and Shadow Cartel, 14 points last week fielded 50 point setups, and advanced.

How about that winners bracket?

Rote Kapelle advanced with a win against Fluffeh Bunneh, our setup narrowly edging out theirs in a really close fight, that turned into steamroll towards the end. So we are through to the 12v12 rounds!

Otherwise, 9 teams, despite winning last week, failed to score enough points this week to advance.

Tribal Conclave was rolled by FA, dropping them out of the top 32. THE SPACE P0LICE was also rolled by HUN, Against ALL Authorities scored 2 points, but need at least 6 to advance. The R0NIN scored 4 points, but needed 6, and lost the battle of "The zero's." Team Liquid showed up in Tengu's again, didn't work out this time. Out of Sight fell to the goons. R.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N. lost and saved my keyboard's period keys. Elysian Empire went home 4 more points. And Fluffeh, who only had just more than 30 points to begin with scored 16, but not enough to advance.

Interestingly, both days the fights were good, setups were MUCH improved over week one, well for the most part. Some gimmicks didn't work, Alpha Tornadoes, and some worked too well, WINDICATORS! (when you don't burn out your guns guys.

ANYWAYS:
My predictions were unnaturally poor this week I felt like. With some stupidness prevailing during some of the matches, like the afore mentioned Vindicator burning out "their entire rack" of blasters, and then 3/4 of the way through the fight realizing they could un-group, amidst other questionable ship and setup.

Excuses aren't any good, so I will just say, 17/32 is better than 50% (53%). Look forward to next weekend where hopefully I can do a better job or predicting some winners, but I doubt it at this rate.

In the mean time, I did a decent job betting at Monocle Madness, and with some of their overall pots cresting over 2 bil on the first day for well known matches or good odds, then building on that the second day with some matches having pools of over 5 bil. The last match of the day, HUN reloaded vs THE SPACE P0LICE, pool was 5.5 bil isk. Others topped out at the 1-3 billion isk mark. Some people out there are losing a whole lot more isk than I have. Good luck to them to recoup it in the group stages.

Next up : The 32 group stage participants, Predictions for weekend 3 of ATX.