Board 8 > ~FIGHT!~ Crono, Juliet, Geese and Alice vs. Sonic, Tifa, Lara and Selvaria Bles

(+) Yeah! (+)

Yeah, and tank shells don't so much as scratch those half-destroyed adobe walls either. It's pretty clearly gameplay mechanics, given we have it straight up given by plot that those trenches, holes in mountains, and destroyed houses are the direct result of valkyrur lasers.

The fact that you're just stretching to say she's not going to use her beams is totally disingenuous. She uses them in other chapters, she uses them in other cutscenes. Aside from the gameplay mechanics of making the game not be impossible and this being an introduction to her, you know what else is different about Chapter 7? She comes into the battle to save her liege, Maximillian, after he reaches the bottom of the southern ramp while the Edelweiss has to be somewhere past that point. He's in a massive, MASSIVE tank, and the only enemy tank she's facing is the Edelweiss. Here's a cutscene of what happens when she shoots at tanks:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p6-uMHLW_aw#t=0m46s

She blows up like 5 tanks in a single shot, without even hitting 4 of them with the beam. She is fanatically devoted to and in love with Maximillian to the point of killing herself for him twice over. Do you really think she's going to blast that close to Maximillian's massive tank, which is rolling straight towards them?
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And I think you're being completely disingenuous with your insistence that this terrain is some big open plain where Selvaria and Lara can gun down everyone at will. I am again playing this level as we speak, the canyon walls alone come up to almost the height of the massive, massive tank. There is no clear shot at anything here, let alone a target you would never know the location of until you traversed the terrain and went to find them.

Christ, do I have to go take another one of my dreaded Fraps videos to display the terrain? I really don't want to but I'd hate for this match to be decided on flat lying about the terrain.
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Playing it again, there's even a small tunnel if you head to the right from my team's spawn point (again, something that doesn't even have a line of sight from where Selvaria would be. She has no way of knowing they're there) that could be used to actually come up *behind* Selvaria's team if they wanted.

I actually respect the hell out of Selvaria's combat abilities, but this terrain being made into something it isn't in order to best suit her is a farce.
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I already said the only thing the cover can even possibly do is hide them from sight, but fat lot of good that does if they actually are camping like you say, or taking any potshots, or get seen by Selvaria or Sonic. If she has any hint on where the enemy is, that cover is blown away like wet paper, and it's got a very broad range.

I just don't see how she can possibly end up in a situation where she just... doesn't fire because she can't see the enemies, even though she knows where they are, and by firing her infinite-ammo-laser, would clear away the only obstructions that could hide them. It's a win-win on her side, because either she's hitting them where they're hiding, or she's narrowing down where they could be hiding. She'd need Half Life 2 AI before corner peeking and firing potshots and then ducking back down works against her.
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Well for one thing, this terrain is pretty damn big and it's giving her some weird prescience as to where they're starting. She has no visual on them at all. She can send Sonic out to scout, I guess, but I maintain that's a good way to get him killed, plus that will take even him awhile to actually do. If there's one thing I feel can slow Sonic up, it's lots of walls and trenches and general obstructions to get in the way of his momentum. This terrain has it in spades.
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Luis_Sera89 posted...

This is a combination of M4's terrain bidding system and Draft Mercs giving defined starting positions, so it's never really come up before. I'm the designated attacker and I also won the terrain bid, so despite it being Selvaria's terrain, she's starting in the attacker position. It probably makes a difference here, but not to a match-turning degree.

I thought there was an official ruling that when it comes to terrains "Defender" always refers to the team that owns the terrain, regardless of who is technically attacking? Like, I was sure I read something about that from Kanz in one of the earlier topics...
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So the archive is a banned word already? That is annoying, especially since I found where the post was...



Topic: Mercenaries Draft, Week 0 Results: I think I've played this song before...

Page: 2

When it says attacked and defender positions, does that relate to the attack/defender or does it relate to owner/ visitor of terrain?

B) Owner and visitor of the terrain. If the terrain is yours, you are always the defender.

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For the hell of it I went ahead and recorded a video. It'll probably be done processing by the time this match is over. 'lol'

Maybe it'll be of use in future matches in any case
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Raetsel_Lapin posted...

So the archive is a banned word already? That is annoying, especially since I found where the post was...



Topic: Mercenaries Draft, Week 0 Results: I think I've played this song before...

Page: 2

When it says attacked and defender positions, does that relate to the attack/defender or does it relate to owner/ visitor of terrain?

B) Owner and visitor of the terrain. If the terrain is yours, you are always the defender.

oh snap

redo topic
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3EfKYUFBEM

Alright, here you are. For the sake of convenience I cleared out all enemies except for the Massive Massive Tank and crippled his guns. My team per the writeup starts over by where Alicia is. No clear shot at anything, as Alicia shows. So let's get a little closer at aim down at Selvaria's starting location. Nope, you can't even see a thing from here, there is a cliff in the way.

Let's get even closer at :44, to that little tunnel I mentioned. When Alicia points right is where Selvaria and company would be starting. *This* is the only visual anyone even gets, if someone is parked right up on that overhang. And even then it isn't much of one as you can kind of see how high up everyone is by how tiny the other troops are.

Then I back Alicia off a bit to simulate the space my side would actually have to move with Selvaria still not really being able to see anything. At 1:18 I take Wendy and try to play out how looking up for Alicia would go...you can't, you couldn't unless she was literally standing right on the edge. I scoot around a bit closer with Wendy, still trying to see anything that might be up on the plateau. Nothing. Cliffs blocking the view. I scooch even closer to where the path finally leads up to my base. You still can't actually see the base from there or anyone who might be in it, you're too far down and it's too high up.

2:02 has me switch to Vyse to get a look at the valley proper. The area where Selvaria starts is relatively open, except for that big trench Wendy began in. Vyse meanwhile encounters walls, sandbags, rocks bigger than he is. Cover basically, but again, I don't see why the fight would even happen down here. There's still no line of sight to the base even this close.

Switch to Aika who is even closer. *Now* she finally has something of a view...of the temple Alicia ran through at the beginning. Still can't see the base. I guess Selvaria could hit something if they decided to park in the temple and not move and she happened to be in this exact spot, but if anyone moves a bit to the left or right the lines of sight again get stuffed up.

And finally I run Aika up the path, turn right and straight into where my guys would be starting, although realistically they can go anywhere along that rightmost plateau and still be entirely unseen. Point of all of this being it is most certainly *not* the fish in a barrel place that it's been attributed to, it's windy and full of crap to block up shots. Except for my guys up above on the cliffs, they have a decent shot at whatever, but otherwise this terrain is Blind Spot Hell.
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Also yeah, if the sides were flipped and my side started down on ground level I'd be equally screwed since same thing would apply. You can see dick all from down there in regard to anyone above you unless they are standing *right* on the cliffside.
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DC, your entire argument relies on your team not attacking, the other team not moving, and the other team not attacking for your's to just somehow attack with perfect stealth, never getting seen and never getting attacked as they hide behind dirt walls.
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Dude, you were the one suggesting that Selvaria is going to stay put and get buffed while sending Sonic out on his own.
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Also no, I'm suggesting that Selvaria's team literally can't see my team from the ground floor, while my team has an entire plateau to run around on right above their heads. I was mistaken in thinking my side was limited strictly to their base here, since upon playing the stage to record it, the ground team is utterly blind to anything above them.
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Team Alice

There is definitelt enoigh cover for alice to take down selvaria in melee and that is going to bad imo
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It's less than a 30 second jog for a regular human from the attacker side to the south side to be able to see up the ramp. I'm pretty sure Sonic can get that done even quicker.

The whole point of all this is Selvaria ridiculously outclasses her opponents, while having better range and durability, and your only argument seems to be... camp sniping against her. Without functional cover. Every argument you're giving for Alice just seems to be better done by Selvaria, nevermind with her actually being able to penetrate cover with her shots, have Sonic take a peek since he can run quickly in an open area like this and have it done in seconds, and has Tifa able to give buffs to make them even more ridiculous.
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I don't think Selvaria can even hit Alice, frankly. And I think Selvaria is pretty good, but you're arguing that she's using her giant charge lasers willy nilly and those are telegraphed from a mile off. Decent invitation for Alice to just teleport and chop her up in close range, by far Selvaria's weakest area.
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Kan hasn't officially said anything yet, but if that ruling excerpt is to be believed, we may have both been under the wrong impression of where the team's start anyway, and it's Selvaria starting by the Ruins.
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I'll happily forfeit if that's the case, since as said, this terrain would screw my team just as badly if I were on the wrong end of it. The ground floor is just bad when the upper floor can blindside them horrifically.
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Can anyone even hit Alice?
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who is aliseo
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Sure, but not Selvaria. Alice is a pretty hard counter to anyone who likes to wind up their attacks, she's too good at being elsewhere.
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Calling her a hard counter is a stretch. She can't avoid Rhum fire indefinitely. Even if she was spamming her butterfly dodge (which feels like something a player would do in gameplay, not how she'd actually move around everywhere), she's only incorporeal for a split second at a time.
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So what is Selvaria doing here? She straight up has no visual sight on anyone to try the Ruhm. You have KJH arguing that she's spamming her overly large charge lasers in apparently blind directions, since again, no visual sight possible from ground floor to top floor. That ain't gonna fly on Alice at all, she can go around it and make hamburger of Selvaria.
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If she sees someone or is attacked by them, she'd shoot them. If she's just sitting there and the other team is just sitting there, and Sonic is also just sitting there instead of doing a quick 10 second lap just to see what's around a corner, I don't see what she has to lose by shooting at the few bits of rubble blocking her sight. Best case, the other team was taking cover behind them because they don't know they're going to be shot at with lasers that pierce the terrain. Worst case, there's less places to hide for the enemy team and a clearer line of sight for Selvaria.

What is done to prevent that? Or Sonic scouting? Or to just shoot Alice if she approaches, which she needs to do to attack, whether it be ranged or melee? Or to fight a buffed Selvaria in the first place? I honestly don't get it.
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It's literally half of the terrain that's stuffing up her line of sight. See the video I posted, I took the time to march people along and point out various angles in which someone could try and reach the top level of the canyon with a gun from the bottom level. They all fail, this is just a flat bad terrain for the bottom level team.
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And no, assuming that Selvaria will somehow know exactly where the other team is standing, aim upwards and have the wherewithal to shoot one of her big charge lasers to hit my team through the cliff is really silly, unless we're granting her x-ray vision.
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Well if they're camping indefinitely like you're claiming they are she has all the time in the world to randomly hit the right spot.
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I honestly changed my mind on the camping thing after I did my video recording. I thought they would be limited to the starting base lest Selvaria just kills them. Then I saw there's actually a big span of terrain right above Selvaria's starting location that her team can't see dick of. *Kinda* mean
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Or Sonic just says "yeah, they're over there" by looking around the corner or just going up on top of the arch.

Either way it's an alternative version of just sitting around that actually helps. Doesn't put her at risk, does some work.

And Selvaria knows the terrain while Alice... doesn't.
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Dude sonic is going to rush ahead and refuse to communicate with his team are you paying any attention.
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And by corner you mean "He has to go to the far end of the map, leaving his team behind who are far slower than he is, right to where the enemy team probably is"
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I like that little exchange

KJH: (Dead seriously) Sonic is going to rush ahead and scout.

Lopen: (Sarcastically) Dude don't you know, Sonic is just going to rush ahead and scout.
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I get the feeling this match lost votals due to the terrain confusion (since as I've said, I think the fight entirely rests on who starts where. I win if I have high ground, I lose if I don't). That's disappointing
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Yeah, I can't vote without knowing who's where, honestly.
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oh whoops

I buy Juliet/Alice make use of the terrain to eke out a win.

But I'm late.
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oh wait I forgot to actually vote

and apparently I'm 5 minutes late

would've voted Team Sonic Raider
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Mercs can't escape the dreaded who's starting where even with rules in place to prevent the dreaded who's starting where
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Selvaria's team is considered the "defender" here.

Selvaria:


Team Selvaria wins.
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FYI This is supposed to be indicated by the fact that Selvaria's team is listed second. In future topics I'm going to make Kanz actually put ATTACKERS and DEFENDERS above those teams for ease of understanding.
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Wish I'd known that ahead of time. I would have forfeited without the need for videos
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I wish I'd caught it earlier, too, but I missed this topic going up for too long. Sorry about that.
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Oh then in that case without terrain advantage Selvaria cleans up.

Not that my first vote even counted.
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I guess if nothing else, the link to that video exists now so no one *else* will have to deal with confusion over this stupid terrain
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Team Sonic
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I like that everyone votes after the match is over

Post-loss forfeit
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well it was the second closest match of the week for me

and then I got distracted by Fryevia

and then it turns out I was operating under false pretenses anyway
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