Ronald McDonald held a tournament this past weekend (Saturday, Nov 7th). I was psyched. I couldn't wait to see how I'd do in open competition. This was no pussy-fest like the CoC (Contest of Champions) held by Avalon. Avalon has a "no healing" rule (except in the Magery division - you get ONE heal). This was a balls to the wall, use whatever it takes to win competition.

Allusion (formerly Vapor) and I hit the bears to get those last few points on our melee skills and tactics. You never know when .1 will come in handy.

The competition was in three parts : 1-on-1, 2-on-2 and the Royal Rumble - the free for all. We all gathered on 1st level Deceit near the water ele room and started the competition around 8pm EST. This was one looong night.

The first competition was the 1on1s. I watched as we started with only one room going, then two, and eventually four rooms going with matches in them. The rules said you could bring unlimited GHs, GEs.. whatever. And apparently people couldn't win without them, so the matches were taking up to 30 minutes! I brought 8 GHs for my first match.

I was paired off against D'artagne in the lower right room. We started by magic arrowing each other and equipping our weapons - me with my GM heavy xbow and him with a bardiche. A bardiche? Well, this match didn't last long - maybe 30 seconds. I hit him twice with my heavy then out came the ebolt I'd cast before I armed my hxbow. I don't have a screenshot of the corpse, but here's what he said later that night. He still had his bardiche because we'd agreed "no looting" before the match started.

My next match was against GaLaHaD. I've owed Galahad (not typing that insane caps/non-caps name over and over) for a while now. zero (then a newbie, so this was 4 months ago) was walking outside of the house after we were mock dueling when Gal rushed the door to my two-story (now the JoV training hut). I couldn't kill him because I had 10 mana and he kept hiding. I eventually ran him out, but I was looking forward to whipping his ass because he thought I sucked because of our last encounter. He was also pretty well known for being good at PVP, so his death was especially sweet. Guess I do a little better when I have mana, eh Gal? Allusion ran in after the match and gave some support. Needless to say, I didn't offer him "no looting". Goddamn, some people depend on GHs too much. Bear in mind, that first pic was taken after I'd looted for a good 20 seconds (the "Corp Por" is for an outgoing looter).

My third match was against Charley. Oh shit. Charley is a good friend of mine in game, so I know ALL about his character. He's almost a 6x GM - including Magery and RESIST. The boy is bad ass. He's also a healer, so out of nowhere his health goes up... grrr. Well, he and I agree on "no looting" (which I do if people don't insist on using magic weapons, neither Charley nor D'artagne did). He asks if I'm ready and off we go. This was my longest match - about 2 minutes. In the end, there can be only one. I was amazed that I beat him, as were the people outside watching. I wish that the wall didn't stop me from hearing what people were saying. Allusion later told me that everyone thought I was fucked (me too), but went apeshit when I won. Nice to prove people wrong with my ninja-like skills and cat-like reflexes. :)

My fourth match was against Carnage. Carnage is nothing short of a complete bad ass. I would have taken a screenshot, but I hate black and white pictures. :( At least I lost to a quality fighter - I'd never heard of anyone beating him 1on1 until he lost later that night in the finals. He beat my ass when I made one mistake. We had each other dead, we both went for it, and he got it. Oh well... it was quick and relatively painless. With that loss I ended up tied for 4th... not bad for my 1st UO tournament.

Allusion and I were in the 2on2s together, but we fucked up and got put out 1st round against two people we should have easily beaten. *sigh* I guess everything can't go my way..

I had a LONG time to wait until the Royal Rumble, so I get bored and start screwing around. Most everyone knows me, so I'm relatively safe no matter what happens. I go gray goofin' off and some dick named Vanderbren summons a demon and says "a kill" - gee, I wonder if that's for me. So, I run for about 10 steps before someone dispels it. Van had been pissing people off all night, but I left him alone because he was a friend of me and Allusion's personal cheering section, Temptress. Well, that did it. I killed him and I killed him fast. One of my adoring fans gave me his head after I'd looted him dry. When Temptress ressed him, I expressed my appreciation for the loot and the head. In the last picture, Temptress is standing there in her cheerleading outfit complete with blue feathered hat and cloak (that matched me and Allusion's robes).

Later on, two more targets, Croc and XxX, decided to steal from Temptress' friend. Temptress can't fight very well, but she tried. She died and I came upon the scene just after it happened. I killed XxX, but Croc recalled. But I'm not that easy to evade. By the time the evening ended I had found him not once, but twice. I'm sure if I'd have seen him more I would have killed him more. I guess it's hard to know who's friends with me, but you'll quickly learn if you kill one of them and I find you.

The Royal Rumble ended up being canceled because it was getting damn late. Everyone was pretty bloodthirsty, so a free-for-all broke out anyhow. Lots of dead people. Allusion, Charley and I whipped the shit out of a LOT of people while taking our share of damage without dropping. Since nearly everyone was Chaos/Order, no one got murder counts... except me. I'd planned on making my guildstone Chaos, but I hadn't done it yet for some reason. It cost me a night of macroing in Charley's house (don't ask about the arrow wall - he was bored I guess).

What a great night. I can't wait for the next tournament. Since I was the only guy in the top 8 of the 1-on-1s with less than 90 resist (at 74), I think I did ok...

Nighthawk