JJBA OCT #8 R1M9 Quality Deliberation

JUDGE CLEVERRUSE

CARC

Fitting that the chessmaster of T8 offers a very solid sense of battlefield awareness throughout this strat, dotted with some very creative use of the scenario and items present to keep himself reasonably safe.

The opening Whisky play is extremely smart and difficult for the enemy to account for, painting them with a smell that intends to permeate through the rest of the strat. As clever as this is I don’t think it’s as damning as some seem to think, as the enemy is entirely capable of swapping clothing within seconds with their ability as well as covering the smell with what they can also scrounge. It does keep the enemy from doing a fast stealthy approach, however, so it is not entirely without merit. Aside from that, Silas plans his early game around gaining a solid surveillance network and moving himself to as safe a spot as possible. Early combat seems to conflict with later notes, (‘shooting the enemy when they get close to Guards’ vs. ‘only firing on them if they don’t see it coming’) but keeps things loose enough to justify keeping pressure off early on.

The denial of resources serves well here, but again interferes with logic used later in the match. Stripping the guards of all equipment and destroying it is a solid idea, but is softened a bit when the strat later suggests that airport workers are plentiful in the area and can be used as a sort of ‘buffer’ to shield Silas from incoming unidentified persons. It strikes a little as ‘having your cake and eating it too’, though again it’s a minor hiccup at best. The core plan of shoring up near one of the booths and keeping an eye out for anything approaching is still solid enough regardless, especially when overseen by the pawns on top of the kiosk. This forces the enemy to play carefully, and slows down their approach if they don’t want to be met with a wall of buckshot. I’m not entirely sold on the destruction of seating keeping the general public at bay, if anything it forces them all to stand and makes it easier for the enemy to mingle with them, but as stated the vigilance of nearby Pawns keeps this from being a dealbreaker.

The Queen’s Gambit plan comes off as inapplicable; I cannot see a reason why the enemy would look to disguise themselves as a pawn when Silas controls them, he can instantly spot a fake and would serve as a very dangerous waste of time for them to even attempt. Disguising a pawn, however, is not a bad idea at all. I wish that part of the plan was followed through with instead, it could have forced the enemy to do counter-espionage of their own.

The spawn times of the guards as well as the overall timeline of the plan is kept pretty vague throughout, which makes picturing just how much of his army Silas has access to at any given time a bit difficult. Assuming competency, I do think he keeps himself properly layered against approach quite well at all parts of the match. I do see things coming to a slow, gradual end as opposed to a big ‘gotcha’ moment here, as the Castling plan at the end does take a pretty sizable assumption that Silas will see the attack that would Retire him coming in order to counter it. The enemy team has no reason to be so blatant, and once finally close enough to the old man to Retire him will likely give no chance to respond. Still, a stalemate very much favors Silas given the network he has very effectively set up. If he does end up Castled to the roof, it becomes a pure turtling plan until the enemy is eventually caught out.

A little straightforward and a bit predictable for my taste, but undeniably effective. CARC gives a solid demonstration of map awareness and logistical application throughout, only marred by a few minor issues here and there that are largely dependent on the enemy’s interaction with their established presence. Silas himself comes through with the writing well enough, though I hoped  to see a little more flair with his own theoretical mastery of such a situation. A solid *Seven*.

DMR

Mary wastes no time getting to work, which is good because given their enemy’s intent to scale and observe the entire map, she’s working on a time limit. The faster and quieter she can get to Silas the better, and I think there’s great arguments here for both of those points.

The strat does make some assumptions on how Pawns approach, though I can see it being more of a vehicle to explain how engagements are handled than an actual series of planned events. There’s some fantastic use of aggro manipulation and positioning to justify keeping herself out of harms way: breaking line of sight as frequently as possible using bags of flour, the everpresent NPCs, and the structures provided on the map. If they can’t identify the target they can’t attack it, and through cycling disguises constantly Mary keeps this a truth throughout. The Lancy Cycle is both an effective defensive tool and an approach tool in one, giving her the edge on approach assuming she can keep inconspicuous enough to keep the heat low.

She is quick to be lost in the crowd, but wisely slow to approach her ultimate target. With so many guns trained in her direction, patience is needed to find an opening and act on it without risking being perforated in the process. Smart application of both the stand ability and her own skills justify such an opening quite well; I really like the idea of posing as the enemy himself and messing with guards to get the heat turned on him, splitting the attention he desperately needs to keep focused on Mary. This only ramps in severity the more he dares to act on the area in his search as more and more civilians are disturbed or otherwise put on edge. I’m not sure if the ‘make them fight themselves’ plan is worth the inherent risk, but as a desperation play I think it effectively shores up her own midding offensive potential against the Guards themselves should the need arise. The faked voice play is much more believable, though one that likely can’t be repeated that many times once pulled off. General misdirection using collected phones is undeniably clever, and further stretches the enemy’s attention to the point of a mistake happening is almost inevitable. Huge fan of the Check-ov’s Mate both as a final one-up and as a great pun.

Overall, Mary’s plan is setting up their enemy for failure and punishing them accordingly. She knows that everyone on the map is a suspect to the enemy, and leverages that paranoia very well with constant movement, disguise changes, and misdirection to argue their way into an opening very well. The more narrative-driven style lends itself to easy reading, and does a great job painting Mary as a character. A bit more consideration of the enemy’s own specific positioning and anti-turtling efforts could have easily pushed this into an extremely high score, but as is deserves a very respectable Eight.


JUDGE ROCKET

CARC

This is a matchup that, conceptually, I think is a really fun exercise. The scaling minion-mancer with a fragile master vs the master of disguise with limited offensive options. Both force the other to play in ways that they normally could forsake and for the most part I think both players do a good job of addressing each other.

Starting with Silas I am impressed with what you guys were able to make happen here. I feel like you did an excellent job of considering your opponent and working to deny her resources without overstepping your capability. Your surveillance network is solidly put together, and your unit choice is solid. However the pragmatism that makes this strategy solid is also to a degree its biggest weakness.

Put simply, the strat lacks the kind of creative flair that we have seen from other strategies. There are aspects of the higher tier pieces kits that could have been more strongly focused on to create more effective combo moves, and at points it feels like your combat, especially with an opponent this slippery, feels a little handwaved, and better utilizing tools like the AOE fire from rooks and the queen along with coordinating shots from bishops in their vantage points would have been great tools for guaranteeing more hits against an especially slippery opponent.

However, I think that your counterplay and core game plan is strong and this should give you a nice base to work off of going into any future matches you may have. Keep working to maximize the admittedly high potential of a kit like this and I think that we could see something special. As is, a decent *7/10* seems more than fair here.

DMR

Moving on to Mary, I was not exactly sure how you would handle a matchup like this, but your expression of the core of your kit is impressively done here. I think that your early game is well considered, and your plans for slipping away from individual units and mitigating damage are both well conceived and executed.

Beyond that, the level of evasiveness that you are able to achieve with this kit is incredibly impressive! Oftentimes narrative can be seen as being a break from mechanics. However, the way that your narrative sections before your disguise heavy tech section sets things up perfectly really sells just how effective they can be. Beyond that, your plans for dipping in and out of stealth and tracking opposing pieces and using less dangerous ones to mitigate the harm that more dangerous pieces like the rooks can do was well executed.

Ultimately, I feel like you guys did a really solid job! There are some moments that I think stretch the power of your stand body a bit, but past that I really have no complaints. When there are few to no complaints and plenty to praise, a solid 8/10 feels more than fair.


JUDGE BLUE

CARC

Silas, fittingly, plays this game much as one would a game of chess.

The name of the game here is Logistics, and in that regard your strategy exudes that in spades. Your broader plan lives and breathes this - you aim to winnow down Mary’s resources in the form of guards and the ambient crowd she can utilize for cover, maximialize upon your Logistics by way of superior positioning and troop dispersal such that any engagement Mary takes into you is a losing one where she is ground into paste against your superior fighting force. The Planning on display here is strong and integrates into your Narrative bits well - the chess analogies are delightful.

Working from the strengths I think you do impressive work towards securing your position, taking the guards out and locking down the northern gate demonstrate strong Competency/Counterplay in establishing your defense. From this position you essentially work to make the approach all the harder as you stall for time and tighten the noose. I don’t ultimately have too much to say here since a lot of your fortification attempts are baseline, competent and well-conceived, working to set the stage to your advantage. The Logistics inherent to how you manage troops  What stands out to me then, is everything that revolves around it.

I worry your strategy is a hint too overconfident in its ability to successfully monitor and surveil Mary when she isn’t actively making a move. While your opening with the whiskey is clever there is a sensation that tactics 5 and B pre alone will suffice to tighten the noose entirely around her, and while they’ll go quite the distance there’s very little present in the strategy in the form of catching Mary out. The kiosk, while a strong vantage, still has to contend with the fact that the Watchmen are dealing with a build tailor made for vanishing like a puff of smoke into a crowd, and are ultimately working from one vantage point in a stage filled with multiple areas of interest, blocks to line of sight, and a constantly rotating cast of NPCs to keep track of. I would’ve liked to have seen stronger efforts towards monitoring the stage and tracing Mary’s movements for the level of confidence you have you’ll be able to find her.

There are, of course, your ‘tricks’, but these are both traps that must be primed rather than active surveillance, and traps which run into a deeper issue: if they work not enough has been done in your strategy for me to be convinced that Mary couldn’t in theory vanish into stealth afterwards. The strength of your strategy here is in turn its greatest weakness, you focus so much on securing your position that you have little in the way of lockdown should Mary be caught out or exposed *outside* of it. There seems to be a sense that once pieces have their awareness honed on her she won't be able to escape from that position, at least not without serious losses, which doesn’t necessarily follow given you’ve not done the necessary work to set up punishes for these hypothetical slip ups that don’t extend beyond “send these pieces to target her” - which runs into the core issue that Mary is very well-suited to give such efforts the slip. The disguised piece is perhaps the one exception, but given how fluid this target can be and her own analytical prowess I’d have wanted to see more effort in setting it in its prime position.

The castle trap itself is rather strong! Whilst I feel your play around the stealth game was altogether lacking the combat tech on display here is rather cunning. I like the management of the forces on display here, and the teleport towards the Kiosk’s roof is choice. Once again Logistics is king within your work, and this is an impressive demonstration of them.

Nevertheless my score will ultimately end up being a high **5**, I think your defensive play overall is strong and establish a really solid win condition of swarming her with numbers after a misstep in the stealth game, but that how you played *around* that stealth inofitself left a lot to be desired. You fortified your position, but did not take that step further to create a significant enough threat to Mary’s stealth abilities to compellingly argue that she’d be all that threatened by your surveillance, which in turn compromises your stage control.

DMR

This is an interesting strategy! The planning on displayed here is multi-layered in a way that’s fitting to the conceit of this matchup, aiming to disengage and vanish within the crowd, using those very evasive maneuvers to eventually set up the lynchpin of your victory in the form of a baited Castle sequenced into a faked death assassination. This represents both a cromulent and interesting scheme to bait the tactician into his own demise, one that in execution I feel bores out to be entertainingly faithful to the conceit of her character.

Starting with the former, the Competency inherent to how Mary handles her stealth play is incredibly well-conceived. I have minor foibles with the assumption that flour of all things would be in an airport kiosk but what remains is a smart, tight usage of her strengths. The juking game in the kiosk makes a strong argument for her early evasion, with your Lacny Cycle and the various means within creating multiple scenarios where it’s easy to imagine this match stalling out incredibly in a vacuum, all conveyed with a strong sense of both Elegance and Narrative panache. This, however, leads to a broader question that your strategy openly acknowledges: “if Holland wants to achieve her goals” she’s going to need to take risks. The question remains of how.

This where Perpetual Check comes in to shine, the individual skirmishing plans are all baseline competent but where the section starts to truly shine is in her management of handling group combat, the approach of ‘thinning the herd’ to embrace a small, controlled swarming in order to cull numbers is a very clever approach and furthers the Technical Understanding of her kit demonstrated in her opening. Zugzwang whilst a deeply clever play raises one executional question to me: how did she record the sounds in the first place? If she’s mimicking Silas loudly enough for the voice to carry then he would have presumably heard her create the recordings - which for me is a flaw in Competency that could’ve been better prepared for. Regardless Zugzwang is a Creative use of Counterplay to your opposition once initiated, a setup that slots perfectly with your passive, drifting style of play.

Where I feel your work suffers is in what comes after. You present a strong narrative for Silas’ defeat and a method that in isolation works, but could’ve done with some flexibility in execution. While you can guarantee that Silas is going to castle if and when your phone play succeeds, you do not know the circumstances into which he *would* castle, or what weapons/techniques he’d apply in warding you off should you assault him in that window. For as strong as the Narrative here on display is I think your strategy needed a stronger, more flexible plan to ‘finish him off’ than what was presented. Scholar’s Mate as presented is perfect, but if you had a tighter, more cohesive plan for how you handled that skirmish beforehand you could’ve convinced me and the reader how Silas either shoots Mary ‘’’dead’’’ then and there or just gets defeated outright, which in turn would make for much more convincing work towards the establishment of your victory: even if she doesn’t get her big trick off, he’s still in check. As things are, you leave too much to the air - even if Mary gets shot it’s uncertain on if she’ll be in position to take her potshot at Silas for instance.

For as successful as you are at manipulation and espionage I feel just a little bit more work could have been invested towards finishing things off, regardless what’s demonstrated here presents a really well-conceived approach to a style of strategy we don’t see often in tourney. Accordingly I’m going to give this a high **7**. While it is held back by the issues listed above what is on display here is nevertheless a plan rich in Creativity, Narrative and clever Counterplay that aims to be evocative of the very show that inspired this OCT format. I have to give my applause accordingly, you did good! I think a stronger finish to your strategy and better means to force Silas’ hand to your favor accordingly throughout the match could have easily pushed my score to a higher point grade, but what remains is still an impressive work!