R3M11 Quality Delibs

Judge Innsmouth (Arch)

We have a monstrous battle ahead, with two combatants going head-to-head in a fairly straightforward brawl. Lucil Caravan from the Gallery of Wayward Reverie vs Steric Lou Faerin of PINDROP. With either opponent being an arm’s length away from taking the victory, it’s definitely a hard call to say who came out on top. Luckily, that’s not what we’re here to determine. How did they do?

Starting with Steric, he begins by observing his opponent diligently. He employs a more defensive, cautious strategy, taking advantage of the fact that Lucil will most likely need some set up before she begins her assault. Steric takes precautionary measures to limit her effectiveness in combat by destroying objects that he comes near, all the while keeping tabs on her whereabouts. It's a simple play, but a smart one all the same.

Once she does start her assault, Steric is prepared. He brightens his cloak to impair Lucil’s vision when she attacks from close quarters. He also makes an effort to use ‘hook spots’, like horns and protrusions to hook his khopesh onto, giving him the means to yank and pull her around during fights, further disorienting her. He also takes advantage of her tendency to avoid her left hand by targeting that weak spot, leading to an eventual amputation of that arm.

Overall, I’m going to give this strategy an 8! I think it offers a solid approach to an opponent who will be much quicker and harder to hit than you. It's a battle of attrition, and Steric has all the means to see it to the end. Well done!

Onto Lucil, she gets started straight away, crushing a rock into pebbles, swallowing said pebbles, and proceeding to crush any rock she sees into a pile of pebbles all throughout the beach. This move is not only pretty metal, but gives her the most amount of resources in the shortest window of time. Once she’s discarded everything that could slow her down, she proceeds to move towards her opponent, and doesn’t slow down once.

Lucil proceeds to use her prior setup to keep the pressure onto Steric at all times. Using a combination of dashes and full-body grappling, Lucil limits Sterics options for attack, while attacking with bites and slashes of her own to whittle down his defenses. When he does get a word in, she teleports to dodge, before teleporting once more to continue the assault. If he attempts to blind her, Lucil pushes that object away from them, limiting his own resources. Eventually, her attacks allow her to open a few wounds in the hunter, giving her an opportunity to slide a pebble into one of those wounds. This allows her unimpeded access to Steric, ending, funnily enough, in an amputation.

Overall, I’m going to give this strategy an 8! I think that it takes great advantage of Lucil’s disoriented state to just keep rushing her opponent, using instinct alone to take him on. It’s very efficient in what it sets out to do, and she executes it fantastically. Well done!

Judge Red Hook (Alpha)

Oh boy, it’s the monster mash! Or, the monster match? Eh, let’s break even and call it the monster mosh!

We’ll start with the first of the biggly bosses, the monsters of the week, the… I hate the rule of three, to be honest. We’re talking about The Caravan, which routinely stops at the Garden (of) Wearing Red!

The setup in this one is so fast you could blink and miss it, but it is incredibly efficient. So too is the teleport spam, the biting, the clawing, and of course, her left hand being fine.

I like the more narrative-driven feel to the mechanical side here, even discounting the ‘flavor’ sections, it feels very much in-character- and in that character’s voice- throughout the strat, which is often hard to accomplish without going full narrative.

The tactical approach within that narrative is also strong, with each beat, claw, bite, gnash and tear building up to the perfect ending for the strat that came before it.

Now, moving to People In Norway Drop Rocks On Pigeons, we have a bit of a similar opening, with early destruction of both the surrounding environment and the discarding of items on one’s person- though not as completely as Caravan before you, as it is worth mentioning solely because I haven’t yet- before moving in for the tactical wait.

The tactical wait also comes with tactical oversight, mainly in the watching, waiting, and BLINDING of your opponent. Parries, strikes, and other sword-based maneuvers abound, giving the air of a fencing competition, which is always fun in these trying times.

The exquisite use of sand as a BLIND source, to say nothing of constantly-bouncing chains present on the weapon itself, is an incredibly useful mechanical tool. The same can be said for exploiting the on-sheet left-side weakness of your opponent, which comes in doubly handy for this sort of setup.

Now, while I think Geese With Rocks had a stronger overall narrative flow, I think Penguins In Noticeable Distress Re-Open Pools has the edge in mechanics, but not strongly enough to give either the edge over the other. Ya both earned these **8**s.


Judge Dunwich (Snek)

Hello everyone! I just want to start off by saying thank you! I concepted this match back during the T6 Judge Challenge, and the moment I actually became a judge, I knew I had to make it real. Inspired by the fusion match, what I was hoping for when I made this match was character exploration, the ability to reach into the darkest parts of your characters’ psyches and make them manifest. Man, did both of you deliver! I can’t tell you how grateful I am.

In any case! On with the delibs! I will start with our Hunter. Your opening is strong, observing your opponent before rushing in, which makes sense for the way that Steric conducts himself as a hunter. Item denial continues to be a core part of your strategy, which makes sense given your opponent, and shows decent Planning. Your Logistics are decent as well, getting yourself in a few ideal positions to prepare for combat. The cloak glowing is also simple, but dependable. Perhaps I would have wanted you to pay more mind to how you get to these areas while being hindered, but you do have Counterplay for projectiles, and a beefy CQC section.

Here is where my first issue is, however. You say you’re going to track Caravan, but from what I can tell, you never really specify how. I know tracking is a capability of Phantom Disturbed, but I would have wanted you to be explicit about the fact that you’re tracking an item on her person (you cannot track her directly, due to the flashbang) and if so, which. This would also help bolster your move to observe her initially. You want to make sure you are clear about these things, instead of leaving the reader to guess. That being said, you immediately follow it up with some really solid combat! I love the way you use Phantom’s positioning to aid you, building off the earlier move to light up your cloak to aid flanking. Making combat as dangerous as possible for Caravan builds up your plan and compliments your denial efforts. Special shoutouts to the watch chain maneuver as well, this is the match for weaponizing sanity damage! Over all, this is a varied approach to close quarters fighting against a dangerous opponent.

You end off on a list of contingencies, which, while it feels a bit odd formatting wise, I understand why you didn’t break up the rest of your Narrative, and the contingencies are well thought out.

Overall, I thought this was quite a simple but gripping strategy that makes great use of your new kit against a terrifying beast. While not perfect, it’s still worthy of a low 8!

Now onto the Caravan! The initial clothing play is a clever way to keep the Hunter from tracking you. I also have no issue with her swallowing something to protect it–given the ‘within 1m’ condition for base objects, holding it was the most likely play. This is also the easiest object to procure and spread through the arena. This is pretty good planning, with moves like the Beachhead Blitz aiding your positioning.

Here we reach my issue with your strat though, as has already been pointed out. You undersold the effects of the disorientation that happens after teleports. Once again, it is good to be explicit about these things, rather than leaving us to fill in the gaps. Still, you don’t completely ignore this (the grapple/bite makes some sense as an instinctive maneuver), so it’s not a major issue. However, it does weaken your claims about your near instant attack speed when you don’t account for this debuff time after warping in.

The rest of the strategy remains solid! The grapple is a good way of Countering the Hunter’s own CQC attempts, and you elaborate on this with other attempts to punish use of his stand ability. Placing a pebble is also a clever little bit of Counterplay. Finally, you conclude by wrapping up your Narrative in a way that ends up wonderfully mirroring your Hunters! Overall, this strat is short and sweet. Perhaps more thought could have been given to covering your retreats or things like that, but this is overall very solid. Just as I had hoped! You also get a low 8.