The Video Game Draft Version 4.0: IT CAN STOP TIME! (Goooooooo Matches) - Winner: BaSSiL

Ha!

 

Oh, man, I thought I posted right after I saw Inty's post of surrender. Anyway. Yeah. Mos no doubt.

 

Championship Match

Richard Kopelle and His Therapy Buddys (3) vs. The Fall of Man (4)


1


Championship Match

Serge (Chrono Cross) vs. Gandrayda (Metroid) *prepared*


I'm definitely leaning Serge at the moment. Sway me?

 

Serge.

 

Nothing, eh? So yeah, Serge. Gan may be faster, but that seems to be about it. She just doesn't seem to be anything Serge can't handle. Difficult for him, sure, but well in hand.


Championship Match

Richard Kopelle and His Therapy Buddys (4) vs. The Fall of Man (4)


3's gonna be our second to last number.


Championship Match

Vivi Ornitier (FF IX) *prepared* vs. Gill (Street Fighter)


Another semi-toughie, but I gotta say I'm thinking Gill at the moment.

 

I'd say prep is extremely important here, as Vivi can start out with some of his best options and can have one of his more powerful spells ready. If he can keep this at a distance, which I think he can for a good while, he can keep Gill from being able to resurrect himself, and besides, I don't think Vivi would take kindly to seeing something like Gill resurrecting, and would probably cast a spell and interrupt the revival. I think the opening with the prep and Vivi's powerful spells will be enough to keep Gill offbalance from the start and overcome the severe strength and speed disadvantage.

 

I get what you're saying, but here are my preliminary thoughts on that stuff:

Knocking Gill out before he can pop back up is not at all easy. You've gotta be fast, fast, fast. Vivi's a lot of things, but fast really isn't one of them. Assuming he can even beat Gill down to the point where he needs to revive himself, it's going to be extremely tough for someone like Vivi to cast and toss a spell in there before Gill can do his thing. It's troublesome enough for people a good deal faster than Vivi.

But again, that's assuming it even gets that far. Power-wise, is Vivi really any more powerful than Gill? As his ending shows when he casually splits the sea, the scope of Gill's power is quite clearly way, way above what it appears to be in the actual gameplay. His ice attacks are almost certainly just as good, but possibly even better than any of Vivi's. Same deal with his fire attacks, one of which is very Meteor-esque. So are Vivi's Meteor, Flare or Doomsday spells even the most powerful attacks in the match? It's tough to say. Because those meteors aren't Gill's best attack by a longshot. That Seraphim Wing dingy is pretty ridiculous, even in the gameplay. Can't even really imagine what it'd be like if we ever saw what it could really do.

Of course, Vivi would have advantages with the prep. Auto-life is kinda like Gill's thing, except auto-life is a one-shot deal and only brings Vivi back to the point of being almost dead, whereas Gill's refreshes him completely. Auto-reflect would be another useful one, without a doubt. But I think Gill might catch on pretty quick and just stick to the physical stuff for the most part, and of course Vivi's no match whatsoever there. And somehow I kinda doubt reflect's effectivness when it comes to the Seraphim Wing.

So while I definitely think it's an interesting match, I'm really having a hard time seeing Vivi win by himself. In fact... might as well just make this my judgment for now. Though I'm not really closed off to a flop, I guess.

Winner: Gill

 

Ok. Gill.

 

Hurry up so the next draft can start!

 

Oh. Didn't even see the second judgment.


Championship Match

Richard Kopelle and His Therapy Buddys (4) vs. The Fall of Man (5)


And 5 is going to be our last number called. And it looks like a good one. Teams? Or a champion right here?


Championship Match

Samus Aran (Metroid) vs. Vayne Caradus Solidor (FF XII)

 

Ah, good ole Vayne. Vayne who doesn't get his best form due to it being a "team" up with Venat.

No, that would be the only chance Vayne would have in this match. Would be to have Venat. And even then he relies on the buffs of his opponent being magical in nature and not technologically based. So he won't be able to deshield Samus, or any other of other status removing spells he would use then. SO, sure, Samus wouldn't be able to attack for about a minute or two when he put up barriers, but she's fast enough and durable enough to get away and stay healthy until his physical barriers are dropped.

But that's against Vayne The Undying. The Vayne Samus is facing is most certainly going to be Vayne Novus. Who was failed by freaking Vaan. VAAN. Yeah, Samus is powerful enough, fast enough, and durable enough to lay a beating down on Vayne while he's basically going berserk. I don't even think Vayne Novus used slowga or anything to that nature, I'd have to hook up the PS2 and find out. But he's not going to like this fight very much, because everything he had over the party in XII, is over him from the start in this one. Except for magic, of course, but Samus doesn't need magic.

So, yeah, a decent fight against the Undying is completely obvious when Vayne is reduced to simply Novus.

 

Don't hold your breath for an argument from me. I've never played FF XII and the last time I played with Samus was on the NES (and the gameboy rerelease of the same game) ... hardly her prime. Though if it is, Vayne takes this one.

But ... I think Vayne should take this because I don't wanna argue teams, and BaSSiL already has a few draft wins, and this would be my first.

 

I don't think vayne can overpower her, so I will vote for Samus.

 

Okay, before I vote, I gotta clear some things up. First off, I'm at a disadvantage here. I never finished FFXII. Never even came close, actually. Dunno why exactly, because I remember really liking it. Probably because I got my 360 when I was in the middle of it and it got pushed aside. Whoops.

But anyways, the vids are available. And so I look at someone playing out the Vayne Novus boss fight. Then I look your comments. Then I look at the video again. And then the comments again.

... Are we talking about the same Vayne Novus here? Because something's not jiving. He got beat by Vaan alone? When? The vids I've seen all show him getting taken down by a full party. And though he seems easy in a couple of them, some comments suggest that the parties are quite overpowered.

Also, I'm looking at some of his moves, and then I'm looking back at comments like Samus is going to lay a beating on him and that he's not powerful enough or whatever, and I'm like, "Really? Huh.". I'm sitting here trying to think of anyone that Samus has beaten that's as powerful as Vayne Novus and I'm coming up with an absolute blank. Except for maybe Mother Brain and her hyper beam. But of course, that was really the metroid did the bulk of the work in that fight, was it? As I recall, Samus got her ass utterly handed to her by the hyper beam, the metroid swooped in, temporarily incapacitated MB, used the energy to heal up a near-dead Samus and got killed in the process of giving Samus the hyper beam. Then Samus finished up a now hyper beam-less MB.

But maybe there's something I'm missing here on account of not having played the game. So, uhhhh... really? Sure, Vayne isn't as fast. Neither was MB.

 

I was talking about the end scene, I couldn't remember if it was Larsa or Vaan. But the final blow was by one of them. And, sure, it was a whole party, but it wasn't like it was too hard a fight at all. In the cutscene, none of the party seems any worse for wear and Vayne is just drained completely, which is why he needs Venat. Yeah, he takes a good two swords through the chest before he's completely drained. Sure, one is after Larsa did something to him, but he was weakening there at the end anyway, otherwise Gabranth wouldn't have had the chance he did.

I just rewatched the fight. Yeah, he relies mainly on his army of flying swords, none of which ever move faster than anything Samus has ever fought. He doesn't really gain any protection (aside from plot) when he flies up for his big attacks, and he only uses them in desperation. And, even then, they are SLOW. Especially his first big attack. Nothing that morph ball Samus can't dodge. Same with the swords, she's going to be zipping around faster than anything he's seen, popping up and hitting him with weaponry he can't know about, and then going back and zipping around again. She may get hit a couple times, but then she's going to understand the flow of the battle because she was trained in battle tactics. This isn't as easy as I made it, but Vayne is too slow, even in his powerful attacks, to really hit her enough to defeat her. Samus is ranged, she isn't going to get in close, meaning all he has is his desperation attacks and his swords. Both of which are dodgeable in varying degrees of difficulty. Vayne's true damage dealing comes in melee and he's simply too slow to force Samus into that. Especially if the battlefield isn't that cramped platform.


EDIT: And about overpowered parties. I defeated Novus with a severly underleveled party. And we weren't but half dead. Sure, Undying kicked my arse, but Novus I actually found the easiest to deal with, IIRC.

 

Okay, so I've wavered on this for way too long, and I'm not starting up another full playthrough of yet another long RPG just for one decision. I'm... gonna have to go with Samus. Primarily because of the speed and because I do think her armor is tough enough to take at least several really rough hits. But that said, I just want it noted that I'm not all that comfortable with this judgment. And that's irking the hell out of me, as it's a really crucial one.

Winner: Samus



Championship Match

Richard Kopelle and His Therapy Buddys (5) vs. The Fall of Man (5)


And that's going to bring us to one last team battle for all the marbles.


Championship Match

KOS-MOS, Samus Aran, Shion Uzuki, Eiko Carol, Zack Fair, Tir McDohl, Raziel, Roxas, Shadow, Wu the Lotus Blossom, Jubei Yagyu, Vivi Ornitier, Dawn of Dreams and Serge vs. Kefka, Kratos, Saix, Vayne Caradus Solidor, Onaga, Zeal, Thrall, Magus' Goons, Justice, Dalton, Gandrayda, Ganondorf, Gill and Zeon

 

Come on and end this people

 

You guys still there?

 

Championship Match

KOS-MOS, Samus Aran, Shion Uzuki, Eiko Carol, Zack Fair, Tir McDohl, Raziel, Roxas, Shadow, Wu the Lotus Blossom, Jubei Yagyu, Vivi Ornitier, Dawn of Dreams and Serge vs. Kefka, Kratos, Saix, Vayne Caradus Solidor, Onaga, Zeal, Thrall, Magus' Goons, Justice, Dalton, Gandrayda, Ganondorf, Gill and Zeon[/b]



I hate judging a close match like this. There's just so much going on here. I think that Gill adds a bit of punch to the back end of Inty, but so does Serge and Vivi. I can't see anywhere that either team really falters, and that's tough. The one thing I like about Bart's team, well, two things, is what appears to be better cohesion, and a bit more tech power. But, really, that's kind of the same thing as magic power. There's tons of support and offense for both sides. I think that Inty's team has more area attacks. But overall, I think the top end of Bart has more oomph. There's no end to skill anywhere, and I am just really finding it hard to pick a winner. I wish I could see it play out. I don't know, I think Bart's team could pull out a close one, although that's going to be very difficult. With KOS at the top though, I think they can handle it.

 

Good call it in favor of them then

 

Son of a... I was originally waiting on me getting a really good chunk of time to give this match a nice, detailed judgment that a final team battle like this deserves, but somewhere along the way this draft just packed up its bags and left my mind in the middle of the night without even saying goodbye. Apologies for that. This thing should've been over at least a week ago, if not sooner.

So anyways, I don't actually have all that much time right now, but since it's gone on too long, a quickie's gonna have to do.

The real bottom line here in this match, when you strip away all the rest of the bull**** that I could write an essay on, is that cohesion costs the Fall of Man the match. In the end, that's what does it. Power is real close (and they might even have an overall edge there), and it's going to be a total classic. But... yeah, the cohesion, while far from the worst I've ever seen, is not very good on that team. Thrall and Gandrayda aren't even villains, but then there are also just a good chunk of them that simply aren't team players at all, including the two most powerful characters. And that right there is never, ever good.

Wouldn't be so bad if there was a strong leader present, but I don't see one. Especially since, on a villain team, your leader had better be the most powerful (or really close to it) or it's just not going to work. Kratos could work... if he gave the first crap about anyone besides himself or his fellow Spartans.

Anyways, BaSSiL's team keeps it real close in overall power and skill and such, and then they're just so much more cohesive on top of that. And there are a couple of solid potential leaders in there, like Zack and Tir. And that's what wins it for them after you factor in everything else.

Winner: Richard Koepelle and His Therapy Buddys


So that's that. Congrats on the win, BaSSiL. And nice almost-win, Inty.

 

Great game, Inty.

And I'm sad to see this go on hiatus. This was one of my favorite drafts, but I agree that the sheer amount of duty given to the judges and to the GMs in regards to giving an accurate judgment is just ridiculous. I'm just glad I was able to win outside of comics, finally.

EDIT: I just realized that the first time I won comics was its 4th game as well.

 

Congrats, BaSSiL!!

If anyone would like to host the next installment of the draft when it's up again, please PM EF or me.

 

Congratulations, BartSimpson-SithLord!

 

Congrats, BaSSiL.

Even my draft teams act like Cleveland sports teams!

Wait till next year, I guess.

[image=http://themushroomkingdom.net/images/mkdd/mkdd_wario_waluigi.jpg]

Wario get you next time!