by laughingcavalier on Tue Sep 17, 2013 9:09 am
Oooooh I do like this discussion. There is so much fun to be had splitting hairs over who is the best player which I guess is why we like to get out our spoddy-books and size up the folks we played against as legends, just a little of whose glory may rub off on our own tawdry records of gameplaying.
Of course Bruce and Mr C are wrong as usual. Oh there have been enough things said in this thread to tease out a few sensible pointers from them, but they miss the essence. I can tell them precisely who is the best player of all time ā yes, peeps, all time ā for we have seen the greatest CC players ever, and their like shall not be seen again.
There are only two things which a CC champion must have to be considered for the title greatest:
First, time. Ticktock countdown hours minutes weeks days: TIME.
Ever notice how josko made his name playing unlimited games on big maps, where you must be able to switch on long minutes, hours even, for the optimum distribution of attack and reinforcement of great numbers of troops over the critical first turns? How CoF made his name in clan wars, where five, ten, twenty games start at once, each taking determined thought & concentration to pull your team through, following the pattern of a game carefully move by move so that each new development is assimilated into a coherent plan? How King_Herpes who was once so fearsome and feared on many maps and in multiple fora is but a stripey shadow of his former self with hardly the strength to boot anyoneās butt? We clear-thinking strategical sequential types may mock the button mashers for their willingness to get up in the night, but let us be honest each point we have gained has been bought with precious minutes paid out to consideration of the options. I know Iām better than some of my team-mates precisely because they come to play in 2 minutes and rush on to the next game. I know Iām not the player I was because I have tried to ration my time here to managebale levels. I know I will never have the reputation I want because like so many others, there are great lacunae in my playing habits where events in real life compel me to rush a turn or skip a commentā¦ The champion, let us be clear has demands and conflictions of his own with Sweet Awesome Tempus who dogs his every mouseclick, but he has a determination and an ability and a freedom to give the time needed to playing the perfect game, and to playing enough of those perfect games to count.
And it is the power of Time that assures us we will never again see someone who can be called the greatest. Why? Oh curse Big Wham and his implementations, curse the incontinence of the mapmakers, curse those fools in the suggestions forum whittering on about improvementsā¦ Have you not stopped to consider what it means to those of us who want to prove our manhood here? You are too prolific, you have spawned such multifarious ways of playing this game that no one person can ever possibly, even with a HighlanderAttack level of addiction, master them all. More and more we shall be pushed into silos, climbing laboriously to the top of whichever rickety tower we choose while we look out across the fog trench manual 12-player freestyle Spanish Armada divide to all those other towers out there that other players are climbing beyond our reach. Compare me with someone atop that dungpile there? How dare you? There was a time perhaps the game had few enough variations to say assuredly someone was best across enough of them to count, that time is gone. No-one after today can be called the greatest any more.
And, second, the other definitive attribute of the greatest players of all time: REPUTATION.
Let us be clear here, we are not voting for the best ever, we are choosing the most-admired ever. And how do you get to be admired. It simply wonāt happen, Messieurs. Mesdames, if you do not stand up, push your head above the parapet, say: āHERE I AM. Look at me. Now. And again. And stop looking the other way. Now.ā Josko and CoF, for example, I sincerely believe they are very great players. But regard how much their reputation is built on their personae, the long hours spent by us all following the twists and turns of their feud, their wit and their wisdom and their crankiness and calumny shared with us in the forums, the private messages sent to friends and team-mates and acquaintances, the way they lead within games. Herpes --ļ who would have thought anyone so good at clicking mouses could be such a great and entertaining figure? What anyone, let alone what Conqueror could match his inspired lunacy? Who ever pulled off the annoying brat with such mastery? For every mug he creamed on mogul there was an outrageous bon mot to put it from our minds. Poomaker? Here, and it is a beautiful thing, we look to the venerations offered by Bruce and by Code and the like ā he does not have to be the loudest because others will speak loudly for him. But what of those who play with great skill and dedication, quiet within the confines of their own teams and circles? What of them? I donāt know. I donāt know if they are the greatest. Because I donāt know them or their reputation. There is no way I can measure them because they simply have not reached the starting post of fame-on-CC which is the place from where the race for greatest is won. However good their play, they are simply not in the race.
And so the greatest? I have mentioned some names, those who spring to my mind immediately as candidates from those who have been called to attention beforeā¦ but one name outstrips them all. And do not think I count on such mundanity as tactics or strategy or diversity of skills, which considerations might promote another to challenge for his title. No, there is one man who above all conquered time and conquered our minds. Yes, of course I speak of blitzaholic. Did he have family? Did he work? Did he have friends? Did he have hobbies? None that might distract from his prolific playing and speaking and organising of the game. But the time he gave was nothing beside his dedication of spirit. In blitz there was no irony, no doubt, no pausing over intent or methods, no digression from the one true discourse, no dallying with unpurposed pleasantries or formless chat, no break for a moment in the mask, there was only pure unadulterated commitment to the creation, frankly, of a CC machine that lived here in hyperspace with one intent and one purpose only, a purpose, most assuredly to be ā and that purpose achieved ā the greatest on CC.
