Rabican, the Eternal Champion

[ChrisP]

Rabican, the highest scoring player to first defeat all five difficulty levels on Mazzarin's Demise VI, is hereby knighted Project Magma's Eternal Champion! Even when the age of Myth has passed, let Rabican's name be remembered as legend: a warrior whose skill, determination and leadership could surmount the most difficult obstacles. When speaking of the utterly impossible, say "That would be a challenge for Rabican".

Congratulations also to CRC, the close runner-up who has also achieved victory on all five difficulty levels.

A download package of all of Rabican's winning films will soon be made available. A short Quicktime movie of Rabican's Mazzarin's Demise VI ventures is also planned.

Finally, to honor the Eternal Champion, the "key" to the Secret Level (SL) is hearby revealed.

Step 1: Once the game begins, taunt with the Electromancer.

Step 2: Wait a second or two and then taunt with the second Squire on the left.

You may taunt with Mazzarin to auto-distribute before or after steps 1 and 2, but not inbetween. Do not attempt to taunt with any other units until after you have completed step 2. Any deviation from these instructions will result in the total imminent annihilation of all player units.

Although the first Eternal Champion has been knighted, the Mazzarin's Demise VI contest and ranking will continue. As Eternal Champion, Rabican has been granted 100 bonus points (20 to each difficulty category) and CRC, who completed all five difficulty levels at the same time, has been awarded 50 bonus points (10 to each difficulty category). Also, the following new rules now apply:

1. Scoring for Mazzarin's Demise VI will continue as before. Please refer to the Guide included with the plugin for specifics.

2. Only games played on version 2 (v.2) may qualify for new points.

3. Victories on Mazzarin's Demise SL qualify for double points, including 10 bonus points for each player on the first team to win each individual difficulty level.

4. Should a player win a given difficulty on Mazz SL prior to winning on the regular map, they will still earn full double points for that victory, however, any subsequent wins on that difficulty on Mazz VI will only earn 10% points. In other words, if you want to earn full points, make sure you win on the regular map difficulty before you win on SL difficulty.

5. A cap of 700 points is the limit a player can score on any given difficulty.

6. When and if any player achieves a total of 3,000 or more points, the contest will be permanetly over and the score board frozen for posterity. The player will with the most points at this time will be the new, and final, Eternal Champion.

[WazzaMouse]

gratz

[GodzFire]

Rabican, the highest scoring player to first defeat all five difficulty levels on Mazzarin's Demise VI, is hereby knighted Project Magma's Eternal Champion! Even when the age of Myth has passed, let Rabican's name be remembered as legend: a warrior whose skill, determination and leadership could surmount the most difficult obstacles. When speaking of the utterly impossible, say "That would be a challenge for Rabican".

There must be pizza nearby, because something's VERY cheesy.

Does that mean he gets use of the company car?

[:) Da Cid (: McCl]

Hmm, I thought the key would be like a tag set that you put into Myth so... I dunno. Having to do this wacky key combination on every multiplayer game will become annoying.

-TGP-

[The Elfoid]

Rabican has been Myth's official champion since 2001 guys. Pretty much anybody would say he's been in the top three players since then (Rab, Tirri/Drizzt and Chohan)

[Doobie]

obviously you haven't played against me...

[A-Red]

Are the Legendary win films uploaded anywhere?

[The Elfoid]

obviously you haven't played against me...

At TFL I'm sure you' both both of us

[Enculator]

i saw rabicanp losing mazz to a spider !

[Soulblaster]

CONGRATS Rabs! Well done bud

[Oroboros]

Well done, Rabz. And, in anticipation of defeating the not-so-secret level, GJ.

I think there is a remaining challenge, however. I find myself thinking this way...

In the days of Mazz 2, a serious bug prevented teams larger than 6 gathering to play. But that didn't stop the game from being played and eventually beaten - It just defined a plugin dimension.

I accept the Mazz VI original release candidate contained a serious flaw. But I have yet to see proof that the flaw prohibits (that's COMPLETELY AND IRREVOCABLY DENIES) a win. So far, all I've seen is people say they're found a bug and because it exists, it's unwinnable.

Perhaps the original release candidate IS winnable. It just requires a new way to play around it. I wonder if CP would consider modifiers to the scores of Mazz 6 Original winners.

-Oro

[Baron LeDant]

Yes its very likely to be winnable, however playing a dozen games to be lucky enough to not be affected by the bug is not my idea of fun.

Its a pure dice roll to me

[buckweaver]

I think you'd just have to spot and web dragons quickly before they had a chance to breath.

If one gets a chance to breath..gg prolly.

Modifying the scoring would have little outcome on the current leaderboard, since no team defeated Heroc or higher with v1.

[Oroboros]

Yes its very likely to be winnable, however playing a dozen games to be lucky enough to not be affected by the bug is not my idea of fun.

True, but that's not really the point. Mazz games have elements of fun, sure, but since version 4 Mazz games have been more about discipline and drilling. Fun takes a backseat anyway if the goal is to win the game.

Here's what would have probably happened if CP had decided to let the bug stand:

1) people would play, hit heroic, and discover the bug.

2) People would stop playing Mazz cos they'd identify that being Eternal Champion would take a lot longer that they have the patience for. There would be finger pointing, blame laid, and the players would once again massage their own egos by saying "It was impossible, cos of the bug."

3) People would occasionally talk about it, and think of new strategies. Rather than try to win, they'd experiment with new tactics. Play around with the map.

4) They'd probably find a way around it. It might take weeks, possibly months, but with the pressure of trying to be first off their shoulders (cos bugger-all people are going for it anyway), they could learn new game tactics.

5) Word would get out that there's a way around it. People would start playing Mazz again.

6) An eternal champion would still rise.

This is Myth guys, remember? Chain Lightning? Marching soulless off the map? CK? Clumping? No Blood? Screwy pathfinding? This game had persistent bugs riddled through it. Sure, lots of the bugs have been squashed now, but back in the day we kept playing it, knowing it had bugs. We found ways around them.

What we know is, the Mazz bug was fixed, and the champ was determined two days from the fix. No discredit to the winners - it's a tough game, and it takes disciplined minds to win Mazz. However, now we have technologies that allow us to do more than what the game is designed for - We have chat-clients running in the background. Some people can be in the same room while playing online. The ability to play better is being aided significantly by non-Myth technologies.

I suggest that the Dragon-breath bug is a skill-leveller that combats this extra level of communciation >:-]

-Oro

[ChrisP]

Watching the bug occur in films, I have to agree with Dante; the bug is too random for it to be any fun to try to overcome with skill. More importantly, at least to me, is that's not how the map was designed to be played.

I'll also state that Normal through Legendary on SL have not been beat yet. Normal will be soon enough, I'm sure. Heroic... maybe. Legendary, though, is going to stay a challenge for a while.