A Tactical Good Time

This video was shot by Eric Anderson using a camera mounted on his Stryfe. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then what is a video? In a nutshell, this video shows you the many elements of what I look to bring together in Tactical Ops: team work, communication, dispersed but co-ordinated movement, intense locations and good old shooting fun. That Eric was able to capture all of it in one clip that is less than a minute long is amazing to me.

 Ben and I had a nice turn out of about 24/25 people for the game, with people coming from different parts of the bay area and even from outside of it. Ben lead the Spec Ops Force (SOF) and I facilitated the Insurgents. With everyone settled and the teams selected, we headed down into the heart of the UCSF campus and into the gaming area. In the first mission, we revisited the Meth Lab location, with the SOF having to clear the area completely for victory: clearing means no players are actively defending the area, because they're either dead, stunned or fleeing. In Meth Lab, the SOF were unable to take the area, but this time around they were able to do so in about 10-15 minutes. I missed the definitive action, where SOF, with Trevor and Ben in the lead, pretty much came in and shot everyone at the same time, as I was talking to a police officer. Someone in the area had already called the cops on us, but when I talked to him he said "Its just Nerf guns? Yeah, I don't care about that." He proceeded to admit that it looked "pretty fun" and that he himself used to play paintball with his friends. He told us to have fun and left, but by then everyone was dead.

In the second mission, with their communications network severed, the Insurgents had to do a manual lockdown of the area. This was both figurative and literal: we had to find and open a series of bike locks then take them to a drop off point. Since we lost the lost round, we only had 25 minutes to do this.

We didnt even get the first lock, but we had a couple of nice shoot outs. Down 0-2, we took a break to get organized for the next mission. In between Missions 2 and 3 was something I was looking forward to. When we first started planning the game, I was determined to somehow make two people fight with knives. It took a little while to figure out the context and motivations for said knife fight, but once squared away I awaited it greatly. It did not disappoint as we formed a circle around Arthur and Zac (who I know from playing with down in the San Jose area), Beat It style, with them swinging foam blades at each other. Zac was victorious and earned the SOF an advantage in the next round.

The above video is from the Hostage Rescue mission, taking place in a UCSF parking garage and was the center piece of the game. Is it my most frequently requested mission and location by far. When it looked like a Hostage Rescue might going down, Trevor's eyes lit up and he asked "Is it happening?" I replied "Its happening" and from the video footage, once can see that it definitely happened.

I was the hostage last time, so Eric had brought a little Yoda doll to act as a stand in. Seeing this,  Ben said he would stand in so I could play, staying where we placed him and taking pictures of the action. It took a few minutes for the SOF to make contact, which I spent anxiously covering a stairwell. Once we did make contact, it was pretty much like that video for the whole time, with some moments way more intense then others.
Another one of those moments.

Ultimately, though SOF came within a few feet of him, he remained secure for the round.

The next mission took place in the same location and had three rounds. During the first round, the Insurgents had to clear (death, stun or flee) the second floor of the garage of SOF players in 10 minutes. SOF only had two respawns at their disposal while the Insurgents were armed only with pistols and knives. That 10 minutes felt like 20 and while I thought initially that we were successful in taking them out, we had missed two SOF players who were just coming back from a respawn  as I was calling time.

I looked around at the crowd of players from both sides, who at 10pm had just spent the last 40 minutes   running around a unreasonably hot garage, sweating their backsides off. I knew that a couple of us (deemed Super Nerds by Trevor) would be up to playing another couple of rounds in there (if not a whole game). But I could tell a good chunk of folks wouldn't mind cutting it short. After a quick pow-wow, I decided to move the game along to the final mission.

It was an extraction mission, with the SOF having to move to an LZ (landing zone) and illuminate three lanterns, keeping them on for a full minute simultaneously to be successful. The LZ, lanterns aside, was almost pitch black, so in the end it wasn't that difficult for the SOF to out-maneuver us and coordinate a countdown over the radio. The mission's ending seemed a little abrupt to Ben (which is definitely how missions go sometimes) and we both agreed that a survival style mission was better suited to the location.

Following this, I was almost killed in Assassin, which I talked about in the other post from today. In tomorrow's post, I'll be talking about a park a few blocks from my apartment that went through a multi-million dollar renovation recently. I feel the place is a goldmine for Nerf games and I'll be sharing some pictures and thoughts about the lay out with you all.

Self Defense

Last night, after the Tactical Ops game, I had a nice conversation with Eric and Trevor. One of my favorite things about attending period is getting to hang with people afterwards whether we're talking, joking around or grabbing a bite to eat. It was especially nice to have a good hour and a half conversation, because it didnt end in a shootout as they are on the other team from me in this game of  Assassin.

Maybe 20 minutes after the game ended, I was walking with them to Eric's car when I suggested a "gentleman's agreement" with "no Assassin sh!t" for the duration of us hanging out. They agreed and we stood around and talked at Eric's car for nearly an hour, before he offered to give me a lift home. (prior to this, I had gotten a text or two from Sargun asking if I needed a ride. Beth, who is on my team, alerted me that Sargun seemed a little fixated on my transport options) Once driving, we came across Arthur, one of my teammates and the guy we assumed to be their target, by complete random chance. He was driving with his friends who had just attended my game and Trevor started bellowing at him to roll down his windows. Arthur said no dice and while Eric tailed him for a little while, he decided not to give full chase. It was a little weird being with the enemy as they tried to hit my teammate, but a ride is a ride so I didnt really do anything about it.

Once we got to my place, we sat and talked for another 20 minutes, but I realized it was nearing 12am and I was out of the grace period. It didnt stop me from leaving the car door wide open for maybe 10 minutes. In a Cinderella-esque display, I decided to rush home in the final minutes before midnight. As I was saying goodbye to them for the fourth time, guess who gives Eric a ring?

Mr. Sargun Dhillon.

I decided I really needed to get home and set off. I was still not really paying attention when I got through our metal gate, but as I opened the door into my building and thus safe hood, I  looked over my shoulder and saw the above mentioned Mr. Dhillon with a Triad and a big ass grin on his face. He took a shot, but by that time I had already crossed the threshold and was safe.

I ran inside and loaded my Strongarm.  I realized I left my keys in the door and had to go back to the gate to get them. While still in the safe zone, Sargun re-appeared and asked what I was up to for the night. I said I was gonna go hang out with my girlfriend Courtney who was upstairs. He said that I should get her to come out with us, to which I replied she was already in bed. He said "see ya later" and left, but not before Ben, my teammate and co-host of the game just hours previous, popped out of nowhere and said hi. I was a little befuddled but I went back inside just the same.

Being the dodgy bastard that I am, I pretended to go upstairs. I waited about 20 seconds and went out to metal gate outside and saw Sargun and Ben walking down the street away from my apartment. Sargun didn't seem on edge, so I slipped out of the gate quietly and ran him down.

I let two darts go, which flew into deep shadows, leaving me unsure if he was hit. When I got closer, I tried again but the dart curved right and away. Being so close to Sargun, I barrel tapped him in the chest and ended his nerf life. He pulled out either a phone/walkie talky and alerted someone that I killed him. When I saw the phone, I thought "oh crap, there's more of them?" and jetted for my door. Before I tapped him, Sargun thought my blaster had jammed, so when I reached the gate he asked me if my Strongarm was loaded. At a safe enough distance I pulled out the remaining darts as evidence and went back inside, with Ben giving me a thumbs up.

I called Trevor, said I just killed Sargun and asked if they had set me up. Trevor said that he was still under the impression it was Arthur who was the target, but because he had been pretty out of the loop lately he may have been wrong. Eric, similarly caught up with non-nerf pursuits (having a life is overrated) was similarly not as connected to what was going on Assassin wise.  Eric said he had only heard from Sargun as I was leaving and didn't know about the ambush. I lived, so in the end it didn't really matter.

Safe and sound inside, I texted Ben and asked what he was doing with the enemy. Ben lives down in Daly City, so he said he traded silence for a lift home. Having done exactly the same thing 30 minutes prior, I was really couldn't say anything. Such is the life of Assassins I guess.

add another to the list 

Insurgent Swarmfire

I'm organizing another game of Tactical Ops tonight and I will be fulfilling my traditional duties as the Insurgent's team facilitator. I don't have a lot of Insurgenty (word?) things to wear and though I've reasoned that Insurgents wear civilian clothes anyway, I still wanted something to represent my Insurgenthood. At the same time, I've been trying to find a way to hook up a sling to my Swarmfire. I killed two birds with one stone today when I did this:

I'm calling it The People's Justice. It's got little duct tape notches on the top of the blast to hook my sling in. I'm hoping it dispenses plenty of justice in a couple of hours. Tomorrow afternoon I'll give a write up of the game and the gun. 

Groups: David or Goliath?

How about both?

Alas, there will always be people who prefer to play in large groups. As a reaction to those groups, there are other people who decide for whatever reason that such a playing style isn't for them. In regards to the Way of the Foamed Dart, these are things that simply are and will always be. In the first couple of posts I attempted to lay out the pros and cons of each configuration.In short, large groups are great for newer players and those looking to lead and instruct new players, as well as those who feel more comfortable with the strength the numbers provide. This is coupled with the fact that running with a large group provides a certain type of (awesome) experience and feeling only available in that setting. But all these things hinge on the cohesion the group maintains and once this cohesion is lost the above stated benefits can cease to exist, as players break formation to ensure personal safety.

On the other hand, this hazard can largely be avoided by moving with less people therefore having less pieces in play. You maintain a lower travel profile and also have more flexibility when coming in contact with zombies. Its easier for a smaller group to hide, scout or ambush zombies, where as unless a  large group  has advanced warning, they are generally limited to either attack or retreat. Once again, there is a particular feeling one gets from the game setting itself and those who like an us against the world experience should go for it. That said, the room for error is minimal. In large groups, there are always players getting picked off at corners or caught lagging behind. But whats one person to forty? One person to five or six is a completely different story. In addition to this reality, you have to have a specialized assortment of blasters, placed in the correct formation to be effective. You need to have readily available options for dealing with zombies at close or long ranges, coupled with people capable of using these blasters properly. Most importantly, if you don't keep a constant state of vigilance in all directions, you won't need any specialized weapons: you'll be tying your bandana around your forehead and dropping your blasters off at base.

So in my opinion its a wash: both are awesome for completely different but not opposing reasons. If proper attention isn't paid to utilizing these groups in an effective way, both lead to calamity. But also in my opinion, there is another question at hand:

How can the two configurations complement each other?

I posted the Large Groups edition of this series on the SFSU HvZ Facebook community and got further insight from a couple of players. Chris James, who I know from playing with B.U.R.N. in the San Jose Area and who also makes cool Nerf related videos like this and this, stated that he prefers smaller groups, but sees the larger groups as an asset. Larger groups naturally attract more zombies and create a significant diversion, allowing smaller, more mobile teams to sneak away un-noticed to take care of missions.

Another strategy uses the same tactic in reverse: smaller squads can go out looking for and drawing in zombies as well. They would not be able to stray far from this large group, but upon making contact with a group of zombies, they can shoot some darts and pick off a couple. If its a big enough group of zombies, there would be no way to make a serious dent in numbers by doing this. However, the smaller group can pretend to freak out, or skip the theatrics and just plain run. Keeping cohesion during a retreat with five or six people isn't that hard to maintain and it still presents a worthy enough target for a group of ten or so zombies. The squad keeps fleeing, taking pot shots, before leading the group of ten zombies into forty something humans laying in ambush. This giant force would be able to either pin down or disperse this group into individual zombies, allowing another small squad or two to handle missions or scout before moving ahead.

Even if neither strategy is tested in the near future, I believe the two configurations should work alongside and compliment each other, rather then wonder or discuss which is the more effective way to go. Ultimately as both can execute the same tactics (scouting, fire support, ambushes, diversions) with different results and benefits, they should be just viewed as their own thing and if both groups are present at a game, they should include each other in dialogue and plan what to do jointly.

Back to the spawning grounds

This Saturday I'm  co-hosting Tactical Ops: Leave No One Behind, a small squad nerf war extravaganza down in Mission Bay. Co-hosting along with me is Ben Ersando, Co-Organizer of Jericho: San Francisco's Urban Spy Game. Ben has brought some ingenious ideas to the table and I have a great feeling about the game in general. We are going back to the location of the first Tactical Ops, which I hosted along with Trevor.

As stated in my second post, I found a few gems during my first walkthrough of the area. This included the "Meth Lab" area, a little courtyard at the intersection of two streets and two paths that has an earth mound and the location, along with the subsequent mission, that people request I do again more then any other:

hawt

This slab of concrete beauty is a parking garage tucked into an obscure corner on the UCSF campus. Trevor spotted it independently of me, and where I just recognized it as a cool spot, he decided that the perfect mission for such a location was a Hostage Rescue. Pre-game we had talked about holding the hostages in the adjacent courtyard area, using the garage stairwells as sniper holes and watch posts. It sounded pretty awesome to us, but there were other missions in the line up that we figured would shine brighter. 

Come game day, we head over to the Hostage Rescue location and we notice that the garage is totally empty. Like empty empty. So empty guys were skateboarding on the ramp that ran down the thing. Repeatedly. We could hear them outside. I'm not one to shy away from last minute adjustments at games, so I said "F' this, lets just do the mission inside?" With everyone saying F' this in universal agreement, I stated that the hostage, who would be portrayed by me, was going to be on the 3rd floor. Come and get me.

It was stipulated that I the hostage couldn't die, as the focus of the mission wasn't to protect my life. I also couldn't make any attempt to flee or do anything except sit where my captures told me. I could be rescued by the Special Ops Force by getting two hand-touched by a player. The Insurgents could recover me in the same fashion.

At the end of the mission everyone was sweating like crazy, raspy from yelling and needing a break to collect all of their ammo. A few people, who's opinions I respect greatly, told me that it was the best mission they had ever played in. Naturally I missed most of the action while preforming my duties as a hostage (I did receive commendation for my hostage abilities, so it wasn't a total loss).

I had a fun time watching otherwise rational, calm people running around bellowing at their teammates and enemies alike. I could look in the eyes of a couple of the players, especially those who had to fight through crazy defenses to get to me, that on some level they weren't really playing a game anymore.

"COME ON! GO! GO!" was what the SOF shouted at me when they showed up. They were very jumpy and on edge, with Ben and Alex leading the pack, scanning in all directions. Now that they had secured me, they needed to take me to an extraction point a couple of hundred feet away.

Along the way they were ambushed, killed and sent to respawn. The Insurgents recaptured me, towing me along and stashing me back in the garage. At that point, there was two minutes left in the mission, no where near enough time for the SOF to recover and put something in action. In an incredibly intense showdown, the Insurgents ruled the round.

So this time, instead of just doing one Hostage Rescue mission, we shaped the entire game around the concept. You can find the official rules here and catch up on the backstory as well as see what other missions we have to offer this Saturday. If you're in San Francisco and not completely tanked by 7pm, come check us out!

Groups: Moving with a Mob

Picking up where we left off with yesterday's post about small squads, I'm going to switch things up and give some coverage to the other side of the coin. But first, a little bit of context is necessary, as there is only really one game played in town that features and promotes the use of large groups. Large groups form up in Jericho, but since the game is based on stealth its not entirely encouraged. Tactical Ops is a squad based game, so by nature there are no big mobs.  That game would be Humans vs. Zombies. In my HvZ games there's a bit of it (Its certainly a bit, as joyous chaos usually kicks in mid round), but the main backdrop for this post features the HvZ game at SFSU, ran by Nate Dizon and Adam Benigno.

As stated, I personally like to play with a small squad no matter the game type. But that's just me. Even when I'm not Nerfing I tend to stay away from big crowds. Regardless, countless players of all grades (Good, Bad and Ugly) have a ton of fun hooking onto a bigger group and dashing out on missions.

There are plenty of reasons to do so.

If you're a noob I down right recommend it. Having more experienced and/or well armed players around you isn't a bad idea if you don't really know what you're doing. They'll be there to recommend equipment ("dude, don't use a Hail Fire if you're only bringing six round magazines."), provide safety and show you all the blindspots that usually kill other noobs. If they're good players they provide a living, real time example of how the game can be played well. I haven't met such a player yet who didn't give good advice when asked.

The feeling you get from running with a big group is a reason in of itself. I remember my first game at SF State. It was back in February and was a week after I ran my first HvZ game out in Fort Mason. I had met Nate at my first game period, but he had come out to Fort Mason to play, bringing a nice group of players with him. It was a nice show of support for a noob like myself and I have appreciated it since. The players he brought out with him were awesome too: most prominent being Nate himself and Mitch, who I only know as Mitch (but who anybody who's ever played at SFSU would immediately recognize. He is a perennial Zombie. At the Fort Mason game, he dumped a bunch of fake blood on his face. He then proceeded to run right through the grassy area and its accompanying Bros, screaming his head off and running at top speed for no reason.). Seeing them in action, I was excited to come out and play a game there at night.

When I showed up Nate was real welcoming and took time out to say hello and talk for a while. When the game got going, there was a weapons restriction rule that limited players to either a melee weapon or pistol. I grabbed my axe and moved to the front of the group. I could feel the anxiousness as the players around me fidgeted in place, the nerd equivalent of Vikings biting the shields. After a pep talk by Skylar Woodies, who I talked about in my fourth Assassin story, the crowd got a little less nervous and a little more pumped up. The Zombies, Mitch included were harassing us just outside of the safe zone, getting similarly pumped up.

Then we were off. We stepped clear of the safe zone and the Zombies charged us. Somewhere in the mix, in the some secluded, pretty dark area, I chopped one in the chest with my axe. Towards the end of the same round, I got another one as a Zombie tried to lunge at our group from the ground. Even with out the axe chopping the atmosphere in that crowd as we moved through the horde of zombies, in dark, tight quarters was electric. I hadn't felt anything else like it in my life and though I have moved onto playing with smaller squads, being in the big group that first time at SF State contributed to my current Nerf mania greatly.

As an organizer, there's another reason to like large groups. Within a group of 20-30 people, naturally there are going to be a few amongst them who stand out. If such a group is to survive, in HvZ, business, politics or any other collection of more than one person, there have to be there to stick out and take the reigns in some fashion. These people, guys such as Skylar, or David Madison (a travelling blues dance instructor with a passion for sneakiness and creating mania on the game field) help get noobs more comfortable and the crowd in general hyped up. I love this as an organizer, because even the people who don't play in large groups feed off the energy that they produce. Needless to say, the overall game environment is that much better when everyone is comfortable, energetic and happy to be playing.

With all that said, I'm going to be going back to Small Squads tomorrow as I give a sneak preview of this Saturday's Tactical Ops: Leave No One Behind. I'll be posting a couple of maps from the game as well as some thoughts and info regarding the process of creating the game itself.

Groups: Small Squad Edition

Hey everyone!

I hope you all had a very nice weekend, where ever you are and whatever you did. I'm back in San Francisco, with the reality of the Assassin game finally upon me. I'll be forced out of the house at some point (much against my will but hey such is adulthood), definitely armed and definitely paranoid as all hell.

But I've written enough lately about the Assassin game, so I'll give it a break for now and move onto something else. In particular, this is the first in a series of three posts about group dynamics during games, with this one covering small squads.  Ever since a game of Humans vs. Zombies at SF State a few months back (which I mentioned in my load out post ) I've suited my playing style towards moving with a smaller group. Generally speaking its the same people at every game. There's usually about 5-8 of us and after months of toying around we kinda know what we're doing. This rotating cast of characters consists of:

Eric: aka Murtaugh. Weapons tech and blowgun master, Eric usually brings a unique if not downright crazy load out. He's usually on the point, good at noticing and announcing contact, has a quick draw and is really good at getting the team to form together when we're a little slack.

Beth: Super accurate shooter. This is coupled with the fact that if Beth sees you, she will keep shooting at you until you're dead. Beth is usually either on the point or the flanks and is pure murder with a Strongarm.

Trevor: Pure murder in general with a lot of blasters, Trevor favors a Stryfe with an assortment of sidearms. He also likes to wear a desert camo army helmet to games (people ask me why and I usually say "because that's Trevor") The first time I met him, he was enthusiastically describing getting ambushed by a bunch of players in Jericho and killing all of them. My initial thought was "wow, that guy is like a real life  FPS Doug." Thankfully I've come to find him way more mellow off the game field. Trevor stays on the flanks with us, but otherwise he is strictly rear guard, as he doesnt trust anyone else to guard his 6.

Casey: Casey is usually no more then 5 feet away from Trevor when he's playing. They are friends, roommates and go to the same school. Casey is equally effective with a Rough Cut or a Stryfe and has a flair for accessorization, making most of his gear out of duct tape and cardboard, to go along with his brightly colored outfits. Casey also has a flair for charging out on contact, though he can (usually) be reeled back in.

Sargun: Sargun usually has a rifle of some sort (preferring a retaliator as of late) and when both Eric and myself started playing games in the city, Sargun  almost exclusively ended up on the opposite team. He's also Beth's boyfriend, has a fondness for being sneaky and is good for fire support in a tight spot. Sargun usually stays in the middle of the group.

Arthur: Mentioned in my post about using the environment of SF to craft games Arthur still only brings a Strongarm and just enough ammo to fill the blaster ("At the end of games, I'm just like 'give me 6 darts and we're OK'"-Arthur) A very low key guy, Arthur is a tenacious attacker, very quick and similarly agile. He is comfortable staying with the group or striking out on his own to pick people off. Not afraid to use environments in unconventional ways either.

Me: Since I run this blog, there will be plenty of opportunities to talk about myself later (perhaps Connor will start talking in the third person too). I usually am either on the point, 6 or right flank. I feel my strongest suit is spotting targets and creating discreet routes of travel, though I'm pretty overt once I'm spotted ("Oh, Connor's the courier? Stealthy!"-Fellow player Yoshi during a game of Jericho).

Ben from Jericho and Dual Disc Gun Alex will usually go along with us if they're not doing their own thing. Ben brings incredible tenaciousness, bullseye shooting, a ton of speed and an endless supply of energy. Alex, despite being something like 6'5" tall is super hard to hit and some how makes carrying two vigilons at the same time work very well. Any time Alex isn't on my team I can count on a good deal of his slow spinning but straight moving green discs coming my way.

Now that you know us, you can know why 

There are plenty of reasons to go with either configuration (large group/small squad) and in the last blog in the series I'll line up the pros and cons of both against each other. But in regards to Small Squads two reasons why they are my preferred mode of playing immediately come to mind: cohesion and low profile travel. Not to mention for us its a ton of fun. In our opinion, whether its in HvZ or in Tactical Ops (the plug for the upcoming game goes here) we like sneaking around, fighting out of envelopments, having running battles, or the fact that most time out of not we stay close together and ensure each other's safety. There is also something to be said about the feeling one gets when potentially facing down a field of enemies with just 6 people. If a proper blend of fear, adrenaline and mirth resulting from forgetting you're not really gonna die sounds like your cup of tea, a small squad may be for you.

In our opinion, its the lack of cohesion that sticks out the most in regards to the larger crowds. Its logically pretty simple: with more people, theres more people to keep track of. With more people to keep track of, more people are going to get lost in the shuffle. Newer players also tend to gravitate towards the larger groups, which is good. What is bad is that a lot of newer players have a tendency to flee upon first contact, especially in Humans vs. Zombies. Once five or six people in a group flee in all directions, more are sure to follow. For those of who choose to stay and fight, the said fleeing in all directions makes determining who is actually a target pretty difficult, much less shooting one. It usually ends with me just saying screw it and linking back up with a small group of survivors, so I might as well just do that from the start.

There is one thing to consider when moving in a small group though: weapon placement. When playing Humans vs. Zombies, we like to keep a melee weapon up front, on the six and on the flanks. Single shot blasters and Strongarms go in the middle of the group, with rifles everywhere else. If you're playing a game with no melee weapons (such as capture the flag) we like to move someone with a Strongarm up front to provide accurate fire, while some provides suppressing fire from another direction.  This in particular is my bread and butter and I will engage someone or a group firing single shot as I continually flank. Sometimes if I have something heavier, I'll sneak around to a blind spot and charge them firing full auto. I may hit nothing but air, but I'm usually successful at either distracting them for one of the sharpshooters or making them fall back to somewhere else. My other teammates can secure the area in their absence while I watch where they run to.

Modding is certainly not my strong point, but if I can mod my Stampede to make it lighter, it may become my primary. I've seen a couple of people hack it apart, shortening the barrel, removing the battery area and upgrading the voltage. This is what I want to do, but there's a great chance of me destroying the blaster in the process. I say 70/30 if anyone wants to lay a bet.

Tomorrow will be the flip side  where I discuss playing in a larger group. Though Small Squads are my preference, there are just as many reasons to join the mob. See you then!

The Balance

The Assassin game started less than 24 hours ago and my team is already energized. Plans are being discussed, agreed upon and in the coming hours more than likely finalized.

I'm about 50 miles away from it all right now and frankly, couldn't be happier.

Though I will likely miss the first hit of the game (Or will I? Maybe I'm actually sitting at home and this post is a big psych out. Only one way to find out...) and wish I was making it happen with my teammates, Im perfectly content to be here in Sacramento for Courtney's Mom's wedding.

The idea of balance came to me in a kind of un-expected way a few weeks back, when I was in The City and Courtney was here in Sacramento wrapping up last minute preparations for the wedding. When I say balance, I don't mean it in a spiritual/metaphysical sense. Though Nerfing provides me a profound stillness and calm of spirit post game, by balance I mean between Nerfing and not-Nerfing.

As stated, it wasn't even something I had though about before. With Courtney gone, I was loafing around the house that Friday night (not being a drinker and living in a drinker's neighborhood, I tend to do a lot of loafing come Friday), BSing on Facebook.  I started getting messaged from people I met through games and or through my online Nerf community. I had some good conversations with people, BS'd a little bit more and called it a night.

The next day in the early afternoon (what I like to call "the morning") I got messaged by even more people, then got drawn into a pretty good group discussion. I started thinking about it, namely "man, why doesn't this happen more often?"

Then it hit me: you have a girlfriend, dude. Friday night we're together and I'm far away from social media and children's toy blasters. Ditto for Saturday afternoon (unless there is a game, then we hang Saturday night), but these are the prime Nerd computer hours and thus the best time to connect with my Nerd kinfolk. Prior to this, I thought I was on Nerf overdrive, as I've gone to at least one game a week for the last two months (sometimes as many as three a week if I'm hosting something), as well as constantly planning new games, meeting new people and trying to collaborate on Nerf stuff. I didn't think there was much more I could do. If anything, without giving it much thought, I cut back on activity. Specifically if there is two games in a weekend (or day), I would make a point to only go to one and spend the other day with my special lady.

After running all this through my noggin, I was actually happy that there was a balance between Nerf and non-Nerf activities in my life. I have a tendency to dive face first into anything I think is half-way cool and Nerfing is definitely not an exception. More then anything, I was glad that I naturally went about maintaining the balance, without diving overboard and having to be fished out by a girlfriend who wants to see me more then once a week. So, even though this blog is called Nerfing in the City, I encourage everyone out there to do some non-Nerf stuff to compliment and accent your Nerfing. It'll make the time you spend on the battle field, online chatting or posting much more special.

With that said, I'm taking a break until  Monday to enjoy life up here. Its like 80 degrees out, which means a lot of if you're used to an ever present layer of fog blocking out the sky. A lot, if not damn near all of Courtney's family is coming out for the Wedding, plenty of whom I haven't met and look forward to sharing a word and a laugh with. Until then, keep Nerfing, not-Nerfin or doing whatever makes you happy.

See you monday!

They can't all be winners...

It catches up to all of us eventually. From those of the gentlest birth, to those most common, we all bite the bullet at some point. Not many people get to write about it after the fact, but such is the beauty of A Friendly Game of Assassin, which will start just a few hours from now.

I remember the first day of the last game like it was yesterday ( it was just a few months ago after all). I had drawn Ajesh, who I mentioned in the first post, but there was also the fact that I was being hunted as well. I had allowed attacks at my job (and will be allowing them again this game) and on that day I expected to get ambushed either at work or along the way.

This had nothing to do with reality, mind you. In my head that first day, with nothing else to go on, I simply transferred my own strategy of striking quick into my Assassin's brain. Walking to work, I clutched a Triad, kept my backpack open and my Strongarm in reach, looking into each hidey-hole, crevice and alley I passed, all while looking over my shoulder after every few steps.

I must have looked like a complete lunatic, which is to say in San Francisco, is fairly normal.

I was on edge like that until I got my first kill about a week later. As stated, before I took down Ajesh and even after Ben, I still figured that when someone came, they would have a semi-intricate plan. But after Tyrone and Skylar, I had a more realistic view: when it happened, it would be quick, there would be little fore thought on the part of the assassin and I most likely would happen when I wasn't paying any attention.

My fifth target was a guy I play Nerf games with all the time, a super-enthusiast named Eric. Eric was the first guy I ever saw use a Nerf blowgun (very effectively at that) and he helped me learned the ropes when I first started organizing. Like the others I respected his prowess. However, Eric had a somewhat bad habit of feeling comfortable around me (don't know what's up with that). A couple of days after acquiring him as a target, we both played at a game of Jericho. Post game, a group of us got some burgers and hung out way longer than the 30 minute grace period that was extended after Nerf games. He exposed himself to attacks a few times after the grace period and genuinely didn't seem to know I was hunting him. Remembering back to shooting Ben following HvZ in Dolores Park, I didn't want to be Dr. Buzzkill again. Even though he gave me a good opportunity post game to take him out, I balked.

Flash forward to a couple of weeks later and I'm hosting the first game of Tactical Ops. Attendance was a little low,  but the awesome players that came out, Eric definitely included, combined with the venue made the game my favorite that I've hosted. I had a plan to bring myself to kill Eric after the game, simply because I hadn't had any chance before and wouldn't get another one for a while. I had a foam combat knife, made out of a flip flop to do the job.

There was someone who was looking to toss a wrench in my plans: Trevor Holminski, the guy I was co-hosting the game with. A very energetic, accurate shooting young man of 18 years old, Trevor wanted to kill everyone in the game. I was part of that everyone, co-host be damned. He had remained silent on the issue of my Nerf murder during the game, but afterwards we had the following exchange:

Him: I'm gonna kill you when the grace period is over.
Me: Are ya now?
Him: Yes.

He offered to show me my dossier, in his possession as proof that I was his target. I told him that I believed him and if he wanted to get me, then come get me.

Trevor disappeared not long after that. I had Eric right in front of me, with my foam knife hidden up my sleeve as I talked to Alex, the guy I mentioned who always dual wields disc guns. He used to work with a frie d of mine from High School and we were having a pretty nice conversation.

"Connor's dead!" Trevor suddenly screamed out, jumping from behind a Winnebago.

He was right, as he had shot me in the chest with a pistol. It was quick and I certainly not paying attention. I was sad I was dead, sad I didn't kill Eric (who was killed by Trevor right after) but still happy with my performance in the game.

And now I'm ready to play again, getting the chance to start tomorrow. Thank you all for reading these Assassin stories, with more hopefully to come. Watch your six out there readers!

Load out: part 1

I've been bringing some combination of this to games lately

Don't worry folks, this post is going to be a fairly short one (the opposite can be said about tomorrow). As I start to draw more readers in, I wonder who you folks are. Where do you live? What is your preferred Nerf War Game of choice? What do you bring to games? Feel free to post in the comments section at the end of this post to chime in on any of the above. 

In my case, my Load out has been framed by three main factors since I got into Nerfing at the start of this year. They are:

1) Cost: "Oh yeah, rents due in a few days, maybe I shoudn't go to Target and buy two Rayvens to dual wield at HvZ."

2) Transport- Really the lack there of. I walk to most games, sometimes take the bus and sometimes can 

catch a ride. This means I more than likely won't be using a Vulcan as a primary with a Stampede as my back up, with corresponding bandoliers for ammo. 

3) Playing style- I'm pretty pragmatic and try to keep an even head when I'm in game, but if I spot an opportunity to have a moment that's at least semi-epic, I'll throw all that "responsible" stuff out the window and go for it. I like to have something light enough to be able to run, flank or do something sneaky with, but still with enough range and firing speed to keep other players at bay. 

Another factor is looking edge itself onto the list: reliability. Namely, as of late my magazine fed weapons (Stryfe, Retaliator and the last time I used a Rampage) having been jamming on me at particularly in-opportune moments, with the Stryfe being the offender du jour. As you can see from the picture above, I'm not loading out a single magazine fed weapon. Handling the magazines has been another headache, especially at games I'm organizing due to all the extra stuff I have to bring. 

My current load out keeps things simple, but still gives me the range and power I'm looking for, as I'm looking to constantly place myself into different game scenarios and never really know what I'll need. Here's a description of what I have and why:

Rough Cut 2x4: The shotgun looking (and acting) blaster in the top right corner. The Rough Cut fills in for my Stryfe when I'm pissed off at it (jamming and getting me killed a few times will do that), as I like its range (about 50 feet in outdoor windy San Francisco) and it can lay down a wall of darts in a couple of seconds. Particularly in Humans vs. Zombies, it can clear an area out pretty quick and make it safe for those behind you to pass. Holds eight darts, can fire one or two darts at a time and can slamfire.

Strongarm: The Revovler looking blaster in the top left corner. Though technically the Rough Cut is my primary, I might get more use out of the Strongarm. Like the Rough Cut, it is able to slamfire. Circumstances during a game of HvZ at SF State forced me to use it as a primary during a game once and I was incredibly impressed, even though I died using it. I was doing a side mission, moving in a small squad (I will definitely talk about the dynamics of small groups vs. big groups in a post soon) and assigned to cover the right flank, we found ourselves constantly followed and attacked by zombies. I didn't miss a zombie inside of 20 feet and reloaded 3 or 4 times during the 30 minute round. In the end, I died because I was out of ammo, which is the only drawback of the blaster (only holds six darts) and why I don't make it a primary. 

Dual Triads: Someone mentioned doing this almost as a joke during a game I was at. I went home, got some tactical rope and tied them together at the cocking levers. I liked using just a single Triad during games, as its very easy to carry and gets maybe 55-60 feet of range outdoors. The first time I got shot with one, I was standing still, about 40 feet away from the shooter. I figured he was out of range do to his tiny gun. I kept standing still and got shot square in the chest, with enough ummph to tell me he could have hit me even further away. The blasters are primed by pulling them in opposite directions and I'm able to unload six darts in a couple of seconds. 

Sling and ammo pouch: With no magazines this is how I transport my ammo. The pouch is wrapped in duct tape around the middle, which prevents the zipper from sliding too far down and dropping the darts. I can carry about 50 or 60 darts in the pouch and the sling is a Nerf bandolier with accommodation for another 20. 

Sock Grenades: A recent, but effective addition. I can carry about 25 of them in this weird green satchel thing I hook onto my belt. I'm no Sergio Romo, but they are good at close ranges in HvZ and from a far you can lob them into crowds indiscriminately and still get some kills. 

If I can find a better way to carry around my Swarmfire then it may replace my Rough Cut. If that happens, I'll build some kind of rig to carry the Rough Cut on my back. 

What about you guys? 

"Oh my god, I blocked it!"

The second installment of A Friendly Game of Assassin starts this Thursday and I'm joyed. This weekend at the Jericho game I got to talk to a few people about Assassin, whether it was regarding the rules ("My house is OK for attacks, I just don't want people breaking my windows. Look, I have Nerf guns everywhere!"-Andrew, game participant), assassination strategies or just people they hope are on the other team. Repeatedly I expressed my desire for getting a melee kill this game. For the moment I've decided that  I'm willing to bite the bullet in the commission of getting said melee kill, but I can't guarantee that this foolish mind sate will carry over when the game actually starts.

On Saturday I said I would be continuing on with stories from the first Friendly Game of Assassin and this one concerns a player named Skylar. Up to drawing him, I was leery of and respected the skills of the people who had been my targets, especially Ben and Tyrone who I'd seen play before. But I had been keeping my eye on Skylar's progress throughout the process.  I had both played with and against him and I definitely respect his prowess with a blaster as well as a foam sword. I'd seen him shoot 5 people wearing a disguise (Skylar has a seemingly endless array of disguises) during a courier escort mission in Jericho, as well as fighting through a pretty giant group of zombies with a sword in each hand at a SF State HVZ game.

He also went to High School with a friend I've known since Fifth grade, works at Gamescape (and was allowing attacks at his job) and is an overall pretty cool dude.

I had acquired Skylar as a target through a somewhat convoluted process. I was both organizing and playing in this game and as such I had my girlfriend Courtney pick half of the original participants' targets. I picked the other half and had no clue who my Assassin was. But as the field shrank, it shrank far enough to where the person who was my Assassin became my target. When this happened, Courtney started handling the passing out of all targets to keep it honest. When this happened, a few players had their targets reassigned, myself included.

So just as easily as I drew Skylar, Skylar could kill his target, or his target could get a kill and possibly cause need for reassignment as well. Skylar had been having a somewhat rough time with his target, a guy I went to High School with named Daniel who signed on to play. Daniel both lived and worked in areas that where inaccessible to Skylar. Skylar had tried to poison him, placing a snake (i think it was a snake, but it could have possibly been some other type of plastic reptile/arachnid) inside of an envelope and mailing it, but Daniel had none of it, posting on Facebook that, after serving in the military, he had enough Counter-Terrorism training he knew enough to not open a such a suspicious package. He applauded the attempted but implored his Assassin (Skylar) to try a little harder.

On top of this, Daniel had killed Skylar's friend and co-worker in Gamescape not that long before. After looking for some games, talking to David and asking for his name, Daniel pulled out a Triad and shot David while he was working the cash register.

Based on all this, if Skylar drew another target he would move on them fast. Therefore, since I drew his name, to save my own backside, I had to move on him fast. The next day, I loaded up a Stryfe with a 6 round clip, put my jacket on over it and tucked a Triad in the pocket. I put an 18 round clip in my backpack, just in case I ran into him un-expectedly. I figured if this happened, he would be armed and shooting when he saw me. Loaded up, I headed over towards Divisadero street, walking over there in about 25 minutes.

As is frequently the case in San Francisco, the weather on one side of town is totally different from the side you just came from. From where I live around Polk street, it was maybe 50 degrees and windy as all hell. Pretty standard fare over here, so the jacket helped, but when I got near where Skylar was, it was sunny and maybe 10 degrees hotter. Coupled with the accompanying antsy feeling that  comes with expecting a shootout if seen had me sweating from head to toe. Making it to Divisadero, I walked up Page street and put a plan together.

My plan was to pass by the store a couple of times and do a little recon. Namely, how much attention was he paying at his job? Not necessarily to his job, but to potential sweaty Assassins lurking in the not so far off distance. Making sure my weapons were loaded (never hurts!) I keep my headphones on but turned off my music as I made my first pass in front of the store. The door was open and I could see through space in the front window display. Skylar had his back to the door and was talking to someone as he stood behind the counter. I kept walking, taking a left up Fell street to reassess.

My first thought was, I should pass by again and if he's still talking to the same person, I'll just go for it. I tried to think of something better, but in the end I decided it was really the only thing to do. There was  a time imperative to remember and I didn't want the roles reversed. Circling back towards Gamescape, when I came to the doorway, he had his back turned and was in conversation with them same person, this time standing further away from the counter but still behind it.

My body just kind of took over for me as I walked through the door and took the Triad out of my pocket. I held it low, waiting until I was about five feet from Skylar before raising it.

At the time, he told me his first thought was "Hey! Cool, Connor is stopping by the store!" He looked at my face and said I looked pretty much how I always looked. Then maybe a second or two later, he just happened to look over a bit and saw I had a gun in my hand.

I fired a shot.

"Oh my god! I blocked it!" He proclaimed immediately after deflecting my shot with a piece of cardboard he had in his hands.

I cocked the Triad and shot him in the gut.

"You bastard! You shot me in the gut!" Skylar declared, then picked up a Strongarm he had stashed a few feet away when I asked if he was armed.

"Im sorry." I said and then apologized to the woman he had been talking to.

"I was actually doing work stuff." Skylar said, nodding towards the woman. "It was the only thing I had to do all day and I was worried someone was gonna show up."

We talked for a minute and I told him that I was relieved for a couple of reasons. One I didn't have to worry about him coming after me, and two, now I could stop by his job and get some games like I'd been wanting to, but hadn't, due to the above mentioned shootouts on site. We shook hands and parted ways, as I had to go to work later that day, to worry if my own Assassin had done the same mental math I had with Skylar.

It wasn't that night, but death would find me soon enough. I will go into that on Wednesday, a day before the next Assassin game starts. If you were possibly getting the feeling that this blog was just a platform for me to boast or channel ego, this next blog will certainly show otherwise.

"This plan might be too smart for us"

Jericho creator Shannon in front with black hat/white shirt. Weekend Game Host Ben Ersando to the left pointing a stockade at Shannon. I'm right below him in the green jacket.  (from Jericho's meetup group page)

Today I played a game of Jericho hosted by Ben Ersando who I've mentioned in previous posts. The basic gist of Jericho is as follows: Jericho is a nerf blaster based Espionage game, encouraging stealth and outside the box planning in the execution of missions. These missions place one team (with selections done at the start of the game) on offense and the opposing on defense, with the offense needing to send a courier to a pick an item up or take a photo of something. They can also kill all of the defense  They win by bringing the item/photo to a drop off location or killing off the other team. The defense wins by killing the courier or by preventing the offense from making the drop within the time limit. Its one shot, one kill and the dead have to make the walk of shame to the drop zone with something covering their heads.

I always have a great time playing Jericho and as I've mentioned before, it was the game that introduced me to the current obsession that is powering this blog. Though my work schedule prevents me from making most weeknight games I try to make every weekend Jericho I can. Special to the weekend games, Ben has a ban on magazine fed and battery powered blasters.

I like the prohibitive rules a lot. To be clear, I like the looser rules of Shannon's games (stock weapons only but you could bring a Vulcan if you felt like it) just as much. The games I plan are definitely overt affairs (nothing stealthy about 30 people with guns battling zombies in all directions and running off), but the environment that limits players to pistols produces, combined with the rule set is something that can't be duplicated. Even with allowing all weapons, there is a sense of your own mortality so to speak, because you could have the aforementioned Vulcan and letting off the belt, meanwhile someone can run up behind you with a Jolt and you're just as dead. However, take away the comfort that your Vulcan belt or your 35 round Raider drum gives you and it makes you even more so aware. If you have any inclinations towards stealth or cunning, having only a Firestrike or a Triad will induce you to use them.

After packing my kit (I'm a pack mule of sorts: I brought 5 pistols and 50/60 rounds. When I'm not running a game I bring all kinds of crap. When I'm running a game, I bring all kinds of crap and whatever I need to run the game) I walked over to Hayes Valley where the game was taking place. When I got there, Ben had just showed up and as we talked more and more people trickled in. Once we had about 25 players or so, Ben got things rolling: selecting the teams and passing out the game sheets for the first mission.

I personally had kind of a funky game, so this post isn't necessarily indicative of gameplay in general. But thats what I like about Jericho: no two games I played have ever followed the same path. There were four rounds, which i'll break down as follows:

Round 1
We drew teams and of note were the fact that two people I had been teamed up with were almost always on the opposing team from myself and in fact we both could be considered nemeses. Definitely not in the personal sense, or in any sense but a Nerf one: being constantly on opposing teams and going for the same objectives, Greg and Yoshi have spent a decent amount of time shooting darts at me and vice versa. (After the game, I decided that I liked it better when those guys were shooting at me. Sounds weird, but the experience is just more fun when Greg is charing at me from across the street and Yoshi is hiding behind stuff, popping out of nowhere and scaring the hell out of me.) We started the game as the defense and our team killed the courier, but the only part I played was walking in the opposite direction about a minute before the Offense showed up, missing the engagement entirely.

Round 2
It was our turn at to take a crack at Offense. We needed to take a picture of the courier holding a key and a blaster, taking it to Alamo Square in 30 minutes.  Never the less, I was on the team going to do the pickup,  escorting Yoshi acting as the courier, to a Mural on a wall at Ida B. Wells High School. Yoshi said he had a secret weapon and when we were off he pulled out a wig ( I won't describe it as to blow the cover on Yoshi's disguise for future benefit). From a distance, I couldn't recognize him. I figured that we could hide him with his disguise behind someone more recognizable who didn't mind drawing attention and possible death. Naturally, I volunteered for the role I just described, with no objections from anyone else. We headed out, but almost immediately, we spotted an enemy across the street.

The enemy in question is another person I have functional Nerf rivalry with, a guy named Andrew, who was cool enough to open up his house to us after the game. He was armed with  a Longshot/strike (forgot which one) modded to fire a single shot at a time. Though he was across the street from us, he leveled his gun and took a shot. And another, both of which tragically flew about 5 feet. After saying, possibly aloud "Wow! That gun sucks!" I decided to run down the street, then across, flanking him as fellow players approached him from the other side.

His next shot went off, the dart flying about 80 feet and just missing my head. Figuring that the gun didn't suck after all, I decided to be a little more cautious. I almost ran into another enemy, who was killed by a team mate. I looked up the street and saw Yoshi calmly walking away, by himself. I caught up to him, as did another player named Usha and we continued our escort. Across the street from the pickup location, I spotted Ben on his phone and he spotted me right after. I started to chase hm, but he had a teammate in reserve. I tried to draw them away from the mural and while initially successful Ben, almost intuitively, turned his head to the right and spotted Yoshi, knocking him off soon after and ending the mission.

Round 3
Before this round started, I realized that I hadn't gotten any kills, in addition to not getting Yoshi to the pickup. I thought, "What the hell am I going to write about?" I was hoping other people were having interesting games. Maybe I could overhear them talking about it and include it here!

Like I said above, this was a funky game for me. In games of Jericho, I've been on teams that have said "screw the pickup, lets all go to the drop off and just shoot everybody." This was the first time I've been on a team where we sent everyone to the pick up and said forget the drop off. As fitting the occasion, coming after two rounds of nothing, I got more Jericho kills in a round than every before with 5. The strategy worked, as our large body of people blocked the pick up location well. I ran around on the flanks of this group, shooting at the clusters of rivals bunched up on the corners with my Triads and Strongarm. With the above stated, with 15 people at the pickup, we still almost missed the courier, clipping him as he ran towards the location. We got him, but sweet Jesus, we had 15 people!

Round 4
After the win, we were back on the Offense for the final mission. We decided that we were going to completely avoid the pickup at first, sending the entire team to secure the drop off before sending a team to the pickup for a quick grab. We were able to do this fairly easily, mainly before like us in the last round, the defense flooded the pickup location. So our main group missed their main group and our small team got slaughtered. I spent the remaining time in the round standing at the drop off, very safe and alive, but with no pickup team to root for. In discussion about our strategy with Nerf Nemesis Greg, he dropped the gem that became the title of this post. Needless to say we lost the round.

All in all, both teams tied 2-2 for rounds. No team that was on the Offense won a round, and I only got kills in the third round, which was the most kills I've gotten in a Jericho round.

It was a funky game, but it was a blast as always. We got to grab some grub and hang at Andrew's place afterwards (like 10-15 people, which was super cool of him) for a few hours, talking and having beers. Andrew said that he wanted to do more non-nerf stuff with the people at the games, something I definitely agreed with.

I'm taking a day off tomorrow, but on Monday I'll share Assassin story #3 in the lead up to the game on the 20th! Have a nice weekend folks!

Pizza Pizza

Its not so hard to imagine. Indeed, to put yourself in the same position isn't that hard at all because you've been there plenty of times. You've spent all day at work, turning loose chunks of material into beautiful pieces of furniture (ok, that part more than likely doesn't apply) when the pangs of hunger strike. With the marvels of today's technology being what they are, your food is already ordered moments after you feel the hunger.

But lets back up a bit first.

As I said in the first couple of posts, I'm organizing A Friendy Game of Assassin II: Team Challenge starting June 20th and with the date approaching, it has me a wee bit nostalgic for the last game. This post concerns a certain player named Tyrone, who was my third target.

My second target, Ben from Jericho who I mentoined yesterday will be co-hosting the next Tactical Ops with me was taken out after a Humans vs. Zombies game I hosted in Dolores Park. The assassination itself wasn't noteworthy: I was behind him when he was looking for a fellow player named Skylar (who will be featured in the next Assassin story I do) when I shot him with my Strongarm. It was nothing fancy and we we're both kinda bummed by the process. Ben was bummed because he was dead (naturally) and because he had a really cool plan for his target that he wouldn't get  to execute, as he had been waiting to make his move later on. (I was bummed because assassinating someone after a game I hosted didn't feel right. I want people to feel comfortable and welcome at games, especially after games when we all hang out. I didn't like the prospect of people in the game either not wanting to hang with me or constantly on edge, waiting for the final, fatal darts. On top of that, the actual Assassination wasn't that cool. Id rather have a semi-epic to epic moment and die then get a regular old kill any day of the week. Gotta have stuff to blog about right?)

It was too bad he didn't get a chance to make it happen, because it really was a good plan. Tyrone originally had designated work a safe area from attacks (like most players, though a few of us opened up work for attacks), but after spending a couple of days fairly on edge about being ambushed (including almost shooting a couple of innocent people on the first day),  Tyrone hopped on Facebook and emphatically said screw it, come and get some at my job. He said that shooting through the fence, shooting him in the lobby or shooting him in the parking lot were OK now, just to try not to shoot him while he was welding. He gave his work hours and even a description of his vehicle. Ben's plan was to dress up in a delivery man's uniform, saying that he had an iPad for Tyrone that he needed to sign for. When Tyrone came to get it, it was kablamo, end of story.

Instead, the kablamo at hand was not to be Tyrone's, but Ben's. I learned two things from the experience: that if i'm possibly going to screw up good feelings people have, mine included, after a game by assassinating them,  then it better be pretty cool. Also, if I have a pretty cool way to do it in mind, I shouldn't wait any longer than I have to.  With Ben's passing, I inherited Tyrone as a target.

Originally, when I saw that he had signed up for the game I was happy and hoped to draw him as either a target or my Assassin. Tyrone is a very energetic guy and at the time I had played a few games with him. Tyrone definitely gets immersed in the experience, is surprising agile for being a pretty big dude and isn't a bad shot on top of it. I felt that when the game started, he was going to get similarly immersed and live the game. As an organizer, more than anything else I love to have people who get so excited about playing any game I do, that they forget its a game to an extent and just move through that alternate reality. Tyrone had clearly demonstrated such a level of excitement even before he became my target.

I swung by his house a few days later, searching around for his car in vain before pulling up a seat with my girlfriend Courtney across the street from his place. With a quick scan of the environment, I decided that where I sat was where I would wait for him any time I came looking. Given the placement of his house somewhat to the center of the block, from where I sat I could see him walk up from either direction with time to react and cover to shield to me (there were a series of bushes and a couple of big trees). He lives on a one way street, so if he drove by he would likely miss me but I would have even more time to react. We sat around talking and waiting, and while a dude in a passing car randomly yelled that we were a "beautiful couple" (???!), Tyrone didn't make an appearance during the time we were there.

A couple days later, I came back around, approaching his house from a the side streets, once again looking for his car. Once again, as in the fateful case of Ajesh in the first post, Tyrone had given away exactly the information I needed and this time I spotted his car. He lives near a very populated area, so after finding his car I went around looking for discarded parking tickets on the street or at worst really long receipts  After walking for 6 or 7 blocks I found what I was looking for and took out a pen from my  bag. I wrote poison about that big in the center of the receipt and headed back towards Tyrone's ride. When I got there I placed it under his driver side windshield wiper, just as DPT would. Then it was back to camping.

I didn't hold out too much hope for Tyrone coming back outside once home from work. I know I don't.  I was OK with it, because at 6 in the morning when he had to leave for work, in that dark, foggy mind state, who wouldn't say "Holy crap! How did I get a ticket?" and grab at the offending piece of paper. But since I was in the neighborhood, I figured why not wait it out for a second? As I was sitting across the street reading a book, or even before that when I was poisoning his windshield, Tyrone made the fateful decision alluded to the opening paragraph.

The decision to order a pizza.

Perfectly understandable. I ordered a pizza a couple of days ago. Pesto with garlic and other stuff, pretty damn good. As I was reading, I saw a delivery car pull up and a guy in a green uniform jumped out with the Pizza in question. I started freaking out a little bit as he got closer to Tyrone's place, ultimately stopping at his front door. I had a Stryfe with a 6 round clip in my backpack, placed off to the side of me to go along with a Triad in my jacket pocket. I stood up and inched towards the curb, anxious to see who came out.

It was Tyrone. He stepped outside and said hi to the pizza man while taking out his wallet. I forgot about the Stryfe in my bag and bolted.

Everything seemed to be moving really slow as I ran across the street, pulling out the Triad when I was about 10 feet away from his front door. I raised the Triad at about 5 feet and Tyrone didn't notice me until after I shot him in the gut.

The Pizza Man on the other hand saw me as soon as I pulled out what looked like a pistol, handed Tyrone the pizza without taking payment and bolted in the opposite direction. After shooting Tyrone, I called back to him, showing him the Triad wasn't a real pistol, that I knew Tyrone and that he wasn't dead. After seeing that something completely awful hadn't just happened, he started laughing and said it was pretty funny. He gave me a thumbs up and told me it was a pretty good shot before leaving.

In a way Ben's delivery man plan for Tyrone came to fruition: I just didn't know it was going to happen or involve an actual, unwitting delivery man.  The next day, Tyrone posted on the Facebook page that even if I hadn't shot him the day previous, the ghastly early morning poison ticket scenario I envisioned happened, thus he was now double dead.

Check back tomorrow as I will be blogging after Ben's Jericho game at 1pm in Hayes Valley with a write up of the games happening, and who knows, I might actually take pictures at this game like I keep planning to do.  Until next time!

Turning sh!t to shine

I've never owned a car. I'm almost 30 years old, but I only got my driver's license a few years ago, well into adulthood. When I tell people this, its not un-common for people to be a little surprised, which is understandable. In a lot of places in the world, most places rather, if you don't have some wheels you're kinda screwed. Want to get some food? See that big ass mountain or long stretch of desert standing in the way? Feel like walking? If you answered yes, god speed and give me that $20 you owe me because I don't think you'e making it back.

San Francisco, where i've lived for my entire life, is not such a place. Its pretty normal for someone to not want to do something because the activity at hand is "too far away." "Too far away" ranges anywhere from having to take the bus more then 20 minutes to simply out of one's neighborhood. As such, for the totality of my life, I've been rolling like the big shot that I am in my BWM: BART Muni Walk. With no other option but to zip around the city in my BMW, in particular the W aspect of it, I've gotten somewhat familiar with the finer points of the city's architecture and lay out.

During a recent conversation about Nerf game planning, I came to a realization of sorts. Most, if not  all the activities I enjoyed most as a kid and teenager (before the internet sucked me into its dark abyss, some time around 1997) were activities that were influenced and almost reactions to what I had at hand outside. This ran the gamut from bird watching, playing war games in the park up the street, riding bikes and skateboards up and down the giant hills near my house, breakdancing on concrete and writing graffiti on buses and walls all around the city.

Though  maybe not the most morally respectable hobby for a youngster to pursue, in retrospect writing graffiti influenced how I plan Nerf games more then any other factor or facet. It didnt give me  an early start at stealth training or some super Parkour climbing skills. It taught me how to look at a piece of real estate and evaluate its worth towards my pursuit in less than a minute. When I was writing graffiti, I would find a spot that I thought was cool (in the opinion of many at the time, hitting up [writing] in a really cool spot was almost as good as hitting up with a cool style, ie. "Yeah, that looks wack but damn, he did it off the side of a freeway"), figure a way to get there or write without being seen, write my name and try not get caught. Every time I wanted to write. Standing around just staring at something was bad news, even if I was just a kid. Thats obviously not a concern today, as I don't have to worry about Johnny Law or getting kicked off the bus for planning games.

But the mental process is pretty much the same. When I have a game or concept I want to do, I go to the general area where I want the game to take place. Then its a matter of just walking around the neighborhood, taking in my options. If I say "Oh! Damn!" a couple of times before I even get to where I want the game to start, I know the area is special.

followed by "What the hell is that thing?"

I still don't know what it is, but I used it for my first game of Tactical Ops: Squad vs Squad and will be coming back to it for the next game as well. I was walking around China Beach, near the new ballpark (As Candlestick will always be "the ballpark" in my dictum) when I came across this structure. As stated this was the first game,  so I wanted to push the envelope a little bit with the concepts. One mission in particular was called "Meth Lab." The goal in this mission was for the team on the offense (known in the game as the Special Operations Force, or SOF) to clear a particular area of rivals in an allotted time. If they failed, the defensive team, the Insurgents, would finish their batch of proverbial meth. Sounds simple enough, right? Walking along the boulevard, I had the aforementioned oh damn moment when I saw this beauty. 

The third thing I thought after oh damn and what the hell is that thing was that if you boarded it up, somebody could really cook some meth in there. Might be a little tough in the middle of the UCSF college campus, but if you take that weird three-quarters shack thing up on the side of a mountain you'd be in business. That qualified enough in my opinion, but since you can't run a game on story line alone it needed a closer look. Stepping inside of it, the immediate defensive advantages for the Insurgents were apparent, especially the fact that they could fire out of the spaces between the wooden planks. The  disadvantages were apparent too, considering that aside from some cars in the parking lot, the Meth Lab was the sole cover available to the defensive side. 

Meth Lab was the second mission of the game, but since the first mission lasted less than 10 minutes, it was the first mission in the game where the two teams heavily engaged each other. I was the team leader for the Insurgents and before the mission started, a player named Arthur (who had played once or twice at the time but since has become a mainstay) asked if he was allowed to climb on top of the structure. I said sure, go for it man. Then I saw that he was armed only with a Strongarm. I asked him how much ammo he had and he replied in an admirably nonchalant manner "just whats in the gun." On the other team, there were numerous people armed with Stryfes, a guy named Alex dual wielding Vigilon Disc guns (which is what he brings every game) and a few people with Retaliators. I wanted him to shoot from up there, but the advantage would be negated if he only had 6 darts. I handed him a bag of ammo and said have fun. 

Arthur ended up getting more kills than anyone, didn't die or even get shot and in the end keep it safe enough for the Insurgents to cook their batch of sweet sweet ice. With the lab so secure at points in the round, the defense was able even to go on the offense a few times, charging forth across the street and pushing the offense back, though we always had to retreat. 

One player on the other team was Ben who runs the weekend games for Jericho, San Francisco's Urban Spy Game. After the mission, with an exclamation of "Dude! That was intense!", Ben asked me how I found the structure and what it was. After a quick back and forth about the quarter-shack's benefits and flaws, he said that he wanted to do a mission there himself.

And now we are.  On June 29th, we're co-hosting the third installment of Tactical Ops and in truth I'm honored. The first nerf game I ever played was a Saturday game of Jericho hosted by Ben. It was during the first mission of that game that I was bitten by the Nerf bug, a bite thats been left completely un-treated and now is pumping a steady stream of nerf toxin directly into my heart. I couldn't be happier, because that game wasn't all that long ago and we're already working together. I'll definitely be blogging about it in the lead up to the game and afterwards. 

In the mean time, i'll be hitting you tomorrow with another story from the first Friendly Game of Assassin in my countdown to the game's start on the 20th. 

First Blood!

Hi!

I'm Connor McCann and thank you for checking out my first blog! As you will come to see, I am into Nerf guns and games (understatement), whether as an organizer or as a player. I first got interested int outdoor/real life game at the start of this year, and I'm striking my first blood now as far as the blogosphere goes. As such, I have a story about first blood that I feel is appropriate given the circumstances. 

In a little more than a week, I will be kicking off A Friendly Game of Assassin II: Team Challenge , a 5 week, 24 hour a day game taking place in the real world. Players are formed into teams, assigned targets and aside from a few places that are off limits (insides of homes and jobs/schools), take them down where ever they catch them. To enter the game, players email me their home and work addresses, as well as a recent picture. This story takes place during the first Friendly Game of Assassin, which concluded in May and was won by Trevor Holminski (a past collaborator, very frequent team mate at games and my eventual Nerf murderer in Game 1). 

My target was a guy named Ajesh, who with his wife Ami, had attended the first game I had ever run back in February. I hadn't gotten a chance to see him play, but I had talked to him and his wife for a bit between games and they were very friendly people. He was my first target in the game and I was excited to draw him, mostly because he lived about 10 minutes away from where I grew up in the Mission. I had a strategy: rent a Zipcar, find a place to park near his house (which were he lived wouldn't be easy), let him walk by me and jump out behind him. In the passenger seat next to me sat a Rough Cut 2x4 and a Strongarm. 

Like I said before, I wasn't familiar at the time with Ajesh's playing style. I was also a little antsy on the drive over, as I had never jumped out of a car and tried to shoot somebody before. This was both my first time organizing and playing in a game (to keep things honest, my girlfriend did the actual target selecting, ensuring I didn't know my Assassin), so I didn't really know what to expect. However, Ajesh had already, unwittingly, helped me out. Ajesh is a fairly avid user of Facebook and in the week that transpired between when the game started and when I went on the hit, had checked into 3 or 4 places on Foursquare. If you're trying to assassinate someone, not much is going to help you more then knowing where they are. Sadly, every time he had checked in somewhere, I was at work, un-able to pay him a visit. 

Still, the information helped me out in another way. I saw that he checked into places at around 5:30 or six clock monday through thursday. On Friday is was earlier, which lead me to believe that if he was able to get off work early, he would do so around 3:30/4. Friday was the only day our schedules synced, so to speak, so I headed over to the Mission in the never ending search for a parking spot at around 3:45. 

Without saying where he lived, I knew I wanted to find something on Mission street itself, halfway between his house and the BART station. I knew he had a car, but I didn't know what it looked like, or if he would chance using it on a Friday afternoon. Before looking for parking, I wanted to swing by his pad and have a look around. Luckily, I found a parking spot 20 feet from his house. I turned my music down, un buckled my seatbelt and waited. Maybe 10 or 15 minutes had passed and I gave my girlfriend Courtney a call, saying that I would hang around for maybe 30 minutes more, but I doubted any longer. 

Maybe a minute had passed when Ajesh walked right infront my car. It was weird, because I saw him but it took a second for it to actually make sense to me. When I released I needed to get off my hind-quarters and take a shot at him, I saw the look on his face. Any one who's lived in The City would recognize it: narrowly drawn, glazed over eyes placed a top an responsive, stone face, a face that says its been a long ass week and I'm tuning every thing out until I get home. You can frequently find me walking around here with such a face. 

I knew he didn't see me and as I crept up to within half a foot of him, I knew he didn't hear me either. He was about five feet from his front door, while holding my rough cut, I debated with myself whether to barrel tap him or just shoot him with the darts. 

I shot him with the darts. 

He had the same reaction to getting shot as I had seeing him: he looked down at the darts on the sidewalk, recognizing them for what they were, but unable to make a connection. Then it hit him, and after a quick burst of profanity, he shook my hand and said "nice kill!" I asked him if he was armed and he told me he wasn't. He wasn't even planning on coming home: he was just going to go straight to a bar (it was Friday after all) but he decided he didn't want to carry all of his work crap with him. I said I had figured if he was going to be coming home at any time before 9 or 10 it was then. I said I was surprised he hadn't walked up from Mission, instead coming from the opposite direction and likely contributing to my momentary inaction. He then told me that he "hated me now", was bummed that he didn't get to try out his plan for his target, but would be coming to my Humans vs. Zombies game the next day (which he did).

I was happy to take him down, but the experience was still a bit strange. As noted above, I'd never ambushed someone infront of their house before. Prior to the hit, I had a semi-grand plan of what I was going to do, where I was going to take cover if needed, what angle to attack from, if i should run back to the car to get another weapon etc. I didn't have any clue that it was as simple as finding a really good parking spot and quietly walking behind someone. This proved to be the case in later hits, which I'll talk about as the June 20th start of Game II draws closer.

In the meantime, thank you if you're still reading (its a bit to commit to the first time you meet someone, I know) and here are the links to my groups if you're in the Bay Area and what to play Assassin, Humans vs. Zombies, Tactical Ops or more traditional games like Capture the Flag and Team Death Match:

Foam Action Network on Facebook

Meetup.com Group