Tomorrow I'm organizing HvZ: Academy, which will be a scenario based, almost training exercise for players looking to sharpen their HvZ skills. Hosted in Lafayette Park, we'll be working out some scenarios or situations players find themselves in, with an equal balance of things I have in mind as well as input from the players present. With this in mind, I figured why not talk shop in preparation for tomorrow's event? As indicated by the title, I'll be talking about the finer points of losing yourself in a crowd of people.
I tend to host my HvZ games in well populated areas, as the crowds become a game element on their own as you have to focus more attention to make sure there aren't zombies lurking in the midst. However, as you also tend to travel in larger groups during these same games, my HvZ games won't be the focus of this post. Nor will Tactical Ops, which is played in more isolated environments. However, Jericho is stealth based and frequently played Downtown, thus near large crowds to lose yourself in. As such it'll be the focus of this post.
I got to thinking about the subject after nearly losing myself in a crowd and not knowing it. I was walking with my girlfriend Courtney and our roommate Maro up Van Ness from Fort Mason after watching the 4th of July fireworks. I don't like being in crowds, especially giant ones consisting of either A) drunk people or B) slow walking tourists. This mob consisted of a blend of both, so I was eager to get past them. My plan was to get off Van Ness via North Point, then walk up the stairs leading to Larkin st and away from the crowd.
Not a bad plan for a person like a myself. The only downside of it was I didn't inform either of the people I was walking with of said plan. Instead, I opted to simply employ the tactics I'll describe shortly. I heard Courtney call out for me and after we linked back up she said that I was just "ten feet away one second and gone the next." Maybe a minute later, in some corner of my mind I connected the experience with a Jericho courier mission and a blog post was born.
When I'm the courier in a game of Jericho, if possible I like to operate remotely. By this I mean simply that if I don't have to do the pickup myself (whether taking a picture or getting an item) I won't. If this is the case, the first thing I will do is disappear. I'll get out of the starting area, traveling by myself and making sure not to come anywhere near the pickup location. Instead, I'll head to within a block or two of the drop off location and hide out.
In Downtown San Francisco, there is a lot to keep track of, so this means hiding in plain sight. The first thing to do, naturally, is to join the crowd. Your insert into this group needs to be sudden and inauspicious. What I like to do is speed up in pace, nowhere near a run, but a steady stride, and walk around the edge of the group. When I see an opening, usually from the side, I'll speed up even more, moving laterally into the thick of the crowd. Once then, I'll continue to maneuver around people in the crowd, before coming back to a slower speed in the middle. If the person following me is outside the crowd, they most likely can't see me. I can just keep plodding along those terribly lengthy blocks on Market street and be lost to the world.
So now that I'm hiding out, I'll either just stay firmly surrounded by human shields, or move to a nice hidey-hole if I come across one. I prefer to stay with the crowd, or move between crowds, because if I spot players from the other team, I can safely observe and report their movements the same as if I was in a concealed location. Anywhere they go, aslong as I stay with mob. If there is just a straggler or two and the risk isn't too high (as the courier in Jericho, if you die the mission ends) for me to take them out, I'll give it a try.
There's something to say about the virtues of losing yourself in a crowd when being pursued. The benefits of such go without saying. The process for doing so doesn't change either, but there is one factor in this situation that can spoil it for you: keeping calm. To the person looking for you, anybody acting agitated, namely by constantly looking over their shoulder or breaking out into a run in the middle of a crowd is going to draw their attention. If they can keep calm and catch up with you, being in a crowd will work against you. However, even if you are freaking out on the inside, if you don't let it show in any visible way, nobody will notice it. You'll be one person in a hundred, or a thousand depending on when and where you are, the needle in a human haystack. If you lose your tail, it'll be possible to turn the tables on them and take them out if you can move to a position to watch them. The moment they doze off or stop to do something you unload.
So in light of this tactical talk, I'm excited about tomorrow's non-game and especially excited to hear any suggestions players have in mind that they want to give some practice. Talk to you next week!
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