Event: Results Prizes
AGP's Fall 2003 Halo Championship
  • 3rd place out of 72 teams from 30 states
  1. $1050 cash
 
 
The third and best AGP to date.  This had to have been the most anticipated halo event ever.  72 teams from 30 states came down to compete in the best Halo action ever.  With a very disappointing 5th place at agp2 PS had a lot to prove.  With all of the bull shit hype on xbc and on the forums many thought team PS was done in halo and wouldn't have a shot at top 10 at agp3.  After our 5th place finish at agp2 we lost one of our better players Clockwork to STK.  We replaced him with pretty much unknown at the time Walshy.  At this point we had three solid players but we still needed a 4th.  We held tryouts for over two months until we found someone we thought was worth it.  Biggy took Luk's spot as the 4th tournament starter.  Finally we had a squad of 4 guys.  At this point we had really never played 4 v 4 as a team and the rest of the time before AGP3 was to practice our teamwork.
 
At this point we had had so many good tryouts we decided to form PSB.  They are a very cool bunch of guys.  After about 3-4 good weekends of playing with PSB and GU we felt fairly well prepared for AGP3.  PS was still the 3rd ranked team in the Nation and we were ready to go down to Ten. To defend our ranking.  If you listened to 1/4 of the agp forums you would have to believe ps was dead and they wouldn't win a game without the "almighty" clockwork. 

The day came for PS to ride down to AGP.  We loaded up the all four of ps and 2 of psb into the PS navigator.  PSB supplied a sweet 17" flat panel monitor for movies and xbox action.  The drive was actually a lot of fun with six guys in the car.  We were about halfway there until we ran into a huge traffic jam.  On a entrance ramp  traffic just stopped.  We sat there for about 10 minutes before we saw a very scary glimmer in Ian's eye.  There was another ramp to the left of us.  Ian decided to floor it and drive up on the grass and pulled onto the ramp.  We got out of the traffic jam but had no idea where we were.  We stopped at a gas station to get directions.  The Woman working there asked us what we needed.  I told her that we needed to get on 427 but since it was all backed up we needed to find another way.  She told us "Just get on the highway".  We explained to her again it was completely backed up and there was absolutely no movement.  She told us again "Well it can't stop forever just get back on the highway".  With her great advice we bought a map and Dragon decided to navigate us down a secondary route.  An hour later and 3 wrong turns we were back on track.  Four hours later we were at our hotel in Ten.  It was around 1 a.m. and with 72 teams in a 1 mile area we got a new breath of energy.  We laned a little bit and went to bed.

 

      
 PS is a friggen happy bunch How walshy prepares to own at ffa.
The next morning we packed up and ate some free continental breakfast.  This being the third agp for Dragon and Corrosion the nerves weren't very bad.  Walshy also seemed very focused.  During the weekdays that he wasn't playing 4 v 4 ctf with ps he was practicing 1 v 1 wizard.  He had a huge drive to win the ffa this year.  PS had taken Walshy in and trained the shit out of him.  He has emerged as a great player and spent nearly a month getting ready for the AGP ffa.   
 
The ffas went fairly good for PS.  Biggy and Corrosion got eliminated in the last round of the 8 man ffas.  They both tied with a bunch of others for about 32nd place out of  288.  Dragon was next to go in the first round of the 4 man ffa.  After getting first place in almost all of the 8 man ffa games he made the mistake of not timing and not teaming up in the 4 man round.  he tied with a few others for 16 place out of 288.  Walshy was able to get a good 4 man ffa teaming up partner in zyos.  Walshy zipped his way through the 4 man ffa rounds and finally was in the 1 v 1's.  Everyone on PS knew how great Walshy was 1 v 1 wizard and we all knew he could go all the way.  The only question was if he could make it to the 1 v 1s.  With that question answered we watch Walsh destroy every single one of his opponents.
 
Walshy's first game was vs. the WCG halo champion.  Zyos had recently won $20,000 and been declared the Halo World Champ.  In reality zyos was on the of the few halo players that knew about the qualifying event in California and was the only one to go qualify.  Zyos had chosen 1 v 1 wizard for his "best" setting at the WCG event.  Well, Walshy showed Zyos how 1 v 1 wizard is played.  Walshy destroyed zyos 25 to 7.

Walshy's next opponent was ex ps member clockwork, who many said Walshy would never be able to replace.  Walshy again played amazingly.  His three shot was on and Clockwork didn't stand a chance.  Walshy won 25 to 13.

Finally it was the Finals.  Darkman had just destroyed one of the Ogres and Strangepurple 1 v 1.  Now it was time for Walshy.  Watching the game was intense.  Everyone watching could tell Walshy had the game the entire time.  Walshy never lost a 1 v 1 pistol battle.  Almost every one of his kills was a three shot.  Walshy amazed the crowd with his original grenade tricks.  He showed off how easy it is to grenade powerups down and even pulled a trick move when he did a grenade jump to evade Darkman near the end of the game.  Walshy became the AGP3 FFA champion beating darkman 25 to 16.

      
                                             

 

After the FFA; TDT was seated first, STK was 2nd, and PS was 3rd.  After an hour or so of waiting we went right into our poolplay.
Pool Play
vs. CC [30], TBZ [35], MC [62], HG [67] 
We had 4 other teams in our Pool Play bracket.  We had to play each team twice.  We went 8-0 fairly easily and went back to the hotel to eat and sleep.  Everyone on ps was completely drained after this long day of halo.

 

AGP ctf record (4-0)
     
PS and PSB after day one.. I think we all feel how biggy looks.

The Start of Day 2

vs. VAB (31)
PS was now seated 2nd.  STK tied one of the teams in their poolplay and dropped all the way down to a seed of 8th.  This was great for us because the 2nd seed allowed us to be in a separate bracket from tdt.  And Because stk messed up in Pool Play they also got placed into TDT's bracket.

Our first game of the championship bracket was vs. the thirty first seed VAB.  We won the first 3 games of the series.  We seemed a bit rusty but we started to warm up more near the end.  Below is a screenshot of the wizard game.

AGP ctf record (5-0) (we count the best of 5 series as 1 win or 1 loss)

vs. NT
Our next game was vs. the 15th seated NT.  This was our one and only game that took place on the main front stage.  Again our team struggled to play well on Battle Creek.  We weren't playing as good as we usually did on the map.  We dragged through two games on battle creek winning them both 3 to 1 and then Played a great game of wizard winning that one 5 to 0.  NT had been talking a little trash during the battle creek games.. and they even managed to talk about 3 seconds of crap in the wizard game because that about how long it lasted.  Our Wizard strat was down and our teamwork was great.  At this point I was a little worried about our Battle Creek game.  I was hoping it would get better as the tournament went on...  Below are the 3 screen shots vs. NT.

AGP ctf record (6-0)

vs. TKA (7) game 1
This game was the Quarter finals vs. Team Kick Ass.  Our Battle Creek game was still lacking.  The first game vs. TKA was pretty bad.  It seemed like we were doing fine in our slaying but we just couldn't come away with a cap.  TKA managed to get two caps in the 13 minutes with PS still at 0.  PS isn't a team that gives up.  We were down 2 to 0 with a minute left in the game.  I think TKA and Just about everyone else watching the game thought it was over.  PS however didn't.  Suddenly our teamwork came together and Corrosion was able to get a cap.  Biggy was waiting in the enemy base exactly when Corrosion capped the flag.  With the cover provided by Walshy and Dragon he was able to make it back to base.  This time they had grabbed our flag and were running away with it.  Dragon was coming back to base to find the FC when the FC was spotted at the front of the base.  As soon as the FC saw Dragon the FC ran back into the base and thus began the longest 20 second chase ever.  Dragon glanced at the timer and saw that there was 20 seconds left in the game.  Every corner the Flag Carrier took Dragon just barely missed him.  With about 10 seconds to go the FC exited the base out of the left side and made a run for the teleport.  With the last possible shot before the FC would be around the corner Dragon dropped the fc and was able to return the flag.  PS capped with 3 seconds left on the clock and the game was tied 2 to 2.  Screen shot shown below.

 

 

vs. TKA (7)                game 2
After the first game Team ps was really pumped.  We were ready to jump into it again and take the win.  We started off rather well and got a 1 to 0 lead.  The game was a non-stop battle for control.  TKA was able to get back control and hold the top of our base.  With our base camped PS was having a very hard time getting out alive and TKA pulled off a cap to tie the game 1 to 1.  PS was able to pull a nice three shot and take down the guy camping the top of our base.  With this we took back control of the map and again retook the lead with 2 caps to 1.  At this point, time was running low in the game and we went into defensive mode.  We held control and had a 2 to 1 lead when time ran out.  However at this point we didn't have a ref at our table (He decided to leave right after the game started).  TKA dropped down into our base and grabbed our flag 1-2 seconds before the time ran out.  Because of a new AGP rule stating a ref could decide to let the time go long if the enemy team had your flag.  After about 10 minutes of arguing and confusion the ref ruled that the game would only have been extended if their flag carrier was out of our base and about to score.  PS was awarded the win and we moved on to Wizard. No screen shot shown.
 

vs. TKA (7)      

 

game 3

After our two games with the 7th seed team we felt good going into one of our best maps Wizard.  Right away we took control of the map.  We had control of both sides and kept their team spawning.  Once we had secured the map we moved in and started to run the flag.  The match was fairly simple and PS simply had control the entire game.  TKA was spawning into double team pistols and there wasn't much they could do about it.  PS won the game 5 caps to 0.  Screen shot shown below.

AGP ctf record (7-0)

 

With this win There were only 4 teams left in the tournament.  We had already done better at this event than the last AGP even though we had 2 brand new members.  We were pumped and ready to make a return to the AGP Finals that we hadn't been to since the first AGP.

 
vs. AP(3) Semi - Finals
Our Semi-Final match was vs. the third seated AP.  They are also apart of a team called JSF and were ranked in the top 10 before AGP 3 even happened.  We knew they would be a hard team to beat.  I was also worried because our Battle Creek game really wasn't up par.
 
Our games vs. AP were just a huge long list of major small fuck ups.  A player on PS had cammo rockets in the back of our base maybe 4-5 games.  Normally they would have gone through teleport or maybe gone to middle to take over the top of enemy base.  However the pressure of this semi-final match really got to the players on PS.  We started altering how we would normally play 4 v 4 on LAN without the pressure.   The PS member with RL basically just sat there and camped our port.  He was afraid to go through and get whapped.  Because of this many times in the game it was 4 vs. 3 in the middle with our 4th player sitting in the back of our base not really helping where he was needed.  Teamwork and communication seemed to also break down in both games.   At one point we had a perfect cap set up.  We had a teammate standing above the teleport just waiting for the flag carrier to come through and toss it to him.  Instead of blocking the port and tossing up the flag our flag carrier came through and tried to run to the left side of the base.  The last major fuck up was when our flag carrier was going into our base  was in a foot race with an AP member.  Instead of hanging back and waiting for help our FC charged at the flag and even turned his back to the AP member.  AP was able to melee him in the back and return the flag about a inch from a capture.  Overall we didn't play either games of Battle Creek very well.  We didn't play it like a polished team would have.  We had way too many fuck ups, communication break downs, and easy blown caps.  We will learn a lot from this poor performance on Battle Creek and we hope to apply that to future tournaments.  We tied one battle creek 2 caps to 2 and lost the other battle creek 2 caps to 3.  No screen shots shown.
 
vs. AP(3) Wizard Games
Coming right off a really hard 2 cap to 3 loss on battle creek we knew we had to win both Wizards.  Our first wizard we played great.  Our teamwork was near flawless and we held control for most of the game.  Dragon had an amazing game as you can see from the screen shot below.  But his insane stats only show exactly how well the entire team played.  One player could hold a side and rack up the kills and as soon as a shift was needed he can go grab the flag and have another teammate instantly fill his spot and give him cover so he could cap.  PS played great and won the game 5 to 1.  Screen shot shown below.

2nd wizard
After a 5 to 1 victory on wizard you would think we could do it again right?  Well the next wizard game started off almost just like the first one.  We had a 1 cap to 0 lead.  The only difference this time around was in order to get that first cap we had to give up our control.  After the cap we were never able to regain complete control of the map again.  The next 5-7 minutes of the match was a brutal battle for control.  Many times we came very close to getting the control back by AP always seemed to manage to get one guy out of the base or one guy hiding out at a power up to keep us from map control.  The major turning point in the game was after 8 minutes.  The game was still 1 to 0 when the rockets spawned.  With map control somewhat leaning towards AP at this point Acer was able to grab both rockets and pull off a triple kill.  This was devastating to our fight for control.  With an rl guy camping our spawns AP moved into their positions and had Complete control.  At this point it was a difficult struggle.  At first our main goal was to stop them from capping.  We were able to drop 2 flag carriers and get the returns.  But by doing this we didn't challenge their map control.  They still had the sides held and could keep going for our flag.  By the time the 2nd RL spawned it was over.  PS simply couldn't get control back.  Many times PS pulled of some great 3 shots to drop campers on the left or right but it wasn't enough.  AP was able to get the next 5 caps with this control and dropped PS out of the tournament with a 3rd place finish. Screen shot shown below,  If you look at stats you see exactly how close the kills were.  ACER had an amazing run with rockets that really turned the game.

 

AP was a great team but it was a very disappointing loss.  With all our mistakes on battle creek we really felt the win could easily have been ours.  Also losing control on the 2nd wizard was purely our fault and our focused should have been holding control not the first cap.  The drive back to Michigan was bitter sweet.  Walshy represent PS well with a first place FFA finish but we fell a little short in the Team Event.  We really wanted that final match vs. stk.  Overall PS played good.  Not many thought we would place top 10 and we pulled out a 3rd place.  This being the first full tournament with our new lineup I have great expectations on how far our new lineup can go.  We had an amazing time at AGP and can't wait for the next one.

AGP ctf record (7-1)  

Stats for Team PS at AGP 3:

Caps Caps Kills Assists Deaths Positive
PS-DragoNSpeaR 11 244 73 118 +126
PS-Corrosion 14 201 69 124 +77
PS-Walshy 6 210 87 131 +79
PS-Biggy 9 204 76 145 +59

 

People LOVE to talk shit on the AGP forums.  Most of the time people run their mouth all day and by the time tournaments actually come around everybody forgets the stupid shit they have said.. Well I accumulated some interesting quotes from various people before AGP 3.  Enjoy:

Clockwork: "I wasn't saying I'm good. I'm saying you are gonna get 20th place at AGP3."


- TDT-Alex: "Walshy will not take top 2"
[TDT]-Boo4NativS: "think we all know that walshy or bakes or 90% of the people in here cant compare too pray's skills."

 

 

Before AGP 3:

~PrAy4U~: "PS - clockwork = a wounded solider...since everyone is into betting nowadays...can we bet that PS doesnt get top 10?"

~PrAy4U~: "I dont believe PS has a chance for top 10...nothing personal but losing luk & clockwork and gaining whalshy isnt making your team stronger..."

~PrAy4U~: "as for my team tdt2, watch out...nobody ever seen us play because we havnt yet...but we will be the suprise team at agp3, making 2 big upsets"

~PrAy4U~: "considering PS lost their best player for good they should move down in rank...they shouldnt even be ranked ahead of LoRdZ"

After AGP 3:

PS places third (higher than we did the year before with clockwork) and Walshy defeates zyos, clockwork, and darkman to win the ffa.

PS is still ranked third.

tdt2 ties for 5th-8th. :( :( :(