Finally our intel department got hold of a picture of the well known reborned. You now have his picture and will be able to tackle him if you meet with him face to face.

Just had a great game against cfrag. I had never played him before and I thought he was a rookie, but I was mistaken and he already has good knowledge of the game’s perks. On this game I made a mistake and on his first move I lost my 50 Vector. That’s a huge blow, especially against a good player. I managed to win simply because cfrag didn’t properly choose his priorities!

Here’s the match:

When you see the game, you’ll see that we were on the middle, I with my Scourge and him with the Vector. It was clear to me that the one the one of those units that prevailed would win the match for the owner. And I concentrated on that. But cfrag spent a lot of time and energy focusing on a part of the board that was not important. I’m talking about the place where I had my Taurus and Scarab. They were completely out of play, I wasn’t even thinking on using them, because they were so far away from that hot spot with the Vector and Scourge. Even so cfrag focused on that and that allowed me to take his vector away.

This is a mistake that I see a lot on new players. For example, wasting moves to attack that Crusader on the far end that won’t be any useful for the rest of the game.

Even so, it was a great match. I’ll be on my guard the next time I face him.

For those who doubt the power of the Blinker, just look at the turns 13,23 and 33 of the following battle:

Historically speaking, I don’t know of any empire that lasted for ever. There are always the rich times, filled with richness and glory, and down times, with less resources and defeats. On Orion’s Belt this also happens. Those familiarized with Orion’s Belt History already know that. Even on this new version we can see that. At one time or another there were an alliance that ruled the universe. We can remember CUS and Cosa Nostra from the old days. And on this version Prophets of the Revolution, ALPHA and System Lords have been on front and quite powerful, and have fallen to lesser positions.

This weekend, while the System Lords admirals were not at the command of their fleets, two of the System Lords officers turned against them and joined the Death Squadron and attacked the only System Lords relic left. This is specially interesting because these two traitors were an important rebel force against the Death Squadron. I dare to say that at this moment the Death Squadron alliance is the most powerful ever seen on this version of Orion’s Belt. System Lords can’t really complaint about their members, seen that the alliance has a history of betraying its allies. And now, an alliance that once had 8 relics, now fights for the last one…

The balance of power may seam on Death Squadron’s side. They are a lot, very well organized, and with great zone control. But every time that one alliance becomes two strong, it has to deal with several problems:

• Internal problems: many members means a lot of stuff to handle; it’s hard to keep all the members happy, specially when there’s bounty to share
• Being the first means that all the alliances focus on that one alliance

It may be difficult to reach number one. But it’s even more difficult to stay there for a long time.