Abuse vs Mark of the Beast

Team Abuse are the top team in the West and are the second ranked team in the entire league. They are also the defending q3Alliance champions and epitomize what teamplay is all about. Abuse isn't a team based on aim or movement but rather arguably the best teamplay in the league. They are a well rounded team and in any given game any one of their players will be their best. Method, citizen, cujo and lantern currently are the starting squad for Abuse and put a lot of time into perfecting their strategies for each map. They also of course had a big influence on the designs of the 2 new cpm maps that are used in the league which only helped them further to develop some of the best teamwork on those maps. They only dropped 3 maps all season long and were the only team to take a map from the stickmen. They had one of the hardest schedules out of all the teams so to finish with only 3 map loses is quiet an achievement.

Mark of the beast came into this league as another OSP team looking to strut their stuff in cpm and have done it fairly well. They barely made it into the playoffs, just edging out Canine and Phobia for the 8th and final spot. Their lineup features players like pezcore (aka vader), clean, diso, simmer, zarbin, and teddy, with each of them getting to see some action. The revolving door on who starts has its advantages and disadvantages. The benefit is that they have a very flexible lineup but on the downside their teamplay will suffer since they are constantly using different players. Mob feature average teamplay and average aim which is simply not going to get it done in the playoffs. And of course like any OSP based team, their best map is cpm4, not that that is going to help them.

Prediction: Abuse will sweep this series easily.

Nobles vs Defiance

Let me start off by saying this is going to be a great game. Nobles are the top team in the league out of all the European squads and feature some high profile players such as Rat (best European cpm dueler?), Swelt (maker of cpm21 and cpm18), Drex, and MarC. They finished the season with only 49 points, but in the very tight western conference it was enough for them to take the second seed. Nobles's best map is a bit of an odd one because unlike most cpm teams, they seem to excel on cpm4, only losing it once all season long. That is a pretty impressive feat considering they even won cpm4 when they were badly out pinged agaisnt Darkside and Styles Unknown in the cross divisional weeks, which goes to show you just how amazing they are on this map. They have some great teamplay and good aim which is why I consider them a mini-abuse.

Defiance is a team that has been improving with every map they play and capped off their impressive play when they managed to take a map from team Abuse, no small feat. Their lineup features wolfy, atastypie, xfoo and jinrai, all of whom have been practicing like mad to try and become one of the best teams. They will have to play out on an east coast server which I think may have been one of the reasons why they lost to team y in the final week of the season, however now that they have that experience under their belt, the higher ping shouldn't be as much of an issue for them. Defiance are a team of decent aim and teamplay, but neither is exceptional. Their best map is by far cpm21, which is the map they beat both Abuse and team y on. However, they have consistently lost cpm4 to all the tough teams they have played, which should give Nobles an easy win on this map. Defiance is going to have to improve upon their cpm18 teamwork if they wish to have any hope of taking this series. They wont win cpm4, so if they were to some how take the entire series, it would be a 3-2 series.

Prediction: As much as defiance have been practicing, I don't think they will be able to take this. I think they will be able to take at least one map, but Nobles will win the series 3-1.

*69 vs team y

*69 are a bit of an odd team, they seem to keep winning despite losing kungfoo (gg ringing) and really not being all that impressive in general. The two best teams they played in the west division were team y and FiTH, losing in a sweep to team y and beating FiTH in a close one. Daler, who has one of the best rails in the league, has really been *69's bread and butter, carrying them through the season. Bughouse has also played pretty well for them, but he starts to struggle a little with his 100 ping to NYC (where this game is likely to be played). *69, despite their seed, is to me the underdog and is really going to need to start to practice if they wish to have a chance of taking this and Jaguar along with Katsu are going to have to step up their play.

Team y, yet another European team, is led by the great Toxter who is complemented by players like tureon, zro, wrath, and vision. Team y, like a most of the west teams, doesn't feature any incredible aim but rather good teamwork with a dash of decent aim for their ping. Team y is a really well rounded team and if they want to win this series, they need to do one thing: shut down Daler. How do you shut down Daler? Well, it isn't easy but depriving him of his precious rail is a good start. One other area that could be improved upon is the insane damage received they seem to get, with toxter being the top player in this stat along with tureon in 3rd. If they can do this, they shouldn't have much trouble winning just as they did the last time these two teams met.

Prediction: Team y should win this in a sweep, I can't imagine *69 putting in enough practice to over come them.

Fire in the Hole vs Quick Omission

Fire in the hole is another vq3 team that is playing decent in the cpm world. However, it may also be a little over rated. In fact, they played 2 teams all season long that made it to the playoffs. In both of those games they lost 2-1, to the #3 seeded *69 and the #8 seeded Mark of the Beast. The team has not practice all season long according to Hakeem, who joined FiTH before the season started, marking his return to the Quake 3 scene after a long absence. FiTH is a team that features some decent skill but is really lacking in the teamplay department and not practicing of course doesn't help. If they wish to beat the European Quick team, they will have to hope that their aim with 80-100 pings can carry them, which isn't likely. Their best map though is cpm18, which they only dropped once all season long.

Quick is led by the popular Sky, and whose best player is snapcase. Supporting them are players such as acq, sonny, sai and perch. Quick has a perfect record against teams from their own division, which is pretty impressive. The only map they dropped to teams from their own division was cpm4, which they lost to neo and Canine. They also beat mob, whom FiTH lost to. Quick has practiced a fair amount over the course of the season as well and like any European team in the league, rely on teamplay more than aim. Their key to success is simply control the armour and get the quads, if they can do that they don't need to worry about how well FiTH can aim.

Prediction: Quick should take this series, but it should be fairly close imo. Quick should take it 3-1 I think.