Bleh!
It’s been a tiresome week here at the ENSL with lots of boring official business and not much playing Natural Selection, but gray skies are clearing up now…

Admirable’s Division 1 Predictions

So put those razorblades away mates, don’t shoot up your schools just yet, I’m back to fan the flames of the European NS Scene for another week. Isn’t this what life is all about?


Flatline-Ns vs LOLSTEAMROLL

This is easily the most appetising item on this week’s menu of e-Sports carnage. The votes are in and this is officially your “Match of the Week”.

The reigning champions, Flatline-Ns, hit a small bump in the road to retaining their title last week. Although they won convincingly, they lost a round to a delayed Shotgun Rush not too dissimilar to the round that saw them take 1st place last season. With this season shaping up to be a very close-cut affair the German War Machine cannot afford to be so careless. Flatline-Ns will be looking to stamp their authority on this fixture, their first real test of the season. However, with their most active player, Macpersil, receiving a one week suspension and subsequently leaving the team, I have to question if they will have a strong line-up for this important fixture. This echoes a little of Cosmic’s “You can’t ban me! I quit” attitude of last season, so perhaps we will see Macpersil again in the not-too-distant future.

My little puppets over at LOLSTEAMROLL produced a strong performance last week against The Sproggalots. They were, without question, the better team on the day and more than a little unlucky to come away with only a draw; let’s see if I can pull their strings again this week. The Finns have a real opportunity here to capitalise on the loss of Macpersil and the inactive state of the German War Machine. I have definitely seen an improvement from LOLSTEAMROLL since the pre-season period. Whilst their Marine Rounds have always been forceful with Peacham in the chair and strong aimers like Tane, NsN, Naxu and N@de in the field, their Alien Rounds have lacked that certain something. In the past I have put it down to poor early game skulking and lone rushing, but all this seems to be improving. I even thought Tane faded quite well in last week’s big game, but I still find his apparently magnetic attraction to large groups of shotguns quite puzzling; play it safe bro!

Impact players:
~flatline-ns` : M (Shotgun\Fade), HiVeFiSh (All-round), phil (Marine\Lerk)
?lol-? : Tane (Marine), N@de (Marine\Lerk), Peacham (Mastermind)

Flatline-Ns 2 - 2 LOLSTEAMROLL

Adz’ Final Thought: Flatline-Ns are still favourites in my eyes, but I really don’t know what sort of shape they are in after the week’s events…


The Sproggalots vs de-stroyer

OK! It’s getting close to the deadline and I don’t want to “do a Macpersil”, so let’s keep this short.

The Sproggalots’ performance last week was, in one word, shit. As Alien they were workmanlike and got the job done (just about), but as Marine they rarely looked like a threat to their Finnish opposition. Fortunately there has been no denial of this from Sprogga HQ, where everyone seems to have held their hands up and said “Man! We fucking sucked!” and recognised that they must do better. With everyone in the right mind frame, GreeN and sheep available to play and a bit more discipline things look promising. Nothing sort of a four nil victory will satisfy the Sproggan bloodlust!

The previously missing (and presumed dead) Commander and Chief of the de-stroyers, SaperioN, has finally returned from Science Camp or wherever you crazy kids go to get your kicks these days. De-stroyers now have to try and rekindle the flames of their potential first displayed in the NSNC, against The Sproggalots funnily enough. There’s not really a lot more to say here as I haven’t seen them play as a clan since the pre-season: show me what you got, Germanians!

Impact players:
sprogga ~ : Altbst (Skulk), GibbZ (Field Comm), sheep (Lerk)
de-stroyer | : SaperioN (Comm), Cobi (Marine)

The Sproggalots 4 - 0 de-stroyer

Adz’ Final Thought: The Sproggalots have the Germans out-classed and out-practised.


Snowrollers vs nineLegends

Witty remark!

Swetards! Why don’t you play more? Stop playing Warcraft III; you can be contenders if you just play some PCWees! At the risk of sounding like a stuck record, I have to say once again than Snowrollers are a team with mountains of potential but about as much motivation as a smacked-out sloth. Since I’m a nice caring guy, here’s a quick three step guide on how to get good again.
One: Delete tjab0’s TF2 install
Two: Kick out all the no-hopers and inactive people
Three: Play some fucking games!

Those nineLegends guys that we all know and love (and secretly want to cup their balls and whisper sweet nothings to) are really shaping up and could possibly resemble something like runners-up this season. Currently top of the league but with their hardest games ahead of them, things will get tough from next week onwards. I don’t see too many obstacles hindering nineL from crushing the lazy Swedes, apart from the absence of Tuomo “Pizza” Havo.

Impact players:
sR | : atman (Fade), web (marine)
nineL * : sherpa (Comm), n44bj (Marine), Fana (Cunt)

Snowrollers 0 - 4 nineLegends

Adz’ Final Thought: Gad I’m glad this is over for another week.


Everyone’s favourite team, CRAB BATTLE!!!, will return next week ;)

Stay tuned!


Bacillus' Div 2 Predictions

Group A

bP - NS~F

The match of the week in div 2 if you ask me. Two interesting and well rounded teams, both playing with quite usual tactics, but there's still some inexperience to mix up and create interesting situations. I expect close rounds, especially in veil. I'm just hoping that bP can field a team, instead of giving a forfeit, like they did last week. I think both the teams are yet to reach their full potential, let's see how good their game is this week. My call is that NS~F is a bit stronger and takes both rounds on Veil.

Biggest impacts
NS~F: Jiriki (all-around, experience), Pessimist(marine)
bP: Rainbow (sg), The marine tactics, activity

My pred: NS~F 3 - 1 bP


Nameless - Dom

The American clans face this week. Dom should be pretty comfortable in this match, even though they surprised me by getting beaten by vital last week. Still, the Nameless seem to be underperforming a bit, and I can't see them turning the course versus the skilled dominators.

Biggest impacts:
Noname: Ability to minimize the skill advantage their opponents have
Dom: FREIGHT_TRAIN (all around dominator), Noxolan (all around)

Dom 4 - 0 Noname


orc - Vital

A difficult match to predict, since orchid hasn't had any matches this season. Nevertheless, I doubt that their play is strong enough to upset the season favorites of Vital. I predict an uneven match, although lost is always a risky map for marines. It wouldn't be a massive upset if orchid managed to pull off one round on lost aliens.

Biggest impacts:
Vital: Bigbanana (commander), Howdeh (all around), Android (all around)
Orchid : Activity

Vital 4 - 0 Orchid.


Group B

TTS - rm

Great match coming up. Both teams have been performing well this season and it should be an even matchup. What makes this even more interesting, is the fact that the teams are very different in playstyles. TTS relies on baserushes and massive amounts of shotties on surprising places, while the frenchmen have a consisntent and very close to stantard approach in the game. It's going to take the Frenchmen some good teamwork to keep track and respond to TTS' plans

Biggest impacts:
TTS : The element of surprise, lifeform play
rm : Teamwork, Marmotte (all around)

TTS 2 - 2 RM


{H|M} - Avalanche'

Two quite inconsistent teams here. The hells militia are American, which makes them difficult enough to predict already, but add the inactive Avalanche in to the mix and you've got very little to predict. The Americans haven't been performing very well this season, buy they've got some potential in their lineup. Avalanche on the other hand haven't been very active lately, so its even more up to Scale and Citrus to win the rounds. I'd say Avalanche should be confortable winning this with the ping advantage as long as Scale is in somewhat good shape and gets K:D > 5 again.

Biggest impacts:
{H|M}: The ping disadvantage, the motivation after getting two 0 - 4's
Avalanche: Scale, Citrus

^rawR 3 - 1 Avalanche