Sigma

Points: 4,396, Level: 44

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Download:

1: Expertise vs Sneaky Charger, ESEA-O S5 W7 cp_yukon_final
2: Area 51 vs Reamped Gaming, ESEA-O S5 W8 cp_granary
3: Blight Gaming vs Evil Geniuses, ESEA-I S5 W8 cp_granary
4: Dignitas vs What Women Want, ESH ASRock Semi-Finals cp_badlands
5: Unrestricted vs Apem, TWL Div 2 playoffs (round 1) cp_badlands
6: Detox vs Vicious Gaming, ESEA-O S5 playoffs cp_gravelpit
7: Team Coolermaster vs I Don't Know?, ESH Sennheiser Challenge Final cp_badlands
8: Evil Geniuses vs Blight Gaming, ESEA-I S5 playoffs koth_viaduct

Please contact me if you have a demo worth commentating on. I don't have the time to watch that many, so without recommendations I will generally pick demos from esea based on stats and the caliber of the players.

Original post:

Hi CommFT!

As you might know, I used to be a regular host on the semi-competitive TF2 podcast, Friendly Fire. Recently, I haven't been doing the show due to the schedule; the other hosts are busy and it would be difficult to move from our old recording time, which falls right when I'm normally scrimming or playing matches.

Anyways, I didn't really want to give up on putting out useful content, so Jestr (my replacement host on Friendly Fire, medic for Harmonic in S4) and I decided to do a spin-off aimed a little bit higher up the skill ladder. Cue Focus Fire (name recycled from another project that never got off the ground). This show will release on a "whenever-we-feel-like-it" schedule (expect about 1/week, might skip a week now and then, might do 2-3 at a time), and will have a simple format: intro, commentate on a demo, recap/outro. I don't have a nice enough setup (or the free time when matches are being played) to do streaming/live shoutcasting, and my camera work is mediocre at best, so each show will be an audio file to be played alongside a demo. The goal here is to create a more entertaining game than the straight demo, and to delve into the strategy behind the map/team. Hopefully, this will be useful for low or mid players wondering why teams do the things they do.

I will be uploading each cast to a folder on mediafire (DOWNLOAD LINK), and for the time being, I'll update this thread when we release something new. As of right now, we have one (rather rocky) show in there (expertise vs sneaky charger on yukon) -- let's call it a learning experience; the format/focus will be a bit different (better) for subsequent episodes. Constructive criticism is welcome!

Cheers,
Sigma

Blind

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Sounds cool.

Bodknocks

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Awesome.

Kermit

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Didn't listen to the commentary yet, but it sounds cool.
Keep it up.

NeoRussia

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ooh can't wait to see people of Comm FT making guest appearances. BTW love Friendly Fire my fav podcast.

shdw.puppet

Points: 1,967, Level: 27

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awesome cast is awesome

djfivenine

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Hit me up for an interview! I would love to be interviewed for once....

ranga

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Sweet, looking forward to this.

Bodknocks

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Off-topic, but did anyone else think this thread was going to be about focus firing? Because I did and I was pretty confused until I got about half way through Sigma's post.

Sigma

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Hey, indirectly it is! I'm looking at you, 3-members-of-ex-with-less-than-50hp-after-a-last-defense.

Also @dj - cool. Will do at some point.

Grimm

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I just listened to it, it was good and I learned some stuff.

__________________
hitscan prefire

Bodknocks

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I watched it, I liked it. The only part I didn't like was that I got a phone call in the middle of it and it is HELLA hard to pause and keep them in sync. And if you accidentally pause or something goes wrong you're pretty much boned because it is a almost impossible to resync them if you get off by a lot. I don't really know if there is much you can do about this though, so I just wouldn't recommend watching these unless you know you can sit through the whole thing without interruption.

The intro seemed a bit too long but that's ok for the first episode. Sigma and jestr have good chemistry together and it was probably 100 times smarter and more informative than any TF2 cast I've ever seen. Obviously since it's a prerecording and not live it's going to be a little better but I never once felt like somebody made a dumb comment. This is good stuff, much better than any TF2 casters around (no offense, they all do good work but this was just so much better).

I had some good criticism for you but it's been a few hours since I watched it and forgot what it was, so enjoy my unabashed praise for your first effort at podcast-casting, or whatever you're calling this.

Grimm

Points: 1,541, Level: 23

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I left for dinner in the middle, and the pausing/resuming didn't cause me any problems.

__________________
hitscan prefire

Sigma

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Activity: 12.1%

That's a good point about the pausing. The best method may be to just remember what we were saying when you pause, rewind the mp3 a bit, then let it play and unpause when it lines up. We can help you out a bit too, though -- when the demo starts for subsequent shows I can state what time it is in the mp3, so you can sync by looking at demo time/tic and mp3 time. Or, that information could be included in the readme. Or, we could just make it very obvious when each round ends.

Thanks for all the comments and suggestions so far, I've got a list of ideas going for the next episode. I'll edit this into the OP at some point, but I wanted to say that if you know of a game you want casted, particularly if it was non-ESEA and you have the STV, please let me know and I'll take a look. Our current method for selecting games is to go by what good matches we saw during the week, or judging matches by their stats and skimming through demos. Hence, it's far more likely for us to use ESEA matches than those from other leagues unless you point us to them. Also, while we're going to use top-open/invite matches primarily, we're not opposed to doing lower-level matches if the game was good.

JonDigweed

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I typed up this wall-of-text response but then lost it because I timed out. Anyway, I think it was better for everyone's eyes that that happened. :P

I think you guys have a great vibe going on in this podcast. All that's left to make this a great success is if you guys can focus your themes, per the 'show-notes' of FriendlyFire.

Also I'd love to hear more medic-centric talk. There was a fail-push on 4th due to an uber-error. I'd love to hear you guys elaborate on that: what'd you do, what'd you advise newer medics to do?

Anyway, I'm really interested on what else you guys got coming.

Grimm

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Plus this is more competitive-centric than Friendly Fire is, seeing as Jestr is the only one who actually plays competitively on that show anymore.

__________________
hitscan prefire

Sigma

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2nd and 3rd episodes are out. This time, we take a look at Area 51 vs Reamped Gaming, and Blight vs EG, both on granary. Edited first post.

Nassty

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I love Friendly Fire. I listened to alot of them.

wanderrful

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hey there -- i just listened to all three of them on a tf2 binge and i really, really like what you guys are doing. you guys work very well together in commentating the match imo and i support this stuff.

breather

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The best way to fix the pause/resume issue is to play the mp3 with a media player that has global hotkeys: foobar2000, winamp. Then you can use your hotkey to pause whenever you want to.

Oh and nice cast, sigma.

Jase

Points: 29, Level: 1

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Just listened/watched Focus Fire # 3 - good job Sigma and Jestr.

BigBadBaldy

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where do i +frag?

wanderrful

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you click on the checkmark underneath his name

edit - i stickied this thread because i felt it was worth keeping at the top of the pile. i hope that jinn doesn't mind..

Sigma

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OP updated. Episodes 4 and 5 are out, this time covering cp_badlands. In these episodes, we bring in some action from across the ocean, as well as a guest host. Check it out!

Kuiper

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Sigma, have you talked to jinn_ about posting these on the site? They certainly could serve as front-page content.

wanderrful

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i completely agree with what kuiper says, and i don't think jinn would refuse something like this.

and if for whatever reason he doesn't let you post it on the front page yourself, i'd be willing to do it for you.

Sigma

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I would appreciate front-page coverage, if possible. I haven't talked to anyone about it as of yet.

djfivenine

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Feel free to hit me up with any new casts, I can post them on as headlines.

Jase

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I was going to suggest the www v Dignitas game to you - only to find that you've already done it. Good choice.

I haven't listened yet but did you catch Darn's premature GG that caused www to fail the defence of the last cap?
Check out the last 30 seconds from Dunc's POV

Kermit

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Enjoyed it, just wish there was a little more play by play. Seemed like there was a lot of strategy talk from everyone and not much play by play.