As an underperforming character with several handicaps, my experiences are filled with wow-factor and luck-based victories that, in the case of events involving enemy PCs, must have been quite galling.
Exploration was always fun, and with all the water areas I thought it would be great to just make a water build. Haha, what naivete. No one wants to do aqua events in PvE, and shortly after my first major plunge into WvW the BLs lost the quaggan pit. (Speaking of which, where were they displaced when their home was filled in? Or, as I hope, were the cruel engineering teams just burying them alive—and then appending faux-ruins like Adams’ planet building race from HHGTTG series?)
That said, there were a few moments my offensive/suppressive water combat build proved hilariously overpowering. I remember a few of us in a mad dash to save our waypointed Bay keep as the bulk of our forces were already falling to what must have been every soul linked to the Northern Shiverpeaks server. Or so we thought. In truth, roughly a third of the group was at the lord’s room, and the rest came swooping down from the outer bailey behind our paltry reinforcement group. We were already in the moat though, and prospects were certainly grim. Light Esperia was separated from me at the inner bailey’s docks, and I was forced to go round south, with naught but sharks to aid me. The NSP reinforcements split in half, with one group waiting at the outer walls for our respawning fallen (I presumed), and the other just waiting in the water between me and Light. Meanwhile, our dwindling forces are still holding on in the Lord’s room, now led by Joren Sleipnersen and his mighty hammer, but at this point his forces cannot hope to withstand the assault.
Light is doing admirably against the token groups splitting off from NSP’s 2nd UW Battalion, and I’m trying to keep other groups from spilling around my side, but clearly they aren’t taking us seriously, feeling that the forces inside will be enough for a flip anyway. Then it happens: Joren’s posse wipes, and Joren is pushed back. But he’s ANGRY now, and refuses to budge, slaying peeps even as the place flips. Impatient to clean house, the underwater brigade pushes en masse to me, while the wall warriors push down to Light’s position.
There are now just three Borlis Pass soldiers in the keep, each fending off a third of NSP’s impossibly vast forces. The keep flips to their hands, but it’s YOLO time, baby, and we last what seems like minutes. Joren’s laughing like a madman in teamspeak, Light’s being glibly-yet-somehow-not-glumly fatalistic, and I’m saying nothing because I’m too busy pooping myself in fear.
Light is the first to fall, being pulled into the water and simul-stomped by a mob of very angry people, so now Joren’s gotta fend off 2/3’s of NSP, and that truly is impossible and he dies. It’s not like he was going to get back out anyway, so their blaze of glory is forever etched upon our Citadel’s Dolyak Memorial statue.
I’m left to face NSP’s finest underwater combat specialists, which some of you may know as a silly thing, given no one is an underwater combat specialist. You’re either set for quick getaways or to snatch back the fleeing. But not me. Oh, no, sir. I EXCEL at this, and kitten it all if it wasn’t my turn to shine. As Santa Anna bore down upon me, I slipped on my game face. Packing the best in karma-obtained exotic gear (none of it matching), a rare-quality breather, lunaria and solaria rings, no food or utility buffs, and using keys instead of mouse to redirect (and skill-clicking with mouse because brain trauma affects muscle coordination and synchronisation in weird, unhelpful ways), this handicapped fighter with a sub-par brain held off a force (and even killed some!) for so long it should shame them despite their inevitable victory.
Throw me in PvP and I fail hard. Toss me in a PvE champ train and I’m invisible. Add me to your WvW zerg-rush or havoc group, and I’m an albatross on land. But get me in the water and I will make you cry.
I’m totally useless.
Borlis Pass has taken a beating since then, and both Joren (THE Joren, j as in “jump” instead of in “fjord”) and Light (Shiva) have departed us. But that day I will remember and treasure. I love protracted battles the most, not insta-caps. Too many people want the fast caps and the party-melts. I want classic Die Hard beatdowns, where the pummelings last for 96 minutes a stretch.
Sorry for the rant, but I loved that moment a lot.
