SoW Season 18 - Match 6 - N0X vs OBV - A Great Run, A Rough Ending

SoW Season 18 has been amazing for N0X so far. We won 4 matches with only one loss against NBe, and things have gone almost exactly as I predicted. Now comes the final match, and there is a real effort from leadership to get that 5th win and hopefully secure our place in the playoffs.

Before the game is even played, the planning starts. We're waiting to see what slots other alliances are playing, trying to coordinate enough attendance with a good slot where we'll have a better chance of facing an opponent around our power level. The goal is a fair match instead of another top alliance that wipes the floor with us.

But the polls don't look very promising and I'm starting to sense a really awkward slot, like reset, where the Americas alliances usually play.

Not long after, the message comes down: we're playing reset!😱This is probably the worst possible slot for me. It means staying up all night to play, then having only about an hour after the game, before my alarm rings and I have to set out on a 6 hour drive.

I close the game hoping my alliance has planned this well around our opponent and everyone's availability. Maybe I'll wake up tomorrow and find out we're in the playoffs.

But when I wake up... I see the actual chosen slot was 13:00!😅

This is not the worst time for me, despite a busy weekend schedule, so maybe I can make it work after all? And seeing OBV as our opponent, this could actually be good for us...

I know OBV well. We face them in every major championship and they are a worthy alliance. We can absolutely beat them if we have the numbers, but I also hear they've picked up a few new recruits, so this should definitely be an interesting match.

But as the match is about to start, we're slightly underrepresented in both accounts and starting points. My optimism is starting to shake.

And as we get to our assignments, we're losing both Armory and Hot Springs. The situation looks dire as OBV has brought almost double our marches in both important objectives.

Since we're not breaking OBV at the big objectives, let's see if we can backdoor some of their buildings, like their Strongholds. At least that would give us an opportunity to split their forces and maybe then we can contest the important stuff.

But at the same time, they're doing exactly the same thing to us. Now we have to decide whether we continue pushing while our backline might collapse, or retreat and defend.

What I thought could be a winnable match is starting to look like an uphill battle, and not even 10 minutes have passed.😫

Since the chances of sniping OBV's backline buildings are looking low, we decide to defend our own Strongholds. For the moment we have enough numbers to repel their advance, but it looks like the entire map is being painted OBV red.

The points per minute are painting a very depressing picture for us as the overall score reaches roughly 2:1 in OBV's favour. Our road to the playoffs has hit its biggest roadblock so far, and if we don't pull off a miracle play soon, we could be in serious trouble.

But just as I think we're getting back into the fight and we're barely starting to take back some map control, OBV sends another wave into our half of the map.

With a firm grip on Armory and Hot Springs, they don't just have the buffs working in their favour. They now also have the account availability to swarm us at our Strongholds and Outposts.

This new push is rather dangerous. We're barely able to repel it on the Armory side, while Hot Springs is under heavy fire with both the Stronghold and Outpost being contested.

As the first pair of dragons lands, we each manage to escort one home while also trying to make a few incursions into OBV territory and flip some lightly defended buildings.

We're hoping this will force them to redirect troops there, allowing us to push back into the middle section of the map.

But they're also testing the waters around our Outposts, so we have to divert troops to defend those as well...😡

The situation stabilizes for a while as we take back control of our Outposts and the main fights move towards the Strongholds.

This almost looks decent... if we don't look at who controls the important objectives, Armory and Hot Springs, or the overall score, or the points per minute, lol.

After about 20 minutes, the second pair of dragons lands and it's time to see if we can somehow flip this game around.

Just like the 5th match against TLT, where we were relatively even on building control, but managed to pull ahead through package deliveries, maybe controlling the dragons can give us the same kind of boost here?

It's a long shot, but at this point I think it's our only shot.

We don't have the numbers to control the map. That has become very clear by now. But if we can swarm the dragons and escort them, that's a nice chunk of points.

And if we can do that several times this match... could we somehow still win?

What do we have to lose?

At this point OBV already controls most of the map, so we just need to dispatch a few marches to make the map blink and force them to divert real marches to contest us, while the majority of our forces focus on the dragons.

It sounds good in theory... now the question becomes: will it work in practice?

And as the Red Dragon lands, we actually have a decent advantage in numbers waiting for it.

And for a brief moment, this looks like the play. We're getting more people at the dragon, we're committing hard and we're trying to make up for our lack of map control with sheer numbers on escort duty.

But OBV reacts. Our early advantage doesn't last long, and before we know it both dragons are being escorted towards the OBV base.

One after another, they make it home and grant OBV another massive 10k points.

So much for our miracle.😭

By the time we hit the halfway point of the match, it looks pretty much done.

We had lower numbers to start with. That caused us problems holding the important buildings after the first race. We couldn't control the map and were constantly pushed back into our own half, forcing us to defend Strongholds and Outposts instead of taking theirs.

And losing both dragons was the final nail in the coffin.

OBV is now sitting on ~43k points compared to our 22k. They control most of the map and are generating around 1020 points per minute compared to our 260.

Any realistic hope we had of winning this match is gone.

We still don't call the game and continue fighting for points and boxes, but in our hearts we know it's over.

The rest of the game goes downhill for us, but before the end we manage to score 30k points for the threshold rewards and collect a decent number of chests for the Blessings rewards.

OBV, meanwhile, finishes with more than 110k points.

We had a great season, but the final match exposed the one thing we couldn't compensate for with strategy: attendance. OBV had the numbers and some new recruits that could have ended up with us, but chose OBV instead. In a matchup this close, that difference was decisive.

So I have to make my peace with it. Four wins, one expected loss against NBe, and some genuinely great team performances, but we couldn't deliver when it mattered most.

Still, I'm proud of what N0X achieved this season. We don't have the biggest accounts, but we have teamwork, discipline and good shotcalling, and Match 5 against TLT proved we can beat strong alliances when we play as a team.

We just needed one more win. Unfortunately, we fumbled the ball right at the end.

Still, we made a very respectable Top 30 finish, so 15 skin fragments for everyone. And on a personal note, I got stronger RTS lineups and let's not forget, a team that showed me exactly what N0X is capable of when we all play together.

So no playoffs this time.

I'll take that, not just because our road stops here, but because it's actually great progress. And next season... we'll try again.