An army of one

I played Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 last night. You might reply, “Wow Anguissette, how is that different from 90% of the nights since COD4 came out in November 2007?”

Yes, it’s true, I pay first-person war games a lot, but last night I found a new kind of fun. Normally I play Hard Core Team Deathmatch: no radar; no kill camera; higher damage; and a much higher quality of people. A person who plays the run-and-gun style usually ends with K/D ratio near 1 at best; the better players are often accused of “camping.” It is a patient game where a methodic strategy usually dominates. Last night I played Free-for-All. But I used the Hard Core strategy. My best load-out had stealth in mind – especially a gun with a silencer. (In the standard core games, the radar is always ON. If you fire an unsuppressed weapon, you show up on everyone’s map.) I used claymores and patiently waited for the runners to come. They came; they died; they watched on the kill cam. Pride is a dangerous thing. When you are outsmarted by an adversary, many times, your desire for revenge takes over and you seek revenge. In Free-for-All, all mics are open: you hear the guy you just popped shout in anger; followed by his threat to return the favor. I remained silent for the most part, adjusting my position for his likely return. I stayed in the same area, but never in the same spot. How did I do? In 3+ hours of work, I ALWAYS won the best Kill-to-Death ratio accolade. I didn’t always place in the top 3 (which counts as a win), but when you end with a 10-2, who cares? My best was 30-2: MVP player (game is over when a player hits 30 kills) and master of the combatants. I got the AC130 kill-streak reward (11 kills) in three games in a row. Usually I quit when my play deteriorates, last night I stopped out of responsibility to my employer. Next time Anguissette is on-line and solo, you will find him in the Free-for-All matches. (Until I get board and move on to Search and Destroy.)