DoA is Sword’s weakest link

After doing some number crunching on the Championship Gaming Series Pan-Asia Finals results, we’ve found that Dead or Alive Male and Female was the single biggest factor in Singapore Sword’s dismal result, while FIFA and Forza Motorsports had remarkable performances.

Team Roster

The Singapore Sword roster returned almost unchanged, with the exception of Aaron “Phenic” Aw, who was promoted to team General Manager. Jeffrey “XOS” Chan was recruited to fill in his position in the team.

GM Aaron “Phenic” Aw
CS:S Chia “Kazuya” De Wei
CS:S Kenneth “MonsterZ” Yeo
CS:S Randy “Randy” Lai
CS:S Ghim “squall” Toh
CS:S Prasad “StrykerX” Paramajothi
FM2 Jonathan “Takumi” Lee
FM2 Jeffrey “XOS” Chan
DoA F Daphne “Perpetiel” Chow
DoA M Wilson “Tetra” Chia
FIFA Mohamed “Xtr3me3” Phirkhan

Singapore Sword was amply represented in Counter-Strike: Source, Dead or Alive Male and FIFA, by team TitaNs, Wilson “Tetra” Chia and Mohemed “Xtr3me3” Phirkan respectively. Each of them have vast amounts of experience on the international stage and are the best that Singapore has to offer in their respective game titles.

Counter-Strike: Source

In a mature game like CS:S, where the field is very competitive and points are hard to come by even for top teams in America and Europe, TitaNs were expected to hold the ground roughly even, while Sword’s console gamers brought home the points.

In this respect, TitaNs did well, taking home 42 points while giving away 48 throughout the Pan-Asia Finals, for an overall ratio of 0.88. Their widest score margin was -6, against both Sydney Underground and Wuhan Dragon.

However, that is not to say that TitaNs did not contribute positively to the team – they managed a +4 score differene against Seoul Jinhwa and Kuala Lumpur Taufan

FIFA 08

Clearly Sword’s star performer this time around, Mohamed “Xtr3me3” Phirkhan ended the Pan-Asia Finals with a point ratio of 1.33, winning 12 points while giving away only 9.

Xtreme3 let his international experience speak for himself, losing only to arch-rival Si_jali from KL and unlimited from Seoul, both times by a score margin of only 1.

Forza Motorsports 2

Singapore has traditionally not done well in the racing sim genre on the international stage, but this time round the FM2 team certainly performed well, exceeding all expectations.

Jonathan “Takumi” Lee and Jeffrey “XOS” Chan snagged 19 points for Singapore while giving away 16, ending the Pan-Asia Finals with a point ratio of 1.19 – making them Singapore’s best performing players after Xtr3me3.

The highlight of the games was the duo’s denial of Sydney race legends Cam and Morpho the full 6 points by coming in second and third, holding them off to a respectable 3-4 result.

Dead or Alive Female

Daphne “Perpetiel” Chow’s results were dismal to say the least. Taking only 9 points while giving away 20, making for a point ratio of 0.45, she is officially Sword’s worst performing player at the Pan-Asia Finals.

While we won’t go into the controversy surrounding her selection for this year’s squad, the results speak for themselves. Perpetiel was the millstone around Sword’s neck, dragging them under.

Dead or Alive Male

While certainly not the worst performer, the biggest disappointment this time round was certainly Singapore’s superstar Wilson “Tetra” Chia. He had built up a remarkable score margin of 9-7 in just two games, a ratio of 1.29, but gave that all away when he decided to let his emotions take control of him and slapped his manager.

Tetra should have expected at the very least to receive a temporary suspension, preventing him from participating in the next game against Seoul. In the end, he was summarily banned from the CGS, a controversial move on its own.

Manager Aaron “Phenic” Aw stepped up as a last minute replacement but proved incapable of stepping into the shoes Tetra left behind. Phenic took 8 points for Singapore while giving away 13, for a ratio of 0.62.

Taking both Tetra and Phenic’s results into account, DoA Male took home 17 points while giving away 20, making for a 0.85, making it Singapore’s worst performer after DoA Female.

Conclusion

Tetra’s indiscretion and Perpetiel’s non-performance ended up costing Singapore dearly in the Pan-Asia Finals.

With close scorelines against Seoul Jinhwa (21 – 25) and Kuala Lumpur Taufan (22 – 26), Tetra’s presence could have easily turned the tables on Jinhwa and Taufan. Consider that in both games, Phenic went 1 – 5 against Jinhwa and 2 – 5 against Taufan. No doubt Tetra could have done far better, grabbing at least 4 points against Jinhwa and the full 5 points against Taufan.

If Singapore had a better DoA Female player representing them, perhaps the score margins would have been reduced by 2 or 3 points, enough to turn a win into a loss in a few cases.

It was hard to find any major fault with the rest of the team, with all of them meeting expectations in performing their roles.