The Blood Pearls

(actual NASA photo but it matched our Teams logo, w00t!)

Remember all, this is a re-post form the Blood Pearls Web Site and some of the contents may be a bit dated but anyway...

Today I am not reviewing a battlemech, nor am I going to discuss any weapon in particular. Nope none of that, instead, I am going to talk about the Blood Pearls. It is hard to ‘review’ yourself objectively but I will give it my best shot.

Where to start? Well, that part is easy, lets start from the beginning, the beginning of the Blood Pearls, that is.

Over a year ago, there were a couple of teams that were a part of NBT Mercs. St. Ives Compact and Black Knight Mercenaries are the two teams that come to mind. Sure there were many more teams, but these two formed the nucleus of what we now know as the Blood Pearls.

Smaga, Cowcrusher, Hacksaw, Prime 24, and Leon were all part of St. Ives Compact along with some others like Pirate and Dottie, Alistair, Space Jimmy (I believe), Creamedweasel and a handful of others like Caccus, Sgt. Steve, Futher and even Paladin if memory serves me (and please guys note the corrections if there are any, I slept once since those days).

Hugh and I were part of the Black Knight Mercenary team, a house merc for St. Ives. There were others Dark Knights (aka BlackKnights), Knightshade, Boomer, Spewdog, a couple of guys from Holland and of course Deathreach.

As mentioned, BKM were house mercs for St. Ives. The Compact was located in a very hard to defend area on the Mercs Universal Map and seemed to be under constant attack. There were drops nearly every night if not for the team, at least for a pilot or four.

St. Ives became too much to handle as members started drifting away for real life issues or joining other teams like the Federated Suns. Black Knights were going through the same sort of troubles, not enough folks for our own drops, Cbill issues and so on. Independently, the leaders of both teams announced that the two team would go on the inactive status as they tried to reach team decisions as to what to do next.

I played in a BKM drop against CapCon on a Tuesday night and on Wednesday I woke up to find out that we had no team. What a shocker. Later that week it was announced that the two teams, or remaining players from each would merge into St. Ives Compact.

That appeared to be a good solution for all involved as BKM had played with and for St Ives many times and we all seemed to do well together. Sorry to say egos, strong wills and a few personalities got in the way of what would have been a very strong team. I am not going to point fingers, name names or place blame, instead, I will say that a merger is a very tough thing to do. It was a difficult situation.

After only a few short weeks the St. Ives Compact folded. Some of the members moved to FS, others formed another Merc Unit and still others went on to form The Blood Pearls, a pirate unit, our home in the MW4 Universe.

If my memories are correct, Smaga, Cow, Hacksaw, Pirate, Dottie, Weasel, Prime, Leon, Space Jimmy, Hugh and I were the 1st members of The Blood Pearls. Others joined us along the way, AC and Ninjawolf from VP, Sparrow, Buddha and Lil Puma, Dread, Deathreach, Bruiser, Homer, Mongo, Bec, Ivy, MechMasta, Soul and I really hope I haven’t forgotten anyone. I know there were others like 5050, Mousewing and Dozer, but I have named the ones I can recall.

We started with a team in trouble; the Blood Pearls were a pirate team in NBT before we tool the reigns. They had a 27% win record and had squandered all the cash. When The Blood Pearls left NBT we had better than a 60% win record, the maximum amount of cash allowable in NBT Automation and a Clan Heavy Factory producing Ares on a weekly basis as well as our own Jump Station and 5 planets.

Some of this was accomplished through wheeling and dealing, but the win % is done on the field of battle. Now think about that for a moment. This team went from 27 % to 60%. The 60% number includes all battle records from the previous owners. Most of that was done playing 1 or 2 times a week over a 6 to 7 month period. Our actual win % was probably in the upper 80 to 90% range.

In MWL we are running at 70%. MWL is a different ball game with, for the most part, a different set of targets, but yet, BP continues to do well.

BP continues to do well. That is what I really wanted to concentrate on in this article. What makes this team do so well? Is it one or two ace pilots? Do we have better mechs? Are we running hacks?

Yes, no and absolutely not answers those questions. 1st and foremost let me dispel any rumours of hacking. BP does not now, nor have we ever hacked. Both Practice servers currently in use have hack protection. Most teams we play in MWL run Cloak. Cloak has merc shield built in, i.e. built in hack protection.

Do we have better mechs? No. Every team in MWL has the same mechs.

Do we have 1 or more ace pilots? Maybe, but again, I don’t think this is the reason for success.

Lets put the last 2 items together and add some to that. All teams in MWL have access to the same mechs, where as in NBT, we had what we started with, those that we purchased and those that we salvaged / stole in raids. In MWL, a team can use ANY mech. So I say, it’s not the mechs, but the mech selection.

Ace pilots? Sure we got some aces. But an ace is not going to win by himself. 2, 3 or more? Maybe we do have that many, but again, aces wont win anything in a team environment. Now we close in on the key. Team. Teamwork. Team practice. Knowing each other, playing with one another and acting as a team has won us more than any other factor.

The Blood Pearls used to be King of the Brawls. I would say that at one time, there were none better in a mech brawl than the Blood Pearls. That may still be so, but our tactics have changed over time.

We have become a more patient team with the ability to play many varied tactics in the same game. We can go from range to brawl to range all in the same confrontation.

Where do we attribute this? Well, I am going to have to say a couple of things about our leaders before I go to the pilot base. Cow and Smaga have very in depth knowledge about almost every map in the game. Both have game savvy knowing what weapons on what mechs work with other weapons and mechs. I try to help out with configs some and pilot assignments, but these guys for the most part build the plan.

Both are exceptional drop commanders, leading a team on the field is not an easy thing, whether its 4 pilots (a lance) or up to 8, but these guys do it very well. Looking for the enemy, finding the enemy, making sure we are all together on targets, getting the team to operate as a team.

The pilots on this team are very disciplined. They listen well to the DC. They follow instructions. They shoot well. These simple sounding things make life for a drop commander much easier.

As a team, we spend a lot of time in the practice server, trying different things and figuring out what works and what doesn’t. Everyone listens to everybody’s ideas. We play on the map and figure out what works or at least what we think will work. Many times I have seen it that we come into practice with what we want in mind only to find out that on the field it simply doesn’t work well enough or like we thought it would.

Another thing this team does is to play in the opens together. This is one of the best ways to learn one another, what a pilots tendencies are, how they react under extreme circumstance, how well they respond to the call for help, how well the concentrate on a specific target. The Blood Pearls do this and more or less they do it every night.

One of the most important factors that I have not covered is respect. I firmly believe that each member of our team has respect for each and every other member. That goes a long way in this game. We can all count on one another and we play the game as a team.

Teamwork. Teamwork. Teamwork. That is the final answer. The better a team works together, the stronger the team is. It’s all about the teamwork. For the Blood Pearls it has become second nature.

I am not going to single out any pilots and point to out good and bad things. I will use a couple of examples though. AC. You guys remember him? We all spent a lot of time with AC, in games, in practice and in the opens. AC used to get on all our nerves, ramming guys, doing DFAs, shooting you from behind and so on. Any of you play with him lately? All that time he spent with all of us turned AC into one deadly pilot. AC is actually leading drops for CJF in Hardcore. Quite a turn around.

I am another example. As a 1 v 1 pilot I am terrible. I tend to charge my opponent, even now after all these years. I don’t shield my ct very well. I am still learning to spread damage and how to avoid missiles. Put me on a team that practices teamwork and I am a different story. Many times being one of the last standing, not because I lay back and let team mates rush in or get picked off first, because I still have the same tendencies of charging and not protecting my ct, but because I listen to the DC (if its not me) and I go for the called target. I have spent a lot of time with many of you in the opens and I have learned how you play and I account for that in the way I play. I may not be very good as a single player, but I am one of the best team players.

The Blood Pearls as a team are one of the best. I firmly believe that given the time to practice, the Blood Pearls will defeat any opponent. I also know we are going to get beat. One of the things about the Blood Pearls, if they do get beat, they find a way to overcome it and take it to that team on the next meeting. That is what we do. It takes a team and we are a team.

I will wrap this up with a statement that I received from one of the Clans that we never faced in NBT Mercs. Just prior to league shut down, we had some open schedules against WoB and we were trying to get these last battles scheduled before the league shut down. One of the Clans, knowing the league was almost over, sent out drop ships launching on every planet they could reach in hopes of finding someone to attack, not us in particular, but any team. They happened across one of our planets. When that happened in NBT, the Leaders had access to a forum called battles schedules or something like that. This was where teams exchanged threads and tried to agree on a time and date to play and from there you would schedule a server. These were OPEN threads to those that had access to the forum, meaning anyone could read them.

Once we received automation notification of the attack I posted in the forum that we would withdrawal from the battle as the league was nearing end and we didn’t see anyway to get the game scheduled prior to league end. The reply from the Kahn (leader) was that they were very sorry to see that. The Clan had not intentionally launched against US, but was very excited to get the opportunity to face us on the battlefield. When I posted a follow up apology, he again posted a comment I hope I never forget, a tribute to our team. He said, “ I and the members of our Clan are very sorry this game will not be played. We have many contacts in the K Cluster (home worlds of the Clans) and we have heard nothing but good about this pirate team that call themselves The Blood Pearls. We have read posts in the GC (General Council forum for Clans and Clan Leaders) about how well you perform and about the damage you have caused many of our fellow clansmen. It is rare for such a small team to do so much damage and play so well that the other Clans WANT to play you. Sorry that this could not have happened in the course of this league for we will not be going forward into HC as I hear you may not be going forward either. Good Luck to the Blood Pearls.”

Let me repeat the important part … “…We have read posts in the GC (General Council forum for Clans and Clan Leaders) about how well you perform and about the damage you have caused many of our fellow clansmen. It is rare for such a small team to do so much damage and play so well that the other Clans WANT to play you. …” I tip my hat to The Blood Pearls.

Damn fine job team, damn fine.