The CAL-Main Semi-Finals witnessed Team Pandemic (#11) face off against the
surprising Enervate (#7) squad. Both the semi-finals and finals will be a
best-of-three series with each team picking their own "home" map.
 Team Pandemic
Nabore
stevE
M0RT
pinkerton
Keith
Enervate
Fetus
soze
g|adia7or
meth211
fx
Map 1 Toujane (Enervate Choice):
This is commonly known as the most popular map in the game. Although it was
Enervate's map pick and the match was held on their server, Pandemic was still confident they could
win. Starting off as the Axis, the first round was pretty ugly for
Pandemic. Enervate got their shotty into the B site and wiped out both Pandemic
players that were defending it.
After losing round 1, Pandemic won rounds 2 and
3 with some amazing teamwork late in the rounds. A seemingly random, and somewhat amusing, occurance in round 5 worked in Pandemic's favor. Right off
the bat, stevE threw a grenade towards the B side of the allied spawn that blew 3
Enervate players to pieces. With that easy round win, the score was 3-2 in favor
of Pandemic.
Enervate quickly picked themselves back up, winning the next 4 rounds
behind many 1v1 and 2v2 victories. However, Pandemic picked up the last round of the half, leaving the score 4-6 in favor of Enervate.
After losing the first half, Pandemic knew they needed a strong
start in the second half, but this wasn't in the cards for them. Enervate came out
hot and won the first two rounds giving them an 8-4 advantage. Team
Pandemic decided to make a run of their own and won three rounds in a row, but
this was all that was left in the tank. Enervate switched to aggressive play and this caught everyone else off guard. They easily won the next
three rounds giving them the first map victory at 11-7. Enervate's ability to take
the mid roof, combined with their late nades, completely shut down
Pandemic's "A" site rush.
Enervate defeats
Team Pandemic 11-7
(6-4, 5-3)
[
screenshot ]
Map 2 Dawnville (Pandemic Choice):
This was map two in the best of three series, and after losing mp_toujane 11-7,
there was no room for error for Pandemic. Starting off as American, which most
consider the more difficult side of the map, would be the key to a Pandemic Map 2
victory. Pandemics strategies were nearly
flawless and they took many rounds without losing a single man. The rounds that they did
lose were rounds where their offense ran into stacks on the "A" site. Once
Nabore saw this, he knew that he had to start calling on the fly in order to
adapt to this defense. He called some fake pushes on "A" site in an attempt to
get the defense to rotate off of "B". This worked well, since Pandemic managed to get some early
grenade kills, making the defensive shift that much more definite. The half
should have been 7-3 in Pandemics favor, but a member of Enervate manage to get the most random running, long range, un-ironsighted mp44 headshot that could ever happen in
CoD2, bringing the score to 6-4.
A strong first half by Pandemic on the weaker offensive sealed the
map victory before the second half even began. Enervate, however, was not ready to accept
this fate, and they began to pick apart the supposedly dominant Pandemic defense. The team suffered many early picks,
creating holes in the defense that Enervate exploited to perfection. Once Pandemic
realized the mistake of taking too many risks, they instantly changed things.
They began to play very passive on A, making Enervate come to the site to
try to plant. This worked out well because they could not see anyone on
defense, so they tried to take over the new panzer house, which was being held
by Nabore from the second floor. Whether it was 3 bashes, or some k98 frags, not
a single person managed to take that house from him at any point while he was
inside of it. This drastically changed their offensive strategy. Enervate
began to lurk around, avoiding the new panzer house and that is when hobo-town guys,
led by stevE, started to pick up some frags. Pandemic pulled ahead in a
hard-fought German half to win the map 11-8.
Team Pandemic
defeats
Enervate 11-8 (6-4,
5-4)
Map 3 Burgundy (CAL Choice):
This was probably the most clutch-heavy match that the Pandemic lineup has
ever played. The way the rounds played out in relation to the results was
phenomenal. Pandemic had side choice and started out as American on mp_burgundy.
The main focus of attention on this map is the main street, which basically acts
as a no-mans land, without smoke. In the beginning, allies can watch this street
with a scope, since the only way into the B site is from this street, giving
players a chance at a vital early frag. What most teams tend to do is flood B
in the hopes that the sniper can kill, or tag the B defender. Once in B, the
Americans have incredible positioning, since the only way in from defense is a
small passage and the wide flank.
Pandemic started off with an A site push.
The push failed, so they tried to go to B next round. The B site was
taken flawlessly, and with a successful plant, Pandemic won the round with ease. The
B site was now the target, since they had not attempted to cross in the beginning. Pandemic was able to get into B many times and get the bomb down, which lead to more rounds won. The only rounds lost were when Nabore called the
A push due to an aggressive flank that achieved great positioning
against Pandemic every time. The next time Pandemic pushed B, they were
countered by a barrage of nades, which instantly wiped out the team. The half
finished at 6-4 in Pandemic's favor, but they we knew victory was in reach since this
map is even-sided.
Team Pandemic again started rough on defense and Nabore was instantly gunned
down trying to cross the street. Pandemic knew they had to
change their strategy if they wanted to win, so they started doing some
retakes on B site. Equipped with some well set grenades, Pandemic
managed to frag their sniper very early, making the flank that much easier to
take. Practically giving Enervate the B site, Pandemic would wrap around the
flank in an attempt to retake the site while Nabore watched the only other exit. This
worked out wonderfully for Pandemic, since the team managed to pick up numermous frags, primarily due to
their good
communication and excellent teamwork. One round, to be specific, was a 4v2 in Enervate's favor. Mort and stevE were the last men alive in the B site and
under intense fire from every angle. Mort managed to position himself
well within the smoke, and crept into the B house ninja style. Picking up
that frag in the house opened him up to the B site defenders, whom he now had a
great position on. With stevE on the way to help, they managed to bring it down
to a 2v2, and eventually won what was arguably the most important round of the match.
Another notable round was when Nabore and stevE were against soZe in a 2v1, with
the bomb down at B. There was not much time left, so Nabore decided to hold
the bomb plant while stevE covered the only entrance soZe had access to.
stevE was killed while covering Nabore, who continued to hold the defuse, but
soZe thought otherwise. Soze ran back to the street window, but Nabore
defused the bomb. In the end, Pandemic won the half 5-5 and the match
overall at 11-9.
Team Pandemic
defeats
Enervate 11-9 (6-4,
5-5)
Team Pandemic will now advance to the CAL-Main grand finals to play the winner
of THendry Gaming vs. Rsports. This is scheduled to take place on Sunday, the time will be announced in the near future.
Reference Links
Official Brackets |
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