Presenting...

From the warped recesses of a mind fried on Kali... where the stars meet... where the good, the bad and the ugly cavort to macabre late-70's disco... where late-night talk-show hosts wish they could be if only they were so cool... stored on a flaky ISP somewhere in the boonies of Western Canada, it's the

First Season Awards

And now our host:  our very own pundit of pompous polysyllabic prolixity...  Zot!

Ready?   x in dibbles...    x in      closed sorry      bye       cya       take the hint already      get lost and i mean it this time you ->Warcraft<- punk and next time stay the hell off our server...  and no I DON'T think that NOSEPICKR is a rockin awesome name      yah u suck        ahhhhh i love givin' them the boot after i insult them          ok x in       x in       x in       x in dibble 4         halloooooooo dibble 4           has he gone to the bathroom or something?      getting coffee? how the hell can he pl       ok there you are x in,     thank you          ok shaddup everyone shut up SHUT THE F        ok starting shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
 
A Word from Zot
 
Elder, lemme tell you a secret.  You don't dominate this league: I do.  "D-o-m-i-n-a-t-e", Elder.  Look it up.  Strauss can help you: it's somewhere before the page on which he found "importunate".

As for the rest of you: be warned that this speech will be a little bit like that of the father of the bride at a wedding banquet.  That is to say, there comes a time when the man who paid for the damn thing gets to say a few words of his own.  Keep your dictionaries handy, and continue reading at your own peril.

Heh.  :)

Ahem.

Looking back on my little homegrown project I have decided that I must have been crazy.

Spawned in the late phases of Warcraft (I mean, does anybody actually play that old thing any more?), after all the good league names were taken, using arcane "mailto:" forms that nobody understood (least of all Microsoft or AOL) ... frankly, by any reasonable assessment this thing was doomed to failure.  Hell, never mind reasonable, even by Amdiranifani's logic we should have been toast...

But here we are, 150-odd active members and 2400 game reports later in three short months.  Small and fragile when compared to a megalith like Cases, but thriving nonetheless. And I mean thriving.

We have here players of all ages, all skill levels, and, interestingly, a comparatively high percentage of women, or so I'm told.  Which I must say I find rather threatening.  Particularly that white-skinned one with the hair, who is obviously too insecure be docile and submissive like a REAL woman.

And from one look at our game log it should be obvious that we have been playing a lot of great Warcraft:  we play every resource level, default units, land and water, big maps and small, every map from KPcatapultoverthetrees.pud to KPhelpcrexisisbarrackingusonawaterpud.pud, 1-on-1's, team games, FFAs, team FFAs, double dibble dabbling... you name it and it's happening here like nowhere else on the internet.

Not to mention the ongoing soap opera on our message board.  Now THAT's entertainment.  Days of Our Warcraft League...

Folks, we have a wild little thing on our hands.

Now naturally I'd like to take all the credit for this incredible success myself, because it must be because I am such a totally cool guy... but unfortunately if I did that I would be lying.  Because really I'm a total dork.  And because some other people deserve major credit:

The KPUD Project:  MugWump & Ohwrd

First and most obviously I must acknowledge the huge contribution of Mug, Ohwrd, and the KPUD project.  Having a wide variety of reliably grumpy and sardonic players - *ahem* fair and fun maps, I meant fair and fun maps - is one of the reasons, probably the #1 reason, this league stands out from all the others.  And to think I just picked the KPUDs to get out of the work of picking official league puds... :)

I also have to thank MugWump and Ohwrd for the message board (little did they know...) and for their colossal contributions to our upcoming season.  Real-time updating and a robust .cgi interface will bring us up to major-league high-tech standards, and the revised rules and point system will be without parallel on the internet.  Thanks to them the untimely-born SGWL is now blazing the trail for internet leagues in every way.

Hindmost

Second, I have to thank Hindmost for the generalist rating.  That simple idea of his is probably the other main reason we are doing so well.  Having good maps is one thing, but in every other league the way to succeed (if you're anyone other than SKYWALK who is just annoying) is to memorize 2-6 map/res settings and to play them exclusively.  In the SGWL people are playing every map on every resource setting, and fighting to play maps they haven't played before - for points!  I mean, in what other league have people ever said "nope - never played it - sure!"?

Hindmost has also made another major conceptual contribution to our next season with the A/B/C skill divisions, which will recognize the achievements of players of every level.  Another milestone for internet leagues.

The Original SGWL Members

Third, I thank the players who were willing to try this league out when it was brand new.  Without their appreciation of the basic idea, not to mention their willingness to ride out the bumps, this league would not have lived long nor prospered.  Specifically I will mention the early members of the Spire of Destruction, (notably the dynamic duo of Strauss & Crexis) and the Immortals (particularly Navim) for setting an extremely high standard of play from the outset, and also the founding members of the Defenders of New Azeroth, notably Bacchus and Dogboy, for again a high standard of play but also particularly for their excellent sportsmanship and great attitudes.

The Referees

Fourth, I thank the 1st season referees ElDorado, HariRichard, HellCat, and Wigger.  The referee's job is not one which makes a lot of friends, and I thank them all for accepting the task and for consistently and diligently promoting league fairness.

All Current Members

Finally I thank everyone who's still here for making this league what it is.  With very few exceptions the SGWL is basically a good-natured and high-class league, and there is nowhere else on the Internet that I want to play.  Congratulations to all of you for being such a cooool gang.  :)

*sniff*  I always cry at these things...

All right, enough of that rot: on with the awards!

Winners may feel free to post acceptance speeches on the message board... :)

 
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And now back to our program:
 
The Coolness Awards
 
These are awards for originality, creativity, and other non-Warcraft-related contributions to the league.  Categories are arbitrary and capricious and will most likely change from season to season.  :)

Coolest New Clan Name

This was a tough choice.  Almost all of our clan names are original.  But to my mind, here are the coolest-named clans in our collection:

Coolest Clan Motto

I chose these winners on the basis of originality and how easily I remembered their line.  Two mottos have stuck with me as being the most original and memorable:

Coolest Posts on the Message Board

There can only be one winner here:  the incomparable  
The Specialty Awards
Before getting to the overall season champs, I will acknowledge specific winners in each category:

The Win-Win-Win Awards

- or: the "how in the world do they DO that??" awards -

These are the awards for best win-loss ratio for the season.  On the basis of their performance this season it's safe to say that these players would probably do well in leagues in which winning is everything... :)

The Generalist Awards

- or: the "it's a good thing you're in the SGWL awards" -

These awards honour the most rabid Generalists in the league - the "pointmongers" of the SGWL - the ones who refused to play any map/res twice because they actually read the point system page...

The Pit Bull Awards

These awards recognize the ones that just kept slugging it out despite all odds - the ones who kept on losing but kept on playing.  For thick skins and great attitudes, we give humble tribute to:

The Warcraft Addict Awards

These are the ones who just logged more bloody games than anybody else around.  Therapy is available on request.  
Most Valuable Players
 
These are the ones you wish you had in your clan.  They kept playing, kept winning, and racked up more raw points by themselves than some entire clans had put together.  Presenting the one-man-armies of the SGWL:  
Global Domination
 
They will fight on the seas and oceans...

And now we come to the stuff folks have been fighting for:  in the battle for global domination these are the SGWL's 1st-season world powers:

 
Warlords
 
We're not worthy!  We're not worthy!

And now, to acknowledge the individual winners of the first-ever SGWL season:  all great players with serious Warcraft addictions and an unstoppable compulsion to be #1.  Ladies and Gentlemen, we present our 1st Season Warlords:

Honourable Mentions are also due to the others in the top 10:  
Sportsman of the Season
 
I wanna be like him when I grow up...

This prestigious title goes to the player who can take the most credit for giving all of us a good name.  Generous to a fault, always happy to play, never one to claim a dropped game or ridicule an opponent or smear dirt on the message board, this is the one guy whom we wish the entire league were like:

Almost all other nominations for this award received at least 1 vote.  Even to be seriously nominated is an honour, so here are the other outstanding good sports of the SGWL so far: Congratulations to all.
 
Hottest League on the Internet Award
 
Take a wild guess...
 

Player dibble was dropped.

dibble - DOH!!!

dibble - god zot's a lagger

dibble - he talks too much

dibble - why do we keep letting him into our games??

dibble - to suck up

dibble - oh yeah right

dibble - so should we go get him?

dibble - nahhh

dibble - nahhh

dibble - nahhh