I started on EU, because back when you start ping doesn't really matter and you can't block anyway. Anyway, I was running around being all peasanty when I see
SoA Micah holding her own wearing peasant clothing (used a bow and poleaxe back then, only managed to play old cRPG for a grand total of two days
). That inspired me to start off as a dickless archer, and occasionally I return to that playstyle. More importantly, I always loved the concept of some peasant kicking everyone's asses so that inspired me to constantly make agility or low armor builds, a trend which I still haven't quite bucked to this day.
Then when I started learning how to play, I started noticing how important ping was so I hopped off of EU. I'll always miss The_Finn. There, I saw
RS running around doing well, a lot of the times in cheap clothing and or cheap weapons so that inspired me to learn how to melee better to hopefully get noticed by those guys. Never happened, but eventually I joined BRD using the excuse they were looking for archers.
BRD was one of the clans I was really interested in because I saw them once plant a bunch of dummies on the ground and hide in them wielding torches, so quite clearly that was a group of people I wanted to play with. Even when I wasn't good, I knew I still didn't feel like being a tryhard at this game so this pointless teamwork type playstyle appealed to me. Little did I know, they were also regulars on the duel server, so I became one as well. My big inspirations then became
Edmond,
Kalam, and
Cyranule. Eddie broke down my playstyle which lead me to start on my path of improvement, Kalam was always a solid duelist and until he joined the army we were always regulars in duel. And of course, Cyranule. I don't feel I need to waste time describing him since a bunch of people already mentioned Cyranule.
But enough clan jerking, two of the most important people in the world are
Partyboy and
POOPHAMMER. They mastered this game. They are peerless. I'm pretty sure the only reason Partyboy stopped playing is because of how amazing he was. The developers constantly made nerfs to his playstyles, the admins constantly banned him for it, he was quite clearly overpowered. I mean, half the time he roleplays being a pacifist with his torch. Sometimes he does it on a horse, and then his horse kills people and he'd apologize because he claims his horse had gone berserk. I'll always miss Partyboy. Is POOPHAMMER still around? I don't know, I don't really play siege. I hope he is. He's one of the few people I respect in this game.
Wiegraf gets a special nomination because he was always a decent player, but more importantly played like a weirdo. He was a big reason in why I joined BRD in the first place. My first impression of Wiegraf was some idiot digging holes in the ground by constantly stabbing down with the goedendag, and then the legendary HarmlessPeasant stood up to him ready to fight. Wiegraf casually looks up, and then thrashes HarmlessPeasant to the ground. It was awesome. Not to mention he started the
Axe Gang. My god it's hilarious seeing 20 axes fly through the air hitting absolutely nothing.
CHINASERF. Enough said.
Always really liked watching and fighting
Bigsandwich and
Hannibal. Such naturals at the game.
Epoch for his 6/33 spear build.
Saulcanner, because of all the reasons people already say about him but also because he's kind enough to never refuse a duel with you. It's hard to learn off of someone if they're constantly snubbing you; I never see Saul dismissing a fight. So whenever I'm in duel, while I still seek out people I feel are better than me, if someone wants to duel me I don't refuse them either. If I can help someone get even a little bit better, I dunno? I feel good I guess?
These days I'm a cav melee build and while there are cav better than him, my favorite horseman will always be
TommyHu. Wears light armor, but it's his style that impresses me most. While most cav do efficient things like only attacking from behind, I always see Tommy attempt the weirdest horse maneuvers and succeeding at them. Like using his horse to jump on top of ruins, carefully balance atop the wall where normally you only see archers with high athletics even try to scale, and slowly sneak up on the archer on the window not looking at him, still on his horse mind you, and then stab him in the arse. TommyHu's amazing.
Special nomination would be
RUFFIES.
ROHYPNOL was and is better, but RUFFIES always seemed like such a cool guy.
-idlewind