Original date of blog: December 21st, 2014
So this entry will be only about Turtle and Panda and my adventures with them. I’ve platooned with them the most, and truly, if anyone deserves an entry, it’s them. At the moment, the most difficult thing to do regarding them is choosing who to platoon with. Until recently, I’ve always had a sort of ‘first come, first serve’ kind of thing going on, but as a result, that means that sometimes I hardly get to play with the other. But I’m not sure how else to go about it. I’m sure I’ll find a balance for it though.
Of the two, I first met Turtle. We met in the chat, while I was searching for someone to platoon with. I befriended him mostly because part of his nick is part of a name from a species from a movie I absolutely adore. It’s also the same part that I use in my nick in some places online. Yes, he impressed me with the way he tanked, but his nickname was what did it. It turned out to be related to something else entirely, lol.
Due to a conversation we had some time ago, we have the running gag that he’s my little brother and I’m his older sister. He’s the one I’ve platooning with most. We have a feel for each other, for the games, for the tanks we drive. He has some massively slow tanks that are just excellent to hide behind, and just like me, he has a preference for tank destroyers. It also helps that he’s online most of the time when I get online, so we can start tanking right away. He’s the main reason I’ve started collecting two of the tank lines I’m collecting, because I want to have the tanks he drives.
But I do fear he distorts my image of some tanks. Reason? It doesn’t matter what tank he drives in. He rocks them all, does excellent no matter how not-upgraded the tanks are. On one side, that makes me very happy for him, feel impressed by him and makes me proud of him. On the other side, it sometimes makes me feel like a noob, especially when he got one of the tanks I had massive troubles with in the beginning (the legendary Ferdinand), and completely rocked the first few matches he had with it, even though it’s heck slow and near impossible to like at that stage. When I voice something like that though (that I feel like a bit of a noob compared to him), he always tells me that I rock too, and that I’m awesome as well and that I shouldn’t think like that. Needless to say, he’s incredibly sweet.
I was very surprised when I learned his age. I’m more than twice his age at my 29. I would’ve pegged him to be in his late teens, or even early adulthood, easily. His English is really good, and he’s very mature. There’s very few times that I feel the age difference, though earlier tonight I had to explain what msn was, and it led to me reminiscing about the time when there wasn’t yet internet and all, making me feel very old, and him very young. We mostly talk tanks though, and tanking. And we tank a lot. He’s helped me get through the Ferd, and the Jagdtiger that followed. Not to mention the SU-100 and the SU-152 (which has got to be my favourite tank -ever-). I got both of them because Turtle drove the SU-152 when we first met.
The most awesome tank for him to drive while platooning with my Jagdtiger, in my eyes, is the T95. It is an epicly slow tank (probably the slowest of the game), but it has very thick armour and a very big gun. It’s very low in height too, I can actually just drive behind him and shoot at the enemy without many shots being directed at me. In the hands of Turtle, the tank is nearly invincible. As he once said ‘oh, how I love the sound of bouncing’, meaning hardly any shot ever actually damages him. Of course, once he’s on his own, and the tanks are fast, they can flank him quite easily, but even then, not all is lost. I’m not quite sure how he does it, but he’s managed to win battles against the much faster mediums despite there being no one to help him. It makes for very intense battles.
When I had gotten the Ferdinand, and had gotten better parts for it, I started to love the big lug. I said as much in chat, and that is how I met Panda. He told me it was rare to meet someone who loved the Ferd, and that is why he added me (though he admitted yesterday that it was also because I’m female, lol). We platooned, and he turned out to be utterly awesome. Then, just like with everyone else, it got quiet for a while. But with him, the silence didn’t last that long. It turned out that he knew Turtle, when one night Turtle wanted to platoon and I couldn’t because I was platooning with Panda. Turns out the two are friends and had been platooning together a lot. For me, one knowing the other just confirmed the level of players they are. And it makes me wonder why they are platooning with me, when they can platoon with each other. They get the most amazing results when playing together, after all. But Panda goes as far as to actually break off whatever platoon he is in when I want to platoon, just so he can tank with me instead. It’s something that makes me go ‘awww!’ out loud each and every time he does that.
Panda plays quite differently than Turtle does though. His tone is a bit more official overall, though that probably also has to do with that he’s older than Turtle (but still quite a bit younger than me). His tanks are faster than mine, so it happens quite often that by the time I get near the battle, he’s halfway across the map from me. This doesn’t have to be a bad thing, mind you. Attacking the enemy from two sides is a very good thing to do, and it has led to various epic victories in the past. Sometimes though, one or both of us get unlucky and we’re blown to smithereens.
Before the battle starts, Panda often gives me a breakdown of what to expect. He’ll have looked at the information we get before the battle (tiers of the tanks we’ll face, names of the tanks, and names of the players) and will know whether the battle will be tough or not. I’m trying to do the same, and I know the names of some of the tanks that will always pose a danger to me (fast tanks..), but he knows much more. He also knows a great many more players than I do. And the breakdown he gives is almost always correct.
When I first met him, Panda was already driving the Jagdtiger, and the way he drove it just got me all excited to get the tank too. It being the one next in line after the Ferdinand, I was sure I’d get to it. He has a tendency to apologise a lot, if I die, or if we lose. It’s never his fault though. At least, not in my eyes. The fact that I’m almost always dead before he is, he never takes into account when he says something like that. If he was able to help me, he would’ve, and sometimes, even epic players get unlucky and get killed. I can’t count all the times that I was about to get killed, or hurt bad, and Panda would come crashing in (sometimes literally), saving my hide and saving the day most often too.
In between matches, he often points out what I (might) have done wrong, and how to remedy it for the future. I try to pay attention to what he tells me, and what he says does make sense, but in the battle itself, I find it hard to apply it. The angling of the tank that both he and Turtle do naturally is something that doesn’t come naturally to me yet, and I’m pretty sure it’s the main reason I die, when I get shot dead.
Turtle has tried to assure me that at one time he was a noob too, but I find that hard to believe 😉 Especially since just a few days ago, the results of the End of Year Competition came in and they both scored really high (along with Chimp). High enough for me to want to nudge someone and tell them ‘hey, see those two? Well, I get to platoon with them. They’re awesome’. I am a bit bummed I wasn’t in the list (high, or low), because I think I did fairly alright, but alas, it wasn’t meant to be. Better luck next year!
These last few days, both of them have been helping me get to the epic Jg.pz.E100. All tier X tanks cost more than 6.1 million coins – and that is without the crew training or equipment. You can get the latter later, but you will definitely want the crew trained up to 75%. I needed a lot of coins for that. And there’s no better way to get coins than to platoon with either of these two and earning loads in the battles we enter together.
Then, the day before yesterday, it was finally time. Panda and I had been grinding together for a few hours when I suddenly had enough coins to get my very first tier X tank. And it is glorious. It is a monster of a tank, but without the crew trained to 100%, it still handles quite bad. I can’t wait to get it to 100%. Panda has the same tank, and when we enter battles together with them, I just know we inspire fear in the enemy team. At least, whenever I see that there are two Jg.pz.E100’s on the enemy team, I think ‘oh crap’ before even entering the battle. Right now though, Panda chooses faster tanks, so he can support me better and we can get my crew trained quicker.
I find it so sweet how these two keep helping me, keep picking tanks that will fit my tanks. At the moment, in tiers VIII, IX and X, I only have one tank in each. Once I have more, I can do the same for them. And, by the time I have another tier X tank, I will likely have grown as a player too and can actually be worthy of all the time and effort and energy they invest in me, and I might have as epic a battle with either of them as they have together.
Battles fought: 2,795
Winrate: 55.85%
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