Fourteen hours in the sand
8 October, south desert of Zone 2: 49 raids against hu9, from 05:19 to 19:43 UTC. They fought like lions. We fought as one team — and the desert is ours. Also: a superhero nobody recognised.
SOME BATTLES are decided in a minute. The desert took a whole day. The first raid report we have from 8 October is stamped 05:19 UTC; the last one, 19:43 UTC. In between: fourteen hours and 24 minutes, 49 raids and 71 of us in the fight — and when the sand settled, hu9’s towers were down and the south desert of Zone 2 was ours.
A worthy enemy
Let’s say it first, because it’s true: hu9 fought like lions. They never stopped coming, they took towers from us, and they made us pay for every one we took from them.
They are led by an R5 who also leads the raids himself: KostyTheMachine — Kosty, for short. Kosty didn’t send others to do the hard part. He was there, in the march, all day long, and 7 of our 10 losses came in raids he led.
Respect, Kosty. Respect, hu9. You made us earn every tower.
The long day, hour by hour
Every hour of the day, from the battle reports in the portal. Each box is one hour: how many raids we fought in it, and the score — won, then lost. Gold means we did not lose a single raid in that hour: 7 of the 15.
The morning belonged to the defenders. SïLv3 opened the day at 05:19 and held X:223 Y:771 three times before 06:35 — twice against Kosty himself. That tower was hit 5 times that day and never fell. At X:240 Y:782, Catfishing nun fought four times in 46 minutes, from 07:07 to 07:53.
Midday was the hard part. Kosty pushed hardest around noon, and he won some: 5 of our 10 losses came between 10:14 and 12:38, 4 of them in raids he led. Nobody backed off. At 12:58 BELT2AZZ held X:216 Y:764 against him; ToeCutt3r and Ruavro held X:223 Y:791 three times between 12:00 and 15:45; and at 18:37 UPRISING attacked there and won.
The evening was ours. BELT2AZZ held the Sub Stronghold twice, at 16:15 and 17:35. Teddy Boys took X:215 Y:797 twice, at 19:18 and 19:35. And the last word of the day belonged to one raid leader — keep reading.
Who held the desert, and when
15 of us led raids that day. Here is each one of them, hour by hour: the darker the square, the more raids that raid leader led in that hour. Every name opens that raid leader’s card on the battle page, with every raid behind it.
15 raid leaders · hour by hour (UTC)
- 1Death Queen8 / 8
- 2Shadow da Kat5 / 6
- 3The MaD HaTTeR4 / 5
- 4SïLv34 / 4
- 5Catfishing nun3 / 6
- 6BELT2AZZ3 / 4
- 7ToeCutt3r3 / 3
- 8Void2 / 4
- 9Ruavro2 / 2
- 10Teddy Boys2 / 2
- 11Brogs1 / 1
- 12ONE TEAM1 / 1
- 13UPRISING1 / 1
- 14MoxieMAX0 / 1
- 15Sexy Alice0 / 1
Most of the day we were on the wall: 36 of the 49 raids were hu9 coming at our towers and our stronghold, and we held 29 of them. When it was our turn to go out, we won 10 of 13 attacks.
The whole battle, as the portal counts it: 49 fights, 39 of them won. 71 of us fought under 15 raid leaders, against 121 hu9 players. We put 61,267,015 enemy troops out of the fight and lost 41,785,017 of our own.
The queen of the desert
If one name has to go on the front page, it is Death Queen. She led 8 raids and won all 8. She was the top killer of the day, with 3,604,089 enemy troops out of the fight. Kosty was on the other side in 9 of the raids she fought — and she won 8 of them.
Death Queen
8 / 8raids led, raids won · top killer of the day: 3,604,089Twice she led the march straight at a tower Kosty was holding, and twice she took it: X:228 Y:796 at 15:27 — the tower another raid leader had failed to take two hours earlier — and X:215 Y:797 at 18:44. Then she held X:220 Y:800 four times in 33 minutes, and her defense at 19:43 is the last raid report of the day. Both of her wins over Kosty, in full:
The ones who never left the desert
A raid leader is nothing without a march behind them. Who hit hardest, who paid the most for it — and who was there the most, back again after every loss and every win.
Breaking: a superhero in the desert
On the night of the battle — at 00:22 UTC on 8 October, says our member log — a new name showed up in our member records: Cyborg Superman. Red cape. Big S on the chest. Steel in his veins. Nobody recognised him.
Nobody, except everybody. Because Cyborg Superman wears a purple top hat with a peacock feather and a 10/6 price tag. Cyborg Superman has wild orange curls and that smile. Hatter, we know it’s you.
And the witnesses agree on one more thing: he wasn’t looking at the towers. He was looking at the barrels. This is the Land of Oil, after all.
I’m not looking at the oil. I’m guarding the perimeter. The oily perimeter.— Cyborg Superman
Then the battle reports came in — and the joke turned on us. Cyborg Superman led 5 raids. At 13:16 he attacked X:228 Y:796 and lost; even superheroes have a bad hour. And from 16:22 to 17:34 our caped friend held X:245 Y:789 four times in 72 minutes: once against ¥ SG ¥, three times against ☆Ric☆. In all, he fought in 10 raids that day and put 1,911,769 enemy troops out of the fight.
KA-POW!So, officially, we still don’t know who Cyborg Superman is. We do know he can hold a tower. And if a barrel went missing that evening… we didn’t see anything.
One team
Fourteen hours and 24 minutes. 49 raids. 71 names. Some of us led, most of us filled the marches, and a lot of us came back again and again, after the wins and after the losses. That is how a desert is won: not by one hero — not even a caped one — but by a team that refuses to leave.
Thank you, TWU. And thank you, hu9 and Kosty, for a fight worth writing about. See you on the next map. Teamwork first. Fun always.
THE DESERT IS OURS!
All times UTC. Every number in this post comes from the 49 raid reports of the battle “GW Desert vs [hu9]” in the portal, shared by our raid leaders.