Themed Challenges and Hall of Fame

Hello, everyone, and a belated Happy New Year!

I bring some news and questions regarding the new website. It's almost ready to use! Data entry is much easier than it used to be (can be done through a web form by any of the curators) and updating of all the leaderboards (including all the PHOF completionist lists) is now a matter of clicking one button. Some of the statistics are already available too. It's all quite fancy, if I do say so myself. But, it's incomplete:

What's missing is the "static content" from the old site - the texts and images for the (400+) challenges and (20+) challenge series. Another thing that's missing is the gold speedruns, which might need to be copied into the new database one by one (like new entries that get posted here). Bringing this content in is a big piece of work that, in honesty, I totally forgot about till recently.

The question is: should I publish the incomplete site on a temporary address so that new runs can already be entered? This might happen soonish, like in a few weeks from now. But you'd have to go to the old site for challenge info, and to the new site for the updated halls of fame until all the content is copied and the new site is ready to replace the old.

OR should I rather complete everything before it's published, which might mean another few months of delay?

Let me know what you think!

Smehur , I agree with traks , that even an "incomplete" site will be very exciting to see ...

I dont see any downside to publish as is, but whatever the choice, i m happy !

OMG, it lives!

 mehof.smehur.com

You've already been warned that it's not content-complete (thus all the placeholder stuff you'll see on the front page and elsewhere). It's also not up to date.   I'll get in touch with the curators, old and new, in a few days, so we can work on it together. Another thing that I kinda falsely advertised before is that "all leaderboards are functional". The truth is that many aren't, yet. I'll work on this as fast as I can.

Most of the differences between the new site and the old are in presentation, not the content. But there were a few things I had (or chose) to change:

- The PHOF completionist lists are now leaderboards with 'challenges' that make up a new "Platinum Solo Achievements" series (I'll write in more detail about this in the PHOF thread).

- Among the PHOF challenges/leaderboards, there's one called "Spectre". I renamed a Weekly 2 bonus challenge with the same name to "The Spectre" (because challenge names now must be unique). Since the challenge in the Weeklies refers specifically to Saren, I feel this change is thematically correct and I hope y'all (especially Prestacious ) won't mind.

- The slash character ("/") in the name of the challenge "IFF (Identify Friend/Foe)" had to be replaced with the minus sign because the slash screws up the URLs.

- The pipe character ("|") in the names of some players had to be replaced with the letter I because the pipe is used as the players-in-team separator.

- Player names cannot be changed. I might make some workaround in the future, but don't hold your breath.

- "Lack of Mastery Over Rage" and "Anarchy Hall of Fame" won't be ported to the new site.

- Player titles (N7 Officers) won't be ported to the new site.

- Only one link per submission can be archived, meaning that some links from multi-link runs will be lost.

Apart from this, several bugs have already been spotted by friends who tested the site a bit. You can find these known issues (as well as a to-do list) here. If you run into pages that don't work, or into other things that look off, please check this link out before reporting a problem. All feedback is welcome, though! Post your comments here, or message me.

Phew! Inb4 they shut down the servers when the LE is released. 

Jokes aside, I hope you'll like it. It's possibly the most massive (and definitely the most public) piece of software I've made so far. I learned a lot, and probably had more fun doing this than playing the actual ME3MP. Even if it is a bit too late in the making, I'm proud of it and regret nothing. Thank you all for the support and patience.

Themed Solo Challenges 2 [Gold edition]- Part 2

Hello everyone. This is ANOTHER post from the kind of #unretired ones. I know it took me some time to post this second part of the series, but here we go. I'll try to write a thing or two about each challenge, but it's been some time since I've finished it, so I might've lost some of the crucial details about them. But worry not, I still remember my sufferings and scrubbing quite well 

Week 12 - In Your Heart Shall Burn

30:29 - Sonashii (236 514 pts) [V]

I remember I tried to go full spectacular here - grenade cap, power amp, and only 3 pts in fitness. The game wasn't so kind to my idea and it usually pulled some random crap out of its pocket. Have I said I hate Collectors? Eff them, amirite? After Slasher's suggestion about the Geth Scanner I got it on the first try. A moment of hesitation costed me 10 WS medal. Oh well.. Done and Forgotten. Next..

Week 13 - Blue Shift

33:57 - Sonashii (324 900 pts) [V]

Assguard carried me here. Geth can be easily rage inducing, especially with their stunlock bs. I wanted to get it done asap (or in Asari case - afap ). Geth are not the most likeable enemy for me, but Reactor made up for it, as it's probably in my TOP 3 maps in the game. Sadly I got double targets and devices, so the time is kinda meh. But the more time spent with Blueberry the better

Week 14 - Explosives Are A Woman´s Best Friend

28:24 - Sonashii (250 755 pts) [V]

Probably the easiest Rio solo I've ever done. Not that I've done many of them, no no! As Apry calls her - Mrs Cargopants is a powerful character vs. Reapers. Arc Pistol (not tweaked hehe) and Incendiary ammo combined with triple (kind) escorts, resulted in a relaxing solo. Would solo again.

Week 15 - Survive

25:34 - Sonashii (273 270 pts) [V]

Probably the most relaxing and easy solo in the series. Krosent is a powerhouse. Add Wraith and Giant to it, against cheese vulnerable Reapers, and it's a walk in the park, as some #elitist would say. I did it as the last hurrah, after finishing all other regular challenges, kinda like a reward for me I had plans to make it a flawless run, or if not then mebi sub 20. But reality quickly brought me down to Earth. So I said eff that, and proceeded to finish it.

Week 16 - Pinnacle Station

30:01 - Sonashii (220 840 pts) 10WS [V]

Volus Engie is a beast. Also 10 WS babby. Fun solo, not gonna lie. Probably the only one I enjoyed vs. Collectors. Shame it was so close to sub 30. But time is not everything, r-right?

Week 17 - Weapon Test

27:16 - Sonashii (256 185 pts) [V]

Jiggly Quarian bum bum. Got bum-bum'd very quickly, like a naab. For the first two waves I used Black Widow like it was its older sis - Widow. Reloaded it after each shot. Damn, I'm bad at this game... Took only that one kind Hunter to remind me, I need to step up my game. Wanted to hug him for that smol reminder, but I killed the shiet out ot him instead. I rarely play QFI. Used to do it more often in the past. So I was happy I could do it in this challenge. Sabotage and Geth even made Hydra not depressing.

Week 18 - Mordus Revolutions

29:35 - Sonashii (274 638 pts) [V]

Salarian Engie equipped with Venom shotgun. Against Cerby. Sign me up pls. 5 grabs on Vancouver is a must, no other way. The grab spots are just too good to ignore. Especially Nemesis ... swift ladies deserve a nice omni tool in the face. Shame you can't do the same to as nimble Sword Ladies. But you can't have everything. Just like I could not have 10 WS here but no matter. I enjoyed it. Thought about going for 25 melee kills, but it was never close. So moving on..

Week 19 - The Smash Brothers

34:43 - Sonashii (236 531 pts) [V]

Oh boi... where to even begin with this one. Holy moly.. Let's say I wanted to get it done. No matter how slow or how bad I'd play. Just get it out of my sight. I know I've said in the past that Phoenix kits are fun to play. I was probably on crystal meth or sth. Nothing fun about it here. Especially with cheating bugz. And who thought the Lancer is a good idea for this combo? COME ON :rage: I know I might make some .. ekhm.. Smashbros and Lancer lovers, but I've said it, and I meant it nakkiCross (that's the best lamb emoji on the Internetz for those curious). NEXT!!

Week 20 - Arrhythmia

33:38 - Sonashii (204 509 pts) [V]

Probably the most difficult regular solo in the series. I'm not counting the bonus, flawless one, for obvious reasons. I mean, it's like the continuation of the nightmare from the 19th week. But it's even worse. I know Drelldept is a monster, Venom is amazing, but Goddess isn't the best environment for both of them! Especially vs. Trolls. Fekin bugs, really. I wanted to get it done, no matter the cost. I even went into the PUG territory and brought 9 medi-gels with me No regrets. Every one of them was useful lol. At least I was satisfied when I finally pulled it off. Unlike the Smashbro one. Pffft. The challenge lived up to its name.

Week 21 - Alpha and Omega

20:54 - Sonashii (305 195 pts) [V]

GI/Javelin - the ultimate killing machine. Not counting the Dark Lord, obviously. That would be unfair White Haz and Cerby. Quite the speedrunny setup, if you'd ask me. The thing is, the previous two runs drained out of me the whole will to play this series, so I've tried to sub 20 it, but it wasn't meant to be. Bad rng, missed shots and many other baloneys. All in all a good end to the series. Started with GI and ended with GI.

*BONUS CHALLENGES*

Armax Bonus: Conrad Verner

Tier 1
23:18 - Sonashii (260 088 pts) [V]

Tier 2
35:11 - Sonashii (226 482 pts) [V]

Tier 3
34:30 - Sonashii (301 506 pts) [V]

Quick summary - the supposed to be quick and eezy runs, were not quick and eezy at all. While Cerby stuff was as expected, the Lancer + Collies combo was crap and slou. Whoever come up with this combo, should wake up with 10k insect in their underpants one morning. Mattock + Geth wasn't better either. Also Glacier is making me puke a little. Just throwing it out there

SCPECTRE
34:19 - Sonashii (251 990 pts) 10WS [V]

This one, despite being flawless and quite difficult, was also GLORIOUS and FAT! TSent is a gentleman who never lets you down. I sacrificed Warp for more survivability, coz as Alfonse has pointed out before - it's relaxing and easy most of the time, but can co sideways in 2 seconds. So had to be careful and cautious. It felt nice to do a flawless run after such a long time.

And with that - this is my submission of the Themed Solos 2 series on Hardcore difficulty. No. I'm not gonna touch Themed 1. Back to my #retirement

Hello, TCHOF!  I updated the site just now. It's a regular HoF update but also a design update, so please do a hard reload (Ctrl+F5).

So far, we transferred about a half of the Gold Speedruns and updated the Themed Challenges Halls of Fame up to Sonashii's latest post. Here are the highlights:

* Alfonsedode and The_Doctor46N7 completed Themed Duo Challenges 1 on Platinum with an impressive cumulative time of 08:12:34. Congrats!
* Alfonsedode, TheNightSlasher and Vastator completed The Compact trios on Platinum with the cumulative time of 01:55:17, which is the best on record so far. It's been a while since we had completions in this old series. Well done!
* Balbock, fraggle and SenorZanahoria completed N7 Triune Trials on Gold with the top-ranking cumulative time of 13:20:32. They are the second team ever to accomplish this feat. Keep up the good work!

Smehur out.

Weekly Solos 1

Week 7 - Peak 15 (hardcore)

23:06 - Areksto (275 572 pts)

Week 15 - Haestrom Thermonuclear (hardcore)

21:47 - Areksto (273 037 pts)

I was bored and I decided to play this game for the first time in 2 years. It's still kinda fun but plenty of little irritations reminded me why I moved on from it. 

Oh dear, the last post from me in here was in September 2019 Where did all this time go?!

Balbock and I actually did some more challenges from the Themed Duos I after September, but we never got around to post them because we scrubbed one challenge really bad (yes, looking at you, Hydra/Trollectors ), and we wanted to finish Set 4 before posting it.
Well... Today, just a bit over 1,5 years later, we still haven't done the Hydra match successfully, but at least we started trying again

It was a couple fails once more, so for the time being until we can get motivated enough to try again, we continued the series and did Set 5. Some leftovers from Set 4 in 2019 were these:

Themed Duo Challenges 1 (Hardcore)

Set 4 - New Beginnings

I. Eden Prime
28:57 - fraggle | Balbock [v]
Pizza / Pizza / Targets


III. Bonus Challenge: Reach the Normandy
39:39 - fraggle | Balbock [v]
Hack / Targets / Hack

I remember absolutely nothing about these 2 games


Set 5 - Invaluable Synergy

I. N7's Finest, Part I
26:38 - fraggle | Balbock [v]
Devices / Escort / Escort

We managed on the second try, thankfully. Bai and I both hate Glacier Hazard, and vs Trolls it's just painful imo. As if the stupid Hazard swarm is not enough, you'll get a dozen extra swarms for free! Yaaaay...
But somehow we managed to get past W7 the second time I was down to 1 Medi-Gel since mid-wave 5, but I guess we need that kind of pressure sometimes

II. Ardat-Yakshi
30:18 - fraggle | Balbock [v]
Devices / Hack / Pizza

First try and it felt good to not having to repeat a challenge countless times Asari Boom Booms and Nade spam can never be wrong, right!? 5WS though, still panic-mode for me, after all these years playing. Still a total scrub with dumb ideas sometimes

Let's try and see if we actually manage to finish this series one day

Skipping a stuck challenge leads to overall progress with the series... It probably won't come back to bite us later. Maybe it will, but till then we have some fun with the other challenges in the series:


Themed Duo Challenges 1 (Hardcore)

Set 6 - The Path Less Traveled


I. Meandering of Mordus, Part 1 - Lystheni

28:07 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Escort / Escort / Devices

A Venom Salarian Engineer and a Raider Batarian Soldier... Cerberus is in for some pain... 4 times because remembering the Gold medals and Melee kills while playing can be hard. I'm sure Cerberus isn't complaining


II. The Enemy of My Enemy

31:21 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Delivery / Targets / Hack

The Mantis, a fine sniper rifle, and 2 kits that can make it shine with some decent aim, on a good sniping map. A map with some of the meanest hack positions in the game, though... Naturally we got some of those, trying to ruin our 5 Waves Survived medal. 2 Hacks (one in Wave 3 and one in Wave 6 in earlier attempts) succeeded with that, the third one in Wave 10 came too late and a rocket barrage made that one doable.


III. Bonus: Armiger Legion

30:39 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Hack / Devices / Escort

Nailed this one on the first try, but because nobody wants to watch a very long and slow wave 8 solo... Thank you, you &%?§#&! Phantom... we did it again. The second time was better, but could have been even better without the wave 6 devices.

Themed Duo Challenges 1 (Hardcore)

Sets 7 and 8 - Arashu, Goddess of Protection


28:57 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Targets / Devices / Delivery

First time went really, um, great... no more gel for me after W5, still made it to W9 after Bai clutched a wave successfully... But that was the end of it and we failed after some Geth shenanigans
Things got better when we tried camping the bridge part in the next game and just run whenever it got dire. Drell are still squishy


22:42 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Hack / Delivery / Hack

Hmmm, a challenge with the Dark Lord. Naturally I sacrificed myself to play it because Bai hates it 5WS in this cramped Glacier map is always an adventure, but we actually succeeded the first time. I suck with the Reegar, but I'm glad to never touch it unless for a challenge
But I felt dirty afterwards, so I guess I am not yet lost
We could have been faster in this one, but I looked at Bai's screen when I got downed to see if he could get to me in time, when a Marauder stomped me...


24:26 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Targets / Delivery / Hack

This one was really rage inducing for us since we both don't like Venom that much. While most of the time I get along okay-ish with it, sometimes you shoot an enemy 6 or 7 times and still don't hit despite them being right in front of you. I mean, WTF! Sure sure, some people might say L2Venom, but it's just not that great for us
Everything went rather smooth in the first run, but then of course something had to happen. Bai had frame drops mid-W10, something his PC does like to do sometimes, with some funky stuff happening to enemies... which made the already long enough going on W10 targets almost a 10 minute joyful experience with Bai being alt-tabbed and me trying to keep enemies away from him
We were actually successful in this run, with my 75 shotgun kills dropping 13 secs before extraction But it was too long overall and we thought we could do better. How little we knew...

The second time trying had us switching kits and we also made it to the end this time, but we both did not get the required shotgun gold medal... Then we failed twice to get 3WS medal, with me raging quite a lot already
Finally, the next time we nailed it, after me wasting lots of rockets in W6 to nuke Turrets and Engineers Luckily, Bai still had some rockets left for the W10 Hack
Granted, when the Venom works the physics are hilarious, but... NEEEEXT!

IV. Huerta's Archangels
30:55 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Devices / Devices / Hack

Rage. Just pure rage. Yeah, I am not sure I ever raged so much in a challenge as in this one. 5WS against Collies is super painful when scrubbing as much as we do
3 times trying, 3 epic fails with mistakes on both sides 4 more of those were following, the best one with quitting in W1 after 1,5 min
We switched kits after these infuriating attempts and that was way better (not being a squishy Drell anymore was great, and possibly it was also great for Bai not being a squishy TSol on my host again ). Everything went super smooth, we got the 5WS, carried on to W8 until the frame drops reappeared
Still we got along, proceeding to W10 and got a Hack. The whole wave was bugged though since I could neither see Bai anymore (or rather he was stuck in one place for me) nor was able to revive him. We also used all our remaining rockets on this Hack, but it was too much of a mess. At some point, after I still could not revive Bai and he was out of gel, I somehow managed to finish the Hack and clutch the wave, but that damn run was over 40 minutes, so we thought we could do better and this time without this crap happening towards the latter waves

So we tried again today and after 3 more rage tries we finally finished it, with 10 minutes shaved off. Still slow though But glad this is finally over.

Also, Devices... I truly inherit the same curse as doc, I get devices like no other in almost every game
And congrats if you read this book. You will get a virtual cookie

The next Set is (mostly) done. Cerberus themed and with a glance over the weapons fraggle and I already knew that we will have more fun with this Set than with any duo including a Reegar or Venom:


Themed Duo Challenges 1 (Hardcore)

Set 9 - The Rise and Fall of Cerberus Part 1


I. Mars Archives

29:14 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Devices / Targets / Targets

Shuriken AIU and Hornet male HSol... We did that before but in different matches. With Snap Freeze plus Cryo Soldier and some Disruptor Ammo Tech Bursts we had a plan to approach this challenge. But the first problem arose with the male part of the kits... I had to respec my Claymore Soldier to a second Cryo Soldier and at some point I have to spec him back... The second problem arose at the end of our first try because I just couldn't get a 3rd personal gold medal anymore... And the third problem arose in the second try in wave 8. We both at the same time needed to revive right under the nose of a Phantom and I was out of OpsPacks. fraggle got stabbed immediately but due to some miracle I made it out alive. The wave was near to the end and therefore it didn't take to long to finish the wave alone... In the end we had the required amount of medals and were just 1 second slower than in the first try... Maybe there is some room for improvement in the future


II. Illusive Defeat

31:31 - Balbock | fraggle [v]
Devices / Hack / Escort

Roleplaying a Dragoon and a Phantom... Obviously fraggle picked the Dragoon and "left" the Phantom for me, because she likes the Phoenix Adept a lot. And soon we spent a respec card each and because minimal Hornet use is encouraged and Phantoms like to use their swords, I went with a Melee build. I know I'm not good with a melee Slayer but I'm not good with the Slayer overall (I just prefer the Novaguard...). Anyway first the Banshees were far too much into hugging, then the medigel situation was far too dire, but then we made it... somewhat slowly with much kiting we left behind a bunch of smashed and beheaded Reapers. We picked a bit of rage up on the way, that we used to start the next set. But that is something for another post... Soon^(tm)


The Bonus Challenge has to wait for a bit. Sniping on Glacier isn't something we like to do too often.