To say my APOC experience was great would be an understatement. I've been dreaming about going to this war for nearly 7 years, and fulfilling that dream was nothing short of incredible.
I could never have done it without my friends: NoM, Drac, EOC, Draculina, and Red. You know you've got a great group of friends when you can road trip from Georgia to New Jersey and back, and love almost every minute of it. Thank you.
And now, my highlights from APOC 2015:
+ Rolling up to the parking lot and literally jumping around out of excitement. We were up late marking darts, and our motel was 45 minutes away, so we got there later than I would've liked, but fortunately for us the war started a bit slow.
+ Meeting and Nerfing with so many awesome people that I had only heard about and interacted with online: Gears (instant BFFs), DX, JLego, Langley, Ted, Miguel (super fast friends), Lucian, tomorrowsDarkness (finally!), Nick, Dan, Chris, Xellah, hoongfu, randomshadow, Corbett, joedimarco, Koree, Zorn, Shoopy, Gates... I'm so sorry that I can't remember everyone's names, but if I talked to you at all, just know that I loved every second.
+ Meeting, and more importantly, shooting Van James.
+ Seeing Vlad and Groove again.
+ Introducing myself as "the dickhead who runs Nerf Modders Welcome"
+ My aim wasn't quite consistent, but man my dodging was on point all day.
+ Super satisfying, high-level play with Gears and DX, among others.
+ Using my primary Crossbow, Chickenbow Rev. 3. Lots of kills, lots of compliments, and any malfunction was repaired between rounds. Still totally in love with it.
+ Using my backup Crossbow during various speed rounds and deathmatches. It didn't break when I expected it to, and shot even better than my primary one.
+ Used my Arrowstorm surprisingly just as much as my Crossbows. It held up so well, performed admirably, and even got some favorable comments.
+ The speed rounds may have been the most fun I had all day. Langley did a great job at organizing them on the spot and running them efficiently.
+ Teaming up with Gears and Ted during the aforementioned speed rounds, and being one of the only 2(?) teams to go undefeated.
+ After the speed rounds, a low-key 5v5 2-life round with Miguel, Roboman, Nick, Lucian, and others that was incredibly fun.
+ Van throwing an Elite dart and hitting me. Hilarious, but absolutely didn't count ;P
+ Actually getting the opportunity to run 3 rounds. At APOC!
+ The Freeze Tag: Kill Confirmed rounds being well-recieved.
+ Finishing our 3 rounds just as the superstock group started its last one, and being able to film that entire round.
+ Having around 3000 of some of the best darts on the field at our disposal, thanks to Red, our amazing dart smith.
+ Gorgeous weather all day.
+ Miguel, Lucian, and the silly string incident
+ Leaving the war feeling like I had proven myself.
+/- Missing out on Carpe to play Gunslinger and TDM
+/- Staying super late to pick up darts. We ended up getting at least 70% of our darts back, but I didn't get to say goodbye to everyone
- No pistol rounds
- No Civil War (North vs South) or duels
- Not as many rounds or as high attendance as I had hoped for
- NEVER BOUGHT MY TICKET
Postwar:
Brunch with Groove and Zaxbys, downtown shenanigans, and exploring the Jersey shore with the SE crew.
All in all, easily one of my favorite wars I've ever attended. Thank you so much to Langley for putting in the work and running the war.
I don't think I could have asked for a better weekend, nor a better group of people to spend it with.
It's safe to say the Southeast definitely brought the heat; hopefully we will do so again next year.
I have a good amount of 3rd-person footage, as well as some sweet GoPro footage from Drac and EOC. I'm making a war video; if anyone else has footage they'd like to share, please feel free to contact me! I'd love to have as much to work with as possible.
Deadshooter711, thank you for those awesome pics! I remember talking to you while we were documenting the rounds; I had no idea you had an account.
Looking forward to seeing Zorn's as well.
(Will edit in more highlights as I remember them)
...I'm still so happy!