The Times report | The first decision of Benson’s that caused difficulty was an Australian appeal for caught behind against Shivnarine Chanderpaul. He was on 38 and given not out by Benson, a verdict that was upheld by Asad Rauf, the TV official. This led to a long-running inquisition by Ponting, who made several demands of match officials during the day for the reasons behind the not-out verdict. Ponting said later: “The new system was meant to stop this sort of thing happening but it didn’t.”

The incident understood to have most upset Benson was when Chanderpaul was later given out caught behind for 62 after Australia had again asked for a referral. Benson had given Chanderpaul not out but Rauf overturned his decision, although the evidence for doing this was unclear. Replays provided little evidence to suggest Chanderpaul’s bat had made contact with ball, with any noise detected appearing to be caused by bat hitting pad, but the Pakistani official gave Chanderpaul out anyway. One Australian newspaper reported that Chanderpaul had been “crucified”.

David Richardson, the ICC’s general manager | “Vintcent van der Bijl, our umpires manager, has been speaking to him but I know Mark has a problem with his heart. He was anxious about it. It was worrying him.”

Snicko and HotSpot technologies: When used in combination can determine the truth in most of the situations. No doubt about it. Technology should be used with a good human brain to analyse it. No matter what technology we use.. if the umpire dont use a good brain to analyse it, the whole new system will break down.

Hawk-Eye: I agree that the 3d-tracking system used by TV channels for LBW decisions have an angle of guess-work in it, but even if it is a guess-work.. the system is very consistent.. not like human umpire.. who considers how FAT is batsman’s STATS.. I dont understand why ICC cant use FULL HAWK-EYE for decision makings ? Why stop playing the tapes when it hits batsman’s pad.. why include the umpire and his ‘inconsistent’ guesses ? Why not play the tape full and give the batsman OUT if HAWK-EYE says ball is hitting [or even touching] any of the 3 stumps ?

Umpires and FAT STATS:  India lost its last test series in Sri Lanka thanks to referral system where none of its GREATS got the benefit from the umpires.. as referrals kept on GIVING THEM OUT.. ignoring their FAT STATS.

Bigness of small decisions :  Other day, Sehwag went on to score 293, but he was clearly LBW in his 30s.. but umpire gave the benefit of doubt [BOD] to the batsman. That combined with the fact that T.Dilshan [6 centuries in 2009] of Sri Lanka was given out recklessly in both innings of the test match [he was clearly eligible for BOD on both occasions] tilted the result in India’s favor.

Het is een welbekende uitspraak, ‘The Luck of the Irish’. Een uitspraak waarvan niemand zeker weet waar hij vandaan komt, maar hij klinkt meestal zo lekker. Meestal als Ieren geluk hebben is er dan ook de neiging deze uitdrukking daarbij te betrekken. Zo ook gisteren.

Het geluk van de Ieren werd het geluk van de Fransen, die als een echte dief in de nacht met de overwinning aan de haal gingen tegen, jawel, de Ieren. We praten dan uiteraard over voetbal, de beslissende play-off voor de WK-kwalificatie.

Tot tweemaal toe ontbrak het Robbie Keane aan de immer beroemde ‘Luck’ toen hij (nadat Ierland al op 0-1 stond) twee keer faalde tegenover de Franse doelman Lloris. En omdat het dankzij deze pech bij 0-1 bleef, betekende dat verlengen. Het was niet zomaar een verlenging, want andermaal werd duidelijk dat de arbitrage het niet meer af kan zonder hulpmiddelen.

Thierry Henry nam de bal met de hand aan (in buitenspelpositie nota bene), om vervolgens voor te geven op William Gallas die de voor Ierland fatale gelijkmaker binnen kopte. En terwijl hiermee een einde kwam aan de ‘lucky spree’ van de Ieren laait nu andermaal de discussie op over het gebruik van videobeelden bij de besluitvorming van scheidsrechters. In tennis noemen ze het de ‘Hawk-Eye’, een technologie die volgens de FIFA niet bij het voetbal past.

Maar realistisch gezien zal het er op den duur van moeten komen. Italië en Nederland stelden een aantal weken geleden al het goede voorbeeld. Giampaolo Pazzini werkte met een handsbal het leer binnen voor de Italianen, maar door de hevige protesten bekeek de arbitrage de beelden nog eens, en prompt werd de goal dan toch afgekeurd. Zo zou het moeten zijn, ten allen tijden. Maar nu puntje bij paaltje komt is er opnieuw een cruciale misser begaan. De sympathieke Ieren blijven komende zomer thuis, bier drinkend zoals ze daar zo bedreven in zijn.  Het bier drinken zal dit keer vooral uit verdriet zijn omdat Frankrijk ten onrechte afreist naar Zuid-Afrika.

Hoelang de FIFA nog haar rug toekeert naar technologische hulp blijft een vraag. Een voornaam bezwaar van tegenstanders is dat het spel te veel stil zou liggen, maar stel dat er alleen bij dit soort cruciale momenten (dus een moment waar een doelpunt uit valt) een beslissing heroverwogen kan worden, dan gaat de vaart niet uit het spel, simpelweg omdat het spel sowieso even stil ligt voor de aftrap als er een doelpunt is gemaakt. Het is een optie die het bekijken waard is, lijkt me.

Hawk-Eye is een belangrijk onderdeel van de tennisarbitrage geworden

“Hawk-Eye is het meest geavanceerde systeem ter ondersteuning van officials, in elke sport.” Dat zegt het bedrijf Hawk-Eye Innovations zelf op haar website. De site zelf is echter minder geavanceerd. De pagina over tennis stamt uit 2007 en is sindsdien niet meer bijgewerkt.

Het Hawk-Eye systeem werd oorspronkelijk ontwikkeld voor televisie, maar in 2006 werd het ook als arbitrair hulpmiddel in gebruik genomen op de professionele tennistour. Hawk-Eye had daarmee niet de primeur, want al sinds de jaren ‘80 kende de sport het Cyclops-systeem, dat werd ingezet op de servicelijn, en een luide piep gaf wanneer een opslag uit was.

Diepgaande analyses
Cyclops was echter lang niet zo geavanceerd als zijn opvolger. Hawk-Eye registreert elke geslagen bal tijdens een rally, en niet alleen helpt het spelers met de mogelijkheid om een call te ‘challengen’, commentatoren gebruiken het systeem om diepgaande analyses op wedstrijden toe te passen.

Hawk-Eye kan precies weergeven hoe vaak een speler bijvoorbeeld naar de backhandhoek van zijn tegenstander slaat, of hoe ver deze achter de baseline staat tijdens een rally, of bij het ontvangen van de service. Dit kan worden gespecificeerd naar bijvoorbeeld set 1 en set 2, waardoor verschillen in tactiek in beeld kunnen worden gebracht. Hawk-Eye biedt televisiekijkers dus een diepere blik in de patronen die zich ontwikkelen in wedstrijden.

Novak Djokovic is de beste 'challenger' op de ATP Tour

Maar nog belangrijker is dat het systeem soms letterlijk wedstrijden beslist. Toen Lleyton Hewitt tijdens het ABN AMRO-toernooi in Rotterdam vorig jaar dacht een ace geslagen te hebben op matchpoint, vroeg zijn tegenstander Andreas Seppi een challenge aan. De bal bleek uit te zijn en de Italiaan zou uiteindelijk de wedstrijd nog winnen. Zonder Hawk-Eye had Hewitt de partij gewonnen.

Meerdere camera’s
Het Hawk-Eye systeem is inmiddels van toepassing bij vrijwel alle grote toernooien ter wereld. Tijdens het gravelseizoen wordt Hawk-Eye alleen gebruikt als hulpmiddel voor de televisie, aangezien van de balafdrukken op de baan direct valt af te lezen of een bal in of uit was.

Voor gebruik van het Hawk-Eye systeem staan er meerdere camera’s gepositioneerd rond de tennisbaan. Soms zijn dit er wel acht. Wanneer een speler een challenge aanvraagt, maken Hawk-Eye medewerkers ter plaatse een 3D-animatie op de computer van de balbaan en deze wordt vervolgens geprojecteerd op de grote schermen in het stadion.

Paniek
Toch is niet iedereen een fan van het systeem. Roger Federer vindt het allemaal maar niks. Hij twijfelt aan de betrouwbaarheid van de projecties en ziet liever een lijnrechter een extra fout maken dan dat zijn lot in de handen van een computer terechtkomt. In de Wimbledon-finale van 2007 raakte Federer bijna in paniek vanwege het systeem, toen een geslagen bal van Rafael Nadal volgens Hawk-Eye 1 milimeter in was.

“Hoe kan die bal in hemelsnaam in zijn? Kunnen we het systeem niet uitzetten? It’s killing me!“, beklaagde Federer zich bij de umpire. Kijk zelf naar het filmpje. 

Aanleiding
Iemand die drie jaar geleden wel erg blij was met de komst van Hawk-Eye, was Serena Williams. Een wedstrijd van de Amerikaanse op de US Open van 2004 tegen Jennifer Capriati vormde een belangrijke aanleiding voor de introductie van het systeem. De beelden spreken voor zich. Kijkt u vooral het hele filmpje af.

Schoonheidsfoutjes
Hoewel Hawk-Eye een doorslaand succes is geworden, is het systeem niet geheel onfeilbaar gebleken. In de ruim drie jaar tijd dat de technologie nu wordt gebruikt, zijn er ook enkele schoonheidsfoutjes geweest. Deze zijn echter op de vingers van één hand te tellen.

In de wedstrijd van Amélie Mauresmo tegen Olga Poutchkova op de Australian Open van 2007 was het voor de umpire van dienst even schrikken.Mauresmo vroeg aan het eind van de eerste set een challenge aan, maar Hawk-Eye geeft de bal zowel in als uit. De afbeelding liet een afdruk áchter de baseline zien, terwijl het onderschrift keurig las “IN”. Mauresmo kon er om lachen. Wat volgde was een let. Zie hier het filmpje.

Later dat jaar op de US Open gebeurde er iets vergelijkbaars in de wedstrijd tussen Nicole Vaidisova en Alla Kudryavtseva.

En dan was er nog de menselijke fout eerder dit jaar, waarbij een Hawk-Eye operator – naar later bleek – per ongeluk de verkeerde stuit van de bal afspeelde op het scherm in het duel tussen Andy Murray en Ivan Ljubicic in Indian Wells.

10.000 challenges
Sinds Hawk-Eye voor het eerst werd gebruikt als technologisch hulpmiddel voor officials bij de Sony Ericsson Open in Miami ruim drie jaar geleden, zijn er in totaal meer dan 10.000 challenges aangevraagd door spelers. Een onderzoek van USA Today eerder dit jaar, leerde dat de mannen veel vaker het systeem inschakelden dan de vrouwen.

Ruim 6.300 van de totale hoeveelheid challenges kwam van de heren. En mochten de spelers denken dat ze het allemaal beter zien dan de lijnrechters, dan zitten ze er flink naast. Slechts 35% van de aangevraagde challenges leverde een positief resultaat op voor de tennisprof.

De dames doen het met hun zuinigere beleid wat dat betreft net wat beter. In 36% van de gevallen zaten de speelsters bij het juiste eind.

De ATP Tour stelde voor het onderzoek van de Amerikaanse krant ook een lijst beschikbaar van spelers die ten minste 50 challenges aan hebben gevraagd. Van de 39 spelers was er slechts één die in meer dan 50% van de gevallen het gelijk aan zijn zijde had: Novak Djokovic. De Serviër had op het moment van publicatie een hitrate van 55%.

En wie was de grote clown van het geheel? Niemand minder dan Andy Murray, die van zijn totaal van 224 challenges slechts 56 keer met een blij gezicht naar het videoscherm kon kijken. Daarmee had hij het in 25% van de gevallen goed gezien. De Schot heeft wél een verklaring voor zijn lage score. “Ik weet vaak wel dat als ik challenge ik het verkeerd heb, maar ik wil dan gewoon zien hoe ver mijn geslagen bal uit was.”

Foto’s © Niels de Water

Regular readers will know by now I hold most of football’s regulatory bodies in deep contempt. The announcement that FIFA are not prepared to explore technology on the goal line for at least another 18 months doesn’t do them any favours in my book.

Clubs all over the world are crying out for goal-line technology. Just a simple microchip in the ball, linked to a light behind it, would be enough to clarify whether a goal should be given or not. However, once again FIFA and the IFAB (International Football Association Board) seem to be on another planet to the people they claim to represent.

The most infuriating part of this is that on the 4th October, after a referee and his assistant failed to allow a strike from Fiorentina’s Alberto Gilardino against Lazio in Serie A, Blatter FINALLY seemed to accept technology was required.

“We still haven’t found anything which settles the problem. Now the inventor of Hawk-Eye (the system used in both Tennis and cricket) has said publicly his system would work. We will gladly take a look at it,” he said.

This from the man who instead said that more officials were the answer. We’ve then seen the controversial introduction of extra referees in this year’s Europa League, who none of us can say what they’ve actually provided in the three rounds they’ve been available for. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see this experiment continue into next Summer’s World Cup either.

However, FIFA had allowed some associations to try their own systems in non-league football, which includes the English FA. This latest ruling means that these trials cannot be taken any further until FIFA and IFAB’s AGM in March 2011.

The only positive to come from this appears to be Sepp Blatter has finally accepted that without this technology, too many big games are decided on errors of judgement. As much as FIFA insist the element of human error must still be a part of the game, even referees would like help in deciding whether the ball has crossed the line or not.

Despite my frustration that progress will not be made until 2011, I take my hat off to FIFA for finally exploring the proposal.

I just wish it hadn’t taken them so long.

Sachin Tendulkar jumped into the debate over umpiring referrals, arguing that more technology should be implemented, albeit with no referral system accompanying it. Being Sachin Tendulkar, he probably knows that the cricketing world will be more than a little interested in what he has to say…which is why it is worth breaking down his suggestions.

Tendulkar strongly supports the use of Hot-Spot in determining bat-pad and caught-behind dismissals, while he also suggests using tennis-style hawk-eye technology to spot overstepping no-balls; both technologies are used extensively by commentary crews. Of greater interest though, is what Tendulkar thinks should not be changed- he is against the referral system and using technology for lbw decisions:

“I’m not particularly happy with the referrals because I’m not convinced of the angles (on television),” Tendulkar told India Today magazine. “I’m not convinced. I wasn’t happy when we first went through it [on India's tour of Sri Lanka last year].”

Given that dodgy lbw decisions have probably been the biggest inspiration for those advocating increased use of technology, I find Tendulkar’s exclusion of just those dismissals (I am excluding situations where batsmen are bowled since there really isn’t a debate there) rather puzzling. However, I understand the rationale- indeed, at the risk of being a heretic, I side with him on that issue. There have been a number of times when the predicted Hawk-eye trajectory has just looked off, even accounting for visual illusions. Furthermore, I find it hard to believe that Hawk-eye- which is ultimately a prediction based on rapid-frame snapshots and algorithms- can accurately account for the diversity of pitch and weather conditions across matches. This is important: marginal differences in a pitch can account for an extra inch here and there…it is those very inches that make a marginal lbw decision so, well, marginal. Getting hit above the knee-roll on a bouncy Perth track is worlds apart from getting hit above the knee-roll on a pancake-flat subcontinent pitch. On the other hand though, given the way in which Hawk-eye works, I expect its accuracy would improve as the gap between pitching and striking the pad increases (since more information on the pitch can implicitly be accounted for); this still doesn’t put me in favor of its adoption.

Precluding the argument by analogy, there are relevant differences between cricket and tennis- the latter uses Hawk-eye largely in order to determine where a ball pitched, not how it pitched. For obvious decisions, umpires are probably just as good as Hawk-eye at determining an lbw decision; for the marginal cases, I could live with the odd error from umpires, rather than adopt an additional form of error. I understand that umpires cannot be precise either- why else would we be having this discussion- but I place more faith in a thinking, cognitive being, capable of making adjustments. Granted, this is a contentious view and quite often, umpires do make egregious errors; however, given the small proportion of matches where such a decision may actually determine the outcome of the game, I think the importance of the issue has been overstated[1].

To be, or not to be...

Which provides a segue of sorts into another point made by Tendulkar viz. the possible rotation of umpires during a match, in order to alleviate errors attributable to fatigue. I appreciate the sentiment, but this idea does not strike me as a very good one at first glance. As mentioned above, pitch differences and subtleties are important factors and I can only see an umpire getting a better handle on things over time. Think about a batsmen getting “set” after some time at the crease, once he gains a measure of the conditions; I think the same idea can be abstracted in thinking about umpiring accuracy. As a match progresses, the umpire probably becomes more accustomed to the conditions, accounting for wind, irregular bounce and so forth. When the “set” umpire is switched out for a fresh one (analogous to a new batsmen at the crease), the latter would need to familiarize himself with the conditions. Again, one could think about batsmen being extra vulnerable when they are fresh at the crease; the same would probably apply to a new umpire. Although my Statsguru expertise does not extend this far, I expect one could easily verify my claim by examining just when in a match erroneous decisions are most likely to occur, given historical statistics. Further research anyone?

What about referrals? I think the discussion above provides an answer by default: yes in certain situations and no in others. They will be a permanent feature in international test matches now, so I suppose we will get to test out our predictions in the real world. For now, inevitably, the jury is out.

New image in the photo equipment photography contest

…
1926 Kodak Hawk-Eye 2a photography picture

La Fifa è disponibile a sperimentare l’impiego della tecnologia per risolvere i casi di gol fantasma. Lo dice il presidente della federazione internazionale, Joseph Blatter, all’agenzia Dpa. Finora, la Fifa aveva sempre detto ‘no’ all’uso di sistemi elettronici in campo. “Perché finora non abbiamo trovato nulla che potesse risolvere il problema”, dice Blatter. Ora, la soluzione potrebbe arrivare dal tennis e dal cricket. La Fifa è pronta a valutare il sistema hawk-eye che viene già impiegato in altre discipline e che consente di ricostruire la traiettoria della palla.
“L’inventore dell’hawk-eye (Paul Hawkins, ndr) ha detto pubblicamente che il suo sistema funzionerebbe. Lo prenderemo in considerazione volentieri”, dice Blatter.
In attesa dell’hawk-eye, in Europa la Uefa ha avviato la sperimentazione che prevede l’impiego di due giudici d’area nelle partite di Europa League. <!– –>

The guy in the stand can't believe what Serena just said to the lineswoman (who obviously had no idea what she said)

Defending champion Serena Williams blew her load on a lineswoman in her semi-final against (eventual winner) Kim Clijsters at the 2009 US Open yesterday, costing her the match on match point.  Williams was called for a foot fault on a second serve when down 15-30 and 6-5 in the second set, causing her to go into a profanity-laced tirade at the lineswoman, eventually leading to a point-penalty that turned out to be the final point of the match.

However, apart from bowing out of the tournament in disgrace and being fined the maximum cash penalty, Serena’s outburst has raised some further, long-debated questions.  In a month when South African champion sprinter Caster Semenya was revealed to be a hermaphrodite and in the age of Lady Gaga, Serena was overhead telling the lineswoman that she would “take my f—ing balls and shove them down your  f—-ing throat.”  A slip of the tongue, perhaps?

Since the outburst, internet forums have been rife with speculation.  Initially, viewers thought Serena was referring to the tennis ball in her hand, though a slow motion replay using Hawk-Eye indicated that Serena was indeed pointing to her crotch area.  Skeptics have been quick to state that Serena prefaced that line with “[i]f I could”, meaning that she couldn’t.  On the other hand, bystanders swear that the reason why Serena was visibly upset was because she could not physically carry out the threat.

Nevertheless, there are now calls for stricter testing to be done on all female athletes (in particular the better or buffed ones)  in order to ensure a more level playing field.

[PS: For those who are still as lost as the lineswoman in the photo above, this is my first attempt at satire]

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That’s right– after 2 years working with “Matthew” the Hawk-eye, I found out recently through a third-party source that his name in fact is not Matthew (or Hawk-eye) but Edward! Just when you begin to think you can trust your co-workers, bam- something as deceitful as this happens. Disappointing if you ask me.

But even with his real name revealed, he won’t give up his alias. It looks like I’m going to have to play detective on this one and uncover the underlying reason Hawk-eye has been playing us for fools all this time. Until I have some findings to report, I’ll leave you with this–

Hawk-Eye is a computer system used in cricket, tennis and other sports to visually track the path of the ball and display a record of its actual path as graphic image. In some sports, like tennis, it is now part of the adjudication process. It is also able to predict the future path of a ball. It was developed by engineers at Roke Manor Research Limited of Romsey, Hampshire in the UK, in 2001. A UK patent was submitted by Dr Paul Hawkins and David Sherry.

A little bit about Hawk-Eye in Tennis

In Serena Williams’ quarterfinal loss to Jennifer Capriati at the 2004 US Open, many crucial calls were contested by Williams, and TV replays demonstrated that some were indeed erroneous. Though the calls themselves were not reversed, the chair umpire Mariana Alves was dismissed from the tournament. These errors prompted talks about line calling assistance especially as the Auto-Ref system was being tested by the U.S. Open at that time and was shown to be very accurate.

In late 2005 Hawk-Eye was tested by the (ITF) in New York City and was passed for professional use. Hawk-Eye reported that the New York tests involved 80 shots being measured by the ITF’s high speed camera, a device similar to MacCAM. During an early test of the system during an exhibition tennis tournament in Australia (seen on local TV), there was an instance when the tennis ball was shown as “Out”, but the accompanying word was “In”. This was explained to be an error in the way the tennis ball was shown on the graphical display as a circle, rather than as an ellipse. This was immediately corrected.

The 2006 Hopman Cup in Australia, was the first elite-level tennis tournament where players were allowed to challenge point-ending line calls, which were then reviewed by the referees using Hawk-Eye technology. It used 10 cameras feeding information about ball position to the computers.

In March 2006, at the Nasdaq-100 Open, Hawk-Eye was used officially for the first time at a tennis tour event. Later that year, the US Open became the first grand-slam event to use the system during play, allowing players to challenge line calls.

The 2007 Australian Open was the first grand-slam tournament of 2007 to implement Hawk-Eye in challenges to line calls, where each tennis player on Rod Laver Arena was allowed 2 incorrect challenges per set and one additional challenge should a tiebreaker be played. In the event of an advantage final set, challenges were reset to 2 for each player every 12 games, i.e. 6 all, 12 all. Controversies followed the event as at times Hawk-Eye produced erroneous output. In 2008, tennis players were allowed 3 incorrect challenges per set instead. Any leftover challenges didn’t carry over to the next set. Once, in one of  Amélie Mauresmo’s’s matches, she challenged a ball that was called in, Hawk-Eye showed the ball was out by less than a millimeter but the verdict was called in. As a result, the point was replayed and Mauresmo didn’t lose an incorrect challenge.

The Hawk-Eye technology was used in the 2007 Dubai Tennis Championships with some minor controversies. Defending champion Rafael Nadal accused the system of incorrectly declaring an out ball to be in following his exit. The umpire had called a ball out; when Mikhail Youzhny challenged the decision, Hawk-Eye said it was in. Youzhny said afterwards that he himself thought the mark may have been wide but then offered that this kind of technology error could easily have been made by linesmen and umpires. Nadal could only shrug, saying that had this system been on clay, the mark would have clearly shown Hawk-Eye to be wrong.

The 2007 Wimbledon Championships also implemented the Hawk-Eye system as an officiating aid on Centre Court and Court 1, and each tennis player was allowed 3 incorrect challenges per set. If the set produced a tiebreaker, each player was given an additional challenge. Additionally, in the event of a final set (third set in women’s or mixed matches, fifth set in men’s matches), where there is no tiebreak, each player’s number of challenges was reset to three if the game score reached 6-6, and again at 12-12. Teimuraz Gabashvili, in his 1st round match against Roger Federer, made the first ever Hawk-Eye challenge on Centre Court. Additionally, during the finals of Federer against Rafael Nadal, Nadal challenged a shot which was called out. Hawk-Eye showed the ball as in, just clipping the line. The reversal agitated Federer enough for him to request (unsuccessfully) that the umpire turn off the Hawk-Eye technology for the remainder of the match.

In the 2009 Indian Wells Masters quarterfinals match between Ivan Ljubicic and Andy Murray, Murray challenged a ball that was called out. The Hawk-eye system showed the ball landed on the center of the line despite instant replay images showing that the ball was clearly out. It was later revealed that the hawk-eye system had mistakenly picked up the second bounce, which was on the line, instead of the first bounce of the ball which was clearly out. Murray later apologized to Ljubicic for the call, and acknowledged that the point was out.

“OK, I got aimed shot… What next?”

Hi guys, today we’re going to talk about speccing a hunter for arenas. I will concern myself mostly with 3v3 and 5v5, I will deal with both marks and surv but not beast mastery, and I will address pet talent trees at the end.

Survival

My spec no longer varies for 3v3 and 5v5, but it used to. I’ll go over my talent spread for both brackets when I’m playing survival (which is most of the time now), and in the process you’ll learn a little bit about pvp philosophy. These days I prioritize dps over everything. Anyone who has checked my armory knows I abuse the hell out of pve gear, and I’m not ashamed. Hunters got a raw deal when the “burst damage” cards were dealt, and I do everything I can to compensate for this, including maxing talents like improved hunter’s mark and improved tracking. You don’t have to max these, but I would recommend always putting at least 4 talent points in improved tracking. You may have noticed I don’t max hawk eye. I find 41 yds unnecessary in arenas as the area in which most fights actually take place on most maps is pretty tiny. I do occasionally have a hard time getting in range of healers to scatter them, however, so you can definitely make a case for maxing this talent.

If you do a lot of 5v5 and not much 3v3, you can afford to put just 1 in survival tactics or skip it completely (as long as you’re glyphing disengage), you should absolutely spec point of no escape, you should avoid deflection at all costs (I rarely get disarmed in 5s), and I would try to find room in your spec for master tactician, because there’s always time to stand and nuke. No matter what your bracket is, I would always get trap mastery and resourcefulness (max them both) and avoid surefooted, savage strikes, noxious stings, and sniper training at all costs. There are better places to put your points, period.

For those who 3v3 the most, I would suggest that you always have survival tactics maxed (and keep glyphing disengage), and don’t be so hung up on master tactician. It’s a good talent for dps, but 3v3 can be frustrating from a dps standpoint. The games often end in 30 seconds, it’s hard to pretend you’re getting your money’s worth. Consider deflection (and even counterattack, if you think you’ll remember to use it) if you love using a 2-hander, but I rock my 1-handers and a weapon chain for 3s. Using 1-handers also lets you eke out a little more resil, which is key in 3s. Things get dispelled more often in 3v3 relative to 5v5, so you can afford to drop improved hunter’s mark (likewise, if you do 2s I wouldn’t bother with this talent), and in 3v3 I would opt out of point of no escape unless you play with a melee partner. That said, there aren’t many other places to put these points if you’ve already maxed imp tracking and hawk eye and whatever else, and point of no escape is only 2 points. Trap mastery, T.N.T., and lock and load are all must-haves no matter what, and if you love to 2v2, I would always get counterattack. That pretty much sums up my advice for speccing survival. On to marks!

Marksmanship

There are two general ways you can go with your MM spec, based on how much you use hunter’s mark. If you believe hunter’s mark is your bread and butter, as I do, then I would spec something like this. There’s a lot of options in the MM tree, but so many of them are random number generator based talents that are meant to boost pve dps, like piercing shots, improved steady shot, and wild quiver. If you like them, you can take points out of concussive barrage, trap mastery, or efficiency to get them. I would hold on to the efficiency talents, however, because MM is more mana intensive than ever now that we can drop 3 traps at once. Trap Mastery really isn’t that crucial for MM hunters, but I would probably spec into it since hunters are always dropping frost and nature traps these days. I don’t feel comfortable saying it’s better for 3v3 than it is for 5v5 or vice versa, because it’s only as good as your trap spells are. Because traps can be situational, this talent too is situational. I don’t really like piercing shots that much, but I could see a use for it if you run comps that rarely ends games in the first 30 seconds. Improved barrage, it should be noted, has a lot of synergy with piercing shots, so don’t be afraid to put a point or two in it along the way.

If you never use hunter’s mark, you could skip improved hunter’s mark and even neglect marked for death (I’m not sure how anyone can justify skipping MfD, but I know some people do), and end up with something like this. This gets you a lot of the RNG talents, which some people (who are surely in the minority of pvp hunters) prefer, and it saves you from wasting talents on an ability that you aren’t using anyway. As an aside: If you look closely at marked for death, you’ll see it grants you a bonus to crit damage whether or not hunter’s mark is active on the target. Even people who don’t use HM would do well to spec this talent.

As with survival, if you are 5v5ing mostly, you can skip survival tactics and just dump the points into efficiency, which is never a waste for MM hunters. You can also dump all those extra points into focused aim and ditch some hit gear. I’m not good at math so I can’t tell you whether the damage increase is worth not using hunter’s mark much, but skipping improved hunter’s mark (and/or MfD) definitely gives you lots of options.

Depending on how much you’re getting focused, you might want to ditch points in improved tracking and put them in survivalist instead. MM hunters generally keep themselves alive through use of cooldowns rather than reliance on passive defenses like HP and resilience, but stam never hurts.

Pet

That does it for speccing yourself, now how about speccing your pet? That’s quite easy if you love tenacity pets like I do. The spec doesn’t vary much and you have enough points to get just about everything you could possibly want for pvp. This is the spec I prefer for my gorilla and you’d be hard pressed to convince me to change it. For my crab, however, I do spec into charge, for the obvious synergy it shares with pin.

Ferocity pets are as simple to spec and I’m not going to waste time giving advice about them. Anyone who uses one of these in arenas obviously doesn’t care much what abilities his pet has, he just wants to see big numbers.

Cunning pets are tricky. On the one hand they have a lot of situational talents that can turn them into dps machines when the stars align, but they also have a lot of defensive talents that you need to spec into if you want to keep them alive. This is what I would spec for situations where your pet is getting focused relentlessly. As you can see, it’s not possible to really get all the bread and butter cunning pet moves like roar of sacrifice, bullheaded, and roar of recovery at the same time. This is the main reason I don’t use cunning pets.

In case you didn’t know, cornered reduces the damage your pet takes by 60%+ when it’s below 35%, not just its chance to be crit by attacks. This makes it a very nice talent. Now if only mages and locks couldn’t bring it from 50 to 0 in a second… If I wasn’t worried at all that my pet was going to die, I would do this with it. This way you get some damage and utility, and if you’re lucky, it’ll catch some heals. Until heart of the phoenix (or blood of the rhino), is available to all pets, I will stick with my gorilla and my crab.

-Jurgwena

My paladin healers are busy guys. Between keeping my pet alive with splash heals from their holy light and actual heals that will bounce back to the tank through beacon of light, they’ve got a lot on their hands. That and I believe feign death is for pansies. Hunters were given a bubble for a reason!

All of this means that I’m lucky if they have time to judge the boss more than the strict minimum needed for their haste bonus, and that means judgment of wisdom’s uptime can be fairly low.

That said, I noticed that my passive armor penetration rating was getting up there without any work (gems, food, etc) on my part. I decided to try taking improved arcane shot out of my build and arcane shot out of my standing still rotation. My logic was that since arcane shot is one of those shots that already ignores armor, I might be able to get more DPS out of the extra steady shot (which does benefit from ArP and piercing shots, and has two nice procs) per cycle, and the extra mana provided the freed up talent points.

The question was where would I put the talent points I now have free? I want to use as many as possible on mana and, since I needed something in the top part of the marksman tree in order to advance to the bottom part, I picked a point in efficiency over one point in improved arcane, improved hunter’s mark, or focused aim. There’s already a hunter with improved mark, and his is glyphed too. Focused aim doesn’t contribute to pet expertise like hit rating does, and I honestly don’t move that much in most of the content we are working on now. That left efficiency.

This combined with two points in rapid recuperation should mean the end of mana trouble for me. The last point is the stickler though- I dropped it in focused aim, but am thinking of putting it somewhere else. Trueshot aura would be a waste because of all the buffs it doesn’t stack with, and aside from maybe a little extra range from hawk eye, there’s nothing outside the marks tree within reaching distance that would increase my DPS. Still, I could easily get to hit cap by gear. For now, FA will do.

Now how does this change my rotation? It actually makes things simpler when I can stand and shoot- I hit chimera and aimed shot when they’re available, and fire steady shots when they’re not. There’s no chance of my wasting a charge of improved steady shot proc on an arcane shot any more either.

End result- if you have the right gear and find yourself in viper once in a while, you might be able to get some DPS out of taking arcane shot out of your rotation. Still cast it when you move, but not when you can cast a steady shot. To see whether you’re in this situation, import your character to www.femaledwarf.com.

Sonunda beklenen an geldi. Geçtiğimiz bölümlerde (552. bölüm) Beyaz Sakal’ı Moby Dick’in puruvasında tüm ihtişamı ile dururken ve oğluna “Seni kurtarmaya geldim evlat!” derken gördük. Her ne kadar Ace onun öz oğlu olmasada tayfasında ki pek çok kişi gibi oğlu sayılmakta ve belkide tüm diğerlerinden çok farklı bir noktada… Oğlu, sağ kolu ve ikinci kaptanı…

Ne var ki “beklenen an geldi” dediğimde Beyaz Sakal’ın ihtişamını bir kenara bırakıp kudretini kullandığı ve bize bu zamana kadar merakla beklediğimiz gücünü sunduğu o anı kastettim. Adeta dünyanın duvarına vurarak yarattığı depremler ile oluşturduğu dev dalgaları, Tsunami’yi, bir Leviethan edası ile Donanma’nın üzerine salarken Beyaz Sakal öyle kudretli görünüyordu ki…

Tahtlarında oturmakta olan üç donanma amiralinden birinin, sağ koltuğun sahibinin, daha önceden tayfa ile karşılaşmasını bir çok kez ağzımız açık izlediğimiz Ao Kiji’nin tahtını terketmesini ve Donanma üzerine doğru gelen devasa dalgalarla birlikte tüm körfezide dondurmasını, buz çağını bir anda Kutsal Diyar’ın körfezine getirmesini, yine de Beyaz Sakal’ın kudreti ve dünya duvarına vurduğu darbesi ile buzdan parçalara ayrılmasını dehşet içerisinde izledik. Böylece ilk defa Beyaz Sakal’ın bire bir gerçekleşecek bir dövüşte bu yeteneğini nasıl kullanacağını görmüş olduk.

Ao Kiji buzdan parçalarına ayrılırken, adeta ikiye bölünürken Donanma sahilinden ateşlenen toplar ve bu düzlemde Moby Dick’i ve Filoya ait tüm diğer gemilerle birlikte Beyaz Sakal’ı korumak için buzdan körfezde ileriye atılan Beyaz Sakal filosuna karşılık Donanmanın tam teşekküllü Yardımcı Amirallerininde salındığını görüyoruz.

Sanırım tüm bu yardımcı amiraller arasında sadece bir tanesi tanıdık. Pala bıyıkları ve hipi vari, sadece kafasının ortasını boydan boya arkaya doğru kaplayan saçları ile tanıdığımız bu Yardımcı Amiral’i de ilk defa Amazon Lily açıklarında Hebihime ile dialogdayken görmüştük. Hebihime’nin taş edici etkisine karşı koymak, kendi hormonlarının etkisinden kurtulmak için hiç düşünmeden kendi eline bıçağı saplamış, Hebihime’mizi Donanma tarafından davet edildiği büyük toplantıya götürmek için himayesine almadan oradan ayrılmayacağını gayet ciddi şekilde beyan etmişti. Ne var ki bir Shichibukai’ye denk olmadığını o zaman hissetmiştik. Tüm tayfasını bir kere de kaybetmesi bile bu denklemin sağlanmadığını bize göstermeye yetmişti.

Nitekim Amazon Prensesimiz gönlünü Luffy’e kaptırmasa ve onu eteklerinin altında Impel Down’a götürmeye karar vermese bu Yardımcı Amiralimizin himayesine girerek yola da koyulmaz, bizim pala bıyıklı yardımcı amiralimiz kendi başına, kuzu kuzu Kutsal Diyar’ın yolunu tutardı.

Hemen konuya dönmeden şuna bir açıklık getireyim; seviyeleri konusunda merakla baktığımız Yardımcı Amirallerin güçlerini bu olay doğrultusunda az çok kestirebiliriz. Bir Shichibukai’den daha güçsüz, rakip oldukları Beyaz Sakal tayfasının üyelerinin güçlerine denkler… Yine de hepsi çok karizma görünüşlere sahipler… Özellikle hepsinin yan yana göründükleri resimde solda, üstte kalan, köpek maskesi takan, beyaz sakallı Yardımcı Amiralin görünümünü takdir ettim. Çok güzel tasarlanmışlar, en az Beyaz Sakal tayfasının üyeleri kadar, hemde daha da iyi tasarlanmışlar…

Tsuru-chan’ın hamlesini merak ederken ilginç bir kaç söz etti ve merakımı daha da cezbetti. O ve savaşın aktiflik kazandığı 553. bölüm boyunca ortalarda hiç gözükmeyen Garp acaba savaşta ne gibi bir rol alacaklar?

Başladı…

Bu sözlerle birlikte harekete geçen ilk kişi bir Shichibukai oldu ve inanın Shichibukai’ler arasından hamla yapmasını en beklemediğim kişi harekete geçti. Bu nasıl bir plitikadır ki Mihawk, namı değer Hawk Eye, Şahin Gözümüz; Beyaz Sakal’ın anlaşmalı arkadaşı Shanks’ın arkadaşı olduğunu düşündüğümüz denizlerin en güçlü kılıç ustası şimdi Beyaz Sakal’ın karşısına korkusuzca, hiç geri durmaksızın çıksın… Mihawk kılıcını öyle bir savurdu ki, sanki hep bu anı beklemiş gibi… Sanki bu nihai anı bekler gibi savurdu kılıcını körfezin üzerinde ve yardı dalgaları hunharca, acımasızca… Şahin gözlerinin kısık bakışları arasında izledi rakibini ikiye biçecek olan, biçmesini beklediği hamleyi…

Mihawk zamanında o devasa kılıcını Zoro’ya karşı çekmemiş, ufacık bir kılıcı bizim büyük kılıç ustamız karşısında kullanarak adeta onunla alay etmişti. Taa Baratie Restoranı mazilerine dönmek lazım hatırlamak için… Zoro’nun hayatı boyunca vücudunda taşıyacağı, vücudunu ikiye bölen o yara izini açan kişi, dünyanın en büyük kılıç ustası (hem gerçek hem mecaz var burada) olarak bilinen Mihawk dı bu kişi… Zoro’nun hayatının amacı… Mihawk’ı yenmek… Ve Mihawk şimdi yeneceğini hiç sanmadığım bir savaşa atladı…

Neyse ki Beyaz Sakalı biçmesi için savurduğu, denizi yararak giden kılıç hamlesi ile Beyaz Sakal arasına Mihawk’ın yenebileceği nitelikte bir rakip girdi ki onun gözümüzdeki yeri küçülmeyecek…

Moby Dick’e buzları yararak giden darbenin önüne, Beyaz Sakal ile arasına giren, Mihawk ile eşleşen kişi 3. takımın lideri Elmas Diş oldu. Dünyanın en güçlü kılıç saldırısına maruz kalan Elmas Diş’in bu saldırı karşısında aldığı surat ifadesinden görülebileceği üzere hamlenin etkisi pek öyle etkili değildi.

Kizaru burda!

Işın gücü ile kendini öne süren, Beyaz Sakal’ın üzerine atılan, 3 amiralden birisi olan Kizaru ise kendisini 1. takımın lideri Marco ve onun merak uyandıran alevleri ile karşı karşıya buldu. Marco’nun bu alevlerinin Ace’ın alevlerinden farkını sonraki bölümlerde göreceğiz gibi; lakin bu noktada Kizaru’nun Ürkünç demesi bize ilginç gelecektir.

Tüm bunlar olurken 553. bölüm boyunca Luffy, Jimbei, Buggy, Croc ve diğerlerini hiç görmedik; ama onları önceki arc’ın sonunda Kutsal Diyar kapılarında, esrarengiz kapılar kendiliğinden açılır ve tayfamız içeriye girerken görmüştük.

Nitekim böyle bir savaşın içerisinde böyle bir tayfanın nasıl bir yeri olacak merak konusu doğrusu… Yine de Beyaz Sakal’ın Sengoku karşısında bir şekilde sıkıntıya düşeceğini ve Luffy’nin böyle bir durumda orada olacağını da düşünmüyor değilim…

Hi folks, today you’re going to get a primer on how a hit capped raiding hunter can rearrange the deck chairs on the titanic and get DPS increases on gear with hit while hit capped!

I was in Dalaran admiring the new gear I paid through the nose for, and glanced down at my hit rating. 300!? What in tarnation…? What do you do in a situation like that? I’m wasting 70 itemization points (as a Draenei, my hit cap is 230). That new T8.5 chest added a buttload of hit, and while the DPS calculator says it’s still an upgrade (probably because it gave me my 4 piece bonus), I feel dirty running over hit cap! What to do?

Well, I started off by analyzing where all my hit was coming from. Top of my list is my trinket and weapon. Now I stole that staff fair and square from a feral druid, and there’s no way I’m not going to wear it. Nothing says “this thing looks so silly that I would never bother hitting anything with it” like tassels on a stat stick, and the groans in vent from the (regrettably still untamable) cat druid in our guild every time he sees it make me happy. So happy that I let another hunter in the guild get the rune edge first. Well, that and he asked nice.

So, short of getting rid of a tier piece with hit and losing my set bonus, I am looking at a trinket replacement. I sat down with wowhead and looked at my options. There are some nice drops in Ulduar I will probably be unable to afford, as well as some T7 trinkets that would serve to reduce my hit, but I don’t have any of them and I’m really not interested in running OS25 pugs again to lose rolls on the fury of the five flights. Wait a sec, what about the first epic trinket I ever got? That’s right, the badge trinket I bought with badges earned mostly in heroics, the very basic yet fairly decent mirror of truth!

Having gotten rid of all that hit, I was actually below cap. Now, I checked the math and I can gain a very small amount of DPS by removing arcane shot from my rotation (because of all the armor pen I have) except when Im moving and need another instant, or fighting a boss with a magic damage accellerator. I can take three talent points out of improved arcane shot, however I need to put one of them somewhere in the first 5 tiers or else I can’t get to the 6th. Well, I can avoid gemming for hit (which allows me to gem for agility) by taking a single point in focused aim. Since this was fixed, the hit will now be passed down to my pet.

Where to put the last two points? There’s nothing in tier two of the beast mastery or survival trees that would increase my DPS, and while I would like the extra range allowed by hawk eye, I put the points into mana talents. The raid comp we run is mana-regen light, and I find I have to go into viper right about when we hit the execute range of a boss. So I took another point in rapid recuperation, and a point in efficiency.

Now all that remain is for me to test this out. I’m leaving arcane shot keybound and on my bars, but ideally I’ll get more steady shots. I’m also going to invest in a belt of dragons.

Geçtiğimiz One Piece manga sayılarından birinin kapağında Oda’nın kaleminden Shichibukai’lerin hepsini yan yana görmüştük. Donanma tarafından tutuklatılan Jimbei ve Kuma da dahil hepsi kapaktaki yerini almıştı. Olağan üstü bir şekilde Luffy’e gönlünü kaptıran Hebihime ile Jimbei yan yana duruyorlardı. Luffy’e Shabondy Takım adasının sonunda, onu göndermeden hemen önce “Bir daha asla karşılaşmayacağız!” diyen Kuma (halen bu konuda çok sağlam teorilerim var) bir süre sonra zincire vurulmuş olmasına rağmen kapakta, diğerlerinin arasında ki yerini almıştı. Hiçbir toplantıya katılmaması ile ünlü Hawk Eye dahi kapaktaydı… Gerçi yaklaşmakta olan olaylar zinciri vesilesi ile belki de ilk kez bir toplantıda da yerini almıştı.

Thriller Bark’da Luffy tarafından muazzam bir yenilgiye uğrayan; ama bunu hiç kimseye çaktırmayarak koltuğunda oturmaya devam eden Moria da aynı kapaktaydı, Kara Sakal korsanlarının kaptanı olarak bilinen, Crocodile’ın düşüşünden faydalanarak Shichibukai ünvanını sahiplenen, başındaki ödül konusunda bizleri sürekli şaşırtan Teach ve nihayetinde, şu zamana kadar en az gördüğümüz, belki de hiç geniş geniş izleme olanağı tanımadığımız Don Flamingo’da kapakta ki yerini almıştı…

Peki ya, tüm bu Shichibukai’lerde şimdilerde neler oluyor?

Eski bir Shichibukai olan Crocodile, Alabastadaki planlarını hayata geçiremeden, daha doğrusu boşa kürek çektiğini öğrendiği anda Luffy’nin ani ve ısrarcı vurgunu sonrası yenilmiş, yaptığı anlaşmaya aykırı hareketi nedeni ile o zamanlar sadece tutuklandığını bilmemize rağmen sonradan çok şaşırtıcı bir şekilde öğrenmemiz üzerine Impel Down’ın en derin yerine, idam mahkumu olan Luffy’nin biricik kardeşi Fire Fist Ace’ın ve başka bir mahkum Shichibukai olan Jimbei’nin yanına hapsedilmişti.

Sengoku ile bilmediğimiz bir nedenden ötürü ters düşen, yine açıkça bilmediğimiz bir nedenden ötürü Impel Down’ın en derin yerinde hapsedilmiş olan Jimbei, tüm onuru ve sadakâti ile bizlerde heyecan uyandıran bir diğer karakter olmuştu.

İşte tüm Shichibukai politikası, koltuk savaşları bu çerçevede dönüyordu…

Crocodile Impel Down’a atılınca açılan 7. Shichibukai mevkisini hızla doldurmak isteyen donanma olası adayları araya dursun çoktan kendisi adaylığını koyan bir korsan vardı bile. Ace’ın adamlarından birisi olan ve büyük bir ihanet ile kaçan Teach kendi tayfasını kurmuş, elinde ki şeytan meyvesi gücü ile Shichibukai mevkisine, Donanmaya vaatlerde bulunarak aday olmuştu. Daha Alabasta çöllerinde tanıdığımız Luffy’nin biricik kardeşi Fire Fist Ace’ın amacı uğrunda onca dolanmasını izledik ve Water 7 sonlarına kadar da bu amacın nihayetini göremedik. Derken amaç nihayetine erdi ve karanlık ile alev kapıştı. Geride sadece Ace’ın o alengirli şapkası ve karanlığın içerisinde yok olmuş koskoca bir ada kalmıştı.

Tüm bu gelişmeler ışığında, Shabondy ve Amazon Lily sonlarında öğreneceğimize göre Fire Fist Ace, Kara Sakal’ın hafiften değişmiş; ama amacına çok daha iyi bir şekilde ulaşmış vaadi olmuştu. Shichibukai koltuğu uğrunda Donanmaya teslim edilen Ace ve bu neticede koltuğa yerleşen Kara Sakal, Shichibukai mevkilerinden boş olanı da sahiplendi. Peki ya sonra?

Ace’ın idam süreci başladı…

Bu süreç binlerce farklı olayı tetikledi!

Beyaz Sakal korsanlarının ikinci adamı olan Ace’ın böyle bir konuma getirilmesi BS’ı Donanma’yı hedef alır hale getirdi. Muhtemelen Jimbei’de böyle bir durumda BS’ın karşısında yer almamak istediği için Sengoku ile ters düştü. Kararını değiştirdiğinde çıkartılmak üzere Impel Down’ın en derin hücrelerinden birine, olaya bakın ki Fire Fist Ace’ın hücresine atıldı.

Crocodile’ın da karşı hücredeki varlığı yaklaşık bir zaman diliminde sezilirken başka bir cephede yine bir çok Shichibukai’nin müdahil olduğu olaylar çerçevesinde işler çok farklı bir boyut kazanmaktaydı.

Amiral Kizaru, bir kutsal ejdere yumruk atan Hasır Şapka Luffy’i yakalamak üzere Shabondy Takımadasına gelerek ışın logia gücü ile ortalığı darma duman ederken, az kaldı tüm Hasır Şapka tayfasını ölüme yollarken ortaya Kuma çıktı. Shichibukai’lerin belki de en sırlarla dolu olanı, ilk defa Thriller Bark’da Zoro’ya gerçek acıyı tattırırken gördüğümüz Kuma bu sefer neyin peşindeydi?

Luffy ve tayfasının tüm üyeleri birer birer Kuma’nın patisi ile temas ederken ve farklı yönlerde millerce uzağa doğru yollanırken Kuma geriye kalan son kişiye, Luffy’e döndü ve “Seninle bir daha hiç karşılaşmayacağız!” dedikten sonra onu da yolladı.

Benim tahminlerime göre Kuma geleceğe dair görüşe sahip olan bir Shichibukai… Luffy’nin gelecekte ne gibi bir felaketi önleyeceğini görmüş olabilir ve onu böyle bir hamle ile yapması gerekene yönlendirmiş olabilir. Çünkü bir dönüp bakacak olursak tayfanın tüm üyeleri sanki kendileri için özenle seçilmiş adalara yollanmışlar. Kuma, Reyleigh’e fısıldarken ve Reyleigh fısıltılara cevabını o ilginç sözleri ile verirken bu tahminim nasıl olurda güçlenmez? Kuma geleceği görmese neden Luffy’e böyle bir cümle ile veda etsin, neden oraya kadar gelip, her şeyinden (donanmadaki mevkisi vs.) vaz geçip Luffy’i kaderi olan bir yolda çok uzaklara yollasın?

Luffy gökyüzünde millerce süzüldükten sonra sadece amazonlardan oluşan bir adaya iniş yaptı ve işte bu noktada güzeller güzeli Hebihime ile tanıştı. Aslında önce savaştı, sonra tanıştı. Kadınlarla kaplı adada Luffy’e gönlünü kaptıran, Shichibukai’lerin tek kadın üyesi Hebihime önceleri bahsi geçen acil Shichibukai toplantısına gitmeyeceğini Donanmaya beyan etmişken, Luffy kardeşinin durumunu öğrenince, onu Impel Down’a götürmek için Donanma’nın toplantı katılım talebini kabul etti. İşte böyle yollara düştü sevdiğini eteklerinin altına alarak…

Hebihime bizi Luffy’nin erkekliği konusunda şüphelere düşürsede olası bir aşkın doğduğunu, bizlere kıskançlık yaratacak kadar güzel bir şekilde, her karede defalarca betimledi.

Derken kendimizi Hebihime’mizin etekleri arasında Impel Down’da bulduk ve işte bundan kısa bir süre sonra Shichibukai’lerin hepsinin bir masanın etrafında toplanmış olduğunu da gördük. O zamana kadar hiçbir toplantıya gitmemiş olan Şahin Göz bile oradayken…

Luffy gelişen olaylar ışığında Impel Down’ın en derinlerine kadar inmeyi başardı. Ace’ı kıl payı kaçırmış olsada orada hapis olan Crocodile ve Jimbei’yi de, o anda Jimbei’nin bir Shichibukai olduğunu bilmeksizin yanına aldı.

Şimdilerde bu iki Shichibukai Luffy ile birlikte idam alanına doğru yolculuk ederlerken ufukta çok daha büyük bir savaş var ve diğer Shichibukai’lerin kesin konumları belirsizliğini sürdürüyor.

Bakalım bundan sonra olaylar nasıl şekillenecek?

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Da derzeit wieder einmal Wimbledon-Zeit ist, will ich die Gelegenheit nutzen, ein gutes altes Tennis-Video rauszukramen.

Zum Video:

Heutzutage werden strittige Entscheidungen auf dem Tennisplatz (“War der Ball gut oder nicht?”) ja häufig mit dem so genannten “Hawk Eye” gelöst (übrigens nicht zu verwechseln mit dem deutlich älteren und weniger leistungsstarken System “Magisches Auge“!). In der Geschichte des Tennis ist das “Hawk Eye” jedoch eine neuere Entwicklung. Früher konnten Spieler nicht einfach “Challenge” rufen, wenn sie eine Entscheidung für falsch hielten.

Für alle, die sich an diese Zeiten noch erinnern können, hier ein Video vom unbestrittenen Ausraster-König auf dem Tennisplatz, John McEnroe! Wer könnte seinen Markenzeichen-Ausruf  “You cannot be serious!” vergessen, üblicherweise herrlich laut und mit wahrhaftiger Empörung in Richtung Schiedsrichterstuhl gebrüllt.

Hier nun ein Video davon — viel Spaß:

Weitere McEnroe-Ausraster hier, hier, hier und hier.

Geof Hurst (right)

The first goal-line incident that comes to mind is of course the shot of Geof Hurst that hit the underside of the crossbar and bounced down on or behind the goal-line in the 1966 World Cup final. England won in extra time also due to this controversial goal with 4-2 against Germany. Modern technology suggests the ball didn’t pass the goal-line and even Hurst himself admitted it didn’t. Maybe hawk-eye can be the permanent solution. Check the video of the incident:

patch 3.1 edit: while some of this is still good, patch 3.1 changed the game a little for survival. Here’s the guide, and here’s the shot rotation.

OK, I’ve rambled on about how to play a survival hunter, but unless you have a good spec, you’re still going to suck, even if you take all my advice.

First off, whenever discussing specs, the cookie cutter response from elitist jerks huntards everywhere is “Use the spreadsheet, n00b”. Then they report you, then someone gives you an infraction, then you write up a complaint by PM to the moderator who gave it to you because they mocked your grammar in the comment, who then gives you another week off for mod sass. I watch this process repeat itself ad nauseam.

The problem with the spreadsheet is that is has a few problems. Firstly, it thinks raptor pets are the second coming because when you model their long cooldown special attack, it looks good on paper. In reality, the consistent DPS of a cat or wasp would probably be better for your group (more on that soon!). Secondly, it thinks that sniper training is much better than it really is. There’s no easy way to model the positioning of your shaman totems and paladin auras other than manually removing them from the buffs tab, and this means you can’t assume that you would be in range some of the time. Thirdly, it assumes you can’t count to two and are casting shots between explosive shots when you have lock and load. Fourth, I don’t think it knows that until patch 3.1, frost traps with resourcefulness are a guaranteed lock and load every 24 seconds.

All that said, it’s invaluable for determining your best gear and enchants, but for crafting a spec, I did it the hard way.

Here is the minimum spec for frost trap dancing. It leaves you 6 points to spread around. You might be asked to use some more of them on hunting party to provide mana replenishment, and personally, I always take aimed shot for mobility fights. The rest of them can be dumped into improved aspect of the hawk to provide a decent DPS increase. Expecially good if your steady shots take more than a global cooldown, and passably good if you’re already at the haste soft cap.

Some notes on this spec:

• Whenever evaluating talents like go for the throat (marks tree) and expose weakness (surv tree), bear in mind that you will crit a lot. Putting more than one point into GFTT will be a waste as your pet can’t spend focus as fast as you can generate it with just the one point.
• Expose weakness will have almost 100% uptime with two points.
• The only reason to take wyvern sting is to get noxious stings.
• Hawk eye is just a filler to get to the next level, however it’s a better filler than any of the melee or pvp talents I chose it over.

Using this information, you should be able to approach the maximum possible DPS atainable with your gear.

Weg met de buitenspelregel in het voetbal!

Door GERSON HEIDINGA, TobSport.nl

Gepost op: 20-01-2009.

Deze maand was weer de tijd voor de traditionele nieuwjaarsrecepties bij de meeste clubs in het betaald voetbal. In Alkmaar voerde Dirk Scheringa ditmaal eens het woord en hij nam van de gelegenheid gebruik om eens flink tegen de schenen van het conservatieve voetbalwereldje te schoppen. Natuurlijk wel in uiterst bescheiden bewoordingen en met het respect dat we van hem gewend zijn. In de Kees Kist-lounge sprak hij namens het complete ‘team AZ’. Dirk pleitte voor het afschaffen van de leeftijdsgrens voor arbiters, het toepassen van elektronische hulpmiddelen bij arbitrage, maar ook: het afschaffen van de buitenspelregel.

Marcel van der Kraan van het AD tekende de volgende quote op uit zijn mond: “Wel of geen 10 cm buitenspel. In het stadion denk je dat de scheidsrechter het goed ziet, maar ’s avonds krijg je bij Studio Sport weer te zien dat het andersom was. Daar moeten we echt een keer vanaf “. Dirk’s uitspraken werden de volgende dag breed uitgemeten in alle traditionele media. Die natuurlijk direct op de gebruikelijke ‘creatieve’ wijze de goede man in het keurslijf van de onwetende geldschieter plaatsten. Hij moest en zou afgeserveerd worden. Naar de bodem met die man. Als een ‘duikboot’, à la Van Seumeren.

Hoongelach viel hem ten deel.

In de aflevering van Studio Voetbal van 18 januari viel alleen Youri Mulder Scheringa bij toen het onderwerp ter sprake kwam. Hugo Borst en Hans Kraay sr. zien niets in het afschaffen van de regel. De invloedrijke analyticus Johan Derksen was al eerder te gast in De Wereld Draait Door en vermoedde dat de bubbels van de champagne de AZ-preses naar het hoofd gestegen waren. En bovendien, moet die man zich niet gewoon met zijn bankzaken bezighouden? Buitenspel is volgens Derksen onlosmakelijk verbonden met de essentie van het voetbal. Al jaren beroept Derksen zich op enkele jeugdwedstrijden, die als proef zonder buitenspel werden gespeeld…

De wedstrijden waren er volgens het publiek niet leuker op geworden. Spitsen bleven hangen in de 16-meter en het veld werd te lang. Tegenwoordig wordt de buitenspelregel toegepast vanaf de D-jeugd. Scheringa sprak op de receptie zoals gezegd namens ‘team AZ’. Coach Louis van Gaal was zijn voorzitter al voor met zijn opmerkingen. In 2004 zei Van Gaal het volgende: “De buitenspelregel is te ingewikkeld en moet afgeschaft worden. Het meest complicerend is de nieuwste regel, waarbij spelers niet strafbaar buitenspel staan. Het aanvallend voetbal van de teams wordt doodgemaakt, dit omdat teams niet meer op buitenspel durven te voetballen. Als de regel wordt afgeschaft wordt het veld groter en wordt het makkelijker om te voetballen.”

De hoogste tijd om deze onmogelijke regel te schrappen.

Een onmogelijke regel, omdat het per definitie onmogelijk is voor een grensrechter om twee verschillende, soms ver uiteenliggende plaatsen op het veld op hetzelfde moment in het gezichtsveld te hebben. Grensrechters staan vaak op lijn met de voorste aanvaller en zien het moment van passen of de beweging van de aanvaller niet op het moment suprème. Daarbij komt nog eens dat de beslissing wel of geen buitenspel de verantwoordelijkheid is van de scheidsrechter. En met 20 veldspelers wil er nog wel eens een speler de arbitrage het zicht op een situatie ontnemen. Het snelle spel en de kleine ruimtes van tegenwoordig dragen ook niet echt bij aan een gedegen inschatting door de assistent-scheidsrechters.

Het belang van het onterecht fluiten voor buitenspel is groot. De Belgische professor Werner Helsen analyseerde het WK 2002 en becijferde dat 26% van de buitenspelgevallen onterecht werd afgefloten. In 4,3% van de gevallen werd een goede goal direct afgekeurd. Helsen concludeerde dat het zicht van de assistent niet eens het grootste probleem was. Het feit, dat een bewegend voorwerp in de regel verder weg wordt waargenomen dan het in werkelijkheid is, nekte de assistenten nog het meest. Helsen stelt dat een assistent de meeste terechte beslissingen neemt als hij kijkt naar de eerste aanvaller en luistert naar het spelen van de bal. Niet echt de ideale techniek voor een rumoerig stadion natuurlijk…

Niet afschaffen? Dan tenminste videobeelden toepassen!

Videobeelden kunnen zorgen voor eerlijkere uitslagen in het voetbal. Geen buitenspelgoals meer, geen was-die-bal-nu-wel-of-niet-over-de-lijn-discussies, geen onterechte penalty’s. Die zaken horen juist bij de charme van het voetbal zegt u? U als midvoor van FC Bal op het Dak kunt dat zeggen natuurlijk. Maar het professionele voetbal van tegenwoordig is een volwaardige bedrijfstak, met een groot economisch belang voor steden en zelfs landen. En bovendien, elke onvolkomenheid in de spelregels van een sport druist in tegen het principe van het op de meest eerlijke manier mogelijk meten van de krachten met de tegenstander. Onprofessionele zaken tolereren is niet per definitie charmant. Van Basten zei het al. Onze arbiters vragen erom. Tim Vos van Spotlighteffect stelt dat de buitenspelregel eenvoudig objectief en met een minimale foutmarge te beoordelen is als er videobeelden toegepast worden.

Vos analyseerde het afgelopen EK en geeft aan dat het belang van het beter toepassen van de buitenspelregel ligt “in de miljoenen euro’s die omgaan in het voetbal, die invloed hebben op de economieën van deelnemende landen.” Naderhand heeft hij het over 6 catastrofale arbitraire beslissingen op het EK 2008, die veel invloed hebben gehad op het verloop van het toernooi. Naast de standaard toegepaste herhalingen zouden teams een bepaald aantal videomomenten op aanvraag kunnen krijgen, waarin ze de arbitrage kunnen controleren. Zoals de ‘Hawk Eye’ in het tennis. Om het aantal dode spelmomenten te beperken, zouden dan de regels als het gaat om overtredingen weer voor de volle 100% afgedwongen moeten worden. Volgens het boekje. Zuivere speeltijd wordt toegepast. Elke overtreding is een persoonlijke fout, geel telt voor twee fouten, rood is direct exit, net als 5 fouten. Dan is het afgelopen met het shirtje trekken bij corners, de slimme overtreding om een mooie aanval te onderbreken of het tijdrekken…

In het vervolg van het artikel komen onder andere sporten aan bod, die succesvol wijzigingen doorvoerden,  zoals de hier voorgestelde verandering…

Lees het hele artikel op de topsportsite www.TobSport.nl.

Any sports fan would be familiar with Hawk eye. Its the latest technological addition to make sports error proof.Its used in cricket, tennis, baseball , snooker etc. We take it for granted the instant ball path after every lbw appeal in a cricket match. But most doesn’t know how it works.

Its used  to get a visually track the path of the ball and display a record of its actual path as graphic image and also to predict the future path of the ball.

This amazing new technique is made possible by the combination of an number of highly sensitive video cameras and a fast computer.

Four high speed video cameras located at various locations and angles around the ground which provide images and timing data to the computer. The computer rapidly processes the data from the cameras to get the result. The computer is feed with the details of the ground and the rules of the game.

Using the image fed by the camera, the computer identifies the position of the ball and by the timing signals it calculates the speed of the ball. It then calculates for each frame the 3D position of the ball by comparing its position on at least 2 of the physically separate cameras at the same instant in time. Using the laws of Physics already stored in the computer, it also calculates the future postion of the ball.

The technology was first used by Channel 4 during a Test match between England and Pakistan on Lord’s Cricket Ground, on 21 May 2001. However, the system is not used by the umpires to adjudicate on LBW decisions in Test cricket or One Day International cricket. It is used primarily by the majority of television networks to track the trajectory of balls in flight.