Hopslam [795412] —
Original article
Introducing Hopslam's Outstanding Player Award, a new monthly prize given to those who are deemed to have recorded the most impressive achievement during the past month.
Our wonderful variety of Torn citizens have accomplished many great things. One of the biggest achievements we somehow manage on a daily basis is reading all the crap that ends up posted all over the forums. However, there are other, rarer accomplishments too, and the one place where respect is genuine and trolls are rare is the Achievements forum.
Here, players of all levels give each other a virtual pat on the back in recognition of their accomplishments, and I thought that in itself deserved recognition. It is important to take a little pause in our lives to celebrate what makes our time here special. And while those who post in the achievements forum already receive forum karma and kind words of encouragement, we'd like to add the glory of appearing in the newspaper to those rewards.
With that in mind, let me introduce the first monthly HOP: Hopslam’s Outstanding Player Award. I will be keeping an eye on all the new achievement threads created each month and sharing some of the finest accomplishments in this new monthly feature. We will also pay out a prize provided by the Torn City Times to whoever is deemed to have achieved the most achievementy achievement of all the achievements. And this month’s HOP Award goes to… I am not telling you yet. Read on to find out.
So to begin with, let's see what happened in January 2020! Who surpassed 500 awards? Who purchased the shiniest of shiny weapons? Which two muggers had a rather profitable start to the year? And who achieved an epic 1,934 kill streak? Let’s find out with a recap of some of our best Achievements from the month of January.
THE GOLD STANDARD
In 2018, Andyman noticed he was becoming bored with his training routine, but rather than quit altogether, he set himself some new goals instead. Among them was the desire to own the best type of legendary weapon, and after months of hard work, that is precisely what he achieved, as Andyman mugged his way to his very own AK-47.
“This purchase is the result of me allocating a huge % of my energy toward good ol' fashion mugging over the past 20 months”.
This is one of those wonderful long-term stories which proves how fulfilling it can be to define and achieve your own goals. Andyman made a conscious effort to focus on fun areas of the game rather than grinding, and this achievement shows how he was hugely rewarded for adding effort and creativity to his gameplay. Despite the thread's title, Andyman is FAR from Torn’s worst player with a Gold Plated AK-47.
A MUGGING MILESTONE
How much have you made from mugging other players? $100 million? $500 million? A billion? Try $25 billion, because that's how much realistassasin has earned from rifling through the pockets of other players, most of which was collected over the past year!
What makes his achievement doubly impressive is that only $90 million of the $25 bn total was achieved through the mug protection route, which was a method of mugging made possible under the previous mugging mechanics. These mechanics were changed last year, so kudos to realist for choosing to boost his mug total the hard way! We should also point out that he would have added another $4.7 bn to this total if he had been the one to finish the high-profile $4.7 bn shakedown of Navin, which he orchestrated with the help of Penicillin!
Realist said he started playing seriously in 2019 and wanted to try something different - he's certainly achieved that - going on to say that “I chose mugging, and probably the best route I could have picked, (both financially and in terms of enjoyment).”
A REAL RIVAL?
Three days after Realistassasin's post, Big_Rico posted his own $25 bn mugged achievement thread claiming that he was “Faster than Realistassasinoob”. I know we said this forum was mostly a supportive one, but surely you'll forgive us for the occasional sassy boast!
So did Big_Rico really gain $25 bn in mugs faster Realistassasin? Yes, but only if you don't understand how the concept of time works. Big_Rico is over 5,000 days old and hit the $25 bn mark on January 5th, when he was still over 5,000 days old. Realistassassin, on the other hand, has only just surpassed 3,000 days in Torn, but he reached $25 bn in mugging just two weeks after Big_Rico. It is true to say that Big_Rico completed the $25 bn mark first, but untrue to say he did it faster.
Either way, reaching $25 bn mugged is quite a feat. If you have ever tried your hand at selling high-value items, then you've probably had a run-in with one of these two light-fingered felons. Let's cheer them both on their way to $100 bn money mugged. I know I won’t be the only one interested in seeing their progress.
THE AWARD FOR AWARDS
With his achievement of the New Year’s Day Resolution honor, Dexter managed to pass the 500 awards limit, thus receiving the Honored honor. He's started the year off with a big positive, and from the tone of his post, it appears Dexter had been working towards this for a long time. Fewer than 30 people had hit the 500 award mark when Dexter did so, and both Ohadik and Bones both welcomed him to the club in his thread - see, achievement people are nice most of the time.
CASINO COUP
Liam incurred the jealousy and wrath of many at the Wheel of Awesome when he was fortunate enough to land on Free Spin, and then subsequently land on Private Island. But don't go cutting off his feet for luck just yet, as it apparently took him 10,000 tries to achieve the Spaced Out merit with Cannabis - youch.
Elsewhere at the Casino, Kobie was down about $30m at the slots when he ran out of tokens. The smart thing to do here is cut your losses because the "try try again" attitude does NOT often work out well in the Casino. Taking a step out of normalcy, Kobie decided to use a refill and get a new dose of 75 tokens. And then he hit PILE UP on a $10 m spin. That $10 m spin resulted in a payout of $10,000,000,000 - that is a lot of 0's. Kobie said he is going to keep on playing the slots in the chase for that ever-elusive slots jackpot and the merit that goes along with it.
OVERBAKED AND OVERDOSED
Now then, most people don’t celebrate their overdoses in real life. However, here in Torn City, we applaud those who pull a whitey. When Mauk finally managed the momentous feat of overdosing on Cannabis, he titled his thread, “I’ve achieved the impossible", going on to quote the event in question: “Your blood pressure lowers and you fall to the ground.”
Mauk also made it known that he was not going to be happy if anyone gloated about achieving this in two tries, given that he had to make his way through a mere 4,655 individual joints. Slork apparently didn't get the memo, as just a few days later he let the world know that he'd just managed his SECOND overdose after just 613 attempts!
But you know who got really lucky? P00CH, who overdosed on cannabis near the end of January. He was able to achieve this merit by taking fewer than 613 Cannabis. How much fewer? “On my 49th spliff smoked I "luckily" got the merit”. I think it is clear that all these Spaced Out merit achievement threads prove one thing: You cannot OD on cannabis if you don’t try. It's just that some have to try harder than others, isn't that right Liam?
CRIME PAYS
PatBenatar's goal was to hit 50,000 fraud crimes before we saw Crimes 2.0. Notwithstanding Chef_Liam's observation that everyone will achieve this before Crimes 2.0 comes out, PatBenatar's 50k fraud run is clearly something to be proud of. Another master criminal who achieved something this month was Nova, who hit 10,000 drug deals on the 11th of January. Having reduced his NNB from 60 to 40 and was glad to finally be done with this one on his criminal record, and now he can finally wash his extremely tiny hands of the narcotics trade.
rumhamjones also completed 10,000 drug deals, with this total comprising more than a quarter of her entire criminal record. Rumham took around a year to accomplish this feat, and did so while maintaining a NNB of 35 throughout - an achievement which she credits to the 2 and 3 nerve crimes she performed alongside drugs. Rumham also paid tribute to those who busted her out of jail during her crime spree and notes that she paid every one of her busters a 12 pack of beer - except the guy whose profile demanded one.
Franky was another to hit the 10k drug deal mark in January, and in doing so he achieved the full set of the existing crime awards. Franky said it took him about a year and 5 months to go from 500 to 10,000 in his quest to achieve the final honor, having nabbed the 275 drug crimes award way back in 2011! Amazingly, Franky managed to hold onto his 60 natural nerve bar while pursuing this achievement, and claims that he remains a barely functioning PA member in spite of his recent activities.
Several other players also posted about hitting the 60 natural nerve bar mark, but NineAngryNuns claimed to have done this at age 597 days. This is quite fast indeed! She attributed her success at speeding through her nerve bar gains to having a couple of players provide her with help and information throughout.
ADDITIONAL ACHIEVEMENTS
I want to quickly point out a few more achievements from January before announcing this month’s HOP Award. Our friendly staff moderator, PrincessJulie, made a damaging hit worth over 10,000, earning her the Obliteration honor. She thanked her in-game husband Andyman for lending her the Armalite with which she riddled Leslie with Hollow Point ammunition.
Jas, Riot and Ohadik, all earned the Annihilation honor during January - the latter also hit Level 100 too. For many players, Annihilation can be achieved through borrowing or renting a dual primary weapon. Proxima probably didn't need to borrow one, but his opponent adertuno may have needed to loan some gauze and medication, after Prox smashed him for 20,510 in his own achievement of the Annihilation honor.
Another somewhat common achievement thread is when players reach certain battle stat milestones, or they have a certain battle stat balance. KingLouisCLXXII was pumped about his stats reaching a total of 100 million, and DemonSkye was equally pleased as they evened out their stats at roughly 1.131 bn each, having spent years trying to improve their dexterity and defense.
Elsewhere, Revenant hit 1 bn, ZOMB13 hit 4 bn, and TrAsH_FiSh hit 5nb total battle stats. Outstanding achievements, all of them. Madmiketyson gets a little special mention here too, as he snuck in on the 31st of January to break the 10 bn battle stat barrier. This achievement continues his OCD-like tradition of keeping his stats close to even billions, as he currently holds Strength, Defense, Speed and Dex totals of almost exactly 4 bn, 3 bn, 2 bn and 1b respectively.
As a couple of people pointed out in his thread, it is hard to believe that 10 bn total battle stats doesn’t even land you in the top 100 anymore! Nevertheless, Madmike says it did put him at 131st in the HoF at the time, which is still a huge achievement in its own right!
THIS MONTH'S HOP
As you can tell, there is a lot to celebrate here in Torn City. We players achieve all kinds of crazy feats on a regular basis, so there is no shortage of deeds well done. I could easily go on highlighting even more achievements over the last month as they are in abundance, so if yours didn't make the list, please do not take it to mean that what you accomplished doesn't matter - it most certainly does.
However, given that this is a competition, we are obliged to choose someone as a winner. One achievement that stood out to me over all the others isn't necessarily a harder or better achievement than some of the ones we've already seen - besides, who I am to judge? I do, however, get the honor and privilege of picking out my own personal favorite achievement, and for January 2020, the HOP Award goes to...
Congrats Shades221. You are named as Hopslam’s Outstanding Player Award Winner for this first month of 2020. So what did he achieve? Well, back in November Shades221 decided he would try to go for the 500 kill streak. To achieve this he left his faction and held his level at 49, in an attempt to avoid exposure and prevent others from halting his streak.
He chose his timing wisely, as his streak began just after the end of the Dog Tags competition, when far fewer people are actively looking for those on a hot run of kills. Shades221 hit the 500 streak with ease, so much so that he decided to carry on. His momentum took him on and on over a period of three months, and when his run was finally ended on January 11th, he had logged 1,934 kills in a row - nearly four times his original target.
When asked if those were all legit kills or paid losses, Shades221 replied with “They were all legit kills! No paid losses at all because I was worried I would accidentally get killed by putting that out there lol.” Getting such a high killstreak without paying for losses is, by far, my favorite part about this achievement. Well done Shades221. Four donator packs are on their way to you!
FEBRUARY'S HOP
We'll post the list of February's achievements sometime during March, so if you manage to do something noteworthy before the month is out, or you already have and you haven't posted about it, make sure you create a thread before the 29th for a chance at featuring in our next HOP Award article! And even if you don't make a post, make sure above all that you keep up the fun and continue working towards your goals, whatever they may be.
Here, players of all levels give each other a virtual pat on the back in recognition of their accomplishments, and I thought that in itself deserved recognition. It is important to take a little pause in our lives to celebrate what makes our time here special. And while those who post in the achievements forum already receive forum karma and kind words of encouragement, we'd like to add the glory of appearing in the newspaper to those rewards.
With that in mind, let me introduce the first monthly HOP: Hopslam’s Outstanding Player Award. I will be keeping an eye on all the new achievement threads created each month and sharing some of the finest accomplishments in this new monthly feature. We will also pay out a prize provided by the Torn City Times to whoever is deemed to have achieved the most achievementy achievement of all the achievements. And this month’s HOP Award goes to… I am not telling you yet. Read on to find out.
So to begin with, let's see what happened in January 2020! Who surpassed 500 awards? Who purchased the shiniest of shiny weapons? Which two muggers had a rather profitable start to the year? And who achieved an epic 1,934 kill streak? Let’s find out with a recap of some of our best Achievements from the month of January.
THE GOLD STANDARD
In 2018, Andyman noticed he was becoming bored with his training routine, but rather than quit altogether, he set himself some new goals instead. Among them was the desire to own the best type of legendary weapon, and after months of hard work, that is precisely what he achieved, as Andyman mugged his way to his very own AK-47.
“This purchase is the result of me allocating a huge % of my energy toward good ol' fashion mugging over the past 20 months”.
This is one of those wonderful long-term stories which proves how fulfilling it can be to define and achieve your own goals. Andyman made a conscious effort to focus on fun areas of the game rather than grinding, and this achievement shows how he was hugely rewarded for adding effort and creativity to his gameplay. Despite the thread's title, Andyman is FAR from Torn’s worst player with a Gold Plated AK-47.
A MUGGING MILESTONE
How much have you made from mugging other players? $100 million? $500 million? A billion? Try $25 billion, because that's how much realistassasin has earned from rifling through the pockets of other players, most of which was collected over the past year!
What makes his achievement doubly impressive is that only $90 million of the $25 bn total was achieved through the mug protection route, which was a method of mugging made possible under the previous mugging mechanics. These mechanics were changed last year, so kudos to realist for choosing to boost his mug total the hard way! We should also point out that he would have added another $4.7 bn to this total if he had been the one to finish the high-profile $4.7 bn shakedown of Navin, which he orchestrated with the help of Penicillin!
Realist said he started playing seriously in 2019 and wanted to try something different - he's certainly achieved that - going on to say that “I chose mugging, and probably the best route I could have picked, (both financially and in terms of enjoyment).”
A REAL RIVAL?
Three days after Realistassasin's post, Big_Rico posted his own $25 bn mugged achievement thread claiming that he was “Faster than Realistassasinoob”. I know we said this forum was mostly a supportive one, but surely you'll forgive us for the occasional sassy boast!
So did Big_Rico really gain $25 bn in mugs faster Realistassasin? Yes, but only if you don't understand how the concept of time works. Big_Rico is over 5,000 days old and hit the $25 bn mark on January 5th, when he was still over 5,000 days old. Realistassassin, on the other hand, has only just surpassed 3,000 days in Torn, but he reached $25 bn in mugging just two weeks after Big_Rico. It is true to say that Big_Rico completed the $25 bn mark first, but untrue to say he did it faster.
Either way, reaching $25 bn mugged is quite a feat. If you have ever tried your hand at selling high-value items, then you've probably had a run-in with one of these two light-fingered felons. Let's cheer them both on their way to $100 bn money mugged. I know I won’t be the only one interested in seeing their progress.
THE AWARD FOR AWARDS
With his achievement of the New Year’s Day Resolution honor, Dexter managed to pass the 500 awards limit, thus receiving the Honored honor. He's started the year off with a big positive, and from the tone of his post, it appears Dexter had been working towards this for a long time. Fewer than 30 people had hit the 500 award mark when Dexter did so, and both Ohadik and Bones both welcomed him to the club in his thread - see, achievement people are nice most of the time.
CASINO COUP
Liam incurred the jealousy and wrath of many at the Wheel of Awesome when he was fortunate enough to land on Free Spin, and then subsequently land on Private Island. But don't go cutting off his feet for luck just yet, as it apparently took him 10,000 tries to achieve the Spaced Out merit with Cannabis - youch.
Elsewhere at the Casino, Kobie was down about $30m at the slots when he ran out of tokens. The smart thing to do here is cut your losses because the "try try again" attitude does NOT often work out well in the Casino. Taking a step out of normalcy, Kobie decided to use a refill and get a new dose of 75 tokens. And then he hit PILE UP on a $10 m spin. That $10 m spin resulted in a payout of $10,000,000,000 - that is a lot of 0's. Kobie said he is going to keep on playing the slots in the chase for that ever-elusive slots jackpot and the merit that goes along with it.
OVERBAKED AND OVERDOSED
Now then, most people don’t celebrate their overdoses in real life. However, here in Torn City, we applaud those who pull a whitey. When Mauk finally managed the momentous feat of overdosing on Cannabis, he titled his thread, “I’ve achieved the impossible", going on to quote the event in question: “Your blood pressure lowers and you fall to the ground.”
Mauk also made it known that he was not going to be happy if anyone gloated about achieving this in two tries, given that he had to make his way through a mere 4,655 individual joints. Slork apparently didn't get the memo, as just a few days later he let the world know that he'd just managed his SECOND overdose after just 613 attempts!
But you know who got really lucky? P00CH, who overdosed on cannabis near the end of January. He was able to achieve this merit by taking fewer than 613 Cannabis. How much fewer? “On my 49th spliff smoked I "luckily" got the merit”. I think it is clear that all these Spaced Out merit achievement threads prove one thing: You cannot OD on cannabis if you don’t try. It's just that some have to try harder than others, isn't that right Liam?
CRIME PAYS
PatBenatar's goal was to hit 50,000 fraud crimes before we saw Crimes 2.0. Notwithstanding Chef_Liam's observation that everyone will achieve this before Crimes 2.0 comes out, PatBenatar's 50k fraud run is clearly something to be proud of. Another master criminal who achieved something this month was Nova, who hit 10,000 drug deals on the 11th of January. Having reduced his NNB from 60 to 40 and was glad to finally be done with this one on his criminal record, and now he can finally wash his extremely tiny hands of the narcotics trade.
rumhamjones also completed 10,000 drug deals, with this total comprising more than a quarter of her entire criminal record. Rumham took around a year to accomplish this feat, and did so while maintaining a NNB of 35 throughout - an achievement which she credits to the 2 and 3 nerve crimes she performed alongside drugs. Rumham also paid tribute to those who busted her out of jail during her crime spree and notes that she paid every one of her busters a 12 pack of beer - except the guy whose profile demanded one.
Franky was another to hit the 10k drug deal mark in January, and in doing so he achieved the full set of the existing crime awards. Franky said it took him about a year and 5 months to go from 500 to 10,000 in his quest to achieve the final honor, having nabbed the 275 drug crimes award way back in 2011! Amazingly, Franky managed to hold onto his 60 natural nerve bar while pursuing this achievement, and claims that he remains a barely functioning PA member in spite of his recent activities.
Several other players also posted about hitting the 60 natural nerve bar mark, but NineAngryNuns claimed to have done this at age 597 days. This is quite fast indeed! She attributed her success at speeding through her nerve bar gains to having a couple of players provide her with help and information throughout.
ADDITIONAL ACHIEVEMENTS
I want to quickly point out a few more achievements from January before announcing this month’s HOP Award. Our friendly staff moderator, PrincessJulie, made a damaging hit worth over 10,000, earning her the Obliteration honor. She thanked her in-game husband Andyman for lending her the Armalite with which she riddled Leslie with Hollow Point ammunition.
Jas, Riot and Ohadik, all earned the Annihilation honor during January - the latter also hit Level 100 too. For many players, Annihilation can be achieved through borrowing or renting a dual primary weapon. Proxima probably didn't need to borrow one, but his opponent adertuno may have needed to loan some gauze and medication, after Prox smashed him for 20,510 in his own achievement of the Annihilation honor.
Another somewhat common achievement thread is when players reach certain battle stat milestones, or they have a certain battle stat balance. KingLouisCLXXII was pumped about his stats reaching a total of 100 million, and DemonSkye was equally pleased as they evened out their stats at roughly 1.131 bn each, having spent years trying to improve their dexterity and defense.
Elsewhere, Revenant hit 1 bn, ZOMB13 hit 4 bn, and TrAsH_FiSh hit 5nb total battle stats. Outstanding achievements, all of them. Madmiketyson gets a little special mention here too, as he snuck in on the 31st of January to break the 10 bn battle stat barrier. This achievement continues his OCD-like tradition of keeping his stats close to even billions, as he currently holds Strength, Defense, Speed and Dex totals of almost exactly 4 bn, 3 bn, 2 bn and 1b respectively.
As a couple of people pointed out in his thread, it is hard to believe that 10 bn total battle stats doesn’t even land you in the top 100 anymore! Nevertheless, Madmike says it did put him at 131st in the HoF at the time, which is still a huge achievement in its own right!
THIS MONTH'S HOP
As you can tell, there is a lot to celebrate here in Torn City. We players achieve all kinds of crazy feats on a regular basis, so there is no shortage of deeds well done. I could easily go on highlighting even more achievements over the last month as they are in abundance, so if yours didn't make the list, please do not take it to mean that what you accomplished doesn't matter - it most certainly does.
However, given that this is a competition, we are obliged to choose someone as a winner. One achievement that stood out to me over all the others isn't necessarily a harder or better achievement than some of the ones we've already seen - besides, who I am to judge? I do, however, get the honor and privilege of picking out my own personal favorite achievement, and for January 2020, the HOP Award goes to...
Shades221
Congrats Shades221. You are named as Hopslam’s Outstanding Player Award Winner for this first month of 2020. So what did he achieve? Well, back in November Shades221 decided he would try to go for the 500 kill streak. To achieve this he left his faction and held his level at 49, in an attempt to avoid exposure and prevent others from halting his streak.
He chose his timing wisely, as his streak began just after the end of the Dog Tags competition, when far fewer people are actively looking for those on a hot run of kills. Shades221 hit the 500 streak with ease, so much so that he decided to carry on. His momentum took him on and on over a period of three months, and when his run was finally ended on January 11th, he had logged 1,934 kills in a row - nearly four times his original target.
When asked if those were all legit kills or paid losses, Shades221 replied with “They were all legit kills! No paid losses at all because I was worried I would accidentally get killed by putting that out there lol.” Getting such a high killstreak without paying for losses is, by far, my favorite part about this achievement. Well done Shades221. Four donator packs are on their way to you!
FEBRUARY'S HOP
We'll post the list of February's achievements sometime during March, so if you manage to do something noteworthy before the month is out, or you already have and you haven't posted about it, make sure you create a thread before the 29th for a chance at featuring in our next HOP Award article! And even if you don't make a post, make sure above all that you keep up the fun and continue working towards your goals, whatever they may be.
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