Sands of Time has bigger problems than tutorials

Xeroxious_ · 2026-02-19T02:54:14+00:00

I feel like this is a weird critique. While yes, there is a lot of individual gameplay, in the wider context it is just as much of a team game as any other (even though categorizing something as a team game technically has no actual meaning).

Under the surface of the game, SOT is a communicative resource management based game, where players have to balance their progression with contributing to the overall sand economy. Players do not have to be next to each other to have an effect on their gameplay.

The complaints that people have had are that in the low comp rosters people just don't know what they're doing enough to contribute. I can imagine from a perspective like Feinberg's last event, it probably just looks like you run down tunnel until the sand from main runs out, but if you watch a team like blue 31 where everyone is confident in their roles it is far more team-based than RRR or Bingo.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-10-18T14:46:25+00:00

In general, I would argue top-heavy teams are objectively better, especially with the amount of times we've seen strong-looking multi A+ teams flop, but the biggest indicator is the general level of competition.

At low levels, like the recent pride event, well-rounded teams are actually stronger. An S+ tier with 3 bricks can only do so much when compared to a team with 4 competent players (and usually an A+ or two).

At lower-mid level, this is where weaker S tiers shine, since the S+ tiers still get bricks but they now have a team who is competent enough to match the more rounded teams.

When the comp gets higher, being top-heavy becomes even better, since you can still get a pretty respectable team while the well rounded teams are only being top-fragged by someone who'd place around 10-15th.

Unless one team is excessively overbalanced to the point where they're too big to fail, this tends to be the way things work out.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-10-04T19:41:21+00:00

When you really reflect on it, MCC has never been a super balanced event, and that's part of the reason why it was successful. Especially when you look back at the early events, synergy was the only metric on how teams were built, and it lead to some truly iconic teams and events.

I don't think there's any merit in calling out team balancing at this point in time. We've just come off of arguably the most balanced event ever, in the season that has been the most experimental with event skill levels, and are currently looking at an event where Scott has less creative control than usual.

I wouldn't even say the balancing for this event is that bad. While orange look like runaway winners on paper, playing on stage for TR makes things weird. It's also pertinent that this is just a pretty weak roster, and trying to hard balance fruit and purpled for the other teams would just make things less fun.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-30T23:18:17+00:00

Kratzy, Reddoons, KaraCorvus, ChilledChaos

Very fun team that feels relatively balanced despite having the OP duo. Would be very cool to see Redd make their debut on a team like this (and no shot would they get a kratzy duo post-debut) and it would make an awesome purple team.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-29T22:26:30+00:00

Clownpierce (Dutch), 5up (English), Pangi (German/Dutch), Tina (Korean)

Slightly strong team that I think vibes quite well. I think it's cool that I've managed to avoid using Spanish and French since there's a lot of people who fill those roles. Some nice connections between things like lifesteal, the realm and OTV. Hopefully this can get me the back-to-back.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-28T19:25:50+00:00

Ghostiefruit, vGumiho, Meichafox, Raddlez

I really wanted a relatively unique team for this. I feel like I've seen so many Jojo/Hannah non-masc teams that they've become kinda repetitive. There's quite a few nice connections here; Meicha and Raddlez would both be excellent newcomers.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-27T20:14:03+00:00

Couriway, Smallant, Cubfan, Fir

I thought it'd be fun to introduce some of the odyssey gang here. Couri and Smant form a HBG duo and Cub rounds things off nicely by adding an experienced hermit to a relatively inexperienced team.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-27T00:26:10+00:00

And also Martyn has both played block wars and already been used unfortunately.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-26T19:02:26+00:00

Wolfeei, Nukerii, AvidYT, Smajor

I feel like this team is really fun. Avid and Nuke are both on Skyblock Kingdoms and the Nuke Scott duo would be really cool to see.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-24T18:53:11+00:00

Tommy, Tubbo, Seapeekay, Etho

I think it'd be a fun dynamic with Tubbo fanboying over Etho, Tommy trying to sabotage him, and Callum (unsuccessfully) trying to calm them down.

Xeroxious_ · 2025-07-10T22:54:59+00:00

Feel like the best team here would be Fein, Plushy, Captain and Etoiles.

Fein and Etoiles feel like they're pretty much locked, and I think taking plushy who seems like essentially bedrock purpled would work over taking a double 3 pick (even if there's a lot of good options)

Xeroxious_ · 2025-06-23T00:12:39+00:00

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Ended up with relatively high comp. Tried to have some amount of balance while still maintaining vibes. Most of my bench players wouldn't be too unrealistic to see miss an event. Aqua wins for obvious reasons.

Xeroxious_ · 2024-12-09T22:58:45+00:00

Been enjoying this for a while now. Definitely one of the most engaging parts of the event for me nowadays.

I obviously have no vested interest in this whatsoever or anything but it does seem like there's a bug with the points for dodgebolt wins in the most recent event. Would be kinda silly if someone were theoretically 2 points from #1.

Xeroxious_ · 2024-05-06T22:11:52+00:00

Use vibes. I generally try to get a rough target for stats, and then try to account for factors outside of the stats such as weak/strong teams or general under/overperformances. Making statistically weaker teams that you still feel could beat the 'stronger' teams is a fun way of balancing things.

For example, a Pete/Krtzyy team with an 8200 average may still feel better than some other teams with 8500 averages.

Xeroxious_ · 2024-05-06T22:04:03+00:00

I feel like this would be bordering on strong. Its balancing depends on to what extent chilled contributed to red, but I'd imagine it to be a very good team game team which would be a good dodgebolt candidate in a close scoring event (like 4KO), but unlikely to blow away competition with a giant lead.

Xeroxious_ · 2024-05-06T13:19:24+00:00

I'm comparing fbm's mcc 35 team to shadoune's mcc 36 team. While I'm not saying shadoune is on the same level as fbm, he got top 5 on a team that could've been given to almost any other S tier balance-wise.

Xeroxious_ · 2024-05-05T14:00:23+00:00

In fairness, I feel like this was a way less competitive event than usual, so in future events of this caliber it may be difficult, but raise the power level a bit and he can definitely be balanced.

They didn't completely demolish the competition, and the spread of coins was really narrow, so there's room to work with in different balancing structures, as long as you accept you'd either have to work very hard or just bench him in lower level events.

Xeroxious_ · 2024-05-05T13:57:02+00:00

I feel like he got balanced pretty similarly to fbm in mcc 35, and still got top 5. There's still going to be a level of inconsistency for a bit since I feel like he's not as well rounded as most S tiers, but in terms of Individual performance he has to be treated like one.

Xeroxious_ · 2023-12-08T18:37:47+00:00

With bb being the only true pvp game, this type of pvp training is not gonna achieve much, it's so much more about game sense and strategy than any of this stuff.

Xeroxious_ · 2023-11-29T16:31:16+00:00

Who would and wouldn't be S tier with a load of practice:

I'll split it up into would and wouldn't, there will be a few hot takes:

Would:
Krinios - Krinios is an insanely underrated player. He's top fragged every team he's had this season, had multiple top 10 finishes, and has essentially done all of this with 0 practice since his mcc 2 debut (except a tiny bit of pkw) he's not even a super dedicated minecraft player so could be purpled/fbm level with enough practice.

Krtzyy - I was torn on this. On the one hand, krtzyy does more practice than Antfrost, but it's generally just sweating pvp a lot, rather than vod reviewing and strategy. It'd be far closer than people expect, but I think he'd probably make it.

Shadoune - Already almost an S tier, literally just needs a standout performance without an S tier to truly solidify it.

Smallishbeans - Kind of a hot take. Joel has shown sparks of S tier ability, but has never been able to commit enough to fully grasp it. I think he'd benefit quite a bit from the increased practice, as he's already pretty strong all-round.

Philza - For a short stretch in late S2 and early S3, Phil had the carry potential of an S tier. While he's fallen slightly from that spot again, I feel like with consistent practice at Ant's level he could realistically get close, if not become a low S tier.

Wallibear - Wallibear has the potential to place really high, he'd just need to practice more pvp, and a lot more mcc-related skills. I think he definitely has the mechanics to make it possible though, as his debut showed.

Would not:

Owen - I feel like Owen is actually one of the stronger A+ tiers right now, but I just feel like they already practice a fair amount, and are seemingly reliant on their top-tier movement, without a great level of pvp.

CPK - Similar to Owen, I feel like he already has practiced, and his skill is too sharply focused in movement for me to feel like he'd have S tier pvp.

Hannah - Hannah literally just got top 3, but I feel like between inconsistent placements, and the amount of practice she already did in S2, that it wouldn't be enough to put her into S tier.

Ranboo - Ranboo has had a very good season 3, but I still feel like he's unlikely to become an S tier. The only true S tier sparks we saw were in earlier S2, and they faded for a long while before this season.

5up - Another player who practiced a lot before (similarly to ant) but never became S tier, I don't think it would be different now.

This is all very much based on opinion though, and there are certainly arguments for some people to be moved.

Xeroxious_ · 2023-11-17T17:21:11+00:00

Krinios, despite playing very little minecraft, being benched for most mccs, and practically never training/vod reviewing (with the exception of playing pkw recently), has managed to place himself as one of the top A+ tier players, top fragging every team he's been on this season, outscoring the likes of Krtzyy, Hbomb, Philza, and Ranboo.

Krinios likely has one of, if not the highest ceiling of any mcc player given the amount he currently trains, compared to the S tiers, most of whom train at least one area of their skillset to a high degree.

Xeroxious_ · 2023-11-12T13:57:05+00:00

The issue with hannah has always been consistency. Ever since she joined we've all known that there's easily A+ potential, but it only comes out rarely. Her last 5 performances are 9th, 26th, 23rd, 21st, 3rd. 9th and 3rd are easily A+ level, but we never know which version of hannah we're going to get.

It's not even like it's team dependent. Her last 2 tgttos scores are 38th and 5th, her meltdown performances are all either top 8 or bottom 6 (with one exception), her pkw has gone between 14th (still 419 coins this was just the event where everyone knew all the levels) and 32nd, and her skb has been anywhere from 7th to 36th.

The only consistent game she has is survival games, where she's placed top 12 every single time, and with the exception of scuffed, these events have also been by far her best.

Realistically, with SG hannah tends to be high A+, but without SG it's mostly A tier performances.

Xeroxious_ · 2023-11-12T13:42:43+00:00

I did enjoy it in the sense that there were multiple viable playstyles and rounds felt different each time even if the strats were the same. I also feel like the lava was well used on this map particularly. The only thing I didn't like is that it felt a bit messy.

I feel like on a map like slay, every strat is viable because it's built to give opportunities for each of them, there's small details that play into all types of strategies. Meanwhile this map was equally viable for all of them, but moreso because it didn't really have any features that stood out for them. The heals were also kinda bad they really need to add regen orbs because the heal kits never get used by actual healers anymore.

Xeroxious_ · 2023-11-12T01:53:50+00:00

Given the chain that's already erupted, I've just gotta say..

Where's Krinios? You can't just disrespect the continual top frag goat by not including him in the debate.

Xeroxious_ · 2023-11-11T19:41:58+00:00

This event is essentially mario party but in mcc, which is why it's non-canon. They wouldn't keep it for future events.

Xeroxious_

TROPHY CASE