Vertex

Vertex is a criminal organization and competitive roleplaying clan founded by Mobius, Ru, and Doll Maker circa 2006 for RPGChat. Though only a conception clan at the time, the member base of Vertex diversified until 2008 when a purge of membership occurred to reflect a new and more functional clan. Vertex is the first and now leading competitive clan on Thezones. Many of Vertex' members are prominent TZDL participants known for their extraordinary combat status on the site, and boast a very great winning record against non-Vertex members from all 3 active TZDL events. The clan is currently inactive with 2/3rd of the member base being retired or missing, and prides itself as being a very dominant clan in competitive play with an invite only recruitment.

Hierarchy
The Vertex organization in character is ran by Jhieten Matsunagi, a main character of Mobius with many 2 subdivisions. Though operations are usually handled by Mobius directly, many contributions or coordinated efforts are either democratic or Laissez-faire. In character, the clan is mainly democratic with slight shares of autocratic tendencies by Jhieten Matsunagi or Tsubaki Iskiru as his policy enforcer and body guard. Despite a centralized leadership, certain members of the clan are wholly independent or choose to act alone such as situations with Serenity Redstar or Mitsu Mazono, though the former having a captain position of her squad.

Recruitment Style
Much of Vertex's recruitment policy is undisclosed, but it appears to be an invite only clan. The prerequisites for admission are publicly unknown.

Combat Style
Vertex's combat among its individual members prides itself on, "specialist," qualities from the primary six principles of combat meta: Power, Speed, Ability, Offense, Defense, and Technique utilizing mid tier characters for play by-post roleplaying. Their clan does not command a traditional theme such as the AoA but share a more boundship with projectile, WAE/AOW, and movement to subdue foes.

The clan prides upon unorthodoxy styles of typical or conventional combat. These qualities are scene in such characters as Mitsu's electrical affinity; using a railgun unblockable with compensating forms of his energist style to fit generalist like abilities, Ru; using Tsubaki Isekiru melee style with a very power buff meta as an anti-meta strategy, or Argryia's Serenity Redstar; aerial combat with minimum risk using burst control for movement cancels and projectile string meta.

A common trait among Vertex in character characteristics seem to recruit mutants, Demons, or Living Weapons that significantly supplements the character builds' trait for exploiting purposes. There are currently only 2 human characters in Vertex such as Jhieten Matsunagi and Serenity Redstar, but the others are either derivatives, monsters, or other. The ooc meta knowledge among the members are particularly high, with most of their membership having a near or more decade of roleplaying experience.

TZDL participation
The first official clan participation of Vertex was in TZDL2009 and TZDL2011. Vertex currently has a very great ground in both league events with a record of 4 - 0 in total to non-Vertex. Two Vertex members made it to the TZDL2011 finals and hold a 3 - 0 over the AoA in the same year during the clan rivalry. The members of Vertex are no strangers to TZDL, as the majority of them are contestants from the first TZDL of 2007 but the clan was not officially announced. The win record in total counting Mouse's participation and the non-official clan stats from the very first to TZDL2011 is 9 - 0 against non-Vertex members with 1 disputable championship.

Since Vertex members joined 3 out of 4 TZDLs, they are regarded as the veterans of Thezones with a impeccable win record; however, TZDL2007 and TZDL2009 came with great inactivity from Vertex entirely minus Ru and Mouse giving them a very sparse and unreliable reputation. Though Vertex vs Vertex matches take peculiarly longer because of sluggish post activity, non-Vertex vs Vertex members are much shorter in time length possibly out of member interest to maintain an undefeated streak against outsiders.

As far as accolades in TZDL history, Vertex has sustained notoriety and attention from outside member participation and meta innovations. Ares was a TZDL2007 star that captivated many member interest with his intimidating field presence, aura usage, and diction orientated writing style until he defeated Psyko Ducky with the site's first OHK in TZDL (making him hated after). Mystic intimidated Johnny Pheonix into forfeiting in the same year, giving birth to an in-joke from the incident. Ru, slated to be an up-comer, defeated Ares in TZDL2009 which would be known throughout TZDL history as the largest unexpected upset in two years. The gravity and implication of Ares' power style and anti-meta aura was devastated by Ru's speed and strike anti-meta since both were close-quarter dependent. This would solidify Ru's reputation on TZ as the strongest and fiercest close-quarter dueler on the site.

Argryia is no stranger to TZDL with her colorful and often out spoken personality; despite her snide and in-your-face attitude and lack of regard for lesser players, has came to be known among the site veterans as the best player currently active in TZDL. She has innovated the most contributing meta terms out of all TZDL participants, even out of Vertex members throughout her bouts. Her win record is very impressive and use of battle flow, position, and intelligence has earned her much respect. The game changing meta known as Burst Control, String, and now Tells might and has changed the way characters are built in later TZDLs or how players fight. The combat pressure held by Mystic and Mouse, two of TZDL's most versatile players, were overturn by mere smart plays also bestowed her a prestigious rank in Vertex as the smartest player for her knack of using a weaker character against strong characters and winning. The embarrassment known as the Lokanas incident was largely contributed by Argryia's ability to out-think opponents, which earned her an OHK.

The newest Vertex addition of Mouse has also propelled Vertex's standing. Though Mouse obtained a very disputed TZDL championship, his membership into the clan was largely based on his ability to make it far in the tournament. This also couples with his victory of former TZDL champion Lust has lit his career among rookie players as a fan favorite. Mouse also contributed to the Lokanas incident that jump start the win record between Vertex and AoA with an unofficial OHK. The importance of Mouse's role in TZDL and his Vertex membership is based solely on his lack luster performance in TZDL2007 against Wal-Mart Andy during the preliminaries. Mouse has came a long way from being a very piss-poor player to a heavy hitter in 3 years time, having been trained by Argryia and Mobius intimately. This also solidify his standing outside of TZ and roams various websites with stunning OHK victories by his barrier alone. Mouse's adventers outside of Thezones has led Draven Javad to his debut TZDL2011 victory over Veazy as his student.

In summary, Vertex's role in TZDL is uniquely pivotal as the skill level of future TZDL depends solely on their continuous participation. There will be a time when a rivaling clan will challenge or even best Vertex's record or standing in Thezones, but an immediate threat doesn't seem likely to materialize. The likes of Mouse, Argryia, and Ru might have caused a rift between skill levels and future TZDL might born the division system as hesitation grows from outsiders.

Clan roots
The specific origin of Vertex' name derives heavily, if not blatantly, from Armored Core Last Raven for the PlayStation2 console. The clan's in character and out of character requisites are homages, models, and idealism from the video game original. Vertex as a roleplaying entity has evolved greatly on its own since, only borrowing the name, symbol, and core principles it derived from.

The membership of Vertex were very unorganized, recruiting just anyone that would aid the group with no specific combat heavy orientation needed. This led to the clan's large expansion as the goal was not thoroughly explored nor throughout. It wasn't until 2008 where a large shift of membership quality and requirements were enforced, and led to a small purge of members including former founder Doll Maker. The Vertex of now consist heavily of veteran players of the same origin Mobius and Mouse.

Vertex could possibly trace back to the guild known as Titans from Gimlock in AOL, since Argryia, Mystic, and Ares are current members. Argryia is the last known leader of the defunct group, and a subsidiary branch found by Mobius and Ares pulled member resources from Titan to establish a short lived chapter called Frighteners on RPGchat. Ru is a co-leader and founder of Vertex now was a Compuserve rookie and msn regular in 2002 when she encountered Mobius. Mouse is a long time personal friend of Mobius as well and likewise met in Compuserve circa 2000. The relationship of Ru has deep implications since she is the last student of Providence, Mobius and Argryia's mentor from AOL in 2000 as she trained under him because of a grudge she held ooc against Mobius.

Mystic would be the only Vertex member whose lineage doesn't run as deep as the others, having only met Mobius on msn in 2003 with no prior relation. The depth of lineage Vertex has goes as far back as the Suto family from AOL 2000, because Mobius, Argryia, Providence, and Mouse are all members. Though the Suto Family were mainly a in character bloodline, some of the group's out of character agendas impacted the original Compuserve zones such as Mobius' Four Horsemen fiasco, Mouse connections with Red Zone, and so on. Vertex in 2008 consolidated its resources with a stronger and much more meaningful member base, representing its long history.