About Me

I like to play Garry's mod, so you might see me on the servers on there. Two of my favorite game modes are Trouble in Terrorist Town and Zombie Survival.

In zombie survival, when I'm human, I'm usually a cader. I'm good with a hammer, and am the one who pioneered, but didn't name, the hilariously fun phenomena that are known as "Cancer cades." Cancer cades often look like a giant mountain of randomly nailed together crap. So where did the name come from? Well, as someone pointed out long ago to me, they have the tendency to "grow like a tumor" as more props are added to them. After that, the name "Cancer cade" stuck.



Now Cancer cades appear to be a type of ♥♥♥♥ cade, but are actually surprisingly effective at keeping the zombies at bay. If you use a performance metric to judge the difference between a ♥♥♥♥ cade and a good cade, then cancer cades counter intuitively fall into the good cade category. Since they usually work to keep the zombies at bay for a long while (~4 waves are the average, not counting backup cades).



This is primarily due to the fundamental principle of a Cancer cade: Put as many props between you and the zombies as possible. This is epitomized by the cancer cader's motto, often said in jest, of "quantity over quality" =P. Despite the fact that there are in fact some minimum quality standards and guiding principles. Perhaps a more accurate motto is "quantity has a quality all its own."

If the zombies have to break through a mile of props, they aren't going to reach you anytime soon. The fundamental principle of cancer cading (Put as many props between you and the zombies as you can) is often supplemented by secondary principles, such as

(a) Minimizing prop-to-prop nailing.

(b) If you have to nail prop-to-prop, make sure there are multiple anchor props (an anchor prop is a prop connected to a wall, ceiling or floor. And "anchor point" so to speak.). This is done so that if the zombies take out one anchor prop, the whole entire cade doesn't come loose or fall over.

(c) Preferably build the cancer pile going into a doorway (called a "reverse cancer cade") so that people may stand on top of it, repairing the front most props and shooting.

(d) Add little "repair & shooting voids/corners" in the cancer where one may unphase to repair and shoot.

(e) Be prepared to move props from areas that are thick to areas that the zombies are thinning.

And finally, cancer cades don't take a whole lot of skill to build. It's a type of cade that the whole server, newbie kleiner and old veteran alike can help with. So if you see me in ZS, feel free to cancer cade with me! =D


P.S. There are additional "upgrades" that can be added to a cancer cade. Given a reverse cancer cade, the upgrade that I tend to build the most is what I call a "♥♥♥♥♥♥ shark cage" or "shark cage" for short. It basically consists of building a box or "cage" on the outside of the doorway of where you're basing as a skeleton, and then piling tons of props onto the outside of the cage to act as ablative armor (additional layers that the zombies must break through).

The name comes from the fact that when built, the players inside it kind of look like they're in a shark cage, albeit a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ one, with all the different props attached to it jutting out at random angles. =P

And during the construction of the ♥♥♥♥♥♥ shark cage, good shooting lanes are usually kept open. This upgrade, if finished, properly manned, defended, and repaired, often greatly extends the average lifespan of the front cancer cade, usually resulting in a win for the humans.