If you were here in FMB, do you remember this article that someone wrote about it at Something Awful: http://www.somethingawful.com/d/awful-links/fantasy-marching-band.php

Something Awful used to be pretty popular, not sure how its doing now. Its funny to see other peoples' reactions to this site when they don't know about marching arts. :)

Nice!

Do we have any history of FMB by chance?

I think I have a lot of the scores from back in the day when I did the cataloging of the scores. I don't know what I have, but I can see what I have in my hard drives for ya all. :-)

-Wayne

anyone else love when you take someone who makes fun of band and drum corps to a show and they are BLOWN AWAY!!! lol

As an addendum to my last post... I have full scores from Seasons 1, 2, and 5 and at least partials for Seasons 7 and 8 on my computer.

Talk about the stone age! :P

-Wayne

All right, looks like for Season 5 is only a partial as well. :-(

-Wayne

I never saw this. I kind of feel old. I haven't been active in awhile but I'm back for now!

I was around since Season 7 FMB, but I don't frequent online forums often, so I didn't see the article.

Gosh I miss the old days. You had to choose how much focus you wanted in each category (none, low, medium, high). I was a part of it for the first ever three seasons. Any old timers remember Cub Spirit?

I remember Cub Spirit! The old days sure were good ones

I remember the old focus system. I got last place every season with that system. :p

I think it seems like there is still a focus system, it just isn't explicit.

Marimbaman: That was me! I wish I could get that success in this newer system... Sadly I'm not there yet haha...

McEuph: I had two groups in the old system. One of the groups (Cub Spirit) always did really well, but my other group did terrible. I didn't complain though.

Sorry I missed this post! Nice to see you again but looks like you haven't competed in two seasons =/ I don't think there's that much strategy in this new system other than making sure you rehearse all the time.

marimbaman.. there is strategy.. but it's not rocketscience

Yeah I agree, although rehearsing all the time is really a prerequisite if you want to win.

Not really. You can buy your way to the top too :P

Personally I think the game got a LOT easier for the top groups and harder for "lower" groups once the time was bumped to 6 hours instead of 4. But that's what everyone wanted.

I agree. I didn't like the whole 4 hour thing but honestly I like 6 hours even less. We don't have a system where new groups can break into the top anymore unless they use the store. Otherwise it takes a lot of time.

Well there are only 12 spots to "break into" per circuit + division. New players have to compete against all the other new players. Its the way the activity works really. The only way to change this would be to have two or three separate FMA Organizations with full circuits.

Like:
FMA 1 - Color Guard - Division 1
FMA 2 - Color Guard - Division 1
FMA 1 - Color Guard - Division 2
FMA 2 - Color Guard - Division 2
and so on...

That might work, although it presents a whole bunch of other problems like how do you get the different organizations to be equal in caliber? What if 10 players decide to buckle down and play a lot in one of the organizations - new players coming into that organization wouldn't have much of a chance compared to the other one.