Clan Spotlight: FOXEY

We interviewed these players to learn more about the history and future of FOXEY:

Tefftorbes - Commander. Runs the clan at higher levels.
Toomstone357 - Executive Officer. Day to day operations, such as member interactions, etc.
SublimeSilence - Executive Officer. Head caller. Shirks off all responsibilities to other officers.
KiloLovesBoxes - Executive Officer. Manager of Strongholds and lover of boxes (Industrial Resources). Can't read.
LVLAsian - Personnel Officer. Head recruiter, manages incoming recruits, flank caller.

How did FOXEY form?

Tefftorbes - We were started by KingAlphyn, actually, and the majority of FOXEY were BURDY players that wanted to get into Clan Wars. I don't know how many people it was, but about 20-30, which formed our starting core. We grew pretty organically after that, but BURDY's our parent clan. A big shout out to them.

How have FOXEY's goals changed since it started?

Tefftorbes - Back then, we thought we were better than PUPEH pretty early on, and our goal was to supersede them. And what can I say? We did. Realistically, my personal goals since before I became CO has been to improve the clan slowly and steadily, and not compromise our community at all while trying to improve ourselves competitively. And we're in a decent spot now, but there's always room for improvement.

What's the story behind your motto: "Foxey. They're OK. I guess. -loz"?

Tefftorbes - During the Civil War draft, Lozarus was one of the commentators on the draft live stream. We came up during the 7th round for Inchon's team. Loz clearly didn't have anything to say about us, good or bad, so he was just like, “Well, they're ok, I guess.” I took it. We took it. And now we say it.

SublimeSilence - It's definitely a battle cry these days. It kinda encapsulates everything about FOXEY: We don't take things seriously. We like to joke around and have fun. We're ok, I guess. And sometimes we can surprise people by playing incredibly well. It's a good battle cry. I like it. I have to thank Loz for that. As soon as he said it, we all started laughing in TeamSpeak.

Tefftorbes - And even if Loz regrets it, he shouldn't. We thank him for that.

KiloLovesBoxes - Every time someone sees him in a pub match, it's tradition to ask him if we're good yet.

What's the culture like in FOXEY?

SublimeSilence - We don't take anything we do seriously. We don't practice, do training rooms, and 99% of the time our callers don't have map tactics or anything. Everything's kind of fly by wire. I think that's been a pretty big advantage for us. We like to joke around and have fun, and if we have a big loss in a battle or something, we can brush it off pretty quickly because we didn't really try.

Tefftorbes - I will say that when we do take something seriously and try to do training rooms, it can be very difficult because our players do not like to do training rooms. So we just do Strongholds instead.

SublimeSilence - It's like herding a massive group of cats. It's just not possible to get them to do anything like that anyway, so we just don't try.

LVLAsian - Even though we do goof around, when we need to step up for things like Map Exhibitions or campaigns, we do perform. If gold or reward tanks are on the line, we do definitely put on a serious face and try our best.

Toomstone357 - Our guys are smart enough to know when we can be laid back, which is just your general Clan Wars or nightly things, but we really know how to focus when it comes to important fights.

SublimeSilence - I think the thing is that our members are mature enough to know when it's fine to be immature.

How would someone join FOXEY?

LVLAsian - Either PM me or Sorphius, our other recruiter. Our recruitment process is pretty straight forward: After talking to me or one of the officers, if your stats and personality seem all right, you start platooning with someone in FOXEY. We give evaluations based on performance, attitude, and communication. If they're toxic, we'd rather not have them in our clan because we just don't want to deal with that factor. If they're really awesome to play with, and if the overall opinion is good, we let them in.

SublimeSilence - It's not a really grueling process. We've had people get into the clan in an hour basically. It really comes down to the recruits themselves. If they show up on our TeamSpeak and are proactive in getting to know people, they'll move through really quickly. If they don't put the effort in on their end to try and get some platoons going with members, then it can be a lot longer.

Tefftorbes - Those are usually the players who don't work out anyway. The ones who are excited and who our guys enjoy playing with get into the clan quickly and stay active.

KiloLovesBoxes - There's also a mini probation after you get in the clan. Once you're in, we see if there's any inkling to misbehavior while they were trying to do their best to look good during recruitment

LVLAsian - The main thing is show up constantly, get to know everybody, and you'll be good to go.

What advice do you have for upcoming clans?

Tefftorbes - Play a lot of Strongholds. Work your way up; don't just stick at tier VI. Watch what the better clans are doing and learn from it. Practice, keep at it, and you'll get there.

SublimeSilence - I just can't see being a successful clan without some kind of voice comms like Ventrilo or TeamSpeak. Our community's really active because we use Slack. We have a channel dedicated to Clan Wars so everybody knows when there are battles. We also have our goof around channels, looking for platoons, and Strongholds channels. Then we have our forums as well. Most of FOXEY used our forums before we went to Slack, which really helped build the community. I'd highly recommend any clan starting off to get people on something like Slack or forums.

Tefftorbes - If you put people in a place where they can and are encouraged to interact, they're gonna become friends and bond and make your clan stronger.

SublimeSilence - I think a big, big, big thing is getting the community there. Tournaments, Skirmishes especially, immensely help with calling practice. If someone's building a clan and needs to work on calling, I highly recommend starting a Skirmish team. That's gonna teach callers how to flex, the players how to work together as a team, and that's obviously what clans need. Callers can't call everything by themselves. They really need help on the battlefield, especially when they have a group of tanks on the other side of the field. They need eyes and someone willing to communicate, able to make decisions on their own too. Newer clans should definitely invest time into skirmishes.

What are your top four viable Clan Wars tanks?

[Many tanks are listed]

KiloLovesBoxes - Object 140, T110E5, IS-7, E100, arty.

Toomstone357 - AMX 50B.

Tefftorbes - Batchat. You need to use one since they're the most unique. How about E100, a Russian medium, AMX 50b… what'd be the 4th one?

KiloLovesBoxes - T110E5, IS-7.

SublimeSilence - FV215b. We use a lot of tanks. Any battle we go into, doesn't matter the map, we almost always bring a Russian medium. The majority of maps we'll also have a Batchat. Autoloaders like the AMX 50b and T57 really important tanks. For new players, I'd recommend a heavy line. When it comes to team play, a good IS-7 or E100 driver is not always necessary. What you need is people that will listen and be willing to push as a team, and heavy play is very important. Mediums take more skill because you have to be able to think on your own.

Tefftorbes - So we have about 10 tanks on our Top 4.

KiloLovesBoxes - It really depends on the strat because the map varies so much. Sometimes you want more mobility, sometimes you want to be heftier so tanks don't melt.

Are there any friends or allies you'd like to acknowledge?

Tefftorbes - Sorphius is our secondary head recruiter-ish person. He runs this interesting system called “Sorphius Points”. That's how we measure our members' contribution to the clan. It's a proprietary formula and we maintain spreadsheets of it and it guides our choice of players to continue to be FOXEY. And we love him for that.

SublimeSilence - It actually got modified for the campaign to let us know who we should try to bump into the top 15 for free tanks. That way we could do it with a lot less drama.

LVLAsian - PIR8, formerly RDDT8. They were the first clan I joined and they taught me that being in a clan's an awesome thing to be in.

KiloLovesBoxes - The red line for being my friend.

SublimeSilence - Gilalad, FOXEY's mascot. We all love him. He's cool. AllHardAllTheTime is a really good member in FOXEY and a great flank commander. Gotta give one to Tedster59, WhatTheFlank, S7rike, our 3 best arty players.

Tefftorbes - We have pretty good arty players.

KiloLovesBoxes - If I could pull it up, our top box earners. I know Dydyn and Toom are up there on the list, and combined, they still don't have as much as I do. Not sure who's below that.

Toomstone357 - Probably Loki_Blitzkrieg and UnknownChemistry.

SublimeSilence - Alithepersiandude. 1v1, bro.

Do you have any last words?

KiloLovesBoxes - Please stop camping in Strongholds.

Associated Clans

Stronghold Skirmish Details

What: Absolute Stronghold Skirmishes
Who: [FOXEY] and WGA employees
When: July 22, 16:00 PT (19:00 ET) to approx. 18:00 PT (21:00 ET)
Where: NA East server

If you face off against our Spotlight Skirmish, you'll have a chance to win Gold prizes!

If you are streaming on your own Twitch.tv channel and you send a link to your stream with the time at which you face us, your entire team will double their winnings! This link must be sent in a PM on the forums to veganzombiez by 09:00 PT (12:00 ET) the following Friday morning.

If you have any questions you'd like us to ask FOXEY while on the stream, please leave them in the comments thread for this article or you may also ask them in the Twitch chat!

Gold from this event will be distributed by Wednesday, July 29, 2015.