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A Noob in China - When Mousepads Matter


A long time ago...

Before I signed with Tt I never used a mousepad. I just didn't see the need! I play at home on a polished-wood table (not glazed) that I thought was an ideal gaming surface. Whilst I've played games semi-competitively for almost 10 years now I never really knew the finer points of mouse-usage and like many gamers I just figured "it can't make much difference, my table is fine". I was wrong.

The first inkling of how wrong I was came at my first big event, IEM Guangzhou. I was a full-time Starcraft Coach at the time who competed regularly in tournaments but never really expected to win much with so little training time for myself. However it just so happened that my girlfriend travelled to Japan for a month and so I had nothing to do in my free time but practice! Next thing I knew I was winning a qualifier against some of the hardest players in SEA and flying over to to China!

The first day at the event I was incredibly nervous, setting up on stage next to the famouse Ukrainian Zerg Dimaga I noticed he was angrily ripping up the tablecloth off his table to try and create a smooth surface to go underneath his mousepad. He noticed me watching him and said "I don't know why they put this f***** s*** here, my mouse slide everywhere" and showed how the cloth would slide underneath his mouse on his mousepad. I laughed and said, "oh, I don't even have a mousepad haha".

Dimaga just stopped and stared.

"What the F***? Why you forget?"

"No" I explained, "I just don't use a mousepad"

"What!? Why?" He said, his voice still showing some restraint, but his eyes giving off that he had identified that he was speaking to a noob.

"I dunno I just never used one..." I said, starting to feel very stupid and noob, but still more excited to be talking to DIMAGA than I was embarrassed.

Dimaga shook his head in sadness at my noobness and continued setting up... I sat and reflected on the fact that maybe, just MAYBE I wasn't too well prepared for an international LAN.

Tt Dasher Mousepad - Review

Fast forward a few weeks and Tt send me a fine specimen in the form of the dasher mousepad! Since then I've won a National championship and competed all over the world, all using my Tt pad! And boy has it made the world of difference!

The Dasher Mousepad is a soft, smooth-surface pad designed for multi-purpose gaming use. I'm still not an expert on mousepads technical details but I now love to test all my friends mousepads and have become somewhat used to the feel of them all. In my eyes the distinguishing features of the Dasher are its size, durability and feeling.

First of all the Dasher is BIG. You won't catch your mouse slipping off the edge of the Dasher just a half-dozen banelings walk into your worker-line! It's about 40cm by 32cm and so covers a corner of your desk or table nicely. One corner is "cut-off" into a curve so that it can fit around your monitor nicely. its size is large enough to ensure even low-sensitivity mouse users won't slip off the edges, but is still easy to travel with as it rolls ups very easily and comes with its own elastic bag.

The durability of the Dasher is very high for a cloth pad that comes relatively cheap. After a year of constant practice on this pad mine is only slightly frayed on the one side that i've used the most and the others are still entirely intact. Also the easy roll-up travel feature of the pad means that even across a dozen interstate and international trips it has held up remarkably well.

The final outstanding aspect of the Dasher is the feel. This is the most important feature of any mousepad of course as its key role is to make the feel of using your mouse both identical wherever you are, but also smooth and accurate. The Dasher is a very smooth surface but also has a texture to its cloth surface which allows for marvellous tracking on any laser-mouse. I've found whether micro-ing or macro-ing it allowed me to be extremely accurate and allowed me to micro my zerglings to my heart's delight! I've brought this great surface all around the world and recreated that home environment. It's made a big difference in aiding my success, far more than I ever realised on that first trip to China.

Don't underestimate the usefulness of a good mousepad like I did!

About this review:

I've now been representing Tt eSPORTS for a year at tournaments throughout the world and as the 'Tt' at the front of 'TtPiG' becomes more and more just another part of my name, I think it's time to give something back and remind you guys of my amazing sponsor. Anyone who's attended a barcraft, competed in a tournament or tuned into SEA SC2 tournaments would know that there's a hell of a lot of content, events and prize pool being contributed by Tt. These guys are serious about keeping up with and supporting the esports scene. So I will be writing a series of reviews for the gear they've provided me with from their Tt eSPORTS gaming equipment range.

I won't be sugar-coating anything and will be giving my honest opinion on what suits me about some of their gear, and what doesn't suit me so well. I will also be trying to identify what preferences go with which piece of gear and how this equipment has helped me reach a really impressive list of achievements over the last year.