The Art Of Beer Pong

Old_Ironsides7 years ago

“Move swift as the Wind and closely-formed as the Wood. Attack like the Fire and be still as the Mountain.”

Bīrupon. Bierpong. Pong Puteum Luramenti. Bungh Albira. The great conflict is known by many names. A trial of men from which only the most skilled emerge, the battlefield of pong is littered with the discarded clothes of skunked pledges and the shattered wrists of those who do not obey the distance rule. Pong’s lethality is derived from it’s spontaneity; from the sandy tables of the beach, to the inflatable mesas of the pool, beer pong transcends the limitations of location, making it the pinnacle of college combat. It is a struggle not for the feint of heart, the uncoordinated, or those who crack under pressure, but rather for the clever and the resilient. For to become a master of pong, one must understand the complexities of pong itself.

“The whole secret lies in confusing the enemy, so that he cannot fathom our real intent.”

Distraction has often been the tool of a wily force against its foe. If the enemy’s mind is not allowed to focus on the task at hand, it is all the more difficult for them to triumph. This principle holds true in pong. One must not be ashamed or afraid to reveal body parts in order to distract the enemy. If one is of the female sex, it may be found that exposing one’s chest cannons significantly prohibits an opponent’s ability to concentrate, resulting in a more achievable victory. It is imperative that this power be wielded to its fullest potential and used with great frequency.

That is not to say that those of the male sex are incapable of using their body parts to divert enemy attention as well. A well-timed reveal of one’s ass crack or bouncing man-tits may also incite a reaction from the opponent, causing them to miss their salvo. However, this is a tactic that requires strict oversight. To prevent the most heinous of war crimes, a threshold of action deemed to result in mass trauma should not be crossed by either faction. To that regard, any combatant who exposes their taint, or their ball sack stretched out to resemble the wing of a bat, shall be designated a stump fucker and publicly shamed for his lack of battlefield etiquette. Even in the heat of combat, we must resist the urge to become savages.

“Thus the expert in battle moves the enemy, and is not moved by him.”

Beyond the tricks of distraction, a solid defense is of the utmost importance when locked in a pong game that permits the active involvement of the non-shooting team. Live fire pong variants such as Manpong, where the ball can be pursued by members of both teams after it has been shot and unsuccessfully registered a kill, call for a cohesive strategy to prevent lost pong possessions. In these battles, it is wise for the team’s largest and most physically imposing members to be charged with pursuing loose balls, thus allowing those combatants of smaller stature to remain in shooting form. It would be a tragedy of the greatest magnitude if a team member of daintier build was obliterated by a rival behemoth in an effort to regain control of a ball. Such losses and injuries can prove fatal for a pong army and thus cannot be tolerated.

“Who wishes to fight must first count the cost.”

One must accept that in order to achieve great victory, there must be great sacrifice. To become a great warrior of pong, a man is required to first make peace with the damage that pong will inflict upon his body. The liver shall bear the brunt of this punishment. Unless the individual filling the vessels for the skirmish is one of great psychological issues, each cup on the field of battle will be primed with beer to approximately 1/2 or 2/3 of its volume. Meaning that with each cup lost, an individual of the maimed militia is compelled to consume that amount before continuing on.

Drinking is an inevitability of pong warfare and thus should not be feared, but rather embraced. A true pong battle master welcomes the beer, thrives on its bubbly goodness, allows it to infect his conscientiousness with its velvety tendrils. He declares his synergy with it to the entire table; pressing fear into his opponents with epithets about how they are only making his abilities stronger with every cup they force him to devour. This is the way of the master; one who uses his opponents successes as the fuel for his own victory.

“Know your enemy and know yourself and you can fight a hundred battles without disaster”

Perhaps the greatest key to victory in pong is the knowledge of one’s opponent. If he is arrogant, strike at his pride, if he is meek, strike at his ability, if he is excitable, call him a shit sucking slob. It is imperative that one sows the seeds of doubt in his adversary, weakening his foe’s psyche with every successful splash of his stroke and salvo of biting remarks. Next to knowledge of one’s opponent, awareness of oneself is of the utmost importance. If one is alert to his trouble making the last cup, then he should select a teammate adept at making the last cup. If particular formations present an easier challenge for one to make cups, then making cups that result in those formations or choosing them at re-racking opportunities is critical to a triumphant campaign. Great energy should be devoted to learning one’s own pong skills, for without absolute understanding of one’s strengths and weakness, victory is impossible to achieve.

“Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win.”

Armed with the knowledge in this tome, one can become a pong soldier of the utmost ability and expertise. A terror on the table, known for forcing opponents to run laps around the fraternity house nude as the day they were berthed into the world. Skilled in many methods of combat, prepared to do battle handcuffed by even the stupidest house rules. This is the destiny that awaits all who hear these words. Now go. Go forth and conquer..