Truth Interview Thursday Spotlight - Witty

Welcome to our Clan Truth Community Spotlight! To kick off the new year, we are interviewing none other than the big dog himself, WittyCalfX!

CT: So, Witty, tell us a  little about yourself (without revealing too much identifying information you don’t want to give away. Maybe just tell me your debit card PIN code or something). Let’s start off with learning about what you do for work.

My day job is a high school science teacher, I’ve been doing it for about 10 years now. I also referee high school football in the fall and coach high school baseball in the spring.

CT: Aside from videogames, what hobbies or pastimes do you enjoy?

I enjoy golfing, and I’m okay at it – I was a 16 handicap this year which means I routinely shot high 80s, and I had a PR score this year of +11 on a course. I also collect Funko Pops and my collection is small but growing, up to about 60. And I love Pokémon cards. Is drinking a hobby? I love beer and whiskey and my wife and I enjoy visiting different breweries and distilleries. (Plus, drunk Witty = new emojis!)

CT: What is a skill you have that you take pride in?

I’m a really good cook. If I wasn’t a teacher I would’ve considered going into culinary arts. (You need to show off your food in Garden of Salivation)

CT: Any other fun facts about yourself?

I played college baseball for two years before blowing out my knee. I also appeared on an episode of Wheel of Fortune back in 2015. (I tried my hardest to find a video, no luck)

CT: How long have you been playing video games and what are some of your earliest and/or favorite video game memories?

I’m in my early 30s, my first console was an N64 when I turned 8. My cousins and friends had Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo, I remember playing Sonic games, Donkey Kong, Mortal Kombat on those. Mario 64 is to this day one of my favorite games. When my best friend got a PS1 I played a lot of Twisted Metal at his house.

CT: What are your favorite foods, music, movies, shows, etc.?

I’m a foodie, I will eat just about anything. Except Bacon. Can’t stand it. (Wait, what the fuck?) This may be surprising considering I grew up in New Jersey, but I have always been big into trance and EDM. I saw my first live show at 15 sneaking into a club, but I also get down with a lot of 90’s punk rock and ska. Being the huge nerd I am, I love superhero movies or really any action movies – which happen to be my wife’s least favorites. I am a sucker for comedies and anything funny, I’ve watched comedy series like The Office, Parks and Rec, Community, Friends many many times through.

CT: Is there any special story or significance to your gamertag?

Significance? No. Story? Well… in my less mature days back in Halo 3 we used to be able to change Xbox gamertags for free if they were reported and got banned for being inappropriate. It used to be a competition to see how quickly a name could get reported and banned. Not my best moment honestly. When Xbox changed their policy and started charging $9.99 to change gamertag, poor-college-kid Witty did not want to pay it and was stuck with WittyCalf549756 until I modified it a bit during Destiny 2. (So that story I heard about a baby cow with great jokes was a lie?)

CT: So, let’s talk Destiny and Clan Truth specifically. When did you first start playing Destiny, and can you tell us about what drew you to the game?

A Halo 3 buddy told me about Bungie coming out with a new game and it had an open beta, played the beta the summer before it came out and was instantly hooked. The gunplay felt amazing, the story drew me in off the bat and it felt like there was going to be so much to do in the game.

CT: So, after all these years of Destiny, what is your primary/favorite class and why?

I started out as a Hunter main until King’s Fall, then I learned the fun that is Warlock and haven’t looked back. Nova Bomb and Sunsinger drew me in. (Good answer, Warlocks are objectively the best class)

CT: You are the father of Clan Truth (he makes the other admins call him daddy). How did the clan first start? How did we get where we are today?

Back in Destiny 1 I found Fiery, Monke, and Reznor through an LFG website; we formed a “clan” called Raid Alliance Group that consisted of like 10 of us. After the Destiny 2 reveal, we merged with one of my IRL friends who played Destiny and his friends and created The Corrupted Truth before Destiny 2 dropped. His friends were unfortunately the individuals involved in the great “civil war”. We’ve gotten to this point by following the vision the 4 of us, plus Toast and Conner had, which was to grow by creating an environment for everyone, one that would bring in both casual and sweaty gamers, but all good people no matter what. Add in some nifty recruiting, sherpa-ing events, good humor and conversation, and here we are, 4 years, 5 clans and almost 1000 people later.

CT: If you could remove any one weapon from the game, which one and why?

I’m anti-shotgun like many, otherwise I love Destiny’s weapons.

CT: If you could design an exotic weapon or armor, what would it be?

Nova Bomb needs an exotic that gives it Lance like in D1. I’d be a happy Warlock main if that came back in some way. 

CT: Let’s get to the things people really care about. First, do you really think that New Jersey is better than New York? Why? Is it because you still have a crush on Peggy Bundy?

I’m biased obviously. I love NYC, but upstate and Long Island can kick rocks. Being able to go to NYC but not have to stay there is ideal. Also, our pizza and bagels are better. It’s the water. And as much as Jersey Shore gave the beaches a bad rep, they are beautiful and so are most of the beach towns in New Jersey.

CT: What are your favorite and/or least favorite events in Clan Truth history?

Favorites have to be getting Bungie devs and big streamers to yell ‘Ban Pentad’, least favorite was when Shor7y left. He was one of my favorite people to play with, but he lived in Dubai and had to wake up at like 4AM to play with us, so when he left for clan that played in his time window, I understood but it still hurt.

CT: For those of us that were there, the clan “civil war” was a big event, are you willing to tell us about what happened? When is the next one scheduled?

I think it’s a story (albeit a long one) everyone should hear at some point, because it sucked at the time, but we don’t get to this point without it happening either. In 2018, there were 11 admins at the time, me, and the 5 previously mentioned, and 5 other individuals. Brick tried to stay neutral as the bridge between two groups, but the other 4 (Dark, Forsaken, Mason and Thick) and him wanted to do things their way and make us a 1%er clan of PvE players. They wanted strict join guidelines (by that point we already had 3 rosters and 200 discord members because of our efforts, not theirs) and rules about accomplishments needed to join. There was a lot of butting heads, Dark and I never got along, Thick (the largest of the assholes) and Dark hated Toast for some odd reason (like Toast is easily the nicest admin around, except during Prestige Eater of Worlds), even after we chipped in to send Dark flowers after he had an emergency appendectomy, they still acted like they were better than us in every way. On a fateful September afternoon, Brick got into a fight with Thick because he deleted an announcement where Brick let people know he was in the first group of clan people to beat Last Wish, Thick had been deleting other posts by Brick and other admins and was just being childish and petty. Big argument in admin_chat (we still have the logs) while I was driving home from work and by the time I got home, those 4 had left the discord, but not before Dark kicked out over 100 people, and they had control of 2 out of 3 rosters. I still kick myself for the dozen times I thought about but never just booted all of them well before that. We spent the next week reaching out to everyone individually who had been kicked or was on those rosters that we could find and letting them know what happened. Seriously, without Fiery, Toast and the others putting in work to contact everyone I don’t know where we’d be. I started Exiled Truth (if you didn’t know where the name came from) as a roster for those people to come back to. We eventually got control of Forbidden Truth back but never the other one. The next few months were tumultuous, while we tried to get Forbidden Truth back, there was still some contact, but damage was done and as nice of a person I am, we wanted nothing to do with them anymore. But the wounds healed and without standing up for what we wanted and believed in, we probably don’t have what we do today. Them leaving was the best thing that happened to us in the end, and while it sucked the way it went down, I think it motivated us to not give up on what we were doing here.

CT: I think we are all in agreement that you have done something pretty incredible with the formation and growth of this clan. What do you see as the next steps for the clan? What are the loftiest goals you have?

I know I get pinpointed as a figurehead of sorts (well you do make the other admins call you Daddy…) but the people around me deserve so much credit for what has been accomplished here. It’s been refreshing to step back and see the other admins step into the spotlight, and they should get most of the credit for where we are today, I’m just the guy that writes TWAT every week now. As for next steps, and goals, I always wanted to see us keep growing and having a reach and voice in the Destiny community. As long as we keep bringing in good people and keep them around, I want to continue to see us grow. I’d like to get us a way to print clan merch, some Discord sponsorships in the future (so using code Clan Truth at checkout will not return an error code) and see our clan or clan members recognized by Bungie specifically. For now, I’m happy just that what we’ve created resonates with so many different people.

CT: Who is your best friend in the clan? Tell us some of your favorite things about them.

My actual best friend is in the clan – IamTheBat712. He won’t read this, but he’d kill me if I put anything else. Bat doesn’t use discord at all unless we make him. He’s former USAF and we live about an hour away from each other, so we get to drink a lot together when we aren’t gaming. 

CT: What is your most treasured/favorite collectible (doesn’t have to be related to gaming)?

Nerd one is my signed Majin Vegeta Funko Pop by Christopher Sabbat. Sports one I have a banner signed by the entire 1995 NJ Devils Championship team.

CT: Who do you think is the sexiest admin?

Have you seen Toast shirtless? SPLOOSH.

CT: If you could make a Clan Truth GFuel for each clan, what flavors would they be?

Coconut Corrupted, Every-berry Exiled, Forbidden Fruit Punch, Spicy Shattered Salsa, and Very Sweet Veiled

CT: Clan Truth official merch store when?

IDK but this is definitely on my personal priority list. We need one. Give the people what they want

What would you say is your proudest moment?

Every milestone we hit in discord, every new clan we get to announce, they still get me hyped like when we first started. I have a lot of in-game seals and accomplishments, triumphs, and everything, but the things this community does are always what makes me feel the best.

CT: When we do have a store, whose bathwater are we selling first?

Shua easily. (aww shucks)

CT: Why do you attend so many weddings?

My wife was in a sorority, I was in a fraternity, and they were both large. So, we get invited to a lot. We attend because we just feel bad saying no to most of them. Since 2011 we’ve probably attended 60 weddings together, maybe more.

CT: Can you give us advice on how to marry up like you did?

I’m actually kinda funny and charming, hard as that may be to believe. I outkicked my coverage with her, and she is not a gamer, unless that game is Diddy Kong Racing for N64. My advice is to find somebody who is genuine, and appreciates you for you who are, but also loves you when you turn into a 30-year-old gamer who wants a man cave to spend countless hours gaming in.

CT: Is there anything else you would like to tell us about yourself that we haven’t covered yet?

I don’t stream much anymore, but when I do, it is usually for charity. I want to shout out everyone in Clan Truth because when you add up Play Live, Extra Life streams, and Game2Give, we raised over $4,000 in 2021. If there is one thing I’d love to see more of as we move forward, it would be using our reach to continue doing good deeds and helping those in need. I’m already getting things ready for Play Live in May again and want to see what this group can do in 2022. $5,000 or more by Dec 31st is the goal I want to see us hit across all charity outlets.

Witty, thank you so much for taking the time to do this interview. I know that I speak on behalf of the rest of the admin team and the rest of Clan Truth when I say thank you for everything you have done for this group and the overall Destiny community. It is awesome being able to be a part of such an incredible community and we have you to thank for that. Thank you.

That concludes this installment of the Truth Interview Thursday Spotlight!

Happy New Year everyone!!!