UpAndDown Matches- Day 3

      Kyrix gets speed, expands, then builds a roach warren. July gets roaches, then banelings. His first banelings hit home against Kyrix's zerglings, and he is up in roach count by about four or five. But Kyrix is already seven drones ahead, and so is able to stream zerglings into July's roaches, continuously pushing them back until they die. Once Kyrix has held off the first attack, he is up by ten drones, and it is only a matter of time before he is able to overrun July with speedlings and roaches.

Kyrix wins, 1-0

      July gets an early hatchery, then roaches. Kyrix gets zergling speed, then expands. July loses a few unnecessary roaches to speedling surrounds after some intense microing. This lets Kyrix continue to smash July's front with zerglings, surround more roaches, and eventually force July out of the game.

Kyrix solidly 2-0s July, but it's hard to call it an upset after July's disappointing performance in Code A. Kyrix certainly seemed to have a better understanding of the intricacies of ZvZ, despite July saying in his interview that he has been practicing nothing but the mirror match-up.

Kyrix wins 2-0, stays in Code S.
July loses, faces Rain for a Code S berth.

Not needed.

Kyrix wins 2-0, stays in Code S.
July loses, face Rain for a Code S berth.

A summer thunderstorm?

ST_July

      July hatches first. Rain gets two barracks and bunkers the bottom of July's ramp. But Rain's marines get a little bit too brave trying to cover a bunker being built very deep into July's base. July quickly surrounds them and kills all four marines with essentially no losses. July starts zergling speed and breaks out the back of his expansion while faking zergling pressure down the ramp to fool Rain's remaining forces into staying put. July runs all the way around to map right into Rain's un-walled base, ending the game.

July seems to have a much better feel for ZvT than he does ZvZ. He knew exactly what to do this game. Also, no matter how far ahead you think you are, it is almost always a good idea to have that one supply depot to raise in an emergency, although Rain would have had to have super-human reflexes to get it up in time.

July wins, 1-0

      July gets zergling speed, then expands. Rain gets two barracks and expands. July morphs a bunch of banelings in Rain's hallway as Rain start blue flame hellion production. But July's banelings mostly whiff against Rain's engineering bay, and even the ones that hit marines and scvs don't do quite enough damage. July is forced to retreat. Rain's first wave of hellions gets cleverly surrounded by speedlings, and the rest get killed by roaches. Rain transitions to two-factory tank, July gets his lair and baneling speed.
      July's second attack goes much better as his roaches and banelings force all the scvs away from Rain's natural. But two thors come out and repel the rest of the attack. Rain gets a third factory and finally starts shields/stim, continuing marine/tank/hellion production. July expands to his third and gets a spire. July's first mutalisks kill a lot of scvs, putting July up by almost thirty workers. Rain expands to his gold. July goes for a big drop as he gets an infestation pit and a fourth. The drop and a follow-up attack do middling damage, but allow him to get a fifth base and tech to brood lords. Rain attacks July's non-existent gold base before the greater spire finishes, but four perfect neural parasites on Rain's siege tanks compel them to take out Rain's marines very quickly, leaving only a few mech units behind. July quickly refills his army with mutalisks and infestors which clean up the rest of Rain's push. Rain expands to his interior third, the one base left on the map besides July's gold.
      Rain fends off a few of July's attacks as his gold slowly mines out. But when it does finally run out of minerals, there is little that Rain, stuck on just one mining base, can do to stop July's onslaught. The killing blow is when July fungals all of Rain's remaining scvs with just two infestors, forcing Rain to accept his fate of falling to Code A.

Rain's goal this season must have been to prove himself worthy of the finalist title he was so criticized for in the third Open season. He fell way short, going 1-4 and falling immediately to Code A. Hopefully Rain's pride doesn't take too much of a hit, and he really sets his sights on getting back to Code S next season.

July wins 2-0, is promoted to Code S.
Rain loses, is demoted to Code A.

Rain falls.

July wins 2-0, is promoted to Code S.
Rain loses, is demoted to Code A.

      Fruit hatches first and easily holds off some two-barracks bunker pressure. Essy walls off his choke with barracks, expands to his natural, and transitions into two-factory pre-ignited hellions. Fruit gets a roach warren, a lair, burrow, and a third, in-base hatchery. Essy starts building tanks from his factories. Fruit builds his spire. Fruit breaks down Essy's back door rocks with a bunch of roaches and a few banelings. They do a lot of damage, but eventually stray into a sieged tank line, and Fruit loses a lot of supply in roaches. Fruit takes his gold.
      Mutalisks come out and start harassing Essy's mineral lines before he has missile turrets up. FruitDealer takes a fourth. Essy moves out, but, despite some great scans of burrowed banelings, his army gets flattened by mutalisks and quick-healing roaches. Essy gg's as FruitDealer's forces start attacking everywhere at once.

This is the FruitDealer we missed in the Code S matches.

FruitDealer wins, 1-0

      FruitDealer gets fast zergling speed and expands. Essy two barracks. As Essy expands behind a third barracks, FruitDealer gets off a miraculous surround on all of Essy's marines, putting him way ahead and prompting him to get a baneling nest. FruitDealer's first baneling attack again wipes out all of Essy's marines, now building out of four naked barracks. FruitDealer keeps sending in zerglings, but the returns gradually start to diminish. At ten minutes, Essy has stabilized. Both players are still stuck at their initial tech of pool/nest and barracks, but FruitDealer, having made only zerglings all game, is thirteen workers behind his opponent! FruitDealer frantically begins droning, leaving him at seven zerglings to thirty marines and two marauders! FruitDealer is thirty food behind, but keeps attacking with zergling and even makes an evolution chamber for +1 melee attack. FruitDealer starts his lair and gets a third at the close-by-air main. When Essy finally moves out, he is up by fifty supply, with stim, and easily smashes through FruitDealer's bases.

A great comeback from Essy. FruitDealer stayed too aggressive for too long, and just by the nature of the different races' unit production, the terran slowly pulled into the lead.

sC wins, 1-1

Scrap Station

      FruitDealer early expands, opts for roaches instead of speed. Essy builds two-barracks and bunkers the bottom of FruitDealer's ramp. Essy shows that he knows how to get ahead, expanding behind the two successfully built bunkers. FruitDealer decides to leave the bunkers alone for a bit as he drones up and techs to lair. Essy techs to marine/tank/medivac. FruitDealer gets a spire and expands to his semi-island. Essy slowly pushes across the bottom of the map, and once he manages to siege up at FruitDealer's shared choke, FruitDealer makes a final attack. But his banelings die to tanks splash damage, and since his third base has not yet payed for itself, he doesn't have enough roaches to defend. FruitDealer loses the match.

Essy somehow managed to go from literally having 'gg' typed in the chat in game 2 (as revealed in his interview) to winning the match convincingly in game 3. FruitDealer did everything he could to stop him, but ends up in danger of becoming the first former champion to fall to Code A.

sC wins 2-1, is promoted to Code S.
FruitDealer loses, will need fight Maka for Code S status

TSL_Fruit Dealer

      FruitDealer hatches first- gets a lair before zergling speed. Maka get two early starports for a raven followed by two-port banshee. FruitDealer easily fends off a few early hellions and techs to spire. Maka gets a lot of banshees while building a command center... which all quickly die to FruitDealer's first mutalisks. Maka gg's.

Maka is so strange sometimes. I really don't know what he was thinking this game. He built two starports, but didn't start the first banshee until the raven was almost done. He built a second command center, but never even tried to get it down to his natural. It must be the case that he simply was counting on FruitDealer not getting such fast mutalisks, or maybe doing more damage with his hellions, because Maka was essentially left to execute his strategy unmolested the entire game, but got absolutely stomped.

FruitDealer wins, 1-0

FruitDealer hatches first. Maka gets one barracks and expands. FruitDealer gets a lair after zergling speed. Maka builds up to four barracks(TTRR). FruitDealer gets a baneling nest. FruitDealer catches Maka's first forces out of position and takes out Maka's lone bunker. FruitDealer morphs thirteen banelings right outside of Maka's vision. The banelings tear up Maka's bases, after which he concedes.

I think Code A will actually be bad for Maka's development as a player if his crazy strategies start to win him games. On the other hand, I do look forward to Maka beating up on some of the lower tier Code A players snarfs with silly two-port raven builds. Also, I think FruitDealer's zerglings are legitimately fast than other players' zerglings.

FruitDealer wins 2-0, stays in Code S
Maka loses, is demoted to Code A.

Not needs. Maka packa his baga.

FruitDealer wins 2-0, stays in Code S
Maka loses, is demoted to Code A.

KyrixZeNEX 2-0 ST_July KyrixZeNEX stays in Code S
ST_July 2-0 TSL_Rain ST_July is promoted to Code S
TSL_Rain is demoted to Code A

sCfOu 2-1 TSL_FruitDealer sCfOu is promoted to Code S
TSL_FruitDealer 2-0 MakaPrime.WE FruitDealer stays in Code S
MakaPrime.WE is demoted to Code A

Another day full of Code S casualties as a former finalist and an Open Season stalwart both fall from Code S. Maka's demotion really surprised me, as he was one of the few players who made it at least into the RO32 every single season. I'm sure both will be back in the Upandown matches next season, though, as long as their egos haven't been too bruised.

Assuming that both of the Code A finalists make it through their groups tomorrow, and they should, the entire Top4 of the Code A tournament will have been promoted, showing, I think, the healthiness of the relegation system. It was also very nice to see three zergs advance today, as up until now only two out of four zergs had made it in as many days.