Hey TL,

Basically im doing a few blog posts for the london barcraft website and I thought I would re-post them here to see what you guys think. Feedback is always welcome



Welcome Lady and Gents to my first London Barcraft blog post. Always happy to get feedback, good and bad, to help me improve the content going out to you fine folks!

First a little bit about me, I’m a Terran player (I apologise) with a bit of a fetish for Ravens and Ghosts. Ive been to the last two Barcrafts (DH Valencia and MLG Orlando) and it was a pleasure to meet some of you guys there. Really loving how we’re growing as a community and best of luck to Javier Lee and any other Barcrafters at EGL4 as I’m writing this!

For those of you who have followed the Starcraft II scene for a while now (and to an even greater extent Broodwar), you know exactly what it means when Koreans enter a tournament with non-Koreans. It means a trail of broken and bloodied foreigner bodies trailing all the way to the podium where a Korean (Terran) stands holding aloft his ludicrously oversized cheque and grins like a maniac who has swept aside the competition in dominating fashion.

……Or does it?



This has been the unfortunate situation for fans of foreign Starcraft players ever since they have competed against the mighty progamers from the east. However, recent results heading into Blizzcon suggested that the gap in skill is showing signs of closing.

First Idra, who surely needs no introduction, starts off IEM Guangzhou by barely escaping his group, all seems right with the natural order, however he grew in confidence throughout the knockout stages, and his performance culminates in a quite brilliant 3-0 over Korean team mate (and ex practice partner of Flash in Broodwar) Puma; before going on to beat his bogey race (controlled by up and comer Elfi ) 3-1. Something was disturbing the calm waters of Korean dominance…1-0 rest of the world.

Fast forward a few weeks and Idra was at it again with a strong showing at IPL 3, reaching the quarter finals before losing a close series to TheStC, surely this proves again that Koreans are the best and Guangzhou was simply a blip? After all, the level of Korean competition was below par in China right? Instead French Zerg Stephano rises to win the tournament…. 0-2Korea v the world.…to the bank as they say.

Moving into mid October and MLG Orlando was upon us. Those who came to the Assembly House cheered for our favourite players, watched fellow barcrafters cheese unsuspecting ladder opponents and downed beers after foolish GG button predictions (damn you Boxer, you came so close to beating the Gracken! Despite that failure Ill still support you next time) ….Just me for that last one? We’ll move on..I for one didn’t expect a foreigner to make a serious challenge, let alone come away with the title. For surely the Korean talent on display was simply too powerful? MC, MKP, July, Polt, Hero, Bomber to name but a few… Canadian Protoss Huk rose from the Protoss group of death to take the tournament for himself. 3-0 and suddenly it is a different breed wearing the maniacal grin at the podium.

That was the situation heading into Blizzard’s in-house tournament, Blizzcon. Foreigner hopes were high and the Koreans were suddenly looking vulnerable. Would another foreign hero rise from the bracket to sweep aside all competition? Could we possibly see 4-0 in recent major tournaments?

Are you crazy? This is Mother $%*!ingVP and Nes ‘more money than god’ Tea

“Do I look like a noob?”
“No!”
“Then why’d you try to cheese me like a noob?”

(shamelessly stolen from TL may code S hype thread)

and they don’t appreciate you getting in the way of their golden wheelbarrows of prize money.



Blizzcon

9 Zerg

4 Terran and Terran

2 Protoss



Going in, I was interested to see how some of the foreign players who had been training in Korea would perform, for those not in the know, Naniwa, Select and Terran have been out in Korea partaking in the much vaunted intensive training that the high skill level provides out there. In recent showings Naniwa seemed to have fallen off slightly so I was hoping he would make a strong comeback. I was also very happy to see Sen back in a major tournament (outside his native Taiwan) as he always shows incredibly high levels of play. I had a sneaking suspicion that Dimaga might make a big splash, seeing as he managed to defeat both of the Korean powerhouses during his short stay in Korea during the GSL World Championship back in March (and is still the only Zerg to beat NeaTea in a best of series on TV). Tuning in on the opening day (night for us lucky folks inEngland) like the true nerd that I am, this is how it unfolded….

RO 16

Only one real significant upset occurred in the first round, as the relatively unknown ToodMing took out Macro monster Ret (congrats on that prediction on state of the game Artosis!). Otherwise the brackets played out as expected with Naniwa v Terran (call yourself Major my friend, none of this Terran nonsense) being the featured game on the main stream (calm down, NesTea or MVP will be next up for sure). Coming back from a 0-1 deficit, Naniwa took the series, showing excellent overall mechanics and decision making (nearly made a great comeback even in game one where a failed 4 gate put him light years behind, although admittedly Terran was always in control of that game).



RO8

Again not many results that were too surprising, although ToodMing did manage to take a game of the mighty MVP. Naniwa again impressed (shows what I know about player form J ) against Sen taking him out 2-0. The most shocking result may have been the underdog JazBas (a little known New Zealand player) unmercilessly booting Terran from the tournament in the losers bracket. The featured game on stream was Dimaga v Select (Oh man I love seeing me some Dimaga! But NesTea or MVP next right Blizzard…) where Select showed off a new more patient (ala Thorzains spoon style) game plan than we normally see from him (Select is traditionally seen as a multi-dropping, as soon as possible, Terran). It proved mightily effective and he banished Dimaga to the losers bracket 2-0.



RO4 (winners) RO8 (losers)

Both Koreans reminded everyone that they do have a human streak in them by both being forced into ace matches against their opponents. However both came through 2-1 to set up the mouth-watering winners bracket final everyone wanted to see. In the losers bracket Killer pulled the biggest surprise by taking out Sheth in the Liquid player’s weakest matchup. The first game on stream (alright come on Blizzard are you serious with this?!?) was JazBas v ToodMing. I’m going to be honest and say I didn’t expect either of these two to make it this far, so mad props to them! ToodMing had too much for the young Kiwi on the day and we lost another player to the Chinese phenom. Sen against Ret was also streamed and featured an excellent showcase of the strengths of both players. Game one Sen literally out-macroed one of the best macro Zergs in a quite scary manner. You blinked and Sen was suddenly 30 supply ahead – unreal. Game two Ret was in his comfort zone after holding Sens early ling aggression and rode the economic advantage to victory, before Sen stormed back in the third set to take the series, no shame in that loss for mr De Kroon against the Taiwanese terror.



RO4 (losers)

First match in the losers RO4 was Dimaga v Naniwa. The Swedish protoss continued his fine tournament PvZ with a convincing victory. Game one was an excellent play with Naniwa denying the zerg third with his ground army before taking out the lair with void rays in the main, as Dimaga tried to save his expansion. Game 2 was a really lack luster performance from Dimaga, who had a huge lead after killing off most of Naniwa’s sentries early, before squandering said lead by engaging colossus with hydras off creep with predictable results. Next up was the excellent series between Select v Sen (my personal favourite series except the finals). Game one was a simple failed bunker block-in by Select but he ended up miles behind by failing to repair his wall-in quickly enough to prevent the ling counter from putting him leagues behind. Game two on Shakuras saw Sen attempt a quick ling + roach attack off two bases which looked destined to succeed given Select had only one bunker up and few attacking units. However poor target firing from Sen and excellent mass repair from Select allowed him to hold and put himself in a lead. From here Select kept expanding and denying the Zerg third until after his own was up… Select took a position in the middle of the map which Sen eventually broke, but Select was too far ahead at this stage and his elevated production allowed him to quickly re-take the middle before finishing off the Zerg monster. Game 3 on Abyssal Caverns saw Select kill off Sen’s third to put him equal on bases, however, after taking his gold Select became too passive, not dropping enough despite Sen skipping Mutas entirely to head for Ultras and Infestors. Crucially Select also didn’t start a fourth command centre during this period as well. Having been allowed to get up to four bases, Sen simply denied Selects own fourth, first with a ling run by to cancel it building, followed by burrowed Infestor harass (clearly Sen was hiding at our Barcraft during MLG Orlando and saw how hilarious Infestors can be). Eventually Select was forced to fly his main to his fourth (and his natural expansion when his main was killed…), but by this stage Sen had the map, and despite the now excellent drop harass coming from Select, Sen simply had too much and rolled him over. A few different decisions and we could have seen Select take the series in that final game but GG gentlemen, GG.



Finals

The first BO 3 between the Korean invites, Nestea v MVP, the series everyone was waiting for… Game one saw NesTea try out the style shown so effectively by Stefano at IPL 3. Fast 2-2 upgrades for melee units with a large amount of Lings and Infestors. MVP went quick three bases and got severely punished for being too greedy. Game 2 was close spawn on shattered temple…..I don’t want to talk about it….NesTea took it. In the losers match Naniwa couldn’t quite re-capture the magic against Sen and……Wait a second…. I knew it, you knew it. Lets face it we ALL knew that MVP would breeze back into the championship finals for the re-match with his team mate on IM. To the finals we go!



CHAMPIONSHIP FINALS

In the finals MVP had to win two BO 3’s and NesTea had to win one, owing to the fact NesTea had already beaten MVP in the winners finals. I could try and draw it out, but that would be pointless at this stage. This epic final encounter will only be remembered for one game….

MVP had tied the series up with a quick 2-0 to bring it to a final BO 3. These Korean nerd destroyers traded one more game each, leading to one final game on Shakuras to decide our Blizzcon champ. Heres how it went down:

MVP spawns at 11 in blue, while NesTea is positioned top right in red. NesTea opens hatch first while MVP goes for a bog standard reactor hellion expand with some mild bunker pressure to force early Lings. Off this MVP gets down a quick third orbital, whilst NesTea attempts a sneaky run by with some Speedlings which is shut down hard


Attempted run by

DENIED



The game proceeds very normally from here, with hellions poking at the zerg front, while both players macro up. NesTea goes 3 hatch, 2 base Mutas to re-gain map control, while the Terran gets his upgrades going. With Mutalisks out giving him map control NesTea moves out and double expands on his side of the map.

NesTea builds up his Muta flock and engages in some slight harass, which is mostly ineffective, but does keep MVP on only two mining bases. Once he feels comfortable, the Terran moves out to his inside third base and prepares to channel his inner turtle; getting up additional Command Centres and unit production. In response NesTea continues teching to Hive and spine-crawlering up the middle of the map.

After a few exchanges at the terran front, NesTea, with his hive completed, begins his greater spire. When it is half way complete, MVP, with his spider senses tingling, makes a fairly important decision.

this will be fairly significant to the outcome of the game

MVP has his fourth up by this stage and with the Muta harass largely ineffective, NesTea switches to brood lords while taking all the bases on his side of the map.



With NesTea banking a ludicrous amount of resources, he pushes towards the Terran inside third base with the Broodlords and forces a lift, as MVP has inadequate forces to respond. The orbital is destroyed by Mutas and all looks bleak for the Terran star. However MVP had bought himself enough time to assemble the Hive tech hit squad.

got Ghost?



Suddenly MVP had re-set the brood lord count to zero as the sniper rounds decimated the once proud flyers


you can run


but you cant hide




Having failed to truly damage the Terran, NesTea decided on a new tactic of Nydus Worms and sooooo many Banelings. MVP had expanded to all four far away bases on his side of the map and Nestea attempted to Nydus into the fourth, but was caught red-handed.

I wasnt doing anything....honest!



Having failed to sneak his Banelings into the Terran base, NesTea expanded to the 6 o clock expansion but by this stage MVPs marine drops (3-3 in upgrades) were beginning to grind down the Zerg master. During this harass MVP was expanding to his two pocket expansions – bringing the number of terran bases up to a scary 6. While NesTea had fully upgraded Ultras and over 12000 minerals, 4000 gas banked, he couldn’t make any headway into the Terran side of the map.

Meanwhile MVP had been busy

With NesTea heavily distracted from MVP’s continual drop harass, the Terran displayed a few special tactics.



By this stage, with so much money banked, NesTea could afford to lose drones in exchange for more army. Looking at the mini map above, you can see NesTea responded by mass dropping the Terran production in his main with Ultras and Banelings. However the Terran hit-squad moved back to their main and were soon mopping up the Zerg blood whilst the ghosts were starting to get those maniacal grins on their faces.



Multiple drops had by this stage basically stopped mining for NesTea, in addition to reducing his production to tatters. After one final ling drop attempt at the Terran fourth, a totally frustrated NesTea went for one final gambit.

'Nough said

Unfortunately with the Broodlords totally unsupported by a ground army, they were simply fed into the meat grinder of Vikings and sniper fire before NesTea finally GG’s.

The game was one of the best I’ve seen in the short history of Starcraft II and would have been a fitting final game to any tournament. MVP surely showed everyone that he has the mentality of a champion. He not only came back from a crushing loss to MMA in the GSL finals the previous day; but he also come from a BO3 down to beat the best Zerg in the world.

However good he may have played however, I am very very very VERY annoyed at MVP for one reason…

He has single-handedly done enough to get my favourite unit nerfed





Rob Cox (aka Furtle)