CPTBadAss' BadAss Moments of WCS

Ok kiddies, this week’s edition is on Blizzard’s World Championship Series. Now the catch with this week’s blog is that the WCS was at an awful time for me (I’m in the Eastern Time Zone.) and I passed out right after Sen lost to Parting. So anything sweet that happened between Rain vs Creator, Sen vs Rain, and the finals I missed.

CPTBadAss’ BadAss Plays of WCS

#6)

TitaN vs

Curious
Day 1 – Group F – Game 3 – Shakurus Plateau

Looking at this group, my head would say that Titan and possibly Major would be the least likely to advance from the group (My heart was rooting for Major.). TeamLiquid’s prediction said that Titan wouldn’t advance and could only take a game off Major. Titan spawns bottom right and Curious spawns bottom left on Shakurus. Because of the close spawns, Titan went for a 4gate build but got discovered so Curious jumps ahead on bases and upgrades. Now the funny thing is that I saw Curious crushed Titan in the initial engagement, where Titan was on creep, and then turned my attention to a different stream. But when I glanced over again, I realized that our Protoss hero had barely held on and began to harass Zerg like crazy. He’d send a hit squad of stalkers to the third and then use a prism to warp in a line of zealots in the Zerg main main. When Curious responded, Titan would switch focus to another base or simply pull back and re-drop with warp prisms. Eventually Curious was stuck in a position with a bunch of infestors and no economy. And Titan was smart enough to not face the infested terrans head on and to continue moving the prism around, sending out zealots everywhere all the while. Titan trapped the infestors at his 4th and just baited out infested terrans until the infestors run dry. The infestors all popped and Titan won the series.

But don’t just take my word for it; listen to our Protoss hero himself as he describes how he played in the series. Pretty smart guy.

#5)

Illusion vs (P)

Creator
Day 2 – Round of 16 – Games 1 and 2 – Ohana and Entombed Valley

If you’ve ever watched Illusion’s stream, you know that if he’s trying to dodge someone in the match-queue or just wants to warm up, he’ll play the UMS game “Marine Split Challenge.” So let me preface #5 with the following video:

Watch the first split. Then watch his hands. It’s insanity, and he looks bored while playing.

This kid has some crazy good control and I got to see it again during these first two matches he played against Creator. Illusion goes for marine/marauder/medivac on both maps. On Ohana he spawned at the top and on Entombed he spawned top right. Now both of these maps have a pretty large ramp at the natural leading to the middle of the map. In both games, Creator goes for a 2base build, hitting at about the 10-12 minute mark. Illusion seemed to know that the pushes are coming so he tried to prepare for the attacks. In game 1, just as Creator walked out of the fog, Illusion does a heroic split and created a nice crescent around the Protoss forces. He’s behind on upgrades but managed to trade pretty evenly just because of the positioning. Game 2 saw a similar split; changing his clumped bio into a nice crescent which he then proceeded to micro three different groups in three directions: back up towards the ramp to his main, along the path to his third, and right towards his natural. Illusion might’ve lost both games but his control is astounding and he got to showcase it.

#4) (P)

Rain vs

IdrA
Day 2 – Round of 16 – Game 3 – Ohana

Even before I dive into this game, let’s just put this out there.

The single reason why Idra did so well at this tournament: The Gracket. It was absent from some tournaments but it returned with a vengeance.

Idra did Idra and played his slow macro game. As he accumulated his deathball, Rain had a pretty standard idea. He harassed bases far away from the Zerg forces, which were extremely slow. But Rain didn’t just have a typical two or three pronged harass. He went all-out and had a FIVE pronged attack. Four dark Templar were sent to Idra’s four bases and a warp-prism was sent to the main to warp in zealots. Now I realize that DTs are pretty self-sufficient. By that I mean if you just leave them alone in a mineral line or near a building, they deal enough damage that they can make themselves worth it even if left un-microed. But even so, I’ve never seen 5 simultaneous and controlled attacks. I’ve seen two or three controlled drops from a Terran or a zergling run-by but nothing on Rain’s scale.

#3)

Suppy vs

PartinG
Day 2 – Round of 8 – Game 1 – Antiga Shipyard

Parting decided since that there were so many Zergs in the tournament that he would blast his way through using the WonWonWon build. We were all waiting for it. Casters called for it all day and I wondered when he’d lay down the pain. And sure enough, Parting went for his immortal/sentry/warp prism all-in against Suppy on Antiga. Suppy went for quick 1/1 upgrades and built a massive wall of spine crawlers. Protoss ran up against the wall and then decided to drop into the main. So Zerg decided to relocate all his spines into his main, but this takes a little time. Suppy is forced to defend with roaches and 1/1 speedlings. He threw approximately one billion waves against Parting and just barely held until the spines show up and save the day. I remember I half-cheered and half-giggled as I watched these spines run up the ramp and into the main to save the day. But Suppy did what no other Zerg at the tournament could do: he held and defeated Parting’s immortal all-in.

USA!

USA!

#2)

Sen vs

HerO
Day 2 – Round of 8 – Game 4 – Cloud Kingdom

Sen and Hero play until they have the classic ZvP compositions: Zerg with BroodLord/Infestor vs the Protoss deathball/mothership. And there are all the usual components: Dancing for position, slow clump-y units, tension, and the inevitable conclusion of an archon toilet. Sen was especially turtle-y since he was behind most of the game. The armies had danced for a while outside Sen’s fourth; the base that is closer to the third rather than the exposed fourth south of the natural. Our Taiwanese hero had a huge line of spine crawlers setup near the base. Hero danced until he saved up two vortexes and then drops them. But look what happened:

Look carefully at the spine crawlers and where they are in relation to the vortexes. You can see how Sen was spraying out beach balls left and right. Keep in mind that Hero was ahead for most of this game. At the moment he’s up twenty-five supply with a healthy bank.

Then we all got a massive knowledge bomb when Hero’s archons and army couldn’t move forward to jump into the vortex. Since the vortexes were on the area where the spines were, the spines occupied space inside the vortex. That occupation as well as the infested terrans that were spat inside made it so the vortex had no more room to accommodate the archons. So instead, they watched the spinning blue thing….from outside. When the vortexes stopped and the Swarm emerged, the spines and BL’s all fired at the same time. Hero’s army literally evaporated and Sen found himself ahead by fifty supply. Remember, he started the fight behind twenty-five supply. Sen would go on to win.

#1) (P)

PartinG’s Immortal/Warp Prism Micro
Any game he does his WonWonWon immortal all-in

As the name implies, this build is all about the immortals. The sentries and zealots make a wall for the immortals to wreck shit. The stalkers help to augment the immortals firepower, so they can wreck shit. (Side note, even if the stalkers don’t do too much damage, it’s like the immortals have their own Praetorian Guard. This is also badass.) And the warp prism allows Parting to keep his immortals alive so they can continue to wreck shit. How did Parting survive Suppy’s billion wave Zerg defense? He has ridiculous immortal/warp prism micro. The prism can pick up and drop off the immortals. So if Zerg tries to surround them with lings, he can just pick them up and wait for a safer moment or maneuver his FF/zealot walls into place to better protect the immortals. It’s very, very reminiscent of reaver drop micro from BroodWar.

Nony being a boss and showing noobs how to reaver drop.

Parting’s control is just insane. The hot pickups and re-positioning are so sexy. For us plebs, Day[9] devoted an entire Daily to executing the build and was kind enough to slow the replay down. Take a look at the slow-mo micro in action.

#1 BadAss Play. Go watch some VODs from BWC if you want to see more of this

The Idra picture is by Antoine from TeamLiquid. The picture of the Hero’s vortexes at Sen’s base is a screenshot I took. The small thumbnail pictures are from Liqupedia. The credits for the videos can be found in the YouTube videos

CPTBadAss' BadAss Moments of WCS

Completed

Ongoing

Upcoming