A word from the organizer

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After a couple of months of heated competition we have finished yet another edition of TeamLiquid Legacy Starleague. Even though it's only our second season, running TLS has become a routine that we continue to nurture and polish. With the great eagerness to improve and expand our support for Brood War community, I've got to admit that we've suffered a small shortage of manpower this season. It's summer time I know, but seeing as BW community is full of amazing and talented people, I'd like to use this introduction as an invitation to apply to be a part of BW staff here at TL by sending me a message and mentioning your area of expertize (whether it's writing, organizing, graphics, doing menial work, etc.).

Exactly eight months ago we announced our plan to provide regular and high quality support of BW scene through a series of tournaments; BW deserves no less. As promised, we will hold one more regular season of TeamLiquid Legacy Starleague, after which we will organize a Championship Tournament with at least $2,000 in prizes and other amazing things. All in all, my point is that while the BW scene might not have the glory and riches the more popular games might have, there's no reason not to have a healthy and competitive amateur scene which we intend to support as long as there are players playing this beautiful game.

With all that being said, I'd like to congratulate the winner of TLS Season 2, Sziky, for defending his title and proving to be the final boss of the foreign BW scene. TechnicS and Julia get a special mention as well for reaching the second and third place, respectively; as well as every other player who participated in the TLS Season 2, from open qualifiers to the group stages.

Season 3 of TLS is coming soon so I hope you're all practicing hard (especially Protoss and Terrans!) and we get another awesome season of BW to watch. See you soon and remember:

BW has a life of lively to live to life of full life thx 2 shieldbattery.

-- 2Pacalypse-






In the first game of the third place match between the Zerg player, Julia, and the Terran played, TerrOr, both players went to two bases, and Julia angled towards the development of lurker drop capability against TerrOr’s barracks play. TerrOr was able to ferret out the Zerg player’s plans, and he immediately began to build anti-air defenses in an attempt to ward off the drop threat. Seeing this, Julia was content to build more hydralisks and transitioned to a more conventional plan of attack; this was supplemented with the use of stop lurkers outside of the Terran base, which met some success despite the Terran player having researched infantry armor. As the mid game developed, Julia took the top half of the map while TerrOr remained in the bottom right corner. The classic duel between defilers and science vessels ensued. With good plague control, Julia seemed to get the upper hand against his opponent, and he launched a large assault on the Terran player as soon as ultralisks and guardians were out on the map. TerrOr’s science vessel control really suffered in the late game, as he lost a significant number of them in lapses of attention. Despite having the supply advantage throughout the game, Julia simply got the better out of each and every engagement on the map and he was able to sustain these engagements almost non-stop until the very end when he took the first game against TerrOr.

In the second game, which was played on Match Point, Julia’s early zergling aggression was checked with a solid Terran wall, and the focus of the game shifted to the mutalisk play. After achieving a bit of success with the mutalisks early on in the game, TerrOr was eventually able to drive back and destroy the mutalisks that were out on the map with a combination of good control as well as inattention on the part of the Zerg player. Having completed the task of defending against the air units, TerrOr went on the offensive and began a final attack which culminated in a win after Julia lost all of his lurkers and hydralisks in an attempt to save the base at the top left corner position of the map.

The third game featured Julia going for three-hatchery lurker on Wind and Cloud. In response, TerrOr developed drop capability and caught Julia off guard before a spire could be completed for scourge defenses. While this was driven off by the Zerg player, TerrOr was able to get an advantage as the mid game developed after being able to stop Julia’s stop lurker attempts and initiating harassment at the bottom right Zerg base positions. The harassment proved to be too much for Julia to handle, along with the substantial economic resources required to sustain the tech path that the Zerg player chose, and he left the game while blaming his loss on the lag in-game.

The fourth game, which was played on Outsider, started off on the wrong foot for Julia, as his expansion attempt was blocked by an engineering bay in the early game. After TerrOr set himself up in a position of contain just outside of the Zerg base, Julia began to develop drop capability with lurkers and slow overlords. The drop was successful in getting TerrOr to waste a scan and in getting the Terran player to lose a number of units and workers to the lurkers. The lurker harass continued unabated for a number of minutes, leaving TerrOr confined to a single base as Julia sat on three bases, until the Terran player was finally able to get science vessels out on the map with irradiate and defensive matrix to help defend against the Zerg onslaught, but not before Julia was able to infest a Terran command center with a queen. TerrOr’s problems began to compound as further lurker drops did a devastating number on the Terran worker count in the main and infested terrans began to be dropped into the Terran base. After a long, slow death with TerrOr doggedly remaining in the game in the face of numerous debilitating setbacks, TerrOr finally left the game after completely mining out all of the resources left available to him on the map.

The third place match came down to a final and deciding game that was set on Fighting Spirit. In that final game, Julia seized map control and prevented his Terran opponent from getting a critical third base as the mid game developed. TerrOr attempted to break out of his base and take the fight to Julia, but this attempt faltered in the face of dark swarm and plague. When the ultralisks came out on the field, it spelled the final doom of TerrOr in the Teamliquid Legacy Starleague and marked Julia taking third place overall in the tournament.



In the first game of the series between the Zerg players Sziky and TechnicS, played on Jade, both players opened with identical builds, but TechnicS was able to gain air control against Sziky despite the appearance of scourge and having a disadvantage in the zergling count for the ground-side battle. As the extended air battle continued between the competing packs of mutalisks and scourge, Sizky ended up losing all of his mutalisks and had to type out of the game.

The second game of the series took place on Match Point, and, in that game, TechnicS opened with an in-base hatchery on twelve against Sziky’s spawning pool on twelve with an expansion at the natural. TechnicS took an expansion and built a long conga line of zerglings to block access to his base. After reaching a suitable number of zerglings, TechnicS sent that conga line out to Sziky’s base in an attack on the natural, with some scourge support in an attempt to kill Sziky’s mutalisks. The attack was not very successful, however, and Sziky went ahead and attacked TechnicS. Sziky overwhelmed his opponent with his mutalisks and scourge and he thus took the second game of the series in short order.

The third and fourth game of the series were over in short order. In the third game, which was played on Wind and Cloud, after TechnicS pulled off a masterful defense against Sziky’s mutalisks and scourge with a mutalisk and scourge force of his own. TechnicS carried the advantage throughout what was left of the game, and was once again one game ahead of his opponent at the end of the game. In the fourth game of the series, which was played on Fighting Spirit, Sziky opened with a nine-pool build against twelve-hatchery and enjoyed what was largely a build order victory on both the ground and on the air fronts.

Outsider was the setting for the fifth game of the series, with both players tied at two wins apiece overall in the series. In that game, the two players jockeyed for position just outside of Sziky’s ramp, with Sziky on the high ground and TechnicS occupying the low ground. TechnicS attacked straight into the ramp after a short bit of time, and lost every single one of his zerglings in the attempt. After a small counterattack on the part of Sziky, both players took expansions. However, Sziky was able to catch TechnicS off guard on both the air and ground at the natural, and he took a third win in the series.

A game away from overall victory in the tournament, Sziky opened, on Jade, with a nine pool against TechnicS’ hatchery expansion on twelve. After seeing Sziky’s initial zerglings, TechnicS cancelled the expansion and sat in his base for defense. Content with the development, Sziky set up in a position of contain just outside of the base of TechnicS. During a small interlude in which it was discovered on the live broadcast that drones oftentimes sought out irregular pathing in order to gather minerals and gas, both players built up their mutalisk and scourge numbers, and TechnicS took a third base. After having seen the third base under construction, Sziky moved out to attack his opponent before TechnicS could seal the deal with his economic advantage. Caught between the zerglings at his third and the mutalisk and scourge group at his natural, TechnicS had a moment of indecision that allowed Sziky the crucial time to take out the third base with his ground forces. A short while later, Sziky put all of his cards on the table and committed to a huge mutalisk and scourge engagement against his opponent at the center point equidistant from the third, the natural, and the main base of TechnicS. Sziky was able to kill off the entirety of TechnicS’ air forces, and took the victory in this game, the series, and the Teamliquid Legacy Starleague.











With the conclusion of the second TLS, Sziky has once again shown that this tournament is simply a contest for second place. The $300 first prize just goes to him automatically. The question now becomes, how do you stop Sziky? Or should TLS simply just write the cheques to Sziky ahead of time?

TechnicS is the first obvious candidate as he was the one who beat everyone else to reach the final boss platform. He managed to take a surprising 2-1 lead before Sziky decided he had put the crowd in enough suspense and took the win. Just prior to their finals match, TechnicS had brought up the idea of a potential map position imbalance on Jade. While he was able to take the initial win off Sziky on Jade, things did not fare well enough for TechnicS the second time around on the same map.

While it would’ve have been great if TechnicS could have taken the finals from Sziky, what would have been even better would be a non-Zerg take anywhere close to top 3. Skzlime was the Terran hope with his strong TvZ. While rumors of him not being as strong were somewhat disproven given his 3rd place finish last TLS, it resurfaced up again following his 3-0 loss to Julia. I feel wrong to unknowingly judge, but all three of those games felt very disappointing, had a lack of overall game plan and poor preparation by skzlime. With his loss in the Round of 8, he will be forced to start from the Round of 24 next season instead of the Round of 16. After his performance this TLS, skzlime would need more practice and preparation if he hopes to stand against Sziky.

I initially only thought to cover one player from each race, but another player definitely deserves mention as a potential Sziky killer after his performance this TLS. That and I’m biased towards Terran anyways :D. TerrOr fell to Michael in the first TLS in the Round of 8. However, since then he’s been playing great; convincingly advancing first out of his group in the Round of 16 with wins over skzlime and Ramms, and then advancing all the way to the semifinals by taking out Michael 3-2 in a rematch in the Round of 16. Although he couldn’t quite stop the Zerg 1, 2, 3 finish in the 3rd/4th place match, TerrOr put up quite the fight going down to Julia 3-2. If he keeps up this level of play, he will definitely be a terrorfying* Terran to watch out for!

Last but not least, (because my knowledge of Brood War players goes about as deep as an alpha particle’s radiation) we have dRaW! A big fan favourite and a very strong Protoss player, dRaW had to go through one hell of a Round of 16 group where he almost beat Sziky in a best of three. In fact, he was such a big fan favourite, my friends would’ve rather watched his Round of 8 game vs TechnicS than watch anime with me! I’ve since repayed that favour by not finding time to watch that anime with them… jerks, j/k. Tangent aside, as one of the last Protoss in the tournament, he’s helping to build a reputation of only one Protoss making it to the Round of 8 and losing after dewalt did the same thing in the first TLS. When asked whether or not he could beat Sziky, dRaW calmly replied “ye ofc, I can beat anyone” (including Flash). With confidence like that, it will only be a matter of time before Sziky falls! Hopefully it will be soon rather than later.

*I swear that’s the last time I’ll use that pun!

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That's all for now! Keep a close eye on the TeamLiquid Legacy Starleague Season 3 announcement. And as always a big thanks to our sponsors: