EPT
Two more series finished up signaling the end of the quarterfinals. The first series saw Team GuemChi come out on top shutting out Team Sea 3-0 through some funky games and strong teamplay. The second series between Team Bisu and Team Mind went to a game 4 with sSak grabbing the victory beating Rush on Outsider. With the quarterfinals concluded, now it's time for the semifinals. Only 4 teams are left: Team Flash, Team Bisu, Team GuemChi and Team BeSt.
Team Flash vs Team BeSt and Team Bisu vs Team GuemChi are the opening series for the semifinals and will be played in that order over this weekend. Keep in mind that the semifinals is dual tournament format. In other words, a team that loses their opening series will get a chance at redemption and can still advance to the finals. With the games set to start in , read on for a recap of the last two quarterfinal series by c3rberUs and a preview of Team Flash vs Team BeSt and Team Bisu vs Team GuemChi by FlaShFTW and BLinD-RawR respectively.
Let's make some noise!
What the team names don't imply here is that aside maybe from Terror, these teams are not dominated by one personality as in Team FlaSh, Team Mind or Team Bisu. Rather, Team IamMang (GuemChi) is a resurrected skeletal leftover from Woongjin Stars while Team Sea is an exclusive famous-only-Afreeca-BJ-Club.
The first set's outcome shouldn't be hard to guess with PianO and Terror taking the seat for their respective teams. In their game, PianO opted for a 3-barracks sparks terran-esque timing push. The push was able to shut down mining at the natural and basically crippled Terror even after the mutas cleaned up the mess. Desperation set in really quick so he opted for some burrow ling tactics and the obligatory last-ditch all-out attack -- both of which went horribly wrong so that meant that he was still dead meat.
Game two started off as a rocky affair. What started as a simple gas steal turned into an all-in bunker rush. Well, it wasn't really all that all-in but the bunker rush spring-boarded a legitimate firebat runby- yes, you read that right. Things continued to be scrappy well into the midgame because Sea decided to pressure to capitalize on his better economic situation. But somehow, GuemChi was able to leverage some nice double-reaver, buying him time to add carriers. The game stabilized and dragged on late with both players jockeying for the untaken expos at the top and bottom. It was a phase filled with more unit movement than actual fighting until GuemChi was able to win decisively in an engagement just off his third base, allowing him to sweep Sea's bottom expos and get the win.
My first impression was that Soulkey needs to eat. His face looked devoid of muscle mass. I'm a thin guy myself but Soulkey looked like he hasn't eaten for days. Anyway, ex-Woongjin spawned in the 12 and 11 positions while Afreeca Club spawned at 6 and 7. Afreeca Club got map control first by containing ex-Woonjin right outside their natural. There was little movement in the map aside from Terror and Soulkey's mutas. And then a coordinated drop swiftly got rid of Terror. This left Shuttle to carry on. He did an admirable job but in the end, it was futile.
Team GuemChi wins 3-0 to advance to the semifinalsl
![[image loading]](/staff/v1/atb/season1/atb_week2_recap2.jpg)
I find it a bit funny to see how despite their fame/reputation, Bisu and Mind's teams both have the scene's bottom-rung players (no offense, they're still pretty good imo. Just bad relative to their colleagues). Bisu and Mind themselves are quite far from their world-class nerd-slaying form back in ~2015 so that added to the weirdness of this match as well.
Ahh, it's been quite some time since I've seen Tyson in real games. With the saturation and generally good condition for Protoss these days, it's no wonder he's gotten a bit sidetracked. Tyson started with a dragoon-range build and was able to contain Britney, who went reaver first. The investment was there for Britney, but two downed shuttle-reavers later, he was still at zero return. After a long 1-base standoff, Tyson finally added a natural so it was die or break out for Britney. Then things took a turn for the hilarious -- Britney of course ordered everyone down the ramp but his shuttle-reaver got too far ahead. Guess what happened? *Sniped. Then Tyson planted two nexus/nexii for some BM. GG.
The team aces were out early and it was no surprise that Bisu went for the proxy gate (maybe we can call this the Bisu Build now). Mind was prepared with a tailor-made sim city and it worked pretty well. The defining moment of this game was when a goon poke turned into goon soup courtesy of mines. A domino effect then ensued as Mind abused Bisu's depleted dragoon count to take out several probes. This severely slowed Bisu down even more and allowed Mind to breeze through on his way to the win.
In the third set, the ace players decided to call their 'zerg' backups to play with them. Team Bisu spawned close to each other while Team Mind spawned quite far from each other. Nevertheless, it was Team Mind who took action first and tried to wall off sSak. Both teams contested the site and initially, it looked like Team Mind's wall was going to rise up and be secure. Bisu ran out of zealots and sSak's lings dwindled as well. But then, probes were pulled and the tide suddenly turned on Team Mind. The ending was swift when Team Bisu's forces walked into Mind's base, ending the game.
Expecting out-of-the-ordinary stuff when a TvT is played on Outsider is a reasonable one. And indeed we got treated to one. Starting things off, we had a proxy factory from Rush and a wraith into drop build from sSak. Either sSak researched this map very well or his tactics are carry-overs from the time they actually played in this map but his treatment of the map was astoundingly great. He was able to use his air supremacy to deny almost every expo attempt by Rush while adding more of his own -- at the highest gap, sSak was ahead by three bases (6:3). Looking at the big picture, the game was a one-sided clobbering from the SSL10 champion but the novelty of the game made it fun and entertaining.
Team Bisu wins 3-1 to advance to the semifinals!
The first set's outcome shouldn't be hard to guess with PianO and Terror taking the seat for their respective teams. In their game, PianO opted for a 3-barracks sparks terran-esque timing push. The push was able to shut down mining at the natural and basically crippled Terror even after the mutas cleaned up the mess. Desperation set in really quick so he opted for some burrow ling tactics and the obligatory last-ditch all-out attack -- both of which went horribly wrong so that meant that he was still dead meat.
Game two started off as a rocky affair. What started as a simple gas steal turned into an all-in bunker rush. Well, it wasn't really all that all-in but the bunker rush spring-boarded a legitimate firebat runby- yes, you read that right. Things continued to be scrappy well into the midgame because Sea decided to pressure to capitalize on his better economic situation. But somehow, GuemChi was able to leverage some nice double-reaver, buying him time to add carriers. The game stabilized and dragged on late with both players jockeying for the untaken expos at the top and bottom. It was a phase filled with more unit movement than actual fighting until GuemChi was able to win decisively in an engagement just off his third base, allowing him to sweep Sea's bottom expos and get the win.
My first impression was that Soulkey needs to eat. His face looked devoid of muscle mass. I'm a thin guy myself but Soulkey looked like he hasn't eaten for days. Anyway, ex-Woongjin spawned in the 12 and 11 positions while Afreeca Club spawned at 6 and 7. Afreeca Club got map control first by containing ex-Woonjin right outside their natural. There was little movement in the map aside from Terror and Soulkey's mutas. And then a coordinated drop swiftly got rid of Terror. This left Shuttle to carry on. He did an admirable job but in the end, it was futile.
Team GuemChi wins 3-0 to advance to the semifinalsl
Ahh, it's been quite some time since I've seen Tyson in real games. With the saturation and generally good condition for Protoss these days, it's no wonder he's gotten a bit sidetracked. Tyson started with a dragoon-range build and was able to contain Britney, who went reaver first. The investment was there for Britney, but two downed shuttle-reavers later, he was still at zero return. After a long 1-base standoff, Tyson finally added a natural so it was die or break out for Britney. Then things took a turn for the hilarious -- Britney of course ordered everyone down the ramp but his shuttle-reaver got too far ahead. Guess what happened? *Sniped. Then Tyson planted two nexus/nexii for some BM. GG.
The team aces were out early and it was no surprise that Bisu went for the proxy gate (maybe we can call this the Bisu Build now). Mind was prepared with a tailor-made sim city and it worked pretty well. The defining moment of this game was when a goon poke turned into goon soup courtesy of mines. A domino effect then ensued as Mind abused Bisu's depleted dragoon count to take out several probes. This severely slowed Bisu down even more and allowed Mind to breeze through on his way to the win.
In the third set, the ace players decided to call their 'zerg' backups to play with them. Team Bisu spawned close to each other while Team Mind spawned quite far from each other. Nevertheless, it was Team Mind who took action first and tried to wall off sSak. Both teams contested the site and initially, it looked like Team Mind's wall was going to rise up and be secure. Bisu ran out of zealots and sSak's lings dwindled as well. But then, probes were pulled and the tide suddenly turned on Team Mind. The ending was swift when Team Bisu's forces walked into Mind's base, ending the game.
Expecting out-of-the-ordinary stuff when a TvT is played on Outsider is a reasonable one. And indeed we got treated to one. Starting things off, we had a proxy factory from Rush and a wraith into drop build from sSak. Either sSak researched this map very well or his tactics are carry-overs from the time they actually played in this map but his treatment of the map was astoundingly great. He was able to use his air supremacy to deny almost every expo attempt by Rush while adding more of his own -- at the highest gap, sSak was ahead by three bases (6:3). Looking at the big picture, the game was a one-sided clobbering from the SSL10 champion but the novelty of the game made it fun and entertaining.
Team Bisu wins 3-1 to advance to the semifinals!
The captain, 
Flash, once again leads his team off in the team battles in yet another TvZ. 
MIsO was sent out again here on Blue Storm for Team BeSt so if they wanted to throw away a free win somewhere, they certainly found it. FlaSh’s TvZ is still scary strong, crushing the sponmatches with an ungodly 41-11 record (78.8%) win rate. He’s also 4-1 over MisO in these matches and this is indicative of what the matchup will look like. That being said, Blue Storm is not your typical map and the infamous 5 rax build may not be in the game plan for FlaSh. Either way, his other non-5 rax builds are still stupidly strong and I don’t see him slowing down. However, MisO did pull off an impressive ling all-in against Stork, but I don’t think FlaSh will fall for the same tricks. I do have this nagging feeling in the back of my mind though that MisO is going to upset FlaSh here...
Rain vs BeSt on Outsider will be an action packed game with shuttle control being the focus. Rain has recently been on a monster stomp lately, winning the HoSic Starleague and even 3-0'd free in the Quarterfinals. His play has been pretty stellar and he’s only continuing to improve. BeSt was a previous semi-finalist and a near finalist, barely losing to Sea, 2-3 in ASL2. BeSt hasn’t had the greatest PvP performance in the post-KeSPA era, with only a 5-8 record, but he’s been slowly improving his play all around and his late game macro is still scary. On Outsider, his macro might not be as important as intelligent and clever strategies tend to be rewarded. Rain’s shuttle play left a bit to be desired in his matchup with Free, but his overall decision making and dragoon micro was stellar. I’ve got Rain to win.
Ahhhh the 2v2 matchup, always my favorite. FlaSh is taking a seat for this and lettingLast take his spot, who will be taking over the Zerg slot. Light and MisO are once again duoing it up with Light going random instead of Terran this time. Looks like the ⅓ chance of ZZ is too good to pass up. I don’t know how I feel about the Last switch, the synergy might not be there with Rain and Last, but maybe FlaSh just wasn’t cutting it in 2v2 practice so Last will take up the mantle. I’m going to have to give the advantage to the actual Zerg player with a potential random chance for ZZ.
The 4th set will be betweenLast and Light on Fighting Spirit and there’s a clear advantage going in. Last, the TvT specialist boasting a 70% win rate will be duking it out against a mediocre TvTer with a 43% win rate. Fighting Spirit is a fairly standard map so I don’t expect any gimmicks here. Last should be able to take a fairly clean win over Light on this map.
Ace match if it gets there will obviously be FlaSh vs Best, the classic rivalry between the two macro titans. With the ace match on Circuit Breaker, you can only think of flashbacks to the SPL Ace match where FlaSh thrashed a helpless BeSt to allow KT to take home the cup (Yes I’m only saying this to agonize you SKT fans). Anyways, FlaSh is God and BeSt lost to Sea of all people in a semifinals because hey look, I don’t know how to use carriers (God, SKT protoss need to stop using carriers and let Samsung show them the way).
Team FlaSh wins 3-1 to advance to the winners' match!
![[image loading]](/staff/v1/atb/season1/atb_week3_preview2.jpg)
Opening the series, Tyson gets another PvP after his decent showing against Britney last week. This time against the captain of the opposition, GuemChi on Blue Storm. PvP on Blue Storm isn't particularly special as a matchup and unlike Britney, GuemChi is a serious contender and usually a Top 8 player (why he's a team captain). He should crush Tyson with relative ease.
Who's hot? Bisu’s not! Kudos to anyone who gets the reference. He continues to show a decline in his play. Of course, PvZ is his bread n’ butter and while he hasn't shown the spark of the proleague killer he used to be, Soulkey would be the best opponent he could ask for to show that he still got it. Moreso, when the map is Outsider where historically, PvZ has been hard on. That said, Soulkey has been playing pretty well on stream and Outsider is a Zerg favoured map. Considering the fact that Bisu isn't willing to try to play a longer game in offline matches, I'd say that if Soulkey’s early game is on point, he will win.
We got a TZ mirror match for our 2v2 and this one is really close on the team chemistry front with it being ex-Stars vs ex-SKT. I'd give team SKT a slight disadvantage on the account that Bisu is the only player in this match offracing (as Zerg). On the other hand, Bisu’s Zerg is pretty good so it might just even out. Don't expect a super long game, this might be done in under 10 mins.
We come to match 4 on Fighting Spirit with PianO vs sSak. While sSak only played 14 TvTs this last month, he did beat Last 2-0 who along with Flash have the best TvT ever. So, taking that into account and the fact that this game is on Fighting Spirit, I'll say that sSak has this in the bag pretty easily.
Ace Match: Fully expect Stars to send out Soulkey to face up against the opponent captain Bisu. Both players play damn well in the matchup on Circuit Breaker. I expect Bisu to try to play a much more economical game with Soulkey being the more aggressive player who will try to keep Bisu from expanding and getting a foothold on the map especially over at the 12/6 base.
Team Bisu wins 3-2 to advance to the winners' match!
Flash, once again leads his team off in the team battles in yet another TvZ. MIsO was sent out again here on Blue Storm for Team BeSt so if they wanted to throw away a free win somewhere, they certainly found it. FlaSh’s TvZ is still scary strong, crushing the sponmatches with an ungodly 41-11 record (78.8%) win rate. He’s also 4-1 over MisO in these matches and this is indicative of what the matchup will look like. That being said, Blue Storm is not your typical map and the infamous 5 rax build may not be in the game plan for FlaSh. Either way, his other non-5 rax builds are still stupidly strong and I don’t see him slowing down. However, MisO did pull off an impressive ling all-in against Stork, but I don’t think FlaSh will fall for the same tricks. I do have this nagging feeling in the back of my mind though that MisO is going to upset FlaSh here...Rain vs BeSt on Outsider will be an action packed game with shuttle control being the focus. Rain has recently been on a monster stomp lately, winning the HoSic Starleague and even 3-0'd free in the Quarterfinals. His play has been pretty stellar and he’s only continuing to improve. BeSt was a previous semi-finalist and a near finalist, barely losing to Sea, 2-3 in ASL2. BeSt hasn’t had the greatest PvP performance in the post-KeSPA era, with only a 5-8 record, but he’s been slowly improving his play all around and his late game macro is still scary. On Outsider, his macro might not be as important as intelligent and clever strategies tend to be rewarded. Rain’s shuttle play left a bit to be desired in his matchup with Free, but his overall decision making and dragoon micro was stellar. I’ve got Rain to win.Ahhhh the 2v2 matchup, always my favorite. FlaSh is taking a seat for this and letting
Last take his spot, who will be taking over the Zerg slot. Light and MisO are once again duoing it up with Light going random instead of Terran this time. Looks like the ⅓ chance of ZZ is too good to pass up. I don’t know how I feel about the Last switch, the synergy might not be there with Rain and Last, but maybe FlaSh just wasn’t cutting it in 2v2 practice so Last will take up the mantle. I’m going to have to give the advantage to the actual Zerg player with a potential random chance for ZZ.
The 4th set will be between
Last and Light on Fighting Spirit and there’s a clear advantage going in. Last, the TvT specialist boasting a 70% win rate will be duking it out against a mediocre TvTer with a 43% win rate. Fighting Spirit is a fairly standard map so I don’t expect any gimmicks here. Last should be able to take a fairly clean win over Light on this map. Ace match if it gets there will obviously be FlaSh vs Best, the classic rivalry between the two macro titans. With the ace match on Circuit Breaker, you can only think of flashbacks to the SPL Ace match where FlaSh thrashed a helpless BeSt to allow KT to take home the cup (Yes I’m only saying this to agonize you SKT fans). Anyways, FlaSh is God and BeSt lost to Sea of all people in a semifinals because hey look, I don’t know how to use carriers (God, SKT protoss need to stop using carriers and let Samsung show them the way).
Team FlaSh wins 3-1 to advance to the winners' match!
Opening the series, Tyson gets another PvP after his decent showing against Britney last week. This time against the captain of the opposition, GuemChi on Blue Storm. PvP on Blue Storm isn't particularly special as a matchup and unlike Britney, GuemChi is a serious contender and usually a Top 8 player (why he's a team captain). He should crush Tyson with relative ease.
Who's hot? Bisu’s not! Kudos to anyone who gets the reference. He continues to show a decline in his play. Of course, PvZ is his bread n’ butter and while he hasn't shown the spark of the proleague killer he used to be, Soulkey would be the best opponent he could ask for to show that he still got it. Moreso, when the map is Outsider where historically, PvZ has been hard on. That said, Soulkey has been playing pretty well on stream and Outsider is a Zerg favoured map. Considering the fact that Bisu isn't willing to try to play a longer game in offline matches, I'd say that if Soulkey’s early game is on point, he will win.
We got a TZ mirror match for our 2v2 and this one is really close on the team chemistry front with it being ex-Stars vs ex-SKT. I'd give team SKT a slight disadvantage on the account that Bisu is the only player in this match offracing (as Zerg). On the other hand, Bisu’s Zerg is pretty good so it might just even out. Don't expect a super long game, this might be done in under 10 mins.
We come to match 4 on Fighting Spirit with PianO vs sSak. While sSak only played 14 TvTs this last month, he did beat Last 2-0 who along with Flash have the best TvT ever. So, taking that into account and the fact that this game is on Fighting Spirit, I'll say that sSak has this in the bag pretty easily.
Ace Match: Fully expect Stars to send out Soulkey to face up against the opponent captain Bisu. Both players play damn well in the matchup on Circuit Breaker. I expect Bisu to try to play a much more economical game with Soulkey being the more aggressive player who will try to keep Bisu from expanding and getting a foothold on the map especially over at the 12/6 base.
Team Bisu wins 3-2 to advance to the winners' match!
Writers: c3rberUs, BLinD-RawR, FlaShFTW, BigFan
Graphics: Nixer, v1
Editors: BigFan
Photo Credits: Afreeca, Liquipedia
Graphics: Nixer, v1
Editors: BigFan
Photo Credits: Afreeca, Liquipedia
