On October 23 2017 02:18 Ganfei2 wrote: I think Kwark's analysis is entirely right. Also, enough with the tired argument that a commentator cannot possibly assess what a progamer did wrong in a game. No, Kwark doesn't need to translate it to Korean and send it to Rain. Think about how silly that statement is. Rain did play poorly. Progamers aren't infallible beings.
Anyone with an understanding of what they're watching would be throwing their hands up asking why Rain is suiciding 200/200 armies into huge static defense against a Zerg that is doing nothing but turtling, while the P has complete map control, a huge supply advantage, and untaken expansions all over the place. Rain's play reminded me of my own, i.e. impatience is my greatest weakness.
The "quit starcraft" etc. comments are a bit much but I don't think it's serious. I assume Rain will learn from his mistakes. I have no doubt he's analyzed the replays and come to many of the same conclusions that Kwark himself did.
Rain did not play poorly.
Kwark's analysis seems centered on the idea that with Rain up bases or even bases all he had to do was defend and win. I couldn't disagree more. I've posted it before, but I'll post again because it's highly relevant:
Bisu vs Larva (11:30)
This game has Larva go quickly down from serious mistakes, unable to make units and forced to sunken heavily. By the time he can even consider moving out Bisu has a full six functional bases to Larva's four. Without Larva ever killing or preventing a Bisu base, Larva is still able to pull the game out; from a SIX base protoss against his 4. Not just that...the best protoss of all.
Rain wasn't attacking because he doesn't know how to play PvZ, he was attacking primarily because he knows that he can't hope to win a longer game against a man that can defend like that.
Those attacks by Rain only look stupid because Kwark's erroneous thinking that Rain could just sit back and "be ahead" against Larva. On even bases Rain never wins. Those busts aren't very good odds, and usually end in disaster; but Rain clearly understands that he has a better chance of breaking Larva before he is absolutely entrenched than letting Larva secure his defense and max unit supply.
I'd actually nerdgasm if bisu had MC'd the SCV and made a few tanks in that game.
While I do agree that Rain had advantages in game 3 and 4, and that his poor decision making when it came to what to do with his army lost him those games, I still would have liked more attention drawn to Larva's defense in the write-up. Rain often tries to drop while attacking, and throughout the entire series, Larva only let one drop do significant damage. He always had scourge in the right place, he always had his drones pulled, and if he was even SLIGHTLY worse at it, Rain's decision making wouldn't have mattered.
Whether you agree with my point of view or not, (Maybe you think that Larva's defense was unimpressive, that's your prerogative) I still think the write-up was too vicious at points, and focused far too much on one single player in a two person match.
It's unfortunate the Larva's brilliancy is being reduced as a bad game from rain. As someone else said, the battle report can be summarized as "Rain lost, Rain is a bad player" with a few uncalled for insults. I try to understand this as the writers frustration that the player he wants to win lost the game, I don't know.
But I will try to explain the problem with his observation. The maps heavily favor turtling as there are naturals in the back and the center mineral fields can easily be weaved together once the army produced by the initial 3 hatch base is up. This is the main reason Larva always went for the quick second natural and mass sunken macro hatch sim city. Even at even base counts, Larva is under no great pressure since he can simply grow his army while ensuring he defends from drops, and keeps an eye on strategic areas of the map. Once the econ kicks in, he can trade lings, hydras, and lurkers and expand two more bases and turtle up some more. For a player like Larva, who was baptized in fire in ZvP by Bisu, this is a huge advantage.
This is the reason why Rain felt the need to stop Larva from getting bigger and stronger. The repeated attack to the natural was necessary, as it does a double purpose of letting in the actual game crucial maneuver of dropping HTs and DTs to kill workers. Unfortunately for Rain, both his natural harass and drop failed. And this has to be said, Rain made like 20 drop attempts all series, and I think only one accomplished anything. His shuttles were either scourged in transit, or the drones were all gone long before any damage could be made.
There was no point in the game during the exchanges where Rain could have felt he was winning, even with 100% map control. This is an easy miscalculation committed by the writer as it did in fact seem to be winning already for Rain. But even in that engagement where Rain ended up with 50+ supply advantage, Larva was still pumping out of 4-5 bases, and Rain, when he did manage to successfully harass the workers, did so in the most useless of bases.
There were a few errors from both side but it is inaccurate to say Rain is a bad player. With Larva's almost impeccable play that series, or everytime he plays ZvP, Rain has to go for momentum and cannot, as the writer said, just wait until Larva starved.
I disagree with the assessment that Larva had room to grow if Rain had focused on denying Larva a 5th and maintaining map control, rather than trying to break Larva when he was on four bases. Take the Fighting Spirit game for example. Larva needed to take a 5th on a high ground to be even remotely competitive that game, and as anyone who has played on Fighting Spirit will tell you, those high grounds are damn near impossible to take off of a Protoss with a late game army because cannons don't cost supply and are fucking bullshit while high templar storm works perfectly against dark swarm.
Larva was good enough to hold on against Rain's constant macro attacks for two of their games, unlike (I'm assuming) the majority of practice partners Rain had (because logically if Rain had been losing all of his games in practice by throwing mass zealots at lurkers then he wouldn't still be doing it). But he wasn't good enough to not fall seriously behind. Take a look at 18 minutes in to game 4, after the storm and dt play. Larva is dead. 110% dead. Neither player deserved to win that game because both players got beaten thoroughly by Rain.
Edit: Also as much as I am arguing my point here, I completely welcome all the disagreement I'm getting in the comment section. You're all bw fans and I'm glad we care enough to disagree on the tournament we're all watching.
On October 23 2017 22:38 KwarK wrote: I disagree with the assessment that Larva had room to grow if Rain had focused on denying Larva a 5th and maintaining map control, rather than trying to break Larva when he was on four bases. Take the Fighting Spirit game for example. Larva needed to take a 5th on a high ground to be even remotely competitive that game, and as anyone who has played on Fighting Spirit will tell you, those high grounds are damn near impossible to take off of a Protoss with a late game army because cannons don't cost supply and are fucking bullshit while high templar storm works perfectly against dark swarm.
Larva was good enough to hold on against Rain's constant macro attacks for two of their games, unlike (I'm assuming) the majority of practice partners Rain had (because logically if Rain had been losing all of his games in practice by throwing mass zealots at lurkers then he wouldn't still be doing it). But he wasn't good enough to not fall seriously behind. Take a look at 18 minutes in to game 4, after the storm and dt play. Larva is dead. 110% dead. Neither player deserved to win that game because both players got beaten thoroughly by Rain.
Edit: Also as much as I am arguing my point here, I completely welcome all the disagreement I'm getting in the comment section. You're all bw fans and I'm glad we care enough to disagree on the tournament we're all watching.
First, the edit part is a given. Anyone who disagrees with that does not even deserve to be in the discussion. Thanks for your enthusiasm for the game we all love as well, regardless of our disagreements.
So now, I rewatched game 4 upon your suggestion, specifically 18 mins onwards. Here's what happened: - HT drops at nat (@10), kills 10+ workers - DTs in the main (@11), another 8 or so workers killed - Rain cleans up harass at his third (@3), lost 2 or 3 probes at most - Reinforcement lings from 2nd nat (@7) and drones get ambushed in the middle of the map - Larva reharasses @3 expo, loses 12+ lings, kills 3+ zealots and no probes - At this point, Rain has a 50+ supply advantage, and has a 5th base underway vs. Larva's 3 bases - Rain goes for the kill @10, 60+ supply worth of zealots, goons, archons, ht, and obs - Larva is losing, but expertly spore-snipes obs and wall with lurker eggs to make Rain hesistate - Rain could have muscled through even without obs, but it was a good conservative decision to wait for reinfrocement - Rain abandons @11 and goes to check on @6, nothing there. - HT drop @7 was semi successful - Meanwhile, Larva destroys @5, while secures 5th base @9 - Rain counter drops @8 is very mildly successful, and easily eliminated - Rain reclaims @5 - While Larva continues budget guerilla tactics with pure lings trading for goons and hts and reavers - Supply almost even now - Rain goes for the bust @10 again, lings snipe ht and scorge snipe obs - While Larva fails to destroy @5 again - Back @10, Rain has more muscle now than the first bust, Archons, Goons, and Zealots kill static defense - Larva gets swarm on time, flanks Rain on both sides with lurker lings - Larva secures @12, and now has plague - Rains shuttle drops all fail now due to great scourge defense and map mobility - Engagements continue for a bit, but Larva is too strong now, Rain GGs
My take away from this is: 1. Rain didn't make any type of mistake that would make him a bad player 2. His mistake at the first nat bust was crucial, but an understandable judgment call since he has no obs and he knows about Larva's shenanigans 3. Larva recovered by going ling guerilla attack, using the saved resources to stack on defense and secure @7 and @8 4. Rain's other glaring mistake is not going for the bust again immediately when he had his reinforcement, instead going for the safe expo @5, and maybe @6 (which never happened) 5. Larva won the game with impeccable obs snipe, drop denial after the first few ones killed many of his workers, and wise army trade that weakened and delayed Rain's decisive push.
This is why me and others here take exception to your conclusion that Rain played badly. He did all the things he should do in order to win, only that Larva played much much better. The issue now boils down to the supposedly game-ending bust. Should he have continued without obs? My suspicion is that after seeing Larva's approach in the first 3 games, Rain was wary of ambush lurkers especially that Larva has only been showing lings in the open all game, and wanted to get ahead in bases and roll over the next big push. Unfortunately for him, none of his drops worked anymore, his 5th never got relevant in the game, and the many HT and Archon snipes delayed him to the point that Larva was stonger when Rain was finally ready for his big attack.
There isn't any upside to going for the kill in that situation. From where Rain is sitting Larva's win condition depends on taking map control to take the key expansions, which he can't do from his position. Drops lose vs fortified Protoss bases and although 200/200 Zerg can kinda trade against maxed Protoss in the middle, once reavers and archons are out in force it's not easy, and certainly not when the Protoss has a stronger economy and enough gates to simply remax. Either way, Larva didn't have 200/200 and wasn't anywhere near.
Maybe it's a style thing but when I was playing fairly high level (for a non Korean at least) PvZ on Fighting Spirit I'd pretty much never attack a four base Zerg. I didn't see the point. He has to come out at some point and if the map is already mined out by the time he does, while I'm sitting on 10k/10k bank, that's fine by me. But if I did decide I needed to do the killing stroke, I'd do it with either a slow reaver push or recall. Never trying to break mass lurkers with mass zealots, which is what Rain tried over and over.
At 18 minutes Rain could have triple expanded to 9, 12, and 6, and spammed cannons, a gateway, and a robo for reavers at each of them. Instead he played the way Larva wanted him to. On a resource heavy map if my opponent commits everything they have into static defences holding one corner of it, I typically like to just leave them there. Sunkens don't have infinite range, they only work if you move your army to where the sunkens are. You can just choose not to do that, and suddenly the sunkens can't hurt you.
There isn't any upside to going for the kill in that situation.
His fear was more about unknown response once he goes all in blind, and not an upside-downside analysis.
At 18 minutes Rain could have triple expanded to 9, 12, and 6
Which he tried to do and failed, and cost him the game. 9? You mean 5? 9 is out of the question, he'll be flanked on all sides way before and lose his nexus and army.
Leaving Z alone midgame on 3+ bases as P might work at B and even A class players, but foolish at this level. Larva had 2 easily accessible bases, 4 if he is brave in takes 12 and 6. Rain's real mistake is not going Rambo with that first bust. He could have sacked a few zealots to the main to measure the depth of lurker defense while relying on HT starsense to make the right storm. He has an army mid map to intercept reinforcement from 7, and his next macro cycle was seconds away. So even if we use your upside-downside analysis, the reasonable analysis is that there is no downside to going for the kill with a strategic zealot recon army to lead the way.
On October 23 2017 09:38 Dazed. wrote: I cant take any writing seriously when it hinges on pro players not understanding the game...
Rain had this game won for 20 straight minutes if he could just work out that there was nothing he could do about Larva's first four bases, and nothing that he needed to do about them. Rain was starving Larva, not the other way around, but he seemed to be completely unaware that he had already won the game. It was just sad. Apparently Rain has absolutely no idea how to play PvZ when macro alone isn't enough.
Apparently, one of the best players in the world is actually a fucking moron who doesnt understand basic starcraft BUT!! he was also ahead and winning for most of the game because hes JUST THAT FUCKING GOOD!
k...
Care to offer a rival explanation for his allin attacks from ahead? If you disagree that he was throwing the game accidentally, are you implying that he did it deliberately?
Counterargument: It was his game plan to break apart the Zerg using a combination of frontal attacks and drops. When the cost of making shuttles was too much, he switched to Arbiters to continue the drop heavy style of play. Larva did an insane job of defending and managed to deny Rain's game plan all game long. Any other Zerg likely would have been broken down by the constant pressure.
Whether or not it would have been "smarter" or "obvious" to go for a counter-turtle style when he was ahead is beside the point. It was his entire plan to shut down the Zerg with drops and inefficient trades. Should he have mixed things up in G4 after realizing that he couldn't break Larva's defense? Probably, but that doesn't mean that he doesn't understand how to play the matchup or he's clueless as to what he could do next. It's possible that Rain felt he had a better chance of breaking his opponent on Fighting Spirit compared to Gold Rush, which is a valid line of logic.
The sheer mechanics both players showed was mind-boggling, and it's only because Larva managed to defend almost everything cost efficiently that (to you) it looked like Rain was playing badly. If Rain had won, I have no doubt you'd be praising him for his genius style of play.
At 18 minutes Rain could have triple expanded to 9, 12, and 6
Which he tried to do and failed, and cost him the game. 9? You mean 5? 9 is out of the question, he'll be flanked on all sides way before and lose his nexus and army.
Leaving Z alone midgame on 3+ bases as P might work at B and even A class players, but foolish at this level. Larva had 2 easily accessible bases, 4 if he is brave in takes 12 and 6. Rain's real mistake is not going Rambo with that first bust. He could have sacked a few zealots to the main to measure the depth of lurker defense while relying on HT starsense to make the right storm. He has an army mid map to intercept reinforcement from 7, and his next macro cycle was seconds away. So even if we use your upside-downside analysis, the reasonable analysis is that there is no downside to going for the kill with a strategic zealot recon army to lead the way.
I mean 9. Really. Larva can't win without 9. Flanked on all sides by what? Larva didn't have an army at 18 minutes while Rain had total map control and a full late game Protoss army, reavers, archons, ht etc.
The worst case scenario for taking 9 (at the same time as 12 and 6) is that Larva takes the tiny number of units he has cowering behind his sunken wall and moves them out into Rain's army, which is exactly what Rain wants.
I feel like we watched a completely different game, and in the one you watched Larva had this big army waiting to attack. Go back and count the units he had at 18 minutes. Larva had nothing but sunkens and observer snipes in his arsenal.
The downside for going for a kill is the loss of map control (should you lose), even if only temporary, may allow Larva to get a crucial 5th base at 9 or 12. There is no downside to not going for the kill. You're ahead, and every minute that passes puts you more ahead as you fortify the crucial parts of the map. I'm completely serious, I'll happily sit there in a late game PvZ on Fighting Spirit just covering the every high ground expansion with cannons until no more can fit while the Zerg waits for me to finish them off. And if they let me do that, I'll take the middle and cover that with cannons too.
On October 24 2017 01:08 EsportsJohn wrote: Only because Larva managed to defend almost everything cost efficiently that (to you) it looked like Rain was playing badly. If Rain had won, I have no doubt you'd be praising him for his genius style of play.
If Rain tries to rush the closing out of a 100% won game by taking a risk that ends it immediately 90% of the time and lets his opponent recover 10% of the time then it's the wrong choice to make, 100% of the time. Maybe in the other 9 universes where Larva didn't hold on I'm praising him because he broke through so I assume he was always going to break through and therefore I don't see a problem. That's a counterfactual, it's hard to say what my assumptions would have been had his gamble worked.
It's irrelevant though, his choice was -EV and in our universe, he got punished for it. Whether or not I would have noticed the fuckup in an alternate universe has no bearing on the existence of the fuckup, especially given how obvious it is in our universe.
I have very little to add to this awesome discussion! So I'll add something from my actual RL work, as I am a psychologist
I've been watching quite a bit of pro streams lately, and I observed that Rain... doesn't seem to give so much of a damn about training, or success generally speaking. the feeling is of an immature child still. Which is absolutely fine, and he should enjoy the prime of his life! Looks like he is, and what he is focusing on more than anything is women. Good for him!
Larva is all about winning this ASL, it means the world to him (and his family), he's been studying his opponents and practicing till he literally drops sleeping on the floor.
L_Master, it's true that Larva's play that game against Bisu was phenomenal, but I don't think it would have served him well against Rain because of the maps they played on. On Jade there are only 12 bases, but on Fighting Spirit there is an additional base in the center, which gives a Protoss player with map control an extra base to work with. On top of that, the 9 and 12 expos are on high ground, which means Larva would have had to invest more resources to secure them if Rain had contested him.
KwarK, I agree with you that Rain played poorly, but I believe it had more to do with Larva's mind game and superb defense than Rain's lack of understanding of the PvZ matchup. Larva poked the bear in game 1 with that Drone drill and then let Rain do all the cost-inefficient attacking in games 3 and 4. From an observer's point of view that can see everything, Rain clearly underestimated Larva's defense. He might've thought with his lead in supply, he could crush Larva's natural. Even if he lost the fight, I think he thought his economy was good enough that he could easily rebuild his army and finish off Larva before he could rebuild his defenses. Or maybe he just didn't like the idea of playing a long drawn out game against Larva. I don't know for sure. Only Rain himself could explain why he played the way he did.
I think it's quite presumptuous of you to tell a progamer like Rain to quit playing the game, considering how much he's sacrificed to make it this far. It's not rational to wish for something like that anyway since Bisu is leaving for the army soon. Which Protoss player would you root for if both of them left? BeSt and his Dohsairs?
On October 24 2017 01:08 EsportsJohn wrote: Only because Larva managed to defend almost everything cost efficiently that (to you) it looked like Rain was playing badly. If Rain had won, I have no doubt you'd be praising him for his genius style of play.
If Rain tries to rush the closing out of a 100% won game by taking a risk that ends it immediately 90% of the time and lets his opponent recover 10% of the time then it's the wrong choice to make, 100% of the time. Maybe in the other 9 universes where Larva didn't hold on I'm praising him because he broke through so I assume he was always going to break through and therefore I don't see a problem. That's a counterfactual, it's hard to say what my assumptions would have been had his gamble worked.
It's irrelevant though, his choice was -EV and in our universe, he got punished for it. Whether or not I would have noticed the fuckup in an alternate universe has no bearing on the existence of the fuckup, especially given how obvious it is in our universe.
As long as a game is viably competitive [i.e a decision could allow for the player whos behind to viably come back] then you cant claim anythings certain, and if its certain, then the mistake would of cost him nothing. Stop arguing from hyperbole.
I mean there is basically no game that is so over that a player who was actively trying to lose it couldn't lose with the right string of decisions. There are only games where a player trying to win should win every time in a decently large sample size. But very few games are so over that if, for example, one player decided to recall their entire army onto a deserted island and leave it there for the rest of the game, the other player couldn't recover. That doesn't mean the game isn't over, because no rational player trying to win would ever recall their entire army onto a deserted island and leave it there for the rest of the game.
On October 24 2017 06:06 KwarK wrote: I mean there is basically no game that is so over that a player who was actively trying to lose it couldn't lose with the right string of decisions. There are only games where a player trying to win should win every time in a decently large sample size. But very few games are so over that if, for example, one player decided to recall their entire army onto a deserted island and leave it there for the rest of the game, the other player couldn't recover. That doesn't mean the game isn't over, because no rational player trying to win would ever recall their entire army onto a deserted island and leave it there for the rest of the game.
Attacking larva is equivalent to recalling an army to an island and then afking? Again, all of this relies on [as i see it] excessive hyperbole about rains relative advantage.
On October 24 2017 04:32 VioleTAK wrote: I have very little to add to this awesome discussion! So I'll add something from my actual RL work, as I am a psychologist
I've been watching quite a bit of pro streams lately, and I observed that Rain... doesn't seem to give so much of a damn about training, or success generally speaking. the feeling is of an immature child still. Which is absolutely fine, and he should enjoy the prime of his life! Looks like he is, and what he is focusing on more than anything is women. Good for him!
Larva is all about winning this ASL, it means the world to him (and his family), he's been studying his opponents and practicing till he literally drops sleeping on the floor.
Take that as you will...
It seems like Rain has solid mechanics but subpar gamesense as a result of not watching enough replays and not playing enough practice games. I'm guessing that after he pulled pretty far ahead with the whole right side of the map secure and much bigger army, he grossly overestimated the strength of Larva's economy and his unit count and thought "he's gonna move out and kill my 4th and 5th if I don't break his front door while storming his mineral line; best defense is an offense!" He probably could have pulled it off too if he micro'ed his reavers and harassing shuttles better. As impressive as his macro is I think his micro and multitasking were lacking.
Rain probably also thought "if I take the 6 or 12 o' clock high ground bases, Larva will just doom drop them with cracklings and dark swarm and they'll die in like 5 seconds because even with reavers and HTs, static defense is weak, just like the sunkens I'm attacking." Maybe he hasn't recovered from his SC2 mindset of "deathballs kill buildings fast and you only need about 3 bases." He thought "whoa I have way too many bases! And a pretty big late-game army! Better go attack the other guy's base seeing as how there is nothing else to do. Protoss doesn't turtle."
I wonder how up to date is the TS about today's ZvP. I came back to bw few months ago and while watching streams I always got mad at Tosses like Bisu for attacking sunken lines when they could just "take the rest of the map" as described in the OP. At the time I wondered if Bisu was just bored to play passive on a stream. Then I watched the ASL seasons and noticed it was quite standard for some crazy reason. Then Remastered came along and I started playing then I finally realized why they do this.
You gotta force trades and keep the zerg at bay. Zergs on 7 hatches/4 gasses are too powerful if they can use it to get its economy rolling. TS mentioning Rain was strong even after so many "stupid" decisions could've made him realize he was strong exactly because of the so called "stupid" decisions. He kept the aggression on larva, forcing him not only to not use larvas on drones but also to waste drones on static defense. If you don't force trades forcing engagement where you can cast some great storns then in the midgame you'll get rolled over once cracklings arrive to the party. 2/2/2 Cracklings+ lurkers + hydras counter your first 180/200 army absurdly well. You get raped. If you manage to keep it safe then the plagues arrive shortly to turn your 40 zea/goon into trash. Especially if you are playing against Larva. Not even Flash can handle Larva late game if larva's economy is on a great state.
Rain never allowed Larva to play on a stabilized economy, even tho the korean McGregor was on 4 gasses. That's what kept Rain in the game and with an advantage. In fact, he lost game 4 because he ran out of observers on two occasions. Thats it. Props to Larva for taking them out, but if you read the OP you think it was a beatdown.
PS. I disagree with most of TS description of that game, but one thing that 'hurts' the most is saying rain's initial 3 zeas attack were "poorly microed". That was all about larva's micro and how his multitasking is just amazing right now. His drone drills are legendary.
EPT
Bisu vs 
Larva (11:30)
