EPT
It seems to me like Flash lost G1 and G3 from leaving his vessels exposed. Like he was always focused on something else and left them open to scourge. Of course the games he won didn't get to vessel tech. Coincidence?
[ASL9] Ro8 Day 1 - Page 16
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[UoN]Sentinel
United States11320 Posts
It seems to me like Flash lost G1 and G3 from leaving his vessels exposed. Like he was always focused on something else and left them open to scourge. Of course the games he won didn't get to vessel tech. Coincidence? | ||
EsportsJohn
United States4883 Posts
2. Speaking of Neo Sylphid, Action got a 7:30 hive holy fuck. His initial ling attack did so much damage, you can see that he takes great care of his few lings left and lurkers knowing that they are his only defense against a bio attack. At the time that he's teching to hive, he literally has 3 drones in his natural, and they're mining gas. The delay of Flash's army is so unreal. 3. Game 4 is actually very interesting. While on the surface it looks like Action just went for a failed ling allin that was badly executed, it was actually just Flash massively outplaying him. So many questions plagued me while watching this. Why did Action dive the bunker with his first set of lings? Was Flash's scout of the followup an accident? What was the vulture doing throughout all of this? The series of events is as follows: Flash's SCV sees the drone going out to the 3rd then notices that Action makes a 3rd hatch in his base. The SCV is then killed in the main just out of vision of the spire starting, so he follows up with a vulture scout, which immediately runs to the 3rd base to confirm if Action is playing a crazy 4 hatch opening with a hidden base. The observer didn't catch it, but Flash actually sees the first set of lings in Action's natural with his vulture and sends it all the way the fuck back home. Action, thinking he's being clever with his movement, runs all the way around the map to avoid the vulture that should be in the middle of the map looking for lings, checking the 3rd, etc. Thinking he's outsmarted the vulture and seeing only a single goliath out front, Action makes the decision to all-in the bunker so that his followup lings can run it down...BUT surprise, there's a vulture there too. This moment is INCREDIBLY close (like less than 100 HP), but the extra DPS from the vulture prevents the bunker from going down. Following this failed attack, Flash assumes one of three things: either his opponent is making mutalisks or going for a followup attack with lings or lurkers (because he never scouts the tech, and his academy is hella late with the goliath build. There's no need to scout for a 3rd since Action can't afford it, so the vulture just does some light scouting around his natural to clear out stray lings and/or check for any followup attacks. THIS PART IS NOT LUCK. After that, the game was pretty much over. I wish Action had stayed in the game a little later, maybe taken a hidden 3rd or something, but I think when he saw the goliaths and marine counts already high, he knew he couldn't hold or delay a followup attack for long enough to get a 3rd up AND saturate his mineral lines AND get his tech up to defend. There just wasn't enough going for him at that point, and the double bunker up front meant that a bust wasn't an option. Well played by Flash, god tier read. 4. Game 5 was also very weird. Action's defense against the bunker rush was...odd. Had Flash made the first bunker in range of the ramp, it woulda been an insta-gg, and even the way it did go was really a knife's edge defense. Instead Action beat it with 0 drone losses, so it was really really good for him. Skill I guess? The followup defense was super sick from Action catching the first vulture while scouting down mid with a ling. After the initial defense, he decides to pull all of his lings to pressure Flash's ramp (which only had a few marines) while defending any vulture shenanigans with the hydras. And honestly, it was really close again, but there was a gap in the hydras, and Flash took advantage of it. From there, Flash just honestly outplayed the hell out of Action and gained such a huge worker advantage that it didn't even matter how many advantages Action got out of the first 4 minutes. I still think that Flash played subpar in the first set of games, especially in the late game, but the overall series was very high level. Action played some really immense games, and the ones he lost were honestly just a hair's breadth from going the other way. Sorry I called it trash. | ||
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Djabanete
United States2786 Posts
Game 1 Flash had to worry about a speedling bust after losing his vulture, and he built multiple bunkers to be safe, but the bust never came. Then he was preparing against mutas, but instead of building a big pack of mutas, Action just built 3 mutas and then droned up on 3 bases. When Flash was ready to fight, Action’s army was bigger and more upgraded than Flash was ready to deal with. Basically Flash was tricked into taking an overly defensive/slow approach in the hopes of an unbeatable midgame, but by macroing at the right time, Action beat the unbeatable midgame. (The biomech push is all about having an unbeatable midgame.) Game 3, Flash seemed to still be thinking about Game 2, where he crushed a Lurker all-in. Game 3 he scanned the hydra den and then turtled up. But again, the aggression didn’t come and instead Action was expanding and teching rapidly. It took Flash forever to find that third base. Action won those “macro” games because, through trickery, he entering the “macro” phase of the games with a huge advantage. (Edit: and his execution was good. Flash beats you from a disadvantage if your execution is faulty.) Again, nobody ever tricks Flash, but Action managed. It was a really impressive series. | ||
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KobraKay
Portugal4370 Posts
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BigFan
TLADT24920 Posts
On March 31 2020 04:29 Djabanete wrote: Flash lost games 1 and 3 (“lost the macro games”) because at key moments he thought Action would hit him with aggression or an all-in, and Action macroed instead. Action faked him out. The reason it looked like Flash “played badly” is that nobody ever fakes Flash out. Well, this is what it looks like. Game 1 Flash had to worry about a speedling bust after losing his vulture, and he built multiple bunkers to be safe, but the bust never came. Then he was preparing against mutas, but instead of building a big pack of mutas, Action just built 3 mutas and then droned up on 3 bases. When Flash was ready to fight, Action’s army was bigger and more upgraded than Flash was ready to deal with. Basically Flash was tricked into taking an overly defensive/slow approach in the hopes of an unbeatable midgame, but by macroing at the right time, Action beat the unbeatable midgame. (The biomech push is all about having an unbeatable midgame.) Game 3, Flash seemed to still be thinking about Game 2, where he crushed a Lurker all-in. Game 3 he scanned the hydra den and then turtled up. But again, the aggression didn’t come and instead Action was expanding and teching rapidly. It took Flash forever to find that third base. Action won those “macro” games because, through trickery, he entering the “macro” phase of the games with a huge advantage. (Edit: and his execution was good. Flash beats you from a disadvantage if your execution is faulty.) Again, nobody ever tricks Flash, but Action managed. It was a really impressive series. Pretty much. This was a great series precisely because of just how well Action mind gamed Flash in those macro games he won. Like, no one can deny that flash losing some vessels in those games seemed a bit sloppy, but I think it's precisely because Action was doing a lot of stuff at once. I too like john noticed how he constantly moved his lurkers back and forth, did surrounds etc... He played really really well and his plans in game 1 and 3 worked as he planned. Game 5 left a sour taste though. Not to say it was undeserved, but it felt like Action should've been better with his vulture defense after he killed the first one yet he allowed like 4 to get in and his drone count got hammered. I feel like he should've just gotten a third hydra and made a wall. Vultures won't get in at all and you'll get regen too. That would've given him enough time to drone up etc... 2 base zerg vs 1 base terran could've went into his advantage with solid muta micro or w/e he decided >< | ||
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darktreb
United States3019 Posts
On March 31 2020 04:29 Djabanete wrote: Flash lost games 1 and 3 (“lost the macro games”) because at key moments he thought Action would hit him with aggression or an all-in, and Action macroed instead. Action faked him out. The reason it looked like Flash “played badly” is that nobody ever fakes Flash out. Well, this is what it looks like. Game 1 Flash had to worry about a speedling bust after losing his vulture, and he built multiple bunkers to be safe, but the bust never came. Then he was preparing against mutas, but instead of building a big pack of mutas, Action just built 3 mutas and then droned up on 3 bases. When Flash was ready to fight, Action’s army was bigger and more upgraded than Flash was ready to deal with. Basically Flash was tricked into taking an overly defensive/slow approach in the hopes of an unbeatable midgame, but by macroing at the right time, Action beat the unbeatable midgame. (The biomech push is all about having an unbeatable midgame.) Game 3, Flash seemed to still be thinking about Game 2, where he crushed a Lurker all-in. Game 3 he scanned the hydra den and then turtled up. But again, the aggression didn’t come and instead Action was expanding and teching rapidly. It took Flash forever to find that third base. Action won those “macro” games because, through trickery, he entering the “macro” phase of the games with a huge advantage. (Edit: and his execution was good. Flash beats you from a disadvantage if your execution is faulty.) Again, nobody ever tricks Flash, but Action managed. It was a really impressive series. Action did something only Effort has consistently managed to do in the past. He used Flash's strength against him. Flash is so reliably good at reading situations that this is *almost* a weakness if used perfectly against him. This is obviously much easier said than done. In some ways, I think Effort's most impressive game was his Proleague win over Flash *after* Effort had recently beat Flash 3-2 in OSL. That was the game on Fighting Spirit where Effort tricks Flash into expecting a Lurker all-in, since everyone still considered Flash the better "standard" or "macro" player in spite of the OSL win (Effort's wins were short games). Effort made an early Hydra Den (which Flash saw, possibly set up deliberately), and positioned things like he was prepping an all-in bust. Flash made extra Bunkers and hunkered down. Instead, Effort went Hive and got up three bases without making a Lurker (of course he made Lurkers later, but he got to this insanely advantageous position through mindgames, just like Action did in this series). I think Action had an additional advantage which is he was such an underdog that it caused Flash to be even more cautious. Multiple players have literally given up *before* the series against Flash starts, either by playing stupidly standard (which will never beat Flash) or throwing ridiculous gambler type all-ins. It wasn't clear until midway through game 1 that Action was definitely not in this category, and by game 3 it was clear that Action was feeling a puncher's chance. When a Zerg feels a puncher's chance, they are more dangerous than any other race feeling the same way. When people ask "why don't pros just make an extra Bunker every time" or "why not just make one more Cannon", show them games 1 and 3 of this series (I think even the effective Muta counter in game 1 was partly enabled by Flash being a tad behind on timings). Fellow pros are so good that even the best player of all time can't consistently get away with being too conservative. | ||
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Djabanete
United States2786 Posts
I’m inclined to agree, it looked a bit like Flash thought that Action would feel forced to be highly aggressive by his position as an underdog, and that if he (Flash) could just weather the storm, he’d win. Action found the counter to that approach. But to keep the fear alive, he had to actually be aggressive in some games, which cost him... As for Flash losing vessels, maybe (?) he could have been more careful, but Flash has always prioritized irradiating defilers in the middle of the map before they reach his expansions. If he’s at a disadvantage in ground forces it’s hard for the vessels to do that job without sometimes getting sniped. The key is to keep the Dark Swarm as far away from the expansion as possible, and if a vessel kills a defiler and then trades for two scourges, I guess that’s not too awful (?). | ||
Sigrun
United States1655 Posts
On March 31 2020 07:35 darktreb wrote: In some ways, I think Effort's most impressive game was his Proleague win over Flash *after* Effort had recently beat Flash 3-2 in OSL. That was the game on Fighting Spirit where Effort tricks Flash into expecting a Lurker all-in, since everyone still considered Flash the better "standard" or "macro" player in spite of the OSL win (Effort's wins were short games). Effort made an early Hydra Den (which Flash saw, possibly set up deliberately), and positioned things like he was prepping an all-in bust. Flash made extra Bunkers and hunkered down. Do you happen to have a link to the VOD of this game? | ||
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SlayerS_BunkiE
Canada1717 Posts
On March 31 2020 09:29 Sigrun wrote: Do you happen to have a link to the VOD of this game? I remember that game. It went far and the end game was similar to the recent flash vs calm game 3 in ever osl (which flash won). But effort got such a nice advantage from the trick that flash couldnt pull off a win. | ||
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RKC
2848 Posts
On March 31 2020 09:21 Djabanete wrote: >> darktreb wrote: Action was such an underdog that Flash was too cautious I’m inclined to agree, it looked a bit like Flash thought that Action would feel forced to be highly aggressive by his position as an underdog, and that if he (Flash) could just weather the storm, he’d win. Action found the counter to that approach. But to keep the fear alive, he had to actually be aggressive in some games, which cost him... As for Flash losing vessels, maybe (?) he could have been more careful, but Flash has always prioritized irradiating defilers in the middle of the map before they reach his expansions. If he’s at a disadvantage in ground forces it’s hard for the vessels to do that job without sometimes getting sniped. The key is to keep the Dark Swarm as far away from the expansion as possible, and if a vessel kills a defiler and then trades for two scourges, I guess that’s not too awful (?). I watched the Flash v Action game in the preview: tl.net And that's exactly what Flash did. Just kept up the defiler-sniping to the point his vessels kept being killed and plagued. Honestly, it looked to me like Action was having the upper hand throughout the game. Action kept pounding Flash's bases, and macro up rather safely. Flash could barely destroy any of the Zerg expo bases. Flash's composition and engagements look rather sub-optimal, at least to my untrained eye (saving energy for d-matrix seems better?). And yet, Flash manages to hold on, and wins. I guess that's one of them Flash things... | ||
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Djabanete
United States2786 Posts
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outscar
2832 Posts
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konadora
Singapore66364 Posts
On March 31 2020 09:29 Sigrun wrote: Do you happen to have a link to the VOD of this game? | ||
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Miragee
8695 Posts
On March 30 2020 11:59 mcgormack wrote: My (fun and not very serious) personal theory on why Flash lost two games today and didn't play at his best capacity : He had sudden needs to go to the bathroom, and that's why he instantly and oddly got up and left after some/every game. ... it's got to happen to some players sometimes, right? More seriously, I really gained a lot of respect for Action in this tournament. He has improved quite a lot since the last year, it probably also helps that the Zerg competition is much narrower this year. If you look at what Flash usually drinks during matches...no. This guy has a massive bladder. | ||
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Rucho
United States124 Posts
Flash seemed shaken, but that doesn't mean that his skill level isn't what it was. Action successfully threw Flash off his rhythm. If it wasn't for Flash's superhuman ability to reset and adapt, he probably would have lost the series. I was pretty disappointed by flash's game on neo sylphid. I feel like it would have been pretty easy for him to scout that there was hardly any defense at the third. I assumed the dropship play was to hit the third. But perhaps flash thought that was too obvious, and so instead went for the elevator play to the main. I think the game would have been his if he had busted the lurker at the front or double dropped from the ledge. | ||
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JieXian
Malaysia4677 Posts
On March 31 2020 04:20 EsportsJohn wrote: I take it back, it was a good series. Further analysis revealed some pretty awesome stuff.
2. Speaking of Neo Sylphid, Action got a 7:30 hive holy fuck. His initial ling attack did so much damage, you can see that he takes great care of his few lings left and lurkers knowing that they are his only defense against a bio attack. At the time that he's teching to hive, he literally has 3 drones in his natural, and they're mining gas. The delay of Flash's army is so unreal. 3. Game 4 is actually very interesting. While on the surface it looks like Action just went for a failed ling allin that was badly executed, it was actually just Flash massively outplaying him. So many questions plagued me while watching this. Why did Action dive the bunker with his first set of lings? Was Flash's scout of the followup an accident? What was the vulture doing throughout all of this? The series of events is as follows: Flash's SCV sees the drone going out to the 3rd then notices that Action makes a 3rd hatch in his base. The SCV is then killed in the main just out of vision of the spire starting, so he follows up with a vulture scout, which immediately runs to the 3rd base to confirm if Action is playing a crazy 4 hatch opening with a hidden base. The observer didn't catch it, but Flash actually sees the first set of lings in Action's natural with his vulture and sends it all the way the fuck back home. Action, thinking he's being clever with his movement, runs all the way around the map to avoid the vulture that should be in the middle of the map looking for lings, checking the 3rd, etc. Thinking he's outsmarted the vulture and seeing only a single goliath out front, Action makes the decision to all-in the bunker so that his followup lings can run it down...BUT surprise, there's a vulture there too. This moment is INCREDIBLY close (like less than 100 HP), but the extra DPS from the vulture prevents the bunker from going down. Following this failed attack, Flash assumes one of three things: either his opponent is making mutalisks or going for a followup attack with lings or lurkers (because he never scouts the tech, and his academy is hella late with the goliath build. There's no need to scout for a 3rd since Action can't afford it, so the vulture just does some light scouting around his natural to clear out stray lings and/or check for any followup attacks. THIS PART IS NOT LUCK. After that, the game was pretty much over. I wish Action had stayed in the game a little later, maybe taken a hidden 3rd or something, but I think when he saw the goliaths and marine counts already high, he knew he couldn't hold or delay a followup attack for long enough to get a 3rd up AND saturate his mineral lines AND get his tech up to defend. There just wasn't enough going for him at that point, and the double bunker up front meant that a bust wasn't an option. Well played by Flash, god tier read. 4. Game 5 was also very weird. Action's defense against the bunker rush was...odd. Had Flash made the first bunker in range of the ramp, it woulda been an insta-gg, and even the way it did go was really a knife's edge defense. Instead Action beat it with 0 drone losses, so it was really really good for him. Skill I guess? The followup defense was super sick from Action catching the first vulture while scouting down mid with a ling. After the initial defense, he decides to pull all of his lings to pressure Flash's ramp (which only had a few marines) while defending any vulture shenanigans with the hydras. And honestly, it was really close again, but there was a gap in the hydras, and Flash took advantage of it. From there, Flash just honestly outplayed the hell out of Action and gained such a huge worker advantage that it didn't even matter how many advantages Action got out of the first 4 minutes. I still think that Flash played subpar in the first set of games, especially in the late game, but the overall series was very high level. Action played some really immense games, and the ones he lost were honestly just a hair's breadth from going the other way. Sorry I called it trash. Damn that was a good analysis. I'd be very interested in reading more of your post-game analyses. IMO I'm more interested in post-game analyses than a preview, not that previews are bad, but post-game analyses are a lot more educational and allows me to further appreciate the games I had just watched. | ||
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PVJ
Hungary5221 Posts
On April 03 2020 00:14 JieXian wrote: Damn that was a good analysis. I'd be very interested in reading more of your post-game analyses. IMO I'm more interested in post-game analyses than a preview, not that previews are bad, but post-game analyses are a lot more educational and allows me to further appreciate the games I had just watched. Indeed it was great read. There are usually recaps at the beginning of the previews you mention. The previous to last one featured an amazing article of the Stork v Larva Ro16 series, I'd recommend you that as well if you've liked this: https://tl.net/forum/brood-war/557939-asl9-ro16-preview-pt-2-apocalypse-now | ||
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JieXian
Malaysia4677 Posts
On April 04 2020 05:25 PVJ wrote: Indeed it was great read. There are usually recaps at the beginning of the previews you mention. The previous to last one featured an amazing article of the Stork v Larva Ro16 series, I'd recommend you that as well if you've liked this: https://tl.net/forum/brood-war/557939-asl9-ro16-preview-pt-2-apocalypse-now Thanks ^^ | ||
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