[ASL20] Semifinal B - Page 23

On October 15 2025 01:12 Kraekkling wrote:
Great series overall, very aggressive from both sides. Notice how we didn't see a regular long game with hive tech and fully upgraded armies.

I feel like Soma thought he won game 2 for sure but then overextended, clutch come back from Bisu.

The game on Roaring Currents was insightful since now we've seen that Z has a conceptual counter to Carrier/Sair, as long as P stays on air only. I wonder what happens if P doesn't attack at ~160supply but instead adds HTs to the army composition before forcing the fight.

The last game was obviously somewhat anticlimatic but the loss is on Bisu - he was playing blindly after his scouting probe died and by now everyone should expect Soma to be ready to pull the trigger in early game ZvP. IMO its similar for PvZ, ZvT and TvP - as long as you can't rule out certain cheeses/timings, you must play in a way that is safe vs everything. Its just how these matchups work.

On October 15 2025 02:00 Bonyth wrote:

On Roaring Currents you could stop watching after the initial attack with carriers / sairs vs muta / devourers, where ALL (like 18+) corsairs got instantly maximum ammount of acid spores (9). This changed the dynamics of the match up a lot and it lead to Bisu's loss. Compare later engagements to see how poorly that 1 fight went for Bisu.

On October 14 2025 22:47 evilfatsh1t wrote:

well you wouldnt hydra all in off such an early gas. even for mutas that gas was too early.

youre right about pvz generally with your second statement but the theme for this series has generally been that if bisu can overcome the early game aggression he will most likely win. bisus bane was his own obssession with his optimisation that he didnt want to let a probe or two sit idle i guess.

it could just be that bisu is old. if he pulled probes as soon as he saw the zerglings following his zealot i think he could have held. maybe age/fatigue kicked in and he just reacted slow

On October 14 2025 22:24 [sc1f]eonzerg wrote:
could catch the last 2 games. Are the first games worth watching ? Sucks for Bisu to end this way. just 1 freaking game to make it to the finals ruin by that silly all in. I kinda think he deserves it tho cuz he saw how early Soma took his gaz, But yeah im not sure what he was doing with that zealot and why he didnt even bother to block for early speed ling timings. Maybe nerves got the best of him in that last game. Happy for Soma. An ex CJ player will win the ASL for the first time if im not mistaken. Snow has a lot of material to study tho. If i was SNow i will just quit streaming till the finals and grind 24/7 lol. But we are in a different era and im sure both of the end will most likely keep playing proleagues and playing each other till the Final.

All in all this was pretty much my Prediction. Snow vs Soma final. I have Soma taking it 4-2

On October 14 2025 21:24 TMNT wrote:
See @Rogue, Carriers don't work either. Bisu took no damage in early and mid game, killed a bunch of Overlords, but that's nowhere near enough for Carriers to beat Zerg on this map.

On October 15 2025 01:51 Kraekkling wrote:
I can't even think of a single reason to move out with that Zealot?

Bisu saw that Soma made at least 6 lings, so the Zealot cannot cross the map and threaten anything. And since 6 lings were already made, the move out also won't trigger any additional ling production. Why is it moving out? The Zealots job is to sit home and close the wall....+ Show Spoiler +

On October 15 2025 04:13 RogueTheGOAT wrote:

A key difference between this game and the linked game was that Bisu used his Reavers to harass in the daily proleague game but sat back with them in this game. Yes, he killed a bunch of overlords, but he wasn't keeping on the pressure to force the Zerg player to do anything but mass mutalisks and invest in air armor for the inevitable Devourer transition. Maybe it still wouldn't matter, but I don't think that was even close to perfect play from Bisu.

I wonder if investing in High Templar could have helped, but even if you cut the resources invested in Disruption Web, getting to Storm feels like it would take forever, so probably not.

In an alternate world in which one of the "land" bases on each side is mineral only, is the map better for Protoss? Giving Zerg four gases for free is likely part of the problem.

On October 15 2025 04:13 RogueTheGOAT wrote:

A key difference between this game and the linked game was that Bisu used his Reavers to harass in the daily proleague game but sat back with them in this game. Yes, he killed a bunch of overlords, but he wasn't keeping on the pressure to force the Zerg player to do anything but mass mutalisks and invest in air armor for the inevitable Devourer transition. Maybe it still wouldn't matter, but I don't think that was even close to perfect play from Bisu.

I wonder if investing in High Templar could have helped, but even if you cut the resources invested in Disruption Web, getting to Storm feels like it would take forever, so probably not.

In an alternate world in which one of the "land" bases on each side is mineral only, is the map better for Protoss? Giving Zerg four gases for free is likely part of the problem.

On October 15 2025 05:36 TMNT wrote:

Yes. And what caused that difference is that Soma defended with Hydras + Burrow (while Hero contested Bisu with Mutas), making the potential of Reaver harass null. I think since that Bisu vs Hero game, Z has figured out there's no point contesting the double Stargate with air, which makes sense (in normal maps, you'd want to counter double Stargate with Hydra build, not Muta).

Basically, if Reavers can do some damage to Z early on (like Bisu vs Hero), P has the chance to win. If not, it's just a lost build.

If I'm not mistaken Bisu produced like 1 Zealot and 0 Dragoon all game? I doubt he can have both Carriers and HTs soon enough, when it still matters.

I was thinking if this map only had 3 land bases for each Zerg probably can't camp like that, but it'll also likely swing the favor too much for Protoss. 4 bases with 3 gas seems more reasonable, although I have no idea how that would play out. But it's probably a moot point anyway. It's not gonna be there next season lol.

On October 15 2025 05:36 TMNT wrote:

Yes. And what caused that difference is that Soma defended with Hydras + Burrow (while Hero contested Bisu with Mutas), making the potential of Reaver harass null. I think since that Bisu vs Hero game, Z has figured out there's no point contesting the double Stargate with air, which makes sense (in normal maps, you'd want to counter double Stargate with Hydra build, not Muta).

Basically, if Reavers can do some damage to Z early on (like Bisu vs Hero), P has the chance to win. If not, it's just a lost build.

If I'm not mistaken Bisu produced like 1 Zealot and 0 Dragoon all game? I doubt he can have both Carriers and HTs soon enough, when it still matters.

I was thinking if this map only had 3 land bases for each Zerg probably can't camp like that, but it'll also likely swing the favor too much for Protoss. 4 bases with 3 gas seems more reasonable, although I have no idea how that would play out. But it's probably a moot point anyway. It's not gonna be there next season lol.

On October 15 2025 06:39 RogueTheGOAT wrote:

I'm not sure I agree that a player on 4 bases cannot be subject to Reaver harass because that's just way too much space to defend. The burrowed hydras at the natural expansion showed that soma was at least worried about it. Of course, if they jumped on a hypothetical shuttle, the game could probably end because he'd hydra bust right afterward.

I wonder how Bisu's practice games on the map went because I can't imagine that Corsair harass straight into 3 Stargate Carrier and have literally no ground units cross to your opponent's side of the map outside of the initial scouting probe and zealot is the ideal way to play. But maybe the game ends up in the exact same place if the Zerg player never fears a significant ground attack. Yes, reaver harass might delay the Zerg air transition, but unless it delays it more than the Protoss's air transition, that doesn't get you anywhere.

I'd love to see Roaring Currents 2.0 because the map is arguably in the running for the most balanced "weird" map they've done in years. Compare it to something like Sparkle whose 43.3% win rate in PvT was by far its most balanced match up.

On October 15 2025 07:20 mtcn77 wrote:

Along with 76 I do believe it is going to be a staple going forward. If it presents a challenge it presents it for everybody. Maybe they could verify base distances to be equal to all expansions, but it is a good 2 base map. What I worry is 4 base maps - roaring currents went just the way we expected it to be. 4 player maps proved to be less consistent in my opinion. You could argue well then just scout more, but I don't want to watch coin toss games.
Reaver harass kinda requires the shuttle upgrade and it throws the rush into late game territory. Without it, it is one of the faster techs out there since reaver tech finishes first in the whole tech tree. Reavers are available at 119 seconds from the start of cybernetics core. HTs at 189s, shuttles with gravitic thrusters at 211 seconds. By comparison, mutalisks are available at 139 seconds starting from lair. You need something to wedge in between your tech and zerg's tech tree.(that would be archons at 113.4s)

On October 15 2025 08:58 RogueTheGOAT wrote:

1) Literally no meaningful tournament will ever use 76 again, nor should they. PvT has a 70.5% win rate on the map.
2) 76 was last used 2.5 years ago.
3) Please never agree with anything I say about anything. When I can decipher the gibberish you're writing, you're unfailingly wrong, so when you agree with me, I have to take a hard look at whatever I said.

On October 15 2025 09:49 so0willprevail wrote:
Too bad Bisu didn’t get Maelsteom vs Zerg mass air. Really think he would’ve won game 5