Group A - Bischu, DIMAGA, LoWeLy, Sein

This group is a great kick-off for the event. It’s going to be incredibly exciting with one of the best European Zergs, mTwDIMAGA, leading this group forward as the favorite. For the second seed, I believe it will be Dignitas’ very own Bischu. Bischu has been an underdog in the European scene for a very long time, but there is no doubt about his skill and potential. He has a strong chance of making it out of this group.

Complicating the group is SeiN (who is, by the way, Naama’s older brother). SeiN had a very strong performance at the previous Assembly where he managed to knock SjoW out fairly early. However, his recent inactivity makes it hard to judge his skill level. Last but not least we have imba.FXOpen.LoWeLy, a Belarusian Zerg player, who has had a number of strong performances in the weekly tournaments such as ZOTAC and Go4SC2. He’s definitely a player that can take games from the very best in Europe.



Group B: Fuzer, meRz, MorroW, Seiplo

It should be obvious who's the favorite here. Who else but Morrow, one of Europe's most well-known, loved and skilled Zergs? Every tournament he enters you expect him to go all the way. Stomping over top players and lesser-knowns alike at Assembly winter, he went all the way to the finals before taking second place to Ret. Just behind MorroW, you will find one of the fastest and most furious Terrans of Sweden in dignitas.merz. He has yet to live up to his true potential as he has been really busy with his studies, but he has been practicing extremely hard since summer break. Expect him to make a breakthrough.

Like Group A, I don’t see an upset happening. That's not to take anything away from Fuzer and Ai.Seiplo, who are both strong players who have attended numerous international events. However, I think there's a clear gap between the top two and the bottom two in this group.



Group C: Naama, Protosser, SarenS, Sen

Fnatic.MSI Sen is going to be fighting on Finnish soil and it will be a huge upset if he doesn’t go deep into the tournament. He has had some strong international performances and not even in my wildest dreams is there a scenario in which he doesn't top this group. I’ve put VirusNaama at second. While he hasn’t really shown a strong performance since his run at DreamHack Winter where he came out as the champion, he still has enough talent that you should always expect good things from him. But he’s going to have a tough time taking second place since he’s going to face off against CyberNation.SarenS. These two should be pretty evenly matched, and if they decide to adopt the recent mech TvT trends, it will be a long, hard battle for second place. And at last I can introduce the player with the most contradicting name in the history of StarCraft pro-gaming: the Zerg player FL|Protosser (at least TossGirl was a girl, even though she played Terran). For those of you who don’t know Protosser, he’s another online gosu who's looking to make a name for himself at a big event.



Group D: Adelscott, Happy, SjoW, TLO

If there’s a group that’s too close to call, it’s definitely this one. Still better known for his ridiculous Warcraft III skills, Happy has been absolutely dominating on Battle.net as of late. If those online skills translate at all to live events, he's going to win his group easily. Going down the list we see that Liquid`TLO is back from his hiatus and ready to compete, but he is probably not up to full speed yet. With his overall strategic brilliance he can definitely take second in this group, but he still needs more time to practice and work on the finer parts of his play. I'll play it safe and say dignitas.SjoW is going to take second place in this group, following a fairly good performance at MLG Anaheim. It really breaks my heart, but there's nowhere else to put M.Adelscott but at fourth and last place in this difficult group. Even though he finished 3rd place at last the Assembly, this group is just too even.



Group E: Grubby, Kas, LaLuSh, Welmu

The legendary Orc Grubby will once again set foot in Helsinki to attend Assembly. Grubby’s first StarCraft 2 event was Assembly Winter 2011 back in February where he unfortunately got defeated in the group stages after some long, tense games late at night against SarenS. Grubby has been showing progress in each and every tournament he competes in, and I think that he's now at the level where he can get out of his group.

However, Empire.Kas is my favorite to top this group. Europe's strongest Terran has consistently shown outstanding performances both in tournaments and on the ladder. His best LAN performance was at Copenhagen Games where he took 2nd place, only thwarted by oGs.MC at the peak of his powers.

The match to really look out for in this group is M.LaLuSh against Grubby. LaLush has been performing increasingly well in the international scene, and just barely missed out on qualifying for WCG in South Korea. eXelon-Welmu is the Finnish hope in this group. I don’t see a way for him to qualify for the bracket, but he’s not a player to overlook.



Group F: biGs, BRAT_OK, Satiini, Stephano

Depending on what you've been watching, this prediction will be a little controversial. Everybody would think that BratOK will come out victorious in this group pretty easily. But no, he’s not. M.Stephano is going to surprise us all by taking first in this group. The fastest rising European player of the last two months wants his first big trophy, and no one is going to get in his way this early on.

FL|Satiini is also a player to look out for in this group. I doubt he’ll be able to do much, but he’s definitely capable of taking games off of anyone on his best days. Lastly a Zerg player from the French team Against All Authority, aAa.biGs, will compete for a spot in the brackets, though I don’t see him being able to do much.




Group G: DarKFoRcE, HuK, Jimpo, MaNa,

Assembly is Liquid`HuK's second stop after leaving Korea to go on a lengthy foreign tournament lap. Overall, he’s probably the favorite to win the whole tournament. He won DreamHack and HomeStory Cup not long ago, and he was also the top foreigner at MLG Anaheim.

I believe MaNa - who is most famous for his incredible run through the BYOC tournament to finish 2nd overall at DreamHack Winter 2010 - will take second place in this group. His close competitor for this spot is aTn.DarKFoRcE. Both players have been a bit in the background the past few months, but I’m sure they’re both hungry for tournament wins as they fly to Helsinki.

The fourth player in this group is inf.Jimpo who's been having some decent tournament results and has the potential to get through this group with some luck.




Group H: elfi. HayprO, NaDa, NightEnD

The one and only Korean in this tournament, SK.NaDa's achievements and abilities need no introduction at all. That being said, this is a very hard group to call. We have VirusElfi who is known for his strong one-base play, while we have another Swedish top player in Liquid`HayprO who is very macro orientated and a heavy user of banelings. The last player in this tournament is Fnatic.MSI NightEnD who is not to be ignored. NightEnD is a confident player who believes he can and will be the best player in the world, and he can definitely back this up by on occasion. What he needs right now is consistency, or at least the luck to put together a strong run over the next few days. In any case, HayprO vs. NightEnd is the match to look out for in this group.

The World Famous
No need to talk about these guys at length. Without touching upon skill at all, we're pretty sure everyone knows who these players are because of fame, popularity, frequent tournament exposure, etc.

DIMAGA
HuK
MorroW
NaDa
Grubby
HayprO
Sen
TLO


The Should-Be World Famous
Enough people outside of Europe have heard of these guys, but not many recognize just how good they are. Saying these guys have "upset" potential is insulting, because they have pretty much the same chance of winning as everyone in the above group.

Adelscott: Hey, remember TSL3? And do you recall that MVP was eliminated in the first round? Yeah, that was Adelscott. Not like that's his only achievement, but considering that almost no one can take a series off a Code-A/S class Korean nowadays, I thought this would be the best example. In terms of big tournament results, he's the most accomplished French player.

BRAT_OK: Ah, our first victim of the East European passport. He's a top two Russian player, he's just had trouble getting out of the country. He should do quite well if he doesn't get turned back at customs.

DarKFoRcE: After doing quite well in smaller online tournaments, he finally got a taste of international fame by defeating Alive in two EPIC games on the first day of the NASL grand final (unfortunately he was overshadowed by Sen and then Puma in the following days). Not terribly consistent, but fully capable of taking series off more well-known opponents.

Happy: Whatever. This guy is top ten in TLPD ELO if you exclude Koreans. You don't do that without taking a lot of names.

Kas: The original "awesome European you've never heard of." The greatest online tournament competitor in SC II history (seriously, look at this TLPD page). Top five ELO amongst foreigners. And still, every live tournament, we cross our fingers and hope that he can break his LAN jinx and take home the gold.

LaLuSh: Tends to be a bit up and down, but still Sweden's #2 Zerg.

MaNa: Winning silver at DreamHack winter and bronze at HSC2 and Shoutcraft Invitational #2, Mana's definitely got an edge on the guys who've yet to back up their small tourney credentials on a bigger stage. With just one Korean in the competition, he has a clear shot at the gold.

NightEnD: Though he's became more famous recently at HSC3 for his voice (check the VODs), he's been well known in Europe for much longer as one of its best Protoss players.

SjoW: Some players build up such a reputation about being overrated that they become underrated in reality (Idra). In reverse, others have such a rep for being underrated they become overrated (Keen). Sjow is underrated - underrated. Look for him to correct that this tourney.

Stephano: #1 ELO among foreigners. Considering the rate at which he is taking down tournaments, Kas's place as the online king looks to be in jeopardy. With strong performances against the very best European players as of late, Stephano should be considered one of the favorites to win it all.

Players for Hipsters / Cool Because They're Less Known
Hey, we liked these guys before you ever heard of them. For the most part, these guys have been proving their skills in online tournaments with stiff competition but poor exposure, like aspiring indie bands playing in some Glasgow pub (Naniwa is Mumford and Sons, we have determined. Just as good as he used to be, but gets no credit now that he's famous).

elfi: Elfi is a real threat to anyone. Very underrated Protoss who demolishes online cups. He may very well be the best player in Finland, but some may disagree. His big event results are very bad though, possibly due to nerves.

LoWeLy: Very good online, always showing up in the top 3 of online cups. Seems to be falling off a LITTLE lately. Making his first major offline appearance at Assembly. He has a tough group, but he might be able to pull it off.

meRz: Crazy APM, probably the highest average in all of SC2 (or any) progaming? During Dreamhack he had 100 more average APM than the 2nd highest APM player with a blazingly fast 340 SC2 APM (470 real apm) AVERAGE. He rarely wins anything, but has had some promising games at big events. At worst, he's still ridiculously entertaining with his APM. Could definitely surprise a lot of people out of his group.

Naama: People seem to forget that this guy won Dreamhack winter 2010, taking out oGs.TOP along the way. Hasn't showed insanely good results since, but does win/runner-up in a fair share of moderately sized EU events and online cups. Tough call between him and Sarens in his group for #2 spot.

SarenS: If it weren't for Stephano, he'd probably win everything in France. He may be better than ToD and Adellscott, but that's still up for debate. Won Eosl Summer '11, and Eosl Winter '10: two huge French-only events which included the entire French bigshot lineup.

Satiini: Shows up quite often in a lot of online cups, and does quite well. Yet to really pop, but is always out there as a threat. Used to have aerophobia, but has supposedly gotten over it. Will be probably be battling with BratOK for 2nd spot in this group.

Seiplo: Another notable performer in online cups. Can take games off anyone in Europe. Tends to be inconsistent, so it's a tough call.


Longshots
I swear we're not hating on Finland here, it's just that too few of their players have gone out and proved themselves in tourneys with the rest of Europe's best players.

biGs: Very unknown Zerg with Good ZvT. Was runner-up at the LDLC Summer Trophy. For notable wins, he smashed BRATOK in a couple of events. Considering the groups, he might have the best chance in this tier of causing an upset in the group stage.

Bischu: Started to rise a little lately, but is constantly overshadowed by other Sweden talent. Doesn't win much, but his name is always floating around. Probably the best player in this tier, but he's stuck in a group of death at Assembly.

Fuzer: Likes to place second in a lot of online cups, though he's not had much luck at taking gold. Like the rest of the hometown boys, he gonna have a rough time.

Jimpo: Does okay in online cups, seems to REALLY be falling off lately. His chances are doubtful.

Protosser: There's not much information about this player who's stayed largely confined to Finland for now. Naama didn't seem overly concerned about him, though he respected his recent efforst to get better.

SeiN: After doing okay at Assembly Winter, we haven't heard much from Finnish Protoss. As a late replacement for Strelok, we have to wonder how prepared he is.

Welmu: The stats say he can take the odd game off top players, but it seems unlikely that he's gonna win a series of a round robin group.