Nestea > Losira

Nestea started bottom-right while Losira spawned top-left on Bel'Shir Beach. Both players opened with hatch first, which has become the norm on long distance maps in ZvZ. After the naturals were up and running, the two players' plans seemed to diverge as Nestea dropped down a roach warren while Losira built a baneling nest.

Losira went for a little bit of early ling harassment, and in the process scouted out Nestea's roach tech. Deeming an early double-ling attack to be too risky, Losira just followed with his own roach warren while both players decided to go up to lair.

The real tech split occured once the two IM zergs reached lair stage. Nestea went for an unusual muta switch while Losira went for the more standard infestor tech. Though they were both playing semi-blind versus each other, Nestea ended up in a better situation.

This occurred due to Losira's pursuit of many upgrades and tech off just two bases (duo chamber, burrow, overlord speed, infestor mana), which put him behind on army size and strength before those upgrades completed. Though it's unclear as to how aware Nestea was of this situation, he took advantage of it by taking a fast third base. And while Losira wasn't caught unaware by the mutalisks due to a good suicide overlord scout, Nestea was still able to use his mutalisks and roaches to delay Losira's third base considerably before he had the proper roach-infestor combination to take it safely.

So going into the end-game, Nestea and Losira were both on three bases and taking their fourths, with Nestea about twenty to thirty supply ahead due to his faster third expansion. Nestea had a mixed army of muta-roach-infestor while Losira had roach-infestor with better upgrades and more built up mana.

It looked like the perfect set up for some gigantic roach battles decided by infestor micro, or perhaps the start of passive play until hive tech was reached. However, the game ended up being swiftly decided by an unintentional and extremely one-sided 'base trade.'

Losira sent in a large group of infestors beneath the ground into Nestea's main and spawned a huge amount of infested terrans on top of the lair. Against the incredible DPS of infested terrans, Nestea had no chance of saving the central structure. This would have been a pretty nice move in other circumstances, but unfortunately this occurred just as Nestea was commencing with a full scale attack.

The six infestors - with zero mana on the opposite end of the map - had really been the lynchpins of Losira's army. For all their upgrades, Losira's roaches stood no chance against the full might of Nestea's army without the help of the stranded infestors. The end result was Losira having six infestors dawdling around in Nestea's main while Nestea had units with actual attacking capabilities blasting away in Losira's.



Seeing that the battle was lost, Losira conceded game one.

Nestea: 3.5/5
Looked very much on top of things, though he didn't actually have to do anything special to win. His tactic of sending one muta to annoy Losira and force him to use waste mana on infested terrans was pretty cute.

Losira: 1.5/5
Was playing the game pretty well, having built up a very strong-roach infestor army before inexplicably throwing the game by wasting all of his infestors to kill... a lair.

Nestea > Losira

Spawning at the right position, Nestea decided to roll the dice and went for a ten-pool build. Nestea used it in a very calculated manner, making four lings to begin with while sending out a drone scout at a precise timing to confirm whether or not the opponent had fast expanded. If the opponent fast expanded, he could quickly add another pair of lings while plopping down an offensive spine crawler, or he could just go back into drone production off his initial four lings if he saw no expansion hatchery. It ended up being the latter case as Losira had gone for a normal gas-pool build.

Despite having a contingency plan for a fourteen-pool build, Nestea was still unquestionably behind in build orders. Losira had more drones, a faster expansion, and faster tech. But with typical Nestea brilliance, the two time champion evened it up. As roaches began to hatch in his main, Nestea sent out a large force of speedlings to attack Losira's natural. Everything went just perfectly for Nestea, as Losira once more made the mistake of attacking when he should have been 100% focused on defense. He had sent four backdoor banelings to Nestea's base while just two remained on defense. Nestea easily dispatched the four banelings with his newly hatched roaches, while taking care of the defending banelings with good speedling micro. This allowed Nestea to force Losira to hatch a lot of zerglings, net an important early-game queen kill, and put Losira in a defensive posture.

Nestea could probably have followed up from here by making a ton of drones and playing very standard, but instead he decided to produce just enough drones to finance a follow-up offensive. With a fast evolution chamber, Nestea went for a strong +1 roach timing attack while Losira was still catching up in the roach numbers.

The game looked nearly over when Losira decided to make quite a few more drones while defending with spine-crawlers and roaches, but he managed to barely hold off Nestea's attack (though whatever drone advantage he gained was negated when they were lost in the defensive effort). Undaunted, Nestea start preparing for another attack, this time designed to hit with +2 range attack.

With more than enough gas from his four geysers, Nestea made the very smart decision to create four overseers. His goal was to cause massive damage or end the game with one big attack, and his four gas geysers meant that he had four hundred gas sitting around that needed to be converted into some kind of combat advantage.



It would give him only a marginal advantage, but marginal advantages were what Nestea needed as the ensuing battle ended up being extremely close. Nestea attacked with a huge amount of roach-bane while Losira defended once again with roach-spine.



In the end, Nestea won by barely a large enough margin to stay ahead of Losira's newly produced units (thanks to some nice contaminates), allowing him to stream in constant reinforcements of his own and force the GG.

Nestea: 4/5
It was a real stroke of brilliance to produce four overseers, which allowed him to make sure every last bit of his resources were being spent on increasing his combat strength. Also, his play to come back from a BO disadvantage was excellent as well.

Losira: 2.5/5
If he had played purely defensively off his BO advantage, he 'surely' would have won (minus the Nestea factor).

Nestea > Losira

Both players opened with hatchery first builds, Nestea starting at the lower right while Losira started at top right. For the third game in a row, Nestea decided to go straight to roaches while Losira opted to go for a baneling nest first. Losira snuck in a couple of scout zerglings which caught drift of Nestea's plan, but in an awesome bit of mindgames, Nestea pumped out one more large round of speedlings before his roach warren completed. A big speedling run-by caught Losira completely off guard, costing him a queen and a lot of initiative while he frantically made more zerglings to defend.

Nestea tried to follow up the attack by sending out his first wave of roaches, but this turned out to be his first incorrect decision in the series. Instead of droning up further after fending off the attack, Losira had actually made a large double-ling army. Nestea's roaches were surrounded and killed in the middle of the field, but he received no further disadvantages for his error as Losira quickly committed one of his own.

Instead of backing off and capitalizing on his map control, Losira tried to push his temporary troop advantage too hard with a reckless attack into Nestea's base. Nestea had a new round of roaches ready just in time, which finished off Losira's double-ling army with no trouble at all. The game see-sawed once more, as this giveaway of troops by Losira opened a window for Nestea to counter--counter attack. While Nestea went up to spire, he also started pumping out a large amount of roaches while Losira was making drones, evo chambers, and a hydralisk den.

Nestea attacked, and this time took a permanent lead. Losira had been too lax on troop production and was forced to rally his drones in a difficult defense. He held with less drone losses than one would have imagined, but the situation was still looking grim as Nestea had expanded behind this attack. Even worse, Nestea sent in a small group of mutalisks to attack just as hydralisks began to hatch, picking off several of them before they could group, sealing off any possibility of an immediate counter-offensive.

In seriously dire straights, Losira decided to go for a nydus canal attack as his last chance at victory.



Though it was a good effort, Losira just didn't have enough units to defeat Nestea's army after nydusing into his main. Losira attempted one more nydus, but he couldn't overcome Nestea's economic advantage. Seeing that his future was bleak, Losira GG'd out.

Nestea: 3.5/5
He actually made a mistake in this game, what a shocker!

Losira: 2/5
Was in too much of a hurry to capitalize on Nestea's roach throwaway and ended up discarding his own advantage as well.

Nestea > Losira

Nestea went for the dual-option ten-pool build just like in game two, but this time the "opponent is going hatch first" side of the decision tree was triggered. The result?



Nestea: 3.5/5
Such a great calculated risk to go for the same ten-pool build again.

Losira: 2/5
Lost the flip.

Nestea won 4-0.

Nestea won 4-0.

Nestea won 4-0.

Original Interivew

How do you feel about winning the championship?
I'm happy to be the first three time champion. I'm glad the games went as I planned. When I was winning 2-0, I thought that I couldn't lose the third set. So even though it was 2-0, I thought of it as 3-0.

Your overseer contamination rush was impressive
I was originally planning to use it on the fifth set on Terminus. However, my rushes kept getting blocked. Still, my opponent was stopping them on a poor economy, so I thought that I had the advantage. I decided to use it then and there without waiting for the fifth set. I thought it was the most correct decision. If not at that timing, it would have been very hard to win. I used it because it suddenly came to mind.

It was a battle with a teammate. Losira came out taunting you?
Gangho (Losira) said we should play fun games, I thought it was cute. When we practiced before, I always took it easy on him because I couldn't show him everything. I thought this day might come. I thought his challenge was cute. He's a cute dongseng(younger brother), so everything he does is cute.

First three time winner, first place in GSL [ranking] points, first place in prize money: which are you the most happy about?
I'm most satisfied with being first place in GSL points. I'm glad to have the opportunity to participate in Blizzcon.

What do you think is the difference between you and other Zergs?
I'm not so sure what's different, I just want to take a break right now. I do have some years on me... If I don't do well now, my future is unclear, so I play very hard as long as I'm playing because I don't think I could survive otherwise. Other players work hard as well, but I don't think there's a player anywhere who practices more than me. I'm exhausted, with no time to take off. I want to rest.

The friends who practice with me say that I always have a lot of drones. I think that's a small difference, it's more instinct than know-how.

You went for an extreme rush in game four.
I wanted to use that strategy if my opponent took a fast expansion in game two. It was something I had thought of beforehand. Gangho has a tendency to want to play greedily, so I was aiming for that. Even if it becomes disadvantageous like in game two, you can overcome it with good management. It was a prepared build order.

Is there a reason you don't use banelings?
Everyone has a style. Whether it's banelings or roaches, the player who uses them better wins. Because I played while checking what my opponent was going for, there were no big difficulties. Whichever one you choose, it's good for the player who uses them better.

How do you rate Losira's play today?
The strategies I used today were ones I've never revealed before. I used them for the first time today, and he couldn't deal with them properly because not many players use these kind of strategies. While he was lacking in his ability to deal with them, I had my own difficulties as well.

What would happen if other players used today's strategies?
There are yet more builds that will beat these builds. If other players use them, then I would be thankful.

How many new builds did you have prepared?
They were builds that required the opponent to play like Gangho to be used. There were some that I had been thinking about for a while but hadn't been able to show. The builds I used today were builds I could win with, that's all.

There are fans that worry that Terran won't get nerfed because Zerg is strong.
It's a dilemma, I can't can't call for Terran to be nerfed after winning three championships. Honestly ZvT is tough but playable. It changes from time to time, but unconditional nerfs seem greedy. I will have to research it more.

No one's won consecutive GSLs yet.
I want it a lot. If you are a progamer, your only goal is winning. I'll work to make sure I will win, and it would be great if I did. There's no looking back.

Jang Min Chul (MC) and Jeong Jong Hyun (MVP) are on your heels for the #1 ranking spot.
As long as they don't face each other in the finals, it will be difficult for them to catch up to me. If they make it far in a tourney, then I'll just knock them out. Because I'm #1 right now, I'm not worrying about it much.

There are a few players who are asking for you to pick them during the group selection?
I've seen some interviews asking to be picked. But I'm not interested. I plan to pick the player I want. I didn't decide yet, I'll start thinking about it today.

Anything you want to say in conclusion?
I'd like to thank my team's Kim Min Seok (MinSeOk) and Kim Hyo Jong (horror), and TSL's Kim Dong Hyun RevivaL. They played so many games with me. In particular, Horror did so much, even coming to where I was staying to help me practice. Gangho took second place, and even though it's disappointing, there will be opportunities after today so I hope he can be strong. As always, thank you to sponsors Googims company and Coca Cola. I will repay it with good results in the future.

InCa got a lot of crap of for trying (and failing) a lot of cheesy, one-shot builds against Nestea in the previous Code-S final, but can you really blame him? HongUn demonstrated for us in three short games that it's often the only option available to the underdog.

HongUn brought a cute semi all-in build order for the first game; a forge FE with an atypical two stargate follow-up. He used these to mass phoenix while preparing for a big blink-stalker follow up. Nestea held all of this fairly decently by producing well timed defensive units and structures while droning heavily all along. Once HongUn's attack failed, he immediately got trampled by Nestea's overwhelming economy.

Still, there was at least a single moment where you thought HongUn might win the game. When the blink stalkers and phoenixes came running in, there was a short window of time where doubt seeped in, where Nestea's spine crawlers, roaches, and hydras looked awfully lacking in numbers.

In the following two games where HongUn played standard, Nestea's didn't even seem remotely threatened. The second game was as standard as could be on Metalopolis saw the two playing standard-as-can-be macro games, but HongUn just rolled over and died once Nestea decided to attack. Nestea's attack was decently well timed as HongUn tried to take his third, but sadly, it felt like Nestea just decided to apply a little bit of pressure and ended up accidentally winning the game. Of course there were lots of subtle things Nestea was doing well - like splitting his forces up to attack different targets and such - but it just went to show that HongUn could never beat Nestea in a longer game where all those subtle little things had time to add up and make a difference.

The third game was probably the best example of why the strategically inferior player should never try to play straight up. HongUn played it super safe with his three gate expand, and immediately got struck with a game losing disadvantage when he had to make his first important decision of the game.

HongUn decided to take a small but fearsome ground force out to attack Nestea's third base on the opposite corner of the map, upon which Nestea simply counter attacked with roach-ling and killed off HongUn's base in return. It went from two bases vs three to one base vs two; a pretty much unwinnable situation for HongUn.

Even though Nestea is the god of defense and adaptation, HongUn still should have looked to all-in or be unorthodox in every single game (maybe a "standard" game as a rhythm changer during the appropriate set). Perhaps that was his plan, too, but his hurt wrist prevented him from preparing five such builds on five different maps.

Byun looked absolutely crushed after his semi-final match vs Losira and for good reason. It's one thing to lose after several games that show that your opponent clearly has more skill; most people will concede as a deserved loss. However, it's a totally different situation when you lose without being able to "play your game" at all - when you feel like you didn't even get a chance to show what you're capable of.

It was the latter case for Byun, who got completely taken off his game thrice in a row (twice by Losira, once by his own doing). The first game he went for a banshee expand in TvZ, and promptly paid the price when Losira went for a roach all-in (he survived, but at nine SCVs to thirty drones, surviving was all he could manage). In the next game he went for an 11-11 barracks bunker rush against Losira's hatch first. Losira handled it perfectly, simply letting his hatchery die while massing a large amount of speedlings. Byun had brought a lot of SCVs along to ensure his rush "succeeded," but none of them returned home due to Losira's large speedling count. It ended up being a net gain for Losira despite the loss of his hatchery. While Byun made an impressive safe, slow recovery from his poor situation, he eventually lost in an up hill macro battle. In the final game, Byun went for a CC first build on Tal'Darim Altar, only to be promptly countered by a baneling all-in.

Obviously, it was entirely Byun's fault for trying to steal the advantage with risky builds three games in a row, and it was entirely to Losira's credit that he had such a good series-wide strategy. Series planning is a very important skill, as is the ability to take calculated risks over multiple games. There's a bit of luck involved for sure, it's definitely more skill than luck if you can ride it to a high tournament finish (Losira this series, OptimusPrime the last).

Even so, it's always a bit sad to see the victims of that kind of planning, where players go out before they have a chance to show their full potential (similarly, Byun and MMA).

Note: It's amusing that Losira would be the one to employ this "underdog" style of series strategy, considering that he was the favored player. It's something you would have thought HongUn would have tried to do against Nestea.