Redemption Week

The second half of the first round played out in very different fashion from the first. None of the matches were particularly close, with iS's late rally against EG counting as the best performance by the lower seed. Where it looked like there might be nail biters, there were stomps instead, with Quantic dominating Karont3 thanks to Hawk, and Otter and Sickness tag teaming to prevent Alternate-Type from reaching the 4 wins they took in the qualifiers.

This week, the losers of this week and the last will meet each other in a bid for redemption, a bid to prevent the awful fate of an 0-2 performance. Despite wide participation in the tournament qualifiers, only one of the qualifiers, FXO.CIS, actually made it through the first round (not counting the dtG-aTn-Type match which was guaranteed to advance a non-seed). That leaves compLexity as a favorite in the losers bracket, but also the team with the most to prove. For the rest, the main goal at this point is simply to keep getting another round further, once at a time.

Week Two Review

By tree.hugger

It's a wonder that dropping three games to IdrA should actually be considered an unforced error in this day and age, but there it is; iS put themselves way too far behind against a player they should have been able to snipe. Insur, who played on little practice after studying for exams, was a big loss, but Axslav in particular has some explaining to do. After easily holding off a six pool from IdrA on Tal'Darim, Axlsav somehow decided to zealot-sentry five gate all-in. IdrA read it perfectly, built spines, and that was probably the nail in iS's coffin.

Of course, EG would have been in a solid spot no matter what with DeMusliM, JYP, PuMa, and potentially HuK (had EG been in more trouble, iNcontroL may not have been sent). EG had plenty of strong options remaining. But jEcho and CrazymoviNG played just well enough that had iS's Protosses delivered a little more fire, this could've been a close deal.

Overall though, it was a good series and it gets EG rolling. Next round, they'll play MVP and will need to absolutely bring their A-game. With experienced Korean-killer ThorZaIN in that line-up, EG has a powerful front five, but at best, it's probably equal to the five that MVP can send. So the momentum and positive energy EG has coming out of this win will be key towards overcoming MVP mentally.

Meanwhile, iS shouldn't sweat this loss too hard, although they certainly had a chance for an upset. Instead, if they're able to regroup and move on, with Insur off of school, this will be a stronger team than the one that put together this very respectable finish. Their next round opponent, aTn-Type, did extremely poorly, which means that iS should be feeling better about their chances to move on in the losers bracket.





This match had the potential to be two things: a nailbiting battle of aces, or a wipeout. Unfortunately it was the latter, although Quantic fans probably won't be so sad. Against the Spanish all-star squad, Quantic never was forced to use their biggest guns, although their player picks show they absolutely took this match-up quite seriously. Along with State and Illusion, Hawk was part of Vile's triple threat that made them a dangerous team in last season's IPL TAC. It was great to see Quantic immediately recognizing the strength of the Vile line-up and putting him to use. He surely didn't disappoint with a four win performance and kills against Karont3's two aces. Only Apocalypse's game one win was in the way of an all-kill that Hawk almost surely would have achieved. And even though Apoc inadvertently blocked his teammate's AK, it was good to see him back in action again. A loss in the Code A qualifier finals means that the dynamic Korean terran's star will have to wait a bit longer to rise, but in cleaning up the first game and playing a very entertaining second match against VortiX, Apocalypse looked good for Quantic.

Meanwhile, Karont3 should probably just forget this match and continue on. VortiX wasn't useful enough for Karont3, despite notching the team's only win. LucifroN actually played the second weakest match on the night for the Spaniards. Both MikOeL and AlaStOr looked quite good, despite losing. We've known that neither are slouches, European GM certainly means something, but the expectation has always been that VortiX and especially LucifroN would need to do the hard work. That wasn't necessarily disproved by this result, but fans should certainly look forward to performances from the rest of Karont's line-up in their next match.

So where does that leave us? Quantic looks strong. Against their partners Startale, they should have something of an information advantage, should they choose to put it to use. There's no doubting that StarTale has also looked powerful in the past, especially at the Red Bull LAN, where PartinG, Squirtle, and Bomber all seemed at the top of their game. But with a Quantic front line with NaNiwa, SaSe, Apocalypse, Illusion, and Hawk/State, the Big Red should be given some credit. If they put it together (and we really haven't seen them do so in the past, but if) then they could land the upset.

Karont3 will be favored in the meantime, as they face the only team with less proven depth in the first round of the losers bracket. x6 has two players to worry about; both zergs, and that means Karont should be able to focus their energies. Their non Luci-VortiX line-up should be especially excited about this upcoming match as well; this is a prime opportunity to pick up some big wins.





In the match of the two late IPL TAC additions, few people had heard of dtG, skewing the pre-match poll heavily in favor of the Europeans. But there was no doubt or surprise after this match ended, as dtG cleaned up Alternate-Type with authority, even improving on their 5-4 win in the qualifiers. aTn-Type never got rolling, Socke was sniped with a cannon rush PvP, and the unheralded Otter blew the back end of the Euro line-up away.

It's a cliche now, but there are some extremely strong players in Korea that we've never heard of. dtG seems to have at least one of them. ReaL, Delphi, and DBS aren't at the top of Europe, but they're widely respected. Otter didn't care, outplaying all three. The closest call came in the Delphi match, in which the German zerg gained a lead, but Otter siezed the upper hand after Delphi took a terrible engagement. The turning point of the series was early on however, when Socke went down to Sickness's cheesy opening on Antiga. Why aTn-Type chose to send their most valuable player (a Protoss, no less) first, is somewhat of a mystery, but dtG didn't hesitate to pick him off with PvP, and they took the upper hand from there.

dtG was quite lucky to qualify; benefiting from Vile's merger with Quantic. Then dtG, in their own estimation, held an infinitesimal chance of beating oGs before that team also collapsed. Furthermore, the protoss player dtGGanDoL, their only GSL participant, got there after taking walkovers all the way to the qualifier finals. This is a team that's blessed. But in the next round, their luck at long last seems to have run out. They face Incredible Miracle, and barring the plague striking IM's top players, it seems very unlikely that dtG could pull off the upset. They'd need more than a blessing, but their own incredible miracle. Meanwhile, aTn-Type got beaten here quite badly. Against iS in the next round, they'll again have to contend with high expectations against a fairly unknown opponent. But after this week's performance, can anyone call them the favorites? aTn-Type will need to get in much better shape if they hope to prolong their IPL TAC stay.





x6 was somewhat of an odd qualifier. They made it through on the first day, beating some good teams, but their actual results weren't so impressive. Basically, they were carried by Sleep, and when Sleep got tired, Mystik chipped in a few wins. The rest of their line-up wasn't able to help out much, but it didn't matter, because x6's aces were on fire. Disappointingly, they couldn't replicate the performance here, as TSL, the only Korean GSTL team in the first round of games, ran away with it. RevivaL came, RevivaL saw, RevivaL conquered. Simple.

For TSL, there was precious little to say. This is a team that has been looking resurgent lately, with SymboL finally showing the talent that many identified months ago, HyuN and RevivaL becoming quite good at winning tournaments on the EU server, Polt being Polt, and Inori providing a solid protoss backbone. Somewhat intriguingly, TSL might be the hardest Korean team for a foreign team to face, as their experience with cross server latency, even KR->EU is second to none. But they didn't experience much of a test here, and so it's hard to judge their chances against Korean squads, for example, their next round opponents; FXO. Given recent results, they should probably be considered a favorite, although FXO is one of the most talented teams in the world.

Then there's x6, who have to find someone other than Sleep or Mystik if they want to stand much of a chance. Although not nearly as deep as TSL; Karont3 will have aces who are certainly not far short of RevivaL. Karont's supporting cast also is stronger than it first appears, while x6's still looks anemic. It'll be tough, there's no doubt, but x6 will probably end up being happy simply because Karont3 isn't TSL.

Week Three Preview

By NrGmonk

Both teams in this match lost to their respective opponents last week, but they came out of their matches looking completely differently. iS lost to one of the best foreigner/korean hybrid teams, EG, in a relatively close 3-5 score. Yes, EG did not use their absolute best lineup and yes, Idra, in his current form, probably should have been easier to beat than iS made it look. But Jecho showed that iS was not a one man team and Crazymoving showed impressive games with his trademark unhinged locomotion, most notably using his own brand of mass mutalisk play he first showed in the GSL versus HerO. iS were not the favorites going into this war and they certainly didn't look any worse coming out of it.

In contrast, Alternate-Type look a fairly hard beating from a guy named Otter. Let that sink in for a moment. Imagine getting trashed by this little guy. That must have been embarrassing, not only because they lost to a cute aquatic mammal, but because Otter has never been heard of in the Starcraft scene before this match. This not only affirms the deep talent pool of Code B players in Korea, but also reaffirms the notion originating from the first GSLs that unknown Koreans can and will beat down on known foreigners. Most people, in fact 69% in the live report poll, favored Alternate-Type, preferring to go with the players of known skill over the Code B Koreans of relatively unknown skill. It was thus a huge shock for them that a team containing a top performer from last MLG Arena, Socke, succumbed to a team with almost zero results.

And as much as it was a shock for the fans, it probably hit Alternate-Type even harder, shaking their confidence to the core. If anything, the confidence factor should be on iS's side. iS, to begin with, is a strong team, one that should be considered on even terms with aTn-Type. And just as iS should be, I am confident in my prediction.

Prediction: iS 5-4 Alternate-Type



Although Eclypsia put up a good fight in their last match against Acer, they didn't exactly dispel the preconceived notions about the team. Yes, Kenzy contributed a win for the team, but most the team's real strength seemed to come from Welmu, by far the most notable member on Eclypsia who scored three points, requiring the mighty Nerchio to take him down. But with Eclypsia's team stripped down to their bare bones, they struggled versus Acer, a team that is arguably much weaker than their next opponent.

By the way, their opponent, Dignitas didn't exactly wow us either the previous week. Although they sport a competitive team with very notable names in the foreign scene, they continue to disappoint us in team leagues. Last time on their IPL TAC journey, they were the first team to get eliminated out of the tournament. This time, this disappointment came from being all-killed by Zenio, usually not considered Liquid's ace. Every player on Dignitas took Zenio into a macro game and every player feel just slightly short of him in skill there.

And this is exactly what you might expect, as I would rate Zenio just slightly higher than every Dignitas member. While Dignitas didn't show that they could pull upsets, they did show that they were solid and could pull very close games versus better players. For this reason, I see this as a fairly easy win for Dignitas. In contrast to Zenio, I would rate Welmu, Eclypsia's best player, slightly worse than most of the Dignitas players. And while Dignitas didn't show their ability for upsets, I believe they are still a solid team full of solid players, capable of consistently beating teams worse than them on paper.

Prediction: Dignitas 5-2 Eclypsia



What? Am I seeing this right? Complexity, with their newly acquired Korean lineup, is in the losers bracket after losing their first match to a foreigner team? And unlike in previous team leagues, Complexity took their first round seriously this time, sending out their strongest Korean lineup, and still somehow managed to lose. Most notably, their Korean Terran lineup consisting of MLG top performers GanZi and Heart, in addition to the Tornado Terran, Nada, did not manage to score a single point. Complexity's Koreans must have been especially devastated as they often praise their foreign management in interviews but couldn't seem to bring the results in the largest of all foreign team leagues.

In stark contrast to their next opponents, GoSu met and perhaps exceeded expectations by putting up a good fight against one of the best foreigner teams in Empire. Ostojiy, the mass ladder king of NA, seems to do particularly well in these team leagues, this time taking two games off of Empire. And while he did go 0-3(0-6) at the recent Red Bull Battlegrounds Lan, his games certainly weren't boring and he was actually up 100 supply at one point in an epic game versus second place finisher Bomber.

Still, we cannot overlook the daunting task GoSu has in front of them. Complexity will certainly be taking this match very seriously, as it would be an embarrassment for a team of their caliber to go so quickly out of such a prestigious team league. Look for them to bring their A+ game.

Prediction: compLexity 5-3 It's GoSu



Well, Karont3 LucifroN certainly surprised us last week, and not in a good way. I previously called Karont3 a one man team with all their hopes and dreams riding on the shoulder of this Spaniard. However, this 4-0 killer of Thorzain, winner of The Gathering 2012, and Warcraft 3 prodigy certainly showed a disappointing performance in last week's match. Not only did he lose to a relatively unknown player, he didn't particularly impress at all with his game play. What this shows is that while Lucifron can be a great player, he is also inconsistent. This Bo1 format might not be his forte. His brother, Vortix, was actually the only member of the team to score a point for his team, showing that he indeed does matter and his brother didn't get all the food when they were kids. And actually, everyone on the team looked decent so Karont3 might not be as a one man team as previously though.

x6, on the other hand, didn't surprise anyone last week in their match versus TSL. Everyone expected a clean stomp by the top Korean team and a stomp is what x6 got. x6 has not yet proven they can yet compete on the international stage and they have only one player, their token Korean Sleep, who is regularly seen going far in major tournaments, but wasn't able to beat RevivaL. Another disadvantage x6 seems to have is that they are incredibly Zerg heavy with their top players Sleep, Mystik, Suppy, and Mkengyn all fighting for the swarm. This heavily lowers their versatility and makes them extremely easy to prepare for. And while LucifroN has proven to be inconsistent, he has shown good versus Zerg play, taking out Dimaga 3-0 in the SCAN Invitiational #5. While both teams seem outmatched by the rest of their competition in this league, I would give the slight edge to Karont3 for this reason. (Writer's note: I just realized I probably just squandered my only opportunity to ever predict Karont3 4-5 x6, so now I actually really hope x6 wins with that score.)

Prediction: Karont3 5-4 x6