WCS America Season 1 - Premier League

Ro16: Group A Preview
Nestea, Snute, Alicia, Sen

Brackets and standings on Liquipedia

All VODs on MLG's Youtube Channel

by Waxangel.

WCS Europe had its first live, in-studio matches last week, and now it's WCS America's turn. With a high possibility of multiple ZvZ's and no players who hail from 'America,' Group A isn't the ideal kickoff MLG will have wanted for such a big occasion, but.....

NESTEAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!

...so I guess it doesn't really matter. Anyway, let's take a look at the group!


Match One LG-IM_NesTea vs. Liquid`Snute

The first match of the group features a three-time GSL champion, the once undisputed King of Zerg vs. Zerg, and the player still known to many cultists as the creator of the universe, LG-IM's Nestea. In the other corner is the Norwegian powerhouse, HomeStoryCup VI champion, and the player who has enamored the Proleague production crew with his dashing good looks, Liquid's Snute.

We have to be honest with you here—we don't know what to expect. Nestea is a player we've seen so little of in HotS that he could either be a god or a pushover in this group. The only meaningful HotS games we've seen him play so far were his beatdowns against Apocalypse and Minigun in his Ro32 group, but really that's the bare minimum we expected from a player of his caliber. On top of that we haven't even seen him play ZvZ at all, although there is a record of him defeating DongRaeGu 2 - 1 at the recent Asian Indoor Martial Arts Qualifiers. On paper that is a really nice result, but it's just one result.

On the other hand, Snute has shown us a LOT more games in HotS, and he has played quite well after some initial hiccups around release. His ZvZ has looked pretty decent, being able to trade games against other Europeans and internationally inclined Koreans. However, Snute's recent trip to Korea for training is a complicating factor, as we have no idea what kind of gains he's made in three weeks. The only match we saw him play post-Korea was a horror show against free in Proleague, a game so fraught with mistakes that we can only put it down to nerves (unless Snute somehow got WORSE in Korea). In any case, that's a ZvP, this is ZvZ. Having Jaedong, Zenio, and Revival (the latter two still being pretty good at ZvZ, despite their troubles in other match-ups) to practice with will surely have helped Snute improve his mirror-match abilities.

All things considered, I'm more inclined to go with Nestea here. If he was going up against one of the stronger Koreans in a non-mirror I could be doubtful, but ZvZ was always his best match-up, and skill in mirrors tends to be the most easily retained. Also, it's Nestea, so if you believe in intangibles such as veteran know-how, confidence, and experience, you have to give him the edge.


Match Two: Axiom.Alicia vs. Gammania.Sen

After facing Crank in the WCS AM Ro32 just two weeks ago, Taiwan's Sen gets to go up against yet another Axiom Protoss in the Ro16. We all know Sen, the most foreign of all foreigners, residing in Taiwan for most of the year, making rare appearances on the international circuit where he inevitably takes 3rd or 4th place at a stacked tournament. For other players, Sen's Ro4 curse would be something to mock, but considering the difficulty of the tournaments he achieved those results at, it just goes to show how good Sen is. Strangely enough, a tournament called WCS 'America' is now Sen's best chance to become a more regular fixture in the international scene, over two years into his SC2 career.

We should all know Alicia as well, although somehow I don't think that's the actual case. Do you remember that time DRG finally won his first MLG season championship, when Stephano crushed Koreans and celebrated with champagne at NASL S3, or when TaeJa kicked off his summer of domination at MLG Summer Arena 2012? Well, Alicia was at all of those tournaments, finishing in second place each time. Arguably, finishing second place three times in the span of a month is a more impressive result than winning one single major. But as it turns out no one really cared, and Alicia ended up languishing on SlayerS for a few months, then became Jessica's most-hated person for a bit, before moving onto Axiom where he has been laying low for months.

So, where are we now with these two? Once again, it's hard to say. We only really saw Sen play HotS ZvP in his Ro32 group at WCS AM, where he beat HuK and lost to Crank, both in fairly close matches. He seemed to favor a roach-hydra style, with ultralisks being his weapon of choice in the late game—nothing too strange. Crank will surely have saved all those reps and handed them off to Alicia, which means Sen will have to play the same strats at his own risk. In HotS, Acer TeamStory Cup is the only place we've been able to see his PvZ until just a few nights ago, where he lost to Symbol in a not particularly informative match (he lost after some failed gate pressure). Due to the advantage of having a teammate who played against him so recently, I'll give the edge to Alicia here.


Overall outlook and Predictions

A lot of Zerg players complained about ZvZ being a dice-roll once it reaches the muta-stage, so one thing to look out for will be if the spore colony buff has changed anything at all. Nestea's been at work at the LG-IM laboratory, Snute down in the trenches with EG-TL, while Sen... who knows how Sen prepares, but we assume he's figured something out on the ZvZ end. Sen has always been excellent at ZvZ, and was an avid user of mutalisks even before they became the 100% standard, so he's definitely not lacking compared to the two other Zergs in this group.

Nestea > Snute
Alicia > Sen
Nestea > Alicia
Sen > Snute
Sen > Alicia

Nestea and Sen advance

Writers: Waxangel.
Graphics: shiroiusagi.
Editor: Waxangel.