by Peanuts


Game One - Alterzim Stronghold: Recognizing MC’s poor record in drawn out macro games, MMA chose Alterzim as the opening map. In accordance, MMA opened fast reaper in triple orbitals for a macro game, while MC seemed to follow suit by opening nexus first. However, a stargate was soon warped in for MC, pointing to a more devious plan.

Scanning the stargate, MMA simply prepared by putting widow mines near his minerals, expecting little more than some simple oracle harassment. Instead, MC went up to seven gateways and chrono'd out three voidrays for a frontal attack. After picking off mines with a detecting oracle, MC kicked through MMA's front door with brute force to take a quick game one win.


Game Two - Habitation Station: MC continued to show his "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" approach to SC2, returning to Habitation Station with his optimized gold-expansion + mass gateway all-in that crushed jjakji in the semifinals. MMA's scouting reaper quickly alerted him to what he was up against, allowing him to prepare for, and easily hold off MC's initial two oracles with minimal damage. Sparing no expense on a formidable defensive line of bunkers in his natural, MMA was then able to hold against what had previous seemed like an unstoppable timing attack of void rays and zealots.

With his initial attack repelled, MC was put on a timer against MMA's far superior tech. As MC reloaded for one last push, MMA even felt comfortable enough to send medivacs out to harass MC's unguarded bases. After his last-ditch force was torn up by MMA's meatgrinder defense, MC surrendered the GG.

Game Three - Daedalus Point: MC's love of opening stargate seemed to get him in trouble to start game three, as MMA's well-position mine quickly took out MC's first oracle before it could get anything done. Assuming he was safe after killing the oracle, MMA threw down a startport and started pumping out SCVs.

However, MC had different plans. With 7 gateways, blink tech, and a proxy pylon on the way, MC was ready to go all-in for the third game in a row. A starsense scan allowed MMA to discover MC's plan, but not in time for him to prepare proper defenses. Picking apart MMA's infantry with fantastic blink micro, MC forced the GG out of MMA to take a 2-1 lead in the series,

Game Four - Yeonsu: After going all-in three games in a row, MC followed the old adage of "the cheesiest thing a cheesy player can do is play macro" and went for a standard game. Though this seemed to initially favor MMA as he traded favorably in a number of small skirmishes between armies, MC patiently defended and built up a scary deathball. MC's decision to go macro seemed fully justified after he won the first full-pitch battle between armies, as he emerged with a 40 supply lead and one extra base.

The game seemed to be all but in the bag for MC as he sent in his forces for the coup-de-grace, but instead he found himself suffering a remarkable turnaround. Putting his back against a wall, MMA forced MC to funnel his forces into narrow corridors, allowing him to win an engagement where he seemed all but doomed. With the Protoss deathball having lost its colossus backbone, MMA was able to squeeze out just enough ghosts to neutralize MC's remaining archons and templars and complete an incredible comeback.

Game Five - Frost: Almost having won in a macro game in game four, MC decided to take another shot at it on Frost. MMA obliged MC once again, leaving the two players to build up their economies and armies in relative peace for nearly 19 minutes until the first major engagement.

As MC looked to take a fourth base, MMA deemed that it was time to challenge the Protoss army in the field. At first it seemed that MMA had taken the perfect engagement, catching MC's templars clumped and showering them with EMPs. However, MC swung around with a flanking group of templars and zealots from the side, catching MMA off-guard and absolutely crushing the Terran force.

MC opted to play his lead out more safely than the previous game, which allowed MMA the time to build up another force and make a partial recovery. However, it proved to be the right decision in the end for MC as MMA was left needing to make a move to fully recover. A daring attack from MMA allowed him to kill MC's fourth base, but left his army in tatters. That gave MC the opening he needed to counter-attack and take the game.

Game Six - Polar Night: Possessing plenty of options in terms of builds on Polar Night, MC decided to open with up blink stalkers. However, there would be no all-in from MC as he had no qualms about switching to a macro game upon having his plans uncovered by a scouting scan. The series headed into its third straight macro game after three straight all-ins as both players established their third bases.

After focusing on head-on engagements in the previous two games, MMA decided to go in a different direction in game six, risking a four-medivac doom drop while the bulk of his army tried to distract MC on foot. However, this tactic only ended up allowing MC to divide and conquer MMA's forces, with zealots and templars annihilating the drop in the main as his main force pressed on. After a few more warp-ins, MC was able to barrel down the middle of the map, take out MMA's third base and natural, and receive the final GG of the series.

by Waxangel


Game One - Daedalus Point: The finals began with game that could only be called an oddity, as HyuN quickly sent a drone to build an offensive hatchery at Oz's natural expansion on Daedalus Point. Things only got weirder after Oz chose a cannon rush as his response, preventing HyuN from taking his own expansion as well.

As the situation played out, things seemed to favor Oz as he cleared out the offensive hatchery, planted a nexus, and built a defensive wall at his natural. However, a misplaced blocking probe was all HyuN needed to instantly seize control of the game, flooding speedlings into Oz's base. With speedlings wrecking his probe line and banelings morphing inside his main, Oz had no choice but to GG out.


Game Two - Frost: After getting swept in his two previous final appearances, Oz succeeded at winning his first map in a finals in game two. HyuN attempted the roach-hydra-viper style that had been so effective against Alicia during his semi-final bout, but Oz proved to be a more formidable opponent. Getting templars out in time to feedback HyuN's vipers, Oz had no trouble annihilating the remaining ground forces with a mixture of blink stalkers and colossi. A belated ultralisk transition was hardly enough to keep HyuN in the game, and he admitted defeat.

Game Three - Alterzim Stronghold: Drawing diagonal spots on Alterzim Stronghold, both players gave up on early game attacks to prepare for the late game. Oz went for a composition based on a large fleet of air units to back up his colossi on the ground, while HyuN went for a similar strategy of massing corruptors and mutalisks.

Things went wrong for Oz when he moved out too aggressively on the sprawling map, allowing HyuN to use his mobility to his advantage and launch a number of damaging backdoor attacks. Eventually, Hyun felt confident enough in his corruptor count to simply take Oz's army straight on, and crushed the Protoss forces to receive the surrender.

Game Four - Yeonsu: In order to tie up the series once more, Oz enacted one of the most stereotypically evil Protoss plans conceivable. Starting off with a cannon rush on HyuN's natural, Oz continued it with a second cannon rush on HyuN's third base. Oz then followed that with a +2 blink stalker all-in as the third hit in his combo.

Remarkably, HyuN managed to survive all three attacks, but was still left in the terrible position of making mass roaches against a Protoss who had effortlessly transitioned into three-base colossus-stalker production. HyuN inevitably found his army getting torn to pieces in engagements, but put in a conscious effort to stay in the game for as long as possible before GG'ing out.

Game Five - Heavy Rain: With the first four games split evenly between the two players, they moved onto Heavy Rain to begin the final best of three for the championship. As both Oz and HyuN established three bases quickly, the game started to take the look of one that might go long.

However, things seemed to abruptly tilt in Oz's favor after his not particularly adventurous poke was able to destroy HyuN's forth base, all while HyuN's roach counter-attack was torn apart by defenses at home. This spurred Oz on to launch a three base timing attack soon after, with an eye to end the game.

Unfortunately for Oz, everything went wrong for him on his second attack. HyuN's second roach counter went much better, killing of Oz's third before the Protoss force had advanced to a threatening position. Oz decided to continue for forge onward with what had essentially become an all-in attack, but Hyun had more than enough time to recall his roaches to his base and join up with newly produced mutalisks. After a close defensive engagement, HyuN was able to destroy the Protoss army. With his economy crippled and army gone, Oz had no choice but to GG.

Game Six - Habitation Station: The sixth and final game started with Oz taking a gamble, going for a nexus-first build despite scouting out HyuN's 14-pool opener. The move almost instantly backfired for Oz as he was hampered by six pesky zerglings while HyuN quickly took a third base at the gold.

Already playing from behind, and seeing HyuN threaten to pull even further ahead with his gold base, Oz decided it was time for drastic measures. Four more gateways went up in his main for an all-in attack. However, HyuN already had an overlord in position to scout out Oz's additional gateways, and he had no problem preparing for the ensuing attack. Enveloping Oz's army with a flood of lings, HyuN was able to crush the Protoss force and clinch the WCS America championship.