WCS Season 3
Premier League

Scarlett vs Heart
Hyun vs Huk
Bomber vs Pigbaby
Polt vs HerO

Brackets and standings on Liquipedia
America • Europe

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WCS 2014 is nearing its end and the whole world will be looking to WCS America this weekend, where the final spot at Blizzcon will be decided. As it stands, Jaedong is going to the WCS Grand Finals with 3200 WCS points, but three players in WCS America's Round of 8 are capable of eliminating him. Pigbaby (2500 points), HerO (2250) and Scarlett (1950) are all within arms reach of the Tyrant. The bare minimum for all three players is to... well, win WCS America. That feat is worth 2000 WCS points. A second place (1000 points) is not good enough for any of them. But first they're all faced with difficult opponents and might even cross each others' paths on the way to the very biggest of stages. Scarlett faces a very capable TvZer in Axiom's Heart, Pigbaby finds himself in a rematch of last season's finals against Bomber, and HerO is faced with familiar opposition, Polt. Among all the WCS chaos, #1 ranked HyuN is challenged by HuK, who makes his first WCS quarterfinals appearence tonight.



by peanuts

The first matchup in the Ro8 is a doozy. Axiom’s Heart has been on a tear in WCS for the past few seasons, peaking at a 3rd/4th place finish last season. Acer.Scarlett is on a run of her own, having won Battlegrounds NA, taken 3rd/4th at MLG, and then capped it off with a spree of excellent matches at Battlegrounds DC.

Heart is best described as resilient. For years he’s been seen as a strong Terran who’s just that one small step away from being the next champion. “Potential”, “With the right bracket”, “When he doesn’t have to play Stephano” were all phrases tossed around in mid 2012 as he put up strong finishes in every MLG event that year. However, the (then Complexity) Terran just couldn’t seem to pull the perfect tournament, ending the year without a gold. In fact, Heart ended the year with a poor finish at IPL 5, which would set the tone for the next few months. After leaving Complexity and settling in at Axiom, he would remain relatively inactive, playing only in WCS AM, where he was eliminated in the first round.
However, Heart has bounced back like few others. After quickly running through his Challenger League matches, he followed it up with a Ro8 appearance in Premier League at the end of the year. At the same time, he helped guide Axiom-Acer to their first GSTL title at the end of the year, as well as a second place finish in ATC. This year, he’s been playing the best Starcraft of his life. Though he opened with a slightly mediocre start, he’s since shut down all critics with his Ro4 appearance last season.
This season, he’s proving yet again that he has the potential to be one of the best Terrans in the world. Consistently making deep runs in online qualifiers, as well as winning the majority of online events that he enters, Heart is honing his chops to become a deadly offline player as well. His style of play is marked by flexibility and a willingness to go along with the flow of a set. The Axiom Terran favors to quickly establish the tempo of a match, forcing his opponents to play on his terms. Yet, when the situation calls for it, Heart is a deadly cheese player, hitting harsh timings and throwing in early aggression to overpower his opponent into a quick defeat.

Scarlett is a woman on a mission. After a long period of training in Korea, she’s returned to the West, looking for her first tournament win in over 2 years. Like other great foreigners, she’s been giving the Korean training style a shot, in hopes of boosting her results. The last time she made her retreat, she came back guns blazing. Ro4 WCS, 3rd place RedBull NYC, 2nd place ASUS ROG. At 15-0, she held one of the best pre-playoffs records in ATC. These were the kind of results that she planned to obtain after a second trip of intense training.
This time, however, the results are less pronounced. With an early bang, she secured a Ro4 finish at Homestory Cup and MLG Anaheim. Unfortunately the results have tapered off since then. First round eliminations at IEM Toronto and RedBull DC have lessened the hype surrounding the Canadian Zerg, as flaws in her play are becoming apparent. Despite this lack of results, the keys to winning are present. Strong macro, excellent game sense, and impeccable control are the hallmarks of Scarlett’s play. As the year goes on, it seems that she is coming closer and closer to reclaiming her title as the best foreigner.
Scarlett’s playstyle is best described as “do anything if it gets a map win”. At RedBull DC, she showed an ability to break out risky, innovative builds in order to throw her opponent off guard. At MLG, she showed a rare willingness to race switch, if she deems it the best way to take a game. With this unpredictability, she often forces her opponents to react with a defensive style, fearful of what may come. If all else fails, she will often resort to simply playing the macro game, where she can hold her own against the best - to a point. Scarlett’s major flaw in ZvT is that she sometimes falls apart in the late game, getting stretched thin by multi-pronged aggression, eventually suiciding her army into the Terran, in vein attempts to end the game as quickly as possible. Despite this shortcoming, she still managed to play impressively against Polt and Cure at DC, drawing out the sets to their entirety each time.

Predictions:

It’s a tough call. Heart has excellent TvZ and has always been confident in the matchup. He also has a winning record against Scarlett, having knocked her out of WCS previously. However, Scarlett has been making large strides in the matchup lately. She has the potential to outplay anyone, and can certainly clinch the set, given the right map picks.

Scarlett 3 - 2 Heart


by XXTN

The Mountain and the Viper

Up next is fellow Canadian and long time fan favorite, EG.HuK who will be pitted against Roccat.HyuN in the second quarterfinal. Like the Mountain clashing with the Red Viper, we have the big bad Blizzcon #1 seed going up against an overwhelming underdog. As far as results go, this matchup appears totally one-sided as HuK has never taken a game off HyuN in HotS. However, they have not played each other for quite a few months and HuK has recently made great strides in his PvZ. Should he catch his prey unawares, a viper can prove deadly. Can this Evil Genius finally claim his long overdue vengeance?

HuK is one of only two foreigners left in the Ro8, and there is no denying that he is far from favored in this match. Yet while past results indicate an imminent defeat, HuK’s recent form suggests otherwise. The former “top foreigner” has been experiencing quite a resurgence, finishing top four in RB Atlanta, second in Destiny 1, and now cracking top eight in WCS for the first time. That being said, HuK still shows vulnerability from time to time; he was eliminated by Leenock in the Ro32 of DH Stockholm and narrowly lost a bo7 to JonSnow just a few days ago in the Copa America S3 Grand Finals. He will certainly need to show his infamous “top 3 control” today if he hopes to survive HyuN’s aggressive, roach centered playstyle.

The good news is that HuK’s PvZ has improved greatly over these past few months. Gone are the bland and predictable mass gateway all-ins that he often threw out hoping for miracles. Though he occasionally sprinkles them in, these awkward timings are more indicative of greater concern in HuK's mind, perhaps even panic. Instead, his style has adjusted well to the current meta, and he looks much more confident in late-game scenarios. Still, HuK loves his gateway units and makes this low tier composition work with brilliant force fields. While he does use immortals to to strengthen his composition, HuK’s has never been the type of player to open Stargate -> Colossus for example. Instead, the currently standard PvZ style of highly aggressive mass sentry/+2 blink is one he definitely enjoys and will likely show tonight.
This Canadian Protoss wants to be back in the discussion for “best foreigner” and clinching a semifinal berth would certainly get his name back into the hat. But to do so, HuK will need to bring his A-game and then some to take on Hyun, or risk getting his head crushed in the process.

The ever-flamboyant and confident HyuN will attempt to tighten his grip on the #1 Blizzcon seed this weekend. The Season 1 champion roared into the quarters by topping the Ro16 group of death. There, he defeated Taeja and swept the defending champion Pigbaby. Like Gregor Clegane, HyuN is a dangerous opponent who fights with a ruthless and unrelenting style. But HyuN is not only aggressive but also tactful; he knows how to outmaneuver his opponents and make the most of a lair tech swarm.

He seems to have some of the best work ethics in Europe as he is always either practicing, dominating online cups, or traveling to tournaments. His recent dip in results however may suggest that perhaps all the traveling and yearlong grind may finally be catching up to him. He fell out in the Ro16 of DH Moscow and proceeded to lose in the Stockholm group stages. More importantly, his ZvP has been looking a bit shaky lately. The Roccat Zerg has dropped matches to herO, MaNa, MyuNgSiK, First, Sjaak and Jersen over the last two weeks. With most of those losses coming from online cups, we are left wondering if HyuN can elevate his play for the big stage. While he is the clear favorite, this match may not be as clear cut as their previous meetings. Considering the imminent 2015 region lock, HyuN has already declared that this would most likely be his last WCS America season… now can he make this one count?

Overall thoughts and Predictions

These two have met four times total in ranked HotS matches, and HuK has yet to win one game. They’ve played each other three times this year and HyuN remains at a perfect 6-0. However, their last meeting took place nearly four months ago at MLG Anaheim and much has changed since then. While HuK has improved in this matchup, he will still need to bring something special if he wants to end this drought. HyuN has shown weaknesses to Protoss timing attacks in the past, namely against Pigbaby in last season’s semifinals. While HuK probably will not scale the entire mountain, I believe he can take his first steps today.

HyuN 3 - 1 HuK


by Destructicon

Craziness may ensue in the third series of the night as Bomber faces off against Pigbaby in a rematch of last season's final. Despite hailing from different generations and races both players have shown a strong willingness to think outside the box when it comes to tactics and strategy. With everything on the line - even a spot at Blizzcon in Pigbaby's case - every wrench, bone and kitchen sink in the house is ready to be thrown in.

Pigbaby comes from the new generation of KeSPA pro gamers. He racked up an impressive 5-1 record in the first part of the 2013-14 Proleague season against names such as Zest, RorO, Rain, Hydra. However one month later he was removed from the JinAir roster, along with CoCa. It was then that Pigbaby decided that his talents would be best put to use gobbling up foreign cash. He managed to qualify for WCS AM Season 2 in his first try, tearing trough strong players such as Ryung, Revival, Hyun and Taeja on his way to the final. There he would meet Bomber. Initially it looked like the Red Bull terran had the championship in the bag, getting a quick 3-1 lead. However Pigbaby fought back with all his creativity and wits managing to pull off a miraculous comeback to take the championship. And although we've had so many games of his to study, Pigbaby still remains enigmatic. He doesn't seem to play any particular style, but rather molds his play from series to series or even from game to game, adapting to his opponents. He pulled out cheese and timing to defeat Hyun, deflected Taeja's aggression with observes in a strong macro series and outsmarted Bomber pulling off creative builds of his own. This following series is very important to Pigbaby, a win in WCS AM could guarantee him a spot at Blizzcon, make him the second player behind Polt to get back to back WCS titles and solidify his place on the scene as one of the strongest players around. Pigbaby must be feeling confident going up against Bomber, an opponent he has already vanquished. But he must not let his confidence turn to arrogance, for Bomber is a shrewd and cunning opponent who can make even the best of the best look silly.

Bomber is one of the great veterans of the SC2 scene. He made his debut back in 2011 and quickly rose to fame, taking his first championship by defeating MMA, Ryung and Mvp to win Code A May edition back when it was still its own tournament. After his victory at MLG Raleigh 2011 a lot of people thought he would become the next Mvp - an extremely solid macro terran with great game sense and series planning. Instead, Bomber's hype train crashed and burned after he spectacularly broke down against ByuN after he went up 2-0 in the series. This even sparked the creation of the infamous "Bomber's Law" running joke. Bomber didn't give up however, he kept fighting, improving and coming back stronger and stronger each time - but he also kept on disappointing whenever it seemed like he was on the verge of breaking out again. After a year long championship drought he finally managed to obtain his third title at the WCS Season Finals 2 in Cologne. The win completed his triple crown and helped him silence the law-fanatics. Through it all Bomber never lost his core identity. After so many years and thousands of games played, great macro is now a standard skill, a requirement for success. Yet Bomber somehow still manages to impress with exactly that, his ability to simply make more stuff than others could. What's more, Bomber is an especially dangerous opponent to face due to his own arsenal of unorthodox builds that throw a wrench in opponents' plans while he's just as capable of outmacroing them.

When you see his fingers dance across the keyboard it's easy to forget that Bomber is now 26 years old. Late last year he made the decision to leave StarTale to travel the world and have as much fun as he could before joining the military. So far he has succeeded, gaining two more championships and placing highly in many other tournaments. However you can sense that Bomber wants more. Even though he is already qualified for Blizzcon, a WCS AM title still eludes him.

Final Thoughts

This is a symbolic clash between the old and the new. Both players have everything to play for, Pigbaby desperately wants to qualify for Blizzcon so he can start building a legacy of his own. For Bomber this is the chance to solidify his place as one of SC2's all time greats before passing the torch. In terms of momentum, Pigbaby has had a bit of a dip in form, failing to qualify for IEM Toronto after losing to Zest and Flash, and then falling to Hyun in his WCS group. Meanwhile Bomber has been on an absolute tear, defeating Rain in KeSPA cup and tearing through Red Bull Washington to win it. His only recent series loss was to CJ herO in the KeSPA cup. When two players are as unorthodox and witty as these two are, it becomes quite hard to predict a winner, but I will go with Bomber on this one. I think he is hungrier than ever to leave a mark on the scene and his experience will shine through here.

Bomber 3-2 Pigbaby


by DarkLordOlli

The final match of the Ro8 features two veterans of the scene who by now should be as familiar with playing against each other as anyone. LiquidHerO and CMStorm_Polt have played a grand total of 38 maps against each other in tournaments. The head to head score is currently in favor of Polt, if only slightly - he leads 21-17. HerO has however come through to defeat him on a number of big occasions. In 2012's WCS Korea, the NASL 4 Semifinals and most recently the IEM Cologne Grand Finals. Their playstyles often make for highly entertaining games, but can this clash live up to those expectations?

In Polt's case, he doesn't really have to perform his very best. His ticket to Blizzcon is already secured and nobody would blame him if he took this one easy. His championship is going nowhere, 2015's region lock almost confirms that he will get to enjoy it soon enough. And against almost any protoss opponent, he would still be favored to advance. His only losses to protoss over the last few months have come against Zest and herO. The far bigger problem seems to be his TvT. With losses to Apocalypse, MMA, sKyHigh, Cure, Cure again, Bunny, Cure again, Bomber and ForGG (all in the last two months), he may have skipped some TvP practice to address bigger concerns.

His TvP playstyle has changed very little over the years anyway, it's still the same old hyperaggressive style of dropping everywhere at once, often delaying higher tech to keep up his relentless pressure. It's not an uncommon playstyle by any means - Maru and Cure have made it their standard - but it still is rare to see someone execute it as masterfully as Polt does day in, day out.

So why does HerO have a chance then? Considering his recent form and results, you would have to give this one to Polt easily, right?
Perhaps. I for one am not so sure about it. Even though Polt leads in the head to head, HerO's playstyle matches up very well against Polt's. The reason why these two play such entertaining games is simple. HerO and Polt share the same strengths. They both flourish in chaotic situations, with small, scrappy fights all over the map. At IEM Cologne, HerO was able to clinically deconstruct Polt's war machine. As long as he's prepared well, who's to say he can't do it again?

The story behind this match is incredibly simple. HerO has to win WCS America to make it to Blizzcon. If he is to reach the Top 16 of the year, losing to Polt or anyone else in this tournament is not an option for him. For an iconic protoss champion like HerO, anything but that will be a disappointment. This is no longer about realizing his potential, or besting his nerve issues, as it has often been in the past. This is now about living up to the standards he's set for himself over the years.

Predictions:

In HerO's shoes, I would have practiced nothing but PvT at the MVP house in anticipation of this encounter. With Bomber's current form, he's likely expecting to face him in the semifinals, should he make it past Polt. Even if Pigbaby does beat Bomber, HerO has expressed that he feels confident in his PvP.
I'm expecting more of the same from Polt. He's often been called out for being predictable in the past and he hasn't changed much. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it". Against someone like HerO however, someone who knows his style almost perfectly by now, Polt may be faced with builds that are specifically tailored to take him down.

HerO 3 - 2 Polt

Writers: peanuts, Destructicon, XXTN, DarkLordOlli.
Graphics: Meru.
Editors: DarkLordOlli.