Photo Credit: ESL



Don't forget to read about MC's road to blizzcon here.

Suicide Toss.

Boss Toss.

Protoss President.

      The man of many names, MC has come a long way in his StarCraft career. In the early days as a B-teamer he became known as suicide toss while on MBC Game HERO, playing Brood War. Infamously MC decided to gesture a throat slash before the game started, he then proceeded to lose and so the nickname stuck. This moment was a sign of things to come - always self confident and full of bravado MC has become a legend in StarCraft 2.

      Losing is inevitable but MC has many reasons to be as confident as he is. The first protoss to win the GSL. The only Protoss to win two GSL titles to date. The highest earning player who's career truly began with StarCraft 2 , the third highest earning StarCraft player just behind Flash and Jaedong. MC's results speak for themselves. He is a champion. His confidence is the result of a consistent performance spanning a four year career. MC has revolutionized Protoss play more than once in his career, and no one should be surprised if he does it again on the biggest stage StarCraft has to offer.





      MC spawns in the upper right and StarDust in the bottom left of Yeonsu. MC chooses to go with his trademark hyper aggressive style and opens with a very dangerous cannon rush. Fortunately for StarDust, he scouts the cannon rush and is able to pull some probes to delay it. However, due to map architecture, it is essentially impossible to stop this cannon rush with what StarDust currently has. StarDust catches a break when some excellent micro kills off one of MC’s two probes being used for the rush, and the second probe is a fair bit away. This buys StarDust some more time, but he had opted not to defend with cannons and cannot get enough units out in time. The cannon on the low ground covers his two cannons up top, and they finish.



      StarDust opts to take his natural instead and uses his units to stop a pylon wall from going up at the ramp so that he can transfer probes. He is able to do so, but is forced to wait a while after his main nexus goes down before he can start mining again. MC, being comfortable in any game in which he is able to be aggressive, transitions quickly out of his cannon rush, using only the 3 cannons. The game is fairly even at this point in terms of tech, and MC has only a small economic lead, but MC has a major positional advantage, having a warp-in point in StarDust’s main base and having StarDust’s production and Nexus separated by a ramp and his warp ins and cannons.

      MC kills StarDust’s zealot and pushes across with his own zealot and stalker to pressure, but is deflected by StarDust’s mothership core and 2 stalkers. MC goes up to 3 gates and begins warping in stalkers in StarDust’s main base, poking at the pylons powering the gateway while poking the front with the other 2 stalkers he already had. He also completes his twilight council and begins blink. MC forces a photon overcharge from StarDust, and continues to pressure in StarDust’s main, warping in more units. StarDust’s additional gateways are late, and cannot match the production of MC immediately, so he falls behind slightly in the unit count. The cannons of MC prevent StarDust from killing his small warped in army when outnumbered 4 to 3, and is able to produce enough units in StarDust’s main to overrun him.

      StarDust baits MC’s army over to his nexus, planning on fighting in the best possible location. MC, being MC, decides to dance his army right on top of the nexus. StarDust pulls his probes, and surrounds MC’s army with them, right after activating his photon overcharge. MC loses his entire army, but kills all of StarDust’s stalkers and a few probes. It all comes down to a 3 gate vs 3 gate fight in StarDust’s main base over the pylons powering StarDust’s gateways. The unit count is approximately even, but StarDust has more zealots and MC has more stalkers. Not only that, but MC has blink and cannons to prevent the zealots from being useful. The micro from this point on is short and sweet, and MC claims victory.




      MC is faces CJ's herO. A formidable opponent for sure. However, in PvP, anything can happen, especially when MC, a master of PvP, is involved. In a matchup where coin flips are common, MC seems to flip the coin in his favour more often than not. Being extremely good at micro is going to really benefit MC in this match up since early game PvP is all about unit control and small advantages. MC is well suited to the match up where blink stalkers, three gateways and oracles are most potent.

      MC needs to play aggressively, play to his strengths. The bigger the army gets, the less unit control matters with the exception of very specific timings. If MC can use aggressive openings to gain advantages in the early game he will be in a fantastic position to take the series. That is of course, assuming he doesn't decide to showboat. The legacy of the suicide toss remains, and should he choose to "/dance" in a series against herO, his chances of advancing beyond the round of 16 will fall dramatically.

Brought to you by the TL Strategy Team
Writer: Whitewing, ZeromuS
Graphics: Meru
Editors: NovemberstOrm