EPTUnofficial Dreamhack Stockholm Power Rank
by Yorkie
So I decided to sit down and rank who I believe are the best players going into the upcoming Dreamhack Stockholm event. This might become a regular thing that I do heading into big and important weekend tournaments and depending on the reception I'll probably do one of these for Kespa Cup 3 which will feature a lot more research and analysis (not Blizzcon because the TL writers already cover that from every angle much better than I could). This one is relatively off the cuff and very informal. It's mostly to get my thoughts out there and get a discussion going.
A few points about my criteria. I ranked the players based on a combination of recent results, likelihood to win this tournament, and the "eye test." I know a lot of you don't like that last one but I like to at least consider how skilled players are at their peak not simply what placings they have achieved. That said it is the least important of the three. Without further ado here's my top twenty players heading into Dreamhack Stockholm:
The Favorites
1.
sOs - "So sOs you just reverse all-killed KT, murdering TY and his family in back to back events. What's next for you?" "I guess I'm gonna go collect some more free money." sOs is smart. sOs is cheesy. sOs is scary. While at first heralded as a king of preparation, then as the ruler of 100k tournaments, now he has shown himself to be just as terrifying in shorter events like Dreamhack where strategies and game plans are made on the fly. After Zest's fortuitous withdrawal from MSI sOs made the most of his opportunity, going 11-1 in games as he cruised to the title. Although he fell out of Code S and S2SL in the ro16 you can't ignore his opponents. He lost in close sets to Life, Innovation, herO, and Classic, all of whom will be at Blizzcon but none of whom will be in Stockholm this weekend. Factor in his performance in Proleague against KT and he's my pick to win the event.2.
Rain - For the next ten days Rain is the reigning GSL champion, and I would be remiss to not include him as a favorite here. If I had to pick a word to describe Rain's style it would be solid and amazingly he's only gotten better as this year has gone on. Given that his GSL victory obviously has more pedigree than sOs's win at MSI he would be number one if not for a few recent red flags. He was outclassed by Parting in a 3-0 sweep at Dreamhack France, a feat I could easily see sOs repeating here. Secondly he has been solidly beaten by Snute and Losira in recent tournaments, and with a field stacked with zergs that could be worrying. Lastly he failed to make it to the bracket stage in GSL season 3 falling to Rogue and Bbyong who, while certainly no pushovers, are expected to be the underdogs against a player like Rain. Despite this, he's solidly cemented himself as a favorite here with a strong ro4 in S2SL falling in 7 games to the eventual champion and WCS point leader herO. If he avoids sOs he can easily win, and is a cut above most of the players in attendance. 3.
Dark - The word potential comes to mind a lot when I looked at Dark in years past. For a while I had him pegged as a player who would become a top 5 zerg. Finally that has come to fruition in 2015 but hasn't overcome the final hurdleThis is a prediction made by Darkhorse last December and at the time I agreed with him wholeheartedly. Since then Dark and Dream have collectively made four finals and lost them all, but while Dream looks ready to take the next step towards becoming a powerhouse, Dark is still on shaky ground. For one Dream made two S2SL finals, whereas Dark hasn't made the bracket stage of GSL or S2SL this year at all, his finals appearances coming in Kespa cups. On the plus side for him, Kespa cups are a lot more like Dreamhack than those other tournaments anyway and with his high skill ceiling and excellent macro and micro mechanics I could see him taking the title provided he only has to beat one of the two players I have ranked above him. Last but not least I need to mention his WCS standing. Currently Dark is ranked 17th, just shy of Blizzcon, and ranks 16 and 15 (Fantasy and sOs respectively) will be present this weekend. While I don't see him passing sOs he could very easily pass Fantasy if he plays to his skill level, and the motivation and pressure of earning a seed at Blizzcon will likely impact him for better or worse this weekend.
The Contenders
There's a pretty significant drop off in tournament-winning potential here, but these players have a decent shot if they can pull of one upset. This is also where the list gets murkier and the distance between players gets closer and closer. Reasonable minds can debate moving these players around a lot depending on your perception, and I look forward to your reasonable and well thought out disagreements.
4.
FanTaSy - This pick will likely be heavily disputed for good reason. It genuinely feels weird ranking Fantasy so highly here. He's not an elite terran player on a global level and he hasn't had any amazingly impressive results this year. So why is he here? While Fantasy does poorly on the eye test he has shown a consistency that most of the players below him have not. Despite moving out of a Korean team house he has made every season of Code S and shown that can compete with the best by beating some big names i.e Innovation at IEM Gamescom before falling out 3-2 to soO in the semis. Despite going out in third in his ro32 Code S group he was facing the eventual semifinalists Dear and Byul. Not to mention Fantasy has shown relatively strong mech play in the past which will serve him extremely well in the current meta in a field filled with zerg players. I think Fantasy is on an uptick right now, and he'll need to show it this weekend with Dark breathing down his neck for a Blizzcon spot. 5.
Curious - Amazingly for someone with such a long career, but this may be Curious's best year of Starcraft. He made the semifinals of Code S season 2 beating sOs, Byul, herO and Rogue along the way and won Dreamhack Valencia which featured a lot of the players on this list. The only reason he isn't in Blizzcon contention is because he hasn't been able to get into S2SL once all year being eliminated in qualifiers by DRG, Hyun, and trap respectively. Curious is solid enough to make a run for the title and the tendency for people to sleep on skills may help him along the way. 6.
Solar - After a tremendous second half of 2014 (2 GSL ro8s, 2nd at IEM Shenzhen, and titles at Dreamhack and MSI back to back) Solar has been quiet this year. Or rather he wishes he had been quiet, but his lack of results has actually been extremely well noticed and ridiculed. He hasn't done well in Proleague, losing his role as Samsung's ace to Dear, and aside from season 1 has not made it to the bracket stage of a Korean individual league. Despite all this Solar is still very dangerous. He made the finals of MSI by taking Parting, a nemesis of his, and looked solid in the most recent season of Code S out ZvZing Dark before being ousted by Byul and Zest. Anything less than a top 8 or greater than a top 4 finish for Solar would surprise me, but seeing him beat one of the players ranked above him wouldn't. 7.
Leenock - Leenock is obviously not the player he used to be and based off his previous two Dreamhack runs I almost placed him outside the top ten. To be fair regarding the Dreamhack ro32 exits those were bo3 losses to Gumiho and HerO respectively. So long as he tops his group he likely won't be tested in the same way until the ro16 at least. What is actually worrying for Leenock is that he's currently teamless. While he is almost certainly simply practicing in the SBENU house, being technically teamless does put a lot of pressure on a player without the security of most competitors. Even still Leenock is one of the best players to ever do it and in a field filled with middling to good (by elite Korean standards) zerg players he could shine. 8.
ForGG - Mech. Just kidding. ForGG is coming off his best WCS season yet and is a legitimate threat despite being the first player on this list not competing in Korea. As a former Dreamhack champion he has what it takes to win big weekend events even against what most would consider superior players. jokes aside, his skill as a mech player cannot be ignored in a tournament featuring so many Korean zergs, and even though his aggressive style can get him into trouble it will likely catch many Koreans off guard.
9.
HyuN - The WCS America stalwart and weekend warrior of 2014 returned to Korea this year and predictably didn't find too much success. His Blizzcon hopes are almost certainly nonexistent barring a championship run and Fantasy and Dark falling flat (although I'll leave the actual projections to Die4ever). Even still I think as a player he is generally underrated and is especially good in a Dreamhack environment. He's made the semifinals of his previous two Dreamhack events, each with talent pools as deep as this one. The Question Marks
Okay player write ups are going to get shorter now because I'm putting way more effort into this than I planned to and this is getting lengthy. Essentially these players could finish anywhere from the ro32 to the quarterfinals, possibly the semifinals with a great bracket, but aren't real championship contenders in my eyes.
10.
Jaedong - The Tyrant Has had a Quiet year. After taking season 1 off he hasn't gotten the results in WCS many expected of him in WCS. In RecenT Weekend tournaments he Has proven himself to be a legitimate competitor and is showing Signs of a return to form. JvZ was a force to be reckoned with in the past and might heLp him a lot Here. 11.
TRUE - The second in a trio of zergs I could swap around interchangeably, TRUE Has made the semifinals and finals of his previous two Dreamhack events and done literally nothing else all year. I expect some Wild games and one upset. 12.
Sacsri - Sacsri is a former Dreamhack champion but hasn't done much in 2015 aside from making Code S in season 2. He did place second at Homestory Cup, beating PartinG and Jaedong before losing to Rain. I don't expect him to pull any big upsets, but don't see him losing to inferior players either. 13.
HerO - With such a storied career and huge past success at Dreamhack it's tough for me to rank HerO this low but I have to. He simply hasn't shown enough games this year. he made Code S in season 2 and beat two players above him on this list (Leenock and Sacsri) before losing to TRUE in the ro8 of Dreamhack Valencia. He's a strong contender for the quarter or even semifinals, but he's also prone to upsets and his form is hard to judge. 14.
Reality - Reality nails the eye test with me. He's played some extremely sick games over his career and I think he is generally underrated. That doesn't really matter though when you have literally no individual results to speak of this year. He's 6-5 in Proleague on one of it's worst teams and has talent, but I can't in good conscience rank him higher without proving himself.15.
Hurricane - Hurricane is an enigma. He'll qualify for S2SL one day then look absolutely silly in proleague the next. He's honestly quite good but he has a strong potential to be upset by the 5 players ranked below him and making the quarterfinals or more would be a stretch. The Best of the Rest
16.
Snute - Snute had some really impressive games at IEM Shenzhen against Classic and Rain, who at the time were the reigning GSL and SSL champions respectively. These two series showed us the peak of what he is capable of, but he has struggled outside of Korea lately, failing to make the bracket stage of WCS and being knocked out relatively early in the previous Dreamhack and Homestory Cup. He can take a series off almost everyone here, but I don't see him stringing together two or three victories against top 15 players. 17.
PtitDrogo - Carrying the French flag in Lilbow's place, I expect blink stalkers to take one series upset over one of the zergs I have ranked above him. Despite his impressive ASUS 2nd place finish, I don't give him much of a chance of making the quarterfinals. 18.
MaNa - MaNa had an awesome run at WCS season 3, but everything I've seen lately of him makes me think he's going to get 2-0d by the first Top 15 player he runs into, particularly a zerg since his PvZ looked shaky at best in WCS. 19.
Armani - He's never done much in individual leagues in his career, but apparently he was scary enough for KT to keep Zest home for proleague so maybe he can upset someone? Also dude change your ID back to BurNing. You need to reinvent yourself and that's a good first step. 20.
viOLet - viOLet limped through this year of WCS and he knows it. A big performance Here could prove he still Has something left in the tank, but I don't see it happening. Thanks for reading if you read this far. Sorry it's not very pretty/lacks pictures I'm gonna do better next time I promise. If you disagree with something on the list know that you may be right and I may be crazy but it just may be a lunatic you're looking for. Cheers!
Also this is NOT affiliated with TL or the TL writers in any way I'm just a dog who thinks I know a decent amount about SC2 and wanted to write something. Happy to accept feedback on rankings or my writing.
![[image loading]](http://cdn.teamacer.com/media/uploads/2014/09/BxhfzcpIYAAgOJG.jpg)
