StarCraft II may have a new balance patch, but its best player remains the same. WCS Global Champion Serral defeated INnoVation 4-3 to claim the championship at HomeStory Cup XVIII, the first major tournament after the 4.7.1 balance patch.
After an underwhelming WCS 2018 campaign, INnoVation put in one of his best tournament performances in nearly a year. He gave the viewers a taste of vintage INnoVation in game one of the finals, out-producing and outlasting Serral in a bloody macro game. INnoVation was unable to repeat that feat, but still managed to go up 3-2 with expertly executed proxy-rax rushes.
Unfortunately for INnoVation, Serral was no stranger to fighting back from a deficit. The Finnish Phenom was imperious as ever, seemingly taking the final two points at will with a decisive roach-ravager timing followed by a masterful macro game.
For the rest of the field, HSC told the abridged story of WCS 2017-2018. Non-Korean players put in surprisingly strong performances early on, with ShoWTimE and Reynor taking first place in their groups. In the upset of the tournament, 2017 Global Champion Rogue was eliminated in the group stage after dropping matches to ShoWTiME, uThermal, and Namshar. However, the Korean pros proved to be sharper in the bracket phase of the tournament, winning the majority of BO5's against foreigners-not-named-Serral.
The newly un-retired TaeJa was another person-of-interest at the tournament, achieving a top eight finish in his first live event since concluding his military service. While other past champions in MMA and PartinG have struggled to regain their form after returning from hiatuses, TaeJa's strong performances (including a 2-3 loss to Serral) suggested that he may have the sheer talent needed to shake off the rust from a 20 month military service break.
Is there a list of the best matches? Match ratings? Old tournament threads had them but I don't see it anymore. I understand there were a ton of matches.
On November 26 2018 11:15 Moobla wrote: Is there a list of the best matches? Match ratings? Old tournament threads had them but I don't see it anymore. I understand there were a ton of matches.
I can recommend Serral vs Bunny from the groupstage(best games imho), vs Taeja and vs Innovation in addiction to Reynor vs UThermal as TvZ. I liked Elazer vs Solar too(ZvZ).
On November 26 2018 11:15 Moobla wrote: Is there a list of the best matches? Match ratings? Old tournament threads had them but I don't see it anymore. I understand there were a ton of matches.
I can recommend Serral vs Bunny from the groupstage(best games imho), vs Taeja and vs Innovation in addiction to Reynor vs UThermal as TvZ. I liked Elazer vs Solar too(ZvZ).
This was one of my favorite HSCs ever. I'm so glad INno got his wish facing Serral in the finals. I hope that doesn't sound like INno trash talk because it isn't intended to be that way. I was just thinking that the biggest disappointment of Blizzcon was that we never got to see the Maru vs Serral showdown, but this time we got the promised match and it didn't disappoint.
Good run by Bogus. He did improve alot but the late game transition planning wasn't quite there. TY and maru would put a better macro game imo Still baffled why did TY choose to proxy rogue in game 5
The guy is just insane. Hasn't lost an offline bo3 since March.
Your thoughts?
Poll: Serral's place in SC2 History at the end of 2018
Most dominant run in SC2 history (Bonjwa?) (219)
56%
Best overall player of 2018 (107)
27%
Best foreigner of 2018 (39)
10%
GOAT (21)
5%
Best Zerg of 2018 (8)
2%
394 total votes
Your vote: Serral's place in SC2 History at the end of 2018
(Vote): Best foreigner of 2018 (Vote): Best Zerg of 2018 (Vote): Best overall player of 2018 (Vote): Most dominant run in SC2 history (Bonjwa?) (Vote): GOAT
EPT
