Road to BlizzCon 2019: Maru (#4 WCS Korea)

No Second Chances (Except This One)

by Destructicon and Wax

Maru, is without a doubt one, a living legend of StarCraft II. Throughout his long and rich career, Maru has achieved almost all there is to achieve in StarCraft II, from playing in the first ever GSL, helping his team win GSTL and ProLeague championships, and winning individual champions in every major domestic league (OSL, SSL, Code S).

Yet, for all his greatness, there is one achievement which has eluded Maru for his entire career: The WCS Global Finals championship. A peerless, standout player in almost every other way, Maru is but one of many great players who are still looking for this one final piece to their career puzzle.


It was 2013, and expectations were low for MaruPrime going into the OnGameNet Starleague. The kid had made his broadcast debut three years prior, but his career thus far suggested he was doomed to be one of those forever prospects. But, befitting its name, the OnGameNet Starleague has a reputation for making stars. As the tournament went on, round after round, Maru kept winning. He might have seemed lucky to survive the group stages, but then he beat Code S finalist Symbol in his first playoff match. Oh, this might be happening. Maru might be walking the Royal Road. Maru continued to shine brightly, defeating the invincible INnoVation 4-0 in the semifinals. Finally, he defeated Rain—himself a Royal Roader—to take his place in the sky.



This particular star has always been prone to a bit of flickering in and out. Maru ended his breakout year with a glut of top four finishes in major tournaments, impressing with his gameplay but ultimately losing to more solid players. At the end of 2013, Maru moved on from Prime and signed with Jin Air Green Wings. Joining a KeSPA team gave Maru the opportunity to take his career to the next level, which he did... in a sense.

From 2014 to 2016 Maru was absolutely indispensable for Jin Air in Proleague, always toward the top of the performance charts in terms of games played, games won, and win-rate. His results in Proleague only got better as time went along. The 2016 season saw him record an obscene 22-4 record and win finals MVP in Jin Air's first championship-winning campaign.

Yet, during that time, the only individual gold Maru was able to obtain was his SSL Season 1 title (he also took two second place finishes at IEM Taipei 2014 and WESG 2016). Some of it might have been due to style reasons. Despite possessing the micro and multitasking skills to beat most players to a pulp with bio and medivacs, Maru wasn't perfectly suited to play in the mech-heavy era of late Heart of the Swarm. 2016 also brought the advent of a new expansion, and Maru wouldn't have been alone in struggling to adapt to Legacy of the Void.

But really, none of that explains the difference between Proleague and individual league Maru, with his domination of the 2016 Proleague coinciding with his worst individual league slump yet (just one Ro16 finish in SSL/GSL). These disappointments might simply have been a matter of conflicting priorities, with Maru and Jin Air opting to focus his energies on Proleague instead of overextending him in a vain grab for more glory. 2017, the first year without Proleague, saw Maru perform better in individual leagues, but ultimately end the year with Ro32 elimination in Code S and no ticket to BlizzCon.

Maru has said that loss was a wake-up call, the reason he got his s*** together and tore off the greatest Code S year ever in 2018. He somehow managed to make winning Code S look easy, setting a new record by winning three consecutive Code S events. He did this despite facing the toughest opponents Korea had to offer, defeating all seven of Korea's BlizzCon representatives in a playoff match.

Maru showed off impressive strategic range, whether it was extreme late-game turtling against Zerg (as seen earlier in 2018 against the likes of Serral and Dark) or proxying every single building against Protoss. While it could look like Maru was simply trying to abuse whatever strategies were most overpowered at the time, those strategies were also strong in part because Maru was perfecting them.

Clearly, as the best player in GSL Code S, Maru had to be the best player in the world. But in August, an inkling of doubt started to creep in. For while Maru was carving up Korea, WCS Circuit champion Serral had recovered from winter losses at IEM Katowice and WESG, and was looking even more dominant on the Circuit. He shocked the StarCraft II world by winning August's GSL vs. The World, defeating three of Korea's best in Dark, INnoVation, and Stats to claim a championship on Korean soil. While Maru avoided a direct confrontation with Serral as he was eliminated by Stats in the semis, he let the seed of doubt sprout roots when he lost a best-of-one to Serral in the showmatch portion of GSL vs. The World.

Maru's GSL vs. The World performance, combined with two early eliminations in GSL Super Tournament, put fans in a perplexing spot. While it seemed that Maru could win GSL Code S at will, it didn't necessarily mean that ability applied to any tournament, even a lesser one. Then what about a bigger one?

Conveniently, every was set up perfectly to be resolved at the 2018 Global Finals. Maru and Serral were clearly the best players from their respective regions. There was no way BlizzCon was ending without a conclusive battle to decide who was the undisputed, best player in the world.

And then, in the quarterfinals of BlizzCon, sOs ran Maru over in barely 15 minutes of in-game time, with Maru falling apart completely against his teammate's aggressive strategies. If Maru had tripped and broke his hand on his way to the venue, it couldn't have been more anti-climatic an ending. As for Serral, well, we all know what happened there.



If Maru's rock-bottom ending to 2017 inspired his 2018 run, then 2019 seemed to begin in a similar way. Maru looked hungry for redemption as he took his fourth consecutive Code S title, shattering his own record in the process. It seemed for a moment that Maru was made from even sterner stuff than we had imagined, with the disappointment of BlizzCon 2018 birthing an even more motivated Maru that would take his rightful championship in 2019. But then, his performance for the rest of the year took a sharp and unexpected nosedive, with a shocking elimination in the Ro32 of the very next Code S.

The 3rd season of Code S had the potential to be another special one for Maru, as he landed a nearly perfect bracket road to the final. Yet in a reversal of the first season of Code S, Maru was beaten by his teammate, Trap and was denied a shot at the mythic G5L trophy.

While Maru's total domination over GSL Code S in 2018 will stand forever as one of the greatest feats in StarCraft II, it's also tinged with regret. Without a BlizzCon championship to wrap it all up, it's like a work of art that's been left incomplete. Maru almost had the greatest calendar year in StarCraft history. Maru almost seized the title of greatest of all time. Instead, he was 'merely' unbelievably great, which was just not good enough to meet our lofty expectations. No, a victory at BlizzCon 2019 won't redeem the failed quest of 2018. But, at least, it could complete the even longer journey started in 2010.