Group D of the RO16 concluded with Stats and Rogue advancing over Zest and Cure, finalizing the eight-player playoff bracket for GSL Code S Season 2.
DongRaeGu and Dream are the two names that stick out most in the bracket, as they are the first two players to return from Korea's mandatory military service and reach the Code S quarterfinals. On the other hand, Maru and Dark are conspicuous in their absence, as they suffered shocking upsets in their RO16 groups.
Who will rise to the occasion in this most unusual season of Code S? The Code S quarterfinals will begin on Wednesday, Jul 29 9:30am GMT (GMT+00:00) with the first two matches: DongRaeGu vs INnoVation and Dream vs Rogue.
Group D results
Initial Match #1: Stats 2 - 0 Cure
Cure kicked off the group by playing a one-base 1/1/1 build against on Ever Dream. Part one of his plan worked out quite well as his Medivac ferried Marines and Hellions safely into Stats' main. Part two, however, was a total disaster, as it turns out Battery Overcharge is really good against unstimmed Marines and Hellions. Stats then sent his Stalkers to Cure's base to try to get some harassment done, but ended up finding a victory instead. Cure had unsieged his Tanks to move out together with Marines, which made them easy targets for Stats' Stalkers to Blink on top of. Once the Tanks were focus-fired down, it was all over for Cure.
The two players made up for the brevity of game one with a lengthy macro game on—you guessed it—Eternal Empire. The first macro build-up lead to a semi-base trade, as both players sent their armies across the map without encountering each other. The two players cut each other's expansion counts down from four to two, before retreating to lick their wounds and recover. In this second build-up phase, Stats came out ahead with a couple of slick moves. He used Blink DT's to cripple Cure's economy, while shutting down Cure's harassment with a devastating Stasis Ward + Disruptor combo on his own side of the map. Having taken both the army and worker count lead, Stats played out his lead slowly and methodically, chipping away at Cure until he was forced into a final desperation attack.
Initial Match #2: Rogue 2 - 1 Zest
Despite being the player who codified the Glaive-Adept PvZ meta of 2020, Zest opted not to go for his signature unit in game one against Rogue, utilizing an Oracle opener instead. Just kidding! Zest followed the Oracle up with a Glaive-Adept all-in, and forced a sub-seven-minute GG out of Rogue.
Zest went for a more normal Stargate opener in game two, applying some early Oracle harassment while going up to three bases. Unfortunately for Zest, this time it was Rogue's turn to go for an all-in, and his Roach-Ravager-Queen easily busted through the Protoss defenses to earn Rogue his own sub-seven-minute win in the series.
Rogue and Zest then one-upped (or one-downed) themselves by delivering a sub-SIX-minute game on Deathaura, which is almost certain to end up being the weirdest game of the season. Zest opened up with a Cannon-rush, to which Rogue responded by going for an offensive hatchery inside of Zest's main. What followed was a largely incomprehensible sequence of events, which might be summed up as "I'm not sure Zest knew what he was doing." Anyway, it ended with Zest losing to one-base speedlings, despite having two Cannons inside his main. Look, this game is impossible to recap—just watch it. It won't help you understand it any better, but it will at least make you believe that it actually happened.
Winners' Match: Stats 2 - 1 Rogue
A macro game still wasn't on Rogue's mind as he went up against Stats, as he aimed to go for a Roach-Queen-Nydus attack on Deathaura. While Stats' 2-Stargate Phoenix strategy seemed like it could be vulnerable, it actually proved to be the perfect counter when Rogue erred by gifting five Queens to Stats' Phoenixes when they flew into his base. This took all the threat out of the Nydus attack, letting Stats sit back and macro-up in peace. However, Stats soon gifted the lead back to Rogue, launching a suicidal attack into Zerg territory which saw all of his units evaporate against the defending Hydralisks and Roaches. With the Protoss army gone, Rogue finally got the money Nydus he had been looking for from the start, and flooded Stats with Hydralisks to force the GG.
Rogue kept the aggression coming in game two on Ever Dream, as he went for a proxy-Hatchery just outside of Stats' natural for an offensive Spine-Crawler rush. Having scouted the proxy-Hatchery late, Stats made the prudent decision to give up his natural expansion and play a 1-base vs 1-base game. Stats executed a highly effective delaying action at his natural, buying himself plenty of time to set himself up on one base. By the time Speedlings and Spine Crawlers were done killing the natural expansion Nexus, there was already a Cannon and Immortal ready to hold the Protoss ramp.
Unable to advance any further, Rogue faced a deadly countdown. His Spine Crawlers could contain Stats inside his main for the time being, but he would soon have to deal with the all-powerful Immortal-Warp Prism combo. Against a lesser Player, Rogue might have had time to take his natural and transition out of his low-tech all-in. However, Stats immediately started to put the pressure back on Rogue once he had two Immortals and a Warp Prism, knowing Ling-Queen was helpless against that combo's deadly micro potential. Stats used impeccable Prism juggling micro break through the containment, and started moving over to Rogue's territory to inflict some pain. In the end, Rogue never managed to get off of Ling-Queen, and Stats was able to roll him over with Sentries, Adepts, and Immortals off one base.
The series concluded on Eternal Empire, where Stats started by hammering Rogue with Glaive-Adept pressure. While Stats couldn't kill Rogue straight-up, he racked up enough Drone kills and forced enough Zergling production to put Rogue severely behind. Once Stats added Immortals and Sentries to his growing Adept force, he was able to roll over Rogue and cinch the 2-1 victory for first place in the group.
Losers' Match: Zest 2 - 0 Cure
The losers' match turned out to be a great showcase for Zest's other major innovation of 2020: His Blink-DT centric PvT style. Zest showed great sense for when to use DT's to harass and when to use them to hack apart vulnerable Terran units, and beat Cure convincingly in two macro games.
Decider Match: Rogue 2 - 0 Zest
After their cheesy initial series, it was inevitable that one of Rogue or Zest was going to bring out a creative strategy in game one on Golden Wall. Channeling Trap from the DH Summer Finals, Zest mined out his backdoor minerals to go for a backdoor-expansion + proxy-Stargate combo. After some light Oracle harassment to start, Zest followed-up with a mass Glaive-adept all-in off two bases. While this might have worked against a three-base Zerg, Rogue was focused his own unorthodox strategy: Swarm Host-Nydus off of two bases. Upon scouting Zest's intent to go mass Adepts, Rogue simply walled off his natural expansion with Evolution Chambers and Spine Crawlers. This rendered Zest's Adepts totally useless, while on the other side of the map, Zest was largely helpless against Rogue's Swarm Hosts. After several minutes of whittling Zest down with Locusts, Rogue finally finished him off with Roaches.
Zest had another trick prepared for game two on Ever Dream, opening with a standard DT/Archon drop and transitioning into mass Phoenixes from two hidden Stargates. As for Rogue, he had gone for his most 'normal' gameplan of the night, making Roach-Ravager off four bases while eyeing a transition to Hive tech. In the midst of this, Rogue scouted out Zest's two hidden Stargates, which prompted him to morph a bunch more Ravagers and go for a big Roach-Ravager-Ling attack. The Zerg forces arrived before there were enough Phoenixes to really affect the tide of battle, and punched a giant hole in the Protoss defenses. Rogue followed up by pouring Hydralisks through the breach, forcing the final GG out of Zest.
Stats is certainly a unique player for a few reasons. For one, the dude is just great offline. For whatever he reason his play is just slightly off when playing online - like he's not locked in or something. His micro just isn't quite what it should be and he'll move his camera back to unit just in time to watch it die. He was definitely pretty locked in tonight and his play was very crisp. Just the ill advised attack on Rogue in game 1 to really regret.
He's also interesting in that you can kind of predict his performance based on his recent ladder. Players who like aggressive styles (protoss primarily, and to a lesser extent terrans) typically maintain a fairly strong rating due to the lack of preparation the opponent has and the roulette of things you'll encounter on ladder. Defensive players usually lag behind a little bit more and Stats is one of the few true top end players who you will see sitting at like 6400 something MMR. During those sessions his timings are just not quite sharp enough and his defense not quite quick enough to carry him through, where other plays would be just aggressive enough to sneak wins. But on the flipside, when Stats is playing at 6700+ on the ladder you know he's in good form.
Cure really showed some poor PvT today. Felt like everything he tried just got swatted away by both Zest and Stats. Just disappointing all around.
Zest tried out more whacky shit that was both really cool and really not effective at the same time. His PvT though was really excellent and he's a master at the mass gateway unit style, and given its general effectiveness, I wish Protoss leaned on it a bit more often. Also you know its a Zest game when you see a Protoss player not maxed, have 4k minerals in the bank with 8 gateways, and his solution to macro is just to build 9 gates all at once. I'm still amazed that the correct analysis of that is "yeah, this is still fine actually."
Rogue still using stupid abusive zerg strats and timings in a ridiculous amount of games. I miss macro rogue.
Rogue still using stupid abusive zerg strats and timings in a ridiculous amount of games. I miss macro rogue.
Rogue played accordingy to the opponent and accordingly to the metagame
Yeah, Zest was kind of player that Rogue tended to do abusive strategies against him due to Rogue's immediate responds to his play style. It has been a long time we have seen macro games between these two players.
wouldn't be shocked if Rogue wins this season although I hope it's either iNnoVation or Stats who wins. But Rogue is just an absolute god in Bo7s and I think he will beat Dream in all likelihood.
Rogues attack on Zest in the second game of the first series was pretty much identical to the Serral vs Trap game on the same map of the Dreamhack Masters. He streamed roaches, queens and lings across the map and even though Zest had a Warp Prism going across the map he did not see the attack until it hit his doorstep.
Cure's drop was perfectly defended by Stats who played extremely well. The real threat of the drop (which included 7 marines, a medivac and 3 hellions) was the fact that the 3 hellions could one shot probes. So when it hit his mineral line he focused down 1 hellion and then immediately the medivac so the rest of the units couldn't escape. After killing that initial hellion not a single other protoss unit died in the attack.
I also was quite tickled in their second game after the base trade they were basically wielding two armies each on opposite sides of the map. In one of the army group Stats had all his collosi, Cure also had all his vikings in one group. Anytime Cure would send his vikings to the side where Stats had his collosi Stats would move the collosi to the other army group. He was just one step ahead this series.
On July 26 2020 01:40 Anc13nt wrote: wouldn't be shocked if Rogue wins this season although I hope it's either iNnoVation or Stats who wins. But Rogue is just an absolute god in Bo7s and I think he will beat Dream in all likelihood.
It's almost comical how many times people have (rightfully) said if Rogue gets past the ro8 he'll be unstoppable, and then he's proceeded to somehow lose in said ro8.
On July 25 2020 22:08 Russano wrote: Rogue still using stupid abusive zerg strats and timings in a ridiculous amount of games. I miss macro rogue.
I used to be a massive Rogue fan but I have to agree. When Artosis said Rogue is the most abusive zerg he was right. Out of all the big champions in SC2 he always feels the least deserving.
Typo in stats - rogue, it says zest! Otherwise very nice
On July 26 2020 01:40 Anc13nt wrote: wouldn't be shocked if Rogue wins this season although I hope it's either iNnoVation or Stats who wins. But Rogue is just an absolute god in Bo7s and I think he will beat Dream in all likelihood.
On July 25 2020 22:08 Russano wrote: Rogue still using stupid abusive zerg strats and timings in a ridiculous amount of games. I miss macro rogue.
I used to be a massive Rogue fan but I have to agree. When Artosis said Rogue is the most abusive zerg he was right. Out of all the big champions in SC2 he always feels the least deserving.
Still, wasn't Rogue one of very few zergs to actually to admit how much balance favored zerg? With that disgusting display on Golden wall maybe he is trying to have swarm hosts nerfed. After today, I don't think anyone would mind never having to see those units again.
Hoping for Rogue Trap finals with Trap taking it. I don't think Inno has a chance to beat both DRG and Rogue, probably not even DRG with the current state of ZvT.
Trap will have it tough against Stats but if he wins there is a big chance to reach the finals. His PvP looks super solid this year. Even made the former PvP God Zest look like a scrub a couple of times
On July 25 2020 22:08 Russano wrote: Stats is certainly a unique player for a few reasons. For one, the dude is just great offline. For whatever he reason his play is just slightly off when playing online - like he's not locked in or something. His micro just isn't quite what it should be and he'll move his camera back to unit just in time to watch it die. He was definitely pretty locked in tonight and his play was very crisp. Just the ill advised attack on Rogue in game 1 to really regret.
He's also interesting in that you can kind of predict his performance based on his recent ladder. Players who like aggressive styles (protoss primarily, and to a lesser extent terrans) typically maintain a fairly strong rating due to the lack of preparation the opponent has and the roulette of things you'll encounter on ladder. Defensive players usually lag behind a little bit more and Stats is one of the few true top end players who you will see sitting at like 6400 something MMR. During those sessions his timings are just not quite sharp enough and his defense not quite quick enough to carry him through, where other plays would be just aggressive enough to sneak wins. But on the flipside, when Stats is playing at 6700+ on the ladder you know he's in good form.
Cure really showed some poor PvT today. Felt like everything he tried just got swatted away by both Zest and Stats. Just disappointing all around.
Zest tried out more whacky shit that was both really cool and really not effective at the same time. His PvT though was really excellent and he's a master at the mass gateway unit style, and given its general effectiveness, I wish Protoss leaned on it a bit more often. Also you know its a Zest game when you see a Protoss player not maxed, have 4k minerals in the bank with 8 gateways, and his solution to macro is just to build 9 gates all at once. I'm still amazed that the correct analysis of that is "yeah, this is still fine actually."
Rogue still using stupid abusive zerg strats and timings in a ridiculous amount of games. I miss macro rogue.
You are perceptive... I've long been of the opinion that relentless laddering is in fact the BEST practice..
Look at Cure... clearly he practiced vs the wrong type of Protoss. You practice with a player, and you end up formulating strategies for THAT specific player, not the race.
It's like when Byun was in his top form. He was like, streaming, winning 30-40 games in a row, get rank 1 GM, then leave and do it all over again...
On July 26 2020 22:57 Argonauta wrote: So much Rogue hate around here lol.
Rogue is the best korean zerg player, rogue deserves his champsionships. Deal with it .
Rogue plays macro games and sometimes cheeses like everyone else.
Rogue uses swarmhosts, why he sohouldnt? Why other zergs refuse to use them? Deal with that too.
You cant blame Rogue for Zest cannon rushes or glaive adepts all ins.
Agreed here. Rogue is a strategically fascinating and brilliant player, and the fact that he used to be king of proleague sniping really shows in his tournament play. Only in recent years he's also had top-tier mechanics and solid standard play to round things off.
That adept-wall SH nydus play on Golden Wall was the perfect response well executed. Sure PvZ isn't in a good spot, but that was a game where Zest got played like a fiddle.
Haven't watched so exiting Ro16 in probably 2 years. For a first time in a while I am so for all the upcoming matches. My biggest fear was the fall of the protosses, but now any player is well deserved and there are no outsiders. So many pleasant surprises. Stats and Trap are slowly restoring their top forms. Parting is like 90% near to his glory days back in the end of 2012. DRG plays like a champion and the only worry is that he's not on the same level in every race matchup. Inno is the most serious pretender for a final. Dream is something different, he is not reminding for his top form back in 2015, but he is even like a new man. TY is totally unpredictable and his main issue is with TvP matches and apart of that he still can play like a god. TY, Inno and Rogue are players who can instantly change their behavior when the smell that the final is close. GG for every and even those who didn't make it on Ro16. Even Zest surprised me pleasantly with the new DT tactics. I was really pissed of that mass adept stuff for months. For now Parting seems so inspirational that I haven't felt such joy for my favorite race for really long time... may be 4-5 years.
EPT
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