Serral's winning streak at TakeTV's HomeStory Cup series of tournaments was ended at five, with Stats emerging as the new champion in StayAt HomeStory Cup XXL (#3).
Stats' run through StayAtHSC was highlighted by his impressive best-of-five victories against three elite Zergs in Reynor (group stage), Rogue (winners final), and Serral (grand final). The 'standard' version of 2-Stargate Void Rays may have been picked apart in the last month, but the Shield of Aiur still had plenty of ways to safely set himself up for a powerful Skytoss transition. Fleets of well-upgraded Carriers consistently showed up ahead of schedule, putting Stats' Zerg opponents into an inescapable bind.
Overall, StayAt HSC continued the trend of highly unpredictable and even competition from the past half-year. Favorites like IEM Katowice champion Reynor went out in the group stage, (losing to Stats and Cure), while underdog souL (who hadn't even qualified for IEM) made a playoff run and even played a five game series against Stats. The championship picture looks to be wide open at the top end of pro SC2—especially in Korea where the new season of GSL is about to begin.
Check out TakeTV on Twitch for VODs from HSC, or download the official replay pack to catch up on the games.
It's really fascinating how the top Protoss title keeps bouncing around. I think Classic held top Protoss title the longest in LoTV, but I'm sure its close. Trap has made a good case this past year.
On March 15 2021 09:09 BisuDagger wrote: It's really fascinating how the top Protoss title keeps bouncing around. I think Classic held top Protoss title the longest in LoTV, but I'm sure its close. Trap has made a good case this past year.
I'd say in LotV overall Stats has definitely been the best Protoss for way more time than Classic or anyone else--he just has so many more podium finishes. If we look at the last year and a bit (ever since Classic's gone to the military), Stats, Zest, and Trap have been trading the title around, with Trap probably being the best Protoss the longest over that time period.
Congratulations to Stats on being #SAHSCIII champion! He had a ridiculous, gauntlet-like run. Very impressive. Truly the Shield of Aiur, and maybe even considered the Sword of Aiur with his stellar Carrier +2 interceptor play.
Definitely great series vs. Reynor, a surprising five-game series vs. soul, then 3-2'd Zest, 3-1'd Rogue and swept five consecutive HSC champion Serral. Well-rounded in all matchups.
Convincing series against both Serral and Rogue. Stats proves PvZ has more depth than previously thought. It's not all or nothing attack before, or wait till late game etc.
Stat's play throughout was amazing to see, so few builds from the great book of Protoss BS. He shows that Protoss is a complete SC2 race with a more nuanced approach required at the highest level than just 'all ins' or trick builds.
HUGE RESPECT. Great tourny, great casting, amazing games. Thank you to TakeTV and all involved!!!
GG! Happy for Stats, too bad the tourney was so late and I had to go to bed :-( Also impressive by Serral to come back to the final, he somehow keeps manages to stay at the top!
Man, HSC always delivers. Great games, good vibes, and really enjoyed the Rotti + Lowko casting combo. Grats to Stats and awesome play by him. Gabe looking into the smoke-filled oven was legendary.
Overall, StayAt HSC continued the trend of highly unpredictable and even competition from the past half-year.
I feel like I did allright with my predictions though 13/16 in Group Stage 1 and 2 out of the top 4 were players I predicted most likely to have a deep run
Soul was absolutly unpedictable though, I thought he had a punchers Chance to get into Ro16 just to ge massacred there imideatly. GGs to him, most impressive Performance in the tournament imo.
Very happy for stats. He's clearly worked on his PvZ a lot and what he was able to show at IEM was not even close to what he's capable of. Huge statement to beat Reynor, Rogue and Serral all in the same tournament. Even if it's not the event that draws the best strats/builds/play from most players (much lower prize pool event occurring right after IEM Katowice), if you watch Stats games, his skill and knowledge were undeniable. Honestly think other protoss should give up on whatever they were trying to develop in PvZ themselves and copy a lot of what Stats did in this tournament as a new starting point.
Well that's a good news, I am happy for that Stats, he must have put the hard work there. I am however not convinced with a single toss win a major or even premier tournament.
The game is still unbalanced with Zerg reigning supreme for the last 6 years or so.
Starcraft 2 could have been saved but that's too late. Look at the liquipedia by games, starcraft 2 has the lowest number of tournaments, lowest amount of money. Even games like Age of Empires are more popular. Crazy. Fuck you blizzard
On March 18 2021 14:26 atchosvk wrote: Well that's a good news, I am happy for that Stats, he must have put the hard work there. I am however not convinced with a single toss win a major or even premier tournament.
The game is still unbalanced with Zerg reigning supreme for the last 6 years or so.
Starcraft 2 could have been saved but that's too late. Look at the liquipedia by games, starcraft 2 has the lowest number of tournaments, lowest amount of money. Even games like Age of Empires are more popular. Crazy. Fuck you blizzard
User was warned for this post.
Mate you are out of your mind. Trap won 3 tournaments in a row. Zest made the finals of Katowise and lost only 2-4 to reynor, to all-ins every game. ( Best player in world thinks he has to risk it all and all-in every game to barely squeeze a win).
Stats bopped Serral 3-0 in HSC finals, breaking Serrals HSC win streak at 5.
GM ladder is almost 50% protoss world wide if you take out Ukko 30 zerg accounts in GM. But yea sure, Protoss is totally too weak.
I would also risk myself and say, PvZ is the easiest matchup in the game right now. If PvZ is your weakest matchup, you need to reevaluate your strategies. You can literally skip early/mid game units and go straight to skytoss with void rays and shield batteries/canons.. This is pretty much broodlord infestor on crack. But its only in PvZ, so its not as obvious. Also, the player base was still blooming in 2012, so it was easier for Zerg to totally dominate when they got OP. Where as now its the same pros we had for 5 years with no up and coming players in Korea, so Protoss doesnt get as invasive as zerg was in 2012.
Thank you guys for this nice event. Fuck corona, hopefully the next one will be an offline one. I only have one feedback, one change req. Please try to get a korean-english translator. I missed the winners interview with Stats right after the win. I know this is not trivial to do, you would need someone who knows starcraft vocabulary and stuff, but without the interview the show just ends brutally fast and that's it. We had the replay pack very fast holy fuck.
On March 18 2021 14:26 atchosvk wrote: Well that's a good news, I am happy for that Stats, he must have put the hard work there. I am however not convinced with a single toss win a major or even premier tournament.
The game is still unbalanced with Zerg reigning supreme for the last 6 years or so.
Starcraft 2 could have been saved but that's too late. Look at the liquipedia by games, starcraft 2 has the lowest number of tournaments, lowest amount of money. Even games like Age of Empires are more popular. Crazy. Fuck you blizzard
User was warned for this post.
Mate you are out of your mind. Trap won 3 tournaments in a row. Zest made the finals of Katowise and lost only 2-4 to reynor, to all-ins every game. ( Best player in world thinks he has to risk it all and all-in every game to barely squeeze a win).
Stats bopped Serral 3-0 in HSC finals, breaking Serrals HSC win streak at 5.
GM ladder is almost 50% protoss world wide if you take out Ukko 30 zerg accounts in GM. But yea sure, Protoss is totally too weak.
I would also risk myself and say, PvZ is the easiest matchup in the game right now. If PvZ is your weakest matchup, you need to reevaluate your strategies. You can literally skip early/mid game units and go straight to skytoss with void rays and shield batteries/canons.. This is pretty much broodlord infestor on crack. But its only in PvZ, so its not as obvious. Also, the player base was still blooming in 2012, so it was easier for Zerg to totally dominate when they got OP. Where as now its the same pros we had for 5 years with no up and coming players in Korea, so Protoss doesnt get as invasive as zerg was in 2012.
Tournament level though just no?
Protoss has a huge amount of variations on the Protoss book of bullshit, and on a ladder where you’re matched up against tons of different players all the time it’s going to prosper pretty well.
I’d wager Protoss’ GM percentage would drop an appreciable amount solely by banning barcode IDs and forcing players to have identifiable ones.
On March 18 2021 14:26 atchosvk wrote: Well that's a good news, I am happy for that Stats, he must have put the hard work there. I am however not convinced with a single toss win a major or even premier tournament.
The game is still unbalanced with Zerg reigning supreme for the last 6 years or so.
Starcraft 2 could have been saved but that's too late. Look at the liquipedia by games, starcraft 2 has the lowest number of tournaments, lowest amount of money. Even games like Age of Empires are more popular. Crazy. Fuck you blizzard
User was warned for this post.
Mate you are out of your mind. Trap won 3 tournaments in a row. Zest made the finals of Katowise and lost only 2-4 to reynor, to all-ins every game. ( Best player in world thinks he has to risk it all and all-in every game to barely squeeze a win).
Stats bopped Serral 3-0 in HSC finals, breaking Serrals HSC win streak at 5.
GM ladder is almost 50% protoss world wide if you take out Ukko 30 zerg accounts in GM. But yea sure, Protoss is totally too weak.
I would also risk myself and say, PvZ is the easiest matchup in the game right now. If PvZ is your weakest matchup, you need to reevaluate your strategies. You can literally skip early/mid game units and go straight to skytoss with void rays and shield batteries/canons.. This is pretty much broodlord infestor on crack. But its only in PvZ, so its not as obvious. Also, the player base was still blooming in 2012, so it was easier for Zerg to totally dominate when they got OP. Where as now its the same pros we had for 5 years with no up and coming players in Korea, so Protoss doesnt get as invasive as zerg was in 2012.
Tournament level though just no?
Protoss has a huge amount of variations on the Protoss book of bullshit, and on a ladder where you’re matched up against tons of different players all the time it’s going to prosper pretty well.
I’d wager Protoss’ GM percentage would drop an appreciable amount solely by banning barcode IDs and forcing players to have identifiable ones.
What make you think at tournament level zerg is imba against toss ? Or easier ? Look at Serral pov against harstem, it's incredibly difficult.
The reasons you mentionned to explain the protoss domination on the ladder are wrong or at least incomplete, barcodes exist since 8 years and the protoss bs were even stronger with the old mineral patches which would last forever but that's the first time we saw such a domination. Balance aside, gaining mmr as protoss is nowadays just easier at low/mid gm level to a point it is not healthy for the game, HM, Lilbow and a lot of top players share this view.
At pro level, TvZ seems a more concerning mu with terrans struggling lately but it could be a trend or fixed by maps.
On March 18 2021 14:26 atchosvk wrote: Well that's a good news, I am happy for that Stats, he must have put the hard work there. I am however not convinced with a single toss win a major or even premier tournament.
The game is still unbalanced with Zerg reigning supreme for the last 6 years or so.
Starcraft 2 could have been saved but that's too late. Look at the liquipedia by games, starcraft 2 has the lowest number of tournaments, lowest amount of money. Even games like Age of Empires are more popular. Crazy. Fuck you blizzard
User was warned for this post.
Mate you are out of your mind. Trap won 3 tournaments in a row. Zest made the finals of Katowise and lost only 2-4 to reynor, to all-ins every game. ( Best player in world thinks he has to risk it all and all-in every game to barely squeeze a win).
Stats bopped Serral 3-0 in HSC finals, breaking Serrals HSC win streak at 5.
GM ladder is almost 50% protoss world wide if you take out Ukko 30 zerg accounts in GM. But yea sure, Protoss is totally too weak.
I would also risk myself and say, PvZ is the easiest matchup in the game right now. If PvZ is your weakest matchup, you need to reevaluate your strategies. You can literally skip early/mid game units and go straight to skytoss with void rays and shield batteries/canons.. This is pretty much broodlord infestor on crack. But its only in PvZ, so its not as obvious. Also, the player base was still blooming in 2012, so it was easier for Zerg to totally dominate when they got OP. Where as now its the same pros we had for 5 years with no up and coming players in Korea, so Protoss doesnt get as invasive as zerg was in 2012.
Tournament level though just no?
Protoss has a huge amount of variations on the Protoss book of bullshit, and on a ladder where you’re matched up against tons of different players all the time it’s going to prosper pretty well.
I’d wager Protoss’ GM percentage would drop an appreciable amount solely by banning barcode IDs and forcing players to have identifiable ones.
What make you think at tournament level zerg is imba against toss ? Or easier ? Look at Serral pov against harstem, it's incredibly difficult.
The reasons you mentionned to explain the protoss domination on the ladder are wrong or at least incomplete, barcodes exist since 8 years and the protoss bs were even stronger with the old mineral patches which would last forever but that's the first time we saw such a domination. Balance aside, gaining mmr as protoss is nowadays just easier at low/mid gm level to a point it is not healthy for the game, HM, Lilbow and a lot of top players share this view.
At pro level, TvZ seems a more concerning mu with terrans struggling lately but it could be a trend or fixed by maps.
I’m not sure which way the wind is blowing, or indeed if it’s relatively balanced in PvZ at the minute at the highest level. Certainly the last couple of years the pendulum has been over in the Zerg quadrant.
I don’t think barcodes are the full reason you’re right to say that’s incomplete. Protoss relies the most on trickery as a race by a distance, has the lowest mechanical floor to overcome but also probably the lowest skill ceiling in terms of mechanics. With those factors it’s tailor-made to dominate on ladder where you’re playing a lot of bo1s against random opponents, especially at the kind of low-GM register. You also have a lot of top Protoss players with very different styles, which I imagine makes ladder sessions against a bunch of Protoss players trickier again.
At tournament level those advantages are negated quite a bit, Zergs especially start to enter their final form. I’d wager a Serral/Reynor or a Dark/Rogue’s ability to make reads and deflect whatever trickery you’re able to bring to the table is absolutely leagues beyond a mid GM Zerg’s, whereas the top Protoss execution can only improve so much. Plus didn’t Serral hit something like 7.4K MMR once?
I do agree it’s a problem, have said for years I’d be in favour of making Protoss a bit harder to play but with a higher ceiling, regardless of the specifics.
EPT
Serral's winning streak at TakeTV's HomeStory Cup series of tournaments was ended at five, with 
![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/7HHrSCW.png)
![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/hk19yBY.gif)
