EPT
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Protoss fans finally got some relief on Thursday night, as Creator and Trap claimed both tickets out of Group D to advance to the RO10. Surprisingly, it was Solar who was eliminated in last place, despite coming in off a strong IEM Katowice showing where he placed in the top eight. Another small surprise was the improved GuMiho skill demonstrated as he finished in third place, coming within a map of eliminating Trap and advancing to the RO10 himself.
The post-match interviews seemed especially long that day, with Creator and Trap both taking their time to air out grievances about Protoss and the balance patch. Regardless of what faction you play in the game, they're worth a listen.
Group D's result was probably a relief for StarCraft II fans in general, as match-up variety in the RO10 looked to be in a very dicey situation after the previous Group C had concluded with both Protoss participants in Zoun and NightMare being eliminated. It was no surprise to see NightMare go out in last place as he was playing in only his third Code S—he probably even surpassed expectations with the quality of his play in his two map wins. Furthermore, Rogue coming out on top in first place always seemed like the most likely outcome.
However, in the second place duel between ByuN and Zoun, Protoss fans had to suffer the pain of matches results going in the wrong order—the two tied each other 1-1 on the night (2-2 map score), but ByuN was the one who was triumphant in last and more important decider match.
The Code S Round-of-20 will conclude on Monday, Apr 04 9:30am GMT (GMT+00:00) with Group E, featuring Cure, herO, RagnaroK, and Bunny.
Match Recaps
Group C
Initial Match #1: Rogue [2 - 1] NightMare
Game 1 - Glittering Ashes: NightMare opened with the first in a series of several Twilight Council-based openers he would use on the night, going for fake Glaive-Adept pressure into a Dark Templar drop (canceling Resonating Glaives). Unfortunately for him, a timely Overlord scout from Rogue discovered this deception in time, allowing Rogue to be more than ready for the DT's. Things got even worse for NightMare as he made a horrible micro mistake during his drop harass, losing a prism with three DT's in it. Rogue basically had the game in the bag at that point, and fended off a desperation Archon+Blink Stalker all-in to win.
Game 2 - Curious Minds: Playing mind games off his original opener, NightMare just went for straight-up Glaive Adepts this time around. Yet, the same Overlord scout coming in at the same timing discovered his intent, allowing Rogue to easily prepare.
It seemed like Rogue would be able to snowball his way to another victory, but he ended up stepping over his own feet. As NightMare took his third with Adepts and a handful of Immortals, he managed to posture convincingly enough to make Rogue think there must be an all-in incoming (fake third all-ins are popular, after all). Rogue got caught in an awkward position where he was cranking out Roach-Ravager-Bane on a low Drone count for quite a while, preparing for an all-in that was never coming.
NightMare played things out calmly from this position, staying back and building a powerful army with Gateway units and Disruptors. Rogue tried an attack to see if he could get anything done, but it was total folly against the much more cost effective Protoss force.
Eventually, NightMare decided he had a strong enough army to try and finish Rogue off. The difference in level between the two players showed as Rogue actually came close to holding off the attack, even though he should have been completely dead. However, the Protoss army was just too powerful in the end, and Rogue conceded the series tying GG.
Game 3 - Hardwire: NightMare finally learned his lesson from the first two games and tried to use Rogue's 4:15 Overlord scout against him. This time he went for Resonating Glaives research, waited until the Overlord saw it, and then canceled it and went for Dark Shrine once the Overlord was dead.
Rogue responded by going for heavy Roach-Ling off a low Drone count, which seemed amazing for NightMare as he'd be able to easily secure his third base with defensive Dark Templars. Unfortunately for NightMare, he overthought the situation and canceled his Dark Shrine for Robo tech instead, and ended up getting overrun by Rogue's swarm in an anticlimactic ending.
Initial Match #2: ByuN [0 - 2] Zoun
Game 1 - Curious Minds: Zoun opened up with defensive Blink, while ByuN opened with a Mine drop as he looked to follow-up with heavy 2-base pressure. Zoun held off the drop without much trouble, but seemed to be in danger when ByuN moved out with Marine-Medivac-Marauder for a two-prong attack. However, despite losing some Probes, Zoun was ultimately able to clean up both ByuN's Medivac drop squad and main ground army without taking much damage, and jumped ahead to take a decent army and economy lead.
ByuN had a few more chances to significantly threaten Zoun with bio pushes, but Zoun's good Disruptor use let him hold the line. After that, the momentum shifted in Zoun's favor, as he was able to use DT and Zealot run-bys to keep ByuN pinned back, and also use the distraction to keep getting good Disruptor hits on random chunks of bio. Zoun patiently bled ByuN out and finally finished the game with the addition of Tempests.
Game 2 - Hardwire: ByuN went for an unorthodox build where he got fast Concussive Shells after expanding, but apparently didn't see an opportunity to pressure Zoun and played things out passively instead. Likewise, Zoun seemed to be thinking about playing aggressively by placing a proxy-Gate out on the field, but switched to more standard play after seeing ByuN's early Marauders.
Thus, the game proceeded rather tamely until the mid-game, with both players building up their armies until ByuN finally made the first major advance at around the 10 minute mark with a near-max bio army. Once again, ByuN split his army into a ground attack force and a seperate Medivac drop force, and again, Zoun responded deftly and defeated the Terran troops on both fronts. Zoun counter-attacked with the help of Disruptors, and found some big Disruptor hits to put himself even further ahead. Sensing an opportunity to end the game then and there, Zoun swarmed over ByuN with Zealots, Stalkers, and Disuptors to force the GG.
Winners' Match: Rogue [2 - 0] Zoun
Game 1 - Hardwire: Zoun played a greedy 1/1/1-style build where he got Stargate-Twilight-Robo tech, while also researching +1 air attack early in preparation for a late-game transition. In response, Rogue faked a 7:20-ish Queen walk with Overlords to generate creep while actually going for Mutalisks behind it. Zoun took the bait, making Disruptors in defense while barely having any anti-air units besides a handful of Void Rays. Zoun's base was completely naked when the Mutas arrived, and Rogue was able to easily win with pure Mutas.
Rogue said after the games that Dark's play was the inspiration for this kind of fake Queen-walk into Mutalisks strategy. Interestingly enough, DongRaeGu did this kind of strategy as well, and later referred to some unspecific tips that Dark had given him. Has Dark already codified one of the new standard strategies for post-patch ZvP in Korea?
Game 2 - Berlingrad: Rogue went for a Ling-Roach all-in off two bases, which proved to be the perfect counter for Zoun's fast Fleet Beacon play off two bases. Arriving when one Void Ray was barely out, Rogue busted through the Protoss wall for the easy win.
Losers' Match: ByuN [2 - 1] NightMare
Game 1 - Hardwire: NightMare had an absolute nightmare of an early-game, as both his hidden Stargate AND hidden Dark Shrine were caught by ByuN's meticulous scouting. ByuN used his economic lead to build up a deadly war machine, and battered NightMare into submission with a series of early/mid-game attacks.
Game 2 - Pride of Altaris: ByuN went for the map-specific trick of making his first Barracks behind his main mineral line, and further shook NightMare with a timely SCV pull to destroy his initial Probe scout. In his panic, NightMare actually went for an additional double-Probe scout after that to check for any proxies. Somehow, this didn't leave ByuN with a ridiculous early economic lead—ByuN later revealed he was so excited at getting such an advantage that he forgot to build a critical supply depot, basically nullifying said advantage.
In any case, NightMare gambled on a greedy follow up, getting this third base quickly off Blink tech with a late Robotics. Despite running into some scary situations against ByuN's multi-directional bio attacks, NightMare survived the barrage without taking any significant damage and got his mass Gateway production online.
Multiple attempts to look for Zealot runbys and sneaky warp-ins backfired for NightMare, and he bled troops away for little gain. Despite this, he still found a way to win the game with one good attack. His first few Templars caught ByuN by surprise, and the Terran's slow reactions saw a huge chunk of bio forces melt away underneath Psionic Storm. NightMare knew it was time to put the pedal to the metal, and flooded ByuN with constant Zealot-Stalker reinforcements until he was forced to GG.
Game 3 - Glittering Ashes: NightMare opened with Blink Stalkers into a delayed DT drop, but an intrepid Reaper scout from ByuN discovered it in time. Meanwhile, ByuN's own opener fared much better, as his 3-Mine drop hit the jackpot and took out 12 Probes. From there, NightMare did a decent job playing from behind with his Colossus-Stalker composition, but couldn't hold out against the waves of Bio-Tank coming at him.
Decider Match: ByuN [2 - 0] Zoun
Game 1 - Curious Minds: ByuN changed things up with a 3-Rax style this time, while Zoun looked to play defensive Blink again on Curious Minds. Unlike the previous match on the map, ByuN's two prong drop+frontal attack worked beautifully, with the drop providing a distraction while the main Terran army crushed Zoun's forces at the front. With his defensive line broken, Zoun had no choice but to GG.
Game 2 - Hardwire: ByuN brought the mine-drop back out, while Zoun looked to go for 3-Gate Blink pressure with a proxy-Robo. Unfortunately for Zoun, the timings ended up aligning absolutely horribly for him, as he basically had to give up his attack after losing a considerable amount of mining time to ByuN's frustrating mine burrow/unburrow micro. Zoun tried to transition into a macro game from this bad position, but simply didn't have the army to fend off ByuN's simple Bio-Tank push that came to end the game.
Group D
Initial Match #1: Trap [0 - 2] GuMiho
Game 1 - Hardwire: GuMiho opened with a hidden Barracks on the map and two Refineries for one-base play. Looking to stay safe against whatever GuMiho was cooking up, Trap went for Blink Stalkers off of two bases. However, GuMiho's incisive Hellions + 3 Marauder timing hit far before Blink was done, and he used a single Medivac to ferry them up into the Protoss main. Battery Overcharge could only buy Trap a little time before his Adept-Stalker defense fatally collapsed.
Game 2 - Berlingrad: Game two was much more back-and-forth, with plenty of action from start to finish. Trap's Oracle opener didn't do much initially due to good scouting and preparation from GuMiho, but his signature 3 Oracle + Adepts attack inflicted a decent amount of damage to put GuMiho slightly behind. However, Trap's subsequent Stalker pokes ended up just giving away units for free, and actually left him with a dearth of defending units as he looked to secure three bases. Trap tried to get his Blink Stalkers out on the map to delay GuMiho's advance with Stim and Medivacs, but he ended up completely losing track of GuMiho's movements and allowed a series of painful drops/attacks on his expansion and main.
After putting Trap on the ropes, GuMiho went for the knockout blow with a big two-prong attack with his infantry. However, Trap's great use of Force Fields let him hold on, buying enough time to finish Storm research and start Chargelot production in earnest. Once he had three Templars with a big energy bank, Trap decided to go for a frontal attack to end GuMiho for good. Unfortunately for Trap, GuMiho had just enough bio at home to weather the storm, and even hit one of the Protoss expansions with a devastating drop during the battle. Having depleted both the Protoss economy and military, GuMiho finished Trap off with a counterattack.
Initial Match #2: Creator [2 - 1] Solar
Game 1 - Berlingrad: Solar opened with a 12 pool and faked sending a Drone out to take an expansion as Creator's scouting Probe arrived. Solar continued to send his Drone straight on down to Creator's base, which fooled Creator into thinking the Zerg was building a Hatchery at his 'third' base as often happens in ZvP when a Probe blocks the natural. Creator ended up Probe-checking BOTH of Solar's potential third base locations on Berlingrad, after which he belatedly scouted the Zerg main to see that it was a 12 pool strategy.
Meanwhile, Solar's scouting Drone had gone to Creator's natural and plopped down an offensive Hatchery right next to the Gateway at the wall-off. Zerglings soon arrived as well, leaving Creator hard pressed to try and kill the Hatchery with Zealot-Probe while also preventing Zerglings from killing too many mining Probes. Ultimately, Creator couldn't finish the Hatchery off before it completed morphing, and three Drones were ready to plop down three Spine Crawlers right away. It was curtains for Creator from there, with the Spines ripping up the buildings in the natural before crawling up to attack the exposed main.
Game 2 - Hardwire: A more standard game played out this time around with Creator going for 2-Stargate play while Solar decided to counter with Spire tech. Good Oracle scouting from Creator let him stay on top of things and he got a handful of Phoenixes and Phoenix range in response. Knowing that Creator had seen his Spire, Solar took the mind games a layer deeper and skipped Mutalisks altogether, going for mass Corruptors instead. Fortunately for Creator, he kept up his diligent scouting, and was able to minimize Phoenix production and go back into mass Void Rays.
Solar ended up in a situation where he had a lot of Corruptors and a relatively small number of Roach-Ravager on the ground, which he tried to use to pressure Creator. However, Creator had just the right mix of Void Rays and Disruptors to be well-covered on both ends, and all of Solar's attacks ended in better trades for Creator. Yet, Solar was playing off 90+ Drones, and he didn't seem to mind taking some losses as long as he could keep Creator on the defensive while he teched up to Greater Spire. Solar actually managed to take out most of the Voids by overproducing Corruptors, soon after which he morphed Brood Lords to continue his assault.
However, as often is the case, overproducing Corruptors ended up being the Zerg's downfall. Solar still only had a meager group of ground units to help his Brood Lords, whereas Creator had transitioned out of air into a largely Stalker-Archon-Disruptor based force. When the Brood Lords arrived, Creator actually had a strong enough ground army to just aggressively Blink forward. Creator focused down the Brood Lords and mopped up the ground forces, all while the Corruptors watched helplessly. This started a game-ending rout for Solar, and he GG'd out after he failed to stabilize on defense.
Game 3 - Blackburn: Creator opened with proxy 2-Gate and Forge off one base, going for a Zealot + Cannon-rush all-in. This caught Solar completely off guard, and he didn't quite seem to know the correct reaction (or was simply flustered in the moment) as he pulled his Drones far too late to have a chance of stopping the Cannons from completing. Once the warp-ins finished, it was all over for Solar.
Winners' Match: Creator [2 - 1] GuMiho
Game 1 - Hardwire: Creator went for proxy-1 Gate pressure early on, but good scouting from GuMiho let him get up a Bunker in time to protect his fast expansion on the low-ground. Creator had to settle for delaying mining by camping behind the minerals while plotting his next move. That turned out to be another proxy Pylon, but GuMiho scouting that as well with continued SCV recon.
In a cheeky mind-game, Creator made a Dark Shrine at that second proxy Pylon anyway, once he got rid of the scouting SCV. Though GuMiho didn't re-scout that location, he still had the wherewithal to get up a safety Turret and totally nullify the DT's.
With both of his early gambits foiled, Creator was stuck in the enviable position of trying to transition to a macro game from behind. While he did barely stop GuMiho's first big Marine-Tank push, the overpowering Terran economy meant GuMiho had an even stronger force ready to attack in no time. Creator tried to roll the dice on a desperate base trade, but the difference in firepower was too much to overcome and he GG'd out.
Game 2 - Roughneck: Creator opened up with defensive Phoenixes, which completely negated GuMiho's Cloaked Banshee opener in conjunction with well-placed perimeter Pylons. GuMiho tried to force a 1/1/1-style attack with Marines, Cyclones, and Tanks, but Phoenixes and Gateway units made short work of the motley Terran squadron.
Creator was able to macro-up at home with ease while GuMiho was left to turtle on three bases and try to rebuild. GuMiho did have one more strong attack in him, moving out with Marine-Tank and setting up just outside the Protoss natural. However, Creator executed a beautiful surround attack that crushed the Terran army, and GuMiho surrendered to the counterattack.
Game 3 - Glittering Ashes: GuMiho opened with an expansion into 3-Barracks while Creator went Robo-first into double-forge. This strategy from Creator seemed oddly suboptimal as he didn't get to use his Forges immediately (he had to prioritize Robo units to prevent any early infantry pressure from the 3-Rax), but it was still a nostalgic throwback to Creator's heyday in 2012.
In any case, the early/mid-game progressed without too much incident, with GuMiho trying the usual two-prong bio attacks but not dealing much damage. Ultimately, the game settled into a passive build-up to the late game. Even Creator's fast 3/3 upgrades didn't offer him an opportunity to attack as GuMiho was very intent on turtling.
Creator was faster in switching to his end-game composition, teching up to Carriers before GuMiho made his own transition to Battlecruisers. This gave Creator a good window to attack with Carriers while the BC and Viking count was still low, and he picked off some outlying Terran expansions. BC's eventually chased the Carriers off, and Creator added Tempests to his fleet in response. There was a lull in the action at this point, with neither side wanting to engage in a battle between main fleets. There was some harassment around the fringes of each other's territory with bio and DT's, but no significant damage was inflicted.
A semi base-trade occured when the two main fleets set course for opposite ends of the map, and they both razed a few expansions before pulling back. GuMiho made an error here, overextending a little too far before Tactical Jump was available. He lost a considerable number of his BC's to the returning Tempests, and he had to deplete most of his bank to replace them.
After both players built back up to maxed out fleets, GuMiho decided he would break the deadlock and go for broke. He teleported his BC's right on top of the Protoss fleet, starting the deciding battle of the game. Creator did a much better job of getting his supporting ground units to contribute to the fight, and he took a decisive victory to book his ticket to the RO10.
Losers' Match: Trap [2 - 0] Solar
Game 1 - Berlingrad: Trap opened with an old specialty in an Oracle opener, killing off several Drones with his precise micro. He followed with Blink Stalkers and Immortals for a potential attack, but pulled back to get more tech units upon seeing Solar's strong defenses. Solar continued to commit hard to Roach-Ravager-Baneling, looking to deal significant damage while Trap was still stuck on a largely Stalker-based force. A big frontal attack from Solar threatened to end the game, but a timely Disruptor was able to stem the assault.
Solar tried to stay on the offensive, but found himself stymied by continued Disruptor shots. Eventually, Trap accumulated enough high-tech units to support his Stalkers and burned through the Zerg forces to claim the win.
Game 2 - Blackburn: Solar's sloppy loss of an early Overlord scout (misplacing it above the OL-pillar) forced Solar to play rather conservatively to begin this game, not knowing what Trap was going for off two bases. As it turned out, it was just a light 1-Disruptor drop into macro play, which let Trap get off to a great start in terms of build orders. Trap improved his situation with some solid Disruptor hits onto Drones, and he built up for a deadly Stalker-Colossus attack in the mid-game. Solar tried to turn the game back in his favor with Spire tech, but his Mutalisks came out far too late and in too few numbers to stop Trap's game-ending army.
Decider Match: Trap [2 - 1] GuMiho
Game 1 - Berlingrad: Trap opened up with proxy-Oracle, but GuMiho scouted it out like he had with all the other proxy strategies on the night. GuMiho reacted by getting very aggressive with his initial Marines, Cyclones, and Medivac, moving out and depowering the Stargate before going on to attack the Protoss natural. Trap navigated this situation well, backdooring GuMiho with a few units and microing his way to a great defensive stand at home.
Gumiho went for round two of attacks with a Marine-Tank push, but unlike in their first match, Trap successfully used a hit-squad of Blink-Stalkers to heavily delay GuMiho and deal a lot of damage at his third base. The Terran push basically fell apart when Disruptors came out, forcing GuMiho back. Trap had superior map and vision control at that point, and found an angle to evade the main Terran army and attack the natural directly. This forced GuMiho into a bad basetrade, and it wasn't long before he had to GG out.
Game 2 - Hardwire: Trap's diligent Probe scouting saw GuMiho playing Reaper into fast Marauders, which he pounced on with some early Adept harass to get in several SCV kills early. That early pressure forced Gumiho into a defensive position, leaving Trap to comfortably set up for a macro game.
However, Trap got a little bit too comfortable, seemingly thinking that GuMiho wouldn't dare move out until he was fully maxed with upgraded Ghosts. A mid-game advance from GuMiho caught Trap off-guard, with a lot of empty supply, money in the bank, and troops out of position. GuMiho somehow managed to blitz across the map and kill two expansions before Trap could get his army together to contest the Terran infantry, but the momentum had already swung hugely in GuMiho's favor. Trap couldn't fully recover his composure, and he continued to miss Terran army movements and bleed away units and bases. After one last desperate attack, Trap GG'd out.
Game 3 - Glittering Ashes: GuMiho brought out Cloaked Banshees for another spin, catching a few Probes but losing his Banshee after overstaying against defensive Blink from Trap. GuMiho did well to make up for that loss with some good skirmishing against Stalkers in the field, and then looked to secure his third base with Tanks.
The game seemed like it might settle down then, but Trap went for a daring attack by running his Stalkers past some perimeter Tanks and Blinking deep into the Terran main. It took forever for GuMiho to pull his defenses back to his main, which let Trap do significant SCV damage before recalling out. This put the two players in a similar situation as the last game, with Trap holding an advantage while GuMiho was forced to turtle up for the while being.
This time, Trap played his advantage beautifully and safely made a transition to Tempests before GuMiho had any intent of attacking. He even set up several clusters of Shield Batteries toward the front line to assist his Tempests as they chipped away at the Terran defenses.
GuMiho did his best to stall with Vikings and Turrets while his infantry looked for openings on the other side of the map, but it was a losing effort on both ends. Trap kept enough troops back on defense, while his Tempest continued to chip away at the Terran defenses. Trap's Stalker and Templar support made it impossible for GuMiho to send his Vikings forward without taking a bad trade, and the slow bleeding soon turned into an uncontrollable stream of losses. GuMiho just couldn't win this battle of attrition and GG'd out.
