2025 RSL Revival: Season 3

RO16 Group A & B Previews

by Wax

The RSL Revival is back for its third season of 2025, pitting 16 high-level players against each other through two weeks of competition. Unlike the first two seasons, we now have a final destination in sight: the year-end finals to be held offline with over $10,000 on the line. Who will join Classic and Zoun in the grand finale? We'll start finding out the answer in the RO16.

Group A: Solar, Zoun, MaxPax, Bunny

Start time: Thursday, Nov 13 10:00am GMT (GMT+00:00)

The RO16 begins with the toughest group in terms of overall strength. Online powerhouse MaxPax should be the clear favorite of the group, given the countless BO3 wins he's picked up in cup events—often over the players in this very group. However, he's been oddly inconsistent when competing in the larger online tournaments, which was highlighted in the last season of RSL where he went out in the RO16 (losses to MaNa and SHIN). While that does feel like a somewhat flukey result, I'm still a bit wary about his chances ahead of this group.

A poor MaxPax performance could see Solar top the group, as the Team Falcons Zerg comes in with some momentum built up in recent cup competitions. He's given Zerg a few rare weekly cup wins, beating the likes of herO, Clem, and MaxPax along the way. A two-Protoss group might have spelled trouble in the past, but Solar seems to have gotten over the ZvP hump thanks to strong offense. Even though his aggressive approach is predictable, opponents don't know whether to expect an early Queen-Ravager all-in, unrelenting Hydra-Baneling waves in the mid-game, or whatever else he might have up his sleeve.

We don't see much of Zoun in weekly cup competitions, but he did give us a reminder of his skills at last week's Stellar Fest LAN in Canada. He did look rather shaky in PvZ—losing to Lambo and struggling to overcome Scarlett—but his other two match-ups looked on point. He took a convincing 4-1 victory over Trigger, and piloted his Disruptors to 4-2 win over Clem in the first leg of the double-elimination grand finals. While Zoun did give up a 0-4 sweep to Clem in the second and deciding BO7, just getting that first win was impressive enough.

Alas, poor Bunny! It's hard to see him getting through as he'll need to get at least two PvT wins against top-level players to do so. The 5.0.15 patch seems to have benefited Clem against Protoss, but most other Terrans still have trouble stopping the Protoss economy from snowballing out of control. Still, Bunny's penchant for all-ins could see him squeak through as the underdog in the RO16's BO3 format.

Prediction: Solar and MaxPax to advance

Group B: Classic, Creator, trigger, Cure

Start time: Friday, Nov 14 10:00am GMT (GMT+00:00)

Classic enters Group B as the prohibitive favorite to advance, looking to be a tier above the other three players in the group. He's repeatedly proven to us he's the best all-around Protoss player in the world in the past few months, placing runner-up at EWC and winning back-to-back RSL championships (not only that, but he also won the two biggest SC: Evo tournaments to date). In this group, the volatility of PvP may look like a concern on the surface, but I think it's less of a problem for Classic than other Protoss. Watching his games, it feels like he's just a step ahead of everyone else in terms of early-game mind-games, playing with weighted dice in a match-up filled with gambles.

The second place pick in Group B has to be Cure, but it's not as definitive as it might seem on paper. Cure is clearly above Creator and Trigger in the StarCraft II hierarchy, finishing third place in August's world championship and having consistently placed RO4+ in major tournaments for several years. However, TvP has been a major problem for him in 2025 (join the club), and his great EWC result was aided by a fortunate bracket that saw him largely avoid the match-up. I'm still picking him to advance, but I suspect Creator or Trigger to make it a struggle.

While I am picking Cure to get through in second, I definitely respect Creator and Trigger's chances to play spoiler. Creator has been trending downward in the last few months, missing out on EWC and failing to make an impact in most of the online tournaments he's participated in. However, he's still capable of exploding for a strong performance out of nowhere, such as his victory in the October Sparkling Tuna Cup where he took down Bunny, ByuN, and herO consecutively.

Trigger has the more conventional case to create an upset in the group, as he's slowly risen through the ranks to become a dangerous player. The last RSL's RO16 was a great demonstration of his abilities, as he defeated the far more established ByuN and GuMiho to advance from first place in his group. While he did fall 1-3 to Cure in the playoffs, he has a puncher's chance in a rematch.

Prediction: Classic and Cure to advance.

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