EPT
The challenge league continued on Monday with the last two groups making their debuts. Featuring good Zerg players such as Chojja and Yellow, a day of feasting upon the fleshy terrans seemed imminent.
Chojja (z) vs Freshen[S.G] (t) Group F
On Mercury
The experienced Chojja was looking well fed today as he went up against the promising Terran Freshen. I was actually a little worried about Freshen when he appeared on screen. He looked so tired, and his eyes were barely open. Either he had been practicing late every night, or he is quite the ladies man, but his challenge today would be just to stay awake long enough to take on Chojja.
Freshen started at 8 oclock with a two barracks academy build, while Chojja started at 5 oclock. Chojja laid his first hatchery at his natural expansion, and then followed up with a third hatchery hidden up at the 2 oclock main. Freshens first marine medic group came up to the zerg main and plowed through the defending sunks, forcing Chojja to defend with his drones. Only once Chojjas newly hatched speed lings arrived did freshen have to pull back. Chojja defeated the next marine group with more speedlings, giving himself time to tech to lurkers. Once he finished his drop and speed upgrades for his overlords, Chojja began to repeatedly drop lurker ling on Freshen, bottling him up inside his base, and forcing him to defend his newly made natural expansion as well as his main. While harassing the terran base, Chojja expanded to 12 oclock, and then teched rapidly up to his greater spire. After dealing with the drops, Freshen began to reassert himself, killing the 12 oclock hatchery seconds after it was completed while moving his main force towards the bottom of the map. Chojja tried to pincer with his gaurds from one angle, and his lurker ling force with the other, and managed to chase the terran force away. Chojja again took advantage of a brief advantage to expand two more times, to the right middle and four oclock. Unfortunately for Chojja, while he sent his gaurds up to the left from his main, Freshen managed to intercept them in the intervening landmass with marines and kill them all, turning the tide to his favour. With the destruction of most of the zerg army, Freshen himself expanded to the middle left, and took his force to crush Chojjas middle right expansion. Chojja tried another drop as a counter, but he just didnt have enough firepower left after losing part of his economy and most of his units. Freshen brought his to Chojjas main base, and leveled it. Chojja bought himself a little more time with some defiler games, but he was no match to Freshens now dominant army.
Chojja < Freshen[S.G]
I think Chojja tried to take advantage of Freshens relative inexperience by trying to steal a free expansion at the start, but Freshen responded well by sticking to a solid strategy and responding well to early pressure drops. Chojjas tech was delayed because of his fast third hatchery and loss of drones, and I think that gave Freshen enough time to establish himself. Although the drops by Chojja were nice, they failed to do any significant damage, and once Freshens army reached a large enough size, he began to stomp around the map.
[Oops]Cloud (t) vs HyO (z) Group F
on Namja Iyaga
Cloud opened up at the 11 oclock position while Hyo spawned at 7. Reach`s clanmate opened with a typical 2 barracks, academy build while sending his scouting scv down to Hyos base in time to see him drop a hatchery at his natural expansion. Hyo looked nervous early, allowing himself to be bothered by Clouds early marine and scv harassment, eventually losing a drone. As Hyo got his lair, and then teched to lurkers, Cloud sent his first modest marine/medic force south to the Zerg natural. Sunkens held off the early marines, and Hyo chased them out of range with his newly morphed lurkers. Playing safe early on, Hyo used his lurkers to fortify his main base as well as his natural. It turned out to be a good idea, as back in the terran base, Cloud had made a dropship and was sending down a force of MM. Cloud dropped on the edge of the base, killed an overlord, and moved in to take on zerg lurkers that were scrambling into position. Using some cute micro, Cloud used a couple marines to attract the fire of two closely positioned lurkers to the south, while moving in for the kill with a fire bat from the west. The marines dodged long enough allowing the bat to kill the two damaged lurkers.
Once he defeated the drop, Hyo moved out into the lower middle with a small lurker ling force. At this point his biggest problem was that he had not seen the inside of the terran base. While sending reinforcements, Hyo set up on a lurker ling containment on the cliffs above Clouds natural. Cloud had moved out again to fortify his recently taken natural expansion, and had teched up to vessels and tanks. Zerg took advantage of the lull in the action to make an expansion over at 5 oclock. Cloud sent a second drop ship that had been D-Matrixed, allowing it to survive a scourge strike, but it did not accomplish much other than leaving a couple lonely marines stranded on the mineral only mini island in the corner of the zerg base. By this time Cloud had been able to mass a large tanks and marine force accompanied by a vessel. Maneuvering his growing lurker ling force, Hyo tried to stop Cloud from getting up his ramp and into the middle. A well timed scourge killed the vessel, and while Cloud scanned to allow his tanks to fire, he was forced to pull back and wait for another science vessel to appear. Zerg sent up a few reinforcements, but terran forces manage to breach the ramp on the second attempt. Seconds before the last couple lurkers succumbed to tank fire, a red cloud appeared, and Hyo again delayed the terran advance with his newly created defilers. Eventually Cloud managed to work his way down the map, only to have Hyo sneak a small lurker ling force up the map from his 5 oclock base, behind the terran army, and into his natural. Although he couldnt break through into Clouds main, Hyo managed to stop mining at the expansion, while simultaneously defending his own expansion against Clouds main army. Again a mix of lings lurkers and defilers managed to ward off the terran offensive and a counter attack returned to Clouds natural to further ruin his scv count. Terran was forced to regroup, allowing Hyo to mass up a large army. Once Cloud felt safe enough, he moved out once again, this time heading to 5 oclock. Hyo allowed his expansion to fall, and sent the bulk of his forces into the terran base. Terran lost all of his ability to gather minerals, and although he fought for a few more minutes, the game was over.
[Oops]Cloud (t) < HyO (z)
I thought that Cloud took his opponent too lightly. Once Cloud got the early advantage, it seems that he assumed that he would win fast, and he neglected long term strategy options such as upgrades until quite late. Hyo looked nervous at the start, as his lurkers were slow to appear and he played very cautiously at the start. He stayed focused through the early pressure though, and showed good decision making and strategy later in the game.
Suma_Midas (t) vs Legend_SJHR (p) Group E
On Requim
While Midas had a lofty nine game sunder his belt in OGN play, this was the debut match for Legend, and this protoss player would try to make an impression on his many friends in attendance. Legend started at 6 oclock, while Midas landed at 9. Legend scouted aggressively, sending out two probes, obviously wanting to get an early look at his opponents base, and maybe prevent any early cheese which could cause him to die quickly.
Well, Midas didnt seem to mind about that scout, as he dropped down two barracks and later an academy to produce a medic marine force. Legend, seeing this with his scout, dropped a second gateway, and began to pump zealots, while getting a later core. Midas waited until he had a group of 12 marines, a couple firebats, and a smattering of medics. Coming down towards the protoss base, Midas stimmed both his marines and bats, running the later around to the side of Legends zealot force, creating a multi angle attack. Legend panicked, and after losing his first goon right away, tried to retreat his zealots down his ramp and into his base. Unfortunately, most of his zealots died to marine fire before they got to the ramp, and Midas walked into the Protoss base unopposed and leveled it.
Midas > Legend
I felt so bad for Legend. Just imagine how many hours he must have played to reach that level, only to be humiliated PvT by MM in like 8 minutes. You could tell he was upset, and his hands must have been shaking violently, as his last two dragoons got off only one shot after the emerged, hitting Legends own gateways. His face looked so crestfallen at the end of the game, while Midas just stared at him with no emotion.
Yellow (z) vs ArtofTerran (t) Group E
On Nostalgia
This was the matchup I was most looking forward to. Yellow would be taking on Rekruls soon to be teammate ArtofTerran. Terran started with a two barracks academy build, making it the same build used by terrans in all four games today. Yellow went the same route of Chojja, starting at 11 oclock, expanding to his main, and then expanding again to a hidden spot at 6 oclock. ArtofTerran built up a small marine medic firebat force and moved out early towards Yellows main. Similar to Chojja, Yellow had opted for an early speedling force to allow for his 3rd hatchery, but this delayed his tech. Once Terran moved out, Yellow snuck his speedlings into his base and forced Terran to come running back. This allowed Yellow enough time to fortify his natural expansion with sunkens. ArtofTerran ran his force back to Yellows bridges, and by stimming across the lower one and killing one sunken colony, he was able to run up Yellows ramp and into his base. Yellow, with no units, was forced to run his drones, losing 5 or 6 of them. Terran focused on killing the hydralisk den, but Yellow managed to come in with new speedlings, and with a breathtaking piece of micro, his 8 lings managed to kill 2 marines, 2 firebats, and 4 medics. The crowd and announcers went crazy, as that move probably saved the game for yellow.
In the meantime, Terran had floated a Command Center to his natural, and began to rally his forces to his bridges. Yellow harassed the edges of Terrans expansion, but did no real harm as the number of marines and tanks began to rise. Terran moved out with a large tanks and marine army, heading right across the map towards Yellows main. Yellow dug in with sunks, lurkers and lings, but numerous tanks began to tear apart the defenses, and with tanks on the upper bridge, Terran neatly stimmed across the bottom bridge, getting all his units across quickly and taking apart the Zerg natural. At the same time, Yellow dropped lurker lings into the empty terran base, and Yellow smartly split his lurkers, half to the ramp and half to the mineral line. In fact, when Terran evacuated his scvs and raised his CC, Yellow repositioned his lurker underneath the CC to prevent it from landing, while simultaneously repositioning another lurker behind the natural mineral line, keeping the pressure on. Back at his own base, Yellow had lost his natural, but had made lurker eggs to block his ramp just as Terran tried to stim up it. This messed with the AI of the marines, and they milled about outside the zerg main, getting cut to pieces by Yellows two remaining lurkers. Yellow successfully dropped again in the terran base, killing most of the scvs, and leaving nothing but burning buildings. Terran tried to again force his way into the zerg base with his remaining tank force, but with 6 oclock still active, and reinforcements in the main base, only tanks could not be successful, and ArtofTerran was forced to concede.
Yellow > ArtofTerran
Yellow really showed why he is such a dominant player today. Despite an early setback, flawless timing, breath taking micro, and a push-me-I-push-you-back attitude allowed him to grab this game back. Another though that occurred to me today was that he has 63 career wins on OGN, and that there is a distinct possibility that he could win 100 games, something I think that would solidify his reputation as the best ever professional player.
So, a couple good games and a couple mediocre ones. I was impressed with Freshens composure against Chojja, as he didnt allow himself to get bullied early in the game and played solidly for the win. The look on Chojjas face when he lost his main base was one of extreme disapointment. It was obvious that he and Yellow had practiced the same strategy this week, but it was only Yellow that it worked for.
Cloud really should have won his game againt Hyo, but after sensing his early advantage, he seemed to slack off and Hyo took advantage. The two expansion lurker ling defiler army was very effective, not allowing terran to gain much free movement around the map, forcing Cloud to battle everytime he wanted to move out somewhere.
Mani~
