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United States666 Posts
I am probably not the only one impressed by the huge success of Fin, aka  fOrGG, the ex broadwar progamer. Apparently he has been playing starcraft 2 for almost a year now, but this is the first season we have in the GSL, and he is on tear.
In his code A run, he has demolished the likes of  Sage, Polt, and  July, clinching his spot in code S for the next season. In each he won 2-0, and all of the games were incredibly one sided.
In his games against Sage, he showcased probably the best marine/maurader micro that sc2 has ever seen, showing an incredible ability, in game 2, to micro continually while keeping his minerals and gas below 400 the entire time.
In his games against Polt, he used brilliant banshee micro, often picking apart Polts scvs from two different places at once, and almost always being able to pull them back before they were killed. In the first game, fin was able to push Polts' bio army with a mech force at 13 minutes, something that the rules of mech says should be impossible.
Then last night, against July, he went two rax and gained a decisive advantage. July baneling busted fin in game two, but fin used great micro and crisis management to hold off the attack, and then quickly ended it with a mass hellion run by.
I first want to preface this, by saying that I am not a broodwar fan, and I never followed fOrGG or anything in the broodwar scene closely. So when I make this praise about fin and how I expect him to win a GSL within the next two or three seasons, I do so without looking through any rose colored glass. I have no broodwar biases.
The most obvious thing to note about fin is his micro looks to easily be the best starcraft 2 has ever seen. Even though fin has only played all of six games in the GSL, I think that statement can still be made. Sage should have taken game two with his high templar/gateway army, but the kiting of fins maraurders was just picture perfect; always pullling away from strorms just enough, and kiting back the least distance as possible, so that every possible volley from his units were released. His bunker rush against july was truly amazing, keeping as many as 4 marines alive with less then 5 hitpoints at one point, willing to abandon the bunker if it meant picking of zerglings and drones for free. And of course, most impressively, in game 2 of his match against polt, he was able to micro two banshees in two bases, with missile turrents in the mineral lines, and absolutely reck polts economy; at times doing this while even carrying on a push at the same time, or defending an attack at his own base.
But its not fins micro that has me all hot and bothered; its his fundamental style. Nearly everyone that plays starcraft II plays one of two styles; super aggressive (cheese and timing attacks) or super passive(macro/harrass oriented play). This may sound like a gross over simplification... some players can do both, and some style feature aggression and macro as well. What I mean by this, is that nearly everyone who plays starcraft II uses a strategy that either exploits the mistake their opponent makes in a big way (for instance, leenocks roach/ling timing in ZvT), or they play a style that focuses on making less mistakes then their opponent (Nestea style ZvT, MVP mech style in TvT, ect). What fin did, at least in his games where he didn't open with a cheese, was play an aggressive macro style. Fin is one of the few players I have ever seen force his opponent to make mistakes without going all in. Whats more he was also comfortable being weak at times in his games, so that he could both harass and macro behind it.
Fin looked so good and so dominant because he exploited anything and everything he could in his games; meaning that he had the fewest number of units possible, with the most bases and scvs he could afford, while still putting on incredible pressure and making decisive pushes. The margins for this kind of play style are incredibly close. I can only imagine how many games fin must have lost in ladder and practice trying to figure these timings out. In all of his games, if sage, or polt, or july had made the right units to hard counter whatever fin was doing, they could have pushed his front door and won the game nearly instantly. At one point against Polt, fins army consisted of three banshees, two wounded reapers, and a handful of marines. The brilliance of his play is that he was able to keep polt, who had the larger bio army, back in his base and at the same time was able to develop his tech better and force polt, through harassment, to fall behind on economy. That kind of play is truly amazing, and still unique to starcraft II. If this is the kind of play we can expect from top level broodwar players who switch over, then I can only hope more switch over soon and show us the way these games can truly be played.
I think fin deserves a lot of attention right now, perhaps even more then he is getting already. I would like to think he is playing a style that we will see more of in the future as starcraft II strategy continues to develop. I am very excited about seeing him compete in code S next season. If he plays like he has been in his last three matchups, then I think he could easily take a GSL title.
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shouldnt this be under the blog section ? 
edit: nice read, good effort
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I totally agree with you, he really does look impressive thus far, his control especially with multiple groups is outstanding. But you can pose the argument that July/Polt are both in slumps and Sage is massively overhyped. I'll hold off on the bandwagon (as much as I want to because I love fOrGG >_>) because we all know too much hype kills promising players hahaha.
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"The way I play is to create a pattern where I have an advantage, and then crush my opponents with momentum. That way my opponent can’t play with 100% of his skill. That’s why I think mind-games are more important than skill."-  iloveoov
I'd describe his play as being more tactic-centric as compared to strategy-centric than we have been seeing from top players since beta
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yea, though i do have a bw bias, that is merely being proved by forgg being a boss right now :D
if those rumors of pl having a sc2 section ever come true (in a season or two) i expect him to return to kt and teach flash how to wreck everything ;3
that said, forgg is a boss and im glad to see him in code s (despite that he plays terran -__- we have enough terrans in there already)
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Can't we just call him ForGG? Fin is just confusing :-)
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this was the bread and butter of BW. agresssive harrass while macroing. Although it worked better in BW because static defence was a little better.
BW was a macro game. Thats why cheese was actually exciting because it was so hard to pull off.
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the part where you actually say why he looks like one of the best was rather short(and not very thought out imho). It's more like a small summary of what happened the last week or so (and i was busy all week so i appreciate it  )
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On December 07 2011 04:52 Irritation wrote:shouldnt this be under the blog section ? Maybe, but it's a nice write-up.
I think that the point has to be made that Fin (aka ForGG) is not only a former BW player but by far the highest level former BW player that professional SC2 has seen make the transfer yet. (Boxer, Nada, and July are all BW legends, but they're much further past their prime than ForGG). The Starcraft 2 scene is still young and hasn't had a chance to fully develop 'home-grown' talent. At this point, I think it's safe to say that the top SC1 players still have the edge over pretty much everyone else who plays Starcraft 2, and Fin's success just underscores that fact.
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On December 07 2011 04:55 Grend wrote:
Can't we just call him ForGG? Fin is just confusing :-)
I agree. Even when I see the brackets and see Fin, I think ForGG. He should change his name back :D. I bet he'll be picked in the last round of selections for code S next season.
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He's been playing for over 6 months in KR top 20 gm, this isn't something insane.
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On December 07 2011 04:58 Brosy wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2011 04:55 Grend wrote:
Can't we just call him ForGG? Fin is just confusing :-) I agree. Even when I see the brackets and see Fin, I think ForGG. He should change his name back :D. I bet he'll be picked in the last round of selections for code S next season.
Don't think anyone thinks of him as Fin rather than ForGG.
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Not far off given the other GSL winners were BW nobodies (woonjin terran and Iron lol) that an A-teamer (despite his bad bad baddd performance in the last year of his BW career) is dominating.
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On December 07 2011 04:58 VPGeneralHans wrote:
He's been playing for over 6 months in KR top 20 gm, this isn't something insane.
Six months as opposed to the players who have been playing for a year and a half?
Look at TSL HyuN, he's been playing for like a month and a half, with two weeks in the TSL house, and he's already beating other Korean pros in things like the Playhem Daily.
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Fin's games last night were the first games in GSL I've actually watched twice since the very first GSTL.
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On December 07 2011 04:58 VPGeneralHans wrote:
He's been playing for over 6 months in KR top 20 gm, this isn't something insane.
You can rationalize it all you want. Nobody is saying this guy is suddenly uncontested out of the woodwork... but so far he has made 3 top players look absolutely amateurish. Actually it is kind of insane just sayin.
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i agree with the part that all players(in most cases) in sc2 either go for greedy macro play or july-esque aggression nothing in between. Forgg does what most people would call "cheese"(unfortunately tt) because they dont see that its not cheese but safe aggressive play. You ask whats safe about being aggressive, well you put pressure on your opponent, also you scout him, and play more mechanic-esque starcraft which is ForGG's forte. His oppeners are not hard countered by neither early allin's nor super greedy play, his builds generally put opponent in defense which gives forgg initiative to be more "all-in" or "greedy". Its hardest style to play, because its effectiveness relies on execution but also requires that from his opponent.
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He's been in the top of the ladder for several months and just now has had some "public" success. His play is impressive, but its not like he magicly became amazing. He has been amazing for quite some time.
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He's been playing official matches in the ESV Korean Weekly. You could have made some of these conclusions earlier.
edit: similarly for jjakji, by the way. /offtopic
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EPT
