Summer Arena: Draft Review

By: Waxangel

Consulting by tree.hugger and NrGmonk

2. All Winners Round 1 Matchups will be set by the Players seeded #1-15. Starting with the #1 Seed, Players must choose their Winners Round 1 opponent from the Players seeded #17-32. In Winners Round 1, the #16 Seed will play the Player not chosen.

Update: Now includes post-draft review!

Ever since the above provision showed up in the MLG Arena rulebook last season, we've been excited.

A draft! After tailgaiting and absurd amounts of commercials, there's nothing else that so quintessentially defines American sports. The fact that it was implemented in the most American of leagues, Major League Gaming, was no great surprise. It follows that it should be no surprise to you, dear reader, that we give the draft a very American sports journalism treatment: a mock draft.

Last time, we were only in time to do a belated draft review. This time around, with MLG's live group show coming up, we acquired the seeding list so we could indulge in the time honored tradition of pretending to know better than the players and tell them who they should pick.

Player Seeding
+ Show Spoiler [Player Seeding] +

1. Alicia
2. Sase
3. Puma
4. Stephano
5. Oz
6. Ganzi
7. Alive
8. Grubby
9. Hero
10. Golden
11. SortOf
12. Violet
13. Illusion
14. Taeja
15. Real
16. Sheth

Cut off
17. Ryung
18. Roof
19. Losira
20. qxc
21. Sasquatch
22. Cytoplasm
23. Top
24. Daisy
25. Rain
26. First
27. Welmu
28. Snute
29. Goody
30. Revival
31. Dream
32. Tefel

#1: SlayerS_Alicia

Player's Pick: Sasquatch

It was the obvious #1 pick to anyone in the West, and it turns out that Alicia also got the memo. Kudos to the SlayerS camp, the foreigners who advised Alicia at NASL, or whoever it was that helped him make this pick. Or maybe it was even Alicia himself, taking the time out to dig through TLPD and liquipedia to scout out his opponents. In any case, congratulations to Alicia on getting the best pick in the draft!

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick:

Sasquatch
A foreign Terran might seem like the natural pick for Alicia, but not when Sasquatch is up for grabs. The elusive, rarely seen Sasquatch was the surprise entrant into this tournament, qualifying after winning games over Binksi and Trimaster, while also receiving two fortunate byes against Insur and Sleep in the qualifier. There have been similarly unknown Arena entrants in the past such as Tefel and Mook, but it's safe to say that Sasquatch comes into this tournament with an even lower profile. It will be all on Sasquatch to prove that he deserves to be in this tournament, and show that he isn't terribly outclassed.

Though he's an obvious first pick in our minds, it's not a given that Alicia will choose to take Sasquatch. Korean players have shown a remarkable lack of knowledge of the international scene in the past, and it wouldn't have been surprising if Alicia hadn't able to distinguish between Nerchio and Sasquatch prior to Homestory. We don't know what kind of information (or misinformation) Alicia received from foreign players at NASL, so don't be surprised to see Sasquatch fall to #2 and get snatched up by SaSe.

#2: Quantic.SaSe

Player Pick: ESC.GoOdy

The obvious, best pick for SaSe and his strong PvT was either of the two foreign Terrans. We thought he should pick qxc, but SaSe opted to with the Panzer General GoOdy instead. Honestly there's not much between the two, and SaSe would be strongly favored against either player. Perhaps SaSe just preferred to play a more familiar opponent than risk dealing with a more unpredictable opponent.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: coL.qxc

SaSe has been an absolute terror in PvT, and he will be looking to pick up a foreign Terran here if Sasquatch isn't up for grabs. He doesn't have much choice in this area, with just GoOdy and qxc representing that contingent. Neither player has been in the championship picture for quite a while now, and SaSe should be able to beat either of them quite handily.

Though it's close, but SaSe should prefer to play qxc because he's American. As we've seen from the TSL4 qualifiers, Americans don't even qualify for tournaments if they're not given their own separate qualification region. Just blindly saying Koreans are better than foreigners was surprisingly valid in 2011, and saying everyone is better than Americans is rapidly becoming the 2012 equivalent.

#3: EG.PuMa

Player Pick: EC.Welmu

Welmu was the player we thought PuMa would pick, but not necessarily the player we thought he should pick. It's completely understandable if PuMa personally feels better about his TvP and thinks he should avoid TvZ at all costs. But...

Maybe we're just a little higher on Welmu's skill than most. He seems like he's just a little bit too dangerous JUST to take for being a Protoss foreigner. Not with the #3 pick.

In the end, it's really just splitting hairs. PuMa would have been strongly favored against Tefel, Snute, Welmu, or whoever he decided to take at this spot.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: BLAST.Tefel

Welmu might seem like the natural choice here because he's the sole foreign Protoss player available in the pool, but PuMa doesn't absolutely need to take a TvP here. Though it's a match-up he once dominated, it has changed much since the summer of 2011. Now, PuMa is a player with much more well rounded strengths.

While a lot of the foreigners left are players who have been building momentum recently, Tefel has been fairly static. He played surprisingly well at the last Arena by taking out Ret and SeleCT, but he hasn't really been able to build on that performance. It will mean playing the recently feared TvZ, but PuMa should still go with Tefel here.

#4: Mill.Stephano

Player Pick: coL.qxc

Forget the 11 – 3 against foreign Protoss players last weekend. We still think Stephano's best match-up is post-queen patch ZvT. Exactly like SaSe, the best choice for Stephano was one of the two foreign Terrans, GoOdy or qxc.

Due to the players picking above him, Stephano was almost much guaranteed to get one or the other. Sasquatch was bound to go ASAP, SaSe was definitely taking one of the Terrans, while PuMa was highly unlikely to take a TvT.

There's really nothing to complain about here. This is an A+ steal, because if Stephano had been picking first, it's not unlikely that he would have taken qxc with the #1 overall pick – forgoing Sasquatch because of his own ZvZ aversion.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: ESC.GoOdy

After seeing him crush MC, HerO, and Alicia at NASL, you may have been led to believe that Stephano's best match-up is ZvT. We beg to differ. Scary as it might seem, we believe that Stephano playing ZvT post-queen patch is even more formidable (and come on, NASL had Bel'Shir Beach and Dual Sight in the map pool). Sorry GoOdy! You're the sacrifice here.

#5: FnaticRC Oz

Player Pick: BLAST.roof

At #5, this could be a bit of a miss-pick. With Sasquatch and both foreign Terrans surely gone by the fourth pick, Oz was going into the draft knowing he'd be shopping for a European Zerg at #5 (he's wisely given up on PvP for the time being, it appears). That gave him a choice between Cytoplasm, Roof, Snute, and Tefel at this spot. Of the four, we of the belief that Cytoplasm struggles a bit more than the rest at ZvP, and was the best choice for Oz.

That said, it's probably just splitting hairs, as Oz would beat all of them anyway. Well, except maybe Snute...

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: Ai.Cytoplasm

After making his now-infamous 'PvP is pure skill' statement, Oz has struggled to maintain even a 40% win-rate at the match-up. He picked Grubby as his opponent at the previous Arena, and got creamed 2 – 0 for his confidence. For pure entertainment's sake, we would love for Oz to take Welmu, Daisy, or First with the fifth pick in the draft.

If he wants to win, however, Cytoplasm represents the best opportunity. Without any foreign Terrans left on the table, Oz is limited to picking from three foreign Zergs in Cytoplasm, Roof, and Snute. All three have rapidly risen to prominence in the European scene, and it wouldn't be a surprise to see any of them cause some serious upsets this tournament. Of the three, Cytoplasm is the one who has the worst ZvP, and is thus Oz's best bet.

An alternative option for Oz here would have been to try and take advantage of SlayerS_Ryung's porous early game TvP defense, but it's hard to justify picking a Code S player over a less established European in any scenario.

#6: coL.GanZi

Player Pick: GL.Snute

Here are the two most likely ways this pick was made.

1) Ganzi refused to pick a Korean, and rolled the dice on all the remaining foreigners.

2) Someone on Complexity opened up the TLPD profiles, saw Snute's 41% ZvT win rate, and told Ganzi to pick him.

Honestly, we think that Ganzi's TvT is so beastly, and TvZ is so annoying, that he should have just taken a fellow Korean in Rain. But can you really call out a Korean for picking a foreigner out of pure principle? Recent progress says that the day is coming soon when all that will change, but not just yet.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: FnaticRC Rain

Symbol's ground-breaking, cold-blooded selection of his countryman Dream in last Arena's draft has opened the way for more Korean on Korean crime in the name of personal gain. It follows that GanZi should have no reservations about picking Rain and his recently lackluster TvT. Like PuMa, Ganzi is a very well rounded player who could pick anyone regardless of race. Looking through the rest of the field, there are a few other bad match-ups Ganzi could look to exploit, like Snute's ZvT, but in the end taking on Rain in a TvT seems marginally favorable.

#7: FnaticRC aLive

Player Pick: ESC.Daisy

aLive decided to be this tournament's Symbol, ruthlessly picking one of his countrymen to further his own chances at winning. Although, you must wonder if it's actually camaraderie that stops other Korean-Korean picks. Perhaps they are all making 100% rational choices, and they truly believe that most foreigners are just that bad.

In any case, it's a perfect choice for aLive and his strong TvP, and one he might have been expecting. Considering the preferred match-ups of the six players above him, it was unlikely that both foreign Protosses in Daisy (essentially a foreigner) and Welmu would already have been snapped up.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: EC.Welmu

aLive looked like he had been hit particularly hard by the Queen patch in the first few weeks following its introduction, but his more recent TvZ performances have looked a lot stronger. Even so, we're still a lot more impressed by his TvP, especially his late-game army control which could seriously be the best in the world. Good thing there's a foreign Protoss left on the board in our projection!

I can't conscientiously mention Welmu without pointing out his capacity for undermining himself and his team with his god-awful sense of humor, but he does happen to be a pretty good player on the side. Honestly, it's a marginal call between him and Daisy here, and it could probably go either way.

#8: Grubby

Player Pick: BLAST.Tefel

Fortuitously placed at #8, the cut-off line where foreigners in the draft dry up, Grubby managed to escape with a desirable pick in Tefel. Picking Rain, probably the weakest Korean in the pool, was also an option here, but Grubby instead opted to two-immortal all-in a European Zerg into oblivion. From what we can tell, it still works fairly well in Europe, so why not stick to it?

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: BLAST.roof

Roof isn't the ninth scariest player in this pool, but TvZ aversion and other match-up preferences see him survive this long to get picked up by Grubby in our mock draft. It's a minor windfall for Grubby at #8, but with eight Koreans and eight foreigners in the draft pool, he probably can expect to pick a foreigner in this position barring some crazy circumstances. In any case, Grubby can pick between Snute or Roof in this position. Both are good at ZvP, but Snute is a bit better, making Roof the appropriate pick.

#9: Liquid`HerO

Player Pick: Ai.Cytoplasm

It should be illegal to get such a windfall at #9. Somehow, the combination of four Euro-zergs in the draft pool, and a bunch of TvZ averse Terrans picking in the top eight means that HerO gets to play his best match-up versus one of the best possible opponents for him (only Sasquatch would clearly be a better pick). Yes, HerO got beat down by Stephano at NASL, but so did MC and Alicia. That's more indicative of Stephano being awesome at ZvP (and Bel'Shir and Dual Sight being awful maps) that the skill level of those three Protoss players. Cytoplasm has been running very hot lately, but this will be the toughest challenge he's had in months.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: GL.Snute

Congratulations HerO, there's still a foreign Zerg left in the pool at #9. Although, the last time he played a foreign Zerg, it didn't go so well...

#10: GoldenLight

Player Pick: TOP

Golden's best match-up is ZvT. TOP and Rain remain on the board. Golden picks TOP.

...What?

Rain and TOP are very similar in how they won GSL silvers and then went on to spend the rest of their careers being terrible compared to their peaks. Even so, wouldn't most people rate TOP at least slightly higher than Rain? Rain's silver came in GSL Open Season 3 (2010), when compared to now, people didn't even know how to play the game. At least TOP got his silver in GSL August (2011), when the quality of GSL games had risen past the "tolerable" line.

We've barely seen anything of TOP in 2012, and we're mostly going by his preliminaries results and inability to break through Code B to judge him. Unless Golden and Rain became fast friends on the international circuit or something like that, then this pick has some negative implications for TOP.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: TOP

You would think a former GSL finalist should go later in the draft, but TOP has almost literally done nothing since reaching Code S August finals ten months ago. We can only speculate as to reason for his precipitous decline following his 4 – 1 defeat to Mvp, but in any case, he's put things back together and made a minor comeback in the past few months with good performances in various online qualifiers.

It's not everything that he hoped for, but at #10, it's a pretty palatable pick for Golden. Leveraging ZvT is his best way out of the first round, and he'll be happy to take the long slumping veteran over a recent Code S player like Ryung.

#11: WW.SortOf

Player Pick: LG-IM First

Seeing as that First is really good, and that he's barely lost any PvZ in his short but colorful career after switching from BW to SC2, I can only interpret this pick by SortOf as incredibly brave and worthy of our applause, or just borderline suicidal.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: TSL_RevivaL

SortOf rolled kind of unexpectedly into this tournament on the back of strong ZvZ (wins over Nerchio x2, Haypro, and Roof) so his best option from the remaining draft pool of only Koreans is fairly obvious. It's either Losira, effectively LG-IM's Zerg ace in the face of Nestea's indifferent GSTL performances, or TSL's rotation player Revival. We picked the latter.

You might rate Revival a little lower than he deserves, considering that TSL recalled Polt and Inori to Korea to play in the GSTL semi-finals while Revival has been left to play in MLG. However, considering that TSL are already three deep at Zerg with Symbol, Shine, and Hyun, it's understandable that they'd give Revival a shot to earn a pool play seed at the Summer Championship.

#12: viOLet

Player Pick: FnaticRC Rain

Not much to say here, as the rest of the bracket kind of fills itself automatically. Preferring ZvT, viOLet was left with a choice between Rain and Ryung, and understandably, he took the guy who's not in Code S, and didn't recently beat DongRaeGu on the most Zerg favored map in the GSL.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: ESC.Daisy

The reigning Arena champion has a low pick at #12, but in this version of the draft, viOLet should have one player left that he can feel happy picking. Daisy looked good as he qualified for TSL4 over several Europeans, and if Golden and Sleep's performances in America are anything to go by, Daisy could be a regular fixture in the Euro scene for a while. But together in a pool with five recent GSL players, Daisy is definitely the easy choice for viOLet.

#13: Quantic.Illusion

Player Pick: TSL_RevivaL

With Ryung and Losira pretty clearly the best two players remaining and guaranteed to get pickd last, Illusion was left with an interesting choice between Revival and Dream. Both players are borderline Code A Koreans who have shown glimpses of brilliance, but don't have much semblance of consistency. Illusion hasn't had the best of luck against top players of either race, but it's odd to see him try his hand at the much hated TvZ.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: LG-IM First

Though this is just a mock draft, and a lot of things have to happen in a certain order for things to turn out this way, we're still fairly certain about the fearsome foursome Illusion will be picking from at #13: Ryung, Losira, Dream, and First. It's a tough position to be in for Illusion, trying to pick the least-bad of four terrible options.

Ryung is a recently Code S, TvT monster, so he's instantly out of the question. Losira is Zerg, so he's out by default as well. That leaves First and Dream. Dream was good but not great in his first tour of the international circuit, impressing against Terran and Protoss but behind held back by his TvZ like many others Terrans. First hasn't competed internationally yet, but he's kicking up a big cloud of dust as he stampedes through online qualifiers in Korea, picking up the legacy of the elephant that fOrGG has unfortunately failed to live up to. It's a close call, but First's lack of experience in dealing with jet lag and travel gives him the push ahead

#14: Liquid`TaeJa

Player Pick: MYM.MvP.Dream

Though TypeReal is the player who has the true last pick, Illusion had his own version of the last pick as well. There was no way TaeJa was picking Losira or Ryung, so he ended up taking the player between Revival/Dream that that Illusion decided to leave him.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: MYM.MvP.Dream

If Illusion takes First as we projected, then this is an easy choice for TaeJa. Losira's out because he's Zerg. Between Ryung and Dream, Dream is a far more desirable opponent. Ryung's been good at TvT since the same time last year, and he's consistently been one of the most intelligent players in the Terran mirror. Also, he was in Code S Ro16 just this season. Dream's good, but just not on that level.

#15: TypeReaL

Player Pick: LG-IMLosirA

#16: Liquid`Sheth

Pick: SlayerS_Ryung

We've made plenty of fun of Ryung over the months for his bad TvP record, but it was mostly due to the fact that he would constantly get all-in'd in every tournament game we saw. When we saw him get to the mid-late game, he was actually pretty damn good (TaeJa has picked up on his tradition). It's my belief that TypeReal still should have gone for three-gate void rays against Ryung, but if he wants to two-immortal rush Losira to death, then that's fine too!

As for Sheth, he's left with the BAMF award winner of this draft, Ryung. MLG's seeding went pretty well in this case with the #17 seed Ryung actually ending up in the #17 seed place. As the only consistent Code S player in the draft, he was the natural pick to go last. It's hard to tell whether this is good or bad for Sheth, as he gets the best match-up, but also against the most skilled player.

Pre-Draft Analysis
+ Show Spoiler [Pre-draft Analysis] +

TL's Pick: LG-IMLosirA

Whether it's because MLG's seeding system has improved, or just because of dumb luck, seeds #1 ~ 16 (the drafters) are actually better on the whole than #17 ~ 32 (the draftees). Compare that to the previous Spring Arena II, where the final six draft picks were Losira, Leenock, viOLet, HuK, MC, and Polt... The final two of Ryung and Losira isn't as scary as the previous final pair of Polt and MC, but we'll gladly sacrifice a more entertaining draft for brackets that make more sense.

One player among sixteen draftees must win the "scariest mofo" award, and it will fall to TypeReal, the Korean who's not really a 'Korean' in the Starcraft II sense, to decide which of his countrymen will receive that honor. Sheth, will have to live with Real's decision, further proving that Americans are destined to be shafted in esports.

On one hand, Real could seek to exploit Ryung's weak early game defenses in TvP. However, that's a hole Ryung has had months to seal up, and once he actually gets to play the mid-late game, he's a very scary fellow. After much deliberation, we've decided that ReaL should just take Losira, gear up to two-immortal all-in / DT all-in every game, and pray.

Writer: WaxAngel.
Graphics: Meko.
Moral Support: R1CH.