EPT
The final conclusion to the longest OSL tournament in history is now upon us. Chojja, the red hot, old-school Zerg that has been tearing it up over the past couple months vs. Casy, the maturing Terran dynamo that narrowly missed out last season.
Game 1 - Rush Hour
Chojja spawned at 3 and Casy at 11. Chojja opened with a standard 11 hatch at his natural while Casy 2 raxed in his main. Casy tried to poke around at the Zerg natural with his first handful of rines, but was stopped by sunkens. Once his first academy units walked out he poked around again, accomplishing nothing but clumsily losing a marine to sunken fire, and returned to his own natural to protect the CC being built there.
Casy made the first aggressive move, sending a tiny infantry group down the left side of the map to attack Chojja’s freshly hatched expansion at the 5 o’clock gas expo. He killed all of the drones and nearly got the hatchery too, but Chojja was able to make the save with a group of lurkers.
Casy built up his tech as his economy kicked in, but was caught off guard by Chojja’s very savvy (and lame...LAME!) use of hold-position lurkers in the lower-center of the map. Chojja scored a huge number of infantry kills, but Casy was able to eventually kill the three hidden lurkers and cut his loses somewhat. He then continued on to the 5 o’clock Zerg expansion and killed it, but not before Chojja could transfer all the drones to his new expo at the 7 o’clock main.
Chojja was now enjoying the luxuries of hive tech and morphed his group of mutalisks (which, surprisingly, had done virtually no harassing as they surveyed the map) into guardians. Casy tried to attack Chojja’s natural with a modest MnM/Tank force, but was completely annihilated by guardian/ling. Things were not looking good for Casy as the guardians made their way toward the Terran natural, as Casy’s drop attempt at the 7 o’clock main was stopped cold.
Casy continued to try and take the fight to his Zerg opponent, but outside of a minor victory in catching the guardian force out of position to kill it off, he was getting worked by hydra/ling counters under darkswarm. Casy dropped again, this time in Chojja’s main, but only got a single hatchery kill for his trouble before his forces were brought down by hydra/ling once again.
Chojja allowed Casy to take the upper right hand gas expo in order to minimize the threat of a counter attack and built up his forces. When he finally attacked it, Casy countered and took out one of his new expos in the lower left. It didn’t really matter though, as Chojja currently held the 7 o’clock main and the gas expo in the lower right.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/game1.JPG)
Chojja's perfect plague execution neautralizes Casy's infantry.
Casy then tried to take the min only directly below his main and did so successfully for a minute or two before Chojja plagued his last infantry group and then attacked with everything he had.
Chojja > Casy
Chojja made great use of dark swarm and played a pretty cool, micro intensive style that involved lots of spell casting and minimal macroing. Other than his hold-position lurker lameness, this was a very unique and well played game on Chojja’s part. He controlled Casy the entire time.
Game 2 - Cultivation Period
Chojja (3) 9 pooled with a fast ling speed upgrade while Casy (12) stuck with a standard 2 rax in his main once again. Chojja was very aggressive early on but mucked up his micro a little as he lost 3 lings to get an SCV kill. Chojja then expanded to his natural as Casy secured the entrance to his main with an SCV/rine wall.
As Casy took his gas and added to his rine numbers, Chojja was building up a large ling force, producing no drones at all at his nat! He then stacked up 5 drones and drilled the Terran entrance with all the lings. Casy and Chojja traded forces, but in the end Casy came out on top, with 3 rines remaining when the dust settled.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/game2.JPG)
Chojja uses a drone drill to break through Casy's SCV wall.
Casy quickly countered with an infantry attack at Chojja’s nat and had to settle for running past the sunkens to harass Chojja’s main mineral line. Chojja cleared out the intruders with lings quite quickly and built his sunken line up. Casy attacked again, this time attempting to take out the wall, but was deflected as Chojja’s 2 new sunkens morphed just in the nick of time.
Chojja worked on getting his lurker tech going while Casy teched up. Chojja broke through the neutral buildings on the left side of Casy’s base and made a huge ling/lurk attack through the opening and the main entrance just as Casy dropped the Zerg main with 2 dropships. Chojja’s forces were killed under tank and rine fire and his main was now full of enemy infantry.
Casy > Chojja
Casy played smart and defensively, absorbing all of Chojja’s attacks effectively. It seemed his whole game was geared toward that big drop, which needed to take place at an opportune time. Chojja certainly gave it to him.
Game 3 - Peaks of Baekdu
Chojja 9 pooled with gas at the top main while Casy walled the entrance of his bottom main to tech quickly to academy. Chojja took his natural and teched to lair as he forced some wandering marines back home.
Casy hid his growing infantry force within his main, but Chojja wasn’t going to be fooled that easily. He had 4 sunkens up in time to stop the advancing troops. Casy ran his infantry around the left most path and headed toward the high ground above Chojja’s main mineral line as Chojja brought a large ling/lurk force around the same path on the bottom right, toward Casy’s main mineral line. Casy put on a marine micro clinic as he killed off Chojja’s entire attack force and the few defending lurks on the Zerg high ground. He was completely in control now and continued to pump infantry as he expanded to his natural.
Casy then attacked the upper left hand expansion and killed it exclusively with infantry despite the fact that it was defended by a steady stream of lurkers. He followed that up with a drop on Chojja’s center expansion.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/game3fight.JPG)
Casy's infantry seems immune to lurker spines as he tramples Chojja's expansion.
Chojja was reeling and had only one shot left. He gathered all of the ling/lurk he could muster and attacked through the high ground entrance of Casy’s main. Chojja easily took control of the high ground and forced Casy’s SCVs off of the mineral line. He was only able to control the area for a short time though as Casy slaughtered all of his forces with infantry.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/side.JPG)
Chojja's fellow Pro Zerg players sit in disgust as they watch him fall helplessly to MnM groups...IMBAL!
Casy’s dropship was now in Chojja’s main, but with some stylish ling/lurk work, Chojja was able to neutralize the situation before any major damage was done.
But it was all for nothing. Casy had tons of economy and Chojja had lost his steam. One more half hearted attack on Casy’s new expansion in the middle and a counter attack from the Terran was all it took to end it.
Casy > Chojja
Casy doesn’t even need tanks to kill lurkers. This kid is good.
Game 4 - 815
Casy (7) opened with a one rax tech build and expanded to his natural once he had some academy units out. Chojja (1) used a 12 hatch expansion build and teched to lurkers. As Casy secured his natural with a bunker, Chojja took his first 2 lurkers and a group of lings and tried to create a containment around the Terran natural. Unfortunately, Chojja got a little too close and immediately lost a lurker and all his lings to Casy’s infantry group. The one remaining lurker scurried back home and out of danger.
With a nice early battle win under his belt, Casy gathered up a little more MnM and set off to survey the middle of the map. In typical lame-o fashion, Chojja planted 2 hold-position lurkers on the path toward his natural and waited for his opportunity to steal marine kills when his unsuspecting opponent wandered toward them. There was one thing Chojja didn’t count on, however... completely blind, dumb, horseshoe toting... LUCK! Casy randomly scanned the area directly over Chojja’s lurkers (obviously looking for opposing army position) and quickly ran his warriors in to get the easy kills. Without a single unit loss, Casy took out both lurkers and continued forward before he was deflected at the Zerg natural by more ling/lurk.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/game4fight.JPG)
Hold-position lurkers are ambushed by marines! Oh, the irony!
Casy returned to his own natural and loaded up a dropship, which headed toward the 11 o’clock main and cleared out all the drones at the fresh expansion before his Zerg opponent was able to scare him off with lings.
Casy was moving through the center of the map now and commanded a strong MnM/tank force. He killed lurkers and lings as he powered toward the Zerg natural. Chojja made one last attempt to stop the Terran advances with a wave of ling/lurk, but it was easily stopped. Casy ran over the Zerg natural and on to victory.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/game4fight2.JPG)
Casy rolls over Chojja without any difficulty.
Casy > Chojja
This was a combination of good fortune and incredible marine micro. Casy certainly lived up to his name as he fought lurkers exclusively with infantry throughout the early game, but I’m sure no one will dispute that the 3 lurker kills he took away for free helped a lot.
Casy wins 3-1!
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/casyhappy.JPG)
Casy shows reserved happiness as he takes in victory.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/chojjasad.JPG)
Failure hits Chojja like a brick in the face once he realizes his OSL journey is over...without the title to show for it.
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/casythrown.JPG)
Casy's teammates throw him in the air in celebration, but what goes up...
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/ManaBlue/Shinhan_OSL_Finals/casydropped.JPG)
...must come down!
Well that’s it for this OSL. Big thanks go to:
-Mani for getting me involved
-jkillashark for running his incredible OSL summary topic
-Octopuss for helping out with the reporting during a time of great need
-Live2Win and hasuprotoss for uploading all of the VODs that I’ve been basing these reports on all season
-The whole TL.net staff for being so helpful as I got my feet wet writing these things
(especially Saro <3 )
And most of all, all of you that read and comment on the games. This is the best SC community in the world for a reason.
I’ll be sure to keep the news page posted with updates as the duel leagues end and the tournament gears back up.
Until then, cheers
