MST1 Grand Final: eStro vs Excello

Excello Yoon(Z) vs eStro Fancy(T)
Map: Blue Storm

The game begins with Yoon spawning at the top position and Fancy at the bottom. Right off the bat we get some bad omens in the form of unbelievable lag and chattering observers.

Yoon opens with a standard 12 hatch while Fancy does a standard FE as well. Fancy does some nice tricky move with starting a bunker at Yoon's natural to try and fake Yoon out into pulling drones, but the trick doesn't really work.

Yoon goes straight for lurker tech off of 2 bases and tries to use it to contain Fancy and expand, but Fancy responds quickly with tanks and science vessels. Yoon does a switch to mutas at this point and pulls off some impressive micro considering the huge amount of bnet lag going on, picking off 3 tanks and doing a super fast gosu irradiate-split before being driven out.

Fancy rolls out with a MnM force supported by several tanks and science vessels. A few skirmishes occur resulting in Yoon driving Fancy back, but only scoring some marine kills before backing off and repeating the cycle.

During one of Yoon's offensives Fancy drops two shuttle loads worth of MnM off in Yoon's defenseless natural causing the drones and hatchery to pop before Yoon can respond.

Yoon has switched to mostly hydras with a few lurkers and hive tech is nowhere in sight. A few more engagements happen in the center before Fancy crushes Yoon's forces and causes him to GG before a marine could even set foot on creep.

Excello 0 - 1 eStro, Fancy wins.

Excello JF(P) vs eStro Fancy(T)
Map: Othello

This game was truly epic and if you are reading this battle report before watching it I URGE you to check it out yourself. It was really a fantastic game.

Also a warning: this battle report turned out to be really fricken long, partly because it was an EPIC game, partly because I put perhaps too much detail into it. Whatever, enjoy it.

This game begins with JF at the bottom left and Fancy at the top left. The lag and obs chatter are gone, mostly, and both players open fairly standard with Fancy doing a FD build and JF a cautious 2gate robo into obs and reavers.

Fancy arrives outside JF's base with 6 marines, a tank, and a vulture, but backs out without real engagement when JF takes out the vulture. JF meanwhile builds up forces until his shuttle and reaver are out and then launches an offensive.

JF barrels into the front of Fancy's natural getting a tank snipe before the tanks siege and force him to pull back, meanwhile he drops a reaver and zealot in the main but loses the shuttle. These take out a tank and some SCVs before they are finally dispatched, the last scarab dudding unsatisfactorily next to a huge pile of SCVs.

JF produces several more reavers as he claims his expansion and tries to keep Fancy bottled up in his base. Fancy meanwhile plays along acting completely defensive. JF cuts off any vulture scouts and sets off to claim the bottom right base for himself.

The game enters a macro phase with JF on 3 bases and Fancy on two. Fancy decides to push out just enough to claim his third and is delayed by JF's reaver micro before securing the perimeter.

JF claims the natural of 5 o'clock and continues macroing zealots and goons, meanwhile Fancy is looking like he is about to max out on tanks and vultures. Fancy also has both armories pumping upgrades, already at 2-1.

JF claims 6 o'clock as Fancy begins to push out. Fancy pushes down toward JF's main while JF decides to counter heading up toward 12. Fancy enters JF's natural just as JF begins to encroach on Fancy's third via the 12 o'clock base forcing Fancy to pull back.

JF retreats and is able to take out the left-behinds before they take out 6 (the nexus being left alive at 1 HP!), but his natural's nexus is destroyed. Fancy rears around and pushes again and finally the forces engage. JF is able to deal a lot of damage with some fantastic storms, but pulls back to replenish his zealot count.

JF looks like he is getting pinned into the bottom right as fancy pushes forward, but JF launches a strong offensive force complemented by a flank of reinforcements from his main and more excellent storms. Fancy's push is completely destroyed.

Fancy is already rolling out with another force which JF engages. JF is now being complemented with arbiter tech and uses stasis for good effect forcing Fancy has to pull back.. until he meets up with the next wave of reinforcements and sends JF running.

Meanwhile Fancy is constructing 3 command centers at the top right of the map in the main, natural, and 3rd. JF has also taken the 3rd of bottom right and bottom left. Aside from 12 and 9 every base on the map is being claimed with a clean top/bottom split between Fancy and JF.

JF maneuvers his forces around the bottom half of the map while Fancy sets up a siege line going across the center. In a nice flank attack JF engages the Terran forces from both sides supported by a decent stasis and some fantastic psi storms. JF carves a deep wound into the tank line but decides to back off once his zealot force is depleted.

Fancy continues macroing and re-securing his line across the center as JF decides to take the game into his own hands with a recall into Fancy's main. Immediately following the recall he casts a beautiful stasis on the ramp blocking out all of Fancy's forces. The dragoons manage to take out the armories, CC, and a good number of supply depots but no factories are touched and Fancy is already at 3-2 making the armory losses sting quite a bit less.

While this distracting is going on JF launches a sneaky assault up the right side of the map and manages to snipe the CC of the top right 3rd before being forced out by Fancy's tanks. Just as he is retreating from one side he is launching a small force to assault 9 which Fancy has just finished a CC at. The CC survives only by floating away as Fancy hurries some tanks and vultures to deal with JF's forces.

JF is still somehow in Fancy's main at this point, but not for long as Fancy finally cleans the dragoons up. But by this point the arbiter has regenerated a good amount of mana and another recall from the same arbiter goes off bringing a second arbiter which casts a 3rd recall. Unfortunately for JF he does not manage to take out any factories before his forces are cleaned up leaving the drop fairly unsuccessful and mainly as a distraction.

Luckily the distraction does allow him to push his forces up the right side and into the top right's natural. Fancy is responding quickly so JF focuses on killing as many SCVs as possible before the siege tanks roll in and reduce the offensive to a blue soup.

JF meanwhile presses up for another attack on 9, really doing a fantastic job of keeping Fancy on his toes, and denies the 9 o'clock expansion from Fancy once again before being driven back.

Fancy decides he needs to go on the offensive and begins pushing in on JF's base at the bottom left 3rd, forcing an engagement with JF. The two armies clash and JF throws down two amazing stasis fields freezing up 10 of Fancy's tanks and forcing him to back off.

But only temporarily as Fancy starts pushing back with his reinforcements attempting to save his frozen troops. JF clashes directly with him and looks like he is going to crush the forces when the frozen tanks thaw and JF finds himself being shelled from behind. JF engages these with his remaining forces and some fresh reinforcements and is able to mop them up, but not before taking heavy casualties.

Both players regroup before JF decides to launch an offensive up the right side of the map. He is able to drive back Fancy's forces a short distance before being forced to back off by reinforcements. Both forces back off and regroup. At this point Fancy has 3 bases mining and JF has 4, although it is clear JF has consumed more minerals overall at this point.

JF leads the next offensive, again up the right side of the map and slams into Fancy's forces. Both sides lose basically their entire force, with Fancy winning the battle by the thin advantage of just 1 damaged tank and a vulture.

Both players return to gathering up their forces as Fancy puts a CC down at the top right 3rd once again. JF again is the aggressor and pushes up the center and toward Fancy's main with a large goon/zealot force. The forces trade zealots and vultures before JF backs off losing a few goons in exchange for a few tanks and science vessel snipes.

Fancy is quick to return with a push down the right-middle part of the map. JF tries to engage before the force reaches any bases, but he quickly find himself with just dragoons against tanks and is forced to back off before too many turn into blue goo.

Fancy sets up siege on JF's bottom right 3rd while JF hurries troops across from the left side of the map. These arrive in time to save the nexus and JF is able to pull off a nice flank and crush the push once again.

JF continues up the center, but is quickly repelled by some new tanks and vultures Fancy has massed up. The game calms down for a few moments before Fancy tries to reclaim 9 once again at the same time that JF sends a probe over to drop a pylon beside it. Both players send their troops directly toward the location for a showdown.

JF's troops arrive first and send the CC running so Fancy drops south toward JF's bottom right 3rd. The two sides clash with a few nice stasis fields going off before the EMPs are able to deplete the arbiter's energy. JF totally crushes the offensive and tries to set up beside the frozen units.

The game enters a lull as both players focus on macroing up again. Fancy is looking like he is going to be running into economic trouble soon, but so does JF as the map becomes dangerously close to being fully mined out.

Fancy waits until he is maxed and launches another push on JF's bottom left 3rd. This time it appears he was able to out-macro JF as he wins the battle easily due to superior numbers and sends JF running.

Fancy is able to take out that base and continues pushing in as JF repeatedly engages and retreats to try and do as much damage as he can with his inferior troop count.

Meanwhile JF's 3 o'clock base has been mined out so JF decides to send his probes in for an assault on Fancy's top-right 3rd. This actually takes out a fair number of SCVs before it is mopped up by some of Fancy's forces.

Fancy pulls back confident in the knowledge that JF is completely mined out now. JF knows this too and launches a final assault up the right side of the map. Unfortunately he simply does not have Fancy's troop count and is forced to GG.

At the end of an amazing epic game, JF simply exhausted all his resources a little faster then Fancy and was forced to concede.

Excello 0 - 2 eStro, Fancy wins.

Excello Nony(P) vs eStro Fancy(T)
Map: Blue Storm

Again, if you are jumping directly into the battle report I implore you: Watch this game. The last game was epic and constantly exciting in every way and this one is no different. It is really worth watching!

Back to Blue Storm with Nony on the bottom and Fancy on the top. It is worth noting that at this point Fancy has to be physically exhausted having just finished an incredible 47 minute epic game against JF. Now he is up against Excello's other big name Protoss on his self-proclaimed favorite map.

Fancy goes for a fast expansion and so does Nony. Nony claims a quick 3rd and adds some reaver tech to go on an offensive. The offensive is fairly successful scoring two tank kills and about 5 SCVs before being destroyed. Meanwhile Nony is already grabbing a 4th base and laying the groundwork for a macro game with a lot of gateways.

The map is carved down the center as Nony does not try to breach the tank line instead claiming 12 o'clock, really early. Both players build up and Fancy puts a 4th base down at bottom right trying to keep up with Nony's economy.

Nony launches a push down the center and nearly breaks into Fancy's mineral only, but does not send any reinforcements and eventually fizzles out. Fancy is now in macro mode as he throws down more factories and pumps tanks and vultures at an alarming rate.

The game enters a phase that is best described as 'recall mania'. Nony begins with a recall into Fancy's main which succeeds at taking out the armories and a few factories. This is followed by a recall to the newly build expansion at 6 which totally demolishes it. Nony endears himself to me forever by recalling his trapped troops out rather than letting them die.

The recalls continue with attacks on Fancy's natural and his bottom right expansion. Some of the zealots from the latter even manage to run up to the mineral only killing a fair number of SCVs. 6 is recalled on several more times, constantly denying Fancy of it's valuable resources.

Fancy finally decides he needs to go on the offensive and pushes down the center. He slices Nony's forces off from 12 and begins laying siege to it. Nony responds with another pair or recalls at 6 and bottom right forcing Fancy to pull the majority of his forces back for defense and giving Nony a window to reclaim control of 12.

At this point Nony has mined out all except for top-left and 12 and is distance-mining 12 o'clock. Fancy on the other hand has still not been able to touch 6 and has resources coming in from bottom-right and his mineral only.

He pushes down the center again and Nony engages, but is forced to back off due to Fancy's superior numbers and upgrades. He responds with another recall on 6 to shut it down once again and pull Fancy's troops away from 12.

Fancy launches a push back at 12 and manages to take it out once again. Nony is totally mined out and is starting to produce primarily high templar as he prepares to get as much value out of every mineral he can.

Fancy pulls his troops down towards 6 hoping to finally establish mining there and end the game by virtue of having all the remaining resources on the map when Nony pulls off the game-changing move.

Nony flies in his arbiters and chain-recalls his entire forces directly on top of Fancy's moving army. The screen is completely filled with storms on both sides of Nony's ball wrecking havoc on Fancy's troops. Nony entered the battle with inferior numbers and lower upgrades. When the dust settles Nony has about a half dozen dragoons alive.

These walk down to 6 and shut it down again and then start heading toward the bottom left, Fancy's only mining expansion. Fancy throws a tank in their path which they crush and Fancy concedes the game, probably not realizing those were likely the last 6 dragoons Nony could have afforded to produce.

An incredible game that literally came down to very wire with the entire map being mined out.

Excello 1 - 2 eStro
Nony wins.

Excello Nony(P) vs eStro Melon(Z)
Map: Blue Storm

The game begins with Nony on the bottom against Melon on the top. Nony starts with a standard forge first FE while Melon 9pools.

Melon switches into expansion mode quickly claiming his mineral only and his natural (after dealing with a pylon Nony dropped to slow the hatchery placement down). Nony in the meantime teching to corsairs and DTs.

Melon keeps dropping hatcheries, adding a second to his mineral only and one at the bottom right base as he rolls out a force of hydras and lurkers to contain Nony. Nony's DT harass is ineffective and he has a little trouble breaking the lurker container giving Melon time to get his economy going in a beastly manner.

Nony finally breaks out and launches an offensive, but Melon is just reaching Hive tech, has 4 fully saturated bases, and about 6 hatcheries now pumping cracklings. Nony is not able to push into Melon's base and do any real damage.

While Nony tries to make an inroad Melon loads up a doom drop of cracklings which he delivers directly into the heart of Nony's main. These go completely unopposed for a long while and rip apart all of Nony's gateways and tech.

The rest of the game is Nony struggling to hold on, but Melon's production is beyond opposition. He falls shortly to a huge force of cracklings, ultras, and dark swarm.

Excello 1 - 3 eStro
Melon wins.

Excello Nony(P) vs eStro Melon(Z)
Map: Othello

So this is pretty much just a show game since eStro has already won and Oldy is not available to play. Nony spawns in the bottom left and Melon in the top left. Again Melon opens 9pool and Nony opens forge-first FE. This time however Melon is getting some quick gas for speed upgrade.

Melon makes a break for a run-by, but only manages to get 2 zerglings in which annoy the crap out of Nony without doing a lot of damage. Nony gets his single corsair and DT out which get a good look at what Melon is up to.

Melon grabs his 3rd and shortly after the 12 o'clock mineral only as he sends down a hydra/lurker/ling/scourge force to sit outside Nony's natural and contain him. Nony's base layout seems to be helping him, since there is no way for Nony to get his troops out of his natural. Nony finally decides to kill his own forge to make a path, but the forge appears to be upgrading while he does this (neither the obs nor Diggity got a look at if the upgrade finished before the forge was destroyed..)

Nony is able to force his way out and heads toward 12 while setting up his 3rd base. 12 already has several lurkers and sunkens when he arrives though, so he backs off to respond to a zergling force Melon has sent to squash his 3rd. His 3rd survives he postures around the map looking for a weak spot, but not able to do any damage into Melon's base.

Melon engages Nony's forces and pushes them away to the right side of the map while Nony sets up a 4th at his 6 o'clock mineral only. Melon sends some forces down to crush it, but Nony is able to hold it fairly easily.

Both players continue to build up their forces with Melon sending small parties around to keep Nony on his toes while he claims the top right natural. Melon hits hive tech and begins to apply some pressure with cracklings ripping up Nony's dragoon heavy army.

Nony is forced back in fight after fight, unable to keep enough storm or zealots out on the field to deal with the crackings and dark swarm. Melon bears down on Nony's 6 o'clock base while he drops some lurkers on the cliff overlooking Nony's 3rd and his natural.

Nony has trouble responding to this lurker harassment and begins to crumble as his army struggles to hold onto his 3rd against the never ending stream of zerg units. The 3rd falls and and Nony makes his last stand at his natural. Finally he GGs as the last of his troops are torn to sheds by a horde of angry cracklings.

Excello 1 - 4 eStro
Melon Wins.