Since Hg won the winner's bracket, he recieved a 1 game lead in this best-of-5 series. Game 1 turned out to be an epic and controversial PvT battle on Temple that will go down in Teamliquid.net replay section history. It was a Draw.
Game 2:
Map: Lost temple
Nazgul: Protoss, Hellghost: Random Protoss
The Game: Naz warped in at 6 o'clock, and Hg at 9 o'clock. Naz, not knowing Hg's race did a standard 2 gate rush build versus random, while Hg did a tech build. Early game consisted of Nazgul rushing and Hg frantically attempting to keep his probes alive from Naz's stealthy zealot onslaught. Hellghost survived the rush with minimal damage. Both players micro'd and macro'd very well in this action-packed game. But in the end, Naz came out victorious.
1-1-1
Game 3:
Map: Neo Forbidden Zone (Hg's pick)
Nazgul: Protoss, Hellghost: Terran
The Game: Naz warped in at 7 o'clock, while Hg started at 5 o'clock. Both players started out with defensive builds. Hg did a fairly early safe expand while Naz did two gates outside of his main and an expand soon after. When Hg massed up a big army and attacked, Naz was on the edge. Hellghost seiged up near Naz's natural and both armies were reduced to minimal numbers after the first battle. Hg kept sending units while Naz kept pumping units out of a bunch of gateways.
Eventually with the use of shuttles, Naz fended off the attack. After that the game was macro intensive with many small battles and attacks on expansions here and there. Hg stuck to the ground while naz used ground units and many shuttles. In the end Naz had grabbed too many expansions for Hg to handle, and overwhelmed Hg's forces.
2-1-1 in Naz's favor.
Game 4:
Map: Lost Temple (Hg's pick)
Nazgul: Protoss, Hg: Random Terran
The Game: Hellghost knew he was on the ropes. It was do or die this game. One's best guess would be that he picked Temple and prayed to God he got ZvP on good positions, or TvP on 3v12, as he had been outclassed so far in the match. Alas, Hellghost started at 6 o'clock with Terran, and Nazgul at 12 o'clock with Protoss. Those positions are without a doubt the hardest for Terran to win versus Protoss on Lost Temple. Hellghost used the same build he had been using all tourney for TvP on temple; Fast Expand. Naz went with 1 gate gas tech this game. Hg managed to get his scouting SCV into Naz's base early and found the 1 gate tech with a citadel warping in. Hg begun to make an academy. Just after the SCV died to a dragoon, Naz cancelled the citadel and early expanded. Naz's guile had worked perfectly. Naz was able to expand twice, while Hg was scared and made some turrets along with his scan. After some building up, Hg came to attack but was crushed by Naz's immense army of zealots and dragoons. After that Naz was able to grab more expands, and power like a mofo. Hg tried to take the isle with turrets all around, but was stopped short by a multi-shuttle drop on the island. After that it was just pure domination by Naz. Hg made some more attacks in vein, but was squashed every time.
With a final score of 3-1-1 (dominating the finals 3-0-1 but we must give Hg his credit for winning the winners bracket), Naz wins the TL.net tournament. He may have had a few shakey losses in group play and in the 8 man tourney, but when elimination was on the line, he played with great skill and resolve, and NEVER gave up.
Congrats and thanks to Naz for setting up and winning his own tournament . Congrats to Hellghost for his stellar performance with all 3 races throughout the tournament and earning 2nd place.
Poll:
42% of you (310) thought Hellghost would win. Well he was 2nd place among 16 great players, only behind to Nazgul, so thats a very impressive performance.
33% of you (243) thought Naz would win. Yay, you were right.
25% of you (186) thought Daaman would win it all. Daaman went flawless until the winners bracket finals, beating many of your favorite players (including Elky 2-0). But finally met his match versus Hg and Naz. Nevertheless, 3rd place is solid.
Thanks to Naz, Nash[pG] for helping run it, all the players, and all the interested fans for a great tournament.