EPT![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/battlereport5.jpg)
Skyhigh walls off at ten o'clock and Best warps in at seven, placing a nexus at his mineral-only when he reaches twelve supply. Once Skyhigh completes his first supply depot, he uses the SCV to mine out the zero-minerals at his backdoor, and then he scouts toward three o'clock. After making his gateway at fourteen supply, Best scouts in the correct direction, but is blocked by Skyhigh's wall.
Skyhigh chooses to first expand to his mineral-only. Then he makes a tank and seige expands into his natural. At thirty-two supply, Skyhigh kills Best's scouting probe and then drops his command center into his natural.
Best responds by moving out with four dragoons to test the waters at Skyhigh's natural, but the seiged tanks force him back. Knowing now that Skyhigh has taken his natural, Best follows by warping in a nexus at his own natural while he techs toward reaver.
Best loads two zealots and a reaver into his shuttle and moves twelve dragoons into the middle of the map. When Best's shuttle runs into turret fire at Skyhigh's mineral-only, he drops his reaver and fires a scarab at the turret. The reaver absorbs one tank volley so Best picks his reaver-- Skyhigh repairs his turret. Best then drops a zealot onto one of Skyhigh's two localized tanks, then fires a scarab at the other one. Skyhigh unseiges and micro's away from the reaver and zealot, but another scarab destroys one of the tanks. While Skyhigh micros against the first zealot (killing it off-screen), a flanking tank expires due to coordinated attacks from the other zealot and the reaver.
Best uses this opportunity to run into Skyhigh's natural with eight dragoons, but Skyhigh has excellent tank and building placement and uses an SCV to block the dragoons from targeting the tanks. Best loses two dragoons and then retreats to concentrate on his reaver harass. Despite this extra concentration, the harass is surprisingly ineffective, and very few SCVs die.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes1_1.jpg)
Denied.
Two goliaths arrive and finish off the reaver and shuttle. Since he only lost four scvs to the exchange, Skyhigh is in good condition to continue. Best has also made use of the time, expanding to five o'clock.
Skyhigh sneaks three vultures down to five and discovers the expansion attempt. He lays a few mines and attacks the warping cannon, forcing a cancel. Best sends an observer and ten dragoons to clean up the vultures, giving Skyhigh the opportunity to attempt a raid on Best's natural with five vultures. Best spots the vultures as they leave Skyhigh's natural and sends four of the dragoons at five o'clock back to support his natural. Skyhigh's vultures lay down some mines (killing two of Best's dragoons) and catching Best's probes mid-transfer, but dragoons are too close-by so the vultures are forced to retreat after managing minimal probe kills.
In preperation for late-game, Best begins teching toward arbiters. Skyhigh also prepares for late-game as he completes his ninth factory (two with machine shops).
With eightteen tanks and twenty-four Vultures, Skyhigh begins his push, but he barely gets out of his natural before Best attacks with nineteen dragoons, twelve zealots and a shuttle filled with four more zealots. Because of Skyhigh's heavy vulture presence, the drops do next to no damage, and Skyhigh proves to have more than enough vultures to kill the rest of Best's zealots as they charge in. Best retreats to save his dragoons and Skyhigh continues his push.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes1_2.jpg)
TvPgasm!
As Skyhigh reaches his own backdoor, Best launches another assault with his dragoons, but his fresh control group of zealots arrive late and he's forced to regroup after he loses two dragoons. Skyhigh repositions his tanks, lays down mines and expands to one o'clock. For his part, Best macros up fourty-two zealots, an arbiter, and expands to the three o'clock main. As Skyhigh approaches Best's natural, though, Best's had enough and attacks the terran army.
With fourty-four Vultures acting as a buffer for his tanks, and plenty of scans saved up, Skyhigh absorbs the attack in stride. Best casts stasis on four tanks, but seven tanks and a couple dozen vultures remain free. As Best's zealots vanish, his dragoons pick up the slack and reduce the terran army to the stasised tanks and a handful of reinforcing vultures. Skyhigh rushes forward and lays several mines, a couple of which hit their targets.
As more tanks and vultures arrive, Best's initial force is cleaned up, but Best still has a fresh production round to use and he moves out with an arbiter, two zealots two high-templar and seven dragoons. Skyhigh quickly prevents the force from moving by laying over a dozen mines and while Best is cleaning up the mines, Skyhigh moves towards five o'clock with seven tanks and a control group of vultures. Skyhigh places mines behind Best's backdoor, and then makes his move.
Best reacts immediately, but declines to take any observers with his army, and the zealots in the army are torn to shreds on their way toward five o'clock. With very few zealots to absorb tank fire, Best loses a number of dragoons attempting to cross the bridge and clean up the terran expedition. Meanwhile, Skyhigh sends a dozen vultures toward three o'clock and meets up with Best's probe transfer along the way. The probes are all lost.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes1_3.jpg)
Like finding a five dollar bill on the ground when you're short a nickle for cab fair...
Back at five o'clock, Best casts stasis on three tanks, but Skyhigh's last tank manages to finish off the nexus before Best can prevent its destruction. When Best sends his army toward three o'clock in reaction to the vultures there, several mines go off, killing his high templar and a few other stray units. Skyhigh moves out with another control group of Vultures to lay more mines and intercept the probes returning cargo from the recently destroyed five o'clock.
Skyhigh reinforces the vultures in the middle of the map with four tanks, and when Best moves out with his next production round of dragoons, they walk into tank fire, taking heavy damage and six die.
Feeling the advantage he's developed, Skyhigh continues the pressure chasing the four remaining dragoons back into Best's natural, killing them with vulture fire before they can make it back into the protection of their base. Best does what he can to refocus his army from three and five o'clock back towards his natural, but although he gets off a nice stasis, vultures and mines delay the refocus and Skyhigh's vultures are able to distribute massive damage within Best's natural. Eventually Best is able to remove the threat, but not before his economy is left in shambles.
In an attempt to remove the focus from himself, Best sends a dark templar to Skyhigh's expansion at one o'clock, but Skyhigh notices it quickly and sends two vultures to deal with the problem. Then Skyhigh sends the rest of his army to three o'clock to eliminate Best's only fully functional base.
Best has two dark templar at the three o'clock base, and they successfully kill the vultures, with the helpful assist of some mine splash damage.
Best then recalls four dragoons and two zealots to one o'clock. Skyhigh reacts very quickly, however, sending eight vultures, four goliaths and a three tanks to the expansion. Best micros the dragoons behind the mineral line, but that does little to prevent their deaths.
Skyhigh seems to have had enough of this and counters Best's natural cornering and killing most of Best's dragoons. Half of the terran's force is finally stasised, but Skyhigh still has more units, which he sends to the undefended three o'clock. Knowing he can not continue without the resources from three o'clock, Best types out.
+ Show Spoiler [Key Moments] +
Skyhigh's choice of massive vultures and mines to deal with the arbiter threat turned out to be very effective. Best was short on observers for most of the game and the vultures were constantly finding holes in Best's defense.
Skyhigh opens at two o'clock and Best at eight. They both open with standard builds, scouting later than last game (Best with his zealot, Skyhigh after beginning his refinery). Skyhigh blocks his ramp with an SCV and two marines, preventing the zealot from doing any scouting.
Once his scouting SCV is eliminated, Skyhigh FDs with five marines and one tank. Not interested in pressing too hard, Skyhigh takes his high-ground, and then runs his vulture around the east side of the map and into Best's position.
Best decides on going for an early reaver. Skyhigh, for his part, places many mines around the map, mostly on ramps and chokes. Once his reaver completes, Best sends his shuttle north, flying over several mines. When the reaver is dropped west of Skyhigh's natural, it is immediately hit with a tank shot. Discouraged, Best picks it up and moves off, expanding to five o'clock while teching to arbiters.
Skyhigh continues to scout with vultures and planting mines. And Best spends his time clearing them with an observer and four dragoons.
Skyhigh finally settles on building up to a five factory hard-push, placing turrets on the way towards Best's five o'clock base. Best weakens the push by zealot-bombing one tank as the turrets are being built, but he doesn't rush right into the terran mass. Neither player is feeling particularly impatient, and the hard-push continues until Skyhigh notices that the high-ground in front of Best's natural only has five dragoons guarding it. He sends a control group of vultures at Best's natural, laying mines on the way to slow the dragoons, but is rebuffed when he discovers that Best has twelve zealots and two dragoons sitting in wait. Skyhigh retreats immediately.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes2_1.jpg)
A good idea, but Best is prepared.
Best's first arbiter warps in before Skyhigh's academy has completed but Best, still not feeling impatient, doesn't realize this and fails to capitalize on the advantage. When Skyhigh's scanners complete, he scans five o'clock, spotting Best's army, and switches gears to attack Best's natural.
As Skyhigh seiges on Best's highground, best drops a zealot into the tanks, taking out two. When Skyhigh moves onto lowground, Best casts stasis on three tanks and attacks. With seventeen dragoons and twenty-two zealots, all the non-stasised tanks are quickly destroyed, and Best's reaver kills the vultures in large clumps (ending the fight with twenty-one kills), decimating Skyhigh's army.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes2_2.jpg)
A good stasis, but the reaver shots were even better.
After the fight, Skyhigh expands to twelve o'clock, and Best expands to six. Lacking tanks, Skyhigh thinks better of pressuring Best, and Best for his part uses the time to patiently clear mines and scout with his shuttle. The two roaming armies meet briefly at three o'clock, but Skyhigh lacks a strong tank presence and Best stasises a clump of vultures and goliaths, making the tanks easy pickings. Best then drops his reaver at twelve o'clock, but skyhigh reacts very quickly and only one SCV is killed.
Meanwhile, Skyhigh attacks six o'clock with four tanks and eight vultures. Best attacks the task force from all three sides, casting stasis on two tanks and two vultures, and easily removing the threat.
Best picks up his reaver and places it on the high ground above the ramp at twelve o'clock. No longer able to see the reaver on the mini-map, Skyhigh sends his SCVs back to twelve o'clock, where they become easy pickings for the reaver. Skyhigh GGs and Best's reaver ends the game with twenty-nine kills.
+ Show Spoiler [Key Moments] +
The damage Best's reaver did was not insignificant. Even before the SCVs it killed at the end of the game, it's most effective purpose was taking out Skyhigh's deadly vultures, completely dismantling a very dangerous push.
Skyhigh's command center lands at five o'clock and Best warps in at eleven. Up to something, Best sends his fifth probe down to place a proxy gateway inside Skyhigh's natural. After placing the gateway, Best steals Skyhigh's gas. Suspecting that something's up, Skyhigh scouts the proxy and sends seven SCVs to destroy it. Spamming the attack command to destroy the gateway, no zealots make it out of the gateway in time, but Best isn't done hassling the CJ terran and manner pylons, trapping three SCVs. Having bought enough time to finish a pylon and gateway at his own base, Best cancels the pylon as it completes and hides his probe behind Skyhigh's natural minerals, waiting to see how the terran will react.
Soaked in minerals, Skyhigh reacts by placing his natural command center as he takes his gas. He defends his base with six marines placed outside his natural's bridges. Best also takes his natural and sends his scouting probe back into the terran main. Having split the attention of the marines, Best attacks Skyhigh's front with three dragoons and one zealot, forcing Skyhigh to lift his natural command center.
Skyhigh blocks his ramp with two SCVs and his marines and uses one of the SCVs to glitch Best's dragoons. Best is forced to let up on the pressure after his zealot and one dragoon are killed. Best follows up by teching toward reaver and expanding to ten o'clock.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes3_1.jpg)
Ha, slick glitch!
When Skyhigh finally gets a tank, he moves to retake his natural and starts to pump his deadly vultures.
Best attacks again with four dragoons and target fires Skyhigh's tank, but good vulture micro saves it and Best backs off. Having mined out his own backdoor, Skyhigh then sends four vultures out and into the map. He places several mines in the middle of the map and then rushes into Best's natural killing a few probes before storming up and into Best's main. In total, he successfully kills five probes before Best can clear out the harass.
When Best's reaver arrives he transports it to Skyhigh's main looking for a place to drop. Skyhigh is well prepared for the drop, however, and Best fails to do any immediate damage.
Meanwhile, Skyhigh sends four more vultures out to ten o'clock and catches Best's probe transfer. He manages to kill three probes before they get behind the protective barrier of Best's pylon wall. Best chases the vultures up and into nine o'clock with dragoons and then places his reaver at the opposite ramp, trapping the vultures. One scarab kills all four.
After he's collected nine tanks, Skyhigh begins a hard push with reinforcements on the way. Best prepares the map for breaking the push by clearing out the mines from the middle of the map and macroing up zealots to assist his seventeen dragoons.
Skyhigh sends his push up into nine o'clock to utilize the high-ground for assaulting ten o'clock. After the pylon wall falls, Skyhigh sends his vultures in to raid the probes. Best responds by countering Skyhigh's natural, leaving his reaver to defend ten from the vultures. Skyhigh defends against the counter with mines, seven vultures and four tanks, and manages to kill most of Best's zealots before he's forced to pull SCVs. As the last of Skyhigh's defending tanks falls, a fresh production round completes, and with the help of SCVs, Skyhigh is able to finish off Best's counter.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes3_2.jpg)
Skyhigh survives this? Damn, SCVs are tough!
Best then decides to remove the terran threat from nine o'clock and sends seven zealots, seven dragoons and his reaver to clear out the tanks. Without any vultures to act as a buffer, the tank force is eliminated. Unfortunately for Best, so is the reaver and most of the protoss force.
In preparation for another raid, Skyhigh uses eight vultures to place mines between Best's natural and ten o'clock, but Best has already walled off ten again, so Skyhigh contents himself to finishing off Best's remaining zealots and dragoons at nine before chipping away at the wall again.
Best sends four dragoons to deal with the vultures, but they run into the mines, and two of them are destroyed before they can reach the vultures. The other two are no match for eight vultures, and Best is forced to back off for a moment.
Meanwhile, Skyhigh sneaks two tanks behind Best's natural, seiges and scans while distracting Best's front with vultures. Most of Best's natural probes are destroyed before he notices the problem and sends the survivors to safety.
The tanks continue to beat on the nexus as Skyhigh contains with an eight vulture force and sends two more tanks to nine o'clock to begin taking down the pylon wall at ten. In the meantime, Skyhigh expands to seven o'clock.
Not wanting to lose ten, Best moves out with eight dragoons and a control group of zealots. Clearing mines the whole way, one of Best's zealots drags a mine into a cluster of vultures, killing a tank and all but two vultures. Best is able to finish off the terran task force shortly afterwards. But it seems like Skyhigh wanted this to happen, because he immediately sends eight more vultures and four tanks up toward Best's natural, forcing best into an uncomfortable position. In the meantime, Best drops some zealots onto the tanks that've been beating on his natural nexus, finally removing them.
Skyhigh continues to reinforce his push as he expands to eight o'clock, and then Best attacks the push with ten zealots and nine dragoons. The terran tanks are destroyed but they did their damage and the remaining vultures plant mines to clean up the rest of the dragoons. Two more tanks arrive at ten o'clock, to beat on the wall again, but Best has been macroing up zealots and they're able to clear out the terran tank presence. However, the vultures continue to be a problem, and Skyhigh micros them well, thinning the zealot numbers.
As both sides continue to reinforce, Best seems to be crumpling under the viscious and relentless vulture assault. Skyhigh continues to send tanks in two at a time, protecting with vultures, and as the protoss army is forced back into his natural's bridge, an arbiter arrives to save the day by cloaking the units. Skyhigh immediately scans and continues his pressure but doesn't dare follow Best into his natural. Instead, he changes focus and sends his tanks back to ten o'clock. Best follows him there with what remains of his army in a desperate bid to prevent any further damage to his economy. Exceptional mine placement destroy the zealot numbers while tanks rain down hellfire onto Best's dragoons, yet Best is able to clear out the tanks, successfully saving the base.
Perhaps tired of these mostly fruitless skirmishes, both players take a break to build up their forces for a more sustained assault. The brief truce is broken when Skyhigh sends six tanks and twelve vultures back toward ten o'clock. Best casts stasis on four of the tanks as they seige, but Skyhigh is still able to deal a significant blow to Best's army with expertly places spider mines. Best is finally able to kill the vultures, though, and the two unstasised tanks fall shortly afterwards.
Skyhigh places a couple dozen mines in the middle of the map, while Best waits for stasis to wear off, and sends a vulture, two tanks and a goliath back behind Best's natural again.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/skybes3_3.jpg)
Not again...
Best runs his probes to safety and whether because he can't spare the units to drop behind the natural or because he's too exhausted to deal with the problem immediately, he chooses to ignore the harass for the time being. Instead, he spends his efforts to defend ten from a control group of vultures. The vultures run around Best's army and into best's natural to provide sight for the tanks. Skyhigh having planted mines within the natural, Best continues to ignore the problem and instead launches an assault on Skyhigh's expansion at eight o'clock. Skyhigh is ready for the assault, however, boasting four tanks, fourteen vultures, a turret and a goliath in the area. Best casts stasis on three tanks and a vulture and then rushes in. The attack fails miserably as vultures slaughter zealots and mines tear apart dragoons. Then, Best's natural nexus falls.
Skyhigh follows up the success by sending sixteen vultures to ten o'clock. Best sends the last of his forces (five zealots, five dragoons, one arbiter and a bunch of probes) in a desperate bid to defend. When the protoss army is cut to shreds, Best gives up. Skyhigh earns a spot in the SemiFinals!
+ Show Spoiler [Key Moments] +
Skyhigh utterly exhausted Best. It seemed like Best couldn't catch a moment's breath the whole game and eventually got tired of constantly defending on multiple fronts. The biggest single key moment would probably have been Skyhigh's narrow survival of Best's counter attack.
Flash walls off at ten o'clock and mines out the zero-minerals at his backdoor before scouting. Bisu, warping in at seven o'clock, takes his mineral-only at twelve supply, scouting after placing his gateway.
Flash takes all his SCVs off of gas and makes a command center while opening with a vulture. The vulture kills Bisu's scout, then travels into Bisu's main where it kills a gas probe before Bisu's first dragoon can finish it off.
Bisu attempts to harass Flash's wall with a zealot and a three dragoons, but Flash seiges his tank and takes his natural with ease. He then places an early armory and academy.
As Bisu takes his own natural and techs toward reavers, he charges Flash's natural with five dragoons and a zealot. Flash pulls SCVs to defend, losing two tanks in the process but he seiges another tank and after taking a few pot-shots at SCVs, Bisu backs off with his two surviving dragoons.
Flash plants his barracks at his natural and finishes the wall with an engineering bay, intending to stay well sealed up until he's prepared to push. Bisu uses his shuttle to elevate four dragoons onto Flash's high-ground. An SCV spots the dragoons and Flash positions a tank below his command center to successfully stave off the dragoon harass. Still macroing out of a lone factory, Flash starts building his starport in preparation for speedy upgrades.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/flabis1_1.jpg)
That's some precision defense, right there.
Meanwhile, Bisu takes his shuttle back to his base and picks up his reaver. Dropping one zealot on Flash's highground to absorb tank fire, Bisu drops his reaver and launches a scarab at Flash's gas SCVs, killing one before the zealot dies and Bisu lays off, positioning himself to delay Flash from taking his mineral-only. Bisu then expands to nine o'clock.
Bisu attempts to harass Flash's natural with his reaver, but Flash is adequately prepared for it and very little damage is done. Flash sends two goliath and a tank onto his high-ground to deal with the dragoons placed there, and he's successful in placing his command center and clearing out the dragoons without losing a single unit.
As Bisu begins building an arbiter, Flash prepares to expand again, building the command center in his natural. Settling into late-game, Bisu expands to five o'clock and Flash puts his macro into high-gear, getting a total of six factories before beginning his push. Bisu briefly tests Flash, but retreats for a better opportunity later. Meanwhile, Flash floats his command center over to one o'clock and Bisu expands to the three o'clock natural.
Maxed at seventeen dragoons and fourty-one zealots, Bisu sacrifices an arbiter by flying it into Flash's well protected mineral-only and recalling. Beyond the one science vessel and tank there, Flash only has a large number of turrets in the area. So he lifts, runs his SCVs away and starts his push in earnest. Pushing the thinned Protoss army with twenty-nine vultures, five goliaths, seventeen tanks and three science vessels, an elimination race begins.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/flabis1_2.jpg)
Flash knows your army is weak now, Bisu.
With Flash launching EMPs and maintaining excellent formation, there is little Bisu can do to prevent the terran's advance. But he works to delay it while his force within Flash's base does it's damage and frees up supply for defense (as it dies).
Flash uses his vulture production rounds to protect his base, and so cannot reinforce his push. As his push's vultures are killed off, Flash seiges half his tanks and uses his other half to act as close-range fighters. Bisu is still unable to prevent the forward movement of the terran army.
Flash finally cleans his base of Bisu's units and begins to reinforce his push, which is now outside Bisu's natural. Bisu has twenty zealots and seven dragoons to try and break the push, but with six tanks, an EMPing science vessel and vultures arriving, Flash is able to discourage the break until Bisu can get an arbiter.
Once Bisu's arbiter arrives he flings his army at Flash's contain. Flash casts defensive matrix on a forward tank and weathers the storm. As Flash's reinforcements arrive, Bisu is forced to concede.
+ Show Spoiler [Key Moments] +
The recall turned out to be a big mistake. Bisu needed to engage the terran army at least once to reduce how many tanks Flash had before he recalled. He may've been gambling that Flash would return to his base to defend, but Flash made the right choice and won the game, instead.
Flash starts at eight o'clock and Bisu at two. Flash begins by checking for some proxies, and then returns his SCV to mining. Choosing to scout later. Bisu scouts with his first zealot and Flash blocks the zealot with two SCVs and two marines. He builds a third marine before building his command center on high-ground in preparation for a fast expand. Playing in the dark, Bisu techs for fast observers and builds his natural nexus.
With two tanks and three marines, Flash drops his barracks at his natural choke and places an engineering bay to complete the wall. Playing very safe, Flash puts up several turrets before landing his command center at his natural. Bisu expands to ten o'clock. And techs quickly for arbiters.
Flash kills the observer Bisu's had in his base, and cancels his second armory, putting down four more factories instead, building toward a five factory timing push.
With nine tanks and reinforcing rallied vultures, Flash moves out. Surprised, Bisu sends seven dragoons and a zealot around the west side of the map-- before Flash can set up camp in the center of Sin Chupung-Ryeong-- to cuts off reinforcements and delay Flash's push while he places several gateways.
Flash chases away the reinforcement-blocking dragoons briefly, and drops his barracks on the high ground to prevent any more tampering with his reinforcements. As Bisu is destroying the barracks, Flash unseiges and moves northward. Bisu, now possessing an arbiter, claims high ground first and fires a few times at Flash's army before backing away and loading his shuttle with zealots.
Flash seiges outside Bisu's natural and his first tank volley demolishes four dragoons, but Bisu is able to get several cloaked zealots deep into the midst of Flash's tanks, and then the units Bisu had attacking Flash's barracks arrive, claiming the high ground behind the tanks. Flash's reinforcing vulture arrive soon afterward and finish off the dragoons, but not before Bisu was able to end the threat of Flash's tanks. Left with only vultures and running out of scans, Flash lays some mines and retreats toward some reinforcing tanks, then he redoubles his efforts.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/flabis2_1.jpg)
Bisu's flank comes at the perfect moment to diffuse Flash's attack.
A stray mine drag damages the reinforcing tanks severely, though, and Bisu is able to focus fire the tanks with his dragoons and then clean up the remaining vultures.
Recognizing that the battle is not going his way, Flash takes Bisu's high ground and lays down a thick barrier of spider mines. Although Bisu has an observer in the area, tank fire prevents him from clearing the mines just yet. Flash moves his vultures towards ten to see if he can't raid some probes, but there's already a pylon wall set up to prevent it. Bisu uses the opportunity to drop a zealot onto Flash's high-ground holding tank, and a number of mines rush towards the zealot like beams of light toward a black hole. The explosion that results leaves no units behind, and Bisu's able to clear out the minefield with his dragoons.
In the meantime, Flash's vultures are able to kill a pylon, but Bisu's already sealed the ramp, and the vultures have no place to go but east. However, Bisu already has units coming from that direction. Flash is determined, though, and he manages to get four vultures into Bisu's natural. They kill three probes before they're chased away.
With three tanks and a handful of goliaths and vultures, Flash attempts another push, taking his own highground. Bisu casts stasis on two of the tanks and a vulture and is able to easily run the terran army over. Bisu's army of nine dragoons and a control group of zealots then walks straight into Flash's natural. Flash cliffs with two tanks, though, and perhaps because he loses his observer to turret fire, Bisu chooses to not press the issue, and instead backs off to wait for stasis to wear off on Flash's units, claiming Flash's highground in the process. After killing the stasised units, Bisu expands to eleven o'clock, and backs his army off to sit on his lead. Flash, for his part, retakes his highground and secures his position. After some time passes, Bisu sends his arbiter into Flash's main and performs a recall. Flash pulls his army back to defend, but without another expansion, nor control of his own ramp he has difficulty clearing out the invasion. Bisu uses the opportunity to clear the map of mines. When Flash finally removes the last protoss unit from his main, he pushes out again, setting up camp outside his natural, challenging Bisu to attack him. Bisu, in obvious control, obliges, casting stasis on half Flash's tanks and running the rest over with cloaked zealots. Flash scans one last time and gives up.
+ Show Spoiler [Key Moments] +
Bisu's patience in spite of the surprise of the disguised five-factory timing push allowed him to flank Flash's tanks once they had reached low-ground. Once the push was diffused, it was Bisu's game to lose. And he didn't.
Flash starts at eleven, Bisu starts at five. Flash again checks for a proxy and then returns his SCV to mine minerals. Both players open standard until Bisu manner pylons, trapping an SCV. Flash manages to glitch the SCV out, and Bisu allows the pylon to complete as he techs toward reaver.
Flash makes three marines and sets them at his ramp, Bisu uses his first two dragoons to assault the marines, killing one, but then Flash's first tank completes and one dragoon falls.
Flash places a command center on his high ground in preparation for taking his natural and lands his barracks at his natural. Bisu takes his natural as well.
Then Bisu's shuttle sneaks into Flash's main from the southwest side. Unfortunately for Bisu, Flash already has three tanks in the area and the reaver takes damage from one of them as soon as it's dropped. The scarab sticks to the minerals for a scant second allowing Flash's SCVs to escape and Bisu immediately picks his reaver up removes his shuttle from the area. Flash repeats the build he used on Medusa, teching upgrades and placing down a starport with only one factory.
As Flash is building another command center above ten o'clock and cliffing tanks to defend the expansion attempt, Bisu takes four o'clock and sends his shuttle over the west side of Flash's main again. The shuttle has speed researched, but Flash has several goliath in the area, and the shuttle can do little more than scout.
To support his expansion at ten, Flash drops a tank and a goliath onto the lowground, and then follows by dropping SCVs. Bisu briefly drops a reaver at the ten o'clock expansion but quickly realizes how well defended it is, and instead places his shuttle with his army of twelve dragoons and two zealots, triggering an attack on Flash's natural. Although Flash is well walled, there are only three tanks in the area, and by using zealots to absorb tank fire, Bisu's able to drop his reaver in-between volleys and target-fire tanks with scarabs.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/flabis3_1.jpg)
Damn, dude. Are you serious?
Flash is forced to lift his command center and barracks while tanks reposition to cliff the natural. Bisu moves out of tank-range and contents himself with killing Flash's scanner, refinery and a supply depot.
Next, Bisu sends five zealots and eight dragoons to ten o'clock. Flash has walled off with supply depots, but all the tanks that had been protecting ten have been moved to protect the natural. Flash rushes to use SCVs to repair the supply depots and moves some tanks back to cover the ten o'clock bridge, forcing Bisu to back off as he starts building his first arbiter.
Bisu expands to three o'clock and Flash retakes his natural, but Bisu isn't happy with that, and drops zealots onto Flash's cliffed tanks while rushing into the terran natural with his dragoons. The command center is again forced to lift, and again, Bisu contents himself with destroying flash's scanner and refinery.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/flabis3_2.jpg)
Second verse, same as the first.
Flash sends six vultures outside his bridge and plants mines behind Bisu's escape route, but Bisu already has an observer there, and he's able to escape Flash's natural.
As Bisu's first arbiter comes out, he loads two high templar and some zealots in his shuttle and positions his dragoons to prevent any vulture harass at his expansions. Flash does his best to find holes in Bisu's defense, but his vultures are entirely ineffective-- even the mines they place are almost immediately discovered and cleared off the map.
When Bisu tests the terran's defense at ten o'clock again (quite good), Flash finally finds a hole at three o'clock and rushes up the ramp to raid some probes. Unfortunately for him, cannons have already been placed, and only one probe is killed before Bisu runs the probes away and out of the reach of the vultures.
As Bisu takes his fifth base at eight o'clock, Flash decides to push with four science vessels, eightteen vultures, four goliaths and twenty-one tanks. Bisu positions himself and then casts stasis on three of Flash's science vessels, stalling the terran push just outside of Flash's natural. Then Bisu recalls into the ten o'clock expansion. Flash EMPs the army and lifts his command center, but all the SCVs are trapped and killed by a mixture of dragoon attacks and tank splash-damage. Bisu focus fires on the command center and gets it into the red before it can retreat to the safety of Flash's main.
Flash decides his best response, as in game one, would be a counter push. He unseiges his tanks and moves out with only one science vessel. The vessel moves ahead of the army and spots Bisu's arbiters, but the EMP fails to connect and the science vessel is destroyed in the process.
Bisu feignts a retreat, drawing Flash's army beyond the bridges in the center of Destination and then turns around and casts stasis on half the terran army. Unfortunately for Bisu, he also casts stasis on his shuttles (filled with high templar) and there are still ten tanks left active behind the stasised ones. Bisu's dragoons are cut to shreds. With only four dragoons left, Bisu is forced to retreat and rebuild his forces.
Flash uses the time he's bought to double expand to one and two o'clock. As stasis wears off, Flash reassumes his push. His army is now mostly tank at this point (twenty-four tanks, nine vultures, three goliaths and a couple science vessels). Bisu sends his sizable zealot army into the tanks to draw fire and drops his now-freed high templar, storming the masses of tanks. Few of the tanks are destroyed by the storms, but most are damaged, and Bisu starts making production-rounds of his trademark unit: the dark templar.
![[image loading]](/staff/Tadzio/GOMquarter/flabis3_3.jpg)
These psi storms prevent a deja vu incident.
Flash splits his army, sending three tanks to eight o'clock and four to four o'clock. His remaining forces stay infront of Bisu's natural, but with few vultures or goliaths to buffer the tanks and dark templar running around, Flash doesn't dare seige. Instead, he waits for scans and micros.
Flash successfully takes out eight o'clock, but four o'clock is saved by a dark templar. Another of Bisu's dark templar has found its way to Flash's expansion at two o'clock and begins killing SCVs. Moving on to one o'clock when it's done feasting on the SCV's brains at two.
With a combination of dark templar and psi storm, Bisu finally manages to clear out Flash's tanks from outside his natural and then he attacks two o'clock with an arbiter five dragoons and an archon. Flash now has units and spider mines there, but Bisu casts stasis on the tanks and destroys the rest of the units on his way toward eliminating Flash's already fragile economy. After Bisu takes out two o'clock he moves over toward ten which Flash has finally retaken. In order to get SCVs into the base, though, Flash has ruined the integrity of his supply depot wall and Bisu is able sneak three dark templar into the mineral line. Flash scans so a cliffed tank may kill the dark templar, but the splash-damage only seems to assist in the slaughter of SCVs. Then Bisu drops a high templar at ten, and storms the fleeing mineral gatherers.
Bisu's army reconstituted, and Flash's economy in tatters, Bisu moves his army to one o'clock to put the final nail in the coffin. Bisu destroys the command center at one, then drops high templar at ten o'clock again, this time killing every last SCV.
Flash chooses to use his last moments in the GOMtv Classic to push toward Bisu's three o'clock expansion. Bisu rolls over the feeble attempt with attack-move supplimented with psionic storm. Thus is Flash eliminated, and Bisu earns the right to play Skyhigh in the SemiFinals!
+ Show Spoiler [Key Moments] +
Bisu's tempered aggression towards Flash's natural early in the game was absolutely stellar, and he led from then on. Bisu almost gave the game back to Flash when he recalled into 10 o'clock, but some clutch storms and sneaky sneaky DT saved the day. Fantastic series!
I promised myself I'd be concise this time around. Wow, I failed hardcore. Crap! Maybe next week...
