by: Kollin


If people thought WoL TvZ was stale, then WoL PvZ was like ten year old bread. After Parting solely trained his execution of the WonWonWon, the matc-hup devolved into who could do their best Parting imitation and who could hold it off. With the release of HotS, that had changed as now the Soul Train is stopped with relative ease by the new swarm hosts, and the improved phoenixes wreak havoc in a Zerg's mineral line.

Snute didn't seem to know this however and played every single game of the series without even touching a HotS unit, not even the new mutalisk. In game one both players opened normally, getting up the normal amount of bases in the matchup. However, Sase looked for the early win combined a powerful 8-gate all-in with a mothership core and his fantastic control, smashing through Snute's small roach force. Game two saw Snute try to apply pressure himself with some two base roach speeding aggression, but he just couldn't get the damage done. Sase defended taking no losses, and proceeded to hit with a 2-0 blink stalker mothership core timing, killing his opponent's third before recalling away and taking minimal losses. From there, the deficit was just too big and a follow-up attack forced Snute to leave.

In game three, with everything on the line, you'd assume Snute would finally at least attempt to use a new HotS unit, right? After all, Sase was using the mothership core to great effect and Snute just has no answer. Well you'd be wrong. Snute went for his quick three bases and transitioned into roach infestor, but the mothership core and it's recall ability meant that Sase could move very far out on the map and force a lot of units out of his enemy, without fear of getting caught out. This allowed him to take a fourth base and go for a devastating six colossi 3-3 timing that Snute's late spire and cost inefficient army had no chance against. An uninspiring series from the new Liquid player, he will need to practice HotS a lot more if he hopes to compete with his European peers.


Unsurprisingly, the first series of the first premier HotS tournament to feature two players that looked like they practiced the game to some degree came from foreigners. While it was clear Nerchio's understanding of the new units just wasn't on the same level as Babyknight's, we at least got to see the first new Zerg unit in play, the swarm host, which was featured in game one.

Game one itself was by far the most interesting of the series, as Nerchio opened with a gas before hatchery for faster speed, and Babyknight opened with the ever more common gateway expand. Both players got three bases up and Nerchio used the improved mutalisks to devastating effect, getting about 20 of them, and scoring over 40 drone kills. Nerchio then moved overlords outside Babyknight's base and began dropping creep, upon which he placed an enormous spine crawler wall. With a crippled economy and a spine crawler-swarm host-hydralisk contain on his doorstep, Babyknight teched to tempests and eventually used his superior upgrades and Nerchio's low drone count to his advantage, breaking out of the contain and easily beating Nerchio's badly upgraded brood lord army to take the first game.

In the second game, both players opened similarly but this time Nerchio took a different path in his tech. Throwing down a nydus network and a roach warren, Nerchio went for a huge timing attack in his opponents main that went unscouted. Despite the lack of preparation, Babyknight by some miracle held and ended up even with the Polish Zerg. Nerchio took a risk and double expanded, which Babyknight failed to punish, and it eventually cost him the game, as Nerchio's huge roach hydra corrupter force rolled over the Protoss' players small colossus based army. Game three saw Nerchio once again open gas before hatchery, this time choosing to end the game quickly with a baneling bust. Despite Babyknight going nexus first, some very lucky timing and fantastic control saw him hold it off, leaving him a single game away from a trip to Dallas.

In game four, Nerchio, for the fourth time, opened gas before hatchery whereas Babyknight opened gateway expand. Nerchio got three bases and a relatively quick lair, teching up to spire while Babyknight chose to go for a stargate. A small poke from Babyknight's tiny sentry-zealot-mothership core force ended up paying huge dividends, as he somehow sniped Nerchio's third and kept alive all but one of the sentries. Nerchio began pumping roaches, but couldn't get anything done with them, and a big 2-2 blink timing from Babyknight ended the game, winning him a spot to one of the biggest tournaments of the European player's life.




In the third PvZ of the week, we had two very interesting players. The first was Stephano, who needs no introduction. And then there was Titan. The Russian Protoss player uses a surprisingly effective unorthodox style to his advantage but he is relatively unknown compared to the giant he was fighting.

Game one saw a fairly normal opening, as Stephano and Titan got three and two bases respectively and teched up. Titan went for a small amount of 4 gate pressure, which Stephano vastly overreacted too, creating around 15 roaches for the 6 zealot, 1 stalker force. An oracle follow-up from his opponent only increased the economic damage and Stephano was forced to do damage with his roaches, or he would be very far behind. He went in for the attack, but fantastic forcefields and use of the photon overcharge ability (which turns your nexus into a 13 range cannon) meant Titan held it off with very minimal probe losses, staying even in worker count with his enemy. However, Stephano being Stephano meant he took a fourth base and maxed out on a huge roach hydralisk army, battered down Titan's front door and subsequently won the game.

In game two Stephano mixed it up from his usual fast three base style, instead opting for a two base speed roach all-in. It hit with a huge amount of roaches very early, and Titan just didn't have an answer, putting him two games behind. The final game of the series was another all in, this time from Titan's side. A two base blink stalker timing got caught out of position by Stephano's roach ball, and Titan neglected to blink them up to the high ground. While the Protoss tried to hold on valiantly, he was overrun by the huge swarm of roach hydralisk, and for the first time in the qualifiers a Zerg advanced on to Dallas. While the series itself may not have been the most exciting, Stephano showed off that his normal 12 minute roach max just got a whole lot stronger if you add in the improved hydralisks.


As each PvZ passes by in the European week, we get to see more and more interesting new strategies from both races. Since one of the players in this match is Bly, everyone watching could be fairly sure we would see some very interesting new styles from the innovative Zerg. That is not to say that the heir to the Polish throne, Mana, is not capable of coming up with crazy and very, very strong new builds himself, but Bly is definitely the more unorthodox player out of the two.

In the first game Bly certainly opened strangely, choosing to go for a one base roach-zergling attack, which was easily defended by Mana's more than ample number of sentries and cannons. Mana transitioned into a stargate, inflicting even greater economic damage with his phoenixes. In a final desperation move, Bly attacked into a larger, better upgraded colossi army with his hydralisks to no avail, giving Mana the victory. In game two it was Mana's turn to be the aggressor, as he went for an early six gateway attack. However, Bly had gone for a lair before his third hatchery for much faster hydralisks, and held off the attack taking minimal losses. Mana chose to follow Day[9]'s advice, building a DT shrine, but it was not enough and despite the loss of his third base due to harass, Bly's large hydralisk force smashed through Mana's front door, taking the game.

The third game started out very similarly to the previous game, Bly choosing to get a lair before his third hatchery and Mana putting on the pressure with a zealot-only 7-gate. While he did snipe the third off, Bly had far too many mutalisks for Mana to hold off, even with the Whitera-esque double stargate transition, and lost the game. The last game in the series was a bit different than the previous games. Throughout all three games of the series, Mana had been doing an excellent job delaying Bly's natural with a probe, so Bly decided that he would take it no more and 12 pooled. He managed to sneak four zerglings past his opponent's cannon and deny mining as well as pick of a few probes for a significant amount of time, all the while getting a lair and a third base behind this. Mana teched for a stargate, intending to attack with gateway units and oracles, however a good scout from Bly's zerglings meant he was well prepared with a hydralisk ling army, and held the attack with ease. He then counterattacked, keeping his opponent from taking a third as well as picking off units where he could for around five minutes. Eventually Mana got colossus and forced away the hydralisk army, but Bly had already teched to mutalisks, and as soon as Mana saw the flock of mutalisks, he left the game. Bly took the series with seemingly little effort and while the Korean players may be more practiced against his unusual style, it still bodes well for his trip to Dallas.





In this series, Thorzain really displayed why he his nickname is the Spoon Terran, combining his slow, careful style with fantastic multitasking, really displaying how his HotS practice in Korea has improved his play. But while Thorzain chose to employ the improved WoL units to his advantage, Socke opted for more inventive HotS based strategies.

In the opening game, Thorzain started out with a one-rax fast expand, getting a single barracks then double gas afterwards. Socke chose for a proxy stargate, and attempted to harass with oracles. However, Thorzain was prepared with turrets in his mineral line, and deflected the oracles while taking almost no damage. Socke's army was not even nearly enough to stop Thorzain's army, which he didn't even bother to control, and the German Protoss lost the first game.

Game two started out with Thorzain taking a fast expansion, and Socke opening with the insanely greedy one-gate double expand. Despite Thorzain scouting it with a reaper, it paid off beautifully as Thorzain's two medivac push was easily defended. Thorzain desperately tried to take a third while Socke prepared a huge colossus/high templar push, which Thorzain only scouted at the last minute. He began to pump vikings, and only managed to hold the attack due to a huge oversight on Socke's part, as he forgot to research storm. Thorzain eventually stabilized, and Socke once again pushed forward off four bases to Thorzain's three, with six colossus as well as archons. He still hadn't researched storm, and Thorzain had enough vikings and ghosts to not only hold off, but absolutely crush Socke's army, trading brilliantly and bringing him back into the game. Both players went up to five bases and began building their late-game super expensive armies. Thorzain dropped down more ghost academies for nukes, and started raven production to counter Socke's tempests. For those not in the know, PDD's actually stop tempest shots, making ravens a great tool to use against them. Thorzain really showed off how good he was at just chipping away at his opponent with harass, using nukes to completely wipe out his opponents main base, while picking off probes constantly at the fifth. Eventually his large ghost viking raven army pushed forward and smashed through Socke's mostly tier three army, putting Thorzain one game away from a trip to Dallas.



In the last game, Socke scouted that Thorzain was going for a very greedy CC first, and reacted by taking two early gases and proxying a stargate. In contrast to game one, he began producing void rays and got up three gateways. However, Thorzain scouted the proxy pylon and was prepared with bunkers and tanks set up in an almost unbreakable defensive position. Thorzain took the game and the series with a clean sweep, really showcasing how his stay in Korea is improving his play.





While Ret was once considered one of the best foreigners playing Zerg, using the 'Game of Drones' style to the maximum it could be taken, the last few months have looked rather shaky for him. Relatively poor results, peppered with a few top four finishes here and there have made many begin to doubt if he could truly get back to the form he displayed in 2011. Alternatively, Feast only made his first showing in the past year, doing very well in European events for someone who had only just broken into competitive play. Needless to say the series between the two was interesting, and showed just how powerful swarm hosts could be if used properly.

In the first game, Ret actually chose to use mutalisks, while Feast started it off with some slight zealot sentry pressure, which was shut down easily. Ret began to build up an enormous muta-ling army, stretching his opponent as far across his three bases as he could manage, eventually sneaking his entire army into Feast's main base, killing off the nexus as well as other vital infrastructure. He managed to keep the vast majority of his mutalisks alive, and after a quick five base remax on speedlings, Ret proceeded to kill his opponents third and win game one. In the next game, Feast opted for phoenix harass, really utilizing the increased range to his advantage and picking off multiple queens and drones. However, Ret managed to get up a large swarm host army and began to slowly move out onto the map with them. He positioned himself outside of Feast's third, however a fatal blunder caused the loss of every single one of his swarm hosts, and as soon as the follow up attack arrived in his base, Ret realized any attempt to resist would be futile and left the game.



Game three of the series started out fairly similarly to game two, Ret teching up to swarm hosts and Feast inflicting slight economic damage with his phoenixes. Both players set themselves up for macro games with Feast choosing a colossus based composition whereas Ret chose swarm host corruptor, which is slowly growing in popularity. Ret executed a huge four base attack, and smashed down Feast's third and putting him within arms reach of qualifying. In the final game Feast went all out, taking an extremely quick third base, boosting his economy much further ahead than it would be had he opened normally. Ret managed to scout this with a sneaky overlord, and responded by taking an absurdly quick fourth base for himself. Feast prepared a large blink stalker timing, reminiscent of Creator's three base blink builds. He used the mothership core to grant him vision, and while the stalkers couldn't directly engage the swarm hosts, they used their superior mobility to snipe Ret's natural hatchery before recalling away, taking almost zero losses. Not to be erred, Ret reclaimed his natural while once again building up a sizable swarm host-hydralisk-corruptor force. On the other hand, Feast grew impatient sitting on his three bases, and decided to attack with his maxed out colossus-based army. This proved to be ill-fated as an excellent concave and great swarm host positioning from Ret drove back Feast's force. The Protoss had no answer to the inevitable counter attack, and gave up the chance for him to qualify for his first NA event. Ret took the series 3-1, and really showed off the power of swarm hosts when positioned and moved around correctly.