by flamewheel, KwarK and Waxangel
This week's content brought
to you bySnorlax flamewheel.
Results and Battle Reports
Taking the World by Storm
Map Analysis
to you by
Results and Battle Reports
Taking the World by Storm
Map Analysis
It's been a ridiculous
Regardless, that's not what's important, and that's not why we're putting out this post. This post is dedicated to the two best players in the world, and those that fell before them, stepping stones on the way to yet another final. Flash vs Jaedong WCG finals, Flash vs Jaedong MSL finals, and now we have, for the first time, a Flash vs Jaedong OSL finals.
Others may think differently, but I do feel like if the time has come, there is no better way for Brood War to be sent off.
The Semifinals
Quick Results and Standings
Quick Results and Standings
+ Show Spoiler [Results] +
Semifinal A
Jaedong <Grand Line SE> Stork
Jaedong <Flight-Dreamliner> Stork
Jaedong <Polaris Rhapsody> Stork
Jaedong <Eye of the Storm> Stork
Jaedong <Grand Line SE> Stork
Jaedong wins 3-2
Semifinal B
Flash <Grand Line SE> free
Flash <Flight-Dreamliner> free
Flash <Polaris Rhapsody> free
Flash <Eye of the Storm> free
Flash <Grand Line SE> free
Flash wins 3-1
Semifinal A
Jaedong <Grand Line SE> Stork
Jaedong <Flight-Dreamliner> Stork
Jaedong <Polaris Rhapsody> Stork
Jaedong <Eye of the Storm> Stork
Jaedong <Grand Line SE> Stork
Jaedong wins 3-2
Semifinal B
Flash <Grand Line SE> free
Flash <Flight-Dreamliner> free
Flash <Polaris Rhapsody> free
Flash <Eye of the Storm> free
Flash wins 3-1
Battle Reports
And now for something new....
The OSL team is well aware of the 'wall of text' effect our battle reports have. While some people certainly enjoy the old school battle report, the advent of easily accessible VODs has introduced many other possibilities as well. The present OSL team is quite old-fashioned to have stuck with the battle report for every game, but this week we shall experiment.
These weeks reports were written as Battle Report companions, with timestamped notes corresponding to specific points in the game. They are meant to be to used alongside the video itself, although the text alone should be enough to convey the general flow of the games. After reading, please leave your feedback in the comments and in the poll further below.
by WaxAngel
Game One - Grand Line SE - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
2:05 - Game starts. Stork top left, Jaedong top right. Incorrect scout for JD.
3:19 - Straight up 9 pool for Jaedong, while Stork still hasn't scouted. Also Stork looks like he will be going blind nexus before gate, which is a pretty bad gamble as we'll see in a second.
3:56-4:30 - Nexus, then forge for Stork. His probe scouts incorrectly while Jaedong is hatching lings and sending a drone in the right direction. When we see that Jaedong's overlord is checking the bottom right natural just as his zerglings hatch, we know that Jaedong was always going to know where Stork had started (barring a strange 1 gate start) and would send his lings to the correct location on the first try. Essentially, Stork was committing himself to eating a 9 pool rush with his blind nexus first build.
5:00 - Stork could have held better here, but his probes didn't make it down in time to surround the warping cannon. Four lings force the cancel, and run in to cause Stork some grief.
5:40 - Stork only has 12 probes now, and has to balance between making zealots, cannons, and more probes from his nexii. Without both cannons and zealots, he's not going to stop the lings from killing his probes, and without probes he's not gonna have money to make both zealots and cannons. So yeah, Stork is pretty screwed.
6:00 - Not to mention he's only mining with like 3 probes in his main if he's gonna have to keep fighting using his probes.
6:30 - Sending the zealot to attack instead of defending? Well, when you've already lost, you might as well see if you can make your opponent screw up and luck out incredibly.
7:10 - Inevitably, GG.
Match Rating: 1/10
9 pool beat a 12 nexus. Yay?
Jaedong: 6/10
He microed his lings well, but Stork made it too easy.
3:19 - Straight up 9 pool for Jaedong, while Stork still hasn't scouted. Also Stork looks like he will be going blind nexus before gate, which is a pretty bad gamble as we'll see in a second.
3:56-4:30 - Nexus, then forge for Stork. His probe scouts incorrectly while Jaedong is hatching lings and sending a drone in the right direction. When we see that Jaedong's overlord is checking the bottom right natural just as his zerglings hatch, we know that Jaedong was always going to know where Stork had started (barring a strange 1 gate start) and would send his lings to the correct location on the first try. Essentially, Stork was committing himself to eating a 9 pool rush with his blind nexus first build.
5:00 - Stork could have held better here, but his probes didn't make it down in time to surround the warping cannon. Four lings force the cancel, and run in to cause Stork some grief.
5:40 - Stork only has 12 probes now, and has to balance between making zealots, cannons, and more probes from his nexii. Without both cannons and zealots, he's not going to stop the lings from killing his probes, and without probes he's not gonna have money to make both zealots and cannons. So yeah, Stork is pretty screwed.
6:00 - Not to mention he's only mining with like 3 probes in his main if he's gonna have to keep fighting using his probes.
6:30 - Sending the zealot to attack instead of defending? Well, when you've already lost, you might as well see if you can make your opponent screw up and luck out incredibly.
7:10 - Inevitably, GG.
Match Rating: 1/10
9 pool beat a 12 nexus. Yay?
Jaedong: 6/10
He microed his lings well, but Stork made it too easy.
Game Two - Flight-Dreamliner - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
0:12 - Stork at right, Jaedong at bottom. So Stork didn't get the spot that's supposedly more difficult to defend mutas from.
1:36 - Overpool from Jaedong, while Stork is going forge first and scouting. With a before pylon scout it would have been possible to choose nexus or forge depending on what he saw, but Stork just plays very standard.
2:12 - Jaedong fails to deny the probe scout. Stork gets in to see that Jaedong went overpool, with slightly delayed 5th and 6th lings for an extra drone. Even so, last game's terrible loss is making stork play safe and go for two cannons.
5:48 - Jaedong goes standard 3 hatch spire, while Stork goes for some standard sair into templar tech. Everything has been really standard so far, except maybe the fact that Stork built his second gateway at his natural. This could become relevant later, as we shall see.
6:42 - Jaedong will end up losing 2 OLs to sairs which is one more than usual, but this was a good suicide scout to find out that Stork was playing pretty standard.
He does however, miss the second gateway at the natural, which again, may be relevant soon.
7:09 - As DTs poke around for weaknesses, Jaedong scouts out Stork's 3rd and 4th gateways with his scourge.
7:45 - Very cute from Stork to kill off two drones and some poorly microed zerglings with his two DTs. These ling kills matter because...
8:30 - Stork has 9 speedzealots and two DTs heading towards the 8:30 base, while Jaedong has a sunken and 0 lings to defend. True, zerg has to be greedy to be good, but how did Jaedong manage to be so woefully unprepared? It might be grasping at straws, but missing that single gateway Stork built at his natural may have messed up Jaedgon's sense of timing so that he would invest too little on defenses. In any case jaedong takes a lot of damage.
10:00 - Jaedong at least manages to save his expansion hatchery, but Stork has already taken his third base and is massing templars. Jaedong will have to pull off some amazing observer snipes and hold with lurkers to be able to survive until defilers.
11:05 - 50 population difference as Stork breaks out. I probably don't have to say anymore.
12:50 - GG
Match Rating: 2/10
Jaedong makes no defenses, and loses straight up. Bizarre and boring.
Stork: 5/10
Stork made troops and attacked, and that was all he needed to do.
Jaedong: 2/10
Jaedong made drones and no defenses, and that's about it.
1:36 - Overpool from Jaedong, while Stork is going forge first and scouting. With a before pylon scout it would have been possible to choose nexus or forge depending on what he saw, but Stork just plays very standard.
2:12 - Jaedong fails to deny the probe scout. Stork gets in to see that Jaedong went overpool, with slightly delayed 5th and 6th lings for an extra drone. Even so, last game's terrible loss is making stork play safe and go for two cannons.
5:48 - Jaedong goes standard 3 hatch spire, while Stork goes for some standard sair into templar tech. Everything has been really standard so far, except maybe the fact that Stork built his second gateway at his natural. This could become relevant later, as we shall see.
6:42 - Jaedong will end up losing 2 OLs to sairs which is one more than usual, but this was a good suicide scout to find out that Stork was playing pretty standard.
He does however, miss the second gateway at the natural, which again, may be relevant soon.
7:09 - As DTs poke around for weaknesses, Jaedong scouts out Stork's 3rd and 4th gateways with his scourge.
7:45 - Very cute from Stork to kill off two drones and some poorly microed zerglings with his two DTs. These ling kills matter because...
8:30 - Stork has 9 speedzealots and two DTs heading towards the 8:30 base, while Jaedong has a sunken and 0 lings to defend. True, zerg has to be greedy to be good, but how did Jaedong manage to be so woefully unprepared? It might be grasping at straws, but missing that single gateway Stork built at his natural may have messed up Jaedgon's sense of timing so that he would invest too little on defenses. In any case jaedong takes a lot of damage.
10:00 - Jaedong at least manages to save his expansion hatchery, but Stork has already taken his third base and is massing templars. Jaedong will have to pull off some amazing observer snipes and hold with lurkers to be able to survive until defilers.
11:05 - 50 population difference as Stork breaks out. I probably don't have to say anymore.
12:50 - GG
Match Rating: 2/10
Jaedong makes no defenses, and loses straight up. Bizarre and boring.
Stork: 5/10
Stork made troops and attacked, and that was all he needed to do.
Jaedong: 2/10
Jaedong made drones and no defenses, and that's about it.
Game Three - Polaris Rhapsody - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
0:10 - Jaedong on top, Stork at the bottom. La - de - da.
1:10 - Jaedong goes for a straight up 9 pool. Interesting choice on a 2 player map, where he can be easily scouted. Perhaps he doesn't want to play 12 hatch vs 14 nexus against Stork?
1:26 - Again, Stork forge scouts into a standard opening.
2:17 - Two cannons straight away, not even cannon-gate-cannon or anything remotely greedy. Don't blame him since he paid the price in game 1.
4:55 - Stargate and +1 ground attack for Stork, all in sight of Jaedong. Standard PvZ with nothing going on as both players build up. Quite similar to game two in fact....
7:12 - Another predictable early poke by Stork, like game two . This time, it's +1 speedlots.
7:50 - Game two taught Jaedong a lesson about being greedy, so he's not gonna die here. But pulling those hydras out from behind that building wall was an error, and forces a combined drone defense.
8:50 - Losses stand at seven zealots against a handful of hydralisks, 4 or 5 drones, and a destroyed hydra den to delay lurker timing. While initially I thought protoss came out ahead here, we see that Jaedong still had a lot of drones left. Considering that he's holding onto a dual gas base at 2:00, Stork would have liked to have done more damage. Decent attack for Stork, but they're still in fairly even footing.
10:30 - Having suicided some sairs to see Jaedong rushing up to hive, Stork busts out before his dragoons become useless. That horribly narrow choke and stupid HTs cost him some precious seconds.
12:15 - Stork's big chance to cause critical damage fails with some great observer snipes from Jaedong. One can't help but think, since there were only two overlords there, and with one of them having been there for a while, wouldn't it have been really easy for Stork to have force fired them down with his many dragoons? He really was just three lurkers away from icing a base.
12:33 - Now that's just unnecessarily gosu.
12:45 - Jaedong should be close to having consume now, which is going to halt Stork's progress cold. But Stork did come out ahead in terms of cost efficiency in the last battle, and he took 6:00 in during the fight, which means he still has a ton of units to use. That is if he can deploy them where they won't get killed by swarm and lurkers.
13:17 - Stork decides to take the central route on the map, and somehow this catches Jaedong completely flat footed. I mean come on, the entire point of the map was to emphasis the use of three viable land attack routes..... Anyway, not only does Jaedong not have lurkers in place to defend, but he also suicides all of his troops into Stork's attack without any dark swarm cover. In fact, why doesn't he even have a defiler yet?
13:32 - And the overlords? Not that they would have helped those lurkers against storm.
13:40 - GG
Match Rating: 5/10
The close battle where Jaedong barely held was quite exciting, showing good control on both sides. But Jaedong fell apart far too quickly when Stork changed the direction of his attack.
Stork: 7/10
Good combat micro, good macro, all around solid play. He played a better management game than Jaedong for the most part and deserved a win for that.
Jaedong: 4/10
Just when things were about to get interesting, Jaedong collapsed and died without a fight.
1:10 - Jaedong goes for a straight up 9 pool. Interesting choice on a 2 player map, where he can be easily scouted. Perhaps he doesn't want to play 12 hatch vs 14 nexus against Stork?
1:26 - Again, Stork forge scouts into a standard opening.
2:17 - Two cannons straight away, not even cannon-gate-cannon or anything remotely greedy. Don't blame him since he paid the price in game 1.
4:55 - Stargate and +1 ground attack for Stork, all in sight of Jaedong. Standard PvZ with nothing going on as both players build up. Quite similar to game two in fact....
7:12 - Another predictable early poke by Stork, like game two . This time, it's +1 speedlots.
7:50 - Game two taught Jaedong a lesson about being greedy, so he's not gonna die here. But pulling those hydras out from behind that building wall was an error, and forces a combined drone defense.
8:50 - Losses stand at seven zealots against a handful of hydralisks, 4 or 5 drones, and a destroyed hydra den to delay lurker timing. While initially I thought protoss came out ahead here, we see that Jaedong still had a lot of drones left. Considering that he's holding onto a dual gas base at 2:00, Stork would have liked to have done more damage. Decent attack for Stork, but they're still in fairly even footing.
10:30 - Having suicided some sairs to see Jaedong rushing up to hive, Stork busts out before his dragoons become useless. That horribly narrow choke and stupid HTs cost him some precious seconds.
12:15 - Stork's big chance to cause critical damage fails with some great observer snipes from Jaedong. One can't help but think, since there were only two overlords there, and with one of them having been there for a while, wouldn't it have been really easy for Stork to have force fired them down with his many dragoons? He really was just three lurkers away from icing a base.
12:33 - Now that's just unnecessarily gosu.
12:45 - Jaedong should be close to having consume now, which is going to halt Stork's progress cold. But Stork did come out ahead in terms of cost efficiency in the last battle, and he took 6:00 in during the fight, which means he still has a ton of units to use. That is if he can deploy them where they won't get killed by swarm and lurkers.
13:17 - Stork decides to take the central route on the map, and somehow this catches Jaedong completely flat footed. I mean come on, the entire point of the map was to emphasis the use of three viable land attack routes..... Anyway, not only does Jaedong not have lurkers in place to defend, but he also suicides all of his troops into Stork's attack without any dark swarm cover. In fact, why doesn't he even have a defiler yet?
13:32 - And the overlords? Not that they would have helped those lurkers against storm.
13:40 - GG
Match Rating: 5/10
The close battle where Jaedong barely held was quite exciting, showing good control on both sides. But Jaedong fell apart far too quickly when Stork changed the direction of his attack.
Stork: 7/10
Good combat micro, good macro, all around solid play. He played a better management game than Jaedong for the most part and deserved a win for that.
Jaedong: 4/10
Just when things were about to get interesting, Jaedong collapsed and died without a fight.
Game Four - Eye of the Storm - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
00:10 - Stork top right, Jaedong top left. OL scouts incorrectly.
01:30 - For the first time in the series, Jaedong goes for a 12 hatch opening. Meanwhile, getting shafted by 9 pool in the first game is still deep in Stork's mind as he sends a second probe to scout after his first one whiffs. Having started forge first, he needed to know what his next building should have been. On the other hand, Jaedong hardly seems to care what Stork is doing.
2:30 - A nexus goes down before cannon like it should, while Jaedong goes and takes a third hatchery at the 8:00 natural.
3:30 - A full eight lings pop out of Jaedong's saved larva, a very aggressive move. Oddly enough he checks for a hidden expansion at 5:00 first, rather than try to run directly to Stork's base to see if he's not ready.
4:28 - It turns out the long detour didn't matter as Jaedong still gets into Stork's base anyway. It's the same mistake from Stork in game one. He needs to keep that choke ling-tight!
4:40 - Not terribly damaging stuff from Jaedong, but at least he can piss off Stork for as long as he desires to micro his zerglings. Jaedong only sees a stargate, so it's not like he's been tipped off to something big.
5:56 - Robotics support bay completes at Stork's natural. It would actually have been pretty simple for Jaedong's single ling to have made a detour to check out Stork's natural and completely ruin Stork's plan. Sair reaver would be another nice variation after two games of sair/citadel. Meanwhile, Jaedong is playing standard scourge + mass drones.
6:52 - Nope! Not sair-reaver. Three gates in the main for a dragoon-reaver push. Jaedong now has the 8:00 main and a ton of drones. Stork caught Jaedong powering too hard the past two games with some good early pressure, but neither of them were really all-ins or particularly aggressive builds. This dragoon reaver build however, could very much be all-or-nothing against an impending 4 hatch muta. +1 attack upgrades as well, which won't be nearly as useful on dragoons as they are on zealots.
7:31 - Jaedong sees Stork's plan with his scourge....
7:51 - ...with the reaver coming out just now and his spire having been completed very long ago, I'd say this is plenty of time for Jaedong to have been preparing. I'm not even sure what timing this build from Stork is supposed to exploit. 4 gate reaver-goon that attacks more than a minute after spire, cool?
8:17 - Stork's army already looks dreadfully thin, and Jaedong does brilliantly to cut off a dragoon. With speedlings threatening to cut off reinforcing dragoons, Stork is under some serious pressure to make things happen FAST.
8:36 - So, Jaedong had five sunkens by the time Stork arrived, and there were five dragoons to try and protect a single shuttle from four scourge. The further this game goes on, the harder it is to see how Stork's build was supposed to work. Also, corsairs anyone? Also, Kwark offered his thoughts on what might have been going through Stork's mind.
"it's the old goonsair rush
it started off goon rushes with micro
but muta owns it
so p evolved to work in sairs
and z sunked up
so they evolved to work in a reaver
and then stork was like "yeah, but if i stop making sairs i can add an extra gateway"
and then JD was like "i'm gonna win now"
and then stork was all like ""
^how it went down"
8:54 - I almost think Stork stopped trying here with his reaver and goons a world apart. He has to know he's gonna lose this game anyway.
9:20 - Reaver goes down, and it's essentially over. Jaedong choses to counter Stork instead of beating up all of his goons, though either option would have worked here.
10:06 - GG
Match Rating: 3/10
Terribly one-sided, but Stork's bizarre build was at least somewhat interesting to observe in its failure. No surprises here, reaver/goon has been losing to mutas since 1998.
Jaedong: 7/10
Stork's build was terrible, but Jaedong did happen to pick it apart particularly well while pushing the limits of greed.
Stork: 2/10
One point for creativity, and one baseline point.
01:30 - For the first time in the series, Jaedong goes for a 12 hatch opening. Meanwhile, getting shafted by 9 pool in the first game is still deep in Stork's mind as he sends a second probe to scout after his first one whiffs. Having started forge first, he needed to know what his next building should have been. On the other hand, Jaedong hardly seems to care what Stork is doing.
2:30 - A nexus goes down before cannon like it should, while Jaedong goes and takes a third hatchery at the 8:00 natural.
3:30 - A full eight lings pop out of Jaedong's saved larva, a very aggressive move. Oddly enough he checks for a hidden expansion at 5:00 first, rather than try to run directly to Stork's base to see if he's not ready.
4:28 - It turns out the long detour didn't matter as Jaedong still gets into Stork's base anyway. It's the same mistake from Stork in game one. He needs to keep that choke ling-tight!
4:40 - Not terribly damaging stuff from Jaedong, but at least he can piss off Stork for as long as he desires to micro his zerglings. Jaedong only sees a stargate, so it's not like he's been tipped off to something big.
5:56 - Robotics support bay completes at Stork's natural. It would actually have been pretty simple for Jaedong's single ling to have made a detour to check out Stork's natural and completely ruin Stork's plan. Sair reaver would be another nice variation after two games of sair/citadel. Meanwhile, Jaedong is playing standard scourge + mass drones.
6:52 - Nope! Not sair-reaver. Three gates in the main for a dragoon-reaver push. Jaedong now has the 8:00 main and a ton of drones. Stork caught Jaedong powering too hard the past two games with some good early pressure, but neither of them were really all-ins or particularly aggressive builds. This dragoon reaver build however, could very much be all-or-nothing against an impending 4 hatch muta. +1 attack upgrades as well, which won't be nearly as useful on dragoons as they are on zealots.
7:31 - Jaedong sees Stork's plan with his scourge....
7:51 - ...with the reaver coming out just now and his spire having been completed very long ago, I'd say this is plenty of time for Jaedong to have been preparing. I'm not even sure what timing this build from Stork is supposed to exploit. 4 gate reaver-goon that attacks more than a minute after spire, cool?
8:17 - Stork's army already looks dreadfully thin, and Jaedong does brilliantly to cut off a dragoon. With speedlings threatening to cut off reinforcing dragoons, Stork is under some serious pressure to make things happen FAST.
8:36 - So, Jaedong had five sunkens by the time Stork arrived, and there were five dragoons to try and protect a single shuttle from four scourge. The further this game goes on, the harder it is to see how Stork's build was supposed to work. Also, corsairs anyone? Also, Kwark offered his thoughts on what might have been going through Stork's mind.
"it's the old goonsair rush
it started off goon rushes with micro
but muta owns it
so p evolved to work in sairs
and z sunked up
so they evolved to work in a reaver
and then stork was like "yeah, but if i stop making sairs i can add an extra gateway"
and then JD was like "i'm gonna win now"
and then stork was all like ""
^how it went down"
8:54 - I almost think Stork stopped trying here with his reaver and goons a world apart. He has to know he's gonna lose this game anyway.
9:20 - Reaver goes down, and it's essentially over. Jaedong choses to counter Stork instead of beating up all of his goons, though either option would have worked here.
10:06 - GG
Match Rating: 3/10
Terribly one-sided, but Stork's bizarre build was at least somewhat interesting to observe in its failure. No surprises here, reaver/goon has been losing to mutas since 1998.
Jaedong: 7/10
Stork's build was terrible, but Jaedong did happen to pick it apart particularly well while pushing the limits of greed.
Stork: 2/10
One point for creativity, and one baseline point.
Game Five - Grand Line SE - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
0:00 - Jaedong top right, Stork bottom right. Grand Line SE has almost identical rush distances for horizontal and vertical starts, so there could be a game 1 repeat.
1:05-08 - Jaedong goes straight 9 pool like the first game on grand line SE. This time Stork is scouting with his pylon probe, as late scouting hurt him last game. However, a pylon scout will still only see pool in time if he scouts Zerg on the first try. Luckily for Stork, his scouting is in the right direction.
1:40 - Forge first for stork, like he should.
2:06 - And a cannon before nexus, like he should.
2:25 - Jaedong holds off and decides to kill the scouting probe, since a scouted 9 pool probably isn't going to do much damage.
3:40 - Stork does a really good job here to keep his probe alive for a long time, and just barely misses out on seeing that Jaedong got ling speed before lair.
4:53 - Jaedong goes for a Zergling break as his speedling upgrade finishes. Stork knows it is coming and prepares with 2 zealots and a probe at his simcity choke, but Jaedong opts to go for it anyway seeing as there is only one cannon.
5:15 - A critical blunder from Stork. Having fended off the first attack, Stork pulls back all of his probes to mine again. Was he just gambling that Jaedong would not send a second wave of units? I can't count the number of games Shine and Kwanro have won when their opponent relaxed after stopping the first attack, only to be overrun by Zerg's second wave. Stork should actually be defending even MORE carefully now, considering Zerg has two more hatcheries at this point, and he still only has one cannon. Why not build another cannon? Stork did that on Polaris Rhapsody, and he won that game.
5:23 - And Stork pays the price.
5:44 - Stork had a chance to stay alive here, but he let Jaedong entice him away from warping cannon with lings. If his probes had hugged it for dear life, he may have had time to complete it. Alas.
6:37 - We see that Stork didn't have that many probes mining his main all this time, and that he even had to cut gas to keep his economy running. All of that lost mining time at his natural was really hurting him.
7:45 - GG
Match Rating: 1/10
Eight minute death by ling run-through.
Jaedong: 6/10
Stork handed him the win, but he still had some nice ling micro.
Stork: 1/10
Way to bookend the series with the same terrible mistake.
1:05-08 - Jaedong goes straight 9 pool like the first game on grand line SE. This time Stork is scouting with his pylon probe, as late scouting hurt him last game. However, a pylon scout will still only see pool in time if he scouts Zerg on the first try. Luckily for Stork, his scouting is in the right direction.
1:40 - Forge first for stork, like he should.
2:06 - And a cannon before nexus, like he should.
2:25 - Jaedong holds off and decides to kill the scouting probe, since a scouted 9 pool probably isn't going to do much damage.
3:40 - Stork does a really good job here to keep his probe alive for a long time, and just barely misses out on seeing that Jaedong got ling speed before lair.
4:53 - Jaedong goes for a Zergling break as his speedling upgrade finishes. Stork knows it is coming and prepares with 2 zealots and a probe at his simcity choke, but Jaedong opts to go for it anyway seeing as there is only one cannon.
5:15 - A critical blunder from Stork. Having fended off the first attack, Stork pulls back all of his probes to mine again. Was he just gambling that Jaedong would not send a second wave of units? I can't count the number of games Shine and Kwanro have won when their opponent relaxed after stopping the first attack, only to be overrun by Zerg's second wave. Stork should actually be defending even MORE carefully now, considering Zerg has two more hatcheries at this point, and he still only has one cannon. Why not build another cannon? Stork did that on Polaris Rhapsody, and he won that game.
5:23 - And Stork pays the price.
5:44 - Stork had a chance to stay alive here, but he let Jaedong entice him away from warping cannon with lings. If his probes had hugged it for dear life, he may have had time to complete it. Alas.
6:37 - We see that Stork didn't have that many probes mining his main all this time, and that he even had to cut gas to keep his economy running. All of that lost mining time at his natural was really hurting him.
7:45 - GG
Match Rating: 1/10
Eight minute death by ling run-through.
Jaedong: 6/10
Stork handed him the win, but he still had some nice ling micro.
Stork: 1/10
Way to bookend the series with the same terrible mistake.
By KwarK
Game One - Grand Line SE - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
2:30 Flash goes for a barracks expand which is a very nice macro build, especially when you can wall in like he did. It's basically really good against anything Protoss can do and still pretty safe vs cheese, especially with a blind bunker which he adds at 3:15.
3:48 free finally scouts the fact he's probably against a barracks expand whle still on one base himself.
4:20 free counterexpands at a considerable economic disadvantage.
5:43 free takes the 5:00 main. Now this I love. He's got two basic choices here. He can either go two base vs two base and hope to overwhelm Flash's army with speedlots and storm in the medium term and then use his victory to expand or he can go for a third base and hope he can get enough return on his investment to survive and eventually win. That's fairly self evident. However then we consider the map, Flash basically has a second natural at 11:30 and even if free did get some hardcore map control going on and then crushed Flash's first push Flash would still end up on three bases about the same time free did. Going two base isn't really viable. As for expanding, when they got an economic advantage early then there will be a timing when their investments are reaping dividends while your own have yet to recover their expense and this is free's biggest worry. That if he takes a third Flash will just come out and kill everything before it repays. If free took his second natural then this would be easy, Flash would just cross the map and leave two tanks blasting the third while the rest sieged the natural. But taking 5:00 and then building gateways there negates all that because Flash cannot ever push to it. On a map this size it's a nightmare for a Terran to slow push an uncontained Protoss and taking 5:00 (rather than 00:30) makes free uncontainable.
06:40 free starts spamming gateways without any tech and with three bases. At the same time Flash pushes out, right before the gateways kick in and a reaver is produced. Beautiful.
8:00 Flash establishes his contain but the third he expected isn't there. With two base against three free is happy to play for time.
8:40 free realises he is contained and starts making gateways at 5:00, rather too late.
9:20 free uses his reaver to harass which is a massive mistake. No progamer in the last few years has got as many scv kills as it'd take to slow down Flash's push whereas a shuttle with a reaver can completely cut off reinforcements. Without a wraith there is absolutely nothing stopping the reaver from taking free shots at any units heading to support Flash's contain. It's not as cool to watch because you know the reaver is doing its job when it gets no kills but you make up for it when Flash's cool timing attack becomes a band of stranded, outnumbered and surrounded units. Why massacre scvs when you can massacre tanks? Additionally at this point the first shuttle and a second shuttle he is producing should be used to ferry as many units as possible out of free's main.
10:45 Flash's contain pushes a little forwards and loses one of its tanks for three dragoons. It also gives away that he only has five tanks left. Just five! That's nothing if you can engage them. It is at this timing that in an ideal world the shuttle would bring the reaver back, the eight zealots and four dragoons ferried from 01:00 to 00:30 would flank and the main army would break out. Under attack from both sides with no reinforcements, a reaver taking microed shots from shuttle safety and just five tanks free could break out with almost no losses. He doesn't do this though.
11:20 With a tiny force containing free's main and free's natural dead Flash is free to go kill 05:00. At the same time he reinforces the contain with more mines and vultures.
12:00 free suicides into the contain from a single angle.
An army worth a quarter of the Protoss force kills everything because free refused to flank.
free had so many assets that provided map control this game. He had 05:00 which I've already explained as being huge, he had shuttles, he had an ideal landing ground for ferrying units out at 00:30, he had the reaver, he could even have left his first few dragoons out on the map rather than retreat himself into a corner. But despite arming himself with every asset imaginable he lacked the vision to use Flash's push to his advantage. It was always going to be very difficult to stop Flash's push from killing something simply because Flash had more money to spend at that part of the midgame. But with 03:00 coming and 05:00 up that's entirely acceptable, especially if it results in the isolation and annihilation of Flash's first army. An absolutely uninspired game by him. Mechanically he wasn't bad but strategically it was painful. As for Flash, it was a pretty cute build, barracks expand into timing tank marine push. I'll give him credit for that but he never had room to really shine because free was just playing so badly. He needs to be pushed a little more to really show how good he is.
free 2/5
Flash 4/5
Game 2/5
3:48 free finally scouts the fact he's probably against a barracks expand whle still on one base himself.
4:20 free counterexpands at a considerable economic disadvantage.
5:43 free takes the 5:00 main. Now this I love. He's got two basic choices here. He can either go two base vs two base and hope to overwhelm Flash's army with speedlots and storm in the medium term and then use his victory to expand or he can go for a third base and hope he can get enough return on his investment to survive and eventually win. That's fairly self evident. However then we consider the map, Flash basically has a second natural at 11:30 and even if free did get some hardcore map control going on and then crushed Flash's first push Flash would still end up on three bases about the same time free did. Going two base isn't really viable. As for expanding, when they got an economic advantage early then there will be a timing when their investments are reaping dividends while your own have yet to recover their expense and this is free's biggest worry. That if he takes a third Flash will just come out and kill everything before it repays. If free took his second natural then this would be easy, Flash would just cross the map and leave two tanks blasting the third while the rest sieged the natural. But taking 5:00 and then building gateways there negates all that because Flash cannot ever push to it. On a map this size it's a nightmare for a Terran to slow push an uncontained Protoss and taking 5:00 (rather than 00:30) makes free uncontainable.
06:40 free starts spamming gateways without any tech and with three bases. At the same time Flash pushes out, right before the gateways kick in and a reaver is produced. Beautiful.
8:00 Flash establishes his contain but the third he expected isn't there. With two base against three free is happy to play for time.
8:40 free realises he is contained and starts making gateways at 5:00, rather too late.
9:20 free uses his reaver to harass which is a massive mistake. No progamer in the last few years has got as many scv kills as it'd take to slow down Flash's push whereas a shuttle with a reaver can completely cut off reinforcements. Without a wraith there is absolutely nothing stopping the reaver from taking free shots at any units heading to support Flash's contain. It's not as cool to watch because you know the reaver is doing its job when it gets no kills but you make up for it when Flash's cool timing attack becomes a band of stranded, outnumbered and surrounded units. Why massacre scvs when you can massacre tanks? Additionally at this point the first shuttle and a second shuttle he is producing should be used to ferry as many units as possible out of free's main.
10:45 Flash's contain pushes a little forwards and loses one of its tanks for three dragoons. It also gives away that he only has five tanks left. Just five! That's nothing if you can engage them. It is at this timing that in an ideal world the shuttle would bring the reaver back, the eight zealots and four dragoons ferried from 01:00 to 00:30 would flank and the main army would break out. Under attack from both sides with no reinforcements, a reaver taking microed shots from shuttle safety and just five tanks free could break out with almost no losses. He doesn't do this though.
11:20 With a tiny force containing free's main and free's natural dead Flash is free to go kill 05:00. At the same time he reinforces the contain with more mines and vultures.
12:00 free suicides into the contain from a single angle.
An army worth a quarter of the Protoss force kills everything because free refused to flank.
free had so many assets that provided map control this game. He had 05:00 which I've already explained as being huge, he had shuttles, he had an ideal landing ground for ferrying units out at 00:30, he had the reaver, he could even have left his first few dragoons out on the map rather than retreat himself into a corner. But despite arming himself with every asset imaginable he lacked the vision to use Flash's push to his advantage. It was always going to be very difficult to stop Flash's push from killing something simply because Flash had more money to spend at that part of the midgame. But with 03:00 coming and 05:00 up that's entirely acceptable, especially if it results in the isolation and annihilation of Flash's first army. An absolutely uninspired game by him. Mechanically he wasn't bad but strategically it was painful. As for Flash, it was a pretty cute build, barracks expand into timing tank marine push. I'll give him credit for that but he never had room to really shine because free was just playing so badly. He needs to be pushed a little more to really show how good he is.
free 2/5
Flash 4/5
Game 2/5
Game Two - Flight-Dreamliner - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
07:11 start
12:13 free takes a very sloppy dragoon loss which makes Flash's push much harder for him to defend, forcing him to use his reaver instead of potentially harassing while holding with dragoons.
13:32 free lets his shuttle drift a little far forwards and Flash immediately pounces on the mistake and snipes the reaver. However as Flash attempts to resume his position free breaks out and replies with some good tank kills of his own.
15:00 Game settles into two base vs two base and free heads to carrier but Flash was able to do his push off of a single factory while doing the quick academy armoury combination that loves the late game. free goes carriers anyway because if you play it right you can constantly threaten base swaps on this map with the assurance that no matter how you swap you're gonna end up with the island and carriers defending it. And while they hesitate and block counterattacks your carrier count increases until there's nothing they can do. And if free was Stork I'd think it was a great idea to try it.
17:19 Flash double expands as it becomes clear that neither can push and that free intends to go carriers. These were perfectly timed, Flash having got his tech in order, started his upgrades and then gone for economy in time to mass produce double upgraded goliaths as the carriers came out. free just takes a single expansion as a wraith suppressed his attempted island expansion.
21:25 free tries to use some carriers to lure Flash while dragoons harass 12:00 but the carriers have no upgrades and the goliaths are 2-1 so the interceptors all die in seconds. Flash then walls off the gap in his defences.
23:25 Flash maxes and finishes 3-2 upgrades and just attack moves. Mass dragoons, carriers and storms do better than you'd expect but the carriers tie up far too much resources for very little damage output. With no upgrades they're just a burden while a two control groups of zealots could have made a real difference.
This game just made me nostalgic for the semifinals that could have been. Stork has been doing some great PvT carrier play on Dreamliner recently and this was a pale imitation. Flash had seen it all before and pre-emptively countered everything while free's dragoon counters seemed unwieldy and blunt compared to the fluid ninja play Stork shows. Basically Flash knew what was going to happen and free isn't good enough to do the build at the best of times. And given there has yet to be discovered an alternative PvT build this is obviously a problem. It would have been nice is free had risen to the challenge and shown us something new but I guess I can't blame him for trying what everyone else does. It did show him up as just another Protoss before the titan that is Flash though and what I can blame him for is not getting carrier upgrades. When their armour is half your damage things are going wrong. Bad free!
free 2/5
Flash 4/5
Game 2/5
12:13 free takes a very sloppy dragoon loss which makes Flash's push much harder for him to defend, forcing him to use his reaver instead of potentially harassing while holding with dragoons.
13:32 free lets his shuttle drift a little far forwards and Flash immediately pounces on the mistake and snipes the reaver. However as Flash attempts to resume his position free breaks out and replies with some good tank kills of his own.
15:00 Game settles into two base vs two base and free heads to carrier but Flash was able to do his push off of a single factory while doing the quick academy armoury combination that loves the late game. free goes carriers anyway because if you play it right you can constantly threaten base swaps on this map with the assurance that no matter how you swap you're gonna end up with the island and carriers defending it. And while they hesitate and block counterattacks your carrier count increases until there's nothing they can do. And if free was Stork I'd think it was a great idea to try it.
17:19 Flash double expands as it becomes clear that neither can push and that free intends to go carriers. These were perfectly timed, Flash having got his tech in order, started his upgrades and then gone for economy in time to mass produce double upgraded goliaths as the carriers came out. free just takes a single expansion as a wraith suppressed his attempted island expansion.
21:25 free tries to use some carriers to lure Flash while dragoons harass 12:00 but the carriers have no upgrades and the goliaths are 2-1 so the interceptors all die in seconds. Flash then walls off the gap in his defences.
23:25 Flash maxes and finishes 3-2 upgrades and just attack moves. Mass dragoons, carriers and storms do better than you'd expect but the carriers tie up far too much resources for very little damage output. With no upgrades they're just a burden while a two control groups of zealots could have made a real difference.
This game just made me nostalgic for the semifinals that could have been. Stork has been doing some great PvT carrier play on Dreamliner recently and this was a pale imitation. Flash had seen it all before and pre-emptively countered everything while free's dragoon counters seemed unwieldy and blunt compared to the fluid ninja play Stork shows. Basically Flash knew what was going to happen and free isn't good enough to do the build at the best of times. And given there has yet to be discovered an alternative PvT build this is obviously a problem. It would have been nice is free had risen to the challenge and shown us something new but I guess I can't blame him for trying what everyone else does. It did show him up as just another Protoss before the titan that is Flash though and what I can blame him for is not getting carrier upgrades. When their armour is half your damage things are going wrong. Bad free!
free 2/5
Flash 4/5
Game 2/5
Game Three - Polaris Rhapsody - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
0:15 free sends a probe to proxy rush
1:36 Flash does a forwards 10 rax which is very close to the gateway. Meanwhile free sends his probe back to mimic a normal scout timing and direction and doesn't see it.
2:30 Flash sends his scv to scout and because his rax is off the direct route it goes up straight into the gateway.
+ Show Spoiler [Flash's reaction] +
The zealots beat the marines into the base and Flash could never get his marines to the safety of scvs and micro. free micros excellently on the ramp to deny them and the zealots ruin Flash's economy while free is teching up and has a strong economy, second gateway and core. free just sent his dragoons in and the game was done. There were a few minutes of Flash holding on with mines but when free had twice his supply and over twice his economy then it was barely worth watching.
In my opinion Flash got unlucky here. I'm not entirely sure why he did the forward hidden ten barracks but this was the absolute worst situation for it. Flash has very competent marine/scv micro and would have little trouble holding free's rush under normal circumstances, although that would in turn not be a problem for free who didn't commit much to it. free's opening was aggressive but not cheesy or allin and it just happened that he hit the jackpot this time. Over a decent number of games these things happen.
free 4/5
Flash 3/5
Game 1/5
1:36 Flash does a forwards 10 rax which is very close to the gateway. Meanwhile free sends his probe back to mimic a normal scout timing and direction and doesn't see it.
2:30 Flash sends his scv to scout and because his rax is off the direct route it goes up straight into the gateway.
+ Show Spoiler [Flash's reaction] +
The zealots beat the marines into the base and Flash could never get his marines to the safety of scvs and micro. free micros excellently on the ramp to deny them and the zealots ruin Flash's economy while free is teching up and has a strong economy, second gateway and core. free just sent his dragoons in and the game was done. There were a few minutes of Flash holding on with mines but when free had twice his supply and over twice his economy then it was barely worth watching.
In my opinion Flash got unlucky here. I'm not entirely sure why he did the forward hidden ten barracks but this was the absolute worst situation for it. Flash has very competent marine/scv micro and would have little trouble holding free's rush under normal circumstances, although that would in turn not be a problem for free who didn't commit much to it. free's opening was aggressive but not cheesy or allin and it just happened that he hit the jackpot this time. Over a decent number of games these things happen.
free 4/5
Flash 3/5
Game 1/5
Game Four - Eye of the Storm - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
0:00 Cross positions EotS. Great for the midgame PvT but it means that if it goes to the late game Flash will be close to Free's crucial 4th base.
2:50 Blind rax expand, great counter to fast nexus, playable vs anything else but fast dragoon range is cheap and will give him trouble while not costing free anything. Flash can repair and is in no danger but it's just messy.
4:20 Excellent micro to shut down marine production and get a free kill. You can see Flash realizing he can't produce rines anymore and cancelling one.
5:12 SUPPLY BLOCK AT THE MOST CRUCIAL TIME EVER!!! Come on Flash, he was shooting it for several minutes, you could have anticipated that.
5:54 Flash gets siege mode and free pulls back because he's committed virtually no resources to this rush, just a few dragoons off of a gateway he had anyway while building up his economy.
6:40 Tanks hidden behind a wall and then a suicidal vulture to lure dragoons nearby, man Flash can be cute sometimes.
7:30 Observers on the map and free makes the decision to play to keep Flash on two bases and map control with arbiters rather than macro. A fourth gateway goes down and he goes to arbiter tech off of two gas which in turn means no storm.
8:45 If that was deliberate, best thing ever.
9:05 free decides he can't deny Flash his third without a frontal attack and switches into a late third base. The investment in units then changing his mind isn't really optimal as Flash now pushes as the nexus finishes.
11:00 Flash starts his starport. This is huge that it is so late. It means he's completely cut his tech for a massive timing attack right now. If free gets up a decent mass of arbiters then Flash is going to have a lot of trouble trying to EMP them but right now it means he has a huge amount of tanks and free can't hold his third.
11:15 Classic Flash timing attack and what's best is that he knows free has no chance of holding it. Flash immediately bails the attack leaving three tanks to clean up 12 while cutting off reinforcements and sandwiching free's predictable counterattack. Dismantling him clinically.
Rest of the game: Flash had more bases and more units. What's to analyse?
19:01 lol moment when Flash's entire army is stasised and it looks like free has something and then it thaws and just kills all his units.
If I tried to find words to describe how completely Flash dominated this game then half the comments would either be complaining at my choice of words or making bad analogies. free just never got anything going, no momentum, no aggression, the entire game was just one long road to an inevitable defeat and I imagine free himself couldn't help but feel doomed. So, how did this happen? free's build was completely wrong for what Flash was doing.
Although Flash's opening gave him an economic advantage it wasn't huge. Where free went wrong was giving Flash a huge amount of freedom in the midgame. free could read the situation
+ Show Spoiler [reading the situation] +
Flash can either push or expand.
If push he can slow push or fast push.
It is cross positions with a wide open middle.
He cannot fast push.
I have observer tech and can adapt my build.
Slow push is fine.
Flash can therefore expand.
I can break expansion or I can counterexpand.
Expansion is high ground with a narrow, wallable choke, nearby terrain support and the command centre can be flown in and out.
I counterexpand. and somehow managed to choose the third option, ignore everything that Flash was doing and head to arbiters. By leaving Flash to his own devices he allowed Flash to adapt into a very cool mass unit low tech timing attack that destroyed free's economy just before he had the tech to defend it. It was very precise, hit a very narrow window and was extremely vulnerable if he got it wrong. But Flash is awesome.
free however, is not awesome. While the OSL observer may not have felt it was interesting to show us how many factories Flash had or how late his starport was but I bet free found out (even with two observers lost). That fast arbiter map control build is great against the double armoury camping thing but Flash wasn't doing that and it's free's job to find out. In the past we've seen some great games where the Protoss pre-empts the Terran camp until late game strategy and beats them at it by rushing to late game even faster than the Terran but this is a classic example of the Terran keeping the Protoss honest. A midgame timing attack against an opponent blindly rushing to the lategame.
free 2/5
Flash 5/5
Game 3/5
2:50 Blind rax expand, great counter to fast nexus, playable vs anything else but fast dragoon range is cheap and will give him trouble while not costing free anything. Flash can repair and is in no danger but it's just messy.
4:20 Excellent micro to shut down marine production and get a free kill. You can see Flash realizing he can't produce rines anymore and cancelling one.
5:12 SUPPLY BLOCK AT THE MOST CRUCIAL TIME EVER!!! Come on Flash, he was shooting it for several minutes, you could have anticipated that.
5:54 Flash gets siege mode and free pulls back because he's committed virtually no resources to this rush, just a few dragoons off of a gateway he had anyway while building up his economy.
6:40 Tanks hidden behind a wall and then a suicidal vulture to lure dragoons nearby, man Flash can be cute sometimes.
7:30 Observers on the map and free makes the decision to play to keep Flash on two bases and map control with arbiters rather than macro. A fourth gateway goes down and he goes to arbiter tech off of two gas which in turn means no storm.
8:45 If that was deliberate, best thing ever.
9:05 free decides he can't deny Flash his third without a frontal attack and switches into a late third base. The investment in units then changing his mind isn't really optimal as Flash now pushes as the nexus finishes.
11:00 Flash starts his starport. This is huge that it is so late. It means he's completely cut his tech for a massive timing attack right now. If free gets up a decent mass of arbiters then Flash is going to have a lot of trouble trying to EMP them but right now it means he has a huge amount of tanks and free can't hold his third.
11:15 Classic Flash timing attack and what's best is that he knows free has no chance of holding it. Flash immediately bails the attack leaving three tanks to clean up 12 while cutting off reinforcements and sandwiching free's predictable counterattack. Dismantling him clinically.
Rest of the game: Flash had more bases and more units. What's to analyse?
19:01 lol moment when Flash's entire army is stasised and it looks like free has something and then it thaws and just kills all his units.
If I tried to find words to describe how completely Flash dominated this game then half the comments would either be complaining at my choice of words or making bad analogies. free just never got anything going, no momentum, no aggression, the entire game was just one long road to an inevitable defeat and I imagine free himself couldn't help but feel doomed. So, how did this happen? free's build was completely wrong for what Flash was doing.
Although Flash's opening gave him an economic advantage it wasn't huge. Where free went wrong was giving Flash a huge amount of freedom in the midgame. free could read the situation
+ Show Spoiler [reading the situation] +
Flash can either push or expand.
If push he can slow push or fast push.
It is cross positions with a wide open middle.
He cannot fast push.
I have observer tech and can adapt my build.
Slow push is fine.
Flash can therefore expand.
I can break expansion or I can counterexpand.
Expansion is high ground with a narrow, wallable choke, nearby terrain support and the command centre can be flown in and out.
I counterexpand.
free however, is not awesome. While the OSL observer may not have felt it was interesting to show us how many factories Flash had or how late his starport was but I bet free found out (even with two observers lost). That fast arbiter map control build is great against the double armoury camping thing but Flash wasn't doing that and it's free's job to find out. In the past we've seen some great games where the Protoss pre-empts the Terran camp until late game strategy and beats them at it by rushing to late game even faster than the Terran but this is a classic example of the Terran keeping the Protoss honest. A midgame timing attack against an opponent blindly rushing to the lategame.
free 2/5
Flash 5/5
Game 3/5
Game Five - Grand Line SE - VOD
+ Show Spoiler [Battle Report] +
The series ended 3-1.
But enough with the semifinals. We're moving on to bigger, better things... in China. Not long from now, Flash and Jaedong will be touching down in China to play the OSL finals in a tower. Korean Air is so badass.
Taking the World by Storm
by flamewheel
by flamewheel
The year is 2009, and the tremors have yet to start happening. The world of Brood War is quiet. A few of the great--Fantasy, Bisu, Jaedong--fight above the rest, but for the most part it is as it has always been. Flash, so prominent during 2008 has fallen into silence.
But then came the time of troubles, and the world would be flipped upside down. Bisu fell away, his days of prominence had ended, and Fantasy slipped back into the shadows. Jaedong, too, lost some of the powerful drive he had coming into the latter half of the year, but he did not fall. He was stopped.
With the advent of late 2009, Flash came back with a monstrous resurgence. Like a fearsome tornado touching down in a small town he took down all in his path, tossing the bodies by the wayside. Whispers, rumours, the b-word started being bandied around again.
But Flash was not alone, for Lee Jaedong was not yet done. There were others that too did not completely fall, there were those yet who still presented a fight. Brood War continued onward, the struggles had not yet ceased. There was no complete domination, but it wasn't long before it looked again as if a few were starting to pull very far ahead of the rest of the crowd.
But in this time of troubles, there are outside forces at work. Savior, the man first crowned Bonjwa, the dark prince of the Zerg, was revealed for who he truly was, and with that he brought down a host of people. The proscene shook, and darkness crept into the world. Starcraft II was released, and like an insidious poison it worked itself into the very essence of Brood War, and the structures started to fall. One by one, the world of Brood War started crumbling. Heroes, icons, players and coaches of old all fell, vanishing into shadow. It was a dark time for
They dominated.
And now, the Brood War scene has quintessentially become a showdown between Flash vs Jaedong. There has not yet been a final in 2010 in which there wasn't at least one of the two participating, and between the NATE MSL finals, Hana Daetoo MSL finals, and 2010 WCG finals, the two have found themselves staring at each other from across the battlefield with the gold at stake. While the world of Brood War rots around them, Flash and Jaedong continue surging ahead. They continue onward, to what end none of us can even guess at, but they keep fighting, and they keep getting stronger.
As pretty much every ranking has shown, Flash and Jaedong are the two best in a crumbling world. KeSPA ranking, ELO, Power Rank--they are dominated by these two. One, a child prodigy turned machine and the other, the "Legend Killer" thus dubbed Tyrant will meet yet again. In the Pearl Tower of Shanghai, away from their own country, Flash and Jaedong will face each other again in the Korean Air Season II OSL finals. And even if the world of Brood War dies around them, this will be a fitting end.
(I know that OSL will continue on, but if teams and Proleague are removed the very essence of Brood War dies, and I wouldn't envision a BW OSL lasting long)
Next, KwarK has taken some time out of his morning to write up some map analysis, so let's take a look at that.
Map Analysis
by KwarK
by KwarK
EotS appears balanced with Terran having a slight edge in the statistics but not an unreasonable one given the sample size. It's also the crucial opening set. The only Zerg favoured map is in game four and obviously if he doesn't take one of the first three games then that becomes irrelevant so this is the most important game of the series. If he loses EotS Jaedong has to take a game on a strongly Terran favoured map against Flash, just to avoid going 0-3. And while we know Jaedong appears to be immune to pressure that's not a good situation to be in. EotS will define this series, if Jaedong takes it he can lose the two following games, win Dreamliner and take it home for go back to EotS at 2-2 having already beaten Flash once on it today. That's a very good place to be in. If on the other hand he loses it then going out 0-3 becomes a likely possibility and in turn a self fulfilling prophecy. Game one is the game to watch.
Polaris Rhapsody isn't hugely Terran favoured but Flash has been making it seem that way. It's very good for his brand of turtle Terran into dividing the map and pushing that one crucial last expansion to cut off any option the Zerg may have. It loves mech play and the whole map is a killing ground for minefields. In my opinion Flash actually defies the statistics here by being more favoured TvZ here than they would suggest, despite it being a Terran favoured map. Flash almost certainly takes this game which in turn opens up possibilities that Jaedong will try something awesome to avoid playing the late game the way Flash wants. Still, while it's possible it's not likely. Flash takes this game nine times out of ten and that really sucks for us in a finals. The only advantage for Jaedong is that Flash is unlikely to get any real momentum from winning because he's expected to so if he equalisies Jaedong won't feel too pressured. If on the other hand Jaedong wins it then it begins to look like the start of a rout for Flash.
Grand Line SE doesn't get down on its knees and service Flash's playstyle in the same way Polaris Rhapsody does but statistically it's still hugely Terran favoured. It's a big macro map like Fighting Spirit except with more good terrain for Terran and no gas at the second natural for Zerg. Flash will play it just like he plays Fighting Spirit, he will try to contain expansions, particularly one middle expansion between them, and try and set himself up at another main base with a load of factories. It's not about a quick, smooth win, it's about area control and the remaining resources. Jaedong will establish another main early and Flash knows he will and is okay with that. The result will be that Flash is on the back foot in the midgame but by the lategame all the resources will be concentrated in the quarter of the map with neither of their main bases and without Jaedong's second main. Flash will be building that up with factories from the midgame and will cover it with tanks, forcing Jaedong into suicidal aggressive play. It'll come down to the old guardian and drop with swarm combo and that's really hard for Zerg to do correctly. Assuming there is no massive micro mistake early that allows Jaedong to get an advantage this game will play out exactly as Flash wants it to and Jaedong will mine out in the late game and be unable to secure one last expansion in the no mans land. We've seen it all before and Flash is very good at it.
Dreamliner we'll see Jaedong win, if it gets that far. He'll do some amazing mutalisk harass while actually transitioning into a three hatch lurker hive. I know how much he loves to show off his micro but this is the finals and it actually matters so this time he'll do it perfectly. And it'll be awesome. Of course one micro mistake with mutalisks like a late split under irradiate and it's over but there's a reason Jaedong is the best. So, assuming he wins one of the first three games which is like assuming he wins game one Jaedong will equalise this game.
That'll take us back to EotS where it all started. If we're here in game five (and personally I don't think we will be) then Jaedong has defied the odds and already either beaten Flash here or at his own game on one of his best maps. And that may just be all the edge Jaedong needs to do it again. It's Flash so it won't be easy but assuming a result other than 3-0 Flash a 3-2 Jaedong win is possible and personally I'm hoping for it.
What more can I say? Let's get ready for OSL. Tell a friend, get some snacks, stock up on Mountain Dew. The time has come.
Somehow I got Shanghaied into making this. Either way, thanks to KwarK and Wax for their work, and thanks to the graphics guys for the baller pictures.
Also this post was started before MSL post-finals recap went out, so it doesn't count for anything.