This Foreigner Special covers Liquid`Jinro's match against HongUnPrime.WE with battle reports and a post game interview. Also included are two (late) battle reports of FXO.mOOngLaDe's match against ZeNEXJJUN and Liquid`Ret's match against SlayerS_M.
GSL Code S Ro32 Foreigner Special: Liquid`Jinro
By Divinek
Images courtesy of GomTV
By Divinek
Images courtesy of GomTV
Liquid`Jinro = Red | HongUnPrime.WE = Blue
T6 Game 1 - Metalopolis P2
+ Show Spoiler [Show Recap] +
Jinro begins with a factory first build, only to float this away for scouting purposes while transitioning into a starport and a second factory. Hungun chooses 1 gate into robo followed up by a second gateway. He utilizes this fast robo to get an even faster observer out, Jinro’s close and he needs to know what’s up. Following this up Hungun tries to put some pressure with his initial units but meets the wall that is a lone terran bunker.
Jinro show’s us his immediate intention with this starport is to get rid of those pesky observers. With the initial raven he builds, he’s able to snipe off Hungun’s scouting observers putting him in some uncertainty for what’s about to come.
Jinro proceeds to demonstrate his prowess not only in his mechanical talents, but also his strategic awareness. He turns into Jinro P.I. and begins discovering every little thing his opponent is up to. First he uses that initially floated factory to scout Hungun’s entire base; discovering the stargate. Then he finds Hungun’s 12 o’clock main not seconds after Hungun starts building it! Nothing can be kept from Jinro this game, nothing.
Jinro's eye sees all
With the discovery that Hongun has invested into an expansion that is not yet providing any return, Jinro uses this prime opportunity to push up to Hongun’s natural with his mmRV force. He also sets up an expansion behind this pressure, this is no all in ladies and gentlemen.
Once Jinro arrives at Hongun’s natural, both players dance their units around the main ramp looking for a stray unit or any slip up in macro that could allow one to bust through the other. Hongun makes what looks like a mindless error when he tries to maynard probes to his new base while he knows full well jinros entire army is right outside his natural.
Jinro uses this opening of confusion for Hongun to attempt a push up into his main, throwing out two point defense drones before his raven dies. Hongun makes poor usage of his forcefields while Jinro’s banshees wail on the ground army, the Vikings take care of the void ray, and his ground force to clean up the rest.
oh look some forcefields...isn't that nice
This hardly looked like an effort, Jinro made impeccable use of timing and capitalizing on his opponent’s mistakes in this game.
Jinro show’s us his immediate intention with this starport is to get rid of those pesky observers. With the initial raven he builds, he’s able to snipe off Hungun’s scouting observers putting him in some uncertainty for what’s about to come.
Jinro proceeds to demonstrate his prowess not only in his mechanical talents, but also his strategic awareness. He turns into Jinro P.I. and begins discovering every little thing his opponent is up to. First he uses that initially floated factory to scout Hungun’s entire base; discovering the stargate. Then he finds Hungun’s 12 o’clock main not seconds after Hungun starts building it! Nothing can be kept from Jinro this game, nothing.
Jinro's eye sees all
With the discovery that Hongun has invested into an expansion that is not yet providing any return, Jinro uses this prime opportunity to push up to Hongun’s natural with his mmRV force. He also sets up an expansion behind this pressure, this is no all in ladies and gentlemen.
Once Jinro arrives at Hongun’s natural, both players dance their units around the main ramp looking for a stray unit or any slip up in macro that could allow one to bust through the other. Hongun makes what looks like a mindless error when he tries to maynard probes to his new base while he knows full well jinros entire army is right outside his natural.
Jinro uses this opening of confusion for Hongun to attempt a push up into his main, throwing out two point defense drones before his raven dies. Hongun makes poor usage of his forcefields while Jinro’s banshees wail on the ground army, the Vikings take care of the void ray, and his ground force to clean up the rest.
oh look some forcefields...isn't that nice
This hardly looked like an effort, Jinro made impeccable use of timing and capitalizing on his opponent’s mistakes in this game.
T11 Game 2 - Tal'Darim Altar P1
+ Show Spoiler [Show Recap] +
Jinro starts this game off with concussive shells upgrading while getting a factory, wanting to fast expand, but not without some early potential out of factory units. Hongun again impresses us with his creativity by opening up 4 gate on this wide open map, sarcasm alarms a blaring at this point. Thanks to the spacious chokes, Jinro easily pushes into Hongun’s main; attempting some pressure with a small mm hellion force, causing Hongun to waste a few forcefields before withdrawing with neither taking any real losses.
Hongun replies to this with some pressure of his own as soon as his warpgates finish. He sends out a stalker strike force right after Jinro’s fleeing units. Jinro engages him on the way to his own base in order to buy time to set up bunkers outside of his natural, even though this is a losing exchange for him.
At this point Hongun simply has too much “stuff” and jinro has invested too heavily into things that don’t attack, read bunkers and CCs. He can’t hold this massive 4 gate force in such a wide choke. Hongun lays down some surrounding forcefields on the bunkers and smashes through Jinro’s natural, leaving our terran with no choice but to type out.
T1 Game 3 - Xel'Naga Caverns P7
+ Show Spoiler [Show Recap] +
This game starts off with cross position spawns, hopefully promising us a longer game than the previous two. Hongun really does get a bit interesting this time, proxying a stargate nearer to Jinro’s base. Out of this he begins producing what seem like all too fast a unit, phoenixes.
Jinro chooses to get out a fast reaper in order to scout his opponent that would otherwise have an easier time intercepting his scout or stopping at the ramp with such large travel distances. Behind this movement Jinro fast expands and adds 2 more barracks to his main. Fortunately Jinro’s reaper does manage to penetrate the defences of Hongun and see what’s in his base. Rather, he sees exactly what’s not in his base, any tech. Right about this time Hongun sends his first 2 phoenixes over to Jinro’s main, and this is where the onslaught begins.
No one leaves alive
Hongun flies in when jinro has produced only one marine, naturally hongun goes straight for the mules. But what’s this you say, Jinro outsmarts these two gravity defying nightmares and repairs to mule saving it from an timely death?! Yes! He does just that. Unfortunately once Hongun adds another phoenix to the mix this trick no longer works, costing Jinro a couple mules. It’d be all too easy of that was the end of Hongun’s fun.
While Hongun expand his phoenixes continue their punishing barrage of terror. They pick off stray SCVs, units that pop out of barracks, even scouts can’t leave the base with these winged demons flying overhead.
Yes this is still going on
While this mayhem continues both players tech up, Hongun producing colossuses, and Jinro their airborne counters. At this point it is suspected that Hongun somehow managed to kill even Jinro’s mouse with his phoenix harass. The game had to be paused while Jinro got some tech support, the problem was dealt with extremely quickly.
With the action resumed back into its full swing, Hongun goes for another base while Jinro produces some shiny new ghosts. When Hongun notices that Jinro’s Viking count is continuing to increase, he switches over to high Templars in aims to increase the longevity and lethality of his own army.
Jinro tries to break honguns third before he can get it up and fully running, this engagement proves to be one that was inevitable but not in favour of the terran. While the colossus count is reduced to zero, Jinro loses his entire army for that trade without damaging the expansion.
Hongun then wastes no time, pushing out and killing Jinro’s rallied units sitting outside his third, while maynarding probes to that same base. However Jinro is putting up a third base of his own at the gold expansion, the race is on to get a planetary up in time.
Hongun strikes just before the planetary finishes, and with amazing psi storms taking out scvs repairing, and the marauder groups. Hongun manages to destroy jinros 3rd along with his entire army. Jinro hits out the the g keys and it’s all over for his run this season.
Nothing left...
TLAF-Liquid`Jinro Post Game Interview
By Hot_Bid
By Hot_Bid
Tough loss. What do you think went wrong wrong?
He made phoenixes. I told Hero that if he plays phoenix, I'm just dead. I have no idea how to play against it. So third game he did that and I was like "oh shit."
Why not?
They're faster than any Terran unit and they counter banshees and ravens. I just don't know what I'm supposed to do.
If you could do the series over what would you do differently?
I'd proxy barracks him. Because he's Protoss. True story.
What did you do to get your mind off the loss?
I went to a movie with Chris (HuK) and ate some Chinese food.
What movie did you watch?
The Adjustment Bureau in Korea. It wasn't too bad, just a cheesy ending. Hot girl though, and Rachel Weisz* was on the poster for some other movie -- double score.
* Jinro stated that to him, Rachel Weisz is the opposite of Michelle Rodriguez.
Did you do anything else after?
Then we met up with Tasteless at a bar. I was hitting on a couple of Korean girls at the table next to us before we left. I don't remember much more than that. I'm pretty sure I asked for and got a phone number, but I was too drunk to write it down.
How disappointed are you? About losing to HongUn, not the phone number.
I'm disappointed, but I'm going to shave my head as a symbolic gesture for starting over practice-wise. Maybe not full shave but like a military crew cut.
A few of your teammates are still in the tournament, including HuK, MC, NaDa, and TheWind. Are you going to cheer for them?
Of course. Minchul is going to win this GSL, nobody is left that's a threat, and HuK is going to clinch a Code S spot. Then we will dominate next round. TheWind will be like the manager guy who is so talented that he stays Code S forever.
Do you have any words of encouragement for Hayder and Ret? They both lost earlier this week.
Hayder was unlucky enough to draw one of the best TvZs in Korea. Jos will show his true self again soon, and he'll be happy.
Whats your plan for next season?
Do better than this. TvP is and has been a thorn in my side forever. I want to learn how to play it. Right now, I don't know how I'll do that, but I'll try my best.
Good luck!
GSL Code S Ro32 Foreigner Special: mOOnGLaDe
By palookieblue
By palookieblue
mOOngLaDe = Red | ZeNEXJJUN = Blue
Z7 Game 1 - Xel'Naga Caverns T1
+ Show Spoiler [Show Recap] +
JJUN opens with a gas-less 2rax while GLaDE opts for a hatch into pool opening. The zerg player loses a scouting overlord as it hovers towards the terran natural. JJUN uses his marines to control the towers and prevent further scouting, forcing a defensive spinecrawler.
The terran feigns pressure with around 9-10 marines and backs off while expanding behind it. Seeing only pure marine, GLaDe gets a baneling nest and plenty of zerglings. Realising that immediate aggression will be futile, JJUN drops two factories, going for pre-igniter hellions. Another clutch denial of a scouting overlord near the Terran base leaves Zerg in the dark.
GLaDe responds by moving his whole ling force to the natural area, morphing banelings for an attack. The hellions and marines intercept the force, however, and the lack of creep and baneling speed spell the doom for the Zerg army. GLaDe's indecisiveness led to even greater loss as he moved to engage, and backed off numerous times. The slow banelings are helplessly toyed with by the hellions, and he runs the zerglings into a healthy marine ball.
JJUN goes in for the kill, rallying all his units and reinforcements to the Zerg's bare expo. The hellions force the drones to run away and the marines easily dispose of the lone spinecrawler and queen. The lings hatch and the banes morph, but the Terran force is too great. The blue-flame hellions prove the matchwinner in this game, roasting the remaining army away for the second and final time.
With his hatch falling to the red zone and no army/ economy to speak off, GLaDe taps out.
The terran feigns pressure with around 9-10 marines and backs off while expanding behind it. Seeing only pure marine, GLaDe gets a baneling nest and plenty of zerglings. Realising that immediate aggression will be futile, JJUN drops two factories, going for pre-igniter hellions. Another clutch denial of a scouting overlord near the Terran base leaves Zerg in the dark.
GLaDe responds by moving his whole ling force to the natural area, morphing banelings for an attack. The hellions and marines intercept the force, however, and the lack of creep and baneling speed spell the doom for the Zerg army. GLaDe's indecisiveness led to even greater loss as he moved to engage, and backed off numerous times. The slow banelings are helplessly toyed with by the hellions, and he runs the zerglings into a healthy marine ball.
JJUN goes in for the kill, rallying all his units and reinforcements to the Zerg's bare expo. The hellions force the drones to run away and the marines easily dispose of the lone spinecrawler and queen. The lings hatch and the banes morph, but the Terran force is too great. The blue-flame hellions prove the matchwinner in this game, roasting the remaining army away for the second and final time.
With his hatch falling to the red zone and no army/ economy to speak off, GLaDe taps out.
Z12 Game 2 - Terminus RE T6
+ Show Spoiler [Show Recap] +
GLaDe in the 12o'clock position, JJUN at 6o'clock.
Terran goes for a 1rax-FE, with an identical build to the previous game from GLaDe. A quick double gas for JJUN, and he grabs two factories soon after. As he floats his CC to the nearby expo, he makes a sim-city wall with the buildings, negating possible ling run-bys. We see GLaDE again choosing to stick with the ling/baneling composition, and he also grabs an evo chamber for melee upgrades. The hellions move out again just as the Zerg player looks to tech to mutas. The lair is almost done and additional geysers have been added. Smart positioning of the queens block the ramp to the main base, but JJUN's hellions force the drones to scatter, losing valuable mining time. The hellions continue to camp the mineral line and GLaDe is forced to surround with additional lings.
While this harass was taking place, Terran constructs his 3rd base, has an operational starport, and is teching to siege tanks. Another blue-flame harass in the main takes place via medivac drop, forcing more drone movement and mass loss of speedlings. Both players choosing to tech up, GLaDe going for mutalisks and baneling speed while JJUN researches combat shields and builds an armoury. Another drop is successfully warded off and the game enters a slight lull. The problem for GLaDe is that it is 3base vs 3base with the Terran getting his up earlier. At the 13-minute mark, JJUN begins the slow march to the zerg choke with a large marine/tank/medivac army
Mutalisks flying around the sieged tanks try and stall the incoming push but JJUN executes the tank crawl methodically, shelling the spinecrawlers and dropping the 3rd base simultaneously. A couple of well-placed Thors in the army mix ward off the growing muta flock and GLaDe is forced to magic box the Thors. One goes down but the stream of incoming marines scare him away. As JJUN starts elevator-dropping the 3rd base, the zerg can't wait any longer and throws his full army at the choke, managing to wipe out everything.
The few mutas that do survive can't stop another large push at the 4th base, and the hatch is left to perish. Meanwhile JJUN has been firmly on top of his macro, getting his 4th base up and running and amassing another fearsome marine/tank force heading straight for the main. GLaDe can't get back into the economy race as he is forced to produce units non-stop.
The re-taken 3rd base for Zerg is dropped onto again with a small force which succeed in destroying it. GLaDe cleans it up and goes for a counter with his whole army, wiping out JJUN's 4th base. The two large armies now sit near the enemy's section of the map, but JJUN forces the zerg to engage on his terms as he gets in range of the production facilities. The banelings die before they can splash their innards on the marines but the sheer number of mutalisks clean up the anti-air forcing the tanks to roll home.
In spite of this small victory, GLaDe is still behind on bases, on economy, and Terran reinforces frighteningly quickly with a replacement army. The supplies tell the story with JJUN doubling his opponent as he commences another methodical foray into the zerg main. GLaDe's shrinking army barely tickles the mix of 2/2 marines, tanks and thors and the natural goes down in a sloppy mess. The four lone mutas catch sight of 3 command centres building outside the zerg base and mOOnGLaDe calls GG.
Terran goes for a 1rax-FE, with an identical build to the previous game from GLaDe. A quick double gas for JJUN, and he grabs two factories soon after. As he floats his CC to the nearby expo, he makes a sim-city wall with the buildings, negating possible ling run-bys. We see GLaDE again choosing to stick with the ling/baneling composition, and he also grabs an evo chamber for melee upgrades. The hellions move out again just as the Zerg player looks to tech to mutas. The lair is almost done and additional geysers have been added. Smart positioning of the queens block the ramp to the main base, but JJUN's hellions force the drones to scatter, losing valuable mining time. The hellions continue to camp the mineral line and GLaDe is forced to surround with additional lings.
While this harass was taking place, Terran constructs his 3rd base, has an operational starport, and is teching to siege tanks. Another blue-flame harass in the main takes place via medivac drop, forcing more drone movement and mass loss of speedlings. Both players choosing to tech up, GLaDe going for mutalisks and baneling speed while JJUN researches combat shields and builds an armoury. Another drop is successfully warded off and the game enters a slight lull. The problem for GLaDe is that it is 3base vs 3base with the Terran getting his up earlier. At the 13-minute mark, JJUN begins the slow march to the zerg choke with a large marine/tank/medivac army
Mutalisks flying around the sieged tanks try and stall the incoming push but JJUN executes the tank crawl methodically, shelling the spinecrawlers and dropping the 3rd base simultaneously. A couple of well-placed Thors in the army mix ward off the growing muta flock and GLaDe is forced to magic box the Thors. One goes down but the stream of incoming marines scare him away. As JJUN starts elevator-dropping the 3rd base, the zerg can't wait any longer and throws his full army at the choke, managing to wipe out everything.
The few mutas that do survive can't stop another large push at the 4th base, and the hatch is left to perish. Meanwhile JJUN has been firmly on top of his macro, getting his 4th base up and running and amassing another fearsome marine/tank force heading straight for the main. GLaDe can't get back into the economy race as he is forced to produce units non-stop.
The re-taken 3rd base for Zerg is dropped onto again with a small force which succeed in destroying it. GLaDe cleans it up and goes for a counter with his whole army, wiping out JJUN's 4th base. The two large armies now sit near the enemy's section of the map, but JJUN forces the zerg to engage on his terms as he gets in range of the production facilities. The banelings die before they can splash their innards on the marines but the sheer number of mutalisks clean up the anti-air forcing the tanks to roll home.
In spite of this small victory, GLaDe is still behind on bases, on economy, and Terran reinforces frighteningly quickly with a replacement army. The supplies tell the story with JJUN doubling his opponent as he commences another methodical foray into the zerg main. GLaDe's shrinking army barely tickles the mix of 2/2 marines, tanks and thors and the natural goes down in a sloppy mess. The four lone mutas catch sight of 3 command centres building outside the zerg base and mOOnGLaDe calls GG.
GSL Code S Ro32 Foreigner Special: Liquid`Ret
By Xxio
By Xxio
SlayerS_M = Red | LiquidRet = Blue
T1 Game 1 - Crevasse Z11
+ Show Spoiler +
SlayerS_M, chosen by Boxer to join SlayerS clan, used multiple drops to shake up Ret's booming, 40 drone economy at 8 minutes. A late lair delayed Ret's mutalisks, but he still easily defended M's drops, which ended up costing M much more than he gained. Nearing the 13 minute mark, at 140 food to M's 120, Ret took back map control with a burst of zerglings and mutalisks. At 14 minutes Ret's infestation pit was well under way and his 4th base had just finished. With 79 drones and looking very suave in his booth, Ret picked off a number of M's tanks. M tried to drop again, in a few places, but Ret suffered little if any damage. At 17 minutes, M started his 4th base and had more than a couple infestors on the field. M's drops, however, finally paid off when he sniped Ret's natural and damaged the Zerg's 4th. Massed up, M pushed on Ret's third and dropped Ret's 4th again.
Broodlords drove back the main push, but Ret did lose his 4th. Ret slowly chased M back with a mass of broodlords and took out the Terran's 4th, but his surviving broodlords continued the attack without any support and were cleaned up by a group of newly made marines. M continued to harass Ret's frontier bases, sniping Ret's 5th with a drop while pushing back along the main route of attack. Ret switched to ultralisks but his economy could not make enough of them to shift the game in his favor. When a nuke luckily caught an expansion's worth of drones in a transfer, Ret typed out.
Similar to how Ganzi beat Haypro, M's drops whittled away at Ret's economy
Broodlords drove back the main push, but Ret did lose his 4th. Ret slowly chased M back with a mass of broodlords and took out the Terran's 4th, but his surviving broodlords continued the attack without any support and were cleaned up by a group of newly made marines. M continued to harass Ret's frontier bases, sniping Ret's 5th with a drop while pushing back along the main route of attack. Ret switched to ultralisks but his economy could not make enough of them to shift the game in his favor. When a nuke luckily caught an expansion's worth of drones in a transfer, Ret typed out.
T1 Game 2 - Tal'Darim Altar Z5
+ Show Spoiler +
M went expansion first, then walled off his choke with 3 barracks and began researching the infernal preignitor upgrade. A small marine hellion push killed off 4 of Ret's creep tumors before they had a chance to spread, but Ret's mutalisks popped just in time to catch and kill off a hellion drop. With his 3rd up, Ret harassed M's worker lines before the turrets finished and began to power drones. Once his bases were mutalisk-secure, M pushed towards Ret with 3 tanks and a mass of marines, scanning on his way to clear the creep. Always poking with his mutalisks, Ret picked off small groups of marines and a tank until M gave up on his position and moved back to his base. At 15 minutes Ret started his hive, transferred a group of his 79 drones to his 4th – in the bottom left corner – and began whittling away at the Terran's main with flock of mutalisks. Ret successfully kept M in his base but the Terran was massing a large number of tanks. M tried to drop Ret's 4th but, despite it's remote location, Ret fended it off.
As M pushed to Ret's main, Ret countered with a swarm of zerglings, forcing the Terran's 3rd to lift. Ret's broodlords did not finish in time, however, and the Terran was able to push into Ret's natural with the bulk of his army intact. Ret's natural fell, then his third while a drop in his main began taking out the tech. Maxed less than a minute ago and now under 100 food, Ret gg'd.
The broodlords never got to see the light of day
As M pushed to Ret's main, Ret countered with a swarm of zerglings, forcing the Terran's 3rd to lift. Ret's broodlords did not finish in time, however, and the Terran was able to push into Ret's natural with the bulk of his army intact. Ret's natural fell, then his third while a drop in his main began taking out the tech. Maxed less than a minute ago and now under 100 food, Ret gg'd.
Next: TLAF-Liquid`HuK in Code A Quarterfinals!
The past week or so has been sad and disappointing for fans of foreigners in the GSL, as only one of six total foreigners are alive in the brackets. Liquid`HuK is our last remaining foreigner in the GSL March 2011, and we wish him luck in against IM.LosirA!