EPTAnyone who won a game this month:
Seriously, TLPD the month of August and see if anyone but Flash or Jaedong really sticks out. Very slim pickings. To name a few, Action, Best, Violet, or Calm could all have been in the 9~10 rank range.
Power Rank
| Rank | Player | Prev | High | Description |
| 1. |  Flash (T) (stats) |
+1 | 1 | As the new PR writer, it’s my responsibility to explain my ranking criteria as it always differs slightly from writer to writer. In rough order of importance – 1: Performance in major tournaments (PL/OSL/MSL) in the last period. The month of August will be considered, allowing a few days overlap into late July and a special inclusion for the OSL final. Performance in the later stages of these tournaments will be weighed more heavily. 2: Performance in minor tournaments (WCG preliminaries). The STX Masters Cup will be given no consideration as it is very much a series of exhibition games (I don’t deny their entertainment value). 3: Variety of race matchups played. 4: There will be small amount of credit given to players for extraordinary displays in the past. I fully expect to get ripped apart by the TL readers as is tradition for Power Rank writers, but at least I got some beginner’s luck with clear cut picks for #1 and #2. The Lee-ssang pair was deadlocked in terms of skill in the recent past, but there were many trophies up for grabs in August and September that could settle the dispute. While the level of play displayed by the two players was fairly close, Flash won medals and broke records, while Jaedong did not. Flash became the first player to win the OSL and MSL in the same season, and tied Jaedong at five 1st place finishes, just behind Nada who has six. If the B-word hadn’t gone out of fashion a few months ago, people would certainly be clamoring to award Flash the title. Instead, the most recent Korean community trend is to give Flash a more appropriate surname and call him “God Young-ho”. Flash also won the deciding game for KT at the Proleague finals, but his contribution was surprisingly small due to the nature of team competition. Still, he deserves no small amount of credit for winning on the biggest stage of the year. Overall, Flash is the obvious pick for best player in the world. |
| 2. |  Jaedong (Z) (stats) |
-1 | 1 | It was another solid month for Jaedong, where his play was consistently in the great to awesome range. It was marked with a variety of tough TvZ tests, where Jaedong faced capable opponents in Light and Flash. Jaedong played well in all of these series, with some spectacular play in drawn out games against Light and Flash. Unfortunately, he was unable to keep Flash out of his head and complicated mind-games caused him to lose some one-sided but intriguing matches. JD’s only real fault this month was losing to Flash, which seems to be a precondition of being a progamer. He certainly showed he’s capable of beating Flash in a series, but for now he’ll have to live with the fact that Flash’s overall match strategy was vastly superior. If it’s any consolation, Jaedong is clearly the greatest #2 we’ve had at any point in time. |
| 3. |  Fantasy (T) (stats) |
0 | 1 | There’s a large gulf between the top two and the rest of the field. Cracking a 0.500 win ratio was a real feat this month, because Jaedong and Flash played a combined six multi-game series (more if you count WCG) and won every single one of them. Simply speaking, there were a lot of losses to go around. Since no one actually beat Starcraft’s dominant duo, the quality of play in these defeats was a key factor in the rankings. Fantasy barely edged out Stork and Light to take the #3 spot this month. Although Fantasy’s heads up loss against Stork led to his OSL elimination, he had a slightly stronger showing against his Leessang opponent. Although Fantasy displayed some lapses in concentration and decision making as the games wore on, he showed a lot of determination and grit to take Flash to a fifth game in the MSL. In addition, Fantasy had the boost of playing well in the Proleague post-season. He won his match at Kwang-an-ri for the second year running, although this time it could not help his team win a championship. Even so, winning at such an important event counts for a lot. Combined with some solid wins over a variety of decent players such Calm, Shuttle, and Kal, Fantasy showed that he’s the best of the rest. |
| 4. |  Stork[gm] (P) (stats) |
+3 | 1 | Stork was having a very pleasant late summer, dominating good TvP players with his laughably predictable two base carrier strategy. It was reminiscent of Jaedong’s mutalisk stacking or Bisu’s sair/DT when they first appeared, where opponents would struggle even though they knew exactly what was coming. At least those builds lost effectiveness later in the game; Carriers just get scarier. The addition of a surprising 2-3 PvZ loss to Jaedong shot Stork up the rankings, but he did not perform as well as Fantasy despite recording the same score. The Jaedong versus Stork series was very poor overall, with every loss attributable to terrible play by the loser rather than any merit from the winner. In particular, Stork failed to perform a very basic Starcraft tactic by not ling-proofing his wall, which directly led to two of his losses. Even so, 2-3 against Jaedong in PvZ is better than most have been able to record in several seasons (although Jaedong had the benefit of playing his personal punching bag Kal two seasons in a row). Together with his total mastery of PvT, Stork is worthy to be #2 amongst #2’s (you can’t escape the kong-line). |
| 5. |  Light[aLive] (T) (stats) |
+3 | 2 | Light is the final semifinalist to record a 2-3 against the Lee-ssang, barely losing to Jaedong in the MSL. Of the three players to go five games, Light’s performance was actually the best. In typical Light style, poor early game defense gave some very soft wins to Jaedong. But I’m going to go out on a limb and say that when TvZ goes late and long, Light is even better than Flash. There was only a small sample size, but consider the two late game wins Light took against Jaedong against the one Jaedong took from Flash. Light’s ability to be constantly aggressive and stay one step ahead of Jaedong to important strategic locations was just incredible. So why isn’t Light #3 then? There was a lack of variety, in both matchups and tournaments. Light lucked into playing only TvZ for the entire month of August, which is his best matchup by a large measure. Stork was strong in both PvZ and PvT, and was at least decent in PvP. Fantasy had to play every matchup, and had the aforementioned PL final boost. So while it was an excellent month for Light, he was just too one-dimensional to deserve a higher rank. It was very close between ranks 3~5, and Light is just barely missing out on a higher rank. |
| 6. |  free[gm] (P) (stats) |
+3 | 3 | Free is the last of the non Lee-ssang semifinalists, but he is on a slightly lower level than the other three. Free was on a OSL joyride, going undefeated on his royal road tour before Flash gave him a heavy dose of reality. Besides his win with a slightly lucky (but still well executed) proxy gate rush, Free suffered a terrible thrashing at Flash’s hands. There was a clear gulf in class on display, as Free failed to put up any meaningful resistance. Even besides the 1-3 score, his skill level never suggested the threat of an upset like the above three players. With solid statistical production but no realistic capacity to challenge for a championship, Free provides a solid buffer between the real contenders above him and the murky depths of inconsistency below. |
| 7. |  Sea[Shield] (T) (stats) |
-2 | 1 | The silliness of the Power Rank in a world with no proleague becomes very apparent starting at the #7 spot. With the Lee-ssang taking up two spots in both the MSL and OSL quarterfinals, that left 11 players left in competitions to vie for eight PR spots. Basically, as long as you actually played a handful of games this month, and managed to win a few of them, you were getting into the PR. And so we introduce Sea at the #7 spot, for a spectacularly adequate month. It was a month of personal accomplishments for Sea, who improved his plateau from RO16 to RO8 in both leagues. Sea cleared his OSL RO16 group 3-0, which included a surprise win over Jaedong. A good streak of wins culminated with a steal of a win against Jaedong in the first game of their MSL quarterfinal series. Sea then found himself playing in important quarterfinal games, and inevitably ended the month by going a combined 0-5 against Jaedong and Stork. Since everyone from here on down got outclassed by their quarterfinal opponents as well (or didn’t even make a quarterfinal in one case), Sea’s two surprise wins against Jaedong and dual top eight finish secures him a respectable #7. |
| 8. |  Kal (P) (stats) |
- | 3 | For the most part, it was a month of miserable failure for Kal. He was a disappointment for STX Soul in the Proleague playoffs, playing as the team’s Ace and losing two crucial games. His OSL run was awful as well, dropping right out with a 0-3 record. But… Then there was WCG Korea. Nope, I didn’t forget about that tournament! It’s just that with Leessang at #1 and #2 this month, there wasn’t much need to account for that tournament until now. Even though he was a god-awful player in every other tournament, Kal must have really wanted to vacation in LA and get some tanning in before the end of summer. His WCG run to #3 included series wins over Kwanro, Bisu, and Effort, plus a single game taken against Flash. With such slim pickings this month, a single win against the Leessang in addition to beating some mediocre players will get you this far. |
| 9. |  Effort (Z) (stats) |
-5 | 1 | Effort was another mediocre player this month, making it to the MSL quarter-finals and dropping out of the OSL as the champion’s jinx predicted. Highlights included a decent series against TvZ specialist Light in the MSL, and a victory against Bisu in his only good matchup. Effort also had a decent WCG Korea run, having a fairly easy path until the semi-finals where he was beaten by Jaedong, and then by Kal in the 3rd/4th place games. For his average and utterly featureless performances, Effort takes #9. |
| 10. |  Leta (T) (stats) |
- | 1 | Leta barely made it into the power rank this month, with only wins against Bisu and Effort to his credit. Twenty minutes of fantastic Starcraft in a game that was ultimately lost were the clincher for Leta at #10. For the first 23 minutes of Leta and Flash’s first OSL game, we were in some bizarre alternate reality where Leta was abusing Flash like Flash abuses Hiya. For 23 minutes, Leta constantly attacked Flash at a frenetic pace, with his attacks suffering no dullness despite their incredible speed. Even the turtle-king was bewildered, and soon gave up at a 6 to 3 base advantage. However, Leta then made a possibly career defining error, one so costly that it defeated his spirit and allowed Flash to slowly but surely grind out a win. For a spark of brilliance, #10. |
| Forum Index > Polls & Liquibet |
Waxangel
United States33713 Posts
Anyone who won a game this month: Seriously, TLPD the month of August and see if anyone but Flash or Jaedong really sticks out. Very slim pickings. To name a few, Action, Best, Violet, or Calm could all have been in the 9~10 rank range. | ||
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johanes
Czech Republic2246 Posts
Oh, and welcome to PRs Waxangel  | ||
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FetusFondler
United States246 Posts
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Waxangel
United States33713 Posts
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Plexa
Aotearoa39261 Posts
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johanes
Czech Republic2246 Posts
On September 14 2010 15:12 Waxangel wrote: but what's the difference between saying "he set a record" and saying "he set a record, and that's incredible" :D? I was expecting new layout with shiny stars all over the place, power rank consisting only of Flash's praise, his official TL bonjwa title and this all with euphoric music in the background. Oh well... | ||
Milkis
5003 Posts
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Kazius
Israel1456 Posts
On September 14 2010 15:12 Waxangel wrote: but what's the difference between saying "he set a record" and saying "he set a record, and that's incredible" :D? It's the e-peen equivalent of the difference between "yeah, you were fine" to "my GOD, that was INCREDIBLE". And seriously, dual finals for the first time in over 8 years deserves *some* enthusiasm. The past 40-something days are basically the days Flash made BW his bitch  | ||
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Waxangel
United States33713 Posts
 actually, I have no idea what the original topic for a PR thread is anyway. So was there anything to derail in the first place? Carry on =o | ||
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Waxangel
United States33713 Posts
On September 14 2010 15:17 Kazius wrote: It's the e-peen equivalent of the difference between "yeah, you were fine" to "my GOD, that was INCREDIBLE". And seriously, dual finals for the first time in over 8 years deserves *some* enthusiasm. The past 40-something days are basically the days Flash made BW his bitch Some silly Flash fanboy/girl will write a TLFE that's unbearably gushing, don't worry. | ||
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dukethegold
Canada5645 Posts
Poor Bisu...My heart is broken. | ||
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OpticalShot
Canada6330 Posts
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TwoToneTerran
United States8841 Posts
On September 14 2010 15:19 Waxangel wrote: Some silly Flash fanboy/girl will write a TLFE that's unbearably gushing, don't worry. http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=108774 Though I think you're horribly wrong about saying Light is better in the lategame than Flash (completely different maps and unit compositions for the comparison, for instance), the rank is as right as I could've expected. He's bonjwa, tho. ;p Not even a debate. | ||
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Assymptotic
United States552 Posts
Wax is the new PR writer now? Not enough Pokemon reference. Poor Bisu...My heart is broken. Don't worry, Bisu will return once he remembers to not headbutt tank lines. | ||
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Holgerius
Sweden16951 Posts
A very agreeable PR overall I have to say. I agree with pretty much all the positions and the arguments that back them up. But I think there should've been more Flash praise.  You should've written at least twice as much about the historic month that he had. I look forward to your future PR's! Waxangel hwaiting! ^__^ | ||
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POWEROUTAGE
Singapore884 Posts
Can't wait for that new TLFE ;P | ||
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NightmareX
New Zealand31 Posts
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Hyde
Australia14568 Posts
On September 14 2010 15:28 dukethegold wrote: Wax is the new PR writer now? Not enough Pokemon reference. Poor Bisu...My heart is broken. Mine too, he was completely off the list, but no matter no matter, new proleague maps coming up. Overall a nice PR, I don't disagree with any of it, especially with Light. and thanks Waxangel, look forward to your future PRs also | ||
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Trozz
Canada3457 Posts
Way to keep the quality. I'll reread this soon. | ||
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Bill Murray
United States9292 Posts
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