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General12 years agoRadoslav "Nydra" Kolev

Tiebreakers and eSports drama at BlizzardCup day two

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Photos by: Esportseye.net, Thisisgame.com, WellPlayed.org

The second group of the Blizzard Cup was to determine which three will join Mvp, MC and DongRaeGu. Before the day was over, however, the community would witness the conception of one of the largest eSports debates recently plus a vicious tie-breaker to pinpoint the top three.

Korea MMA vs Korea NesTea @ Daybreak


MMA was the first to show his teeth, opening the game with a 1-rax CC into 4-rax pressure. The latter caught NesTea a little bit unprepared and the zerg had to produce a ton of lings to clear up the marine threat. Although his economy was hurting a little bit due to disturbed droning, NesTea succeeded into taking a third and transition into infestors.

The mid and late-game was a total ZvT macro fest. The roles were now changed – MMA was sending only small squads of marines around the map but NesTea kept finding and eradicating them. As his fourth base started to go up, it was the green light for the zerg to find his inner aggression. Most of the action happened at the centre of the map where NesTea’s ultralisk/speedling/infestor army won many a battle but never got close to disrupt any of MMA’s bases. That led to all that gas heavy units being very cost ineffective as MMA was unshakable in his marine/ghost defense.

Viewers also saw an uncharacteristic sloppiness of NesTea as far as unit control was considered. The occasions where the IM zerg lost high tier units in vain were not isolated incidents and the biggest loss of them all came when MMA caught every single infestor undefended. With his casters dead and the infestation pit already destroyed after a medivac drop that occurred earlier, NesTea had no means at all to win the map.

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Korea Leenock vs Sweden Naniwa @ Bel’Shir Beach


What a wild game that was, and right from the start! Nani chose forge fast expand as his opening build but Leenock would not allow the Swede to get what he wants so he countered that with a 1-base baneling rush. Naniwa definitely smelled that something fishy was cooking and threw down some additional cannons but there was very little that he could do. His nexus was doomed to die.

What followed were some moments of passivity as both players reexpanded with Nani taking his natural and later a third at the bottom centre and Leenock taking his own third and then fourth at the top right and bottom left, respectively. For the better part of the mid-game, Leenock used his mutalisks to harass the protoss and avoid a direct confrontation and the game of chicken eventually ended with a small base trade: the zerg lost his bottom left and Nani said goodbye to his natural nexus.

This was, in fact, a bigger damage suffered by Nani then by Leenock as the Swede was now at only two mining bases. Naniwa walked out to try to secure a new base at the more central expansion, also bringing a respectful support – a mothership! It was obvious that Leenock was not prepared to fight this battle. Although he did have brood lords and did manage to deny Nani his new base, the force fields and storms were too much pain for Leenock’s banelings and the trade went horribly for the zerg player.

With the supply hugely in his favor, Naniwa took the green light to attack straight for the jugular and easily made his way through but Leenock had a response of his own. A baneling run by decimated Nani’s only mining base and the Swede now had to finish the game with whatever units he had left.

Still, the zerg base was naked with all the tech ready for the taking so Naniwa just… walked away. He probably thought it would be a good idea to hunt down the remaining zerg mining bases and leave the tech alive but as he found out that was a huge mistake. Given, Naniwa did destroy the zerg base at the bottom left (again) but was met with a heavy spine crawler wall every other step of the way. Checkmate. The game went to Leenock.

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Korea NesTea vs Korea Polt @ Crossfire


Polt opened the series with a reaper/CC build and although not too great a damage was suffered by NesTea, it did make him lose map control to the terran for the better part of the early game.

That soon changed as Polt threw his advantage away by miscalculating his follow-up timing attack. His marines were supposed to hit the zerg just when stim finished but NesTea ran up to engage the terran immediately without giving him time to get this critical upgrade up.

With the scales now more or less even, NesTea turned his gaze to the juicy top left third base of Polt. Its death would give huge economy lead to the zerg so professor Tea marched his forces up the map… only to find himself cornered by Polt’s tanks and marines. The worst part is that the CC actually lived so NesTea suffered a great drop in supply for nothing.

The zerg would eventually kill the aforementioned base with a follow-up attack but that hurt him more than it helped him: Polt had meanwhile cleaned NesTea’s own third while trading his top base very cost efficiently and when he walked in for his final push, the terran faced very little zerg resistance. NesTea’s casualties had been too big for him to repel all the tanks and marines.

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Korea MMA vs Korea Leenock @ Dual Sight


MMA displayed amazing control over Leenock’s hatcheries in this game, starting with a double proxy rax rush that destroyed the zerg natural despite Leenock’s best attempts to push the terran back (starting with a hatch first into 17 gas/17 pool might have also had something to do with Leenock’s troubles).

To his credit, Leenock did manage to recover from the early loss and secure as stable mid-game economy as possible but he had indescribable difficulties in securing a third. MMA was ever vigilant and hunted down every additional hatchery that spawned on the map, putting Leenock up against the ropes. The zerg would eventually start using his mutas to keep the terran at bay while covering his double expand, but MMA could not be contained forever. As the terran moved out, a direct engagement proved to be inevitable and suddenly everything went south for Leenock really, really quickly.

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Sweden Naniwa vs Korea Polt @ Tal’Darim Altar


Two rax openings are not uncommon in TvP these days so, naturally, Polt decided that it would be not too bad to cause some inconvenience to Nani’s 1-gate expand. Polt moved out when his first few marauders popped out but was easily pushed back as he had neither stim nor concussive shells to reinforce his armies.

Naniwa grabbed the reins and started applying pressure to Polt himself, making the terran pull SCVs off mining and killing them in the process. Polt was under so much protoss fire that all he could do is add a raven, start siege tech and prepare for an all-in follow-up. And with so many SCVs dead it did seem like the only doable option.

Meanwhile in Naniland, the Swede was powering probes like crazy, going up to almost 20 worker advantage. As it turned out, however, that would come back to bite him in the butt as when Polt’s push arrived at his doorstep there was just too few units for Naniwa to defend with. One immortal and a few stalkers melted instantly and so did the expansion and as Polt walked further inside protoss territory, Naniwa typed out.

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Korea NesTea vs Korea Leenock @ Antiga Shipyard


This game was a present to all those people that enjoy the hectic early game ZvZ. Leenock opened with a 10 pool/9 gas to NesTea’s standard 13/13 and in a blink of an eye the youngster had speedlings knocking on his opponent’s door. NesTea’s defense seemed impeccable though as speedlings and drones had no trouble repelling the enemy forces but then suddenly all went wrong. NesTea lost a queen and misdetonated a few banelings so Leenock now had both the larvae and the supply advantage.

The Providence champion knew what he had to do and that was pressure NesTea until the ZvZ maestro would bend the knee. Leenock displayed astounding skill at microing his speedlings to pick off enemy banelings and with his expo dying twice, another queen falling down and twenty dead drones in the course of the game, NesTea had to type out.


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Korea MMA vs Sweden Naniwa @ Calm Before the Storm


When MMA opened the game with a proxy factory east of Naniwa’s bases, Khaldor (who was commentating the game at the moment) hinted that the terran might go for a thor rush – a strategy that was not unpopular in times past. He strengthened that with a reactor marines back at home and as Naniwa saw the bio force he reacted immediately…

…making all the wrong decisions. His robo bay started an observer, his gateways produced sentries and his tech took the path of the double forge into colossi – everything that Naniwa did not need to stay alive. The Swede was now 0-3 in his group with no chance of advancing in the Ro6.

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Korea Leenock vs Korea Polt @ Shakuras Plateau


When Polt opened the series with a double rax into full bunker wall-off at Leenock’s ramp I wouldn’t guess in a million years that the zerg would crush this attacks as it is nothing, save his hatchery and even be in a decent economy level. Polt was probably shocked as well and even more so when Leenock busted the rax wall with a stupid amount of banelings and proceeded to win the game like a boss.

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Korea NesTea vs Sweden Naniwa @ Antiga Shipyard


There is both very little and a lot to say about this game. In its entirety it was just a protoss doing a 6-probe rush and gg-ing out 1 minute and 30 seconds into the game.

What the game did is result in a community uproar, Naniwa being stripped from his Code S January spot and multiple discussions about how fair his behavior and the one of the GSL management were. This, however, is just a battle report and nothing more so I am going to cut it here. Head over to the news piece next door if you have a say on the matter.

Korea MMA vs Korea Polt @ Bel’Shir Beach


There was nothing unusual with this game, yet it was a well-taught lesson of the intricacies of marine/tank maneuverings, how and when to engage and the proper timings of expanding in a terran mirror.

Polt moved his units like a chess master, putting MMA in discomfort every step of the way. The GSL champion was straight on outplayed and never did the game go into his favor. Wherever he went Polt was there, ready to trade in the best possible way for him and/or make way more efficient counter attacks that by the end had MMA sitting on three bases, with his natural under heavy marine fire. MMA typed out and with that the three of them together with Polt and Leenock would go into tiebreaker matches.

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THE TIEBREAKERS


Korea MMA vs Korea Leenock @ Daybreak


After Leenock scouted the reactor in construction he read that as a hellion opening by MMA and instead of sitting like a duck ready to be shot off, the GSL finalist went for the throat, throwing a roach warren and a baneling nest and preparing to crush MMA from the beginning. Unfortunately for him, his plan was most unsuccessful as MMA had marauders out just in time to laugh off the attack.

The mid-game was a standard ZvT of barely any direct engagements and saw Leenock flying around with his mutalisks trying to pick off whatever valuable terran units he could catch off-guard. That led to the death of some medivacs and tanks but nothing too crippling for MMA. Finally, a substantial damage was suffered but by our zerg player in the match as while defending his centre base, MMA struck both the third and the fourth base of Leenock, killing them off and putting his opponent in a checkmate. With no economy there was no way for the zerg to pull off a victory.

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Korea Leenock vs Korea Polt @ Antiga Shipyard


The game went passive for its better part: Leenock stayed on two base with a macro hatchery and teched to roaches and banes and Polt opted for a quick third on the back of powering up bio. The monotonous tempo was broken only when Polt accidentally lifted his natural CC causing ruckus amidst his base and later when Leenock stomped him over with a huge roach/baneling bomb army.

It wasn’t even close.

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Korea MMA vs Korea Polt @ Crossfire


Whatever flaws there were in MMA’s play in his last match against Polt, they were altogether gone as the tiebreaker was given start. MMA was in complete control of the game, shutting down Polt’s banshee every step of the way and killing four of them in the process. This advantage grew into a mid-game positional domination for the SlayerS terran who pressured Polt so hard that he could barely find opportunities to expand.

To his credit, Polt’s game sense was still on a highest level and an elusive marine run around almost turned the game upside down as MMA lost his natural and his positions were weakened but the SlayerS veteran knew very well how to deal with such developments and by in turn sniping Polt’s third and re-securing his domination in the centre, the game was his and so was Group B’s top spot.

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Blizzard Cup Group B Standings
Korea MMA5-1
Korea Leenock4-2
Korea Polt3-3
Korea Nestea1-3
Sweden Naniwa0-4

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