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StarCraft 211 years agoRadoslav "Nydra" Kolev

The Month in Headlines: October 2012


Table of Contents


04.11.2012: ESWC '12 is Mana's
04.11.2012: Life dethrones Leenock, wins Fall Championship
11.11.2012: The Lone Star Clash throne defended
13.11.2012: Heart of the Swarm launches March 2013
15.11.2012: MLG, ESL, DreamHack announce partnership
18.11.2012: Parting wins the $100,000 of BWC
21.11.2012: Balance testing: Fungal nerfed, Raven buffed
24.11.2012: HerO sweeps Taeja, defends his winter crown
25.11.2012: Sting sits atop Singapore
27.11.2012: Ret suspended from IPL 5
28.11.2012: Stephano: "I didn't try to be better, I was just better"




FROM THE WORLD OF ESPORTS


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Overall, Europeans events of 2012 have been kind to Mana. Wherever there was silver there was now gold and after enjoying two wonderful DreamHacks, the Polish protoss flew to France to compete on another familiar territory for him – ESWC.

In 2011, Mana went as far as the second place, losing to Stephano in the grand final while the Frenchman was one of his best forms ever. This time around, however, Mana had something to say and repeated the scenario from DH Summer ’12 semis: he came, he saw, he de-infested. Crushing ForGG in the closing match was just a bonus to the $20,000 check.


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Great men are never satisfied with little, the concept of enough is foreign to them and this is often the root of many professional successes.

Putting this principle and the premise that Life is one such great man together, one could not possibly imagine that one royal road would be enough for him. Why not another one at the other side of the world? Seriously, they’ll even throw in the last champion and like the fourth person to carry the “best zerg in the world” title, just for the kicks of it.

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Because other colleagues of his revisited one tournament scenario or the other, Stephano decided to try that on his own. While Mana and Life upgraded their previous achievements or explored new tournament grounds, EG's ace sticked to simplicity - visit a tournament you've conquered before and win it again by playing yet another Korean terran in the final.


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PartinG's ascension in the WCS has been a steady one and, truly, seeing a gold medal at the very end was not too huge a surprise. He started with a 3rd place at WCS Korea, upgraded to 2nd place at WCS Asia and, in accordance to the natural order of things, lifted the trophy at the World Championship. A stellar performance without a doubt but catch this fun fact: if only November was two days longer, he would've become world champion twice in the same month.

If Artosis could sit behind my keyboard he would say that that's almost too much for someone's whose not NesTea.

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I swear, the amount of all those "excel where you've excelled before" paradigms is getting scary by the second but it's just how it was that month. At the very end of November, Liquid`Hero travelled to Jonkoping to see if the host city of DreamHack Winter will treat him as kindly as it did last year.

In light of how all previous tournaments in November turned out, it was almost unsurprising that it did. DreamHack offered HerO the very same meal as in 2011: stellar performance in the group stage as entree, lots of foreigners as the main course and the best terran in the world as dessert.

Check please (along with that big ass star trophy that looks incredibly uncomfortable to hold).

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Thankfully, IEM Singapore didn't go according to everybody's plans. This autor will shamefully admit that he dared ask the question "I wonder who will lose to MC in the final" but at the same time be joyful about said admission. All because IEM sticked to their renomee once again - they didn't have the line-up of DreamHack and were almost entirely overshadowed by the competition in Sweden but what they did was find a possible star in "second tier Korean" Sting, aleviating him to some extent from that sour label.

In addition, this was also Grubby's chance to truly shine by beating the tournament favorite and almost ending the champion as well. A high premier placement and a reward for one's dedication that, as many will agree, is long overdue.







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