In an extremely close and surprisingly intense Bo5 during the Town Hall Heroes invitational, Cloud9 Maelstrom broke their month-long loss streak against Tempo Storm.
Killing Tempo Storm's 34 tournament match win streak, Cloud 9 Maelstrom also broke a streak of their own; a losing one. For around two months, Cloud 9 Maelstrom had failed to defeat Tempo Storm every time the two teams clashed. "We had one bad month, a slump" said Cloud9 Maelstrom's DunkTrain after being interviewed directly after the end of the long best of 5 series.
And what a series it was. Already being called one of the most memorable sets in Heroes history, the context surrounding the epic matches would have you believe otherwise. The two teams were playing for a small amount of money during a community funded invitational event, while being casted by 4 (Yes, 4 casters) who's friendly and casual vibes more closely resembled a Skype hangout session than the coverage of such a competitive series.
But here we are; still reeling from what was seriously the most intense back and forth Heroes action since Heroes of the Dorm. Cloud9 Maelstrom seemed determined to put an end to the "always 2nd place" jokes and looked like a different heroes team. Gone were the 2-0 stomps, and in their place were two teams that looked evenly matched.
The first game went to Cloud 9.
Then, Game 2 went to Tempo Storm.
Cloud 9 refocused and took Game 3
Then Tempo Storm did the same thing and made game 4 look easy.
During one of these games, the super spooky strength of Leoric was in full display, especially when backed by Abathur. ?"Anytime Abathur is good, I hate it." said DunkTrain regarding the combo. "I don't think that hero (Abathur) should exist, like... oh my God"
The draft that made Cloud9 Maelstrom tweet their frustrations after losing game 2.
It all came down to the final game on Battlefield of Eternity, and in a draft decision that will surely be discussed further, Cloud 9 Maelstrom banned Anub'arak first, allowing Tempo Storm a free pick up on Zeratul. Tempo Storm instead chose Zagara (due to her strength on the battleground) allowing Cloud 9 Maelstrom to choose Zeratul for them selves.
This would be a decision that Tempo Storm would eventually come to regret, as it was Zeratul's assassination prowess when paired with Abathur that eventually closed out the incredibly close game, killing off nearly 3 heroes on his own. These two teams are slated to face each other again during the MSI MGA 2015 tournament at Pax Prime, but there is a good chance both teams are more concerned with the first real matchup against international competition.
You can watch the full set on our VoDs page.
More on GosuGamers Heroes of the Storm:
