Replay of the Week #10

We start with Year at the bottom, and Wink at the top. Year scouts early, sending his probe pylon to scout, presumably in the hope of a gas steal. Wink begins his first supply near his ramp, starting his wall. Delaying his gateway, Year manages to steal the Terran's gas, making his gateway at 12 supply. Wink uses four SCVs to hit down the now-finished assimilator in his main, damaging his economy slightly, and also builds two marines to finish the job and defend the likely-incoming dragoons.

Meanwhile, Year is teching normally, with a cybernetics core nearly finished in his main. As it finishes, he immediately warps in a second gateway and starts dragoon range. With little else to do with his minerals, Wink expands, and finally begins his first factory. Preparing for the incoming goon attack, he builds a bunker near the two bridges, making a second factory as well. Needing to match the Terran economy, Year double expands, and pressures the bunker with his now range-upgraded goons, forcing many of Wink's SCVs to stop mining to keep it alive while he gets a tank. A robotics facility is on the way for Year, and with both of his expansions finished, is in a good position; eight of Wink's workers have been busy repairing the bunker for quite some time, though he finally gets his tank and forces the dragoons out.

Wink's SCVs work overtime repairing the bunker.
Year adds some extra gateways, increasing his gate count to four. With double machine shops, Wink researches mine and speed tech at the same time, also building a starport in the back of his main. For his part, Year is making more gates and warping in a Citadel, preparing to macro up properly. A drop comes out for the Terran, promptly loading four vultures and heading for Year's main. The drop succeeds well, Year losing a control group worth of probes.

A vulture drop hits Year's economy hard.
With a CC coming in his main, preparing to take his second natural, Wink pushes out and turrets up below his expansion bridges, repairing his dropship and filling it with tanks whilst doing so. Year starts teching up, making a templar archives and a stargate in preparation for arbiters.

Current Position Year Wink Running Bases 3

2Supply125/131101/116Upgrades0-0-00-1Resources444/474310/883

Unit Count
Year	Wink
7 23	9 5

With a dominant army, Year takes the 3 o'clock expansion, and sits on his side of the ridge awaiting action. Stasis is starting to research, and arbiters are coming out of his one stargate while Terran macroes up and takes the 2 o'clock expansion. However, not enough of his units are there, and a large chunk of the Protoss army squeezes across the bridge, decimating the Terran force stationed there and destroying his expansion attempt. Wink's reinforcements trap in the remainder of that army, though a good stasis from one of his arbiters helps him to free them, though an EMP is fired at it shortly after.

Year's army walks across the bridge in "single" file.
With his expansion attempt foiled, Wink tries once again to expand, but this time at the 9 o' clock position. With that he pushes, hitting the Protoss hard with his tanks sieged in range of Year's natural bridges. Once again though, Year's arbiters save the day, and with 2 stargates now pumping them, Wink's vessels are serving a more and more important purpose in the game.

Current Position Year Wink Running Bases 4

3Supply146/200163/198Upgrades1-0-22-2Resources969/660890/2075

Unit Count
Year	Wink
6 7 3	19 11 2

An attempt to cross the bridge fails, with few dragoons left to tell the tale.
Year's position looks nasty. He has very little army left, and with his 3 o'clock expansion demolished by the Terran push, is looking worse for wear. Much of the terran army is sieged up outside his natural, accompanied by vessels and turrets, and he seems unlikely to end the push anytime soon. His arbiters are his main weapons at the moment, and his situation worsens as all of his arbiters are hit by a single EMP; with no other way to do anything about his situation, Wink takes advantage and begins hammering away at both his 4 o'clock and 8 o'clock expansions, though one is saved by the attacks of his arbiters.

Wink's contain is not going to move for a while.

Year is evidently getting desperate.
To make matters worse, some of Wink's vultures find their way into the back mineral only, killing off large numbers of probes. With only one running expansion left, a containment and an inferior supply rating, Wink seems likely to take the match. An attempt to break his containment fails, incurring heavy losses for the already weakened protoss. Without much alternative, Year recalls some of his men into the 2 o'clock expansion, freezing half of the tanks there and shutting down everything else in the area, leaving Wink without an economy. However, Wink's army is superior, and it marches down to Year's mineral only at 7 o'clock and promptly razes it to the ground.

With few minerals left, Year makes many high templars in preparation for his final attempt to break out and kill Wink, who has landed one of his redundant CCs at 9 o'clock and begun mining there. Going out with all of his arbiters, he attempts to micro a vessel on its way home, but in his attempt to do so, his arbiters clump together and are hit by the vessel's final action, an EMP:

The dying vessel renders Year's arbiter horde useless.
As such, he is completely powerless, with no stasis or recall to help him out of his contain. Knowing he now has no chance left to reclaim the game, he attacks head on from the bridge and is completely annihilated, typing out as the Terran army marches into his expansion. GG.

Year surrenders as his army is rolled over.

Do you have a replay you think is worthy of this feature? If so, send it to Yer.ErrOr[-at-]hotmail.com and perhaps it will be seen here in the near future!

As a side note, I am currently too busy to be doing ROTW for the time being; there may be another writer, or I may just be doing it inconsistently, or a mix of both.