British Terran player Benjamin "DeMusliM" Baker qualified for the ESL Pro Series Germany yesterday after a win over German Daniel "XlorD" Spenst.DeMusliM has written eSports history. He is now the very first non-German to have qualified for an ESL Pro Series season since Hwang "Zacard" Tae-Min back in ESL's WarCraft 3 Pro Series Germany.
- The whole situation with moving to Germany came up when I got an eSports job offer - after thinking a great deal about it, including the living situation in Germany, I decided against the job offer, for now, as I still want to see where this gaming path takes me as it's going pretty good," DeMusliM explains to us.
Players wanted him disqualified from the EPS
DeMusliM's participation in the EPS has not gone unnoticed. Benjamin tells us that some of the players in the EPS qualifier wanted him disqualified.
Benjamin explains how XlorD refused to play him for 15 minutes and wanted him kicked from the tournament. Even after he lost he tried to get the Brit kicked.
- And to say we were team mates..." says DeMusliM and smiles.
Won the "base race" against XlorD
After going through a set of internationally unknown players, the Brit came out on top against XlorD in the semi final.
On Steppes of War, DeMusliM went for a 3 barracks build opposed to XlorD's fast high templar build.
- "In terms of the 'what beats what': his build, if he survives the early game, significantly counters mine, and so I tried to rush a bit with some early pressure but to no avail," says DeMusliM to GosuGamers.
- "Eventually it came down to a base race situation in which I managed to keep more units alive than he and so I won."
"In EPS situations you have days to prepare for each singular match which definetely enables people to prepare odd stuff."
"His pure stalker composition got annihilated" The second game on Desert Oasis turned out a wee odd.
- "As he picked Desert Oasis I assumed he would have been going for a Void Ray/Stalker strategy where he picks off my gas: I got the Stalker bit right but he went blink."
- "The game lasted a while, he had an expo all game which I didn't know about on the island, but eventually his pure stalker composition versus my Marauder/Medivacs got annihilated."
- "We both made a few mistakes which caused the win - such as 3 hellions continuously raping his probes while I lost a couple of dropships to blink stalkers but I'm happy with the post result."
What do you think of your chances in the ESL Pro Series? With Socke, HasuObs and TLO as your "for now" enemies?
- Hmm, I'm pretty confident - obviously in EPS situations you have days to prepare for each singular match which definetely enables people to prepare odd stuff. So I'm not going to take anyone lightly - but I do believe I have a decent shot at Top 4.
Any final words?
- I'd like to thank mTw and its sponsors: Sennheiser, Kaspersky, OCZ technology and Xtreme Mobile Gaming. I'd also like to thank my teammates for training with me and helping me out through the qualifier. Hope people carry on supporting mTw!
Links
ESL.eu - Tournament brackets