After six games against StarTale's Life, Taeja stepped out of the booth to lift the DreamHack Winter 2013 trophy as well as the $30,000 cheque. This is the fifth gold medal for Taeja this year and his third DH title overall.
His only loss in the tournament so far was still clear in Life’s head and the Zerg tried his best not to repeat them. Remembering how lack of late-game tech cost him the winners final against Taeja, Life set up a nice transition into the late game, ready to meet the Terran bio with 3/3 ready, ultralisks out on the field and greater spire in construction.
It mattered not. Packing a 3/3 army of his own, Taeja marched south with confidence after a few widow mine shots took a sizeable chunk of Life zerglings. The Terran took and held the highground above Life’s fourth and rallied through there to take the one-game lead in the series.
The game was equalized on Polar Night after a daring move by Life, who took the idea of proxy hatcheries one step further. Not only did Life block Taeja’s natural but spined it up aggressively and actually started mining from it to effectively sustain a three-base economy. Taeja eventually managed to clean the infestation but his economy was so behind that his only shot at a victory was a blue flame/tank/marine all in but it arrived just a little bit too late. Sandwiched between spines, roaches and speedlings, Taeja surrendered game two.
The creep has climbed up all the way to Taeja's main
Eager to take the lead, Life forwent all evo chamber tech and went straight for a baneling/mutalisk all-in. Pressuring all of Taeja’s three bases with his own three-hatch economy, Life made for a dynamic and interesting mid-game but as Taeja completed his 2/2 the Zerg had to back out: his rush was over.
Where other Zergs would tap out, however, Life persisted. Despite the massive upgrade deficit, Life stayed in the game for more than half an hour, keeping himself alive through constant mutalisk counter attacks that held Taeja’s bio forces back. Only after a widow mine fusillade shredded half of Life’s flock was the Terran able to move out safely and break his opponent. The Liquid ace was two games away from a championship.
Life took a more straight-forward win on Derelict Watcher. Repelling Taeja’s banshee opening, Life hit the Terran with a series of ling run-byes to slow his economy, take a fourth base and beat him in the upgrade race. When Taeja’s attack arrived at the 12 o’clock expansion, it found a bigger, stronger Zerg that a-moved through the bio with ease. The score was tied 2-2.
The two enemies continued to trade map for map and Taeja retook his lead on Whirlwind. Once again, nothing special was displayed, merely a standard, solid, unending marine/mine/medivac push that slowly but surely drilled deeper into Zerg territory. Life tried to match Taeja’s macro by maintaining an insane production of his own but the cost efficiency of the Liquid ace was astounding, using hellions as meat shields to char the zerglings and having perfect timings on his medivac lift-ups to minimize baneling damage.
No banelings, no mutas and 25 supply down: Life is doomed
?lmost an exact repeat of the Whirlwind game happened on Bel'Shir Vestige. Undisturbed in the early minutes, Taeja entered into a strong mid-game and soon enough the torrent of marines, medivacs and mines began. A familiar tug-of-war ensued, Life doing his best to find good baneling connections and Taeja dancing around his widow mines to make for cost-efficient trades. Every mutalisk counter attack and every ling run-by was repelled and Life had do eventually acknowledge his defeat. A GG was called and Taeja lifted the third DreamHack trophy of his career.
| 1st |   Taeja | $30,490 |
| 2nd |  Life | $15,244 |
| 3rd |  Patience | $9,146 |
| 4th | Innovation | $6,100 |
| 5th-6th | JYP | $4,570 |
| MMA | $4,570 | |
| 7th-8th |  Naniwa | $3,050 |
| Polt | $3,050 | |
