SC2 E-Sports Thread

[Maguspk]

LeenockfOu v Clide, everyone go watch that right now. Drop everything you're doing, watch the games right fucking now.

[Serif]

Holy shit, anyone else watching ROOTqxc vs DarkCell ?

ROOTqxc just made Zerg endgame his bitch holy shit

[Maguspk]

Where is that playing!?

[Serif]

http://www.teamliquid.net/video/streams/iCCup.TV

First game was on Shakuras and holy shit, see if you can find a replay of it.

[Eanae]

http://www.ustream.tv/day9tv

Dreamhack tourny is up and going on day9's stream. 14k viewers and still raising.

[Not Kuno]

action jesuz lolol

[Neg939]

6 pool'ddddddddd wow

[Eanae]

dat 6pool

19949 viewers at the end. Cripes.

[Eanae]

For those who missed it: http://blip.tv/file/4430757

[Secksi]

Almost 22k people watching now so I'm sure most of you have seen it but, game 3 at Dreamhack finals, holy shit.

[Julian]

Games 3 and 4 were both amazing.

[Gryffes]

Game3 and Game 4 from the finals were both awesome.

[Falaras]

If anyone didn't watch Mana vs Socke G2, you need to do so. Probably my favorite game of the tournament.

http://day9tv.blip.tv/file/4436285/

[RKenshin]

Not sure if this was already posted sometime back, didn't see it in recent pages... But man, I love the use of blink in this game:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxsJaPT14uM

[Falaras]

Not sure if this was already posted sometime back, didn't see it in recent pages... But man, I love the use of blink in this game:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxsJaPT14uM

Wow, the warp prism dropping a sentry to block the ramp...

[GRT]

i like how the other caster keeps emphasizing how "the Koreans aren't much better," while the Korean who failed to qualify in GSL is making semi-final in their tournament as a first-time attendant

[geno]

TOP was a former Ro16 player (GSL1) and Inca was both a former Ro8 and Ro16 player (GSL1 & 2). They are also both on one of the most respected and powerful korean teams, oGs. I think its a very interesting thing to point out honestly, the korean players performance in Dreamhack helps to legitimize the foreign scene's skill. 2 Koreans in a mostly non-korean tourney (still probably not close to the foreigner:korean ratio in the GSL considering the qualifiers) didn't really do too much better than the handful of foreigners that made it into the GSL. There is some parity there, showing how higher representation by a region generally leads to better results for that region (which should be obvious, but a lot of people forget when looking at the GSL and wondering why foreigners haven't swept it).

And anyways, even in a scenario where inca and TOP were B-teamers, the event still has some significance because of how ridiculous the skill levels were in Brood War. 2 Korean reps getting knocked out where they did in a foreign tourney would have been absolutely unheard of, nigh impossible in the BW scene over the last 5+ years. It's nice to know the skill differences clearly are not that screwed up yet.

[Thunder]

i like how the other caster keeps emphasizing how "the Koreans aren't much better," while the Korean who failed to qualify in GSL is making semi-final in their tournament as a first-time attendant

This misconception people have about being "good" and qualifying for the GSL is really annoying. If god damn reporters can qualify among the likes of Nestea, FD, Genius, Maka, Boxer, etc then it's pretty obvious the brackets can have a LARGE variance in difficulty.

Apollo can pretty safely say that "the koreans aren't much better" because TOP isn't shitting all over the europeans. He isn't doing anything special, his game sense isn't better than some of the guys there, he's getting supply blocked in the beginning like other people, etc etc. And all of this is best scene by Apollo/day9 who are casting both games. Even more so Apollo since he can look around at whatever he wants where as day needs to be entertaining.

Also, getting to the semi-finals in a tournament that's largely BO1 is pretty silly. TOP almost lost to Adelscott in a BO3; Adelscott isn't bad but.. come on, did you see all of those mistakes adel had? TOP was losing until Adelscott suicided his entire army into a repaired planetary fortress in Game1. And the other game Adelscott lost to TOP was when he mislicked like 5 times in the beginning and then didn't notice he never made his nexus because TOP had an SCV there. TOP won games he would normally have lost if nerves hadn't gotten to his opponent. It was almost as painful to watch as LittleBoy throwing away two games and his GSL seat to Maka after getting HUGE leads.

Edit: it's also worth noting that while oGs is one of the best teams in korea, inca and TOP are one of the best members of that team. While making it to Ro8(Inca wasn't in the Ro4, no protoss ever was) is a pretty big accomplishment, it's also worth noting TOP beat Fruitdealer, Clide, and Fruitdealer in oGs vs TSL. So, they're both pretty solid players and it's nice to see, like geno said, that the koreans are as mortal as foreigners are.

[Iku]

TOP was a former Ro8 player (GSL1) and Inca was both a former Ro4 and Ro8 player (GSL1 & 2). They are also both on one of the most respected and powerful korean teams, oGs. I think its a very interesting thing to point out honestly, the korean players performance in Dreamhack helps to legitimize the foreign scene's skill. 2 Koreans in a mostly non-korean tourney (still probably not close to the foreigner:korean ratio in the GSL considering the qualifiers) didn't really do too much better than the handful of foreigners that made it into the GSL. There is some parity there, showing how higher representation by a region generally leads to better results for that region (which should be obvious, but a lot of people forget when looking at the GSL and wondering why foreigners haven't swept it).

And anyways, even in a scenario where inca and TOP were B-teamers, the event still has some significance because of how ridiculous the skill levels were in Brood War. 2 Korean reps getting knocked out where they did in a foreign tourney would have been absolutely unheard of, nigh impossible in the BW scene over the last 5+ years. It's nice to know the skill differences clearly are not that screwed up yet.

oGsTop was Ro16 in GSL1. Inca was Ro8 ( GSL1 ) and Ro16 ( GSL2). Top and Inca are good but they are nowhere near the best of the best. What happened if they sent out like Foxer, Fruitdealer, NsPGenius, NesTea, Kyrix? The result may be different.

[geno]

You're both right, I was misreading the brackets. Stupid protoss.

On the other hand, to say Inca and TOP aren't near the best of the best doesn't particularly matter. I mean no offense to Adel, Naama or anyone else at Dreamhack (they played amazingly), but you have to remember Idra, ret, jinro, sen, and others weren't there either. The GSL takes precedence, true for Koreans and non-koreans alike. Not to mention all the other top players that didn't get invites or weren't able to go (Painuser, machine, etc.).

On top of that, I think you are severely overestimating the gap between these two guys and some of the players you mentioned above. For this current GSL, Genius is already knocked out at the Ro32, NesTea was legitimately close to losing in the Ro64 to a relative unknown, and Kyrix got more or less decimated in the Ro64. Acting like they are on some other level because they each had slightly more recent success in GSL2 is a bit absurd, the game is changing far too quickly and no one is so good that they simply cannot lose a series, I'd say even to a non-Korean.

And like I said, anyone who even qualified for an OSL once (this may even be to big a requirement) would have been shunned if he dropped a game, much less a series in a foreign tournament for BW in the last couple years. That's a much wider pool of players and a much higher expected result