SC2 E-Sports Thread

[Maguspk]

He can't afford to be losing overlords, when he is inevitably forced to retreat he will lose his overlords that are generating creep. Early game Zerg cannot afford to lose even a single overlord, larva and resources are in too high a demand to warrant wasting overlords on the chance that you may save a few hydras when you attempt to retreat after a forcefield doesn't totally box you in and force you into a disadvantageous engagement.

Additionally, the forcefielding of the ramp is not something you can counter, you have to have a queen at both hatcheries. You can't just choose where the extra larva will spawn what are you even talking about. You can't choose where your units are going to spawn, you are forced to generate from different sources due to the zerg macro mechanic and regroup at a rally.

MCs forcefields were quite literally not counterable.

[Salodin]

He could have burrowed >_> and like others have said, he didn't exactly do a good job defending his base when he knew it was coming. Some spine crawlers would have helped immensely, and probably forced his retreat.

[synistar]

That's at an issue though. Is zerg going to be at lair tech during a delayed 4gate (9-10 min in game). July was researching burrow and roach speed right at the push timings of MC, completely reactionary. I think it sucks zerg doesn't get burrow at T1 but it can be abused so easily just as a really good player at the late-early game can lock things down with FFs.

Only decent attempt at defending was in game 1, then it was rofflestomp the rest of the way.

[Salodin]

Yeah he played a lot of things as a reaction instead of preparing for it since he had to know it ws coming. No burrow, tunneling claws, even his hydras didnt have upgraded range. He simply got caught with his pants down and couldnt respond. I guarantee in as little as a month from now youll see pro zerg players have an answer to this.

[Foxer]

Herp. Discuss TSL 3. Morrow v Jinro set2 was pretty awesome.

[Maguspk]

I love this armchair speculating like you all think July played wrong. Yeah let's blindly go burrow or roach ups and turn the match into a coin flip. That makes sense. Bad kids.

[Bweigelt]

I love this armchair speculating like you all think July played wrong. Yeah let's blindly go burrow or roach ups and turn the match into a coin flip. That makes sense. Bad kids.

He didn't play it great though. July has never been good at defending, even in SC1. His strength is his aggression but if you can put the pressure on him he tends to get flustered and starts making mistakes. MC just took advantage of that and didn't let July get his game plan going.

[ClarkSammich]

MC did what he does every fucking game, and July really should have had something planned to deal with it.
Personally, I think it was a very weak finals given the production costs/hype GSL has.


Also also, pretty much every match of TSL3 post ro32 is going to be better than the GSL finals. People should be talking about that instead.

Spoiler: show

ro32 still has some good matches left (nada vs. tlo mainly), and nony, chinro, sen, etc are in ro16 already. It's just a shame Husky is casting so many of these...

[Foxer]

Lots of games were better than March finals, not because TSL is that good though, just because the finals were as 1 sided as we expected them to be, much like MVP v MKP. Also, Jinro Ro16?

[ClarkSammich]

Wait, did he lose? I had to stop watching after Huk's first game. If he lost I'm going to be angry.

[Foxer]

2-1, July style. HuK played as bad as he does regularly. Nothing new.

e: That probably made no sense. Yeah, he lost 2-1 via bust and lings. And HuK is not good, nor are his best forcefields in the world, according to Kelly. /hardoff. : )

[Thunder]

I'm assuming we don't need to spoiler since anybody who hasn't watched these games and care would watch the games instead of reading forums.

Having said that.. chinro isn't in RO16. He lost to some pretty entertaining(imo) games vs Morrow that both times boiled down to baneling busts. He basically 2 based and cut drones at @~35 and just committed to baneling/zergling attacks. The first time it caught jinro somewhat off-guard I think but the second time Jinro had a wall off with 3 barracks + factory/engineering bay as a second wall off with spread out marines and he still got overrun.

Huk's games were pretty poor.. especially the 3rd game where he let a proxy pylon up in his base go unscouted. Edit: gotta agree with^, all the praise huk is getting is confusing as hell because he just doesn't put up results anywhere(assembly, GSL codeA, and now at TSL). He's either really nervous and fucks up build orders that he has down on the ladder or he's just really bad and gets to be #1 on the ladder in so many regions through just.. a lot of games. Idk what to say about him but he's really disappointing.

But so far every series has been really entertaining to watch except for MC and Huk which were painful to watch due to the mistakes going on in the games. Like Ciara having drones queued up to follow a drone who was mining in his main. And huk just giving units away. Top 3 control in the world ftw

This tourny is really good though, limited breaks, good casting(for the most part..), and great games. Next week's going to be great; I'm pulling for Idra/tyler to go deep and see them play as many people as possible but my smart money's on MC.

[Foxer]

Don't forget to mention free 720p. I was was like whoa.

I am thinking NesTea v MC in the finals with NesTea losing due to lack of quick AA.

[Sylvrdragon]

I love this armchair speculating like you all think July played wrong. Yeah let's blindly go burrow or roach ups and turn the match into a coin flip. That makes sense. Bad kids.

So you claiming that FFs (or at least MC's FFs) are "uncounterable" ISN'T armchair speculation? The burden of proof is on the one crying IMBA. SC History has shown us that many things that are called IMBA simply require time for people to work out the proper responses. As such, I've suggested several things that may or may not have worked. Sure, I'm not a pro, and I don't have access to the replays to see what July actually had to work with, but neither do I assume that pros are perfect.

As for the queen thing, in the fake expo into 4gate game where he FF'd the ramp like 7 times in a row, July had only 1 queen. He scouted MC's obscene Sentry count, so he could have guessed that he would have trouble reinforcing from his main. Furthermore, it was pretty much set in stone that if he lost the expo, he would lose the game. As such, you could easily come to the conclusion that sending the Queen to the expo in response to the Sentry count would have allowed for more Larva to spawn where the FFs may not have shut them out for so long. Even 4 larva worth of extra Roaches and/or Lings in the battle may have made the difference. That engagement wasn't all that one-sided UNTIL July couldn't reinforce.

[Slapper]

Where did you guys stream these games?

[Rehn]

The live stream is long done, and I'm assuming they'll prepare the VOD when they can.

http://www.youplayoff.com/category/45/StarCraft+II and scroll down to the video section. Yesterday's TSL matches have been posted, and I'm assuming today's matches will be on later today or tomorrow.

EDIT: You can view the live stream for next weeks games at youplayoff as well. Link goes live when at 2PM EST sat/sun I think.

[ClarkSammich]

Where did you guys stream these games?

The GSL games are found at http://www.gomtv.net/league/index.gom (that's a list of all seasons thus far, however VODs require a pass for that season which costs money.)
You can also watch GSL games live, but you have to make an account there/use GOM player.
There are also various restreams available if you look around.

Streams for pretty much every other worthwhile tournament can be found on teamliquid.net, plus they have a calendar etc.

[Slapper]

Awesome, thanks

[Maguspk]

So you claiming that FFs (or at least MC's FFs) are "uncounterable" ISN'T armchair speculation? The burden of proof is on the one crying IMBA. SC History has shown us that many things that are called IMBA simply require time for people to work out the proper responses. As such, I've suggested several things that may or may not have worked. Sure, I'm not a pro, and I don't have access to the replays to see what July actually had to work with, but neither do I assume that pros are perfect.

As for the queen thing, in the fake expo into 4gate game where he FF'd the ramp like 7 times in a row, July had only 1 queen. He scouted MC's obscene Sentry count, so he could have guessed that he would have trouble reinforcing from his main. Furthermore, it was pretty much set in stone that if he lost the expo, he would lose the game. As such, you could easily come to the conclusion that sending the Queen to the expo in response to the Sentry count would have allowed for more Larva to spawn where the FFs may not have shut them out for so long. Even 4 larva worth of extra Roaches and/or Lings in the battle may have made the difference. That engagement wasn't all that one-sided UNTIL July couldn't reinforce.

This is pointless, there is a difference between calling a unit imbalanced like you're claiming and saying July couldn't counter the forcefields. Forcefields by nature are not counterable, the only way to not lose to a forcefield is to hope your opponent sucks and cannot place them well. If your opponent is MC you will not be 'countering' forcefields anytime soon, it's that simple. The roaches cannot do anything to prevent that, burrow is lair tech and even then you'd need burrow movement to really take any advantage and at that point you're dead or he has had plenty of time to build a robotics and one observer.

I don't see how anyone can watch those games and not understand his victories were entirely dependent on forcefields literally castrating the enemy force.

[Salodin]

And again, there is a counter he just didn't use it or know about it. It's strong, not OP, and definitely counter-able once people practice against it for awhile. We'll have this conversation again in a few months when Zerg whoops Toss w/ FF and I come back saying Toss needs a buff.