IEM Cologne Qualifiers and Nation Wars

IEM Cologne (which begins February 13th, not long after IEM Sao Paulo finishes) has just completed its European and American qualifiers and I thought I'd take a look at which players enjoyed strong performances (four other qualifiers--Korean/Taiwan, SEA, China, and Asian--remain).

America (January 10-12)

Only two players could qualify from the bracket and joining no-brainer Polt was qxc.  The only other Korean who took part was viOLet, but he lost to Petraeus and was then knocked out by Illusion.  Polt did not lose a game on his way to qualifying (going 9-0 in his four matches, rolling Shew, Illusion, Suppy, and qxc), while qxc beat Capoch, HuK, Petraeus, and Illusion on his way through (only losing to Polt).  Illusion came closest to making it among the other participants (beating viOLet, Petraeus, and HuK) and it's interesting that three Terrans dominated the qualifier given all the imbalance complaints of late.

Polt also qualified for Sao Paulo back in December (along with MajOr, hellokitty, and puck), but it was a rougher ride for him than this time around.  Of the qualifiers for each tournament only hellokitty failed to make it into WCS.

Europe (January 18-19)

Three spots were open through the European bracket and following the Terran trend above ForGG and jjakji cruised through the bracket each losing only one game each.  MaNa joins them--his play substantially better than his futile attempts to make it into WCS earlier in the month (oddly, he only played Zergs throughout the qualifier, beating TLO, Kane, Nerchio, and Tefel).  Tefel wound up on the outside looking in.  The VODs are now posted on YouTube.

In the Sao Paulo qualifier jjakji cruised through as well, with only TLO joining him (leaving MaNa on the outside looking in).

Nation Wars

TotalBiscuit cast a European tournament called Nation Wars over the weekend and it featured some fantastic play.  Kas going for a proxy Thor against ToD was my favourite, but Dayshi using aggressive mech play to beat Kas' bio/attempted Battlecruiser transition was a strong second (both matches can be found here).  On the flip side, Snute's tedious swarm host/brood lord style, particularly in beating TitaN was awful to watch.  Apparently a threeish base Zerg can beat an eleven base Protoss.  I'll post links to the VOD's when they appear.

Interesting to note: Idra, who co-casted the first day of games before Day[9] took over, streamed in competition with the tourney the second day.  Given how long the stream ran it was probably no big deal, but it struck me as an odd choice.

 

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)