A much better day for WCS Europe. Aligulac's predictions held strong in Group B, which produced better games than Group A. The only negative was Apollo slipping into his bad habit of spending the majority of a game saying it was over (about 20 minutes of game three Dayshi/Snute)--it's something he really needs to break away from. The VODs can be found here. The games:
jjakji 2 
Grubby 0
The expected result, albeit game one was close and one of the best matches of the day. Grubby opened with a proxy Twilight on his way to DTs; jjakji found the Twilight, but prepared for blink and took considerable damage from the DTs; jjakji went for widowmine drops followed by a marine/tank push that killed Grubby's mothership core and did considerable damage; the Terran went drop heavy and pinned Grubby (now firmly on colossus tech) on two bases for quite some time; Grubby was able to buy himself time with big zealot attacks on the natural and third (this permitted him to get up to four bases); jjakji pushed the fourth and killed it; by this time Grubby had templars and jjakji had ghosts; Grubby moved out without an observer and had to run from the ghosts who pursued, killing the army, the third and forcing Grubby to tap out. Game two Grubby let an SCV into his main allowing jjakji to scout his robo build and he was attacked while his mothership core was out on the map and with only two gates he was forced to tap out shortly afterwards.
Snute 2 Dayshi 1
Game one Dayshi went for proxy two racks and despite Snute pulling a ton of drones Dayshi had enough SCVs with him to get the bunker up and force the Norwegian to tap out. In game two Dayshi played pretty standard (hellion opening, with a Polt-viking rather than a banshee), something Snute has no trouble handling with queens and upgraded lings killed his initial hellion/marine push before they did any damage and with a ton of banelings did a ton of damage; both players settled into the usual muta/ling etc game, but with Snute having a tremendous economic damage and Dayshi very short on widowmines and the Frenchman had to tap out quickly. In the final game Dayshi went for triple reaper which Snute defended with queens while sending lings for a counter which got into Dayshi's base and did tremendous damage; the game settled into muta/ling, but just like the previous game the economic advantage for Snute was something Dayshi could never dent and eventually got run over. This series reminded me a lot of VortiX's ZvT's where typical Terran openings accomplished nothing, allowing the Zerg an economic advantage that could not be overcome (which would be echoed in the series that follows).
Snute 2 jjakji 1
Game one jjakji went for proxy racks, but couldn't get the bunker up and wound up very far behind; jjakji was about to get up to three bases while Snute went up to four; Snute had an upgrade lead and crushed jjakji's first army as he couldn't split well enough against banelings, but the win wasn't enough to end the game; jjakji harassed the fourth, but his widowmine wound up killing most of the marines and not much got accomplished; a drop into the main killed the spawning pool and spire; another pool killed the fifth; the attacks made jjakji's fourth safe; the Terran kept going drop heavy, snipping the ultralisk cavern and killing the fourth; jjakji overbuilt medevacs (up to 16) and the drops continued accomplishing a lot less; Snute was way ahead on army supply and built 44 banelings and crushed the army, denied the fifth and jjakji was starved out and while the game went on a little longer the outcome was not in doubt. In game two jjakji went for a triple reaper opening with a heavy blueflame hellion follow-up which Snute spotted with a ling ruby; despite building spines jjakji went around them and roasted the main and killing off 35 drones with the attack; jjakji went for a marine/tank follow-up and attacked the third, using his siege position to snipe the banelings and without them jjakji rolled over the rest of the army and forced Snute to tap out. In the final game both players went super greedy with jjakji going for a marine/hellion attack which killed off some queens, but he was forced to retreat against banelings; jjakji sent a double drop into the main which Snute pushed away easily; jjakji got a double drop on the fourth snipped and accomplished nothing with a drop in the main; the Korean continued with multipronged drops which did okay damage, but jjakji did not take a fourth behind it and got his army run over in the next engagement; jjakji continued to lose drops without accomplishing much; he then lost most of his widowmines away from the army and Snute pushed him over burrowed banelings; while jjakji was still alive and had his fourth, he was so far behind the outcome was no longer in doubt and tapped out after the next engagement. The third game was a good one and is worth checking out.
Dayshi 2 Grubby 0
This entire series was very entertaining and worth watching. Game one Dayshi went mech, building a ton of hellions (along with a ninja third) as Grubby was working his way to colossus; Dayshi's initial attack faced a wall, so after killing a pylon he pulled back; Grubby moved out with three colossus and they got crushed by the hellions (plus a couple of vikings); Dayshi pushed out with tanks added to his composition and while he took a bad fight he remained ahead; Grubby, rattled by the unusual strategy, only added his thermal lance now while getting storm for no reason anyone could figure out; the Dutchman was able to destroy Dayshi's ninja base while getting a fourth; Grubby went for heavy harass and attacked when Dayshi unsieged, but the Terran army was just too big for him to break; after the harassment was cleaned up Dayshi attacked and sieged the third, then the fourth; Grubby attempted a flank as Dayshi repositioned his army, but didn't have enough to crush it; Grubby attacked and Dayshi flanked him and killed most of his forces; the game went on a little longer, but was not in doubt (it was funny to see him kill a tank with probes). In the final game Grubby went robo as Dayshi went for mines; Grubby held off the push at his natural, but not the drop into his main and took a ton of damage--even more as Dayshi put mines in the natural; the game settled as Dayshi went up to three bases; Dayshi had a double drop rejected and his attempted snipe of Grubby's third pushed back too; Grubby pushed too far and lost almost all his colossus; Dayshi went for a four-medevac drop in the main, but it didn't do that much; Grubby went to pressure the gold base, but got his entire army emp'd and lost all his colossus; Grubby fought on a bit longer, but the game was not in doubt and he eventually tapped out.
jjakji 2 Dayshi 1
Game one Dayshi went for a marine/hellion/SCV drop which straight out won him the game (a fun but short game to watch). In game two jjakji got a reaper advantage (three to one) which Dayshi held off initially with some great micro; he held off the next attack with the help of hellions; the game settled for a bit as Dayshi went greedy; Dayshi lost some of his hellions out on the map trying to kill the reapers, and then more at the watch tower; jjakji went for a four-medevac drop in the main while attacking the third; Dayshi managed to hold, but took a lot of damage, and jjakji just kept dropping and Dayshi struggled to establish enough defence against it (being very late putting up turrets); jjakji went up to four bases and began to prepare for a sky Terran transition; jjakji kept up the pressure, attempting to snipe tanks; jjakji sent four medevacs into the main as he attacked the third, killing the CC; with a big bank jjakji pushed in and Dayshi tapped out as marauders wrecked his army. In the final game Dayshi went for a reaper opener and jjakji was able to kill them off, leaving the Frenchman with no army; Dayshi walled off, but jjakji just elevatored up and ended the game.
Snute and jjakji move on.
This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)
No comments:
Post a Comment