Dreamhack Winter 2012 - NaNiWa shows his love for Russian Romanticism

In order to have a decent chance of advancing from group play, NaNiWa needed to defeat Ret in the last deciding set of the night. 

So this is how NaNiWa prepares: checking his build-orders while listening to Rachmaninoff's Piano Concert No 2 on Youtube. 

This classy move almost makes us forget the badmannered and aggressive remark against Thorzain a couple of hours earlier...

Dreamhack Winter 2012 - EG vs. Liquid

At this Dreamhack as well as at other big European LANs, we've noticed something that we find quite interesting.

Whenever we spot a player from Liquid they are almost always surrounded by teammates/coaches/managers and so forth.

On the contrary the EG players always seem to be by themselves.

We do not know the reason behind this, and for all we know it might be a coincidence, but it certainly feels like the Liquid players at the european LANs have a greater sense of teamspirit surrounding them.

We realize that our experience might not reflect reality at all, and might be due to the Liquid team being bigger at these events, but it still feels rather odd to witness this difference.

Actually most of the pictures we took today of the players from the two teams, reflect our point pretty well.

Thorzain by himself after he was defeated by Ret

Ret watches replay from the last game he lost to NaNiWa with teammate Hero and manager Robin Nymann

Hero in action with supporters watching closely

Stephano battling and ending the day with a score of 2 wins and 2 losses

Day 2 of the MLG Fall Championship

In our opinion yesterday was one of the most intense days of gaming in the Starcraft 2 history.

Soooo many good players battling in both the open bracket and the group play of the MLG Fall Championship that it was impossible to watch all the games you wanted.

If we have to pick our favorite games of the day it would be set 1 in the series of Leenock vs. Oz and then the entire series between NaNiWa and Flash.

The 1st set between Leenock and Oz was a crazy basetrade game where Leenock ended up taking a base in the ex-main of Oz via Nydus play and well, we've just never seen a game quite like it.

The series between NaNiWa and Flash was just epic, and you need to watch it right now!

Two of the most famous and infamous players going at it first in a normal series, and then an extended series that ended up going all the way to the seventh set.

Flash did a proxy 2-rax in the last and deciding set, and NaNiWa had taking his natural Nexus quickly so that was basically GG and Flash claimed a spot among the top 6 of the Championship.

Flash thus showed exactly how long it takes for the best Broodwar player in the world to transition to a new game. 

NaNiWa on the other hand showed that he more than anyone in the world has the ability to come back when people think he is done and out.

For months he has seemed depressed and tired of the game and suddenly he plays like a God. That's a charismatic player for you right there.

Unfortunately our danish Protoss hero BabyKnight is now out of the Championship!

He first lost 2-0 to NaNiWa, who had had prepared perfectly and figured out exactly how to play BabyKnight.

After that BabyKnight proved he wasn't out of the tournament yet when he took out Idra 2-1 in impressive fashion and showed some great PvZ.

From there BabyK had to play against HwangSin again and even though BabyK had a lead of 2-1 going in to this extended series he could not take home the victory. 

HwangSin beat BabyK in surprisingly easy fashion when he won 3 games in a row taking the series 4-2

This meant BabyK was down in the Loser's bracket where he suddenly faced Polt, one of the absolute scariest Terrans in the world, in an elimination match.

Polt was too good and defeated BabyK 2-0 meaning the end of the danish player's first MLG.

A lot of great games coming up today though.
Of the 16 players left, NaNiWa is the only one who isn't Korean and he has lived and trained in Korea for a long time.

So much for the korean dominance ever decreasing...

First day of MLG Fall Championship

What a great opening day of the MLG Fall Championship we got to experience yesterday.

The most important result was in our opinion of course BabyKnight's beautiful 2-1 victory over HwangSin.

Their PvP series was really close, but somewhat weird as well.
The three sets included a lot of cool moves from both sides, but also some rather odd mistakes.

HwangSin took the first set even though BabyK got a good economic lead early on. Later in the game though the danish Protoss attacked too aggressively into HwangSin's Colossi.

The second set was on Tal'Darim Alter and BabyK went for a 4-gate that HwangSin defended well against with only 3 gates.
From there on HwangSin took his natural whereas BabyK went for a Blink-Stalker all-in and with beautiful blink micro BabyK was able to take the set.

In the last set HwangSin went for a proxy robotics build that BabyK defended against. From there BabyK could contain HwangSin in his main while getting his own natural up. This gave BabyK an economic lead and he played the rest of the game carefully and eventually overwhelmed HwangSin with a max supply army.


BabyKnight now has to face the winner of the game between NaNiWa and whoever comes up from the from the Open Bracket.


A lot of great games are coming up today and we can't wait. 

Group brackets for MLG Fall Championship released!

OMG!

Group Play Brackets for MLG Dallas 2012

At first glance Group C looks like the "group of death" with top korean killer nerds TaeJa and Life in it. TaeJa vs. Life isn't exactly a bad match to open the MLG Group Play up with either.

Our Danish hero BabyKnight has been placed in Groub B alongside NaNiWa, TheStC, Grubby, Hwangsin and 1 of 4 proleague players (Flash, Soo, Soulkey or Hyvaa).

These 5 players will be joined by 2 of the 8 players that makes it through Open Bracket.

Anyway, we can't wait to see BabyKnight in action in his first MLG.

His game against NaNiWa especially will be quite epic.

Recently we stalked NaNiWa on twitter and noticed him writing the following.

Even though it's just twitter and probably said in fun, it still seems pretty obvious that NaNiWa doesn't consider BabyKnight to be a Starcraft mastermind.

We sincerely hope that BabyK can prove NaNiWa otherwise and crush him in their PvP clash.

Do you think some of the SC 2 pros are considering retirement?

Introduction to discussion:

If at some point you were among the best players in the world, it's naturally going to be very frustrating if you're no longer able to make it far in any tournaments.

We've seen some players like HayprO and Jinro retiring recently, partly due to them no longer being able to play at the very highest level, and also both stating that their motivation was no longer what it needed to be.

As the general level has increased dramatically, it's become harder to achieve really good results, even with an all-in dedication.

So with this in mind we wonder: Will a big SC2 star shock us all in the near future by retiring?

The following players are just some of the names that would provide really big news if they were to quit, even though we don't think any of them necessarily are or should be considering retiring.

Huk?

As we all know he initially performed extremely well and continued to for a long time, but for a while now has not achieved that impressive results.
Sure, he barely qualified for the WCS world finals in Shanghai and has just qualified for the IPL5, but is that enough for someone like him?

Will he quit anytime soon?
Probably not, but it will certainly depend on his results over the next 6 months or so, whether he can continue believing he still has what it takes.

iNcontroL?

It's pretty safe to say that of pretty much all the players out there, iNcontroL is probably the one that will have the easiest time finding a job in the community, if he stops playing professionally.

He himself has expressed that he still believes he has what it takes, to do well in a big tournament and that he still considers himself a player before anything else.

But at the same time it's been a really long time since he has shown world-class play and since he is such a charismatic character, we doubt it will be that long before he makes the official switch from player to caster/host/manager whatever.

NaNiWa?

In 2011 he won MLG in Dallas and finished second in Providence as well as beating both Mvp and Nestea in the MLG global Invitational at a time when they were considered the two best players in the world.
In early 2012 he managed to get RO 8 in season 2 and 3 of the GSL code S, but has since then lost a lot of games, some of which were to pretty unknown players.

While we don't think NaNiWa is going to quit at all, as he seems like a guy who believes too much in himself, we still feel he has a very pretty tough road ahead of him.
Especially if he stays in Korea where the competition is just now getting absolutely insane.

Therefore we feel that he probably ought to return from Korea to try and regain his confidence a bit.
Or else lack of results in Korea might eventually be what causes him to break down and retire.

Nestea?

Still considered to be the greatest human on earth by many, he has had a really tough time lately losing clearly in both the GSL and the OSL. While he probably has the game-understanding to theoretically become one of the best players in the world again, it's seems unlikely that he will be able to find the same kind of motivation as some of the young and upcoming players.

Therefore we see it as being realistic that Nestea retires at some point relatively soon unless he suddenly achieves something impressive again.
But if you've created the universe, then anything less than a GSL title must be a disappointment.

Conclusion

The players we mentioned aren't necessarily the ones that are most likely to retire any day soon.

They are just some of the more famous players that aren't producing fantastic results at the moment.

There are of course a long list of players that might be considering retirement, as the life of a pro SC2 gamer in many ways must be damn exhausting.

For most players the pay isn't exactly great, and while you do get to play SC 2 all day, it's only natural that you also need to achieve good results, in order to feel satisfied and happy.

An important thing to add though is that the feeling of self-realisation for most players will also be affected by how much the SC2 scene eventually ends up growing.

If every country in the world ends up having a SC2 scene that really flourishes economically and competitively then perhaps you don't need to be the best in the world to feel like you are achieving something.

Top 5 in Luxembourg might just be enough...

Recap of GSL Code A RO 48 (MaNa, NaNiWa and Flash)

Today there were some highly anticipated games in the GSL code A, round of 48.

The only two foreigners in GSL at the moment, NaNiWa and MaNa, both had to play to try and keep their place in GSL.

On top of that Broodwar legend Flash had to play his first regular GSL match, which had naturally also spawned a lot of high expectations

MaNa vs. asd

MaNa won the first set on Antiga Shipyard with a very effective 3-base push with perfect storms eventually winning him the game.

In the second set on Entombed Valley asd made some good drops early on and eventually a very deadly all-in push with Marines/Tanks/Banshees/SCVs that took out MaNa's natural and contained him in his main with asd building bunkers at the natural.
MaNa tried to break the contain but couldn't do it, so asd took the first set.

The third and deciding set was on Ohana and ended up looking a lot like the second set.
When asd pretty much did the exact same all-in push he once again managed to take out MaNa's natural and contain him in his main. MaNa tried to break it with immortals and eventually colossi but was more careful than in game 1 this time realizing that he probably wouldn't be able to break it.

MaNa scouted with his phoenixes that asd had moved his mainorbital to his natural, and since MaNa himself was completely mined out he knew he had to do something quickly.
So MaNa decided to sneak all of his army out of his main with a single warp prism and go for a basetrade.
This might have worked better if asd hadn't scouted it as quickly as he did, but asd saw it and went into MaNa's main with all his army quickly taking it out.
At the same time MaNa had no difficulty either with taking out asd's main

So at this point Mana's only structure was an assimilator that he had placed down in asd's original main.  The only structures remaining for asd were a couple of buildings that were flying in different directions on the map. MaNa found the orbital and took it out eventually giving him vision of asd's remaining flying structures.

In the end asd's army was simply a lot bigger though and asd played carefully as he slowly moved towards MaNa's single remaining building.
MaNa tried to take out asd's remaining structures with his phoenixes but asd could simply land the buildings and as MaNa lost his last Colossi he could do nothing but GG and realise that his days in GSL were over for now.

asd vs. MaNa = 2-1

NaNiWa vs. Mini

First set was on Ohana with Naniwa spawning in the top and Mini in the bottom.

Naniwa went: Gateway - assimilator - assimilator - cybernetics
Mini went: Gateway - assimilator - cybernetics - assimilator

This naturally meant that Mini's cybernetics was quicker but that Naniwa had more gas.
From there they went something like:

Naniwa:  Gateway - Robotics - Expansion - Gateway - immortal - blink
Mini: Gateway - Twilight - Blink - Expansion - Gateway - Robotics

Mini then tried to do some blink harassment in NaNiWa's main, but he was ready for it and Mini lost a few of the stalkers putting NaNiWa a bit ahead in army supply.

From there Mini went into Colossi tech but instead of adding his own robotics support bay NaNiWa decided to throw down 3 additional gateways and go for a big push to try and kill Mini before he got too many Colossi out.
Initially the push from NaNiWa did well as he managed to catch one of Mini's immortals with good forcefields at the ramp to the natural.

At this point though Mini had already gotten a few Colossi out and NaNiWa tried different approach-angles to see how he could best try and break Mini's forces. Eventually it led to a rather close engagement which Mini managed to win with good Colossi control.

NaNiWa tried to retreat with his remaining attack forces but Mini chased after him and took out two of NaNiWa's immortals. This gave Mini quite a big lead in army supply and NaNiWa frantically threw down another robotics facility to try and catch up in Colossi.
But Mini knew he was ahead and he didn't wait long before he pushed and when he did his higher Colossi number won him the final engagement at NaNiWa's natural thus winning Mini the set.

The second set was on Daybreak with NaNiWa spawning in the top right and Mini in the bottom left.

Both players pretty much went for the exact same "two gateways and two stalkers into robotics " build.

They both got a few more stalkers out and NaNiWa then managed to catch and take out one of MiNi's stalker out on the map.
This caused NaNiWa to go for some pressure at the ramp to Mini's main. Unfortunately for NaNiWa though, he overextended a bit and Mini caught some of NaNiWa's stalkers on the ramp.
This gave Mini a supply lead as they both took their natural expansions.

Mini then went for some warp prism with double immortal drops and throughout the entire game he actually used his warp prism beautifully. First he dropped a few times in the main.

Then he dropped at NaNiWa's third forcing a cancel on it, while he himself already had his own third finishing up.

Mini also managed to use the warp prism to get map control by dropping the immortals by the watch tower every time NaNiWa tried to claim it with a zealot.
Mini then dropped in the main again and then at the natural and then in main again every time only doing a of damage and escaping just in time, which must have been pretty damn annoying for NaNiWa

Both player's had gone up to double robotics but by constantly harassing NaNiWa, Mini had gained a good lead in his Colossi number and overall army supply.
This allowed Mini to take his own fourth and at the same time go for a deadly push at NaNiWa's third. With Mini also having Archons to tank damage it never really got close and Mini took the set and the series knocking NaNiWa out of code A.

You can say what you want about NaNiWa and the somewhat strange behavior he has shown at some times, but you have to respect the fact that he risked everything and went to Korea this year to try and battle the best SC 2 players in the world at the center of the Starcraft scene.

With this in mind it's quite understandable that NaNiWa was absolutely devastated after his loss.
This guy has truly sacrificed a lot of foreign tournaments this year to try and prove himself it Korea and now he is out of the GSL and after losing this series he must be wondering what in the world he is supposed to do now.

Mini vs. NaNiWa = 2-0

Flash vs. Killer

The first set was on whirlwind with Killer spawning in the top left and Flash in the bottom left.

Killer went for a big 2 base Colossi push and as he moved towards the natural base of Flash it did not look like Flash would be ready for it at all.
However, in a matter of seconds Flash starting building additional bunkers while repairing the ones in the front beautifully with his SCVs.
Eventually he was able to do an impressive hold until he got vikings out and with them he was able to deny Killer's push.

Killer had invested A LOT in the attack and when Flash went for a big counter push Killer was behind in army supply.
When they engaged the vikings of Flash took care of Killer's Colossi while the stimmed bio army massacred Killer's ground forces and with that set 1 went to Flash.

Second set was on Cloud Kingdom and the game quickly developed into a pretty weird game as Killer went for a proxy robotics facility and Flash went for a proxy starport.
Flash scouted Killer's proxy robotics with the hellions he wanted to drop in Killer's main, but he lost one of the hellions in the process.

Flash still dropped in Killer's main though and actually managed to kill quite a lot of probes with his two hellions mainly because Killer was supply blocked for a while and unable to warp in units to defend.

At the same time Flash had been able to set up a good defense at home. So when Killer tried to get something out of his proxy play, and push up the ramp to the main he had to way of doing damage as Flash already had sieged tanks on the high ground.

From here the game stabilized a bit with both player's taking their natural, but with Flash being quite a bit ahead after their opening agression.
Killer though had sneakily placed down a dark shrine and with this managed to catch Flash completely off guard by sending two DTs to the main and two DTs to the natural.
Flash had to bring his army all the way back from the middle of the map and while doing so took a devastating amount of damage.
From this point on Killer was in too big of a lead and when they finally engaged Killer took the set easily with Flash probably thinking "DTs are for noobs!".

The third and deciding set was on Entombed Valley with Flash spawning in the bottom right and Killer in the top right.

They both went up to three bases relatively fast and without getting bothered.
From here the game turned into a game of big engagements.
There was never really anything sneaky going on and the game was just decided by who positioned and controlled their units the best in the engagements.
And Flash did so in their first engagement, mainly by doing great damage to the Colossi with his perfect number of very well positioned Vikings

From this point on Flash was in a bit of a lead and as the game continued with a lot of big engagements  they both seemed to control their armies really well and quite carefully.
But after every engagement Flash simply managed to come out a bit on top and stay ahead in army supply. At the same time Flash took his own fourth safely while taking out Killer's fourth numerous times, and eventually Flash just got further and further ahead and Killer was rolled over in the final engagements.

Flash vs. Killer = 2-1

There were also some other series today that we unfortunately did not get to watch, but according to Wolf and Khaldor the Maru vs. EffOrt games were really nice as well.

Anyway, all in all not a great day for foreigners in Korea, but a good day for all those people arguing that it's only a matter of time before Flash will be able to dominate the SC2 scene as he has done in Broodwar.

GSL World Championship

It was announced some time ago that another GSL World Championship will be held in connection with the IPL5 which takes place in Las Vegas in the last weekend of november .

The idea is that the seven best foreigners in the world will battle against the best koreans in an epic Korea vs. the world showdown.

It has now been decided how the seven players that will represent the world is gonna be selected.

NaNiWa and Stephano were both given a spot by GomTV so there are five spots left for other players.

To find these players two polls have been established.
One for Europe and another for North America, South America and South East Asia.

Everyone then has a chance to vote for the players they think should represent the world and then on september the 23rd the 16 players in each poll with most votes, will qualify for two separate tournaments that will determine who gets to participate in the World Championship.

Here are the links to the polls where you can vote.

North America/South America/South-East Asia Poll

European poll


In all honesty it's feels a bit weird that it's decided by a poll what 16 players will get a chance to fight for the spots.

It doesn't seem fair simply because, as we all know, the most popular and famous players aren't necessarily the best players at the moment,

But oh well. I guess people never get tired of a good old popularity contest...

GSL code S RO 32 - group F

BEWARE OF SPOILERS

Today's group featured the only remaining foreigner in the GSL, the infamous NaNiWa (infamous as in that no one has ever provided as much perfect Reddit material as he has), going up against the three koreans Heart, Sniper and Squirtle. Well not going up against all of them, but being in the same group as them.

NaNiWa made it to the round of 8 in the last two GSLs (as everyone except my mum knows), but he hasn't really played well in any of the tournaments outside Korea over the summer, so we were pretty excited to see if he could prove that he is still one of the best foreigners by being able to move on from today's group.

First series of the day was between NaNiWa and Heart.
It was a pretty cheesy series, but Heart is known for his early aggression so it was not that different from what we had expected.

First set was on Entombed valley. NaNiWa took his natural after building a gateway and a gas. Heart went for an early factory, but NaNiWa scouted that Heart wasn't expanding so he built two extra gateways and a robo. Heart built a starport and pushed when the first medivac was done along with a few helions and a bunch of marines. He brought some SCVs as well even though we all know they are civilians and not supposed to be fighting.
NaNiWa scouted the exact timing of the all in attack though and he looked prepared at his ramp. Then Heart decided to do a fake drop, and this caused NaNiWa's units to get a bit out of position, and Heart wanted to punish him for it and went up the ramp with his helions. NaNiWa missed the forcefields, and the helions took out all his sentries. .
Heart placed a bunker next to NaNiWa's natural and took it out easily.
From here on NaNiWa was contained in his main. He went for an immortal composition and was able to push out and take out Heart's army. NaNiWa decided to do a counter push but Heart had siege mode and defended it somewhat easily. The game however seemed to be a bit even at this point and NaNiWa took his natural again and built a robotics support bay.
Around the 15 minute mark Heart went for a big all in push in which he brought all his SCVs.
All NaNiWa needed was a colossus or two to defend, so he had to buy time. Unfortunately he once again missed some forcefields, and Heart used good tank placement on the ramps of NaNiWa's natural to force NaNiWa to retreat into his main once again. NaNiWa got two colossi out and tried to break Heart that had already moved into the main with some tanks. But he could not break Heart's army and Heart took the first game. All in all a somewhat weird game that NaNiWa lost partly because of some grim mistakes he made.

Second set was on Antiga Shipyard. Heart went for a helions and a medivac and as he send them across the map to drop in NaNiWa's main, he also took his natural. NaNiWa however is a Swedish viking and they don't like to be cheesed in the way that he had been in game one. So he had decided to do a counter cheese and had already built 4 gates and even been able to sneak a pylon in Heart's natural. NaNiWa's 4 gate took out all of Heart's poor SCV's (they were slaughtered like animals), and although Heart's drop did some damage in NaNiWa's main as well, the game was essentially over and when NaNiWa's stalkers took out Heart's medivac he GG'd and NaNiWa thus tied up the series.

Third set was on Ohana.
Heart went for a 2 rax and a early marauder/marine push. NaNiWa had taken his natural but he scouted the incoming attack so he built two extra gates (making it 3 gates), and a twilight. He was able to defend by bringing the exact right amount of probes.
From there NaNiWa went for DTs. Heart went for another big push when stim and siege mode finished.
When the dark shrine finished NaNiWa had gas enough for two DTs and he warped in both of them outside Heart's main. This was probably a tiny mistake, as Heart's army did a lot of damage at NaNiWa's natural before NaNiWa had enough gas for a defensive DT. He did however kill a ton of SCVs in Hearts main with his two DTs. Heart went for cloaked banshees but NaNiWa scouted them and got out an observer reasonable quick.
At this point NaNiWa had around 4 times as many workers as Heart. Heart however did have a bigger army, that included a raven and a couple of banshees. He then pulled all his SCVs and went for a final push Heart style.
So if NaNiWa could have defended against this the game would have been his, and he did get out an immortal, morphed a few archons and while also researching zealotspeed. Unfortunately for him his three gates didn't give him enough units and he could not stop Heart's army and Heart took the game and the series with an all in.
A deserved win for Heart, but also a heartbreaking loss for NaNiWa. He did some stupid mistakes but overall he kinda looked just as good as Heart, or even better in some situations.
But in the end Heart was the smarter player today.

Heart vs. NaNiWa = 2-1


Second series of the day was between Sniper and Squirtle, and in our opinion Squirtle is top 5 protoss in the world so we had him as a clear favorite going into the game.

First set was on Whirlwind. Sniper went for pool first, and then two expansions. Squirtle did a Gateway nexus built. From there he went for a 5 gate push with around 5 sentries and a bunch of stalkers. Sniper didn't get enough units or spinecrawlers out and Squirtle took out his third without much hassle.
Squirtle even managed to keep three of his sentries alive and was able to push on and by chrono boosting his gateways he ended up simply overwhelming Sniper with units who thus had to GG.

Second set was on Daybreak. Squirtle went for a warp prism sentry drop in Sniper's main. He did the classic force field of the ramp, to prevent the units from Sniper's second and third hatcheries to provive assistance. He did damage but at some point missed a forcefield and zerglings got in and surrounded his army. He did manage to continue the attack for a while though.
After a while Sniper got enough roaches to kill of the drop and from there went for a counter push with roaches. They overwhelmed Squirtle and took out his natural. As response Squirte tried to harass with warp prism again but didn't do all that much damage. Eventually Squirtle got out an immortal that took out Sniper's roaches, but Sniper had another big wave of zergstuff and that was too much for Squirtle. 1-1.

Third set was entombed valley. Sniper pretended to go for three hatcheries, but went for an early roach warren instead and then cancelled his third hatch. He pushed out with 6 roaches and a bunch of zerglings. Squirtle had to defend with probes to gain time for defensive cannons to warp in at the ramp, so Sniper killed quite a few probes, but eventually Squirtle secured his ramp. Squirtle went for DTs and was able to send a DT to each of Sniper's hatcheries. He killed a ton of drones with his DTs and even took out Sniper's third. Squirtle kept harassing quite successfully with the DTs after this, while he himself got a super economy. Sniper went for infestors, but he never got a good economy and when Squirtle pushed out Sniper could not stop his huge amount of Stalkers.

Squirtle vs. Sniper = 2-1


So the third series of the day was the winner's match between Squirtle and Heart.

First set was on Antiga Shipyard. Heart went for a trademark early push with reactored helions and some bio stuff. He even brought some SCV's as Heart seems to believe that he needs to punish some of his poor workers in every game so they all remember who their God is. Anyway, he got a bunker up at Squirtle's natural, but with an immortal and some stalkers from the high ground, Squirtle was able to defend. Heart decided to expand thinking that he had done a reasonable amount of damage, but when Squirtle finally moved out with stalkers and sentries he was able to push all the way into Heart's main with some really good forcefields, and he took the first game.

Second set was on Entombed valley. Having shown nothing else than cheeses today, Heart decided that it was time to be extra sneaky so he built a bunker at his ramp and then two Command Centers inside his main. The idea was that Squirtle would expect another cheese and therefore not be greedy giving Heart an economic advantage. This was a good idea in theory, as Squirtle did go for 3 gates and a robo pretty early. The stupid thing about the plan though was that went Heart floated his orbital out and took his natural he didn't really built a lot of defense at the ramp, which had probably been a good idea considering his economic position. So the production facilities that he had forced Squirtle to built, ended up providing enough units for a push that overwhelmed Heart's natural and took out all his SCVs. As the attack ended Squirtle had three times as many workers as Heart and from here on Squirly played extremely safe. Eventually he overwhelmed Heart with a ton of Colossi and won the game and the series relatively easy.

Squirtle vs. Heart = 2-0


Fourth series was between the losers of the two first games, NaNiWa and Sniper. A very hard elimination match for NaNiWa as his PvZ isn't exactly his strongest matchup.

First set was on Antiga Shipyard and it was actually a pretty painful game to watch.
NaNiWa went for a 2 base push with zealots from 6 gates. The plan was to take out Sniper's third but Sniper scouted both of NaNiWa's pylons and knew exactly what was coming so he just built some roaches and all of NaNiWa's zealots were practically a waste of money. From there NaNiWa decided to go for a blink stalker push that was pretty much all in. Unfortunately for him Sniper had a changelot by his army all the time (that he never saw strangely enough) and once again Sniper was perfectly prepared. He even managed to burrow zerglings in the middle of the map and do a perfect sandwich on NaNiWa's army and NaNiWa was so far behind at this point that he had to GG.

Second set was on cloud kingdom and actually a pretty cool game. NaNiWa once again did a 2 base push on Sniper's third. This time his army of mainly Zealots were supported by a few stalkers which allowed him to micro better against Sniper's units. He did this quite well and was able to take out Sniper's third, however he also lost all of his army in the process. Sniper retook his third and at around the same time NaNiWa began his third. He cancelled however and went for another big push with blink stalkers. This could probably have killed Sniper or at least done a ton of damage, but Sniper had researched burrow and NaNiWa had no detection at all. He tried to push on anyway but lost most of his army without doing much damage. This caused NaNiWa to try to take his third after all, but for what felt like a million years Sniper had a cool sneaky zergling burrowed there. And since NaNiWa had no detection this delayed his third for a while.
After this Sniper went for a heavy infestor composition. He then did a double pronged attack at both NaNiWa's natural and third and although NaNiWa defended pretty well Sniper managed to SNIPE his third (omg that's funny...).
Not having the army or map presence to move out NaNiWa started his third again. When it finished Sniper attacked it again. This time with around 25 infestors or something crazy like that.
NaNiWa had a few colossi to defend, and he controlled them really well, but Sniper had spawned the exact right amount of infested terrans and the last one of them barely managed to take out NaNiWa's third once again. This was too devastating a blow for NaNiWa and he resigned, and he will now have to battle in code A to regain his code S spot.

Sniper vs. NaNiWa = 2-0


So the last series of the day was between Heart and Sniper battling for a spot in the round of 16.
Heart took game 1 and Sniper took game 2, but unfortunately we didn't have a chance to watch those two games. Someone told us that it was actually the two closest games of the day so far, and supposedly they both went past the 20 minute mark (which was long for today's games), so we might have to check them out at some point later.

Anyway, the third and deciding set was on Entombed Valley. Heart decided that he didn't want to play another semi long game because it ain't his style man, so instead he did a proxy 2 rax and went for a bunker attack at Sniper's natural. Sniper managed to survive although he took some damage.
Knowing Hearts aggressive style, Sniper should probably have spend all his money on spines at this point. He only built one though, and Heart, being who he is, took all his SCVs and went for a final push along with a small flock of marines he had built. This was far too much for Sniper to handle and Heart took the game and the series with a smart all in.
He goes on to the round of 16 where he will get another chance to annoy a lot of good players and fans around the world with his sneaky cheeses.

Heart vs. Sniper = 2-1


So at the end of the day Squirtle and Heart moved on into what will certainly be the hardest round of 16 ever. Good luck to both of them. They will need it.
Tomorrow we get a chance to enjoy the grand old man in action. It's NESTEA, and what makes seeing him in action even nicer, is that Tastosis always lights up a bit more on days where Nestea is present.