Dreamhack Valencia Grand Final

Everyone who missed last night's grand final of Dreamhack Valencia actually missed a great and exciting series.

Especially when keeping in mind that finals often end up being somewhat anti-climatic, so it was extra nice to see a tense final series that didn't disappoint.

The final was a BO5 between the two korean terrans ForGG and TaeJa.

ForGG snatched the first two sets, but then TaeJa made an impressive comeback and tied up the score to 2-2

The fifth and deciding set was on Metropolis.

They both went up to two bases rather quickly with ForGG setting up for some mech play and TaeJa doing a hellion into bio build.
TaeJa sneaked a couple of hellions into the mineral line of ForGG's natural, right as ForGG had moved a bit out on the map. He killed some SCVs but not a whole lot.

Around the 10-minute mark ForGG did a nice tank/marine/viking push where he sieged up below TaeJa's main and then used his vikings to gain vision of the high ground. With this he was able to take out some of TaeJa's add-ons and force TaeJa's to move some of his production buildings. He also killed a good amount of TaeJa's units but couldn't push further as TaeJa also had sieged up tanks.

TaeJa eventually got stim and some more tanks and ForGG was forced to retreat while taking some losses on the retreat. While TaeJa pushed ForGG back he could safely take his third base.
A few minutes later though, ForGG once again pushed with a big viking/tank force. This time he couldn't get all the way to TaeJa's base and for a while their tanks battled in the center with ForGG having the vision advantage with his vikings but TaeJa on the other hand having a big bio force that constantly tried to catch ForGG's tanks unsieged.
While this was going on ForGG tried to take his own third.

ForGG moved back and sieged up between his natural and third and this caused TaeJa to try and use his mobility and sneak around from the north and snipe ForGG's third. TaeJa did manage to kill some SCVs and a few tanks that were unsieged but eventually ForGG pushed him up in a corner and took out the part of TaeJa's force that had been invested in the attack. Luckily for TaeJa, being the agressor had allowed him to take a fourth base as well so he was up one base.

ForGG decided to do a big push with his mech force as he was at max supply and once again TaeJa used his mobility advantage and this time was able to take out ForGG's third, but not without taking some heavy losses.
But at this point TaeJa was on 4 bases and ForGG only on two so all TaeJa needed to do was defend. ForGG had part of his army outside TaeJa's natural trying to get in while also moving around on the map with his hellions. Once again there were a lot of hellion vs. tank engagements in this set, as it was actually the case of the entire series.
I've never actually seen hellions take on tanks so many times and actually win as I did in this series.

ForGG could not really break TaeJa or move in and take out any of his bases as TaeJa had sieged up tanks in all the right places. At the same time TaeJa used small parts of his bio force to prevent ForGG from expanding again and therefore TaeJa kept being up two bases.

Eventually ForGG was forced to try a push that was never going to work as it happened completely on TaeJa's conditions and after that attack ForGG was down 40 supply and two bases so he GG'd and TaeJa claimed the victory and the championship.

TaeJa vs. ForGG = 3 - 2

All in all a fantastic tournament with norwegian zerg TarGa probably being the biggest positive surprise and the koreans once again being somewhat dominating.

Next stop on the Dreamhack tour is Bucharest, which will occur in the end of October.
We can't wait.

TLO showing some manlove and hugging teammate TaeJa after his victory

TaeJa celebrating by pouring champagne on a big crowd of cheering nerds

Dreamhack Valencia Quarterfinals Recap (Stephano vs. ForGG)

So all the quarterfinals turned out to be foreigner vs. korean series.

Of the four quarterfinals Stephano vs. ForGG was probably the one from which most people expected a foreigner to advance.

And in the first two quarterfinals there weren't really any surprises as they were both won by the korean.

TaeJa vs. SaSe = 2-0

TheStC vs. Vortix = 2-1

So it was all up to Stephano, but in the end his series against ForGG ended up being rather strange.

Stephano took the first set on Ohana in dominating fashion and at that point it looked like he would have no problems defeating ForGG.

The second set was on Metropolis.

Stephano went for a quick roach attack with around 7-8 roaches at the 7 minute mark and he managed to catch ForGG completely by surprise.
ForGG had gone for reactor'd helions and was building a banshee and when he finally took out Stephano last roach he only had about half the supply of Stephano.
Stephano also had 3 times as many workers as ForGG and the game should have probably been over at this point if Stephano just had played safe.

Stephano did not really play safe though and it actually looked like Stephano was just so certain that he had won the game that he had forgotten all about his usual perfect gamesense.
And when ForGG attacked with cloaked banshees and hellions Stephano defended miserably.

In the end it was almost surreal to watch how the hellions and banshees just kept killing more and more drones until in the end Stephano had nothing left and was forced to GG a game that he had actually already won 4 minutes earlier.

The third and deciding set wasn't quite as surreal but still weird in the sense that it never felt like Stephano was playing his usual confident play.
ForGG once again went for some hellion and cloaked banshee harass and although it didn't do devastating damage, it still felt like Stephano defended a bit carelessly.

Especially when ForGG attacked at Stephano's third around the 11 minute mark with both hellions and banshees. He took out far too many units and it did not look like a Stephano defense at all.

The game transitioned into a somewhat normal macro game after this, but it was always with Stephano playing from behind.
ForGG got the map control he wanted to get far ahead in bases and production.
For a while Stephano defended really well around the map with ultralisks and infestors and managed to win a lot of engagements.
But ForGG had the economy to constantly remax and eventually he got a good siege up at the ramp to Stephano's natural and when Stephano tried to break this he lost almost all he had left.
Shortly afterwards he was forced to GG and with that Stephano was out of the tournament.

So Stephano lost a series that he had practically had in his bag and whether you believe in EG curses or simply being punished for celebrating before the fat lady sings it was a pretty depressing series to watch. At least if you're a Stephano fan.
But you gotta hand it to ForGG. In that second game he just kept playing the game as if he didn't know he was behind and in the third game he actually really played well.

ForGG vs. Stephano = 2-1


Luckily for those people cheering for foreigners Targa managed to take a surprising win against Hero in the last quarterfinal. Hero won the first set but Targa showed some really cool nerve for a relatively new guy on the scene and pulled off an impressive comeback.

TargA vs. HerO = 2-1