Ver is absent this week, busy on an archaeological expedition to the ancient Ma family burial grounds.

With six months to think of a way to improve their group selection format, OnGameNet reached the momentous conclusion to change absolutely nothing. That's right, it's a straight up lottery again.I'll copy paste my short description from Bacchus 2010:The draw resulted in the following groups...And while the format stayed unchanged, the mood was a little different. All that stuff that happens between the drawings, the delicious fluff that turns an otherwise fifteen minute procedure into a two hour show? This time, it was dreadfully boring.Hiya did his usual bit where he teased Jaedong and Stork for the sake of teasing, but with Sea unusually subdued on the day, it was really a poor showing on the mic overall. Even the normally reliable announcer goading was rather lacking.The flavor bits were kept to a bare minimum, with just three short montages shown between breaks. The most interesting one of them was a five minute clip of the Starleaguers pondering their lives if they had not chosen the path of the pro-gamer, yet it ended up being just a mishmash of audio clips and old school records without any clear insight into any one gamer.The neat, black suit-jackets donned by all the players provided some attractive window dressing, but at the same time served to accentuate the eerie sterility of the occasion.Whereas MBCGame has long since fully embraced reckless impropriety and shameless pandering to the fans as the hallmarks of their group selection (a terrifically amusing affair), OnGameNet has flip-flopped for years on what direction theirs should take. After dabbling with a dizzying three hour marathon of fan-service just a year ago, it appears that 'mostly lifeless' is their new theme.Yet, maybe it's not an entirely bad change of direction. There's no need for the OSL to go out of its way to facilitate fan service at this point in its history, when it has cemented itself as the most respectable and only permanent establishment in e-sports.Creative tinkering is a hallmark of the OSL, so I don't expect this style of group lottery to last into next season. But I venture to suggest that at this point in time, austerity and severity might serve to better improve the OSL's stature than more song and dance.

RO16 Preview and Predictions

Group A

Group B

Group C

Group D

The first group we look at features the defending OSL champ Fantasy along with veteran terrans Sea and HiyA, plus SoO, a young zerg player on a hot streak in proleague. It’s no secret that Fantasy has been in a rather bad slump lately, and with the weak form he’s shown us in Proleague I wouldn’t expect him to take more than a game in this group. Fantasy, however, is known for exceeding expectations in individual leagues with his thorough preparation, as Stork learned the hard way last OSL.In contrast, n.Die_SoO has been putting up some solid results, even earning himself a spot on the Power Rank. Most of his recent success, though, has rested on his ZvP. In ZvT he is 4-6 in his last ten games and against two solid terrans and his teammate Fantasy, SoO will struggle.HiyA is hard to predict – he’s not doing badly, but he hasn’t been anything to write home about for a while either. Whether he beats Fantasy or not will depend mostly on whether or not Fantasy can get his act together. I give HiyA the edge over n.Die_SoO, but expect him to lose to Sea’s TvT.Sea, who is putting in his usual solid performance for MBC, on paper looks like the safest bet to advance in this group. His TvT is better than HiyA’s and good enough to hold his own against a non-slumping Fantasy. Sea’s TvZ results haven't been great lately, but he should still be more than a match for SoO.Historically, predicting Sea to advance past the round of 16 has about the same success rate as invading Russia in the winter. However, he managed to get over the RO16 hump last season, and I will go ahead and predict that he can do it again and advance 2-1. My gut says despite his current form, Fantasy also comes out alive 2-1. Whatever happens in this group, it will provide a revealing look at where these players stand right now.Sea and Fantasy advance 2-1.Group B contains one of only two protosses still in the OSL in Stork. I really hope Stork advances, if for no other reason then for the sake of racial diversity. Unfortunately, this is about the worst group that Stork could have hoped for. It’s been a long time since Stork seemed like a contender against Flash; Hydra knocked Stork out of the last MSL; and while Shine has been going through a rough patch himself lately, his legions of anti-fans should remember as well as anyone that he has a penchant for dismantling shaky protoss fan favorites with his early game aggression.Speaking of Shine, his prospects are worse than Stork's. Though no one should be terribly surprised if he beats Stork, but he's still been doing poorly against protoss for a while now, and is not exactly favored against Stork. His uninspired ZvT is unlikely to get him past Flash, and in his best match up, ZvZ, he faces one of the best ZvZers out there. On top of that, he's stuck practicing all three matchups alongside Hydra......who shouldn’t have any trouble with Stork in his current form, and unless he’s had a breakthrough, shouldn’t be able to touch Flash. While he should beat Shine, it’s well known that anything can happen in ZvZ and Shine is no slouch in the matchup. Still, I don’t see Shine or Stork scraping together two wins in this group so even if Hydra loses to Shine, he’ll probably advance through tie-breakers.And then there’s Flash. Hey, did you know Flash is 4-6 in his last ten games? For a while now it hasn’t been a question of if, butFlash’s wrist problems would start catching up with him. Flash continues to say his wrist isn't troubling him greatly and that it's just the doctors telling him to take a break, but the results are worrisome nonetheless. Whatever the state of his wrist is, Flash should be in good enough form to sail through this group fairly easily, as long as Hydra hasn’t figured out how to ZvT as well as he plays the other two matchups. Taking into account his health, I’ll say Flash advances 2-1.Flash and Hydra advance 2-1.This is the group I personally am most excited for. All three races are represented, and everyone in the group is a formidable player.Calm is interesting. He has moments of brilliance, moments of spectacular failure, and long stretches of mediocrity in between. If you look at his individual league records, however, you’ll find that he makes it to the later rounds with surprising consistency. Expect him to live up to his Brain Zerg sobriquet and rely on mind games and strategic play. However, both Calm and Killer have to prepare for all three matchups, putting them at a slight disadvantage.JangBi might not yet be the last hope for protoss in the OSL, but with his teammate Stork in a bad slump, he is certainly the brightest. I favor JangBi above both of the zergs in this group, and while he only recently broke a long losing streak against terran, he did so in convincing fashion. 2-1 or 3-0.BaBy is usually decent and occasionally brilliant. The only TvZ BaBy has played since April was against Hyuk in the dual tournament, and while he won handily, his TvZ definitely seemed a little rusty. Back in winner’s league he would have been a solid favorite over Killer, but at the moment it looks like a toss up to me. I predict him to beat Calm, who is usually terrible against terran, and to lose against Jangbi.The minidong has grown up a lot since he got nuked by BoxeR. Solid in both ZvT and ZvZ, Killer is one of those unusual zergs who doesn't excel at ZvP, so JangBi will probably make quick work of him. I’ll take Killer’s micro over Calm’s in a ZvZ, and I think the determining factor in Killer versus BaBy will be how well BaBy can recover his TvZ before Friday.Jangbi should advance, and I’ll put my money on Killer as the other to make it out of this group. There’s no one in this group you can count out, though. I see an unusually good chance for tiebreakers here.Jangbi advances 3-0 or 2-1, Killer advances 2-1If this group looks boring to you, don’t blame the matchup, blame the players. Three unremarkable zergs and Jaedong. Of course the big question on everyone’s mind in this group is how vulnerable JD’s ZvZ is these days. Though his recent record in the matchup is pretty grim, Jaedong is still definitely favored to advance from this group. He often steps up his performance in the individual leagues and has nothing but ZvZ to worry about practicing for the time being. Just as importantly, neither Hyuk nor hyvaa have particularly good ZvZ. Modesty does though, and is the most likely to advance from the group with Jaedong.Jaedong and Modesty advance 2-1