IEM Taipei, which takes place Saturday, Feb. 1 through Sunday, Feb. 2, will be the second non-World Championship Series event of the year, which means there will be no restrictions on which players can attend. This makes it a rare event; we'll see South Koreans play in a tournament outside of South Korea with some representation from the West. Without further ado, here are the players for IEM Taipei 2016.



Kim "herO" Joon Ho - IEM's Golden Child

herO's breakout into stardom is inextricably linked with the IEM circuit. Before he competed at the tournament, herO was still a middling Protoss player threatening to break into the top level of competition. IEM gave him a chance to play outside of Korea where he experienced growth in results and play. He has won three IEM tournaments, and took second in 2014 at the IEM World Championship in Katowice. Each of his outings to IEM saw him return to Korea a better player than before. His constant run-ins with Jens "Snute" Aasgaard forced him to become a more well rounded and adaptive player. Off of historical correlation alone, herO would be a favorite to win.

Then you remember the other facts about herO. 2015 was the best playing year of his career. He won 2 South Korean LANs(the Kespa Cup S1 and StarCraft II StarLeague S3), had great consistency throughout the year, and was a Top 3 Protoss throughout 2015. And while Legacy of the Void is a different game, the transition hasn't seemed to slow him down any with his Global StarCraft II League pre-season tournament victory to secure a Code S spot.

herO is my pick to win the whole thing.



Kim "sOs" Yoo Jin - The Million Dollar Man

Kim "sOs" Yoo Jin has had a storied history in StarCraft II. Sebastian Ekman/DreamHack

sOs won BlizzCon in 2015, adding another $100,000 to his ever growing bank account. With that, he has won two of the three BlizzCon tournaments in the previous StarCraft II expansion, Heart of the Swarm, and won the winner-take-all IEM WC where he broke herO's soul with 2 Gates. sOs is the most creative Protoss in the game, an incredible player at utilizing mind games and one of the most clutch players to ever touch SCII. A true big game player.

The problem is that if you look outside of his major victories, you realize sOs struggles a lot. He's a brilliant player with a unique, free-flowing style, but that hasn't landed him a lot of consistency, especially in individual tournaments that don't offer $100,000 prizes for first. Those struggles have continued as he failed to qualify for SSL and has since been eliminated from GSL Code A by Baek "Dear" Dong Jun. sOs must make the most of this opportunity as chances to compete in individual tournaments are scarce in South Korea.



Jang "MC" Min Chul - Never Ending Ambition

On July 17, 2015 MC retired from competitive SCII. Since then, he has been streaming and commentating. So why is he playing at IEM Taipei?

I believe that there is a part of MC that still wants to compete. In a stream explaining his desperation to make money for his family, MC said that he had only stopped playing because no team would take him. The implication is that if he had found a team that would support him, MC would still be playing full time competitively right now. And while MC has been out of form for a while now, he is one of the few players in SCII where the cliché "You can never count him out." actually applies. There is a reason this man has won more money than anyone else in SCII.



Kim "Soulkey" Min Chul - The Return

Kim "Soulkey" Min Chul Helena Kristiansson/ESL

At the outset of HotS, Soulkey was the best Zerg in the world. He was one of the co-aces with sOs of the now defunct team Woongjin-Stars along, and one of three Zergs to have ever beaten Lee "INnoVation" Shin Hyung in a macro Terran vs. Zerg during his prime in 2013. However, by the end of 2014, Soulkey was burned out. He took a break, but as he watched from the sidelines, he saw his ex-teammate rise to take the final HotS BlizzCon. That reignited his fire to compete, and once LotV officially launched, Soulkey announced a return to professional play. Considered by sOs to be the best or second best Zerg in South Korea, he is a possible dark horse to win the whole thing.



"ByuN" Hyun Woo - The End of the Exile

There are times when you watch a game and you think to yourself: "I just watched a man's soul get killed today." Jung "Mvp" Jong Hyun did it to both Kim "TOP" Jung Hoon and Park "Squirtle" Hyun Woo in their GSL Finals. Park "July" Sung Joondid it to Do "BeSt" Jae Wook to win his Golden Mouse (while simultaneously breaking Kim "Bisu" Taek Yong's mind). In ByuN's case, his soul got broken by Ahn "Seed" Sang Won four years ago when ByuN choked a huge lead and lost the deciding Game 5 that would have gotten him into the finals of a GSL. He then plummeted in skill, exiled himself from tournaments, then the Prime house, and finally society.

After spending years in solitude, he has slowly come back. He's played a huge amount of OlimoLeagues and was considered the best player in the LotV beta, and is now considered one of the best Terrans in LotV. This will be the first time we will have seen ByuN outside of South Korea since IGN ProLeague 5. It is here that we will see if ByuN can live up to the hype surrounding him and prove that he can play at a LAN, exorcising his past demons that have haunted him for years.



Jens "Snute" Aasgaard - Bane of the South Korean Protoss

Jens "Snute" Aasgaard Adela Sznajder/DreamHack

Snute has been one of the best foreigners for a long time. What makes him dangerous is that he matches extremely well against South Korean Protoss players. He's had victories against herO, Jung "Rain" Yoon Jong, Kim "Classic" Doh Woo, and sOs. By my count he's beaten four of the top six best Protoss' in the last two years. However, he has problems, particularly against Terran and closing out tournaments. A lot of his success will be on his mental state and his bracket, but if he runs into a lot of South Korean Protoss competition he could make real damage in this tournament.



David "Lilbow" Moschetto - Lost in Translation

By the end of 2015, Lilbow was clearly the best foreigner and proved it with his consecutive finals appearances in WCS, one of which he won. However, by the time BlizzCon rolled around, he revealed that he hadn't practiced for the tournament because LotV was just around the corner; he didn't want to use his time for a game that was about to end. He was certain that he could get ahead of the rest with that extra bit of practice he got.

Here we are after three big tournaments and Lilbow has yet to get the results he was hoping for. He was eliminated by Zhou "iAsonu" Hang at Gold Series Pro-League, lost to Dario "TLO" Wünsch at DreamHack LotV Championship, and lost to obias "ShoWTimE" Sieber at DreamHack Leipzig. At this point in time, it looks like the gap between Lilbow and the rest of the foreigners has expanded, and some may have even surpassed him. Lilbow is still a good player, but if he wants to prove that he is still something more, this is the perfect place to do it.



Choi "Polt" Seong Hun - Grand Entrance

Polt is one of the oldest veterans of the scene, and one of the few to have played in the first ever GSL Open in SCII's first expansion, Wings of Liberty (fun fact: both MC and ByuN also played in that tournament). Polt's strengths are in his problem solving and tactical mind. He knows how to drag matchups into his expertise, forcing the game into a tactical battle of positioning. No one has seen Polt play at an official LAN in LotV yet, so coming into this tournament he will be IEM Taipei's biggest wildcard.