It's been a strange season for GOMTV's Team League. We've seen the finalist of the previous season, SlayerS, fall out without winning a match and then dissolve under internal squabbling. StarTale's foreign partners, Quantic, have disbanded after investors pulled out and over in KeSPA's ProLeague, the two largest non-Korean rivals, TeamLiquid and EvilGeniuses, have joined forces to be the first of their kind invited to join.

It seems almost incongruous that the finalists would be FXO and MVP, with FXO being the previous champions and MVP the strongest side in the tournament with being former champions, 4-time semi-finalists and having the most current Code S players of any side, not to mention with Sniper coming off of a victory in the finals of the most recent GSL Championship.

That said, this was the final GSTL of the year, and a lot of money and pride was at stake, so both teams were clearly going to give it their all.

Game One

MVPVampire vs. FXOTheBest

Map: Daybreak

The first match-up of the series would be the most well-planned, as both players would have had a week to prepare for one another. The mind games began immediately, as TheBest chose to go for an expand off 1Rax, rather than opting for his usual one-base aggression. Vampire also expanded, but neither intended this to be a macro game.

TheBest geared his bio up for a huge two-base push, but found himself stymied by some expert positioning coming from Vampire, as his units were sandwiched between Stalkers and Sentries, soon disappearing under the combined weight of their fire. Vampire headed into Twilight tech and DTs came out, yet were unable to do much damage and ended up being mainly used to force scans and delay the third.

TheBest's units get caught in a poor position. - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

TheBest's greatest chance to win came just after his third was constructed, when Vampire attempted a huge push before High Templars were out, and some well-timed EMPs and Vikings managed to kill Vampire's army and reset the Colossus count to zero.

Unfortunately, TheBest never quite managed to build up an army to attack with after this. He would go on to hold as well as he could with a force comprised mainly of Ghosts against Archons, Stalkers & Colossi but in the end was simply overrun in the centre of the map and had to tap out.

Score: 1-0

Game Two

MVPVampire vs. FXOLucky

Map: Antiga Shipyard

A lot rested on Lucky here, as FXO couldn't afford to let MVP start to build up steam with a few quick eliminations. Vampire played his standard PvZ to perfection, with no less than three Observers made before Immortals.

Lucky's Nydus goes undetected behind the smoke - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

Lucky, meanwhile, was in no mood to play standard. An incredibly fast Nydus Network was built, with the Worm popping up behind the smoke in Vampire's main base, undetected by any of his Observers. With Speedlings unpowering his Robotics Facility and killing Probes and Sentries by the handful there was nothing Vampire could do but gg.

Score: 1-1

Game Three

MVPDongRaeGu vs. FXOLucky

Map: Ohana

In a surprising move, MVP replaced Vampire with the player known as the 'Final Boss' of GSTL (due to him generally being positioned as his team's 'ace'), DongRaeGue. DRG has been less of a powerhouse lately, with other Zergs such as Leenock and Life taking the foreground, but he's still not one to underestimate and he set out to prove this from the outset.

This match never particularly elevated itself beyond a standard ZvZ, with both players opening with semi-aggressive Speedling/Baneling. The separating factor was very much DRG's own ability, managing to scout his opponent's Spire and kill Queens as he himself teched into Spire.

Lucky was never able to take and fully saturate a third base, meaning DRG was able to macro harder while his constant harass stopped Lucky from moving out and harassing in return. Lucky ended up essentially being starved out of the game and losing his Mutalisks in a direct confrontation while DRG's Lings danced beneath.

DongRaeGu once again takes down Lucky's third Hatchery - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

Score: 2-1

Game Four

MVPDongRaeGu vs. FXOTear

Map: Entombed Valley

This ZvP match ended up being one of the strangest I've seen from the GSTL, and is proof, if anyone needed it, of DRG's falling star. DongRaeGu opened with the standard three-bas macro after scouting a Forge Fast Expand from Tear. Unbeknownst to him, however, Tear was taking a fast third himself.

Both players were staying fairly low tech, with DRG macroing hard, making only a handful of Speedlings and Roaches to defend any aggression. Tear, on the other hand, was preparing for a heavy Gateway attack, hitting as DRG finished his fourth base. DongRaeGu delayed his Infestation Pit in favour of more drones and should have paid for it heavily.

Instead, despite his fourth base taking heavy damage, DRG forced Tear back, pushing him into sacrificing every last one of his Sentries to save his force of Stalkers. The first of DRG's mistakes came here, as he committed to an attack that didn't do much beyond take down a few WarpGates, while his fourth Hatchery died to Zealots harassing from a Warp Prism (that would also go on to deny DRG a fifth base a few minutes later).

Should've made those spinecralwers earlier - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

DongRaeGu continued to focus on his macro, delaying every unit as late as humanly possible. This would go on to lose him the game as he had neither Spinecrawlers nor Broodlords when Tear pushed out, catching almost all of DRG's Infestors with a mixture of Blink and Forcefield. In a callback to DRG's victory in the previous game, Tear would dance his own units as DongRaeGu gg'd, levelling the series.

Score: 2-2

Game Five

MVPMonster vs. FXOTear

Map: Abyssal City

Continuing the tradition of strange PvZ, Tear this time chose to open with a Stargate, over a Robotics Facility. Monster scouts it perfectly though, even seeing the initial Phoenix. Monster would respond with mass Hydralisk.

Unusually, the Hydras were never used for a timing attack (as you would expect from a normal ZvP), but would instead prove themselves invaluable in a large engagement in the centre, where Tear tried to put on some aggression and wound up losing all of his Colossi. The lack of AoE meant Monster would go on to take the vast majority of their future engagements.

Finally Tear managed to create an army with a sufficient number of Colossi, but would lose them all, incredibly, to a combination of Broodlord and Hydralisk. The Broodlings provided the tanking and crowd control that you would normally expect Roaches to perform for Hydras, while the Hydras themselves wiped out the Stalker force as it Blinked underneath the Broodlords.

Late-game Hydralisks, surprisingly effective - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

All Monster had to do after this was continue to pressure and Tear found himself with no way to respond but gg, leaving MVP in the lead once more.

Score: 3-2

Game Six

MVPMonster vs. FXOGumiho

Map: Grand Lagoon

The fact that Gumiho was sent out to take him on showed just how much FXO knew they needed to take down Monster ASAP. Throughout their history, Gumiho has been a strong player for FXO, including All-Killing SlayerS in the previous Final.

Gumiho opened with some of his trademark aggression, with a 2Rax Bunker rush. Both players microed well intially, with Gumiho forcing Lings instead of Drones, allowing him to get a lead in SCVs. However, a rare mistake from Gumiho in holding the aggression too long would see all of his Marines die and Monster even the game up.

A rare micro mistake by Gumiho leaves his marines surrounded - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

Both players entered somewhat of a macro game, with Gumiho heading from Reactor Hellions into a Mech army from three bases, while Monster droned up in preparation for some aggression of his own.

Banelings and Mutalisks are what Monster has in mind, a strong composition against a macroing Mech player, but one that is designed to kill an opponent in the early to mid-game, before siege tech is out for the Terran. Monster did his best to hit this timing, but never quite had the units or control to achieve a victory.

Gumiho responded perfectly, switching into Thor production to counter both the Mutas and Banes. From this point it was merely a question of how long Monster could survive, never establishing a fourth base. In his favour, Monster did everything he could with the units he had, but after losing them all in a counter-attack he gg'd and Gumiho equalised the score.

Score: 3-3

Game Seven

MVPKeen vs. FXOGumiho

Map: Muspelheim

The GSTL Finals has never been a place to find boring games, and this was no exception. Both Terran players went for incredibly high aggression, proxying a Barracks with a Tech Lab to produce Reapers, pathing them into their opponent's main.

It would be a test of both micro, map awareness and decision making for these two players, and Gumiho never once looked out of control. With a bunker built in Keen's main he had vision of everything occurring there while he managed to delay Keen's Reaper from doing damage for a much longer period, allowing Gumiho to build up a bank of minerals that Keen didn't have.

The game went into a short stalemate period, with Keen occupying a bunker in Gumiho's main base, but Gumiho was able to land his Orbital Command at another location and begin mining again, allowing him to create Marauders. The thign about Marauders is that they outrange Reapers in a Bunker, meaning that Gumiho's Marauders could destroy everything Keen had.

MVP's KeeN looks upset at letting his team down - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

Without any other option, Keen quit the game, meaning Gumiho was the first player to win two games in a row and, for the first time, FXO were in the lead.

Score: 3-4

Game Eight

MVPSniper vs. FXOGumiho

Map: Whirlwind

In such a pivotal situation for MVP, where a loss here would see them losing the Finals, there was no-one else to turn to but the current GSL Champion, Sniper. If anyone on the MVP bench had the ability and heart to take down Gumiho then it was him.

This was a tense, nervy affair, in which both players considered aggression, but never committed to it. Sniper initially planned for a Roach attack, but changed his mind and took a third base instead. Gumiho teched into Blue Flame for his Hellions, even getting a run-by into the main of Sniper, but then would waver over whether to focus on Drones or Queens, not killing enough of either

Blue Flame Hellions, not quite as terrifying as they once were - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

It quickly became Gumiho's game to lose, however, with Sniper so fearful of Gumiho's attacks that he ended up forty supply down without any real tech against Gumiho's three-base Mech. In his defence, Sniper knew his one chance was to rush late-game technology and hold Gumiho there.

Gumiho was wise to this, timing his first major attack to hit before Broodlords were out. Sniper's Infestors did their best to stymy this push, but a clever Hellion run-by meant Sniper couldn't afford to build any Broodlords for several more minutesm giving Gumiho a chance to add more Starports for Viking production in response.

This left Gumiho with nothing to do but pull his SCVs and go kill Sniper. With almost no income in comparison, Sniper held on valiantly, making the most of every unit under his control but it was never going to be enough to stop Gumiho this late in the game.

A gg from Sniper meant that FXO took their second GSTL Championship in a row, and Gumiho has yet to drop a single game in a GSTL Finals. Congratulations to FXO, commiserations to MVP. In just two Seasons, FXO have gone from a team struggling to win their group-stage matches to the unstoppable powerhouse of Team League.

FXOpen stand victorious - Image courtesy GOMTV.net

Can anyone stop them in 2013?