Road to BlizzCon #13 - JinAir_sOs - WCS 2015 Text by TL.net ESPORTS Graphics by shiroiusagi, dravernor Story

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Analysis The Road to Blizzcon - Ch XIII - sOs







Chapter XIII The Most Sane of All by Destructicon







The shrine lay in abyssal darkness, a thick shroud of blackness broken only by the warmth of levitating gems. At the room's very center, deep in meditation, face calm and body perfectly still, was sOs. The Protoss master looked at peace where he sat, in complete silence, but his mind was in chaos.



It had started harmlessly, much as it always did.



Just a peek, he had thought, just a gentle touch.



He had almost fooled himself. The khaydarin energy was so responsive, leaping out at his touch, rippling and twisting all too willingly. There was some smoothness to the process at first, a shred of regularity, but it quickly spun out of control. Sparks crackled around him, flashes of bright blue illuminated the main hall. Darkness again, for the span of a heartbeat or two. Then it lit anew, chains of coruscant sparks forming arcs of electricity that danced across the room. Darkness again, deeper this time. Light again, webs of bright blue flaring under the ceiling, a fabric of crystals tethered by his mind coming alive as lightning spread in arcing waves from one to the next. Xel'naga artifacts recoiled from unseen impacts and ephemeral voids flickered in and out of existence, churning and churning, lit by interconnected spears of blue. The storm extended beyond the castle, and for a few short moments the countryside was ablaze with energy, a dance of energy orchestrated by the paragon of serenity in its midst, a great—



The doors swung open with a bang. A roar echoed through the room, above the crackling cacophony, "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?"



sOs' head snapped up, eyes wide, and the spell was broken—all too abruptly. The holy stones flashed and exploded, spraying the floor with shattered glass. Stray bolts of lightning singed through the paintings, screaming arcs of energy ripping through the air. The figure in the doorway yelped and ducked, dove out of the way to watch the zergling that had stood behind him explode into a mist of meaty, fizzing red. Silence fell, speckled only by the dripping of fried remains against the floor.



"Huh," Rogue didn't appear fazed by his brush with death as it was somehow familiar to him. His exterior changed when he remembered why he was there in the first place. "Hey wait, you promised you'd let me watch next time!" Rogue looked frustrated, but seemed by no means surprised.



sOs got to his feet, swaying slightly, appraising the new arrival. The young man looked barely awake, eyes still somewhat squinting as they darted from one relic to the next. "Sorry. You should have knocked. Containing all this—" he waved, "at a moment's notice isn't easy."



"Who cares about that! I wanted to see it happening. You never let me watch."



"This isn't a game for you to enjoy. Besides, you wouldn't understand. This isn't science."



Rogue sighed and gave an expansive shrug. "What do you mean? It looked like a fun experiment to me."



"I was just meditating."



"You were, uh... in the middle of a storm. And you really won't learn much more if you only study yourself."



sOs nodded slowly and got up, then strode towards Rogue with calm, precisely measured steps. "The crackling of energy, its speed, its unpredictability, its volatility, I find it somehow soothing. I like being in the midst of it. It listens to me." He snapped his fingers, and a little burst of blue shot from his hand.



"Okay, sure you do. But I still wanted to watch. Oh, by the way Maru asked me to tell you. He says you need to practice and get ready. We leave in a few days and you've been in here for like a week." Rogue grabbed an amulet from a nearby table, tossed it into the air to catch it on a little finger, "Ohh, I like this. Can I have it?"



The Protoss' hand shot out and snatched the amulet. "None of you understand my process," he snapped. He forced the amulet down a breast pocket with a sour expression, turning away.



Rogue gave an expansive shrug and knew that it was hopeless. He turned on his heel and headed for the door. "Sheesh. Maru's not gonna be happy about this. Wanna tell him yourself? He says exciting things are happening." Rogue waved away a puff of smoke that had lilted in front of him, "You need some fresh air. Or a bath. You're bumming me out."



sOs stayed behind, running a finger absentmindedly along the edge of the amulet. In spite of his very best attempts, his mind was crowded. Things are happening? What did that mean, exactly? Come to think of it, perhaps he should have asked. And he had to acknowledge that Rogue was, at least, partially correct. He had been distraught recently, his fingers longing to touch a scepter that was no longer there. He shivered, remembering the complete lack of direction that had haunted him just mere months ago. He never wanted to feel so purposeless again. He had sworn never to be so helpless.



It was settled, then. He had business to attend. He had spent weeks confined in the faculties of his skull, contemplating cause-and effect, dreaming up strategies and creating fictional worlds. The clarity that he sought, he had realized, may be found outside the apparitional walls he had constructed.



The great outdoors, how exciting. Perhaps after this I should pay Rogue and Maru a visit and help them with their own work. But look at the time!



The sun blazed above the vast countryside, and the wind danced through flowers and leaves of grass, whispering in the treetops. Out here, sOs found a different kind of peace. The seclusion of his chapel was nice, even homely, but the wind against his face was a different kind of pleasure.



He sensed a Terran nearby, leaning against a tree with a portable simulator unit placed beside him. Quietly, and with great patience, sOs sat down to watch. The rookie's training proceeded quickly, almost too quickly, in a predictable, robotic fashion. Identical scenarios played out, and the responses were equally identical. Fifty times the Terran tried, fifty times his strategy was the same.



Meticulous, but misguided, let me see what you're really made of.



sOs smiled impishly. He had designed the simulator, after all. Cute, but have you prepared for rushes?

Suddenly the recruit was beset by alerts, notifying him that he was about to come under attack. "What?" sOs heard the rookie mutter from where he sat, "I don't remember programming this..."



The assault took only seconds, warp blades tearing the unprepared beginner apart. The simulation was terminated nearly instantly. sOs grinned and allowed the greenhorn a few moments to regain his composure, a few more to fiddle with the simulator unit trying to figure out what had gone wrong.



Let's see if you're the sort that learns.



The Terran put up a better fight the second time around, better by far, but still insufficient. A stream of curses, a kicked water bottle, a terminated simulation. A foregone conclusion, perhaps, but sOs saw potential.



How defensive can you be?



This time, sOs merely postured, fainting aggression but never committing. He filled the rookie's mind with worries, with unwatched angles and threats of impending attacks, following through with none. Seconds turned to grueling minutes, each one turning the Terran a little more toward paranoia. It took the frightened loser a good ten minutes to gather courage, ten long minutes that were cut very short by a burst of thermal energy. The rookie terminated his simulation for a third time and kicked the virtual reality unit. He yelped in pain, staggering back while clutching a wounded foot, tripping and rolling down the hill.



Cackling loudly and unable to stop himself, sOs was overcome by a feeling that had eluded him for very long. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but he felt excited, as if he had been doing something profoundly right, something to set his mind at ease. Something that put him back where he belonged.



"Perhaps", he gasped between bouts of laughter, "that kid wasn't so off-base after all."



Minutes flew by, turning into hours as day soon gave way to twilight, and sOs was still there under the tree. His consciousness drifted across the vast plains, seeking more and more unwitting test subjects. He meticulously studied each, first from the outside—their basic gestures, their rudimentary tactics, the way they went about their training, the way they dealt with victory and defeat. Then he went inward, weaving through the flow of their minds, observing habits, discerning strategies, tendencies.



In their worried, unorganized practice, sOs found a glaring contrast between himself and them. There seemed to be no order to their chaos, no mind to the madness. They fought and fought and fought, tried and tried as they did to force their strength upon simulated opponents, completely absent finesse. Completely absent...



These people aren't like me, are they?



He remembered Rogue saying something about it. Maru had echoed the sentiment, at some point. They weren't like the others, nowhere near so simple-minded. Out here, with the evening chill against his face and the wind sizzling through the trees, it seemed they had been spot on. How could he have forgotten? Why had he forgotten?



He had to, he decided, return to the temple. Now. There were things to do, schemes to design and test, plans to pen and practice, ideas to... Well, things to do, put plainly. Many things, yes. He turned to the last remaining rookie on the field, a Zerg flanked by two feeble-looking zerglings. Caught up in a simulation measuring macro-perspective capabilities, the cornerstone in long-term warfare, it was almost too easy to disrupt him. Subtly first, the mere threat of an impending attack. The Zerg reeled at the unseen threat, overreacting, ordering his pets out to attack a foe they could not see. sOs felt himself smile in the dark.



I've got you now.



And he did. It took no more than a push, a light shove, to put the Zerg on a back foot. Psionic energies crackled, ripping through the night air. Warp blades sang through the air, searing slashes that cut zerglings in half. Defenseless, the Zerg couldn't take it anymore—



Serves you right for coming into our territory—



—and the rookie let slip a scream of purest terror. It took no genius to see that the rookie had finally understood who it was he had come face to face with. The half-processed simulation was hastily terminated as the Zerg scrambled, staggering away and down the slope. It was a nostalgic thing, that scream, that frightened sprint, nostalgic—very nostalgic, indeed. He remembered...



His greatest triumph, defeating JaeDong years ago, becoming king, lifting the scepter. A singular achievement, that, one he had never been able to match. It wasn't even the achievement, really—it was the process. His process. The unadultered joy of discovery, of peeling back every layer of his foe, of using what he found against them. Somehow, after Life's ascent, he had lost it. Forgotten how it felt. He hadn't been himself, he realized. He watched the Zerg sway and stumble his way across the plain as if his pants were on fire, never turning once to see the grinning face of his better. sOs hadn't been himself, he realized.



But I am now.



He opened his eyes, back in the castle. Silence, but not complete. Darkness, but not total. The door swung open with a loud clang of wood against stone, and a blast of energy raced towards it. sOs shot up, turned towards the twirling mass of psionic energy, stopped it with a flick of his wrist then beckoned it back to his hand, absorbing it.



Maru stood in the doorway with a bored expression. sOs surprised him with a bone-cracking, giggling hug, leaping from the side of his bed to wrap his hands around the little Terran.



"Ugh," Maru wiggled out of his embrace, grunting, "what's this for?"



"For being absent minded for too long." He let Maru go, grinning, then continued, "How about we go and play a bit of tag the ling, like we used to?"



The so-called Little Psycho looked ecstatic. "You're on! You'll want to hear the news, though. Word is that—" Screaming interrupted him.



"Oh ignore that, they always make so much noise. You were saying?"



"The other clans are mobilizing. The scepter's location must be known because Life is on the move."



sOs cocked an eyebrow. That little brat. Not for a second time. Slowly, a smile grew on his face. It hadn't taken long, but it had certainly taken long enough. "Now would be a perfect time to get revenge on that little creep for what he did."



Maru looked pained. It was easy to forget, sOs remembered, that the little Terran had suffered just as he had. The chance at greatness, snatched away in the final moment.



"Yes, but word is they've even woken Zest."



sOs raised his hand before his face, rolling the amulet between his fingers, feeling strangely at ease with the revelation. "Oh," he said, "don't worry about that." He snapped his fingers, and a spark of bright energy crackled above them. "I've got a few new tricks in store for them. And they never see me coming."



"No," Maru agreed, looking somewhat put at ease by his elder's apparent confidence. "Those fools."







Deep in the Jin Air castle, through the halls of warp distortion, past the winding corridors of gravitational anomalies, was the entrance to The Temple of Nerazim. Locked behind two miscolored doors lavishly decorated with intricate geometric patterns, it was a marvelous sanctuary. Khalani poetry lined the walls, arrayed in complex spirals and interweaving circles; Xel'naga artifacts were displayed on alcoves; khaydarin crystals floated in mid-air, assimilating the energies around them. It was a veritable museum of antiquities that you couldn't name even if you tried.The shrine lay in abyssal darkness, a thick shroud of blackness broken only by the warmth of levitating gems. At the room's very center, deep in meditation, face calm and body perfectly still, was sOs. The Protoss master looked at peace where he sat, in complete silence, but his mind was in chaos.It had started harmlessly, much as it always did., he had thought,He hadfooled himself. The khaydarin energy was so responsive, leaping out at his touch, rippling and twisting all too willingly. There was some smoothness to the process at first, a shred of regularity, but it quickly spun out of control. Sparks crackled around him, flashes of bright blue illuminated the main hall. Darkness again, for the span of a heartbeat or two. Then it lit anew, chains of coruscant sparks forming arcs of electricity that danced across the room. Darkness again, deeper this time. Light again, webs of bright blue flaring under the ceiling, a fabric of crystals tethered by his mind coming alive as lightning spread in arcing waves from one to the next. Xel'naga artifacts recoiled from unseen impacts and ephemeral voids flickered in and out of existence, churning and churning, lit by interconnected spears of blue. The storm extended beyond the castle, and for a few short moments the countryside was ablaze with energy, a dance of energy orchestrated by the paragon of serenity in its midst, a great—The doors swung open with a bang. A roar echoed through the room, above the crackling cacophony, "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?"sOs' head snapped up, eyes wide, and the spell was broken—all too abruptly. The holy stones flashed and exploded, spraying the floor with shattered glass. Stray bolts of lightning singed through the paintings, screaming arcs of energy ripping through the air. The figure in the doorway yelped and ducked, dove out of the way to watch the zergling that had stood behind him explode into a mist of meaty, fizzing red. Silence fell, speckled only by the dripping of fried remains against the floor."Huh," Rogue didn't appear fazed by his brush with death as it was somehow familiar to him. His exterior changed when he remembered why he was there in the first place. "Hey wait, you promised you'd let me watch next time!" Rogue looked frustrated, but seemed by no means surprised.sOs got to his feet, swaying slightly, appraising the new arrival. The young man looked barely awake, eyes still somewhat squinting as they darted from one relic to the next. "Sorry. You should have knocked. Containing all this—" he waved, "at a moment's notice isn't easy.""Who cares about that! I wanted to see it happening. You never let me watch.""This isn't a game for you to enjoy. Besides, you wouldn't understand. This isn't science."Rogue sighed and gave an expansive shrug. "What do you mean? It looked like a fun experiment to me.""I was just meditating.""You were, uh... in the middle of a storm. And you really won't learn much more if you only study yourself."sOs nodded slowly and got up, then strode towards Rogue with calm, precisely measured steps. "The crackling of energy, its speed, its unpredictability, its volatility, I find it somehow soothing. I like being in the midst of it. It listens to me." He snapped his fingers, and a little burst of blue shot from his hand."Okay, sure you do. But I still wanted to watch. Oh, by the way Maru asked me to tell you. He says you need to practice and get ready. We leave in a few days and you've been in here for like a week." Rogue grabbed an amulet from a nearby table, tossed it into the air to catch it on a little finger, "Ohh, I like this. Can I have it?"The Protoss' hand shot out and snatched the amulet. "None of youmy process," he snapped. He forced the amulet down a breast pocket with a sour expression, turning away.Rogue gave an expansive shrug and knew that it was hopeless. He turned on his heel and headed for the door. "Sheesh. Maru's not gonna be happy about this. Wanna tell him yourself? He says exciting things are happening." Rogue waved away a puff of smoke that had lilted in front of him, "You need some fresh air. Or a bath. You're bumming me out."sOs stayed behind, running a finger absentmindedly along the edge of the amulet. In spite of his very best attempts, his mind was crowded.? What did that mean, exactly? Come to think of it, perhaps he should have asked. And he had to acknowledge that Rogue was, at least, partially correct. He had been distraught recently, his fingers longing to touch a scepter that was no longer there. He shivered, remembering the complete lack of direction that had haunted him just mere months ago. He never wanted to feel so purposeless again. He had sworn never to be so helpless.It was settled, then. He had business to attend. He had spent weeks confined in the faculties of his skull, contemplating cause-and effect, dreaming up strategies and creating fictional worlds. The clarity that he sought, he had realized, may be found outside the apparitional walls he had constructed.The great outdoors, how exciting.The sun blazed above the vast countryside, and the wind danced through flowers and leaves of grass, whispering in the treetops. Out here, sOs found a different kind of peace. The seclusion of his chapel was nice, even homely, but the wind against his face was a different kind of pleasure.He sensed a Terran nearby, leaning against a tree with a portable simulator unit placed beside him. Quietly, and with great patience, sOs sat down to watch. The rookie's training proceeded quickly, almost too quickly, in a predictable, robotic fashion. Identical scenarios played out, and the responses were equally identical. Fifty times the Terran tried, fifty times his strategy was the same.sOs smiled impishly. He had designed the simulator, after all.Suddenly the recruit was beset by alerts, notifying him that he was about to come under attack. "What?" sOs heard the rookie mutter from where he sat, "I don't remember programming this..."The assault took only seconds, warp blades tearing the unprepared beginner apart. The simulation was terminated nearly instantly. sOs grinned and allowed the greenhorn a few moments to regain his composure, a few more to fiddle with the simulator unit trying to figure out what had gone wrong.The Terran put up a better fight the second time around, better by far, but still insufficient. A stream of curses, a kicked water bottle, a terminated simulation. A foregone conclusion, perhaps, but sOs saw potential.This time, sOs merely postured, fainting aggression but never committing. He filled the rookie's mind with worries, with unwatched angles and threats of impending attacks, following through with none. Seconds turned to grueling minutes, each one turning the Terran a little more toward paranoia. It took the frightened loser a good ten minutes to gather courage, ten long minutes that were cut very short by a burst of thermal energy. The rookie terminated his simulation for a third time and kicked the virtual reality unit. He yelped in pain, staggering back while clutching a wounded foot, tripping and rolling down the hill.Cackling loudly and unable to stop himself, sOs was overcome by a feeling that had eluded him for very long. He couldn't quite put his finger on it, but he felt, as if he had been doing something profoundly right, something to set his mind at ease. Something that put him back where he belonged."Perhaps", he gasped between bouts of laughter, "that kid wasn't so off-base after all."Minutes flew by, turning into hours as day soon gave way to twilight, and sOs was still there under the tree. His consciousness drifted across the vast plains, seeking more and more unwitting test subjects. He meticulously studied each, first from the outside—their basic gestures, their rudimentary tactics, the way they went about their training, the way they dealt with victory and defeat. Then he went inward, weaving through the flow of their minds, observing habits, discerning strategies, tendencies.In their worried, unorganized practice, sOs found a glaring contrast between himself and them. There seemed to be no order to their chaos, no mind to the madness. They fought and fought and fought, tried and tried as they did to force their strength upon simulated opponents, completely absent finesse. Completely absent...He remembered Rogue saying something about it. Maru had echoed the sentiment, at some point. They weren't like the others, nowhere near so simple-minded. Out here, with the evening chill against his face and the wind sizzling through the trees, it seemed they had been spot on. How could he have forgotten?had he forgotten?He had to, he decided, return to the temple. Now. There were things to do, schemes to design and test, plans to pen and practice, ideas to... Well, things to do, put plainly.He turned to the last remaining rookie on the field, a Zerg flanked by two feeble-looking zerglings. Caught up in a simulation measuring macro-perspective capabilities, the cornerstone in long-term warfare, it was almost too easy to disrupt him. Subtly first, the mere threat of an impending attack. The Zerg reeled at the unseen threat, overreacting, ordering his pets out to attack a foe they could not see. sOs felt himself smile in the dark.And he did. It took no more than a push, a light shove, to put the Zerg on a back foot. Psionic energies crackled, ripping through the night air. Warp blades sang through the air, searing slashes that cut zerglings in half. Defenseless, the Zerg couldn't take it anymore——and the rookie let slip a scream of purest terror. It took no genius to see that the rookie had finally understood who it was he had come face to face with. The half-processed simulation was hastily terminated as the Zerg scrambled, staggering away and down the slope. It was a nostalgic thing, that scream, that frightened sprint, nostalgic—nostalgic, indeed. He remembered...His greatest triumph, defeating JaeDong years ago, becoming king, lifting the scepter. A singular achievement, that, one he had never been able to match. It wasn't even the achievement, really—it was the process.process. The unadultered joy of discovery, of peeling back every layer of his foe, of using what he found against them. Somehow, after Life's ascent, he had lost it. Forgotten how it felt. He hadn't been himself, he realized. He watched the Zerg sway and stumble his way across the plain as if his pants were on fire, never turning once to see the grinning face of his better. sOs hadn't been himself, he realized.He opened his eyes, back in the castle. Silence, but not complete. Darkness, but not total. The door swung open with a loud clang of wood against stone, and a blast of energy raced towards it. sOs shot up, turned towards the twirling mass of psionic energy, stopped it with a flick of his wrist then beckoned it back to his hand, absorbing it.Maru stood in the doorway with a bored expression. sOs surprised him with a bone-cracking, giggling hug, leaping from the side of his bed to wrap his hands around the little Terran."Ugh," Maru wiggled out of his embrace, grunting, "what's this for?""For being absent minded for too long." He let Maru go, grinning, then continued, "How about we go and play a bit of tag the ling, like we used to?"The so-called Little Psycho looked ecstatic. "You're on! You'll want to hear the news, though. Word is that—" Screaming interrupted him."Oh ignore that, they always make so much noise. You were saying?""The other clans are mobilizing. The scepter's location must be known because Life is on the move."sOs cocked an eyebrow.Slowly, a smile grew on his face. It hadn't taken long, but it had certainly taken long enough. "Now would be a perfect time to get revenge on that little creep for what he did."Maru looked pained. It was easy to forget, sOs remembered, that the little Terran had suffered just as he had. The chance at greatness, snatched away in the final moment."Yes, but word is they've even woken Zest."sOs raised his hand before his face, rolling the amulet between his fingers, feeling strangely at ease with the revelation. "Oh," he said, "don't worry about that." He snapped his fingers, and a spark of bright energy crackled above them. "I've got a few new tricks in store for them. And they never see me coming.""No," Maru agreed, looking somewhat put at ease by his elder's apparent confidence. "Those fools."





Stats are from Aligulac.com







Well, a miracle is what he certainly got. KT’s decision to block Zest from attending the MSI MGA due to Proleague commitments opened the door for sOs to travel for one last shot at a second trip to California. That his ultimate victory and the 750 WCS points attained in Seattle catapulted him above TY in the WCS rankings was the ultimate display of karmic retribution on the KT Rolster squad. MSI MGA marked the start of a hot streak for sOs. A top 4 finish at Dreamhack Stockholm secured his spot in the top 16, while his unbelievable streak of results in the Proleague off-season was one of the most impressive displays of the year. His run of 8 wins on the trot, including a reverse kill of KT Rolster (the first in SC2 Proleague history) dragged Jin Air to the Grand Finals almost singlehandedly, before INnoVation brought an end to the streak as SKT claimed the trophy.



The truly scary thing about sOs is that, at his worst, he’s still able to take games and series off anyone in Korea. At his best though, there are few in the world who can touch him. His game sense is extraordinary, and he frequently spots weaknesses and conceives of plans that everyone else simply can’t see coming. Peaking in form at just the right time, it’ll be a brave man who bets against him going far in Anaheim.



WCS Points:





Top 5 Games







1. sOs vs Bbyong, GSL 2015 Season 2 – Iron Fortress

One of the tensest scenarios in Starcraft occurs when a player opts for a hidden base. It’s frequently a desperation play—after all, if scouted early enough, losing the base is effectively game ending—and some of the wonkiest scenarios revolve around the need to protect two opposite corners of the map simultaneously. With two locations to defend at either end of Iron Fortress, sOs’ game management here against Bbyong was perfect, having just enough to hold off the terran aggression at both locations, while sniping wayward medivacs left him well in the lead. Bbyong’s own desperation move to hide a command centre in the one remaining corner of the map was a cute touch, but sOs’ game winning push was too strong to hold.









2. sOs vs INnoVation, MSI MGA – Cactus Valley

Like every tricky protoss in the game, sOs knows exactly when to pray to InCa. Depending on your allegiance, there’s little more amusing / exasperating than seeing a player absolutely bamboozled by dark templars, and with his Blizzcon place seriously under threat at MSI MGA, sOs pulled out all the stops here against INnoVation. While the initial DT attack was fended off rather easily, the follow up warp prism drop caught INnoVation’s troops on the other side of the map. All the turrets now present providing detection for the terran meant little given his complete lack of army units, and dual pronged harassment shredded the mineral lines at both the main and natural. A final, desperate counter by the terran was pushed back, while even more game ending damage was dealt out back home. In all, nearly 50 SCVs would be wiped off the map, as sOs marched triumphantly into the grand finals.









3. sOs vs Zest, SPL 2015 Postseason – Vaani

Of the three matchups he plays, the one that benefits sOs’ keen sense for mindgames most is the mirror matchup. Time after time, he makes decisions that most of us watching simply had no idea were even options open to him, and one such choice won him this match against Zest in the Proleague Playoffs. Initial commitment to ineffective warp prism harass left him slightly behind going into the midgame, with both players set up on three bases. His next move though opened up the whole game. A colossus drop and full warp in inside Zest’s backdoor base took out the KT protoss’ natural expansion, while a simultaneous push on the third base caught Zest in two minds as to which location to defend. Zest successfully chased off the attack from the main army, but that left the warp prism and colossus combo wreaking havoc in his base. Now significantly ahead in both army value and composition, sOs cemented his lead with another expansion, before a final push caught Zest’s whole army trapped in at his natural at the mercy of sOs’ splash damage-heavy composition.









4. sOs vs Curious, Dreamhack Stockholm 2015 - Iron Fortress

While Has may have stolen his status as Starcraft 2’s premier purveyor of flashy cannon rushes, it’s undeniable that sOs still possesses a certain flair for rage-inducing cheese. Curious’ defence here against sOs’ cannon rush is perfect; right up to the point where he decided that sOs’ probes wandering off spelt an end to the rush. Quick as a flash, the probes doubled back, the cannons were walled in, and sOs was left celebrating another dirty victory.









5. sOs vs Solar, Dreamhack Stockholm 2015 – Bridgehead

There’s normally a certain pattern that most games of Starcraft go by; waves of pressure that ebb and flow as armies clash and back off. Here, sOs and Solar gave us none of that. After sOs started things with a proxy gateway / proxy stargate combo, the game quickly spiralled off into insanity. DT and ling runbys were constant threats, while chargelot / archon with storm support was sOs’s choice of tech against Solar’s fast hive. The game rocked back and forth for more than half an hour, featuring constant aggression with neither player willing to back down. PvZ is infamous for its tendency to feature static deathballs, posturing for position, but we saw none of that here, with both players frequently harassing on multiple fronts with packs of units while simultaneously defending at home against an opponent doing the same.



A couple months back, nobody seriously expected sOs to be here at the WCS Global Finals. A strong performance in early December in the Hot6ix Cup gave us one of the most painfully awkward / painful / hilarious finals in Starcraft history (delete as appropriate). sOs’ array of tricks and aggression was far too much for a flummoxed MarineKing to handle, leaving the Blizzcon champion from 2013 flying high in the rankings. Dual failures in the qualifiers for Season 1 changed all that. Suddenly, sOs was up against it, and despite registering his best result in the GSL to date, a defeat in the semifinals to ByuL still left him stranded and in need of a miracle.Well, a miracle is what he certainly got. KT’s decision to block Zest from attending the MSI MGA due to Proleague commitments opened the door for sOs to travel for one last shot at a second trip to California. That his ultimate victory and the 750 WCS points attained in Seattle catapulted him above TY in the WCS rankings was the ultimate display of karmic retribution on the KT Rolster squad. MSI MGA marked the start of a hot streak for sOs. A top 4 finish at Dreamhack Stockholm secured his spot in the top 16, while his unbelievable streak of results in the Proleague off-season was one of the most impressive displays of the year. His run of 8 wins on the trot, including a reverse kill of KT Rolster (the first in SC2 Proleague history) dragged Jin Air to the Grand Finals almost singlehandedly, before INnoVation brought an end to the streak as SKT claimed the trophy.The truly scary thing about sOs is that, at his worst, he’s still able to take games and series off anyone in Korea. At his best though, there are few in the world who can touch him. His game sense is extraordinary, and he frequently spots weaknesses and conceives of plans that everyone else simply can’t see coming. Peaking in form at just the right time, it’ll be a brave man who bets against him going far in Anaheim.One of the tensest scenarios in Starcraft occurs when a player opts for a hidden base. It’s frequently a desperation play—after all, if scouted early enough, losing the base is effectively game ending—and some of the wonkiest scenarios revolve around the need to protect two opposite corners of the map simultaneously. With two locations to defend at either end of Iron Fortress, sOs’ game management here against Bbyong was perfect, having just enough to hold off the terran aggression at both locations, while sniping wayward medivacs left him well in the lead. Bbyong’s own desperation move to hide a command centre in the one remaining corner of the map was a cute touch, but sOs’ game winning push was too strong to hold.Like every tricky protoss in the game, sOs knows exactly when to pray to InCa. Depending on your allegiance, there’s little more amusing / exasperating than seeing a player absolutely bamboozled by dark templars, and with his Blizzcon place seriously under threat at MSI MGA, sOs pulled out all the stops here against INnoVation. While the initial DT attack was fended off rather easily, the follow up warp prism drop caught INnoVation’s troops on the other side of the map. All the turrets now present providing detection for the terran meant little given his complete lack of army units, and dual pronged harassment shredded the mineral lines at both the main and natural. A final, desperate counter by the terran was pushed back, while even more game ending damage was dealt out back home. In all, nearly 50 SCVs would be wiped off the map, as sOs marched triumphantly into the grand finals.Of the three matchups he plays, the one that benefits sOs’ keen sense for mindgames most is the mirror matchup. Time after time, he makes decisions that most of us watching simply had no idea were even options open to him, and one such choice won him this match against Zest in the Proleague Playoffs. Initial commitment to ineffective warp prism harass left him slightly behind going into the midgame, with both players set up on three bases. His next move though opened up the whole game. A colossus drop and full warp in inside Zest’s backdoor base took out the KT protoss’ natural expansion, while a simultaneous push on the third base caught Zest in two minds as to which location to defend. Zest successfully chased off the attack from the main army, but that left the warp prism and colossus combo wreaking havoc in his base. Now significantly ahead in both army value and composition, sOs cemented his lead with another expansion, before a final push caught Zest’s whole army trapped in at his natural at the mercy of sOs’ splash damage-heavy composition.While Has may have stolen his status as Starcraft 2’s premier purveyor of flashy cannon rushes, it’s undeniable that sOs still possesses a certain flair for rage-inducing cheese. Curious’ defence here against sOs’ cannon rush is perfect; right up to the point where he decided that sOs’ probes wandering off spelt an end to the rush. Quick as a flash, the probes doubled back, the cannons were walled in, and sOs was left celebrating another dirty victory.There’s normally a certain pattern that most games of Starcraft go by; waves of pressure that ebb and flow as armies clash and back off. Here, sOs and Solar gave us none of that. After sOs started things with a proxy gateway / proxy stargate combo, the game quickly spiralled off into insanity. DT and ling runbys were constant threats, while chargelot / archon with storm support was sOs’s choice of tech against Solar’s fast hive. The game rocked back and forth for more than half an hour, featuring constant aggression with neither player willing to back down. PvZ is infamous for its tendency to feature static deathballs, posturing for position, but we saw none of that here, with both players frequently harassing on multiple fronts with packs of units while simultaneously defending at home against an opponent doing the same.

sOs vs Zest

SPL 2015 Post Season - Vaani Research Station

by: lichter



There are players that simply see plays that no one else can. In traditional sports, Hall of Famers like Jason Kidd or Andrea Pirlo possess the hallowed trait of vision. They see the game unfolding three of four steps ahead of the present, and they can pull off passes that might have been foolhardy or impossible to the common man. In Starcraft 2, sOs is the visionary that sees the invisible.



In their rematch during the SPL Proleague Post Season, Zest had to have been favored. The KT wonder had just scored a perfect 11-0 round, and his PvP had always been considered one of the best in Korea (unless he faced Creator). On the other hand, sOs' form had fluctuated throughout the season, especially in PvP, though he was on an all-killing hot streak. That they already played a game on Vaani Research Station that saw sOs pull off a crazy gold base early expansion suggested that sOs should have been out of crazy tricks. We were wrong.



It started as a nondescript game, however. Both players elected to play conservative early games, expanding after their cyber cores. sOs had the earlier 2nd gas, and he invested his resources in a twilight council while Zest picked a defensive posture: earlier gates and a robo. It wasn't going to be a blink timing, however, as sOs added his own robotics facility. Instead, he would attempt to draw Zest out with his blink stalkers and do damage with a warp prism carrying zealots (or vice versa). Unfortunately, Zest was prepared and took no damage, resulting in a 5-6 probe lead and a slight tech advantage. After the initial poke had been pushed back, Zest already had his +1 attack churning along with his first colossus in production. sOs did have his own robo bay just finished, but his investment into blink and a warp prism had been for naught.







At that point, sOs had two choices: try to catch up in economy/tech or commit to a big attack. Instead, he inexplicably opted for a middle of the road solution: catch up slowly while investing in more harassment. However, he saw something that most people would not have identified: the lack of mobile anti-air. Zest had gone straight into a robo, which meant that all he had were waddling stalkers. With no blink and no phoenixes, sOs' warp prism had the leisure of going wherever it wished. Both players expanded to their third bases and their paths diverged; Zest continued to crank out colossus while sOs warped in a templar archives in order leapfrog him in tech. sOs then chronoboosted an additional warp prism right after his hallucinated oracle scout, which set him further behind in colossus number.









Just by looking at the supply counts, sOs appeared helplessly behind. He was 25 supply down with fewer colossus and a slightly later third base. Though his +2 was ahead by a small margin, 1 upgrade would not have made a 25 supply difference. His next move, however, did. He picked up a colossus as soon as his 2nd warp prism finished and moved out towards Zest's third. The KT observer spotted the army, and Zest positioned himself to defend his open expansion. Then, a colossus appeared in his natural along with a big warp in of zealots. For the first time in the game Zest appeared rattled, and he had trouble splitting his army in order to deal with both groups of Jin Air units. Before he could decide how much to commit to the defense, his natural had fallen along with a colossus—at the expense of a handful of zealots. sOs still had a smaller standing army though, and he was forced to recall his main force after a small skirmish in the middle of the map.







sOs had somehow gotten himself back in the game by taking two big risks at the same time. Had Zest moved out with his army to contest sOs' third, there would have been no way for him to hold. His army was smaller because he had spent his money on both harassment and additional tech. Yet he understood Zest's one vulnerability and exploited it perfectly. There was hardly any risk in committing a colossus to the drop, and his main army was merely a distraction. Had Zest pounced on the army without a recall, the game would have been over, but sOs made sure there was no opportunity to do so.



From there, sOs used his base advantage to amass a better army over the next few minutes. Though Zest had already transitioned into tempests, he did not have the number necessary to deal with his opponent's massive colossus and archon army. Even with patience and clever positioning, Zest could not take an engagement with a bulk of his supply in zealots and stalkers. sOs' early gamble on his templar archives eventually paid off to the tune of Zest's entire army evaporating in seconds.







click here to watch the game



There are players that simplyplays that no one else can. In traditional sports, Hall of Famers like Jason Kidd or Andrea Pirlo possess the hallowed trait of. They see the game unfolding three of four steps ahead of the present, and they can pull off passes that might have been foolhardy or impossible to the common man. In Starcraft 2, sOs is the visionary that sees the invisible.In their rematch during the SPL Proleague Post Season, Zest had to have been favored. The KT wonder had just scored a perfect 11-0 round, and his PvP had always been considered one of the best in Korea (unless he faced Creator). On the other hand, sOs' form had fluctuated throughout the season, especially in PvP, though he was on an all-killing hot streak. That they already played a game on Vaani Research Station that saw sOs pull off a crazy gold base early expansion suggested that sOs should have been out of crazy tricks. We were wrong.It started as a nondescript game, however. Both players elected to play conservative early games, expanding after their cyber cores. sOs had the earlier 2nd gas, and he invested his resources in a twilight council while Zest picked a defensive posture: earlier gates and a robo. It wasn't going to be a blink timing, however, as sOs added his own robotics facility. Instead, he would attempt to draw Zest out with his blink stalkers and do damage with a warp prism carrying zealots (or vice versa). Unfortunately, Zest was prepared and took no damage, resulting in a 5-6 probe lead and a slight tech advantage. After the initial poke had been pushed back, Zest already had his +1 attack churning along with his first colossus in production. sOs did have his own robo bay just finished, but his investment into blink and a warp prism had been for naught.At that point, sOs had two choices: try to catch up in economy/tech or commit to a big attack. Instead, he inexplicably opted for a middle of the road solution: catch up slowly while investing in more harassment. However, he saw something that most people would not have identified: the lack of mobile anti-air. Zest had gone straight into a robo, which meant that all he had were waddling stalkers. With no blink and no phoenixes, sOs' warp prism had the leisure of going wherever it wished. Both players expanded to their third bases and their paths diverged; Zest continued to crank out colossus while sOs warped in a templar archives in order leapfrog him in tech. sOs then chronoboosted an additional warp prism right after his hallucinated oracle scout, which set him further behind in colossus number.Just by looking at the supply counts, sOs appeared helplessly behind. He was 25 supply down with fewer colossus and a slightly later third base. Though his +2 was ahead by a small margin, 1 upgrade would not have made a 25 supply difference. His next move, however, did. He picked up a colossus as soon as his 2nd warp prism finished and moved out towards Zest's third. The KT observer spotted the army, and Zest positioned himself to defend his open expansion. Then, a colossus appeared in his natural along with a big warp in of zealots. For the first time in the game Zest appeared rattled, and he had trouble splitting his army in order to deal with both groups of Jin Air units. Before he could decide how much to commit to the defense, his natural had fallen along with a colossus—at the expense of a handful of zealots. sOs still had a smaller standing army though, and he was forced to recall his main force after a small skirmish in the middle of the map.sOs had somehow gotten himself back in the game by taking two big risks at the same time. Had Zest moved out with his army to contest sOs' third, there would have been no way for him to hold. His army was smaller because he had spent his money on both harassment and additional tech. Yet he understood Zest's one vulnerability and exploited it perfectly. There was hardly any risk in committing a colossus to the drop, and his main army was merely a distraction. Had Zest pounced on the army without a recall, the game would have been over, but sOs made sure there was no opportunity to do so.From there, sOs used his base advantage to amass a better army over the next few minutes. Though Zest had already transitioned into tempests, he did not have the number necessary to deal with his opponent's massive colossus and archon army. Even with patience and clever positioning, Zest could not take an engagement with a bulk of his supply in zealots and stalkers. sOs' early gamble on his templar archives eventually paid off to the tune of Zest's entire army evaporating in seconds.













