The second week of MSL is here already. Savior versus his least favorite zerg opponent in the losers game. Could the reigning champion be due for an early exit? Read on for battle reports of todays game and a tiny preview of what's to come in the MSL.
Savior vs Jaedong at Desert Fox
Savior has said that Midas and Jaedong are two of the players he doesn't like to play against. Yesterday he got beaten my Midas, would he lose again against Jaedong who has done so well in the ProLeague this season. Savior spawns at 3 and Jaedong spawns at 7. They both open with a lair before their second hatchery into spire. Savior is way ahead of Jaedong when it comes to destroying the neutral buildings though. Savior puts down his expansion there shortly after Jaedong starts attacking his buildings. Savior also sends 3 drones to his mineral only, to squeeze 2 of them through the minerals into the middle.
Savior goes mostly for scourges, while Jaedong opts for mutalisks. With his mutas he sees Savior's drones trying to get through the mineral line into 12 and kills them before he has a chance to expand there. Jaedong does a little bit of damage to Savior's natural before he tries the same trick as Savior. Again the same thing happens, Savior spots the drones trying to cross the mineral line into 12 and eliminates them. There's some back and forth mutascourge battles, and in the end Savior manages to start building an expansion in the 12 natural. Jaedong sees it, but is nervous to leave his mineral lines unprotected and it has a chance to finish.
“Jaedong sees it, but is nervous to leave his mineral lines unprotected...As the 12 mineral only finishes Jaedong moves in for a huge muta fight there. He wins the battle but Savior gets a spore colony up in time and Jaedong has to withdraw. Jaedong recognizes the danger and sends 4 drones to build his own spores on Saviors creep. Unfortunately they for him it doesn't succeed. Savior holds his expansion after yet another mutabattle. Jaedong is now desperate. He must take this hatchery down or it's gg. He sends a lot of drone to it, but Savior saw it coming and has a sunken plus some lings. Jaedong proceeds to suicide his mutas on Saviors main before tapping out. A very nice ZvZ. GG
The next game was SilvEr versus aQua in another ZvZ, this time on Longinus II. Unfortunately I had a problem with my stream and didn't catch it. As far as I could tell it was a quick game where SilvEr ran his lings past aQua's and then killed off the drones. Simple as that. GG I suppose.
IriS vs Bisu at Reverse Temple
IriS landed at 3 and started with a wallin at his natural followed by a command center. Bisu warped in at 9 and went a fairly standard with a quick core. Then he decided to put down a proxy pylon outside IriS' main. It was spotted but IriS didn't seem to care too much. Obviously it would be a robotics facility, but IriS was confident in his ability to defend the reaver.
Sure enough, as the support bay finished in the protoss main a reaver started building. IriS even scouted it as it finished. What he was not counting on what that Bisu had been busy ferrying all his goons into the terran main before the reaver finished. IriS got caught offguard and had to defend with his scvs with quite heavy losses. Especially after the first reaver arrived. But he held it together even if he had to run all his scvs to his natural. He got a wraith out to deal with the shuttle, and with the reaver immobile it was picked off soon. IriS' scv count was very low though.
Bisu rebuilt a bit and did the exact same thing. He ferried goons in and supported them with a reaver. IriS did surprisingly well in defending his main against it actually. But he almost completely emptied his natural for defences and Bisu took advantage by breaking down the wall with zealots. Once inside the terran had no choice but to face that he was beaten. The camera showed Bisu with an expression on his face that seemed to say "Well, that wasn't too hard". GG
Savior still in the running
JJu vs Free at Blitz X
JJu spawns at the left side of the map and goes for a 12hatch in his natural. Free warps in on the right side and opens with a forge in his natural first. The action starts immediately as Free pylons in a probe behind the hatchery for a quick cannonrush. JJu manages to get a drone in behind the mineral line to start attacking the cannon, but it's not enough. The cannon finishes. Free warps in two cannons in front of the mineral line just before JJu realizes the danger and puts down 2 sunkens. With the help of a few lings JJu is able to clear out the cannons, but barely. The last sunken was on about ten health.
Free has been busy starting his expansion at his natural, but he only has one cannon. He takes a lot of probes off the mineral line however to ensure that JJu doesn't run up the ramp with his lings. JJu choses not to risk an all in move and chills outside and takes his middle expansion instead. While Free is busy teching corsair and dark templar JJu puts down a forth hatch in his main. The first dt manages to kill off 3 drones in the middle before it dies. The second one runs around and somehow managed to kill some drones in the natural before sneaking into the main and killing some more before it dies. JJu is now pretty far behind.
“JJu drops the protoss main with swarm at the same time, but storm takes it out quite easily.Free takes his middle expo and techs to observers as JJu has lurkers out. After some minor skirmishes Free attacks the zerg natural with a rather large force. JJu has already loaded up a drop and decides to go for it. Zerg loses a lot of drones, but eventually holds the attack. His drop didn't go well either. Cannons and storm put a quick end to it. Free recognizes his advantage, but decides to play it safe and takes the southeast natural. He also puts up a lot of cannons there and in the middle. JJu choses to harass with lurker drops while teching to greater spire. Free handles the harass fine though and takes the southeast main while he is at it. He's now 2 bases ahead of JJu. The zerg continues his lurker harass and now starts harass with guardians as well. As his first defiler spawns i think his plan (if he had one) was to soak up the storms with the harass and the dominate with swarm. The first part of his 'plan' works as he gets all his harrassing units stormed well and good.
With two extra expansions Free has all the templars he needs though and attacks the zerg natural again. JJu drops the protoss main with swarm at the same time, but storm take it out quite easily. He also tries to defend his natural with swarm, but Free has a superior army now including reavers. The protoss economy is far too strong and has been for most of the game. JJu surrenders. GG
GomTV MSL Loser matches 21/12-06
Savior > Jaedong Desert Fox
SilvEr > aQua Longinus II
Iris < Bisu Reverse Temple
JJu < Free Blitz X
These were the losers from week 1 of MSL. The winners here will face the losers of the winners matches next time. Savior will face the loser of Hwasin vs Pusan. SilvEr will face loser from Justin (aka Bifrost) vs Much. Bisu the loser of Nal_rA vs Canata and finally Free will meet the loser of XellOs vs LighT. Many good matches to look foreward to in the MSL.
Links
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