by Fionn and Waxangel

CreatorPrime vs MVP.DongRaeGu

Almost a month after suffering two of the worst defeats of his career, DongRaeGu finally returns. Who would have imagined that for a player who experienced defeat in several finals – the Blizzard Cup, and MLG Winter Championship come prominently to mind – two semi-final failures would actually be the most painful of his career? With the finals of the most recent GSTL and Code S tournaments taking place in his hometown of Busan, DongRaeGu was looking forward to the chance of winning his most glorious victories yet, clinching the championships in front of a throng of fans, friends, and family. However, within the span of a few days, he was unceremoniously dumped out in the semi-finals of both tournaments, and crushed under the weight of his own expectations.

Looking at his twitter feed since his defeats, DongRaeGu fans can waylay their fears that he has become a unshaven, drunk derelict who occasionally mumbles about burrowed infestors as he ambles around the beaches of Busan. He's been keeping up with his social media, making vague and philosophical tweets that remind you he's not just one of the best Starcraft II players in the world, but also kid in his early twenties dealing with adversity like everyone else. DRG's had plenty of time to reflect, and he should show up to this match humbled but focused, looking to make his way back to the top, one step at a time. (Just don't ask him about that period between July 17 – 23 when he fell off the grid).

It's interesting and almost even humorous coincidence that DongRaeGu's first opponent in his return is a player who has never had anything to lose. Creator's still at the phase where anything he gains is seen as a sign of his growing skill, while losses are patiently accepted as growing pains. At fifteen years old, he's already recognized as one of the absolute terrors on ladder and in team leagues, but has been unable to make an impact in individual competition. Still, his talent is so prodigious it's considered a matter of when, not if, he finally breaks out on the scene. Surely enough, he's making slow progress as time passes, taking on more responsibilities for Prime in the GSTL and even making his Code S debut last season.

In terms of actual time as Starcraft II pro-gamers, DongRaeGu and Creator are actually pretty similar. But you can't help but imagine that DongRaeGu will head into this match, look across at the other booth, shake his head, and think 'you've got a lot to learn.'

Styles

Creator plays a very standard style of Protoss that could either be called incredibly boring or incredibly solid, depending on your opinion of Protoss in general. Even when he makes a decision to all-in, you can imagine it being entirely technical. Something like 'I will all-in in 38.65% of games because that provides the optimal amount of of uncertainty for my opponent to ensure the highest long term win-rate.' At his best, DongRaeGu also seemed like a machine, with his fluid Zerg play resembling some kind of computer with a perfect response-tree for every changing scenario.

However, if DongRaeGu once looked like water, flowing around and eventually drowning out his opponent's attacks, his recent ZvP games have shown that it's very possible for creative opponents to put him in situations he doesn't know how to deal with. He barely overcame NaNiwa and his unorthodox gateway first strategies in the GSL quarters, while he fell like many a Zerg to MC's all-ins in the GSL semis. Fortunately for DongRaeGu, Creator hasn't shown that much creativity in the all-in department, saving his optimization talents to make builds that give Protoss the best possible foundation in macro games. That should make this series a battle between two of the best straight-up PvZ players in the game, one where we'll hand DongRaeGu a slight advantage because of his reputation.

Prediction: DongRaeGu 2 - 1 Creator


Liquid`HerO vs. CJ_EffOrt

Enter Effort. For all of you who don't know of Effort, here is a short summary: he looks like Supernova's twin, is the only player to defeat Flash in a Brood War final after giving the Ultimate Weapon a 2-0 lead, and out of the KeSPA players, the one with the best chance to make it into Code S first. He briefly retired from playing Starcraft two years ago, but came back since the start of last season's Proleague, he has been consistently one of the best Zergs in Brood War and SC2 in his league.

Things won't be easy, though. For the fourth straight series, one of the KeSPA Seven will be pitted up against one of the stronger players the GOM squadron has to offer. Liquid's Hero, former Code S semifinalist, is considered to be one of the best PvZ players in the world and has defeated top Zerg after another to get where he is now.

Time for the good and bad news for the KeSPA followers out there. First, the good news is that Effort is absolutely crushing ZvZ and hasn't dropped a game in the hybrid Proleague this season. He is also known to be a player that can improve very quickly and is able to revel in the role of the underdog. He has been an underdog many times in his career, going up against many favored opponents, and Effort is a player who has been able to overcome those disadvantages.

The bad news? He is 0-3 in Proleague against Protoss and has had a bit of a slump overall since his blazing start to the season. Losing to players like Lizzy, Shy and Trap is not going to be the best boost of confidence to fans who want to see him take down the now veteran Hero. It's not fair to say that Effort doesn't have a chance at all just because his three comrades have gone down without a single win, but effort might very well be the next on the chopping block if he doesn't bring inspiring play tonight.

Prediction: Hero 2 - 0 Effort


SlayerS_Puzzle vs. CJ_herO[jOin]

Alright, so we can either breakdown a PvP between a veteran GSL player against possibly the biggest underdog of the team of underdogs with a middling PvP record, or we can get down to what everyone wants to know. With the merging of the Brood War and Starcraft 2 scenes, we now have the burden of having three, yeah, that's right, THREE PLAYERS having the name Hero.

It's time to decide which of these three has the right to be known from this day forth as the real Hero, while the other two must either get new names or be forever known as fakes.


Liquid`Hero: Out of the three Heroes, he is the one with the least amount of experience in Brood War, but by far the most accomplished when it comes to Starcraft 2. Out of the three Heroes now in Starcraft 2, he is the last one to make his official debut under his moniker. Team Eight's Hero debuted in 07, and CJ's Hero debuted in late 2009. In terms of seniority, Liquid's Hero is surprisingly the oldest of the trio, being two years older than his CJ counterpart and edging out Team Eight's Hero by fourteen days.

In terms of popularity, there is no question this is the most well known Hero. While T8's Hero had a good Brood War career, even having the honor of getting his ass kicked in the Batoo OSL semifinals by Jaedong, he still was never one of the most popular Brood War players in Korea.

CJ_herO[jOin]: His claim to being the true Hero? Well, he's the youngest of the three. In terms of accomplishments, T8's Hero blows him out of the water in Brood War, and Liquid's Hero records so far heavily outweigh his in Starcraft 2. In terms of popularity and being known, he is probably the least known of the trio. His biggest claim to fame so far is that he was the first player to beat Bisu in SC2, but as we now know, everyone beats Bisu in Starcraft II.

T8_by.hero: The first Hero of the bunch and the one with the most Brood War success, T8's Hero might have the strongest claim to being the real Hero. Thing is, he's only played two games officially in Starcraft 2 in Proleague and got beat down both times against Wooki and Last. Unfortunately for by.hero, even with his success in Brood War, if he walked into a room at
an MLG or a Dreamhack without a uniform on, no one would recognize him except for the Brood War faithful.


The Verdict: He might have been the last to take the name, but as he is by far the most known and popular Hero in Starcraft 2 and that's the game that will be played on from now on, we have to give the moniker of Hero to Liquid's own. He has already established himself as Starcraft 2's Hero across the world and is already one of the most popular players in the scene.

For CJ's Hero, the one with the worst claim to the Hero throne and the least known of the three, I will put him in the ranks of Yarnc in Brood War and MarineKing in Starcraft 2, by calling him Fake Hero, or Fero for short, from now on. Hopefully his fortune goes the way of Fake Boxer, more than it that of Fake Yellow. Good luck, Fero, enjoy your new name.

For Team Eight's Hero, you can call him the Original Hero or Oero for short, which will make me think of cookies every time I now watch any of his games.

If any party does not agree with their new names, GOM can set up a steel cage match with the winner getting the Hero name.

P.S: Fake Hero will make some warp prisms because that's what all KeSPA Protoss do in PvP, lose 0 - 2 and possibly kill any dreams we had of seeing a Hero vs. Fero match in WCS Korea.

Prediction: Puzzle 2 - 0 Fake Hero


SAMSUNG_Reality vs SlayerS_YuGiOh

Naturally enough, the standard metric of rating Koreans pros has become position in the GSL. For fans who have watched plenty of GomTV, terms like 'borderline Code S,' or 'low Code A' are fairly easy to understand. It's no surprise that it has become the way people have been measuring the progress of KeSPA in their switch to Starcraft II, with 'Code S level' being the consensus line where a certain degree of parity between the two groups will finally be achieved.

So far, the KeSPA players in the WCS nationals have had the misfortune of going up against players who are at least Code S quality. The best KeSPA players have often been rated as 'high Code A,' so it was really no surprise that they went 0 – 3 against more highly rated opponents.

You can see where I'm going with this. Tonight, defending the honor of GSL players everywhere, is YuGiOh, more popularly known as the "King of Code A."

YuGiOh has the truly dubious honor of being the only player to qualify for all TWELVE seasons of Code A, a feat some would say necessitates the creation of a parallel "YuGiOh award" to match the "Nestea award" given to players who qualify for ten consecutive Code S tournaments. Though YuGiOh has shown the skill to qualify for Code S on no less than three occasions, each time he has been sent straight back down to Code A to languish for another season.

On the face of it, this suggests the KeSPA seven will have an excellent chance of breaking their losing streak and finally advancing a player to the winners bracket. After all, their opponent is a player whose most famous trait is not being a Code S player. On top of that, the KeSPA representative might be their strongest yet.

Though all of the prior players were seeded into the WCS tournament based on KeSPA recommendations, Reality actually had to prove himself in the qualifiers full of the skilled GSL players he will need to beat in the actual WCS tournament. Though his 4 – 4 record in Proleague suggests that maybe his play isn't very effective in that particular meta-game, he was immensely impressive against GomTV players in the preliminaries. Not only did he defeat beat Heart and Shine (two aforementioned 'high Code A players'), but he took out Symbol, a high Code S player who was once a candidate to be THE best Zerg in the world.

Just by those results, we know Reality is at least high Code A, and one might even start to suspect – *gasp* – Code S quality. In a few short months, KeSPA might actually have produced a pro who is favored against a GomTV veteran.

Not so fast there. The King would like a word.

For all his impressive SC2 achievements in recent days, Reality is a player who has never had much individual league success in his long Brood War career. One good run in the ABC Mart MSL saw him reach the Ro16, but other than that, he's been knocked out of the Survivor League (Code A lite) three times and the OSL Ro36 once.

On the other hand, King YuGiOh has only survived to become a symbol of mediocrity because he is also a symbol of consistency and survival. He's also a symbol of 'f*** your predictions,' defeating MKP to qualify for Code S last season, and somehow managing to qualify for the OGN Dual Tournament alongside the best KeSPA players in the world (of course, he dropped out of both tournaments in the first round). Just like players like MC or Mvp, he's someone who simply gets the job done, albeit on a far smaller scale.

Prediction: YuGiOh 2 – 0 Reality