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Introduction

For the second game of the SC.org invitational 2v2 Finals between Team SG ([B_Blade]Leader and SSamJang) and Team X’Ds (Crow, Roqu) the map choice was given to Team X’Ds as the lower seeded team. Team X’Ds chose Dire Straits as their battlefield:

Crow chose brown zerg and started in the upper left. Roqu chose aqua protoss and warped in at the lower left. SSam chose blue protoss in the upper right and Blade picked white protoss in the lower right. Crow opened his game with a quick gas build, getting a lair and spire in as short a time as possible, then dropping a second hatchery for more efficient muta production. Roqu SSam and Blade all had similar builds, placing buildings within seconds of each other for the first few minutes of the game. All the protoss players went quick gas, then a single gateway and core and immediately a stargate. Blade was the only one with a slight quirk to his build, placing his structures behind his minerals. The protoss players differed at this point, both SG team players putting down a forge and several cannons, while Roqu went with a second stargate. Whenever Crow created an overlord he sent it to the protection of Roqu’s base, not wanting to have to spend money and drones on spore colonies during the early part of the game.

Excuse me, did you call me “White Devil”?

The first in what would be long series of air to air battles occurred when Roqu probes SSam’s defenses with his first two corsair. He quickly turned back when cannons began attacking his troops, leaving a single defending corsair in safety. SSam took advantage of this to kill an overlord on it’s way from Crow’s base to Roqu’s. Roqu sortied his corsairs against SSam’s and drives it off, while Blade sent in his own to reinforce. Crow engaged with his scourge along with Roqu’s corsair and freed his base from the enemy air presence.

All the players indulge in a few moments of peace as they evaluated what sort of game their opponent’s were playing. Crow finally began to place spore colonies around his base, not willing to tie down Roqu’s forces in an escort role for the overlords moving to his partner’s base. Both the Team SG members kept their one gateway busy producing dragoons, and finished a second stargate. Roqu follows much the same path, keeping both of his stargates humming and producing the occasional dragoon. By the time the action heats up again, all three protoss players have around six corsair. Roqu kept testing the defenses of the opposing team, and makes sure they didn’t expand, but the dragoons and shield batteries of his opponents prevented a decisive engagement on enemy territory. Crow had around eight mutas that he began to skirmish with, but the number of corsair that oppose him have reached the point where mutas just wouldn’t be effective without cloned scourge to cut down the enemy numbers.

The Air War over Dire…

Team SG both tried to engage the zerg forces in the air singly, but Crow knew better than to stand and fight. He first lured Blade into his spores, giving Roqu a chance to engage Blade, then does the same trick a second time to SSam, this time over open ground. SSam chose to run rather than stand and fight and lured two of Roqu’s corsair over a waiting line of dragoons at his base where they were quickly dispatched.

The next air battle proved to be the critical one. Team SG coordinated an attack on the combined air forces of Team X’Ds over the center island. The effect of having two sets of corsair over a set of corsair and set of mutas was easily seen. Roqu lost over half of his corsair while Crow left with most of his mutas heavily damaged. Team SG sustained little more than shield damage. This left Team SG with enough of an advantage that they flew their corsairs directly through Crow’s base, ignoring the damage they took from the spore colonies, and killed two overlords and the rest of the mutalisks, losing only two corsair. Roqu took all the corsair he had left and manages to intercept SSam’s corsair force over the top island on his way out. The splash damage is such a large factor in this battle that SSam’s ten corsair easily handle Roqu’s seven with only one loss on their part. Only two aqua corsairs live to run away. With this sequence of events Team SG has firmly established their superiority in the air.

The battle moves to the ground

With the loss of the air battle Roqu decides to expand to the middle left island to try and regain some momentum. Blade and SSam both put down fleet beacons. SSam expands to the middle right island, the center right island top half and the center left island within the span of a minute. Blade expands to the center right island bottom half to share the island with SSam. Within seconds of Blade occupying the island Roqu drops a reaver and two zealots on the island, forcing the cancellation of the nexus. SSam applies the same technique to Roqu that he applied to Crow a few minutes earlier, charging his corsair across Roqu’s base and eliminating the enemy corsair fresh from the stargates while ignoring cannon fire. Crow expanded to the top middle island. Blade finally drops two dragoons, a reaver, and two zealots on the center right island and eliminates the threat from Roqu’s ground forces.

A few seconds later Blade drops the same force, accompanied by two zealots and dragoons from SSam on the top middle island and forced Crow to cancel his expansion attempt. The massive air cover prevented any chance of reinforcement, and the zergling defenders didn’t stand a chance. With this taken care of, Blade finally got his expansion in the center right island started up again. Sensing an opportunity to deal with Crow, Blade dropped his assault package of two zealots, two dragoons, and a reaver on Crow’s main. A sunken and spore colony went down, as well as a control group of zerglings before Team X’Ds realized the trouble they were in. Roqu dropped three dragoons and two zealots to help combat the ground threat, and managed his troops to destroy all the enemy troops without casualties…because Blade’s troops were concentrating on destroying the zerg spire. The spire fell just seconds before the last zealot went down. All three protoss mains were mined out at this point.

Roqu and Crow both expanded to the bottom center island at the same time, hoping to ensure safety with a mutual defense. This effort was quickly spotted by SSam who used his control group of corsair to destroy the four corsair Roqu had defending up with little effort. While SSam engaged in enforcing air superiority before the defending cannons could warp in, Blade had researched disruption web to make ground defenses obsolete. He made a swinging pass through the zerg main, webbing all three spore colonies as he went, and nailed two overlords as a bonus. One escaping overlord managed to drop four zerglings on the center top island, only to find a protoss expansion from Blade was starting there. The eight defending probes caught each zergling as it came out of the overlord and killed all of them while losing only three of their number.

End Game

The economy of three expansions was kicking in for SSam as he started serious carrier production. His stargate count was increased from three to six as he started to macro his advantage. The end was coming closer. Team SG massed their air power for a final assault on Team X’Ds. SSam led off with his carriers on an assault on the center bottom island. Roqu had followed the carrier path himself and defended with six carriers to SSam’s four. The cannons made it seem like a sure victory for the defenders until Team SG deployed over twenty four corsair into the field of battle. The cannons were webbed and the X’Ds carriers fled to Roqu’s main, where they were pursued and eventually eliminated by the corsair. The SG carriers stayed over the expansion and slowly leveled it. Everyone exchanged good games. Everyone except Crow that is.

With the fighting spirit that made him a contender for the 2v2 championship in the first place, Crow decides to go down swinging. A sixteen zergling drop on the center left island provides only a second of hope before the defending cannons and probes finish it, but it did showcase the drive to win that Crow has.

This game leaves the series tied at 1-1. The third and final game will determine which team goes home with $5k USD. Congratulations to both teams on a hard fought game, and to Team SG for their precisely executed air war. I hope you enjoyed this report.

Mark4