I decided that it was time for a break, from schoolwork and from Warcraft. There has been way to much Warcraft content cluttering the site lately and it was time to bring a report on a real classic game. Don't get me wrong, Warcraft III is great. But it can be difficult sometimes, especially when your connection with Starcraft wasn't even that good to begin with.

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The players:Mr.X as [o]Mr.X and Grrr as GoSexySu
The Map:Lost Temple

	Race	Color	Location
Mr.X	Zerg	blue	3:00
Grrr	Protoss	Purple	9:00

Replay

In the Beginning

Mr.X started things off with a Spawning Pool. He put it in a good out of they way spot, and when he morphed his eighth Drone into an Overlord I knew his opening strategy; to play solid and sound. Doubtless Mr.X was fully aware of how dangerous his opponent was, especially in these match ups. So his strategy was to just get his economy going, no funny business with Mr.Grrr, at least not yet. What impressed me most about X's play was that it was surprisingly, well, simple. No time was wasted on half-baked strategies. He started out with a plan and stuck to it. The overall impression is one of efficiency and of understanding. If there is anything like a koan in Starcraft, I would say Mr.X is at one with it.

The scouting Overlord, immediately dispatched by his Zerg Master upon arrival, floated over the vacant northern plateau. Shortly thereafter two Drones raced down the ramp. The first, waited in the valley below, later it would morph itself into a Hatchery. The second continued on, intent on finding its Protoss adversary. The scout Drone looked to the south, but in vain. Meanwhile a Probe showed up, spotted the Hatchery and got to work. Mr.X disregarded the meddlesome little Probe which was now attacking his morphing structure and routed a pair of Overlords along with the scouting Drone to the final starting location. Grrr, deciding that there were more useful endeavors to be sought for his Probe, stopped halted its melee, and had it scout Mr.X's main. There it engaged in another melee, that with the Drones busily mining there. A cat and mouse game then ensued with the Probe backing away as Drones stopped mining to intercept. There followed the usual Drone on Probe relations, with X finally pulling a Drone off mining to harass the Probe in turn. This led to the death of the Drone, and a very badly damaged Probe. This Probe was sent back by Grrr, and its last bit of information obtained, that of six ravenous little Zerglings, newly created. The Zerg recon finally reached the enemy base which was progressing rapidly. Grrr had his two Gateways close to his ramp, but his third building was a bit farther away. An important little nuance really, should his Zerg opponent not come all the way in, he might not notice the Cybernetics Core. Actually an Overlord did notice something. Upon seeing a lone Pylon between the Assimilator and mineral line, X made a special effort to make a full sweep. This revealed the cleverly placed Cy Core but cost the Overlord its life at the hands of a Dragoon. Shortly thereafter, an Extractor was created in the Zerg's main. All remaining Zerg made a U-turn, this included the six Zerglings, which settled in some trees just beyond the Protoss quarter of the map.

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Once Grrr cleansed his base of prying eyes, he immediately set about creating a Citadel of Adun and a Stargate. X also continued with his plan and excepting the sextuplet of Zerglings, all of his efforts had been put into spawning Drones and the Overlords providing for their control. Despite this, Grrr was ahead in terms of mining units as well as beginning to amass a potent attack force. So with his first Hatchery formed and ready to support the Sunken Colonies that would defend both of his mining operations, he created a third Hatchery at his natural. It was very clear that the Zerg player would be tested to his utmost. Not only would he be on the defensive end of the first major battle, but he had to do it less an Overlord. On top of that Grrr was planning the nasty, if expected, surprises of Corsair's and Dark Templar. Still, Mr. X dealt with it all remarkably well. Grrr prefaced his assault with a pair of Corsair air superiority fighters. That is superior to all Zerg Overlords who happen to be in their gun sights. Mr.X had begun the Hydralisk Den necessary to ward off the new threat, but had yet to complete its morph before the first contact between neutron flare and Overlord. X's situation was indeed critical. So much so in fact, that he could only move the Overlords away, and not disperse them, so as to lessen the splash damage. All of his effort was in fact placed on the larvae, in preparation for creating the much needed Hydras. In fact it was a very narrow window between getting Hydras, and having to wait for more Overlords to be created, which X had on the way just in case. As the last larvae had begun its strange warp into pulsating egg, Mr.X's supply counter went red. Several more Overlords burst apart.

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In the meantime, Grrr busied himself with a growing force of Zealots. He rallied them to a point outside of the first Hatchery, while X quelled the Corsairs. One of Mr.x's Overlords spotted the mounting legion, and he directed two Drones into creep colonies. The force was so powerful in fact, that it appeared it could be able to overtake the Zerg defenses, which consisted primarily of Hydralisks, and Sunken Colonies. However, by using his Drones as a shield for these ranged defenders, X was able to render the Protoss attack completely ineffective, and forced their retreat with very few blows being traded. I would like to add that the timing of this maneuver was especially pleasing to witness, considering that X also had just finished dealing with an aerial attack makes it even more impressive. Mr.X casually switched from resourcing/defense to the attack. With his now four (another in the main) Hatcheries he was able to mass an even greater force than the Protoss in just a few seconds time. Grr had to give even more ground to the burgeoning Zerg Swarm as X had also upgraded his Overlords speed. Without having to worry about possible Corsair sneak attacks, he could just send the susceptible Overlords with his attack force. Grr used the time gained in the retreat to rally more forces, and get cannons online to help defend the Nexus he had warping in at his natural He also snuck a Dark Templar past the Zerg while they were closing the distance. The Dt headed south and hugged the cliff wall. Probably Grr figured X was using the push as a cover for an expansion, just as he had only moments before, and wanted to get the Dt down there to confirm and deal with this possibility. He was correct, but unfortunately for Grrr, the morphing drone he was looking for had gone north and not south. The Zerg shadowed the Templar and soon both parties were aware of each others intents. Unable to flank the massive horde of troops blocking his way north, the Dt contented himself with scouting the southern resource nodes. Remembering the Corsair he had doing flybys in the Zerg main, Grr redirected the pilot over the northern expanse of the map to check for Hatcheries, wherein the pilot caught sight of tell-tale purple creep.

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Grrr was upgrading armor by now, as well as Storm. A little latter, X had two evolution chambers up and going. Grrr also had several High Templar on the map and collecting energy, while X was researching the Lurker aspect. Grrr anticipated this and prepared for it by placing two cannons at either side of his naturals Assimilator. Should any Lurkers or Hydralisks or both decide to present themselves here, the Protoss expansion would be well prepared. Still ten minutes in, and with the exception of Grrr's corsair rush, no major offensive had been waged by either side. Not from a lack of trying however, as both sides always probed for weaknesses.

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Grrr left his Dark Templar in the southern main long enough for things to cool down and then sent him to the Zerg choke to see if X had relaxed his Overlord coverage. X's three Overlords and two Sunkens kept him from invading, however. All this time Grr has steadfastly refused to build a Robotics Facility. Just when X burrowed his first two Lurkers at Grrr's mineral only, Grrr warped in three more Gateways. Maybe he was planning on using just High Templar to deal with the Lurks, or maybe he thought it was risky to build down the third advanced tech route before shoring up his defense, but one thing was for sure, as long as Grrr had no observers, X would control the map. X had his third expansion, in 12 o'clock's natural, up and running with an Overlord watching a Sunken Colony being morphed. Needless to say, the six Drones mining minerals there were very surprised when they started getting ripped apart at the hands of Grrr's scouting Dark Templar. The brave warrior was able to fell seven of the hapless creatures before being gruesomely impaled on a subterranean tentacle. After the now active Sunken Colony had taken its revenge, it began picking its teeth with a warp blade. Mr.X decided to liven things up and as Grrr anticipated, started ferrying Lurkers onto the ledge overlooking the Protoss expansion. Mr. X tried very hard to make this work for a long time, but ultimately the assault was about as offensive as flies are to an elephant arse. Zerg units are made to be killed however, and those Lurkers attracted a lot of storms that might otherwise have been put to better use. During all of this, a Zealot ran out into the nest of Lurkers burrowed just beyond Cannon range. After confirming that their Subterranean Spines were still in good working order, the shieldless Zealot rejoined his army in the Natural.

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Grrr soon realized that without Observers, he was getting nowhere fast all the while Mr.X was content to just contain Grrr and expand all over the map. X could have probably even pulled off a devastating drop on Grrr's main, with just his reserve forces. If Grrr pulled his High Templar away from his expansion to deal with the drop, then the way would be opened for the Lurkers. So probably he would have to leave a few there to defend and try to cast some very accurate storms on the drop force. Of course all of this is very easy to see in the replay, and much harder to see during the game. Grrr had also sent a Probe south, presumably to expand there. I don't know how he made it through the containment, to bad he didn't make it passed the Zergling that X had stationed there. X continued with his high ground harassment, and Grrr made three more Gateways, bringing his total to eight, and leaving the place looking like ancient Egypt. Grrr also added two potent Archons to his force. X had been hugging the minerals pretty tight until now, but then the coffers swelled to a thousand and more. I guess that's forgivable when you have um, oh well lessee here, five bases. Grr had added another forge, and had two Observers on the way as well. X had been continuing his campaign to dominate the overlook ledge, and Grrr continued his campaign of letting off brutally accurate storms. And then Grrr began his breakout with a stumble. Just as he was heading out the door with an Observer leading the way a little band of Hydra's decided to get froggy and blew the detector up! Grrr put on the brakes and started ordering troops back but word hadn't reached all the way back to the rear yet and the forward momentum was pushing those in front into the line of unreturnable fire. Luckily a High Templar was there to let off a salvo of Storms. This had helped to stem the flow of enemy forces on the detectionless force of the Protoss.