SC2SEA.com - Starcraft 2 SEA eSports Community Site

Hi everyone!

I thought I would share my first ever LAN experience for those who were either weren't there or have never been to a LAN before!

I didn’t have the greatest start to my day. After looking up the brackets and seeing that I had a PvT first (the matchup that I currently cannot win) I felt that I would be happy if I could win 1 lower bracket match. This was my aim for the day!

After missing my train due to locking myself out of my house (I had to scale the drain pipe to get back in) I arrived at Arena around 9:30 to see about 8-9 people there already, mostly all were watching Iaguz and Tgun laddering. I decided to grab a seat and watch Tgun for a bit, too see how he played. Needless to say he plays about 4-5 times faster than me and watching him random on SEA against Mafia and then cannon rush the hatch first was pretty amusing.

One of the major factors I had overlooked would be that my mouse settings would be different on another computer. As soon as I logged on to Battlenet I had a real shock to the system, my mouse was completely screwed and at a completely random sensitivity. I had thought that since I had made profiles on my Logitech g9x that settings wouldn’t be a problem as they are stored on the mouse, I was wrong. This proved to be my greatest obstacle over the course of the day and turned my favorite matchup, PvP into a nightmare.

My first match went as I expected. I was 2-0’d by solid bio plays and was sent down to the lower bracket. I did actually learn a lot from those 2 games that allowed me to figure out a basic plan for later (I was basically taking my 3rd too late and needed more AoE). I was now in the lower bracket and this is where my fun began! I am very confident in my PvZ apart from when I play PiG on ladder -.- I rarely lose this matchup unless I do something stupid. And stupid I did! My first game on Taldarim Altar I tried to Nexus first and nervously attempted to wall off, leaving a gap and generally screwing up completely. My opponent smartly abused this and roach busted me. Thanks for letting zergs realize they can do that Leenock ^^. My next two games went well after I decided to simply 3gate expand on every map and then counter what I scouted with hallucinate.

My next matchup was a PvP and after laddering a bit and seeing how grossly OP phoenix were I decided that I was going to go Pheonix in at least one of my games. I am a big fan of the 4gate as I love small micro battles, so this was my go to build. What I didn’t realize was how different this would be with weird mouse settings and what a difference it made to my build. My first game I attempted to 4gate and got stomped. I lost my probe to a zealot and found myself supply capped at 26/26 as my gates opened while he warped units into my base /facepalm. The next game I attempted to fake out my opponent and added a second gas merely to make my base look pretty as I busted up his ramp with a 4gate while he only had 2-3 stalkers. The last game was a shocker. I went 3gate Pheonix and my opponent went 3gate robo. After scouting this I thought I would win easily with 4 pheonix and attempted to bust up his ramp, failing hard at micro and getting stomped because of it.

I then was stuck on 1 base attempting to push out while my opponent expanded and FF’d my ramp endlessly, I was running out of minerals and seriously thought I had lost. So I decided to allin with everything I had including my probes. This proved to be too much for my opponent as I was left with a much stronger army after the initial engagement, probes op!

My next game was against another Zerg who loved his roaches. Unfortunately for him I love my Robo/FF’s and was able to take the series 2-1. He was probably a little surprised as I 3gate expanded on both Antiga and Taldarim but I didn’t really trust a FFE after watching Naniwa vs Leenock and my first PvZ of the day.

Next up was my worst nightmare… A Terran! Although I have never QQ’d about this matchup, I’ve never really understood how to consistently win it. My first game I decided to play it like I did in season 1 with a 3gate expand into fast colossus while adding in a warp prism. This warp prism turned out to be pivotal, as whenever he moved out I would simply drop his main keeping him in his base as I took a 3rd and got my colossus out. I feel this harass won the game, as it allowed me to keep up with his own drops and give him something else to think about instead of blanket EMP’s and hitting T. The second game was pretty brutal. I 3gate expanded, he 2 rax expanded. Expecting a heavy bio play I sent my first observer to his base. As soon as it got there a cloaked banshee entered my mineral line and had a great time -.- This took me completely by surprise and I mistakenly took my observer in his base back to my natural while I chronoed out another one for my main. Because of this I didn’t scout that he was going 4port banshee with marauders and got thoroughly stomped at the next engagement! The last game was pretty interesting (for me) after scouting that my opponent skipped his first marine and threw down a tech lab I was pretty confident he was going for a 1rax marauder expand. I remembered an interview with MC where he said that this build was an easy win for Protoss as all you had to do was 4gate and push him after he had placed his orbital down and have a 50/50 ratio of zealots to stalkers. I decided to test this out and 4gated. I managed to snipe 3-4 SCV’s with my stalkers before the engagement happened and I felt very confident moving in. MC was pretty spot on! I simply had too much stuff and hit my opponent just as his additional 3rax were finishing. I had done what I thought was unthinkable for me and actually won a PvT!

My next round was another PvP, but this time I was basically shut down and crushed as I tried to 4gate each game unsuccessfully and got 2-0. The worst part of this for me was that I wasn’t hitting the same timings that I do on ladder and my micro was so abysmal that I probably should have chosen a different build.

Overall I was extremely happy with my days games as I had won 3 more than I had expected, although I never played any of the big names like I had hoped I was content with my effort and happy with the fact that I felt I improved each match. All that was left to do was watch the remaining games! This proved to be the most entertaining part of my day as during most of my games I found myself looking at Tguns screen anyway as it seemed much more interesting than my own ^^. From my personal view the best games of the day were tied between Bielsko vs iaguz and the first series of iaguz vs Tgun. Watching Bielsko’s funky PvT style had me intrigued as from watching his build order on the first game I thought he was going to get rolled. But quite the opposite happened! Anyone who watched the series knows what happened and anyone who didn’t I would highly recommend you go watch it. The first Tgun vs iaguz series was my favorite because both players were fresh and I had never really seen Infestor/ling used much in ZvT as I had only ever seen the ling/bane/muta style that the Koreans love to play. Tgun vs PiG was also great fun to watch, with Tguns come from behind in game 1 to PiG’s smart decision to base trade in game 2 instead of engaging Tguns gazillion broodlords+queens combo. This series really showcased how smart Razer are, they actually design their mice to break so that you can easily put them back together again. I discovered this as during one of my games I heard a very loud FUCKKKKKKKKKK screamed, the sound of something slamming with a subsequent mouse bit landing on my keyboard. Apparently the guy sitting next to me, Tgun had lost a game. I then handed him the part of his mouse and watched as he snapped it back in place. Pro design!

Overall I had a great time at this tournament and would highly recommend if there is a lan event near you, to attend. Its well worth it even if you aren’t playing as you still get to watch the games live and actually talk to people about their builds. I would like to thank frequency for running a very smooth event along with the Arena Internet Cafe for hosting.

For reading my insanely long wall of text I do actually have something slightly amusing that was taken on a trip through Rundle Mall to the Casino.



Forgive my English and sentence structure its 2am ^^