WSVG World Championship 2015- Unofficial Write UP |
Here is the first part of the showdown stage write-up. At this decisive point in the tournament, I've decided to split it up into a write-up for each of the groups, so I can make a more detailed write-up of each series. Bias toward the decisive games, meaning especially ACCM's two games, and adogao-Yellow gets attention in this. Also, I'm trying to use spoilers to break up the walls of text. As always, feedback is welcome.
For the showdown stage, the players themselves had been asked to seed the 16 remaining players into four seeds, which were then distributed across 4 groups. These four groups, with four players each, would then battle out round robin for two spots in the Maldives. In the first group, first seed and favorite TheViper would face Wolfpack player dogao, and the two remaining VNS players Yellow and ACCM for a spot in the Maldives. Many expected the decisive game of this bracket to be the battle for second place between dogao and Yellow.
TheViper - ACCM
However, in the first round, TheViper would go on to face surprising difficulty against ACCM, whose aggressive style proved surprisingly efficient. In the first game, an Aztec mirror on Arabia, the game went into Imperial Age, where superior control of his soldiers, and the well timed use of jaguar warriors against ACCM's eagles provided TheViper with an expected victory. However in the next game of sand maze, ACCM proved to have an additional trick up his sleeve. Seizing control of the water early, ACCM, playing Huns versus TheVipers Mongols, defended against his scout rush with efficient fast walling, and with an aggressive forward ready after merely ten minutes, TheViper was pressured into resigning after 26 minutes, with towers and archery ranges, giving ACCM an unexpected equalizer. In TheVipers home map of Gold Rush, he picked his preferred civ, Britons, against ACCM's Mayans, and in another short intense game, ACCM's forwarding had less luck than earlier, and ended in a victory for TheViper as the VNS player ran out of steam. In the next game of Ghost Lake, a Maya mirror, TheViper was on the offensive and with an efficient Castle Age push, secured a 3-1 lead. In the next game of Duopoly, the characteristically aggressive play from ACCM secured him a quick victory to put the score at 3-2. However, in the final Japanese mirror in desert, TheViper managed to, despite unexpected resistance, finally secure his expected 4-2 victory.
dogao - Yellow
At the same time, the expected key match in the group, the meeting between Yellow and dogao, proved more onesided than expected than one would first expect. Dry Arabia played out as an Aztec mirror, with Yellows aggressive style, somewhat similar to teammate ACCM's didn't come to full fruition. Dogao came off to a better start, and with slightly better micro and macro, pulled a victory home. Yellow, in general an aggressive player prone to both incredible offensive play and sometimes bad mistakes, picked Atacama as a home map, which successfully put dogao under pressure. The early push for the central wood secured Yellow an equalizer, but from that point on, dogao started to pull ahead in the series. Sensing his micro and meta game was stronger, he picked Baltic as a home map, and won the grushing after a short fight, then moving on a game of Hun mirror in Double Arabia. This dragged out somewhat longer, but dogao managed to pull ahead 3-1. With dogaos second home map being the last of the series, he picked a water map again by picking rooster, and once again, Yellow found himself outplayed before the 30 minute mark. With a 4-1 victory, dogao had taken a gigantic step in the direction of the Maldives, a ticket he could most likely secure with a victory against ACCM in the next round.
TheViper - Yellow
First Yellow needed to beat TheViper to have a chance at going to the Maldives, a daunting task which he quickly faced much difficulty in. Despite a lively chat between the players through all the games, they were not quite equal on the playing field, with Yellow making crucial mistakes that one cannot hope to recover from when playing TheViper. TheViper seized the Aztec mirror in Dry Arabia, and even battled Yellow on his feared Atacama home map, with a few mistakes sealing a defeat to Yellow. Ending the series with two games of duopoly and migration, TheViper pulled home a clean 4-0 victory. With only one point from two games, Yellow was soundly defeated, while TheViper had as good as secured his spot in the Maldives – though he would require dogao to beat ACCM to feel completely sure of that.
dogao - ACCM
Dogao – ACCM would then be the decisive game to determine who would follow TheViper to the Maldives. The series opened with a game of Aztec mirror in Dry Arabia, as the tradition was. Here, ACCM managed to surprise dogao with his offensive and aggressive forward base again, but he faced the risk a forward always comes with – if the damage is not done while the surprise effect is sure, eventually, the aggression will lose steam, and as the game got into castle age, dogao turned the game around and pulled ahead, to put the score at 1-0. Then ACCM, picked duopoly, where an Aztec mirror dragged out to 49 minutes, but ended in the favor of ACCM. With the score at 1-1, dogao chose Baltic, and made the ballsy move to sacrifice the water to ACCM in favor of doing a sneak. ACCM didn't pick up that something was off in time, and the sneak had the surprise effect dogao had hoped, letting him harass ACCM, then take back the water and win the game, giving him a 2-1 lead.
What followed was ACCM's second home map, another display of aggression in Atacama. This proved another display of aggression with an Aztec mirror, dragging out to 51 minutes, but with ACCM's aggression securing better early center control, he ended up putting the score at 2-2. With dogao picking another water map, Islands, as his next home map, the expected Viking mirror, in which dogao, with strong micro, pulled the score at 3-2. With dogao later stating to be highly nervous, he moved into a final round – it was worth noting, that ACCM was not completely eliminated with a 4-3 defeat, as he could still pull back by beating Yellow if dogao lost 4-0 to TheViper, so it was essential for dogao to secure his ticket to the Maldives by winning the Japanese mirror in desert. Once again, aggressive play by ACCM tried to secure an early advantage, but dogao managed to stay alive and pull through. Once dogao started pushing, the game went 4-2 in his favor, finalizing the group, and placing the two VNS players in the bottom, and sending dogao and TheViper off to the Maldives.
What followed was ACCM's second home map, another display of aggression in Atacama. This proved another display of aggression with an Aztec mirror, dragging out to 51 minutes, but with ACCM's aggression securing better early center control, he ended up putting the score at 2-2. With dogao picking another water map, Islands, as his next home map, the expected Viking mirror, in which dogao, with strong micro, pulled the score at 3-2. With dogao later stating to be highly nervous, he moved into a final round – it was worth noting, that ACCM was not completely eliminated with a 4-3 defeat, as he could still pull back by beating Yellow if dogao lost 4-0 to TheViper, so it was essential for dogao to secure his ticket to the Maldives by winning the Japanese mirror in desert. Once again, aggressive play by ACCM tried to secure an early advantage, but dogao managed to stay alive and pull through. Once dogao started pushing, the game went 4-2 in his favor, finalizing the group, and placing the two VNS players in the bottom, and sending dogao and TheViper off to the Maldives.
Final games (this one is quite short, as they were not important for the score)
That meant the final games were just for show: Four close games between TheViper and dogao ended up in TheViper's favor, ending with the 4-0 victory that did not quite tell the full story. But with only two losses against him, TheViper was ready to defend the AoC crown he had possessed for years, while dogao was the first Wolfpack to make it through to the Maldives. The final game between ACCM and Yellow was not played.