Starcraft 2 GSL 3 Semi Final results and Final match lineup.

Day 1
HongUnPrime.WE [P] 2 v 4 TSL_Rain [T] : TSL_Rain

Day 2
oGsMC [P] 4 v 0 LiquidJinro [T] : oGsMC

• HongUnPrime and TSL_Rain both made a lot of mistakes this set and have been getting a lot of negative criticism.
• The final match up will be Terran vs Protoss. This is the first time a Protoss has had a chance to win a GSL tournament.
• Jinro, the only foreigner, was eliminated this round. He's the only non-korean to ever make it that far and is widely seen as the current best Terran player worldwide. 
• The prize money for this tournament are 100,000,000 KRW ($85,700USD) for the winner, 30,000,000 KRW ($25,700USD) for the runner up, 10,000,000 KRW ($8,600USD) for the two semifinalists, 4,000,000 KRW ($3,400USD) for the quarterfinalists, as well as lesser amounts for the Ro16, Ro32 and Ro64.
   

Sigh. I kinda thought Jinro would lose this round but not 4 and 0. That's disappointing. MC vs Jinro should have been the final match up, Rain isn't anywhere near Jinro in skill. MC will win this GSL for sure.

The finals will be streamed on Dec 18, 2010 2AMPST, 19:00 KST(GMT+9). Time is subject to change, as they often do with the final matches. You can watch the live stream for free at GOMtv.

Starcraft 2 GSL 3 Ro8 results and Semi Final lineup.

Day 1
IMNesTea [Z] 2 vs 3 TSL.Rain [T]
TSL.FruitDealer [Z] 2 vs 3 HongUnPrime.WE [P]

Day 2
MarineKingPrime.WE [T] 1 vs 3 oGsMC [P]
LiquidJinro [T] 3 vs 2 choyafOu [P]

• Previous GSL champions IMNesTea and TSL.Fruitdealer were both eliminated this round.
• There are no Zerg in the Semi Finals.
• TSL.Rain was able to defeat IMNesTea with all in tactics and bunker rushes. 
• oGsMC pulled off a brilliant starport rush in his first match against MarineKingPrime.WE.
• In the last game of Jinro VS choyafOu, choya forgot to research Thermal Lance for his colossi which probably cost him the game.
• Both semi final matches will be TvP.

Semi Final lineup
Dec 09, 2AM PST, 19:00 KST(GMT+9)
TSL.Rain [T] vs HongUnPrime.WE [P]

Dec 10, 2AM PST, 19:00 KST(GMT+9)
oGsMC [P] vs LiquidJinro [T]

Woo! The matches literally just ended. I'm happy Jinro made it to the semi finals. A non Korean making it this far is amazing. It's 5AM here so this is my post for the day, I need to get some sleep.

Oh and as always, you can watch the games live for free at www.gomtv.net. If you've missed any of the matches it only costs 20USD for the season.

Starcraft 2 GSL 3 Ro8 lineup and Ro16 results.

Day 1 
IMNesTea [Z] vs MakaPrime [T] : IMNesTEA 
ST_GgoBooGie [P] vs TSL_Rain [T] : TSL_Rain 
BitByBitPrime.WE [T] vs TSL_FruitDealer [Z] : TSL_FruitDealer 
TheBestfOu [T] vs HongUnPrime.WE [P] : HongUnPrime.WE


Day 2 
MarineKingPrime.WE [T] vs LeenockfOu [Z] : MarineKingPrime.WE 
oGsMC [P] vs ST_July [Z] : oGsMC 
PoltPrime.WE [T] vs LiquidJinro [T] : LiquidJinro 
IMmvp [T] vs choyafOu [P] : choyafOu

• There a balanced racial break down this time: 2 Zerg, 3 Terran and 3 Protoss.

• NesTea and FruitDealer, both previous GSL winners are still in the running.

• MaineKingPrime is GSL 2's semi finalist BoxeR aka FoxeR.

• LiquidJinro is the only non Korean player to ever make it to the round of 8.

Round of 8 will take place on Dec 06, 2010 19:00 KST (GMT+9) and as always, be streamed at gomTV.

IdrA takes first in MLG 2

As most Starcraft fans know, the 2nd SC2 MLG tournament just finished it's final match up of IdrA (zerg) vs SeleCT (Terran). You'd also know that Blizzard applied patch 1.1.2 in the middle of the tournament. The question here is, how much of a difference did it make on the final outcome?

The patch hurt Terran drops a bit. By slowing Medivac speed and buffing the health points of a handful of Zerg buildings, it gives players much more time to react against stimed marauder drops. On top of that, building a barracks now requires a supply depot, which had a sudden impact on many opening Terran builds by delaying how quickly they were able to build a barracks. The most notable one effected would be early Reaper harass/rushes, a common effective early harass option again Zerg players. It wouldn't be a huge deal if on top of it they didn't move Nitro Packs (Reaper speed upgrade) to be researched at the factory, making early reapers a thing of the past.

On the other hand though, the Zerg unit "Roach" got range upgrade from 3 to 4. This makes Hellion and Reaper harass a little easier to deal with, more notably the Hellions. This makes to very popular and strong early harass options against Zerg weaker as well.

So, it would seem that the patch obviously favored Zerg, and would logically lead to pushing the win into IdrA's favor. Or maybe not. IdrA didn't win with mass Roaches, he won with Mutalisks and Zerg/Banelings. Also keep in mind SeleCT is a professional player who doesn't need to rely on early game cheese tactics to take a win. You don't often see early Reaper bunker rushes in tournament play because it's hit or miss, if it fails there's usually no chance to recover your economy. So maybe this patch didn't hand IdrA the win like it would seem. SeleCT himself admits he didn't practice TvZ as much, but who could blame him? There's hardly anyone to play against and it was an "underpowered" and unpopular race in the tournament scene.

Bottom line though, two recent high level tournaments have been won by Zerg players. (fruitdealer winning GSL) Maybe it's time Blizzard stop balancing their games around Bronze League and start looking at top level game play because at Diamond and pro league levels, win rates are (and have been) fairly even. Sure tweaks need to be made, but Zerg don't need a massive buff just because it's hard to time your Inject Larvas.

PS: Nerf marauders.