Fruitdealer at IEM New York

Carmac, the man behind the ESL/IEM tours, set up a 2v2 show match among the Koreans invitees for their New York event, (DRG, Killer, Fruitdealer, and TOP). In the pre-game smack talk, Fruitdealer uses his husky deep voice and rather impressive English skills to elegantly voice his thoughts.

GSL- World Championship

With the inability to play cross server on Battle.net, the opportunity to watch regions battle it out have always been a treat. Last weekend in Germany, the IEM World Championships was one of those rare occassions, and we saw the 3 Korean Representatives (ST.Ace, Fox.Moon, and ST.Squirtle) take the top 3 spots respectively with amazing games all around. Also the casting was top notch with Rotterdam (EX-Warcraft 3 pro), TLO, and Day 9 rotating matches, I recommend it to everyone and make sure to check out the VODs.

However, GSL is not going to be outdone, as they just announced a world championship tournament at the end of this month. Everyone has handpicked by their results and by the personal recommendation of Blizzard. The selection is process is interesting, it basically cuts down their nominations to two 8 man teams. One is team Korea All-stars and the other is the World All-stars (4 Europe, 2 Asia, and 2 North America). With these two teams formed, they than actually play a team match (1st team to 8 wins, Winner's league style) alongside an individual tournament in Seoul.

This tournament has potential, with players like MVP, MarineKing, Nestea, and Nada already have been named as the half of the Korean Team while Jinro, Moonglade, and Morrow have been announced as the anchors of the world all-stars team. While the other half of the Korean team will be picked by GSL results, the world team will go through a tough online tournament with these great players fighting each other for last 5 spots.

Europe

Tarson

White-Ra

Dimaga

Mana

Socke

Naama

Sjow

North America

Painuser

Huk

Fenix

TT1

Asia/SEA

RedArchon

Kowi

Revenant

Oxygen

Sen

Nv.Xiaot

Nv.Xigua

With such starpower and big money behind the tournament, expect an exciting event from GOM.

A Protoss vs Terran Clinic by AtN Socke

White-Ra or The IEM (Intel Extreme Masters) European finals were held in the city of Kiev 2 weekends ago. The participants were players who traversed through their own national qualifiers, and while all 10 players are worthy participants, the racial distribution was rather embarrassing. 8 Terrans and 2 Protosses qualified. The two heroes that hail from Aiur are

Socke, a German player who’s creativity has no limits, especially in the Protoss vs Terran Match up. Socke’s style has had the tendency to create epic games, for reference watch (Jinro vs Socke) (Socke vs Drewbie, cast is in German but the game is still sick) (Socke vs Sen).

There are no better two players to represent the Protoss race in a field of Terrans in Europe (Except for Naniwa) However sparring off with Terran players such as:

Sjow- a flawless Terran player from Sweden, has shown incredible tactics and multitasking in his gameplay

Kas- A macro monster terran, has shown his solid play by steamrolling opponents in the 1^st TSL Open Qualifier (Team Liquid StarLeague)

Naama- Winner of Dreamhack Sweden who showed his Tank heavy TvP in that same tourney

The other players like Tarson, Predy, Goody, Demuslim, Sarens are all beasts in their own rights as well.

A game that was played though that I found comforting as a Protoss player was Socke vs Sjow on Xelnaga Cavern. Socke played a beautiful game to say the least, using the Protoss arsenal to its fullest and making Sjow fight on Socke’s terms. Things to watch out for in the VOD

- Sockes Map Control is brilliant, using Void Rays to keep Sjow in his own base while securing his own expansion

- A smooth transition into Collosus play, but once the Terran gets that critical mass of Vikings, changes aptly into other tech. Also Socke’s micro and unit positioning is phenomenal, and all Protoss players should take notes.

- A Dark Templar transition after the 3^rd is secured, creating a constant threat and making the Swedish Terran player waste valuable scans to end the cloaked assassins.

- His High Templar usage on harassing Sjow’s expos late game decimated the Terran’s economy

While Socke’s play is nothing revolutionary, it is just that his execution and decision making are amazing. This was Sjow’s only loss in the tournament before the finals (He played more than 15 games).

Thanks to the Casters of the linked games, Blizshouter , HDHomerj, ExoStarcraft, and Eonshikeno.