Hasso Chaddek

 If you regularly check the Blizzard Top 200 on Battle.net, then you'll see names such as:

tQsungpa
tQspeake
tQsadist
tQskullz
tQswarm
tQorGETSLAMT

as well as my brother

tQmagnavox

These are all players who are part of my brother's team "tQ" or "Think Quick" which is made up of some of the best players on the North American server.They have been around since Brood War, but made the transition to SC2, and recently updated their website, with plenty of info about them and what their plans are. They are looking to become a professional team soon, with sponsors to help their members travel to tournaments around the US. The biggest SC2 tournament in the US right now is the MLG in Dallas, but I read that they are trying to start a regular league similar to the GSL soon.

One of the great things about the new Team TQ website is that they have their roster of players and each has a page where they can upload replays of some of their favorite matches. They also have recaps of recent clan wars and news on upcoming events they'll take part in.

TEAM TQ

Korean Starcraft 2

For Christmas I bought my brother the Korean version of Starcraft 2. I had student last semester who also plays Starcraft 2, and he traveled to South Korea over the break to get some dental work done and so he offered to buy a copy for me while there.

If you read this blog, you've probably seen that while I suck at Starcraft 2 and could probably be beaten by Wildebeast playing Zerg on 1 Base vs. me on 3 base as Protoss, my brother Jeremy (or Kuri) is pretty good at the game, and sometimes appears in the Top 200 of North American players (last week he was #108). He'd probably be higher on the ladder, but 10 - 15% of his games were lost because of disconnects, because GTA's idea of high speed DSL, means that there is a 50% chance that you're internet connection won't get snapped if someone picks up the phone.

I wanted to get him the Korean version of the game so he could play on the Korean Ladder, which is considered to be the best ladder our there. For those who don't know although Starcraft 2 is meant to be a global game, you don't really play a pool of players from around the world, but instead you are grouped into regional ladders, such as South East Asia, Taiwan, North America, Europe, South Korea, etc, and you play against those who have a copy of the game from that same region. In order to play people from other areas, you have to buy a copy of that version, and you usually lag like crazy when you play on it.

I have heard plenty of stories about the Korean ladder, and Artosis is always making interesting generalizations about how people are playing on the ladder there and how things are or aren't evolving (primarily about zerg tactics), and so I wanted Kuri to test his might there. Even though the players are supposed to be better, I'm sure that doesn't mean less cheesy, but maybe just as much (if not more cheese)but maybe with better micro?

He hasn't started playing the Korean version yet, mainly because he's trying to fight his way to the top of his Masters League division right now (he's number 11). He also apparently needs a South Korean Social Security number in order to activate the Korean version, and so if anyone out there has a spare SS# to lend to us, we'd really appreciate it!

Gualo

[UPDATE] Unfortunately, my brother did not make it into the Top 200 last week, apparently there was an error when they were calculating the rankings and so he was mistakenly included.

Was on Battle.net yesterday and came across the unbelievable. Each week Blizzard releases a list of the top 200 players for Starcraft 2 for each of their regional servers. Getting on that list is a real honor, even more so since eventually there will be a Grandmaster's League which will be for the top 200 players in each region only. I should note that this list is not based on ladder points alone, and so even the people who have a huge number of points or who are at the top of their division don't necessarily get to the top of the Top 200.

The way of determining who gets to the top of this list is partially hidden, some secret formula that Blizzard uses, but it is clearly not based on pure wins and losses, percentage or points. It comes down to who you win against and who you lose against. If in the course of a week you beat top tier players and don't lose egregiously to players at your level or beneath you, you have a chance at being in the Top 200. It should be noted that the Top 200 is not necessarily the best in the region for all time, but merely in the last week. So even if no one knows who you are, if you have a fantastic week in SC2, you could jump into the Top 200.

So, the unbelievable thing that I saw yesterday was that my brother tQmagnavox had made it into the Top 200 for the past week. Well, gi minagahet, that isn't really ti hongge'on. He's been in the Top 200 before and for the past few months as his score has gone up, he's been Top 100 and Top 200 for points in the North American server. But what was unbelievable was that he didn't just appear in the Top 200, as in crawl his way to number 199 or 190 or something. He leaped, flew, zoomed, I have no idea what the right verb is to use, but he demolished his way to the number 8 spot in the Top 200.

That's right, hunggan magahet enao, you read that right, he was NUMBER EIGHT LAST WEEK.

In addition, Kuri's clan TQ or think quick fighting, had four members in the top 20. A very strong showing for the week.