In the first day of the now altered GSTL, two teams met once again after their epic series in the last team league final. MVP gazed at SlayerS, craving for revenge!
GSTL July kicked off with one of the most epic face-offs that could possibly exist. Team SlayerS, reigning two-times champions, went against MVP - the underdog team that almost knocked over Emperor's team in last season's finals.
SlayerS_Alicia vs 
MVPNoblesse @ CrossfireSlayers sent their Terran killer first and luckily for them, he was to face Noblesse. Alicia opened with a hiding a gold expo and going for a 2-base immortal push that forced Noblesse to lift his natural. Although in dire straits, Noblesse kept his cool and opted to equalize the economies with a banshee after finding Alicia's hidden gold. But even though he managed to get on equal footing with Alicia, Noblesse got tricked easily when the protoss sent a small Zealot army to harass terran's third. Noblesse pulled the majority of his army to kill the harassing forces and that gave Alicia the opportunity to rally the whole of his main army in the main, kill the production facilities and get a leading start for his team.
SlayerS_Alicia vs 
MVPViolet @ Belshir BeachAfter their young terran hope fell, MVP sent forth Violet, a Zerg that made quite a good run and climbed to Code S right after his Code A debut. But this time, Violet took the decision to go for the risky 1-base roach all-in against Alicia's fast expo build. Unfortunately for the zerg, this play was scouted when the probe saw that there is no expo hatch on the way and when the roaches reached the protoss base, there were already three cannons up, denying almost any damage. Violet tried to transition out of this play by putting down second hatch but Alicia already had stargate up and his void rays and phoenixes nimbly decimated the economy of the zerg.
SlayerS_Alicia vs MVPGuineaPig @ Tal'Darim AltarGuineaPig spawned as protoss and soon the protoss mirror extended into a blink mirror match. Alicia took the liberty of being on the aggressive and that would soon cost him the game as a bad engagement near the center of the map led to the obliteration of his army and a quick gg.
SlayerS_Boxer vs MVPGuineaPig @ Xel'Naga CavernsYes, you read that right. The Emperor himself stepped in the booth after a long absence from the GSTL. Not knowing what race his opponent spawned as, Boxer went for double proxy rax, placed north of the right gold. That position was completely missed by GuineaPig's scouting SCV despite its extensive exploring route. Finally, GuineaPig's scout reached Boxer's base only to find it emptier than it should be but instead of throwing down a bunker for just in case, GuineaPig confidence made him go for a CC on top of his one rax.
As he would find out in few minutes, that was not the right decision for him as Boxer's marine count kept growing and with the double rax behind his back, the Emperor took his team to a 3-1 lead.
SlayerS_Boxer vs MVPDongRaeGu @ CrevasseBoxer attempted the same double proxy rax rush against the terran crusher of MVP DongRaeGu but despite getting some bunkers up, Boxer did not manage to do big amounts of damage and as the zerglings chewed through his push, the Emperor switched to pure mech, running double factory thors and preigniter hellions. Meanwhile, DongRaeGu started amassing mutalisks and keeping the immobile mech army tucked in terran's main.
Knowing that if he stays put for a long time he would gift-wrap the map control and give it to the Zerg, Boxer moved out aiming to crush his opponent with a +2 timing push but his forces were met by a maxed zerg army. As the banelings weakened every single unit and the muta cleaned the field after them, Boxer had to gg out.
SlayerS_Ganzi vs MVPDongRaeGu @ Dual SightContrary to Boxer, Ganzi went for marine/blue flame opening into pure bio/medivac in mid-game and that allowed him to be more aggressive and keep DRG on his toes. Ganzi's pushes kept denying zerg's third and the bio force continued to grow stronger and more fearsome.
DongRaeGu knew that this bio aggression would not allow him to go straight to massing mutas and hence he added banelings and started trading armies, putting the supplies back to even playing field. Ganzi succeeded into denying the third a few more times but as DongRaeGu's army - now with roaches in the mix - neared the perfect unit composition, the Slayers terran could not do much more to win the game. During his last push towards Zerg's third, Ganzi lost all his army and had to gg out, the score now tied 3-3.
SlayerS_MMA vs MVPDongRaeGuKnowing that DRG would have total air control with his mutalisk style, MMA chose to go for a standard marine/tank army with thor support but little did he know that DongRaeGu had other special treats in store for him.
The big move from DRG came as he burrowed four banelings just next to the mineral patches of MMA's third. As MMA finished the SCV transfer, DongRaeGu blew his green landmines to cripple terran's economy gain a huge economy advantage, having already taken his own third.
DongRaeGu continued harassing MMA with his mutas until the MLG champion would have enough of it and pushed towards DRG's natural. However, the zerg army and macro capabilities were too much for him to handle and as he main army fell, the ace of SlayerS had to leave the game. MVP got their revenge from May's GSTL final!
| Team SlayerS 3:4 Team MVP | |||
| Alicia | > | Noblesse | @ Crossfire |
| Alicia | > | Violet | @ Belshir Beach |
| Alicia | < | GuineaPig | @ Tal'Darim Altar |
| Boxer | > | GuineaPig | @ Xel'Naga Caverns |
| Boxer | < | DongRaeGu | @ Crevasse |
| Ganzi | < | DongRaeGu | @ Dual Sight |
| MMA | < | DongRaeGu | @ Xel'Naga Fortress |
