A few days ago, Polt threw a shadow of a doubt on if this season's Code S seeds were well deserved. This encumbered Naniwa with another burden as the Swede was already fighting the "only Code S foreigner" pressure and his bad history thus far in GomTV tournaments.
Match 1: Naniwa vs Puzzle
Naniwa began the group that would eventually see him graduate to the Ro16 (ah, the hell with spoilers, even my mother knows that by now) with a PvP against Puzzle. Game one on Ohana, however, would point in Korean's direction as Puzzle chose a 1-base approach with prism immortal drop harass as opening in contrast to Nani's 2-gate nexus. Naniwa was unmoved by those shenanigans and quickly shot down the heavy gas investement of the Korean but there was still a colossus transition marching his way. Naniwa survived at the expense of his nexus but could not turn it around into a victory as his blink/observer all-in got checkmated as the observer was spotted and sniped.
Either because of Puzzle's fresh out of the box confidence or because of Naniwa's 0-1 disadvantage, game two on Cloud Kingdom felt like going to the Korean too. Puzzle played around with a blink/observer, bullying Naniwa's immortal expand and after a few rounds of warp-ins he decided to blink aggressively. He ended up in an involuntary trap and saw his stalkers being executed by three immortal, the last one popping just at the time of the blink. Having a supply advantage of approximately a lot, the Swede took the set and entered the final game with reinvigorated strength. There, on the metal fields of Daybreak he taught Puzzle the important lesson of how an army with three colossi beats one with equal number of immortals any time.
Match 2: Mvp vs Ryung
Mvp did not look himself in this series as he lost to Ryung in a very un-Mvp fashion. On Dual Sight, he lost the first real engagement by sloppily leaving three tanks unattended giving Ryung the confidence to execute another attack from the side which arrived while Mvp was trying to bust through the enemy presence north of his natural. Unofortunately, this loss did not wake up the IM terran and game two on Ohana was even more counter-indicative of what we are used to seeing from the many times champion. Mvp let Ryung have his way with his early aggression without so much of an attempt for a logical defense and completed his downfall as his 2-base four factory timing push was dismantled as Ryung waited for stim and held Mvp from the highground, with a complimentary bio drop in the main.
A disappointing series for Mvp, unquestionably, and one that would send him against Puzzle in an outer-rim battle of life, death and Code S elimination.
Winners match: Ryung vs Naniwa
The one-sided series that would make Naniwa punch the air with joy opened on Entombed Valley as Ryung's attempt to ninja a third CC got screwed over by a simple 4-gate aggression. The few units Ryung had were pressed deeper into the main and with time, Naniwa's presence turned into an unbreakable contain. The terran tried some fancy bio elevation that should have been a part of a flank but Naniwa's army count was just silly. The hide-tank-to-mislead-the-rushing-protoss sneakery on Cloud Kingdom ended just as badly for Ryung and for the first time this year a foreigner made it to the Ro16.
Losers match: Puzzle vs Mvp
Whoever played that game against Ryung earlier was now completely gone. Opening on Entombed Valley, Mvp came as strong as we all know him to be, using a swarming style of bio terran coming from his 7-rax opening to drown Puzzle in units. Puzzle looked helpless but there was never a big margin of error for him, anyway. He either had to hit the perfect storms or keep his templars permanently alive. Failing in both meant one game away from elimination.
Mvp impressed us again in the second set on Daybreak, this time not with the perfect macro and control but with daring, almost comical mind games. As he was "explained" on a number of occasions that he will not be allowed to climb the ramp to Puzzle's natural, a trojan--and empty!--medivac flew from the camp of Mvp and baited the protoss army inwards. With the high ground now clear, Mvp made his storm up the hill, found a crack in Puzzle's forcefields and saved his tournament life for the time being.
Final match: Mvp vs Ryung
Theoretically, winning an essential series breathes new life in the winner but as the final match began, Mvp's actions were painting the picture of a Superman dying to his personal cryptonite. Ryung's unthreatening mech passivity somehow made Mvp attack into his lines (inexplainable act, I know), losing a big percent of his bio units. Fortunately for Mvp, Ryung had zero intention of making something happen in this game. The SlayerS terran turtled, took the center and hit maxed supply soon thereafter... and then turtled some more as if he was expecting someone else to do the winning for him. Meanwhile, Mvp took that as an invitation to go sky terran and take the lead with battle cruisers. Neat.
Things were simpler and at the same time more complex on Cloud Kingdom. Both went mech but Ryung chose to accent on hellions and thors and hold back on the tanks, quickly hitting a muscle army that would easily trample any unprepared army. Such an opportunity was never presented to him, however, and as he lost the few tanks he had during an attack at Mvp's third, Ryung tapped out and said goodbye to the Ro16.
Final standings
| Code S Season 2 Ro32 Group G standings | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
  Naniwa | 2-0 | 4-1 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
  Mvp | 2-1 | 4-2 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| Ryung | 1-2 | 2-4 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| Puzzle | 0-2 | 1-4 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Naniwa 2-1 Puzzle Ryung 2-0 Mvp Naniwa 2-0 Ryung Mvp 2-0 Puzzle Mvp 2-0 Ryung | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
