When I began that last article I promised myself that I would not do two clan-wars back to back, because people would start expecting me to do every single one of them, which would get more than a little stressful on days when they do three clanwars consecutively. But this one I just couldn’t dodge because it contains two of my favorite teams. Mouz, featuring my favorite undead player of all time, Happy, and Serious, the little team that could (incidently, Zubie is another one of my favorite players. But not so much because of his skill as because of his kitten-like personality).

I just realized that I forgot to write out the maps in the previous installment. This time the map will be abbreviated at the start of every game description.

So let’s get it on with an analysis of the matchups! Seriously... no, wait... I need a synonym or the serious-jokes will get old quickly...
Frankly, srs couldn’t have gotten worse matchups had they bribed an wc3l admin to get it. Just look at it...

ToD [2-1] RotterdaM

In the qualifier RoTi showed some fresh thinking concerning the Orc vs Hu matchup when he beat Colorful’s Ace, but ToD is a few figures larger than him.

Game 1 (LT): The unwashed masses are undecided on who holds the biggest advantage on this much hated map. Some argue (still!) that the ability to fast expand on this map makes it a HU map, but by now we all know that HU can fast expand on all maps regardless of the surrounding circumstances. Orc, however, benefits from large maps with healing fountains. The distances makes it easier to stop tower pushes and allows for heavy creeping, and, I don’t need to go into the healing percentage mechanics of the game. This game adds strenght to the second standpoint.

First of all Rotterdam manages to stop ToD’s expansion attempt using a forward voodoo lounge, and then he displays some impressive micro inside the lost temple, making few to no mistakes and picks of units left and right (though mostly on the right). I’m somewhat sceptical to rotterdams style of using the tc. It really needs time to power creep, and such time is not given when fighting against human. This time, however, it works out alright. Shockwaves rip through casters and footmen, bringing the first win.

Game 2 (TR): What I said about the TC gets pretty much proven on this, the second map of the series. Close spawn to a human is unfortunate for Rotterdam who is forced to fight hard for his survival even early on as ToD masses up on footies. A micro mistake loses him a grunt, and such a small thing tips the scales too far. RoTi’s strategy doesn’t even have time to get rolling. A lvl 1 TC has nothing to add to the orc army as ToD stomps into RoTi’s base with casters and a BM.

Game 3 (EI): I think we all expected this result when we first saw the matchups, but I didn’t expect Rotterdam to fight back as hard as he actually did. This last game on Echo gets pretty exciting actually, as we get to see the Rotterdam Strategy in action. Yes, it’s been done before, but at the moment Rotterdam holds the copyright on using Shamans vs human. He should consider experimenting with different heroes though...

It actually looks very well for him early game. He steals kills on a few creeps and WEs, and he even manages to gank the BM just after it comes out. ToD isn’t without an analytical mind however. No walkers means no AoE-dispel which means sorceresses will have free reign, so he starts out getting a large number of them (vs walkers more priests are better since heal can’t be dispelled). Still, RoTi hangs in there, dispelling summons, killing off weak units, but in the end it’s not enough. His TC seems to be the weak link, being in the way a lot without actually doing too much damage with shockwave (it’s healed up again too quickly).

If RoTi is reading this I’d suggest he cast LS on that fat TC and moving into the caster back line where he can deal a ton of damage. That’s just my analysis anyways, there’s probably a downside... Uh, right, back to the game! Once those sorceresses come out Rotterdam’s dps goes down the toilet, and his army slowly crumbles under the weight of entrophy (not that casters deal chaos damage, but...). Once the BM reaches lvl 3 it’s all over. The Shamans can no longer beat back the summons effectively and RoTi calls GG.

"Oh, what a lovely view! I hope those violent types don't come over here..." 

SaSe [2-0] SonKiE

My first statement about the worst matchups ever might seem strange considering how most consider the HU vs NE-matchup to be fairly even (and Sase to be crap), but one has to remember that it’s ”En masse Sase” we’re talking about. A tower rush might be the right medicine against bear-techers, but Sase is known for his tier 1/tier 2-strategies.

Game 1 (TS): Pff, everyone seems to think they are Moon these days. Sase starts out with a Warden for this map that is coming closer and closer to being accoladed ”The Warden Map” (NEs often use Warden against UD to great effect on this map). Playing it a little differently from yesterdays game between Soju and DeMuslim, Sase goes for Blink rather than FoK as a second skill. Perhaps because of this he doesn’t manage to take down Sonkie’s expansion. However, it does save him later on when Sonkie’s MK comes out by Blink-dodging bolts. Sonkie picks up a zeppelin to help him in harassing Sase’s building expansion, but Sase has had the sights and prepared for this. As soon as the zep’ arrivers a hippo arrives as well, chasing it off.

Game 2 (EI): Sase seems to have developed a take-no-crap attitude considering his playstyle of choice on Sonkie’s chosen map, Echo Isles. Sase knows full well that he intends to fast expand and prepares to counter it mercilessly, denying us poor viewers an entertaining match! Bastard... Anyways, Sase starts out with a DR and archers, creeping up a good horde of skellies whom he promptly sends off to harass Sonkie’s expansion attempt. They don’t stop the expansion, but slow it down a bit. As is both common and most likely smartest, Sonkie places priority on getting towers up at his expansion, neglecting his main somewhat. So, when Sase comes marching in with a batallion of lvl 2 dark minions there is little to stop them. In the face of this overwhelming wave of bone he gives.

"Nah, it's Day of the Dead mate..."

Happy [2-1] Neytpoh

Neutron is a realist. If he’s faced with overwhelming odds he does what he can to even them out. In the case of the NE vs UD-matchup he is known to switch over to Orc if possible. However, Happy is known to do well even against the best of orcs (took a map off of Grubby last playday for example).

Game 1 (SV): Haha! I was right! Neutron goes with the flow, switching to orc against Happy. He doesn’t really get much out of it though. Happy shows what experience means, dusting Neutron’s BM at just the right times to avoid creep steals and displays great priority knowledge in battles. As soon as Neutron’s expo goes up Happy is all over it. The game never gets very exciting.

Game 2 (GW): Neutron seems intent on staying in the game and picks GW as his second map. It shouldn’t be too hard to figure out what he’s planning to do. Yeah, that’s right! Hit n run + mass expands! He favors raiders however, rather than mass wyverns. Oh well, it works out the same in the end, unless something goes awry. The gods of fate gives Happy a small favor in letting the middle fountain be mana rather than health, but faced with this, the most annoying strategy ever, that’s small comfort. I won’t relay all of the boring details of this game of running back and forth; let’s skip ahead to the big finish! After getting tired of bat harassing Happy, Neutron masses up on wyvern, brings a few tauren out and goes in for the kill, something he achieves without much trouble, bringing on a game three (and a fairly pissed off Happy I can imagine).

Game 3 (TM): You don’t want to make Happy angry... Not only will he beat you up, he will laugh at you as he’s doing it. At least that’s what this deciding game felt like. The game starts standard with DK/fiends from Happy and BM/Grunts from Neutron. Happy heads off creeping while Neutron puts down an expansion. At this point I was thinking ”No worries, he’ll be scouting that soon and pushing at tier 2 to stop it”. He didn’t, he just kept on creeping. After the expansion has been up for a while Neutron asks himself ”what is better than one expansion? Two, right?” and puts down another. While the gold is drizzling in he harasses Happy’s base. Happy doesn’t seem to be that bothered with it and continues creeping, porting in once it starts to get too annoying. Eventually he has crept his way around to the expansion spot of Neutron and starts taking it down. Not surprisingly Neutron comes in to defend it with a huge 80 food army against Happy’s ca 50. And so it happens. Happy absolutely destroys Neutron, cutting his army to pieces, down to the more manageable size of 55 food at which point Neutron ports out. Neither his team-mates nor I can believe it. What happened there exactly? Well, high level undead heroes happened pretty much. After that the attacks on Happy’s base becomes shabbier and shabbier. Each run he loses a few units before getting away, and soon his second expansion is taken down. By this time he has massed up to 80+ supplies of wyvern, and once again I think the game is over. Happy quickly dispatches those seemingly helpless creatures, together with the blademaster, ending this game of impressive micro and cool. Wow, this is why Happy is my favorite player ^^

Fly100 [2-0] DowaQ

DowaQ is good, surprisingly good, but he’s no Lucifer. And if Lucifer can’t handle Fly’s style I doubt my countryman can.
One might question the decision to put an undead player on GW, where he is more or less guaranteed to face the household orc player, but... no, I can see no reason whatsoever. WHY DID YOU PUT YOUR UNDEAD ON GW, SERIOUSLY?

Game 1: DowaQ is by no means a bad player, but he seems to suffer from the same problem that many an undead does; he gets caught up in his own theorycrafting. Throughout the game he shows off one nice move after another, from stealing creeps to scouting Fly’s expansion using an invisible DK and cancling it using only the DK and 2 skellies. However, hubris sets in as he attacks the orc base to take out burrows. He loses too much of his army. Generally speaking this doesn’t have to be a problem, but in this instance the orc was the only winner. After the attack on his base, Fly had much wood and gold in the bank so he could rebuild all his lost burrows simultaneously, meaing he lost very little unit production time, whereas he gained quite some xp killing of DowaQ’s destroyers and ghouls. Fly uses this level advantage to wittle away at DowaQ’s forces until he is forced to conceed the match after a last desperate battle at Fly’s base.

Game 2 (EI): The second game looks good for a while as DowaQ is able to creepjack Fly at the merc camp and gank 2 grunts. He overstays is welcome however, trying to kill the second grunt without using his second coil and is forced to tp when the SH pops and starts hexin’. I think Fly noticed how reckless DowaQ is, and prepares to take advantage of it, teching to tier 3 and grabbing an orb for his BM. As DowaQ moves around the map his statues trail behind him, something Fly is quick to take advantage of, ensnaring them and using his windwalking BM to reduce them to rubble. After doing this trick twice the entire advantage of DowaQ is lost. DowaQ accidently coils a ghoul instead of the enemy BM in a battle at the orc base, losing the chance to end the game right there. Instead he loses a close battle and is forced to flee. At this point DowaQ starts to produce destroyers in an attempt to counter... something or other, I’m not too sure what he means to do with them at this point, especially considering the BM is able to take on an entire armada of them if he needs to. In a small skirmish (both armies are reduced to early game size after the last battle) DowaQ loses his lich and gives in, perhaps a little early.

ToD, SaSe [1-2] Neytpoh , Tama

The 2s... I dunno actually. I’ve never seen ToD and Sase play together, so this could end up being a complete disaster or the start of the most successful 2v2-team ever. There’s no way to be sure...

Game 1 (AV): It just might be the disaster one. Srs seems bent from the start on harassing, which they do quite well, canceling a moonwell for example. Sase and ToD can keep up mostly because they are ToD and Sase, but great individual player skill does not automatically a great 2s team make. Neutron and Tama slowly builds up their assault force and attacks at just the right moment. This, strangely, seems to be more conicedence than anything else. The timing was great because ToD had just put down an expansion, but srs doesn’t seem to have noticed. The win the battle however, and after that it’s a steady decline. The fact that Sase doesn’t send lumber over to his gold-heavy colleague suggest this 2s team is still not harmonized.

Game 2 (TR): This turns out to be quite the exciting game. Neutron switches over to Undead for this map, preparing to nuke ToD’s heroes to kingdom come. Just like last game, ToD goes for an unconventional second hero. In game 1 it was the Blood Mage, but he didn’t really get much done. In this game it’s the Paladin, and that pretty much saves them. For a while ToD’s mortars are dominating the field, but after a surprising offensive tp by Neutron on top of the human army it is reduced to slagg. Sase’s and Neutron’s armies are destroyed as well, so all that remain is heroes and a few angry bears. But as we all know, the paladin is the bane of undead heroes, so even after some nice dancing back and forth the pala takes down both the dk and lich in a matter of seconds. And what can you do about a paladin once the nuking is gone? Not much really. Second game goes to mouz, with a little bit of luck.

Game 3 (TM): The last game of this nice little series also gets rather exciting. First srs tries a little protector rush (that sounds even more weird than tower rush ~~) on Sase’s base. With some genuinely good distraction tactics, the rush is stopped however. The pressure never ends on Sase however. The spider army of Neutron grows, and even though ToD does a good job of holding it off with a breaker/caster army I think he knows things will turn when destroyers arrive. He has to rely on Sase’s dryads to take them down. And it does work for a while. Team mouz uses pincer attacks to exploit the weakness of the classic Zerter/Zubie (ZZ Top?) strategy of mass hunts and undead high upkeep. But the damage done to Sase during the protector push was just too great. After a long, painful gauntlet through the srs forces, trying to gank Neutron’s Lich, mouz surrenders the game. Serious Gaming wins the 2s 2-1, almost ending it at game 2. QED, a disaster combo.

Conclusion: Weeeell, this was an interesting war. It sort of had the shape of wars of ye olde days, where the lower-level teams commonly had very strong 2s teams, but mediocre solo players. That’s what the score says, but the games tell of other, darker things... The performance of Rotterdam versus ToD for example was a positive surprise for the future.

All he needs is a bit of polish on that strategy of his to make it a real killer, and then we might have to deal with the return of the Far Seer. Happy spits imbalance in the face in his last game on Twisted Meadows, beating an orc (ORC!) army almost twice the size of his with spell nuking and excellent micro. I doubted for a moment when he didn’t scout. No longer. Happy is a true orc slayer, and if he gets any better than he already is he might eventually be required to wear lead braces at LANs as to give the other players a chance.

Sase showed, in the same way Reign did against Xlord in the previously reported match that an excellent strategy can compensate for a micro lapse or an abusive strategy when destroying Sonkie in two quick games. In the first playday he sort of did the same in his games against Shy. I’m expecting great things from my countryman at this point. Sase, keep up the good strategizing! Fly did what was expected, superfly! For DowaQ I suggest a 24h marathon watching Reign replays, because he does have the micro down. What he lacks is a really deadly strategy and that library of knowledge that lets you predict enemy movements.

All in all, I got what I wanted and expected from this clanwar, and I’m looking forward to seeing the future games of these two great teams. Phew, this is going to be a harsh season for everyone...

- Dectilon ( )

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