Persistance...

Hmmm...well...I've seen Bob around before, and I know he's got some talent...I think he wasted me at least once... Then again, everyone wastes me. There's no choke...an initial rush might work, if one team can coordinate it quickly enough...

Both teams waste no time in starting their build orders. Ioti seems to be intent on talking the whole game, as he describes the map to both teams. Reznor, the only zerg, goes for an early spawning pool, and then a second hatchery at his natural. This base will prove vital in the future, as it's one of only two expansions set up the entire game...

Whilst scouting with his overlord, Reznor spots Bob with three gateways. Being no one's fool, he immediately starts to set up a small wall of sunken colonies.

Dragon seems to be producing all the zealots he can from his two gateways, while T.T. continues to create his own army of the Protoss foot.

Meanwhile, the products of both Bob and T.T.'s gateways line up, to the chanting chorus of "GO ORANGE"...

Dragon never had a chance. Maybe, if he had that shield battery sitting on a choke point, and zealots on top of that...but Hot Zone isn't exactly the best for defending a rush, and Bob and T.T. too perfect advantage of the map. Reznor sent six zerglings to aid, but they went down quickly to the warp blades, and soon, Dragon was dead, all but one pylon.

What is this, you say? Why is there a report on such an awful game? I mean, the "gg"'s were already being passed around. True, that at this point I got up, got something to drink, and pretty much gave up hope of seeing anything else interesting in the game...but leave it to Reznor to give a fun-filled night of family entertainment...

At this point, Bob and T.T. still had plenty of zealots left. They moved them in front of Reznor's base, as everyone allied up with Dragon. Ioti must have given Dragon vision at this point, as Dragon continued to give small, but important, tactical advice to Reznor throughout the rest of the game. Cheating? You decide...but either way, the game was now down to two players against a player and a spy.

Bob and T.T., intimidated greatly by the seven or eight sunkens in front of Reznor's main base and expansion, decided to sit back and tech. I imagine at this point in the game, they were feeling pretty confident in their ability to win the match. Their early rush had been completely successful, and all they had to do was contain Reznor until they had some powerful units to attack with, right?

How does the famous quote go? "Do not underestimate the Dark Side of the Zerg.." Er...something, like that...

Several minutes of game time passed. Ioti filled the time with amusing, but idle chatter, to which Dragon, Bob, and T.T. merrily replied. No one seemed to be watching the game anymore...with one exception.

Suddenly, the game was filled with that noise, that god-awful noise (unless you happen to be zerg) of mutalisks attacking. I glanced down to where the battle was happening, attributing it to a last-ditch effort by Reznor. I saw mutalisks attacking Bob's base. I sat up. I saw corsairs coming out of stargates. I slumped back down.

This is the interesting point. According to Bob, there was quite a stockpile of money in the coffers, and those two stargates weren't active the entire time. Ioti was doing a marvelous job of distracting him with idle chatter, and I saw his two corsairs go up in a shower of sparks.

Reznor still had a half-dozen mutas left.

I sat up again. I started taking screenshots again. The mutalisks were heading for the peon line, with reinforcements, and the lone and corsairs to come out of Bob's gateways and stargates were being destroyed as soon as they came out. Soon, dragoon reinforcements came from T.T., but the damage was already done. The nexus was idle, not creating any more probes...and Bob only had one probe left.

Suddenly, the game wasn't so one-sided anymore. My jaw was dropping, my eyes were going wide, especially as the mutas headed straight for T.T.'s expansion. No defense. Over a dozen mutas were now decimating his mineral line, and then going for the nexus itself. Soon, it went up as Protoss building will when attacked by a dozen plus mutalisks with no defense, and the mutas were heading down into T.T.'s main.

T.T. wasn't idle while he was being attacked, though. I'm sure everyone was paying much closer attention to the game now...and T.T. had a few cannons, dragoons, and corsairs to deal with the mutalisk threat. After about half of his fliers fell, Reznor was forced to retreat with his remaining mutalisks. The attack wasn't a total waste; several probes had been destroyed, as well as a defensive cannon or two. The mutas even managed to draw a couple of corsairs after them, which were quickly dispatched.

More of T.T.'s corsairs were sent after the survivors, and a short battle ensued. Winner: Corsairs, by quite a few. Reznor, however, was nowhere near idle, and just as the last muta fell from the sky, he moved out with a few dozen zerglings, heading straight for T.T.'s main, and only, base, while Dragon and Ioti continued to distract the opposition, this time with a discussion of corsairs and mutalisks.

Reznor's zerglings had reached T.T.'s base, and went in. They met a few zealots, a few cannons, and a lot of probes, and the Protoss emerged victorious, minus the zealots and a couple cannons.

Meanwhile, Reznor was busy collecting wave two. Wave two moved quickly across the diagonal of the map, and once again engaged the army that T.T. was able to throw together. Wave two had three dozen or so zerglings, whereas wave one only had two.

This wave did a bit more damage, taking down a gateway and the ground army before being driven away by more probes, a cannon, and a lone scout.

Meanwhile, Reznor was building up another mutalisk army. This one swooped back down to Bob, who had been frantically trying to remake all the probes he'd lost in the last muta attack. His probes fell en masse to the flying horde, and then his nexus went, knocking him completely out of the game.

Reznor's mutalisks met a group of T.T.'s dragoons, moving as fast as their four legs could carry them to save Bob. Upon seeing the devistation that was Bob's nexus, all the 'goons could do was shriek in rage, and attack...with this result.

The mutas started to head over to T.T.'s main again, and were intercepted by three corsairs and a scout. (I had another series for an animation for this...but it isn't tough to figure out who'd win when nine mutas collide with three corsairs and a scout.)

At this point, T.T. was completely mined out at his main, and without an expansion, all that was left for Reznor

to do was to send in his final wave of four or five dozen zerglings to finish the rest of T.T.'s base, then the rest of Bob's.

• Never, ever, EVER assume you've won. Ever. Not until that last building is down.
• Even if you can't create units, you can still spy on and distract your opponents, assuming they let you live.
• When being killed, plea and beg to be left alive.
• Reznor rocks. 'nuff said.

Report ©1999 by IceShadow Productions.