(Part two) Welcome to part two of the great Battle Report Rematch! In case you haven't read part one, please go here Warning! The Following Document contains an unhealthy amount of pictures, so please, in the meantime go play a game, excersize, raise a family, etc... because for the next few minutes your poor little dial up networking connection is going to go on strike for not recieving hazard pay for this download! Introduction As was previously mentioned, this is the Rematch saga for those of you who have already read the first part. CriziS, nursing his wounds from his humiliating defeat that was handed to him by Executor Thug, has planned his revenge. As always, this is a rematch from a previous game (to be honest, i dont know when these two started playing and rematching, but i picked up from last game and said it was the start of the fued). Before we start the game, lets get in a little background about the two contestants! Thug, or Thug457, is a teacher of the Starcraft arts™. He claims to have beaten CriziS on innumeral occasions, but the same could be true with names reversed. He has, however, beaten CriziS in game one with only two attacks, and he lost 1 Probe, 2 Reavers and 5 Zealots to all of CriziS's Hydralisks, Zerglings Drones and Sunken Colonys. He is therefore, my choice of this game. CriziS, or CriziS, is the proclaimed "Diet Gosu" of Starcraft. He has mad skills and micromanagement that can let him defeat 12 dragoons with a single SCV!* He was my choice of winning last game when he was utterly raped trying to early expand, which is why we are playing again. * This is a load of donkey kidneys, there is no way he (or anyone else for that matter) could do this unless it was against myself after six to eight beers, and even then it would be pretty tricky. This game had taken place the same day as Part One, and I didn't even get to empty my screen shot directory (I only took forty shots last game). Soon the game was started on the same level as before, The Lost Temple The Battlefield Map: The Lost Temple Starting Positions and Races: Thug randomed and was given Zerg on the Three O'Clock main. CriziS randomed as well, and recieved his Terrans at the Nine O'clock.

Build Orders

Thug

Thug always choses random, except on special occasions. This was not a special occasion. Fate laughed and pitched a nice plump Drone in his hands.

"Congratulations!" it said, before Thug fell off of the clouds and onto the Three O'clock starting position. His structures built closely resembled those of CriziS's in game one. He morphed an overlord and a hatchery at ten drones, a pool at eleven, followed by an extractor another hatch and a sunken coloney. The three hatcheries were all inside the main base however, rather than at the natural as CriziS did last game.

To defend against an early rush of Marines, he has a whopping 2 zerglings and a whole (Horribly placed) sunken colony. If marines were to charge up into his main, all they would have to do is run around behind the coloney and attack the spawning pool, mineral line, or extractor and deal a crippling blow, where Thugwould still be searching frantically in the instructions trying to find how to make a Sunken Colony move.

CriziS

CriziS chose random as well, and much to his dismay was given the Terrans. He summoned his Terran commander, only to find he has been dead for fifteen years*. So, he takes his vice commander and lands his command center in the Nine O'clock position.

*His commander was dead so long because CriziS's "Diet Gosu" skills with Terran ended after a brief skint. For a short while, I could defeat him in TvT. Yes, I know, its pathetic.

CriziS makes 8 SCV's before he finally lays down a depot to start a wall in. At 10 SCVs a Barracks is laid down. Later, a refinery is welded together, to be followed by a twin Barracks at a total of 12 SCVs.
As the barracks are completed, Marines are pumped out. However, before their number can reach that of eight, a Factory is made outside of the wall in. Plain and simple, CriziS may seem better with his Terrans than when I last played him.

Episode One: Razings

As always the case with CriziS and Thug, the scoutings begin the action. With his lumbering and surprisingly ugly overlord, Thug scouts the Twelve O'clock and in just a few months it arrives to be quickly intoxicated by vespene byproducts of the empty main. Realizing that at this rate he might discover CriziS in about 10 more days with fair winds, he sends his two Zerglings to the Six and Nine O'clock. He is quickly found and dispatched by the handful of Marines that had sprouted during the Overlords Odyssessy. Thug seems pretty cool about his discovery, as if he did not care about marines and tanks ripping him apart.

At the same time this was happening, CriziS sent his own SCV towards the Six O'clock before venturing northeast and finding Thug. Unlike Thug's poor Zergling, the SCV was able to escape because of horrible placement of sunken colonys.(Thug didn't fully appreciate me critizising him for this, so I send my appologies)

Soon a Vulture is pumped out of the factory, as marines and medics are still pouring out. When his first tank's treads dig into the ground; CriziS makes the first move, with 11 marines, 3 medics, 2 scvs, a vulture and his now complete tank.

With his forces camped outside the Zerg base, all CriziS has to do is attack and risk failure for a victory. But wait! He doesn't charge! Instead, he opts for a slow and guarenteed victory, and he digs in. Bunkers are built with unsieged tanks and medarines sitting outside. An engineering bay is soon made as well, to spot for the Tanks (Who are still unsieged?)

Soon more tanks and marines come to reinforce the already strong force. Right now Thug is showing off his hydras that he is building from 3 hatcheries, when he decides to find out what CriziS is up to. Once again, he takes his mighty zergling and charges it out to where he believes CriziS to be. Because the tanks STILL aren't sieged, he is able to get a good look on his unexpected doormen. Thug doesn't believe it.

Realizing he is in big big trouble from the Terrans outside his base, Thug can only get more and more troops... and he begins to experiment with lurkers. It starts out rather innocently, first just 3 of them for ramp defence, and then more and more gas is wasted on the things. Pretty soon he has a total of 7 lurkers, and attacks:

How Not To Attack With Lurkers

Finally CriziS sieges his tanks (he later told me he didn't have siege mode until he had three tanks out), and the Lurkers charge from the cliff. Try and keep a strait face:

Thug's machoness from last game did not extend to his lurkers. He tried attacking down from the cliffs and were pounded to hell by 3 tanks (Finally Sieged) being spotted by an Engineering bay. When the things finally burrowed, they were out of range. A comsat lit up the area and the attacking AND defending lurkers were all nailed in a barrage of arclite fire. The lurkers then unburrowed and retreated back, but not before another barrage nailed most of their number into a red goey mess. All in all, it was a fine waste of 700 gas and 350 minerals.

CriziS took advantage of the situation and placed a factory right near his bunkers to pump out tanks to the front much faster. More Marines and Medics were made, and the game seemed to be closing up all around Thug. There was a major lull in the action here: CriziS strengthened his already superior army, and Thug was rapidly making lots of just about everything.

Soon Crizis has science vessels out, making Lurkers against him as useless as a knife in a gunfight. Not only that, but he has Irradiate now as well, and he begins to piss off Thug's Hydralisk army to come into siege range, die a little more, then be ordered back.

Due to Thug's recent failures, statistically he should be making a good move by now. But one quick look at his base reveals to the contrary... six more lurkers are being made. Let this be a lesson aboutThug: He doesn't learn anything!...

Or so it seems...

CriziS is putting the finishing touches on his attack, and he is ready to assault. Countless marines, Medics and Tanks charge up the ramp, and Tanks deploy on the front and rear. Thug makes his move...

Cream Of Zerg Youth

In one bloody massacre, Thug's poorly microed units are cut down like grass under a lawn mower. All he seems to be using is the attack move, lurkers dont even get to burrow... After about thirty seconds of combat, the once green plateu is covered in Zerg blood, and the Marines advance.

Its the end of Thug, marines are tearing down all of the Zerg structures... Wait a minute!

What are those guys doing?

Where are they going?

What the hell?

Oh... fiddlesticks

CriziS is rapidly tearing down Browns main with stiff resistence from a horribly placed sunken colony. It takes a hole 3 seconds before it is finally dispatched. Stims are administered until the marines dont have any cooldown rate at all (or at least thats the reasoning here). Thug's Lurkers are doing remarkably well, the only resistence they have run into are scvs that tried returning minerals from the natural to the main(The natural cc was lifted off). It is now a race against time. Soon both mains are half dead...

Now without targets, Thugs Lurkers are unburrowed and moved. A brave SCV takes on the invaders and attempts to weld them together. CriziS has a defending force of 4 marines (bunkered) a tank sieged close to the bunker, a turret and a science vessel. Thug's excellent micro lets him burrow all but one in range of the bunker(it goes both ways) but all are still in the range of the tank. Over 13 tank rounds are fired, and the lurkers dont even move. The bunker ends up eating one up, the Tank makes Zerg Salad out of 4 of the ugly things, and an irradiate is wasted on the last offender. However, the lurkers have made their toll.
They took out a supply depot down to half strength, crippled a control tower, and lit fire to a starport

It seems that Thug's attention was diverted elsewhere. CriziS ran into stiff resistence of 9 hydras, which were eaten up faster than you can throw away your third class mail. Surely Thug would lose his only hope at crippling and/or killing CriziS's main for THAT? Right?

As all of this is going on, CriziS is down to the last structure, with Marines, Vultures, Wraith and Tanks doing the fighting.

Wait a minute! He's not dead!! Where could he be? Did you check the mini map?

CriziS's Vessel returned pretty good pictures of mutalisks shooting green crap at it, and after .5 nano seconds it was vaporized by base defence Mutalisks. The Mutalisks were then sent right where their lurker bretherin failed and take out the small garrison. CriziS brings his tank, stimmed medarines & wraith army right towards Thug's base. The newly completed Natural is quickly rolled over into blood by unsieged tanks. It is another Razing Race...

However, CriziS has an ace up his sleeve! With his Command center that he lifted off when the lurkers were severly owning him, he simply landed it in the north west island! Soon SCV's are rolled out, and Thug Doesn't know a clue about this contingency

Thug doesn't seem to give a fine rats ass about his "new main" and rallys his mutalisks in CriziS's base. Likewise, CriziS could care less about his "old main", and doesn't offer any reinforcements. Instead, all of the marines charge into the basically defenceless main and start "The Fall of Thug: Take Two"

Acritilite shells and guass fire pour into hatcheries. If you thought Thug's defence earlier on (The sunken and 2 lings) was horrible, you will shed tears on this. Unless you count drones as combatents, there is NONE, repeat ZERO defences in his base. Obviously staying in the game is not on Thug's "To Do:" list. Thug gets about say... two control groups of mutalisks out of his base before the spire is torn down, and Bases continue to be hit left and right.

CriziS is the first to fall, weakened by the lurkers. However, his force rapidly eats through everything Thug has, and soon the Hive comes pouring down...

Game Over?

Thug doesn't think so. Before his main comes down for "remodeling", he sneaks an overlord with a drone to the lower right island and expands. He also sneaks 4 overlords full of drones to the Northwest expansion as well, with the Mutas in escort. They find CriziS's Command Center, and it is quickly destroyed. CriziS needs to get a base up if he hopes to win this game.

CriziS soon discovers Thug's lower right island, and his two wraiths take it on. Not a single mutalisk comes to their aid, however. The hatchery is killed without resistence. Now, its time for a Mini Map summary, so lets see how everyone (all two of them) in the game has done:

Okay, that ends Episode One. Nifty game eh? Sorry to say I dont have Episode Two on me right now, i think i left it in my pants pocket thats in the wash =P. Anyways, Episode Two: Air War will be released sometime this week, or next week; you shant be disappointed ;).

End of Episode One