Terran vs. Zerg - the bloodiest of all matchups. Those races differ so much, everything can happen.

Tonight we have two excellent BW players finishing a 3 of 5, so far it's 2:1 in Mr.X favor, but don't count Whear out yet, he won the previous game. Both players random and Mr.X gets zerg at 6, Whear terran at 3. This is regular temple so Mr.X is doomed to mine at 85% efficiency compared to the 3 o' clock location, but he has no one to blame as he selected the map.

Whear scouts very early (before having finished his first supply depot) and finds a morphing hatchery at 6's natural. He builds a barracks at his ramp and a second one inside his base. He builds the second depot at the northern edge of his plateau, leaving his wallin uncompleted all through the game.

Mr.X scouts with a drone at this point and notes the double rax strat... he also places an overlord above Whear's natural so he can spot troop movement. He isn't following his standard 2 hatch strat vs. terran, his build order is as follows: hatch at natural, spawning pool, gas, lair, 3rd hatch inside main, then hydra den. This indeed delays his lurkers and he has to rely on a solid sunken defense.

Whear is rushing, meanwhile. He does a weird build, sacrificing production/econ to get an early academy - he has gas and a building academy before having started his 3rd supply depot! That kind of build won't give him a big M&M army, but rather a early lethal force of 5 marines, 2 firebats and 2 medics. Seeing those move out with his overlord, Mr.X is forced to build sunkens - and he builds 4 of them! Perhaps he couldn't count the enemy units passing by and got a bit paranoid... This leaves him with just 2 drones at his natural, but some more are transferred from his main.

Whear cleverly uses comsat before diving into the sunkens, and even more cleverly realizes that attacking is pointless, so he just leaves his troops standing there, while sending some reinforcements (marines/scv) and teching to tanks. Mr.X is struggling a bit now, those sunkens didn't allow him to get his second gas early and he didn't get any benefits (like Whear suiciding his troops).

After getting his second gas, the zerg player pumps some hydras and starts morphing them to lurkers. Whear decides to contain his opponent, which is quite risky vs a zerg that has already expanded to his natural (drops, mutas etc. might screw him).

The terran player places a marine between the 6 and 9 plateaus, looking for an eventual zerg drop, and rallies absolutely all his combat units to the containment in front of Mr.X natural. He builds a bunker there and places his first tank in front of it, while also constructing an engineering bay for spotting purposes.

The first few lurkers that he has hatched, Mr.X buries quite close to this force. The tank shoots at them once, revealing it's presence. Once buried, everything is quiet again, as Whear doesn't have detection yet besides his comsat.

Mr.X reaction to this situation - he starts morphing some lings, and when he has about 30 of them and 10+ lurkers, instead of waiting for his overlords' drop abilities to finish researching, he... my oh my... he decides that he can break the containment by sheer force :O.

So let's see what happens - Mr.X attacks with all his lurkers and zerglings, and they collide with the ~25 M&M&F, 2 tanks and bunker. The resulting battle looks kinda pretty, but not for Mr.X, actually this is one of the very few times I've seen him make such a costly mistake - with the aid of scan and some micro (targeting the incoming lurkers instead of letting his marines shoot at the distracting zerglings) Whear decimates everything thrown at him with very few losses. All that is left of the so carefully built up zerg army is an enormous pool of blood.

The game is pretty much decided at this point... Whear decisively moves his force closer and his tanks start firing at the 4 sunkens. While he is occupied with this Mr.X has his overlord speed and ventral sacs researched and attempts dropping 2 lurkers inside the terran base. His overlord passes above the scouting marine, but Whear doesn't seem to notice that.

Here I bet Mr.X is pretty angry at himself for not having attempted a large drop instead of losing his units to the containment force - his overlord reaches a totally undefended terran base, and his lurkers kill some SCV's. Whear has just built a new command center and after floating it to his natural he transfers his surviving workers there. The lurkers remain at his main but it doesn't really matter that much for the outcome of the game...

Down at 6 the terran army is destroying Mr.X natural after the sunkens have been removed, and Whear's first science vessel arrives as well. The zerg player tries defending with a few hydras, zerglings and 2 lurkers, but indeed it is pointless already and after losing those Mr.X leaves with a GG.

Hey notice it's 2:2 now :O . Mr.X started strong, winning 2 consecutive games, but Whear came back doing the same and seems to have the momentum now. Let's move on to a action packed 5th game - guess what, now Whear randoms to zerg at 3, and Mr.X gets terran at 12 :).

Both start with normal anti random builds, but once Whear's overlord makes it to the ramp of the 12 o' clock location and sees the supply depot there, the zerg player seems confused and cancels his first overlord, resulting in the loss of a larva. The reason - with a terran so close to him, Whear prefers to build pool and gas on 9 supply and rush to lurkers off one hatchery.

Mr.X builds 2 barracks without finishing his wallin, and scouts his opponent with the SCV that built his first depot. Upon spotting the lurker rush Mr.X takes his first 5 marines and 3 SCV's and moves out - he knows if he doesn't at least delay the lurkers, he will have a hard time fending them off. Whear is no fool, he has an overlord watching at the high ground above 3's mineral only, and seeing the mean marines and SCV's making their way to his base, he quickly starts a sunken colony and morphs some lings.

When Mr.X arrives, he first sends his SCV's in and one of them dies to the sunken. The terran player is kinda left hanging without being able to do any damage, but he stays there and builds up his marine force. At home he has early gas and soon an academy is started. While this is going on, Whear is impatiently waiting for his lurker aspect, and then for his first 2 hydras to finish the process of morphing into lurkers.

When Mr.X has 9-10 marines, he decides to have a better look of the zerg base and tries to go around the sunken and eventually do damage out of it's range, like take down the extractor. His troops meet the 6 zerglings that Whear has, and after killing 2 of them and chasing the rest away, the marines start shooting at one of the morphing lurkers. When they finally morph, Whear does a really good job and with just those two lurkers and 4 zerglings starts pushing Mr.X marines and his first two medics out of his base.

At first Mr.X tries hit and run tactics, but Whear microes his lurkers very well, burrowing/unburrowing them one by one until Mr.X switches to a run only tactic. Note after the small marines vs zerglings skirmish both players didn't lose any units during the hit&run process - at this point it might have been game deciding as well. When a terran has just a few M&M, and a zerg player just 2 lurkers, a game can end very fast if someone loses his units.

While morphing some more lurkers, Whear does a cute move by burrowing one of the two initial lurkers at the southwestern corner of his base, where the beast intercepts the enemy marines as they are making their way back home, but again no one dies.

A very short period without violence follows, as Mr.X takes the long way around the temple walls because of that annoying lurker at the corner, and lets them rest close to 3's mineral only - he needs to delay Whear once more to buy some time for his factory, engineering bay and bunker at ramp to finish building. When Whear has 4 lurkers, he takes them and his zerglings and heads northwest to do some damage, while also expanding to his natural.

At 3's mineral only he has to burrow because of the marines that are waiting there. The marines move out of lurker range, but meanwhile the zerglings that Whear has make it around them, and run up the terran ramp. Luckily, the bunker is complete and with two marines quickly hopping in it, the situation is very much under control.

Soon Mr.X is finally forced to withdraw his delay squad to the safety of his ramp, and now the real fighting begins! Those lurkers must not advance any further or else Mr.X = dead. Whear spots with his gosu reconnaissance overlord, and I'll tell you, I'm on the edge of my seat at this point as the situation is really tense - now 5 lurkers below Mr.X ramp are hitting the buildings above, and with just a bunker and no detection besides comsat the terran player is in quite some trouble... soon a supply depot is destroyed and Mr.X is also forced to lift off one of his barracks, until finally a tank arrives, but it doesn't have siege yet.

The turret that Mr.X builds behind his bunker is of no help, the lurks are burrowed too far and aren't detected by it, so he uses scan. He doesn't seem to have marine range yet, so only the tank is able to hit the lurkers. Mr.X has to micro it in order to make it fire at the lurkers and also be out of their range, since at first like most tank commanders this particular one moves too close to the beasts, not taking advantage of the minimal range advantage tanks without siege have over lurkers. A single SCV is repairing the bunker that is already on fire.

Seeing that his opponent is in quite a struggle with those meager defenses, Whear decides to press further. Since just two of his lurkers are hitting the bunker at this point, he unburrows the rest and moves them closer, but it turns out too close (or maybe marine range got researched at that moment) and one of them dies while burrowing. After a new scan another lurker is removed, and then after a third scan one more dies but then the bunker falls and the marines that were inside it are cut to pieces! Now siege saves the day and Whear has to finally withdraw a bit.

Meanwhile Mr.X has already built a starport and one of his SCVs is working on a science facility, while Whear is getting drones at his natural and planning to expand further. Guessing that his opponent will go tank-happy because of the lurkers, Whear is also getting a spire. Mr.X, having saved himself, decides to move out now with his tank and some M&M.

Whear has placed his lurkers very nasty, the bottom of the terran ramp is in their range and Mr.X has to act very careful. His army goes down the ramp taking a few hits, and then the tank and marines gather in a gap where they are out of the lurkers range. A new scan lets the tank kill one of the beasts, and a bit later yet another scan removes the last lurker!

At this point Whear has just expanded to 6's main, and he doesn't have a defense against the marines and tank that are now rushing towards his base... but wait, he has some mutalisks! He sends them right into Mr.X' mineral line and the latter is forced to cancel his attack and return to chase those annoying birds away. After some mutas die, the rest flee to the east, where they meet a brand new CC that is floating slowly on the way to 12's natural. Indeed they start hitting it, which really pisses off Mr.X and his marines.

After some stim the marines aggressively chase the mutas, Mr.X is so furious he even scans above his natural cliff to get some more shots at the mutas that are trying to flee. As Whear has stopped his mutas there, not expecting such brutality, he is now left with just two of the birds.

Mr.X lands his command center and once again presses towards his opponents base, now with science vessel support. Whear has used the window that the mutas gave him to get some hydras and lurkers. Irritated where to defend because of the naked expansion at 6, he is keeping 4 lurkers in the middle of the map and 8 hydras at his natural. The M&M and single tank attack towards his natural, and if not something else the few hydras at least force the terran to siege up there. Some hydras die, the rest move away, closer to the expansion hatchery. Mr.X waits for some more marines to arrive, and when he has about 16 of them, 3 medics, the tank and science vessel, he unsieges his tank and advances.

In a well timed move Whear attacks with hydras from the right and the 4 lurkers from the left - a intensive and prolonged battle ensues. The first part of that battle ends with 5 marines and the tank surviving, but soon Whear has some new units joining the fray. At the same time another VERY small fight was going on at Mr.X natural, with the two mutas shooting at SCVs and generally looking for trouble - a few marines kill them with ease and run south where the serious action is taking place.

Down there, below Whear's ramp, it's a real mess... few marines and the tank are shooting at stuff, some lurkers and hydras come and kill most of the marines before dying, but more infantry is coming. Another small wave of lurkers and hydras manage to kill the tank that was such a tremendous pain in the ass all of the time, and simultaneously the science vessel explodes, destroyed by twin scourge.

Now 5 marines and 3 medics are left undisturbed and start popping drones at Whear's natural, then the hatch falls too. Whear is indeed in a difficult situation now, but he has just two hatches after losing the one at his natural, so he expands once more, taking 6's natural.

A new lurker burrows close to the marines that are working on a larva at 3's natural, but a quick scan and some drugs let the now armored soldiers bring the beast down with ease. Next, after 2-3 more marines arrive from somewhere, Mr.X runs his troops up the ramp and lays waste to two lurkers that just morphed there.

Soon a big reinforcement of about 12 new marines, a science vessel and a tank arrive and 4-5 creep colonies that Whear is desperately morphing at his main are quickly removed... the end of a exciting game with nonstop action. GG's are exchanged and the rest is just a conversation between Mr.X and Whear, while marines and tanks destroy the zerg main and then head for 6, where the last few lurkers are killed by irradiate and direct fire.

So to those that care about numbers, the games between Whear and Mr.X I obsed resulted in a 3:2 win for Mr.X. What I care about is that I watched 5 great games between two great players... =]

Bye, and thanks for reading (and/or watching at the pics).

BREEZE