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War is coming. Kenyan Starcraft League. Tomorrow.

Well, our first and only gaming league in Kenya took a slump in the last few weeks because of a variety of reasons….including the incredible launch of Starcraft 2.

We’re back now, and we’re back to business this coming weekend! The matches that shall be played will be such that every single player in the league makes it to five competitive games played, to end round of this season in Starcraft.

Here’s the schedule. The goal is to get all the unplayed matches over and done with!

Round 5 matches get played on a brand new map: Grandline SE.

Of course we’ll be at the Ihub tomorrow, but that won’t stop us from playing Starcraft!

Notable Features

• Different Spawning Positions — like on Andromeda, spawn positions matter heavily, as players will need to go through different terrains to get to different spawning positions.
• Center Expansions — the expansions in the middle have mineral patches at 500 minerals and geyser at 2000 gas.

Notable Games:

Here are the results of the matches of the day:

• Psyko 2 mr_hyde 0
• r3drox 0 JuGG3RN0t 1 (match not completed)
• McVeigh 0 mr_hyde 1 (match not completed)
• mr_hyde 2 JuGG3RN0t 0

Best Match
Game 1 of the McVeigh-mr_hyde match-up was fascinating. Terran Vs Terran are usually boring for me but this was a game like no other: 1 hour+ of gameplay, thrilling tank pushes, Nuke abuse, and overall carnage. mr_hyde played impressively to win Game 1 of the match-up. Make sure you watch the replay.

Something worrisome: the 2009 WCG Kenya champion currently sits squarely at the bottom….what happened?

There shall be Anarchy

Tomorrow brings to us yet another addition to the on-going Kenya Starcraft league.

Due to the fact that a lot of players haven’t played their previous games, this weekend’s schedule of matches is quite crazy, but the aim is to get everyone to have played at least three rounds of matches (as defined on the schedule) by the end of Saturday.

Because this is quite late: The maps to be used will be Fighting Spirit and Heartbreak Ridge.

We meet at McVeigh’s at 2p.m.

See you there.

The main attraction was, of course, the entry of WooDoo. WooDoo, nicknamed “Spetnaz”, turned out to be a fantastic revelation. He was by far the best player on the day and soundly beat everyone whom he played. We think Starcraft Kenya has found a new champion but time will tell. Every other player needs to watch out for this man and prepare adequately lest he be embarrassed badly.

Match Ups
Many players who were scheduled to play did not show up and so the schedule was moved around somewhat to accommodate those who did show up.

All the games played this week ended up being somewhat one-sided and were easy wins for all the victors.

WooDoo Vs Raegis Kain – we had anticipated this to be the hottest game, Raegis Kain being the former champion, of the weekend but it turned out to be something of a thrashing. WooDoo ran riot and soundly defeated his opponent. It looks like every opponent he faces will suffer the same fate. Both games were finished quickly and cruelly for Raegis, with the second one being particularly hard as WooDoo had the audacity to build Gateways in Raegis Kain’s base.

mosh Vs JuGG3RN0t – being a new player, JuGG3RN0t impressed but mosh dominated, though JuGG3RN0t battled gallantly in the second game and made it last quite a while before being overwhelmed by very aggressive lurkers from mosh.

McVeigh Vs babashuge – McVeigh clearly had a point to prove following his unfortunate loss to Psyko in the first round. He proceeded to summarily demolish babashuge, who looked like he lacked match practice. McVeigh dominated, and even managed to produce a fleet of carriers – something you do not see often in competitive play.

McVeigh Vs Raegis Kain – of the competitive games, this one was much more of a fight than the rest. Raegis Kain battled hard to save face but, alas, McVeigh took both games with relative ease. Kain, the former champion, lost his second match-up of the day and now lies at the bottom of the table thanks to McVeigh.

Friendly Matches
A number of friendly matches were played and these proved to be much more interesting than the official competitive games. Of course WooDoo completely dominated in all the games in which he played. One only hopes that the rest of the contestants are watching, learning, and planning what they shall do when they face WooDoo, ‘Spetnaz’.

A game that was particularly interesting was mosh Vs Raegis Kain. This time round, Raegis Kain gave a good account of himself and proved why he was champion. He almost overran mosh with his Tank push but somehow mosh survived and after some good, albeit clumsy, mutalisk harassment, mosh broke into Raegis Kain’s base with what can only be described as a devastating swarm of zerglings. It will be interesting to watch these two play against each other in the league.

You can find all the replays of all the games here.

League Standings

Name	Race	P	W	L	GW	GL	GD	Pts
Psyko	Protoss	2	2	0	4	0	+4	6
mosh	Zerg	2	2	0	4	0	+4	6
McVeigh	Protoss	4	2	1	4	3	+1	6
WooDoo	Zerg	1	1	0	2	0	+2	3
KArtel	Protoss	1	1	0	2	1	+1	3
mr_hyde	Terran	4	1	2	3	4	-1	3
Alex	Terran	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
michelin_man	??	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
r3drox	Terran	1	0	0	0	1	-1	0
Babashuge	Terran	1	0	1	0	2	-2	0
JuGG3RNOt	Terran	4	0	3	2	6	-4	0
Raegis Kain	Terran	2	0	2	0	4	-4	0

mosh leads the pack despite having a game in hand over McVeigh. One wonders how long his lead will last, with both WooDoo and Psyko breathing hard down his slimy zerg neck.

See you next weekend!

It's going to be a hot weekend of Starcraft action. Who will come out on top? Who will be ripped apart and destroyed?

George Bernard Shaw, “That is the whole secret of successful fighting. Get your enemy at a disadvantage; and never, on any account, fight him on equal terms”.

@McVeigh’s tomorrow. Be there.

Notable Features

• Middle Expansion – Although taking the middle expansion is risky, it provides two gas geysers for any player that sets up an expansion there.
• Easily Harassed Natural – There is little to no room behind the natural mineral line to place defense against any air attack.
• Easy to Defend Third Gas – The third gas is easily defendable.

The above information is courtesy of Team Liquid. You can find more information about the map, including specific strategies, here.

Notable Games

“Match Point is the weirdest map for Protoss – they dominate Zerg and get stomped by Terran. In TvP, the way the expansions pan out is Terran heaven. Expanding used to feel pretty unsecure beyond your natural, with highgrounds and backway passages to all of them, but with the newest versions the highground platform can defend your third pretty easily (while the other route to your nat is a small ramp – the Mineral only is gone now). Though the middle is unbuildable, and pushing distances are pretty far, Terran can take 4 gas mains along the way. Rush distances, however, are really short. Many pro players acknowledged this and set up strong early rushes across the small middle. Recalls and drops appear to be pretty strong but we haven’t seen them yet in this MU.

Notable Features

• Exposed Natural – The natural is pulled back from both chokes, so it will be difficult to defend both the natural and the choke points with static defense.
• Many Paths – There are numerous paths through the map, making it easy to maneuver around your opponent; flanking or counter-attacking them.
• Harassable Bases – Many bases are situated along the side of a cliff, making it easy for players to harass mineral lines or even snipe the Hatchery/CC/Nexus.
• Raised “plateaus” – These two areas provide possibilities for both strong defense of, and assaults on the expansions behind them, as well as giving good map control and positioning to whomever places units there. “

The above information is courtesy of Team Liquid. You can find more information about the map, including specific strategies, here.

Notable Games

The matches shall be as follows:

Click here to view full schedule of matches (not fully done at this moment, though).

The maps to be used for the 2nd round are:

1. Match Point
2. Fighting Spirit

You can download both these maps and others by clicking here.

Those playing Round 1 matches will play at Heart Break Ridge.

Hot Match of The Weekend
WooDoo Vs Ramah Nyang is sure to be a thriller. WooDoo is a visiting, experienced, player from the Russian Federation whilst Ramah Nyang is last year’s WCG Kenya champion. Don’t miss this match!

Good luck to everyone, and good gaming! Long live the Queen of blades!