Lucifron vs Select in the Poker Strategy League

So it's time for my first post actually related to Starcraft! Hopefully this will give you guys a bit of an idea on what there is to come from this blog and whether you actually want to spend time following it! Todays post is going to have spoilers from the PokerStrategy League Select vs Lucifron games, so do not read on if you do not want it to be spoilt!

As mentioned, today I'm going to talk about a fantastic set of ten games I got to cast between Lucifron and Select a week or so ago for the PokerStrategy League. The final score was 7-3 to Lucifron after going on a 6 win-streak to come back from being 1-3 down after the initial games on the NA Server. If you want to check out the games then you can watch the VODs by SCVRush.

Proxied Factory by Select

The series is full of exciting games and definitely worth giving a watch, even if you only have time to watch one or two of them. There are numerous hyper-aggressive Terran styles displayed by Select, varying between gas first and 13 gas openings primarily but using these for a huge variety of builds, with everything from Cloaked Banshees through to proxied Factories. A couple of games also included a more macro orientated style, but it was mostly Lucifron going for economy with Select looking to do early damage.



Lucifron pulled out the largest variety of builds, variations of CC first and early expand builds and gas openings were mixed frequently to give him a large advantage when it came to being unpredictable and unreadable, something Select didn't quite have with him on the day. When you use a gas opening for 7 or 8 out of ten games apart from on the larger maps such as Whirlwind your opponent is going to catch on pretty quickly what is going on and Lucifron definitely used this to his advantage, rarely being surprised or caught off guard by the agression of Select as the series went on.

Select opening with an aggressive gas-first build

So why was Select so predictable with his aggression? The importance of having the ability to mix up your strategies and styles has been discussed hundreds of times with players such as TaeJa, MVP and MKP always coming out with extremely strong macro play mixed in with deadly all-ins executed to near perfection. When MVP won his GSL title this year he was able to go from a style involving a heavy amount of Battlecruisers into a proxy 2 rax in the space of a game. This potential to change between the highest tech and the simplest, cheapest units and workers is what makes these players great.

Obviously Select loves his aggressive play, he uses 2 rax play in TvZ frequently, but in a ten game series there has to be a reason to favour an aggressive style even when your opponent shows that he is able to hold off and defend these styles. Yet Select refuses to open with gasless play game after game. One could suggest that it's for safety, not wanting to lose by being caught off guard by a 1 base play from his opponent, however I feel this isn't the reason. It's a ten game series - in such a multitude of games you can't play safe all the time, you need to take some risks and try out different styles.

Lucifron and Select open with mirror builds

Select even showed that he is capable of pulling off well executed Macro builds such as on Whirlwind, where both players opened with a mirror build of CC first into gas. So why did Select refrain from using more macro orientated builds if he has them in his arsenal and his aggressive builds weren't working? Well the answer really shines true in the exact game I just mentioned, on Whirlwind. Lucifron just straight up out-macroed Select and denied his expansions with beautiful army positioning and movement.

Lucifron was taking advantage of the map, taking a lot of CCs and expanding aggressively, while still keeping ahead of Select on army in terms of numbers and upgrades. This was a theme than rang true throughout the entire of the series - Lucifron always seemed to be going into the mid game with some sort of lead - with better upgrades, a faster third base or just generally with more units and production. Often times this lead was gained from the brilliant defence against Selects early aggression, but even on Whirlwind with mirror builds Lucifron found himself to be ahead on upgrades and with his third base mining a lot sooner even though Select had his built earlier.

It was this story throughout the series that made the series so fascinating to me - the way that Lucifron seemed to just be scaring Select into early aggression builds for fear of going into the late macro game with him. Select was definitely not confident enough to step away from his favoured style and it really felt as though it cost him this series.

Lucifron deals the killing blow to Select on Whirlwind with superior upgrades and positioning - always one step ahead

So here are my three personal favourite points of the series so that you can maybe have some help in picking out which games to catch!

At number three is the tenth game of the series due to Lucifron's cloaked Banshee coming in and killing almost everything in the main base of Select while taking damage to his own mineral line at home. Lucifron's great decision making to move across the map with his marines and wait for a viking to clear up Select's Banshee really decided the game as once the marines joined up with the Banshee in the main of Select there was nothing left to do but for Select to try and run away before throwing out the gg!

Lucifron's Cloakshee and Marines chase last few units of Select out of Select's own base!

Next up involves Select's proxy factories! But it isn't the game from Daybreak in which Select easily shut down Lucifron's early greedy play, it is actually the second time he tried this on Cloud Kingdom in map number 6. It was a very similar situation with Lucifron once again going for a Command Centre first and Select going for a proxy Factory and Starport into siege tank push. What made this moment so special was the way in which Lucifron just adapted his previous response and executed slightly better to hold the same push. Lucifron would go on to win this map after the huge lead from this point.

Lucifron adjusts his strategy to break free of Select's siege-tank all in

My favourite play of the entire series was by Select in game number two on ESVMuspelheim. Select opened with a proxy marauder play which did not work out too well and got even worse for him when Lucifron's counter attack with Hellion-Marine-Medivac did a lot of damage to Select's economy. Select was always behind however he made great attempts to claw his way back into the game and especially with one move where in a split second he spotted Lucifron's army, moved his tanks up to the high ground and out of vision and sieged before watching Lucifron lose a massive chunk of marines to numerous tank volleys. Sadly this wasn't enough for Select to come fully back into the game, but the split second decision making was a beautiful site to see.

Select with great split-second decision making and positioning takes out a huge amount of marines

So that's it for my first blog post! I hope you enjoyed the read. Not every post will be this long, there will be other posts which are shorter with less pictures and more just about my thoughts! So please do keep coming back and checking in on what I've been up to in Starcraft! Until then good luck + have fun!