The MSL Finals in my eyes were a let down..

I want to hear what you guys think about the decision that was made in Game 3 of the finals, the black out.

Comments,raging, anything!

gogogogo!

I think its crap personally. the game wasn't over by any means, so i they definitely should have replayed it.

The MSL Finals were NOT a letdown.

Why?

Well, for three games, we saw what might be classed as the ultimate level of SC play. Players who can do special things because they're just THAT good, their skills defy common tactics. Neither player should hang their head with that display - if you had replaced either of them with any other player in the history of SC, in games 2 and 3 especially, they wouldn't have been close games. Instead, the ridiculous, powerful, bat-shit insane skill level displayed gave us some of the best played SC that you'll ever see. Two players that, when they play their best, are so much better than everyone else that it's just unreal.

You should be thankful that the MSL Finals were not a repeat of the OSL Flash/Jaedong matchup, where JD was obviously stoned or hung over or burnt out or something. Instead, they BOTH rose to the occasion. Sure, some lame drama has to occur but you can't let that take away from what happened. The game was decided, the rules were followed.

I work in an environment where the decisions you make can have consequences on either end. Or, when there is a fight between prominent site members. The decision you make will always have a consequence for one side or the other. In this case, the right decision was made, given the circumstances. Get over it, and enjoy the SC for what it was - the most impressive display you can see, albeit too brief by a few minutes.

And so, by that thought, it was nowhere near a let down.

Semifinals and finals are special....
be honest..... referee make mistake by giving win to jaedong.
Yes, I agree that flash was on good way to lose at point when blackout(flashout ? appear ),but it was still possible that he can won this game.
Little,but was.

It wasn't fair,what referee did and Flash looks like person who prefer be second,than first. (proof? Flash wasn't upset after lost ... he looks like "I don't care.If i can't win in fair condition i don't want win.I want be sure that I'm best!"
Why?because he can feel like he is sure that he deserve at least second place.
But Jeadong ?No..he deserve be first(the same as flash) but he cannot be sure about that.this is reason why he looks half happy,half disappointed.

MSL fail badly ..... looks on OSL it looks EPIC .... i wish that flash with jaedong met there not in OSL.

Anyway.It was cool to enjoying time with live cast made by MattSC and Ph...(i forgot middle of name)...k .They did great job(They bravely fight with difficulties with lags and other sad stories) and i must say.THANKS!BIG THANKS!

It was a let down in general.

The location was bad, the systems were bad (as demonstrated), the ending was so quiet, and then Flash was giving up on the fourth game. OSL did a much better job with their finals than MSL.

But if you mean by the 3rd game roflcopters, I think they did the fair job. Flash was at the point of all-in to break that 7oclock, and it looked like he wasn't going to break it. Then the game would turn to JD and it would've been over. HOWEVER the fourth and the non-existing fifth game was influence by the method of which the players won. Flash could've still came back, but wasn't motivated enough after the blackout.

My thoughts going through the games.

First game- Utter rape by Jaedong. This got me excited because 1- I'm probably the only person who predicted that Jaedong would win on Match Point and 2- It showed that there was no way that Flash was going to completely dominate him the series. I enjoyed watching the game a lot and it got me ready for the next games of the finals.

Second game- I actually enjoyed Jaedong get destroyed by Flash by the drops. They were brilliant and I wouldn't want the games to be one sided. This was exactly the kind of series I enjoyed, with games going back and forth with top notch skill level.

Third game- Dream come true. Flash comes out with massive ball of medicmarines to take down JD's third. It's fended off, but by then, Flash has another massive ball. He comes down and destroys that base and looks to continue down and kill of Jaedong's new base above his main as well, only to be wtfpwnzored by a dozen ultralisks. Then comes the EPIC fights over the bottem left expansion, with Jaedong continually consuming and swarming in the nick of time, and Flash's medicmarine control allowing him to dart in and out and whittle down JD's forces. Scourging kept the vessel count low but JD's ultralisks were continually irradiated. Then came the climax, and blackout.

Now, for the next thirty minutes, I was frantically trying to figure out what had happened. Then I waited for an hour and a half, playing melty blood until the fourth game started. The fourth game was a massive disappointment, but it didn't spoil the night's mood. Only, it gave it a bad end.

Kespa had to do something, and they did it relatively quickly. The only reason it took so long was the raging of the people on Flash's side. I don't blame them, I blame the fact that they didn't get Flash a computer that could handle the epicness of the Finals.

The call for the third game was bullshit, it shouldve been redone. PCCCGG.

Redoing the 3rd game would have been way more unfair to Jaedong, than giving Jaedong the win was unfair to Flash. Jaedong still had defilers, Flash was retreating his MnMs, Jaedong was taking a 5th, Flash was soon to be mining on 1 base, Jaedong had the upgrade advantage... Jaedong had a massive advantage. Regaming that would have basically taken Jaedong's massive advantage, and flushed it down the toilet, like it never happened. Not to mention forcing a regame on such a T>Z Map would have been even more icing on the unfairness cake.

But hahahahahahhahahahah no Duel Crown for you, Flash!

I agree with your post Rad, I think the game quality was very good and I do not mean to take anything away from either player.

But... I want to make a few interesting points:

1. 14 Minutes into the game - Flash kills the top right, making it 2 vs 2 for functioning bases, granted JD's 3 O clock expo was not mining at all at this time.

2. 15 Minutes into the game - JD's 3'O Clock Expo begins functioning, making JD up 3 v 2 bases.

3. 16 Minutes into the game - JD's Bottom Left Expo does not have a single Drone mining and at this minute Flash is still finishing up mining at his main. Still 3 v 2 bases

4. 17 Minutes into the game - Flash Obtains 3 3 upgrades on his marines

5. 18 Minutes into the game - Flash gets his 3rd Expo up and running with a full group of SCV's mining while JD is really really struggling to hold his bottom left. JD momentarily holds a 4 v 2 base advantage but his Bottom Left expo could have went down at any moment against Flash's 3 3 Marines.

6. 18 Minutes into the game - The Power goes out and the game ends.

Things to Note

- JD was was starting to mine in the bottom left for about 1 minute before the game ends, this means that JD was holding a functioning 4 v 2 base lead for about 1 minute, and at any second his Bottom Left Expo could have fallen to the big ball of marines flash was gathering.

- Simple to know but easy to forget - Zerg needs to be up 1 base on Terran to be equal, so really we are talking that towards the end of the game JD was holding the advantage for the last minute when he went up 4 v 2 bases

My opinion - This is way way way way way way to close to call and I believe Kespa really made the wrong decision across the board here. The 3 3 upgrades for flash was something that was completely overlooked and its sad to see.

Maybe Flash should not have made the PCGG (Power Cord Good Game) the fate of his finals, but the bottom line is that it did. Game 4 was not Flash, you could see the frustration and anger. I mean he was close to forfeiting the match and he was never able to recover.

Also, after the Power Cord instance, JD was not happy.. You saw the coach go over and rub his shoulders calming him down, he was frustrated as well because he did not want it to end like that.

So Kespa... If the guy you give the win to (JD) isn't even happy with the call, maybe its time to reconsider your choice.

Agreed... Kespa should have taken their time.. They rushed to a decision and then took over an hour to settle their choice.. Why not take thirty minutes to decide and less time to settle!

Frustrating indeed...

BTW: I'm taking nothing away from Jaedong, nothing at all... His muta control and overall play was out of this world as far as I'm concerned.

I'm not sure about the 3/3. I'm pretty sure he was on 2/2.

Either way, Jaedong had 5/2 ultralisks so he was definitely not at a significant upgrade disadvantage. He also had swarms constantly going up and Flash's science vessal count was kept low by scourge. Flash couldn't have broken the base. Have you ever tried to break a turtling Zerg who has swarm and even only a few ultras, while you only have two dozen medicmarines and four science vessals? Don't forget that there was a nydus canal there as well for immediate reinforcements.

But yeah, blame the blackout

marines were at 3/3 but ultras were at 2/5 i believe and defilers still out. imo, flash loses that game 95% of the time. whether or not it should be redone is one thing, but jaedong was pretty clearly winning. Flash had very few mnm forces left, vessels dying left and right, and only 1-1.5 bases mining.

18:13 in game 3, he was at 3 3 I believe, unless my eyes are giving out! xD

I'm adding a poll to this thread.

I just casted this...

And Neo, you can defend your favorite player all you want, but I'm not a hardcore JD fan or Flash fan, and from an objective point of view, this final was BS.

All of this "He would have, he should have" nonsense doesn't mean a thing. Replay the game. I don't care if it was a Terran favored map, I don't care if Jaedong had the advantage in the game. The simple fact is this - the game was not decided yet. I've seen refs struggle over regame decisions for much more one-sided games than that. And in the finals? Well, that's a special kind of BS right there. But, this is coming from the same tournament where Flash's face was broadcast over a game in which Kal had the disadvantage, but was still definitely in the game.

As good and fun as the games were, this finals will forever be tainted by the decision in the third game. It's a shame, but that's the truth. What's especially embarrassing is that people who are new to the sport will start asking around "Who are the best players?" They'll find out about Flash and Jaedong and they'll watch this series first. What a freakin' disaster.

Well said nuke, I could not agree father...

It's a shame.. the game was way to early to call and thats the bottom line..

Hardcore Jaedong fan I am, but honestly, even I thought it was all BS when it happened. I wanted them to replay it but they gave Jaedong the game.

I was still kinda pissed about it this morning but I read a few topics on TL.

http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessag...topic_id=110681

Like this. KesPA really didn't have a choice.

It should definitely be the last one:

only person to think he would win on match point? like everyone was saying that was the map jaedong had the best chance to win on lol.

Guess what? I'm more objective than you. I dislike both players.

It would have been unfair to Jaedong to take the advantage he built up on a hugely Terran favored map (and it was a big advantage), and say it never happened, and give Flash yet another shot. Nazgul put it right on TL: "Jaedong had the game won 99% and to make him re-play it would be more unfair than to give Flash the loss. By a large margin. To go from 99% to 50% is way worse than going from 1% to 0%. In my eyes KeSPA made the right decision."

i could honestly see it going either awy, but here's my problem with redoing the game, aside from the fact that Jaedong had a dominating advantage. It's not as simple as saying "just do it again, everything is still fair." Both players came into the game with a gameplan and a strategy. It's not fair to jaedong to tell him to "do it again." Flash knows what's coming. And, yes, both players know what the other did, but you're now replaying the game without the prepared builds and gameplan. Which, imo, isn't fair to the person who prepared and executed their gameplan better (jaedong).

So, am i disappointed? yes. Do I think it was unfair? sure, but it had to be unfair for one or the other. There is no perfect solution. Will I forever remember this MSL as "The Tainted One?" HELL NO!! Jaedong DESERVED to win.

I have a zero-tolerance policy for awarding games (and for a while, Kespa did too!) If the game outcome isn't 100% certain (99% isn't 100%, btw), then just replay the damn thing. We're not playing for quality points here, we're playing for wins. The refs' decision had much more of an impact on Flash's state of mind than a simple loss would have. His dad flipped out and his team threatened to leave. There was no way he could win after that.

So yeah, I will think of this as the tainted MSL.

The problem with Flash vs Jaedong is that unless Flash or JD is about to GG, the game could go both ways. So...yeah, I would redo that match.

I'm not actually a fanboy of either player, but I would have been more upset with the game being redone and Flash had won the redo. The fact of the matter is, by doing a redo, you are throwing away all of the hard work and preparation jaedong did to win that game. That would be an outrage considering he had all but won the game.

The call wasn't fair by any stretch of the imagination, but then again - in that situation, no call is going to be fair. You award Jaedong the win, and there is still that sliver of hope that Flash could have come back. It's Flash, after all. Any other Terran and I think the bitching wouldn't be there, but it's Flash - so saying he could come back is a very uphill battle but not completely out of this world. But if you force a regame - Jaedong did have a significant advantage - players better than us all combined have all said Flash had a very slim chance (.1% < x < 1%) to come back and things WERE in Jaedong's favor. Therefore, especially on such an awful ZvT map, Jaedong having to go back to square one would have been massively unfair. So there wasn't a good decision there to be made. KeSPA went with what they thought was the better of the two decisions. This is one of those lose-lose situations for KeSPA. If you force a regame, Jaedong fans will be upset. If you give Jaedong the win, Flash fans will be upset. No matter what you do, objective parties will be split on the decision.

In the end, MBC is where all the blame lies on this one, not KeSPA. For once, KeSPA didn't do something completely boneheaded - they couldn't win in that situation. MBC put them in a shitty situation by using a new stadium for the biggest starleague finals since 2007 when Savior and Nada met in the OSL.

So don't get mad at KeSPA - be mad at MBC on this one.

I've been mad with MBC for years tbh I've never thought the MSL was as epic as the OSL for various reasons.

http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessag...topic_id=110703

Yeah, I mean if the decision went against Jaedong, and Jaedong's dad flipped out, and his team threatened to leave, there would be no way for Jaedong to win after that.

Kwark put it nicely also, with the two decisions KeSPA was faced with:
'Option 1, say "sorry Flash, I know you weren't planning to type out for another 20 seconds but that's the way it is". Option 2, say "sorry JaeDong, you gotta do over, better hope that build works twice lol".'

Absolutely agree.

At least it will make next MSL a little more interesting. How much you want to bet that MBC staged the outage? They already showed promo ghost Flash, so this is the next logical step to turn the MSL into professional wrestling.

I'll see you at ROYAL RUMBLE, JAEDONG!! oooooooooooooooooo yeeeeeeeeeeeeuh!

Figured I should add in something here quickly.

First off, yes, Jaedong definitely had a the upper hand in many different ways. Any of you guys who saw us go over that last 5 minutes of the game over and over again during the live cast while waiting will know this. Flash's first 2 bases were almost mined out from his constant macro and losing marines, setting him at maybe 1.5-2 bases as far as income went. I really like what Phrank said, which was that Jaedong was so confident that he could hold the bottom left base, he actually built the 2nd Extractor before the power went out.

BUT... as I voted in the poll, I totally agree they should have re-played the game. KESPA can go suck a Zerg egg for all I care. Not only did a default win probably make game 4 harder on Flash mentally, it made the resulting victory almost meaningless for Jaedong. Who knows if this will end up haunting him later on? Lame.

Absolutely nothing wrong with KeSPA's decision here. They made the right call. The whole situation was unfortunate, and KeSPA was put in a lose-lose scenario. I'm still angry that the match was ruined because of the obvious psychological effects the outage had on both players, but I don't resent the refs/KeSPA at all for the decision they made (this is the rare exception to the rule: "Blame KeSPA!").

100% of the blame lies with MBC and their technical crew. This is the one time pointing the finger at KeSPA is not called for.

So, you think it was the wrong decision not to regame, but you agree that if there was a regame, then Jaedong would have no chance of winning due to the stuff I said. Yep, you are right, you are VERY unbiased.

Interesting thoughts, thanks for sharing!

Although they "technically" made the right call on who would have probably won, that doesn't negate the fact that it's in poor taste to call a game like that. Starcraft isn't like UFC where you score points for hits, so if there isn't a KO, you can easily determine a winner. If I remember correctly, game 2 looked like it was in Jaedong's hands, then Flash pulled some absolutely brilliant drop play and took the game. I guarantee that if the power went out in game 2 before Flash did this, KeSPA would have given that game to Jaedong as well. That's the problem most people are having with them giving away game 3. It's Starcraft, and these are insanely high level players. Anything could have happened.

Just something to think about. They may have been following their rules, and that's understood, but perhaps the rules should be changed...

I don't really see what else they could do.

What you guys don't understand, is that if there was any way that Flash could have made a come back, they would have probably regamed. Here is a theoretical situation: imagine if Jaedong 4pooled, but Flash blocked the 4pool with almost no losses at all. And then the power went out. Technically Jaedong hadn't GGed yet. But anyone with a brain who knows stuff about Starcraft knows that Jaedong would have already lost. Would you regame? Hell no, lol

In this situation, Flash All-Ined that expansion, but failed. He was done. He just hadn't GGed yet. Then the power went out. And you people think there should be a regame?

I also think game 3 was over. Unless Flash would've used a money hack there was no way he could beat jaedongs tech and economy because he was almost dry on most of his bases

Say you play chess vs IBM Deep Blue and have him in checkmate next move due to your secretly developed revolutionary 29 turn planned opening, and his HP Power Supply fails, turning him off, do you regame?

Guys, you never considered option C: You beat them both into a coma, hard enough so they forget everything in the past 20mins, but not too hard to forget their plans. That's the only fair and sensible way to go about it.

Nope, you misunderstood me. I would have wanted a regame even if Jaedong was in the same position. Although, sarcastic posts get no respect from me, man. Lighten up. You're the one who sounds biased, to be honest.

Long time lurker, first time poster (and probably back to lurking after this ).

I think of the two choices being debated, giving the win to Jaedong was the better call. But I still think it was awfully unfair--majorly to FlaSh, but also to Jaedong, he wasn't happy either. Wouldn't it've been best to reset and postpone the series, draw up a new map pool, and play from scratch in a week or two? Yes that's not perfectly fair to Jaedong since he had an advantage, but it answers all the other difficulties involved in replaying the match right there on the same map. It really seems to answer the heart of the gamesmanship of the sport, and these two players.

Oh shi, best option ever. (no sarcasm)

I feel like my post was ignored so I'm going to reword it:

IntoTheRainbow vs JulyZerg, on 815 III, that map is fucking 23-13 ZvP, Rainbow looks like he's owning, denying July's expos. Bug happens. Re-game. JULY WINS. Fair much????

I don't agree. From a legal standpoint, Kespa is obligated by the rules of the tournament. They didn't just come up with the "give JD the game" solution out of the blue, and it would've been unfair to the players, who by the way agree to those rules when they sign up to the tournament. People don't usually read these rules, and i'm not going to kid you, I generally don't either because they're rarely needed but the rules are there for a reason, so people can know in advance what will happen (my guess is that the time kespa spent making their decision was spent more on reading the rule book than reviewing the replay).

I haven't read the rule book, as i assume most of you haven't, and I won't, so I don't know if awarding the game to the one who is ahead is the only option the Kespa referees had given the situation. Still, if the rules give the referee the burden of taking the decision it doesn't matter if there was a chance of x or y happening, his decision should be respected. It is out of mere respect to the rules of the game that the referee's decision should be respected. The truth of the matter is that the game cannot be continued, and if there is a previous and neutral pact (it doesn't matter who is ahead, if we can't continue we'll decide it this way) it should be enforced. It would be unfair and further aggravating to the players if they were to bypass the rules.

I understand how you people feel, believe me! I also want game three to be decided by a 9 game 5 set supermatch played underwater with limited oxygen reserves according to the vespene geysers each player holds, or a gypsy knife fight to the death between their respective moms, but that just isn't possible. Maybe we should debate what the rulebook SHOULD say. But that would be a somewhat boring discussion that most of you won't be up to and Kespa probably won't care about.

Anyway, just my contribution to the discussion. Given it was somewhat long to write, do post with your thoughts.

I've got to agree with you here.

I don't know what the rules are, but if the refs acted consistently with them, then it's a good call. Game 3 in the OSL tournament finals is not the time to discuss the rules. What's the point of having them if they're going to be broken when you most need them?

Ignored again.

Also, ever heard of the saying, "Learn from your mistakes"?

Caff for taht series ur talkin about between IntoTheRainbow and JulyZerg... yes july did win the re-game, but, he also lost the next game which decided the series, and from what i heard he wasn't playing his top form in the game after the remake of the game.

Um... that's what I said at the end of the post you replied to:

"Just something to think about. They may have been following their rules, and that's understood, but perhaps the rules should be changed..."

I agree that KeSPA has to follow their rules, as in any sport, but I hope this controversy is something that will make them think twice in the future. Again, if the power outage had happened during game 2, in which Jaedong had twice Flash's bases and Hive tech, I think they would have given that to Jaedong as well... but Flash won.

Flash's position in Game 2 before that dropship trick was worlds apart from where he was at the point the outage happened in Game 3.

Game 2 right before the drop:

• We're a little less that 13 minutes in - Flash still has his main and natural operating at full capacity.
• Jaedong's 3rd and 4th gas have only been operating for around a minute.
• Jaedong just lost all of his Guardians - basically the only presence he has on the map outside of a few ctrl groups of lings.
• Flash still had 3-4 full groups of marines - a huge force relative to JD's and more than enough to compensate for the economic difference.

Game 3 before power outage:

• We're at nearly 19 minutes into the game: Flash has just lost his main, and his natural is very nearly dry (mineral patches were already disappearing)
• He is just a little over a minute away from being on a 1 mineral 1 gas economy against a 4 mineral 4 gas Zerg - there's no nifty trick to making up such a suffocating economic disadvantage
• Flash has about one group of marines at the time of outage that is retreating to his mineral only. Most importantly he hadn't amassed the vessels he needed to make his build successful against the late-game army of JD (he had 3 vessels, all of which didn't have enough mana to irradiate the defilers)
• Jaedong has 2 defilers at 7 oclock with energy, 2 damaged ultralisks, and reinforcements that included at least one full-health ultralisk and lings to boot. That expansion was not going to fall.

Even the best progamers have to work under the limitations given to them at any one point in the game. At that point in game 3 the limitations Flash was facing were rapidly becoming insurmountable. They weren't enough to say JD had it 100% but they were large enough to negate having a re-game being an option. Sure, Flash could have survived for another 5 minutes, but ultimately JD had a sizable advantage in Game 3 that he didn't have in Game 2.