Two weeks. Two weeks without Starcraft because of his internet being accidentally disconnected from him. Pip had missed the cry of battle for the past two weeks due to some moron in the telecommunication industry had accidentally disconnected him off from the World Wide Web. What really ticked him was that they tried to cover up their mistakes. But now, through a little “persuasion”, the higher powers have decided to give him a little “upgrade” when he goes online to cover up for their mistakes.
As he entered into the hallowed channel of 419, he was greeted by 4 other Starcraft players – GAME, YC , Raz and Druggy. But an eerie and cold feeling began to overwhelm him. In his absence for the past two weeks, the members of 419 were plagued with spitefulness in their battles. Despite the cheerful greetings, the members of 419 had one thing in their mind: spitefulness. Yet, such thoughts did not bother him at all. If it was anything, what mattered to Pip was honor. It was good to see that while spitefulness reigned in 419, a glimmer of honor still remained.
The latency in the Internet connection of other members of 419 showed him that during his absence, they had gone lax. “ Yellow and red bars – are these people preparing for new year of something?” thought Pip. The lethargy of 419 members was subsequently confirmed when Druggy, the former map creator of 419, requested that Pip create the map. Perusing through his own training database, he found a map where he was familiar with: The Dream of Bahlea, a mutli-layered map with no ramps or entrances. What made this map unique was that players need to transport their troops to a lower level unless they plan to do battle in their own bases.
The game started off with an uneasy alliance between Pip and Raz, as Terrans, commanding the left half of the map while the maniacal GAME and evil YC as Protoss and Zerg in the other half. Seeing that both of his opponents are playing their strongest race, Pip thought that what was necessary to win this battle was not by physical brute force but by attrition. A true genius he is, Pip began to switch his normal gaming style – from pure melee troops to a mixture of melee and scientific troops. Such troops would, in the long run, provide Pip with an added advantage against an assortment of sorties.
It was no more than a few minutes into the game, Pip’s base was bombarded with 8 Zealots descending from their dropships. Pip hated the fact that he had to deal with someone coming from behind his base. Such an act was dishonourable and cowardly but still he had to give GAME credit for attempting such a move. But for some strange reason, Pip felt that GAME’s troops were moving so slowly. It must be due to the new connection that everything seem to move so slowly.
Swiftly adopting a defensive posture, Pip summoned his troops to form a wall so that his siege tanks may provide additional supporting fire. The marines and medics aimed madly towards the crazed zealots bringing two of them down before falling down. Yet, all was not lost-the siege tanks manage to take out four more zealots. The remaining two zealots made a mad dash for the SCVs mining. To the Zealots horror, the SCVs stopped mining and charged towards them. Armed with their precision cutters, the SCV sliced through the Zealots through sheer brute strength alone.
As he breath a sigh of relief, another dropship slowly appeared at Pip’s base. However, this time it was different.
The dropship began unloading dragoons – GAME must have anticipated that Pip would have teched straight to tanks to counter against any further troops. Little did GAME knew that he was not just dealing with tanks, but SCVs as well. The dragoons, like the last two zealots moved closer towards the mineral patch only to find SCVs charging towards them instead of running away. Needless to say, all that remained in the battle field shortly were dragoon remains.
The UnHoly Alliance – Pip and The Defender of the Universe
Meanwhile, Raz was dealing with his own problems. YC was dropping off tons of zerglings into his base and causing mishaps towards his natural expansions. “Argh...” struggled Raz. The might of YC as a Zerg player was truly strong – it is no wonder that he was the King of Zerg for 419. Raz had earlier dropped unsuccessfully a few Vulture bikes at YC’s base only to have them destroyed through overwhelming number of Zerglings. In his usual self, YC had laughed at Raz’s failed attempts of attacking him at his strongest.
However, the laughter was short lived when a couple of Terran dropships bearing the insignia of Pip’s began dropping tanks and marines. Carefully placing siege encampments in a quadrant like position, the troops began to siege YC, crippling him temporarily. It was only until a huge sacrificial amount of zerglings that Pip’s shock troopers were brought down.
“Thanks.” typed Raz.
“No problem. Maybe you can help me out with GAME then” replied Pip. Within the snap-trap mind of Pip, there were two reasons why he needed to rescue Raz. Firstly, Raz’s incredible macro skills with his ground troops proved to be a formidable force against any ground force regardless of what troops they were confronted with. Secondly, it was very difficult to land towards GAME’s base as there were anti-air cannons and troops waiting for his troops the moment they land-it was a fool’s choice to drop at GAME’s base. Seeing that his troops needed additional support fire and flexibility over the steep terrain of Bahlae, Raz realised that such an alliance would be beneficial to both parties. Pip’s nimble and mobile force would be a perfect addition to Raz’s force. But what made the Alliance really interesting was the fact that Pip had some big big Battle Cruisers.
Albeit the differences in game play and tactics, the troops of Raz and Pip slowly began to gather at the Centre of the Dream. Vultures bikes deployed spider mines to prevent anything from disturbing the meeting of this two great forces. True enough, YC was waiting for Pip and Raz for revenge over what they did to his base. YC’s main economy was all but lost and the remaining auxillary bases had some slight problems in terms of producing troops. YC’s ally, GAME, had troubles on his own also. The Protoss had some slight mobility issues when it came to a multi-layered map like Bahlea. Only two troops were able to transport them to a different level of the map: The Shuttle and the Arbiter. The trouble was that the Shuttle could only load very few troops while the Arbiter required energy to transport it troops. GAME was practically a prison in his own base.
Hoping that a variety of troops would provide some sort of resistance against Pip and Raz, YC crossed his fingers that GAME would bring as much as possible troops to the place of confrontation.
Scurrying all remaining zerglings to his command and morphing all available troops to higher level units, YC began to carry out a suicide attack against the forces of Pip and Raz. Needless to say, the combined might of Pip and Raz proved to be too formidable. YC’s troops were slaughtered and did not even know what hit them until it was too late.
GAME’s reinforcement arrived a little too late to leap into the battle fray as Raz’s tanks took out any remaining ground infantry easily. The additional meat shields provided by the Battle Cruisers absorbed most of the puny damage that was inflicted towards them while the tanks and vultures finished off any remaining ground force.
Special Mention – GAME, The Micro Assassin
Anyone looking down on GAME’s micro ought to be shot. Amidst the havoc of sieging laid down by Raz and Pip, GAME had finally revealed his favourite play – the Dark Templar assassin. Prior to Raz and Pip expanding, GAME had secretly hid a few Dark Templars at the natural expansions of Pip and Raz. Such a bold move was never anticipated by Pip and Raz as they kept on sending SCVs to establish a new base – only to find them dead minutes later.
But what made GAME’s game play shine were not the assassination of SCV’s, but the assassination of siege tanks and marines. Amidst the chaos of being sieged by Pip and Raz, GAME had manage to give an illusion that there were multiple DT’s attacking Pip and Raz when in truth, there was only one DT. By skilfully making critical hits (but not killing) the tanks and marines, a player would not really know that he was under attack by DT until ALL his troops are killed off in one strike. When Pip and Raz had realised this, it was already too late – nearly half of their troops were dead. A careful scan eventually revealed the DT, but the DT was soon replaced by another DT. As the cycle repeats, Pip and Raz eventually had to fall back as they ran out of com scans.
One begins to wonder how does GAME execute such a brilliant move under such conditions? Only a professional player would be able to execute such moves against TWO players. The swiftness combined with guile and stealth was truly a force to be reckoned with.
It was after 54 minutes into the game and Pip was nearly running out of minerals. All that remained in the attacking force was nothing more than a few SCVs and tanks and two dropships. In a last desperate attempt, Pip divided the remaining SCVs and tanks and loaded them off into the dropships. One shot – he had all but one shot. The dropship hastily made their way to their destination with Pip’s hope. “Pip Destroying Technique - SCV Tank Attack!” yelled Pip. As they descended upon their destination, the tanks began to siege and the SCVs began to attack. Never in the history of 419 did a player used his workers as an attacking force especially after a big game. It was an act of desperation for Pip. Such an act brought fear and shock to YC and GAME – the sight of troops covered with blood lusted eyes was enough to tell them that the battle was over.
As the last hatchery began to bleed to death – Pip felt triumphant. There can only be one reign in this map – His reign.
