Down goes Goliath

Smack in the middle of Tennessee, an up and coming American Protoss dubbed Cruncher just beat one of the greatest and most infamous American players of all time.

Idra’s 1-2 fall to a person he’d been publicly antagonizing only recently led to an explosion of emotional reactions from fans all over the world. Many fans were ecstatic with the Protoss win and happily danced on Idra’s grave. Others defended their fallen Zerg hero and attacked Cruncher’s play and behavior.

Twitter, Facebook, Team Liquid, Reddit and every corner of the StarCraft universe felt the weight of ten thousand nerds screaming out. Team Liquid went offline instantly and Reddit followed shortly thereafter.

The winner, Cruncher, has just expanded his fan base tenfold. Although his resume includes convincing recent wins over the likes Kas, Sjow, Inca and more, it is this win over Idra which the world will remember as his coming out moment. It is this win that sponsors will hear about.

A history

Cruncher’s competitive history began about five years ago with Warcraft 3. Over time, his career rose to the point of playing multiple World Cyber Games and Blizzcons.

Cruncher’s StarCraft 2 career began on February 17, 2010, the day the beta was released. He’d earned a key during 2009 Blizzcon regionals.

“My transition was pretty smooth,” wrote Cruncher. “I actually played the beta, mostly random and team games but did not practice to get good,” wrote Cruncher. “I actually played StarCraft 1 a bit before and during the beta downtime so I had an idea of how the macro was going to go. In about November, I began to solo a lot more but I was still playing World of Warcraft until December and from then on I played StarCraft 2 only.”

Although he is currently attending Middle Tennessee State University (with his major currently undeclared), it would seem that gaming takes some precedence. Not necessarily competitive StarCraft 2, mind you - in addition to Brood War, WoW and WC3, Cruncher plays League of Legends and SC2 Tower Defense (“My favorite!”) - but he is gaming through and through.

“I just focus on school whenever I have some sort of test coming up,” said Cruncher, “otherwise it is pretty much gaming besides some homework here and there. Both suffer somewhat but SC2 suffers more since it takes more time to get results, where as in school, studying a couple hours a week gets you through.”


Breakout Victory

Cruncher’s win over Idra has sparked a thousand debates. Are force fields overpowered? Was Idra simply unlucky? Was Cruncher unforgivably cheap?

“I’ll use whatever it takes to win,” said Cruncher. “If that means using an ‘imbalanced’ unit then so be it. Find another game or complain to Blizzard.”

During the pre-game interviews at teamliquid.net, Cruncher was asked if he would prepare specific strategies for the American Zerg legend.

“I will indeed,” he responded. “I've been practicing a lot and feel I am prepared.”

When asked today if everything happened as expected, Cruncher answered affirmatively.

“The games went almost exactly as planned,” said Cruncher. “I knew drops were coming before game 2, but I was unable to get enough practice in to learn the timings and so forth, so I lost that map. In the last map, I scouted him and found he had no army, no spine crawlers, and went for a pressure push, and ended up winning.”

If predicting Idra’s play style was easy, predicting his controversial behavior was a cake walk. Idra’s lack of GGs in each game combined with his pregame trash talk created a heated atmosphere.

“I'm approaching the match as if it were a walkover,” said Idra in the days before the match. “He's going to 4 gate all-in both games unless he decides to be clever and make voidrays or DTs.”

In the pre-game lobby after the Zerg’s only victory, Idra took one more verbal poke at his opponent.

“It must suck for you when skill is involved."

“I just ignore that kind of stuff,” said Cruncher. “Idra is known for being immature.”

:)

Cruncher’s victory was sealed not with a GG but with a now-iconic smiley face: :), thus instantly creating a meme and igniting a firestorm of praise and criticism.

“I knew Idra would be raging at that point,” said Cruncher, “and nothing is better than smiling after beating someone who expected a walkover.”

With those keystrokes, the American Protoss won over an army of new fans and a ton of respect from those who didn’t know enough to give it to him before. Cruncher knew it, too: as the game ended, he made posts on WCReplays.com highlighting his own smiley taunt as well as revealing Idra’s mid-series trash talking.

The smiley face was a master stroke. Anything more would have been seen as overkill, someone too excited for their own good. Anything less would have been forgotten. The :) is simple, memorable and stinging beyond any doubt.

Yes, Cruncher knows exactly the worth of his smile, of his win and of his rising stock in the StarCraft world.

When asked if he wanted to say anything to his new fans or old, the American Protoss responded with a concise and clear message.

“:)”

You really can kill them with kindness.