The Team Liquid Starleague has become one of the biggest events of the year. TSL is known for changing the lives of many young pro gamers looking to make a name for themselves. This TSL will be no different in fact with the upcoming launch of HOTS this might be the tournament for someone to build their career

Tonight it will be decided, who will win the fourth TSL. After the third place match between Keen and Sting, it will be Creator and Life who will fight for the title of the most prestigious online tournament. We'll be covering all the action from tonight. So make sure to check back for the latest updates!


Image courtesy of TeamLiquid





Series recap:
The first game on Antiga Shipyard started out with Sting going for a command center first and Keen going for a more aggressive route. Keen was quiet successful in disrupting Stings play with a marine helion push early on, followed up by cloaked Banshees. Sting responded to the pressure with a strong counter push that got cleaned up by Keen. This resulted in Keen taking a quicker third and being economically ahead going into the mid game. Sting realized that he was behind and tried to do a huge doom drop into Keens main. Keen not only managed to kill all the units in his main, maintaining his tank lead, but also took out Stings third at the same time. The following push proved to much for Sting to handle and he is forced to gg

On Daybreak, both players went for an early gas build, both opting to go for banshees. While Sting decided to do the more greedier variation, with an earlier expansion, Keen opted for the more safe option by getting tanks and siege a lot earlier. After getting a Raven and three tanks Keen recognized the position he was in and decided to push. Keen caught Stings marines out of position and was able to force a lift from the natural command center and contain Sting. When Sting eventually broke Keen's contain it was already to late as Keen had established his economy and a strong infrastructure to support it. Keen kept playing very safe by putting turrets around his base and leaving Siege Tanks in his main as he pushed to end the game. Sting lost his whole army in an attempt to drop after seeing the push coming and ggs

Even on the macro friendly map Entombed Valley both players decided to do a an early gas build. This time it was Keen who got the earlier natural expansion up. As he defended Stings first push he overextended trying to counter push and got his units cleaned up. While Sting leap frogged his tanks with air superiority into Keens main, Keen takes a hidden third at the 12 O'Clock position. Keen managed to break Stings tank line at his natural and take his third base safely. We found ourselves in a familiar situation as Keen pushes into Stings 3rd and drops into his main while Sting loses his forces that were drop into Keen's main and he is once again forced to gg.

Keen opened up with his standard early gas into expansion build with early tanks in game 4. Sting though tried to mix things up by going 3 reaper early on but unfortunately was not able to do significant damage. Keen once again recognized his slight economic lead perfectly and builds a relatively quick third command center. Sting tried to do a big 2 Base attack, but is once again unable to do any significant damage. Keen now sitting with a greater lead put on a lot of pressure on Sting by sieging Stings third and dropping him at every opportunity. Sting managed to stabilize after taking a lot of damage, most importantly losing his armory, which delayed his 3/3 upgrades. Sting won a battle quite decisively with god positioning and was even able to take out Keens fourth after that but lost all his forces doing so. At this point the economic lead of Keen really showed as he was able to continue to harass Sting with marine drops while pressuring with his main army. After killing Stings attempt at taking a fourth and killing Stings final push, Sting ggs and Keen takes the series with a decisively 4:0 victory!
Recap provided by: Clamev





The first map to start the finals is Ohana, the early stages of the game went rather usual on the Protoss side, the usual forge fast expand build from Creator while on the other side of the map was Life who went for the unusual response with a very fast gas and teching to Infestors. Creators follow up was Stargate tech with one Void Ray and Phoenix support which was shut down rather quickly by the Infestors. After the attack was done with, Life got himself a 4 base economy and started to pressure Creator with Zerglings and dropping with Overlords loaded with more Zerglings and managed to snipe once the main Nexus of Creator. After the lose of his main base, the Korean Protoss player started to do Warp Prism attack with Dark Templars and Zealot squads trying to snipe different tech structures to by himself more time to establish a better economy and late game army. The game itself was rather passive and at the same time full with small actions across the map. One of the first real battles between the two players occurred in the middle of the map, where Life lost all of his Infestors due a Vortex placement and Creator won that battle and started to push towards the Zerg’s base. Slowly after this the second and final battle was started between the two of them where a great number of Brood Lords where cough into a Vortex and all of them died in a matter of seconds and “gg” was typed by Life, as he had no army left to deal with the incoming attack from Creator.

Entombed Valley is the map for the second game, the start was rather passive as both of them did their usual standard builds, Creator as the previous game went for an Forge Fast expand and Life went for the fast three base no gas style. Creator’s strategy this time was a delayed Stargate a little old school build, it was with 5 Phoenix squad and later on followed by a Void Ray production to be a part of the main army. In response to the flying units of the Korean Protoss player Life started his Infestor production and a fourth base. When Creator tried to do something with his Phoenixes they were easily shut down again by the Infestors. As soon as Hive finished for Life he started his Greater Spire and later on started to produce those deadly Brood Lords. Creator did some attacks with his Warp Prism but it was not enough, and he later on push to attack the Zerg player. Creator started an attack towards Life’s natural but lost a quite big part of his army, after that started another attack at the fourth base of Life and barely won the battle with his Blink micro but Roaches and Zerglings came and pushed back Creator’s army after several attempts by Creator to end the game with his blink stalkers he got shut down in the end with Brood Lords and Roach/Infestor composition.

The map for game number three is Daybreak, where both of the players went for the same styles as the previous game, Creator being the one with an early two base economy with a Stargate harass and Life with an early three base economy followed by Infestor tech. One of the key mistakes for Creator was when he tried to get his third base he lost several sentries for nothing in return. As soon as the Protoss started his third base and Life started his fourth, and the game started to look like Void Ray and Colossus versus Infestors and Zerglings. The Zerg player started an attack towards Creator third base with Infestor/Roach/Zerglings and Corruptors, winning the first battle and the second one the trades were more in favour of Life. Creator tried to get a fourth base, but it was denied by Life while he was teching for Brood Lords and was buying himself the needed time. Creator gathered a couple of rounds of Stalkers and tried to get some map control, but when the Brood Lords were on the field they started an attack towards Creator’s army and killed it with ease.

Antiga Shipyard is the map to welcome game number four, where at the early game nothing special happened yet again Life opened with a 3 base style while Creator opted for the 2 base play but this time the tech option on his side was Robotics facility. As soon as Immortal production was started Creator secured himself a third base, Life tried to deny it but the attack was defended with good force fields. Life decided to get the middle base since the map control was in his hands, but at the 14 minute mark Creator started a killer push towards the middle of the map with a high Immortal count and Dark Templars with his main army. With phenomenal force field placements Creator cut Life's army in half and won the battle and the game in convincing fashion.

Game number five was played on Metropolis, where yet again there was no early aggression from both players. they went for their usual openings for their respective races. Creator this time had a plan to end the game in the mid stages, as he teched for a Robotics facility and started his Immortal production showing indications of an Immortal all in with Gateway support. The Protoss player tried to fool Life that he will get a third base and started his push which resulted in a base trade scenario as Life had Zerglings already on the map and near Creator’s base. Due to his fast reflexes Creator managed to wall in his main base and defended that Zergling counter attack, while his main army was destroying the Zerg’s main base and “gg” was typed by Life.

Cloud Kingdom is the map for the potential final map, where early aggression again was not seen in this game. Creator again went for the Forge Fast expansion and Life went for the 3 Hatchery with no gas. Stargate yet again was the choice from Creator to secure himself a third base. Life was no fool and the air attack was once again shut down by Queens and Infestors. As soon as the third base was established Creator started his Colossus production. Life tried to do several pokes with Zerglings and teched to Nydus Network, but the attack failed badly and he got behind in tech. Creator having the huge advantage started a slow attack towards Life’s fourth base. Having the better position and army composition the Protoss player Creator won the battle ending in getting the final game and becoming the champion of TSL4.
Recap provided by: MMDollar

That's it for TSL 4, it's been a great season and the finals were awesome! stay tuned to SK-Gaming.com for more coverage on tournaments like GSL and NASL