ناگزیر: کلیم نے ESL ماسٹرز ونٹر 2023 جیت لیا۔

موم کی طرف سے

آخر کار، مسابقتی StarCraft II میں سب سے زیادہ ناگزیر نتائج میں سے ایک نتیجہ نکلا ہے۔ ESL ماسٹرز ونٹر میں، شاندار ٹیران سے Clem آخر کار لائیو سیٹنگ میں اپنا پہلا بڑا ٹورنامنٹ جیت لیا۔

EPT یورپ کے پانچ ٹائٹلز جیتنے والے اور 2020 کے بعد سے ایک ٹاپ ٹیران کھلاڑی سمجھے جانے والے، کلیم کو آف لائن ٹورنامنٹس میں اور اعلیٰ بین الاقوامی کھلاڑیوں کے خلاف کامیابی کی نسبتاً کمی کی وجہ سے مسلسل پریشان کیا گیا۔ تاہم، عالمی چیمپیئن سیرل اور رینور کے خلاف اپنی بیلٹ کے نیچے کئی بڑی جیت کے ساتھ، اور آن لائن کھیل میں اپنی زبردست صلاحیتوں کے ہفتہ وار ڈسپلے کے ساتھ، کلیم کے کوہان پر قابو پانے میں صرف وقت کی بات تھی۔

It all came together in Atlanta over the course of five series and nineteen maps. Clem cruised through his initial winners’ bracket with two straight wins over گو میہوہو اور کلاسک. اگرچہ کلیم کو کاغذ پر یقینی طور پر پسند کیا گیا تھا، یہ شاید ہی سرسری میچ تھے — خاص کر GuMiho کے خلاف۔ ماضی میں اکثر اسے ٹیران کے خلاف ابتدائی پریشانی کا سامنا کرنا پڑا تھا جس پر اسے نظریاتی فائدہ تھا۔ بغیر کسی مسئلے کے یہ میچ جیتنا، ایک چھوٹے سے انداز میں، ترقی تھی۔

Clem’s victories in the Winners’ Bracket landed him a direct seed into the RO8 of the playoffs, where he ended up drawing a gauntlet of three Zergs in a row: Solar, Serral, and Dark. This was not the unambiguous stroke of fortune it would have been in 2021, when he was a nearly unstoppable force in TvZ. While it remained Clem’s signature match-up, the top Zergs had caught up to him and dealt him a number of painful losses in 2023, making his final playoff run in Atlanta a challenge (Clem himself said after the finals that he had not been feeling confident in the match-up).

پہلے تھا شمسی توانائی سے کوارٹر فائنل میں (VOD)۔ ONSYDE Zerg اپنے کیریئر کا بہترین سٹار کرافٹ کھیل رہا تھا، جس نے آخر کار دو ماہ سے بھی کم عرصہ قبل GSL Code S جیت لیا تھا۔ کلیم کے بارے میں مزید بات یہ تھی کہ اس سال ان کی پچھلی آف لائن میٹنگز میں کیا ہوا تھا: وہ گیمرز 8 (0-2) اور ہوم اسٹوری کپ 23 (0-3) دونوں میں جیت گیا تھا۔ درحقیقت، سولر ایک مضبوط حریف ثابت ہوا، جس نے دو گیمز میں کلیم کو زیر کر لیا۔ تاہم، کلیم دیگر تین گیمز میں ابتدائی گیم کے اہم دباؤ کو لاگو کرنے میں کامیاب رہا، جس نے خود کو 3-2 سے تنگ کر کے فتح حاصل کی۔

مشکل کی سطح سیمی فائنل میں اپنی بلند ترین ترتیب تک پہنچ گئی، جیسا کہ کلیم کا مقابلہ ہوا۔ سیرال (VOD). The Clem vs Serral match-up had gone through two major swings in the 2020’s, with Clem gaining the upper hand in 2021 before Serral brought it back in his favor in 2022 and onward. 2023 had been an especially good year for Serral in the head-to-head, as he had defeated Clem in both seasons of EPT Europe, as well as HomeStory Cup 24. But despite losing in the end, Clem had managed to keep things close in those series, giving more than enough evidence that he could triumph if he was on form.

As it turned out, Clem was in the form of his life on December 17th in Atlanta, as he took a 3-1 victory over his regional rival. While Clem’s victory in itself wasn’t a huge surprise, the manner of his victory was unexpected. It wasn’t at all like his victory against Solar, where he broke his opponent with non-stop pressure starting in the first minute of the game (what one might call a ‘typical’ Clem TvZ). Instead, it was Maru-esque defense that saw him weather Serral’s furious attacks, eventually grinding the Finnish Phenom down in a war of attrition.

۔ Alcyone پر تیسرا گیم خاص طور پر باہر کھڑا ہوا، دونوں کھلاڑیوں نے اسے 36 منٹ تک سلگ آؤٹ کیا۔ یہ کھیل کے دو صاف ترین کھلاڑیوں کے لیے کیچڑ میں ایک نایاب جھگڑا تھا، جس میں میچ کی شدید شدت نے کھلاڑیوں کو لاپرواہی سے فیصلے کرنے اور غیر معمولی غلطیاں کرنے پر مجبور کر دیا۔ ایسا نہیں ہے کہ یہ اس کے معیار سے تھوڑا سا ہٹ گیا ہے — یہ StarCraft II کے کسی بھی پرستار کے لئے سال کے امیدوار کا واضح کھیل ہونا چاہئے۔

Aptly, the last challenge for Clem was the ‘final boss’ گہرا (VOD). Unlike Solar and Serral, Dark didn’t have an edge on Clem in 2023, as the two had tied 1-1 in their previous offline meetings. What Dark کیا اپنے راستے پر چلنا ایک فاتح اور بڑے میچ پلیئر ہونے کی وجہ سے اس کی اچھی شہرت تھی۔

It seemed to be a worthy final test of Clem’s nerves and skill, but unfortunately it wasn’t the blockbuster match fans were hoping for. After channeling Maru’s defense against Serral, some GSL finals syndrome had rubbed off as well. Clem took out Dark in a convincing 4-1 series, where his offense, defense, early-game, mid-game, and late-game were all on point. While Dark did manage to take a map with a decisive base trade, there was no questioning who the better player was on the night.

While Clem had already won five EPT Europe titles up to that point, his reaction after the final GG was a familiar one we’ve seen from so many first-time champions: total relief. The unseen burden on his shoulders, to win a major tournament in a live setting, had been lifted.

“That means so much, winning my first offline tournament, in front of this crowd—you guys are amazing, that feels amazing.” کلیم نے میچ کے بعد اپنے انٹرویو میں کہا۔ “I’ve been practicing for this so much, the past few months I was at home practicing so much and it feels really nice… …seeing it pay off on a stage like this.”

In the end, this first offline championship was, indeed, inevitable for a player of Clem’s caliber. And, going on his performance at DreamHack Atlanta, that might be true of many more to come.

EPT سرمائی (اٹلانٹا) سے مکمل نتائج

پلے آف بریکٹ
+ دکھائیں۔ سپوئلر [دکھانے کے لیے کلک کریں] +

ناک آؤٹ بریکٹ
+ دکھائیں۔ سپوئلر [دکھانے کے لیے کلک کریں] +

اوپن بریکٹ کے نتائج:
+ دکھائیں۔ سپوئلر [دکھانے کے لیے کلک کریں] +

اوپن اسٹیج بریکٹ #1

اوپن اسٹیج بریکٹ #2

اوپن اسٹیج بریکٹ #3

اوپن اسٹیج بریکٹ #4

Winners’ Stage Results:
+ دکھائیں۔ سپوئلر [دکھانے کے لیے کلک کریں] +

فاتحین کا اسٹیج بریکٹ #1

فاتحین کا اسٹیج بریکٹ #2

Inevitability was the theme of Clem’s first major offline title. How did the StarCraft II scene come to believe so deeply in the 21-year-old French Terran?

کلیم نے 2018 کے موسم بہار میں اپنی WCS (ورلڈ چیمپیئن شپ سیریز) کی شروعات کی، جب وہ 16 سال کی عمر میں برفانی طوفان کے سرکاری مقابلوں کے لیے عمر کا اہل ہو گیا۔ مسابقتی سٹار کرافٹ II منظر میں اس کی شمولیت درحقیقت کم از کم 2013 تک تھی، جب اس نے فرانسیسی LAN ٹورنامنٹس میں کھیلا۔ as an 11-year-old. Thus, even before the ‘official ‘start to his progaming career, Clem had gained a reputation as a skilled up-and-comer.

For the first year and a half of Clem’s WCS career, he remained a curio—a player known more for his blazingly fast hands than his results. In his first six outings in WCS main events during 2018-2019, Clem finished in the RO16 or lower each time. In contrast, fellow prodigy Reynor debuted just a few months after Clem in 2018, and reached the finals of a WCS main event in just his second attempt (he barely lost to Serral in the finals).

In 2020, events outside of StarCraft drastically changed the course of Clem’s career. First, Clem graduated from high school and was able to focus entirely on professional gaming. Similar to Serral in 2018, this کل وقتی حیثیت میں شفٹ paid off big and paid off fast. In Clem’s first tournament of the year, IEM Katowice 2020, he had to endure a hugely disappointing result as he was eliminated in the round-of-76. But just nine months later, Clem won his first major championship in the online tournament of EPT Europe, beating both Serral and Reynor on his way to the title (technically, it was branded DreamHack Masters Europe at the time, but I’ll merge EPT and DHM for convenience here).

That brings us to Clem’s second major career event of 2020—the COVID-19 pandemic. The fully-online EPT Europe tournament being converted from a glorified qualifier to true “major” status was largely a result of the pandemic, as the entire StarCraft II tournament system was restructured to facilitate online play. This was absolutely crucial to Clem, as essentially تمام of his early success would come in these EPT Europe events. Over 2021-22, Clem would go on to win four additional EPT Europe championships, completing his own “E5L” as a counterpart to Maru’s G5L.

Due to the peculiar nature of Clem’s rise, it came with inevitable caveats. Sure, you could look past the fact that all of his championships were won online, since everyone outside of Korea was playing under the same conditions. However, what couldn’t be excused was his lack of success in online بین الاقوامی play. Despite his dominance in Europe, Clem fell short time and time again when it was time to play against the best players from other continents—namely those from Korea. ‘Clem is weak against Terran’ became the conventional wisdom, and broadly speaking that was correct. However, he was also vulnerable against the top GSL players regardless of faction, with Zest, Dark, Trap, Stats, and PartinG all eliminating Clem in events where he was presumed to be among the championship contenders.

Whether it was the EPT Season Finals or third party events such as TeamLiquid Starleague, Clem couldn’t reproduce his stellar results from domestic competition. During the pandemic period, top four was the best he achieved in global competitions. In a handful of events, he was even eliminated in the group stages.

Within these shortcomings lay the most unusual part of Clem’s rise. In spite of his hyper-regionalized success, in spite of his repeated failures to perform in international play, fans never stopped believing in him as a true championship contender.

وہ نتائج پر آنکھوں کے ٹیسٹ پر بھروسہ کرنے کی بہترین مثال تھے۔ میکانکس اور خام رفتار کے لحاظ سے، کلیم شاید سب سے زیادہ ہنر مند ٹیران تھا جسے ہم نے کبھی نہیں دیکھا تھا — نوجوان مارو واحد موازنہ تھا۔ ایسا کھلاڑی کیسے ہو سکتا ہے۔ نوٹ آخر میں ایک چیمپئن شپ جیت لیا؟ ایک خالصتاً اسلوباتی عنصر بھی تھا۔ StarCraft II میں کچھ چیزیں ایسی ہیں۔ متاثر کن ایلیٹ لیول TvZ بائیو پلے کے طور پر، اور کلیم ان سب میں سب سے زیادہ اشرافیہ رہا ہوگا۔ اس طرح، کلیم پر یقین نہ کرنا مسابقتی اسٹار کرافٹ کے بارے میں بنیادی طور پر اچھی چیز کو مسترد کرنے کے مترادف تھا۔

And, even though I said results could be overlooked, Clem actually did have the results that mattered most: championships won over Serral and Reynor. Alongside Maru, the two European Zergs were the most dominant players during Clem’s career, and they framed the entire big picture story for StarCraft II. From 2018 to 2023, nearly every major championship had to go through one of these three players. By taking out Serral in Reynor in multiple EPT Europe events (even if they were online), Clem was essentially going in reverse order. It was as if he had already finished his final exam, and we were just waiting for him to finally sign his damn name on the paper.

I went back through some of my old TL.net Power Rank articles, just to make sure I wasn’t retroactively revising my opinions. جون 2021: تیسرا مقام۔ June 2022:: تیسرا مقام۔ نومبر 2022: چوتھی جگہ۔ فروری 2023: ساتویں جگہ (ٹھیک ہے میرا یقین پھسلنا شروع ہو گیا۔ تھوڑا یہاں).

Here’s a particularly appropriate bit from the November 2022 Power Rank:

Okay, so I did leave out the last part where I said I didn’t think he would win DreamHack Atlanta ’22, but you get the point.

For players of a certain quality, it’s always just a matter of time.

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• ماخذ: https://tl.net/forum/starcraft-2/619416-inevitable-clem-wins-esl-masters-winter-2023