The WC3 community in general has a distaste for strategies that use macro to your advantage such as players like yourself and InFi use of towers, and strategies that Grubby has used recently like hit and runs with Raiders. Do you feel personally that strategies like this take less skill or are just different than traditional 50 v 50 or 80 v 80 battles?

I think they are different but they still take skill. There's a lot of timing and thought that goes into my strategies. If I make one mistake anywhere, everything can be blown in a second. What bugs me is how if I win a game by tanking or playing a tower push - it's viewed as cheap. But if I play against a warden user who does nothing but abuse shadow strike it's “OH MY GOD HES SO GOOD HE'S A KOREAN ELF!”

Grubby uses his raiders to kill Yaws Main.

Or Satiini?

True that. Another thing I view as cheap is when you just have a Blademaster or Demon Hunter with boots, chasing your hero across the map - it's so frustrating because the only thing you can do is run, especially on Echo Isles =(


In a nutshell, describe a perfect Hu v Orc T2 Sky push

Hrmmmm my dream... I suppose it would be getting a quick tech off, hitting level 3, grabbing some mercs, kicking some T2 buildings, and not losing a single foot. It really is such a moral victory when you don't lose footmen - they are such crappy units and just get picked off constantly.

Okay. The patch. The changes, were they good?

No - the Nerf to towers kills human. How can you beat Elves and Undead now? Also how will the Sky push be affected? You have to at least buff rifles or breakers before you can nerf towers. The staff nerf wasn't good, now it's impossible for me to pass my staff around. There should have just been a nerf to the elf staff cool down. Warden was left untouched, panda was left untouched, and knights got a small buff but not enough to matter.

Sonkie sky pushing Who in WC3L week 1

Are you upset that DH and BM were completely untouched?

YES! Blade at level 1 could use a -1 armor nerf, and DH needs a mana burn nerf as well as a slight agility nerf. Buff paladin =D

Pre-patch a lot of the community seems to think the hierarchy is NE Hu Orc UD. How do you personally see it, outside of the obvious Orc > UD, UD > Hu, NE > Orc at a higher percentage, and what do you think will happen to these and other match-ups after the patch goes live?

There really is no hierarchy of races, just a hierarchy of pro players. There are of course the obvious imbalances of race match-ups on certain maps but aside from that it's all skill and micro. I can't say about the other match-ups, it's a bit too early. I can say that I fear for Human with the tower nerfs.

Do you want to thank anyone before we go?

Just want to thank my team SRS for supporting me and giving me motivation to continue practicing, and Frank for interviewing me!