Are the Protoss really unpopular in high-level professional play? Seems like I've seen several Zerg v. Terran matches, not too many with the Protoss.
It's because TvP is hugely imbalanced, so it's more than likely in any S-level tournament that all the protoss players get eliminated before the Ro8. And, casters are more likely to show games near the end of the tournament, so you're more likely to see TvZ and TvT than any other match-up.
This is more true for Korea than Europe and America though.
in my opinion protoss has always had the reputation "easiest to play, lowest ceiling," something that dates all the way back to bw and 2001
protoss is the easiest race to macro in both bw and star2, and always had the reputation (especially in bw) of being the "a-move race." protoss was by far the most popular race in the foreign community because of the much shorter learning curve and the possibility of keeping up with more mechanically skilled players. there are several bw progamers, stork being the most famous, that are notorious for having far less apm than their terran and zerg peers.
fast forward to sc2, and the same basically holds true. the foreigner scene has been dominated by protoss (and specifically huk, naniwa, and kiwikaki) until very recently, when thorzain and especially stephano (!) have begun to show real results against koreans. stephano's rise especially in my opinion has been unique because he has mechanical talent on the level of the koreans, unlike players like thorzain (nicknamed by koreans as the "spoon terran" because of his mechanical inability to kill opponents quickly with micromanagement based rushes, thus opting to play slow, methodical games where he waits for his opponent to suicide into him, killing them so slowly it was as if he was doing it with a spoon) and goody (the infamous sub 100 apm mech player whose mechanics are so bad he often queues up 5 units in his factories) who mostly relied on less mechanically demanding turtling to win games. (the protosses played protoss and thus mostly relied on some variation of warp gate rush from 1 or 2 base, which is comparatively easier to execute. obviously they showed flashes of innovation but their bread and butter that won them tournaments was rush based warpgate play).
korean tvp balance has shifted since patch 1.4 came out and the 1/1/1 all in is no longer effective. protosses have begun to use both multi pronged attacks and upgrade timings to their advantage to overrun terran bioballs. i think with perfect ghost and templar control tvp still favors terran, but usually control is less than perfect and indeed at masters and low grandmasters level i would say the matchup favors protoss because of the ease of a-moving shift zzzzzzz tttt zealot archon compared top the necessity of kiting and ghost control as terran.
also, with regard to race talent, the majority of korean progamers who have switched from broodwar are playing terran. notably the game at date of release (which is when most koreans who switched started playing the game, unlike foreigners who began in beta) was incredibly imbalanced at time of release, way more imbalanced than the game was now, and even protoss players in bw (like clare) picked terran. if star2 v 1.0 was used in tournaments today, using the map pool of august 2010, it would literally be impossible for terran players to drop a set.
Right, seven. My mistake. I heard NesTea got eliminated, which baffles me. It means it's probably going to come down to MvP versus MMA again. Bleh.
NesTea getting eliminated didn't surprise me. I mean he was going up against MvP, who he hasn't really done very well again. Their last few games was something like 8 - 1 in favour of MvP.
MVP always wins. He's boringly good.
you're of course forgetting the massive slump he went on between the end of the gsl world championship and mlg anaheim. mvp is endearingly awkward and isn't very comfortable with showing personality on stage, but to call his play boring is a fundamental misunderstanding of the game. not only is mvp the best player in the world right now, but he also has been one of the most innovative.
notably, mvp invented marine split versus baneling micro, showing it on television in gsl2, something that has usually been accredited to clare in popular imagination because of his association with marines. mvp has shown perhaps the greatest variation in builds in gsl history, with ridiculous games massing ravens, mech against protoss, and 2 base bunker contain variations on 1/1/1 play. despite his reputation as "super solid" (which is a complete misnomer based on the fact that he rarely loses), he doesn't hesitate to cut ridiculous amounts of corners in order to gain an edge in timing attacks. notably he had a hilarious game during his slump before mlg anaheim where he lost to qxc of all people because he went pure hellion in a tvt and didn't account for banshees at all. of course, had qxc not gone banshees, mvp's build would've worked brilliantly because of the corners cut, and people would talk about how "solid" he is, mostly because most people are too stupid to think for themselves and take artosis's mangled and often outright wrong analysis word for word.
oh, also, nestea's zvt kind of sucks. his zvz and zvp records are mindblowing but his zvt overall is pretty pedestrian and probably inferior to zergs like drg and leenock (and maybe even stephano (!))
