Duels should be played with a smile.

Leyou believes that if Fiber Jar wasn't a banned card, it would have been Fiber Jar that gave birth to Pokémon.

“I’m too gentle, I’m going to cry.”

That memory helped Leyou not only in figuring out how he got his self-destructing switch sprite, but also in making him aware of things he hadn't noticed before... The more subtle the details, the more they could affect the final outcome.

……

"After losing two games in a row, do you need some time to calm down? Or perhaps to say something about your defeat?"

Leyou's teasing made K's face instantly turn ugly. He snorted and said, "Hmph, you're so glib. I admit you have a talent in games that I didn't know about, but after losing two games, I won't make the mistake of underestimating you again."

"In the duel just now, I've already witnessed your keenness in exploiting loopholes. You won't get such good opportunities again!"

K's tone was a bit harsh, which was understandable, but to Leyou's surprise, he sensed a special meaning in K's words.

Leyou, who dislikes riddles, feels there's no need for her to speculate.

There's only one thing to do now...

Leaning slightly forward, Leyou rested his elbows on the chessboard, his hands crossed to cover most of his face, and said quietly, "I knew it... you really can control the choices in the game, and judging from your appearance, you can influence more than just the choices in the game, right?"

With golden light gleaming in his eyes, if the surrounding brightness were lowered and he wore glasses, he could easily cosplay some famous characters.

Leyou's pretentious act made K unsure of his intentions, so he simply stopped thinking and said directly, "Enough with the nonsense. The most crucial bargaining chip is still in my hands. I just have one question..."

Are you going to join or not?

"Follow! Why wouldn't I follow!" Leyou said calmly, maintaining his previous posture.

"If it were Duel Monsters, I might need to think about it more, but for other games, you can give it a try!"

K stood up and walked over to the pachinko machine, pulled down the joystick, and said noncommittally, "Heh, then let's go! This time, I won't give you any advantage, and I won't give you any chance to win by using mechanisms I don't know about!"

"Once all extraneous factors are eliminated, the only thing left to compete on is absolute hard power!"

"This time, I'm going to have the final showdown with you in the most hardcore way!"

This time, K completely dropped the pretense. On the pachinko interface, the three scroll bars barely moved before stopping at the same icon.

"I didn't know much about the previous two games, but this game... heh..."

K smiled and didn't continue, but his laughter was full of confidence.

Without lingering or waiting for Leyou's reaction, he took the lead and entered the chessboard.

Leyou frowned as he looked over, and when he saw the icon on the pachinko machine clearly, his expression became subtle.

"No wonder they said they wanted to use a hardcore approach, a battle of raw power..."

"To be honest, if it is this game, then based on my speculation, you may indeed know something about it."

With a slight upturn of his lips, Leyou stood up, placed the two coins he had just won on his side, and then entered the chessboard.

"Ha, why choose this? It's time to show you the depth and sophistication of the pinnacle of real-time strategy games!"

"It's time for you to experience the tactics I learned from my favorite pro player!"

……

The third game has been decided.

StarCraft II, Versus Mode

[Setting up match parameters... Setup complete, mode is BO7 unlimited match]

[Preparations for war are underway]

[Map selection in progress]

There are no additional conditions for this match; everything is based on the original game.

[Setup complete, game begins]

Both sides are currently conducting race selection...

【K: Zerg】

Eternal: Protoss

Consciousness sinks into the battlefield. This time, both sides only have one tactical panel, operating from a god-like perspective and following the original rules of the game.

Looking down at his Protoss base and the few scouts parked beside it, Leyou was filled with emotion.

"Ah, it's time to assemble the troops!"

"You want to compete with me in terms of raw strength? Then I'll tell you that intelligence and knowledge are also part of raw strength!"

----

It's time to review Dog Bro's classic tactics; that man whose fighting power is directly proportional to his bonus.

Is Doge the only WCS double champion? It seems like it was also around the one-year anniversary of his retirement recently.

The only top StarCraft player who uses his brain to play StarCraft.

Chapter Fourteen: Dogs, they can defend themselves? Another 5K+

“GLHF.”

"How should I start this game? I'm not very familiar with this game, so I'll just follow the normal opening sequence."

As soon as he entered the game, Leyou tried to bring up the chat bar, and to his surprise, it was there. So, on a whim, he used a powerful tactic that was among the most famous of all the tactics in StarCraft.

Its name is Chat Stream.

As the name suggests, it involves interfering with the opponent through chatting, using a mix of true and false information to influence the opponent's judgment and actions.

Perhaps because StarCraft is indeed a very complex game, when we entered the game this time, in addition to some basic information, both sides also received some basic tactics and related procedures for the three races. It was like being given an advanced tutorial and tactical guide right from the start.

After briefly reviewing the standard tactics recorded above, Leyou typed a message on the public chat while controlling all the scouts to mine.

That's right, it's the public chat. This game "remake" is thorough enough, based on the original game in every aspect. Even the most basic operations require controlling a virtual keyboard and mouse with your mind.

However, neither of them are ordinary people now. After getting the hang of it, they can easily reach the level of top professional players in terms of operation.

It is precisely because of this incredibly realistic simulation that Leyou can still maintain such confidence.

If both sides have AlphaGo-level micro-management skills, or if they control units directly through the game's underlying mechanisms, then the matchup would be a completely different game altogether.

After exchanging greetings in the public chat, Leyou didn't expect K to reply immediately. While continuously producing scouts in the base, once she had accumulated 100 crystal resources, she sent a mining scout to build a crystal tower.

StarCraft 2 has a population system. The Protoss race, also known as the Protoss, is the race that provides the population cap. The buildings that provide the population cap are the Pylon and the Main Base.

Furthermore, the Protoss have a unique mechanism: the Pylon possesses an energy field with a prototype range. All Protoss buildings, except for the base, must be within the Pylon's energy field to be constructed and operate. If a Pylon near a building is destroyed, the already constructed building will also become inoperable—commonly known as a power outage.

Therefore, the first crystal tower was crucial, both from a population perspective and for the construction of other buildings that followed.

So... under Leyou's command, Tanji did not place a crystal tower near the main base, but instead ran to the entrance of the second mine below the main mine and placed a crystal tower there.

The Protoss buildings are designed to be "summoned"—the Protoss deploys a beacon at a designated location, and after a period of time, the buildings and units built at the Protoss base will be directly teleported there.

Therefore, the Protoss don't need Tanji to constantly watch over their buildings; they can just go over, touch them, and wait for them to be built.

After clicking on the crystal tower, Tanji went back to mining. After the main base's energy increased, Leyou also used the main base's Time Acceleration skill on the base. Time Acceleration can speed up the operation of Protoss buildings for a period of time. Continuously using this skill to speed up technology research or unit production is an essential part of Protoss players' strategy.

The diligent scout continued mining, and K did not answer Leyou's question until Leyou summoned another scout to go out and scout. Only then did the second message appear on the public screen.

"If I said I had a normal start, would you believe me? I don't believe a single punctuation mark of what you say."

K practically had his aloof attitude written all over his face.

In fact, K was also a little unsure about the situation at this moment, because the information he had was more comprehensive than what Leyou had, and he knew more tactics than what was in Leyou's information.

The reason he chose the Zerg race from the start was because of the Zerg's unique mechanics.

Unlike the other two races, the Zerg do not produce troops through different production buildings. The Zerg's main base also functions as a barracks, and all other buildings are considered technology buildings or other types.

The main base will periodically spawn larvae around it. These larvae can mutate into workers and other combat units, and they don't need to be lined up one by one. As long as there are enough larvae and resources, the Zerg can instantly produce a large wave of troops.

With a population of 200, Zerg can stockpile a large amount of resources and larvae in advance, and immediately create a new batch of troops after the entire army is wiped out. This is the Zerg tactic commonly known as "buying a new unit".

The other two races cannot do this because their barracks can only send out troops one at a time.

Meanwhile, the Zerg possess a creep mechanic. Both the main base and creep tumors spread creep around them, and Zerg buildings can only be constructed on creep. Furthermore, Zerg's energy field is even more dominant than that of the Protoss—other races cannot build anything where there is creep.

Furthermore, Zerg units receive bonuses to movement speed and health regeneration while on creep, and the area covered by Zerg creep is the Zerg territory!

Due to the Zerg's unique mechanics, the more bases the better, and the earlier you build more bases, the better.

So after learning about the situation through the information, K chose a tactic that was somewhat risky but had greater potential rewards, as described in the information.

Naked double eyelids.

This means that without building any structures to unlock units, you can save up money and build a second base without any investment. In this case, you can have a second base much earlier. The larvae from the two bases can produce worker bees to mine and build structures more quickly, which can greatly accelerate your development.

Zerg buildings don't require worker units to constantly guard them; instead, they transform into buildings on their own, similar to the Wisps in Warcraft 3. Building too many buildings in the early game can significantly impact the number of your worker units.

Because of the naked double attack tactic, K's defense was quite weak, almost non-existent. The naked double attack was intended to take advantage of this time difference to develop the economy as much as possible and widen the economic and technological gap between the two sides. Naturally, K did not send out worker scouting, but simply let the Zerg population unit "overlord" slowly drift towards the Leyou base.

The Zerg do not have population buildings; instead, they start with an Overlord that can fly, but flies very slowly, so it can serve a scouting purpose to some extent.

Meanwhile, Leyou, who had already gone out to scout somewhat late, turned around after discovering that the opposing worker bees hadn't reached her doorstep yet. She placed a [Forge] near the first crystal before continuing her journey towards K's home base.

Normally, after the first population building is completed, regardless of race, the first thing to do is to build a gas mine or a barracks building for self-defense. However, the forge that Leyou placed was not a barracks.

The Protoss Forge is a tech building used to unlock defensive structures. Once built, it provides offensive and defensive upgrades to ground units and allows the Protoss to build Photon Cannons.

The defensive buildings of all three races are commonly known as bunkers, which are very useful in the early game due to their sturdiness and damage output, enough to defend against most attacks.

A turret costs more than a soldier, but in the early game, several soldiers can't defeat a single turret.

So it makes sense to build a bunker at the start of the game for defense, right?

The beginner's guide clearly states how important early reconnaissance is, and Leyou doesn't believe that K would make such a mistake when he already values ​​him.

There's definitely something wrong with this situation!

As for the consequences of building training camps first and not building barracks, Leyou didn't care much.

Anyway, he had stockpiled some crystal resources, so he could just build a second base to speed up development after building the turrets.

With the turrets providing defense, it's perfectly safe!

The map for this match was roughly symmetrical, with Leyou in the upper left and K in the lower right. The map wasn't very large overall. After Tanji left, he silently counted down the seconds, calculating some key moments.

Not long after, Leyou's scout discovered the second base under construction at the entrance of K's second mine, and a worker bee was wandering around near the entrance.