Two months ago The compLexity Academy added two new players to its StarCraft II squad; Poo & AGIANTSMURF. In the last edition of “Getting to know The Academy” we had the opportunity to learn more about AGIANTSMURF. This time around compLexity Academy commissioner Michawl “Twixz” Shane sat down with Alek “Poo” Hrycaiko to discuss his views on Heart of the Swarm.
Hi Alek. Before we really get into views on StarCraft II, why don’t you introduce yourself.
Hi, my name is Alek “Poo” Hrycaiko, I’m a Canadian Protoss player residing in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Poo is quite an interesting name. How did it come about?
During my adolescence, I played Team Fortress 2 under the ID “Stealthy”. My main class was spy, and there were a lot of people using the same id/class. To differentiate myself, I decided to add a Poo to my name. I then became “Stealthypoo,” which was an alias I used until I had purchased a smurf account for Starcraft 2. At this point, my friend suggested a name change to “Poop;” instead I chose Poo. The ID just stuck with me from there because of how atypical it was.
Now that we have the introduction out of the way why don’t you tell us about Heart of the Swarm. What are your initial impressions on HoTS? Do you like it?
The game is really enjoyable for me right now. One of my favorite things to do in Starcraft II is to craft build orders and try to discover new tactics. By implementing the new and improved Skytoss plus adding the Mothership Core, Blizzard has successfully made Protoss into a much more flexible race. Tinkering with build orders in StarCraft has never been more enjoyable. Right now I’m really excited to keep discovering new builds and attempt to implement them in upcoming tournaments.
As we all know balance is always a discussion when talking with StarCraft II pros. Do you see one race having an advantage at his point in the game?
From my point of view, I don’t think there are any severe racial advantages that have been discovered. I think the game is still being figured out and the only determining factor of ‘advantages’ right now are the maps.
Now that HotS has been out for a month and you’ve had time to become familiar with it, what would you like to see Blizzard do/change?
Create a better map pool. Comparatively this season’s map pool is an improvement, but it’s still quite bad. I feel that Blizzard needs to try harder to communicate with the community Map Making Scene and create better maps for both ladder and tournament use.
Have you had to adapt your game switching from WoL to HoTS?
My game has changed extensively for all match ups. The most extreme change has been my PvP. Lately I’ve been playing a style of PvP focusing on heavy harassment and forgoing air units until later in the game. I haven’t seen many other Protoss players trying this.
Thanks for your time. Any shout outs you’d like to give?
Thanks to everyone who’s supporting me & the compLexity/compLexity Academy family. I’ll try to get better and put out some good games! Oh and if you could follow me @604poo on Twitter that’d be awesome!
Again we at compLexity would like to thank Alek for taking the time out of his busy schedule to speak with us. The compLexity Academy strongly believe in growing the North American StarCraft II scene by supporting our players and giving them a chance to get in the community’s spotlight.