A ticket to the championship

The version kept moving too. The top European and Korean players had already solved a very refined modern metagame. Undead pressure was cleaner than ever. Destroyers made the spell game harder. Death Knight plus Lich could threaten Coil Nova kill windows from almost any angle. Orcs had become better at hero level pacing and economic denial. Night Elves were mastering harassment and edge fights with fewer mistakes than before. The media still did not believe in him. One long pre-tournament article wrote: "Nathan Cole's resurgence is a good story, but stories do not win matches. Opponents will target his Fast Expand and his classic Human tri-hero structure. Once games move into the midgame, the fights around the Gold Mine become too sharp.