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Its another one of those days. You know the days where you lose like 10 games in a row and feel like crap and look around for something to cheer you up. But I'm not going to sit here and just rant because I know how you all despise it but instead I'm going to do something different and ask all those successful players out there "How does it feel to be good at SC2?".
I mean I know we'll never be pro or anything, but I'm quite positive that's it's possible to become good enough to be just be below that "pro" level of play. So who here has gotten to that level of play? Say like you got to 2500 or so rating or won a great series against a known player. How does it feel to know that you're a good player?
I've hit a wall at 1900... losing to the same old things I thought I had figured out, seeing new things that I have to figure out, and at the very end just throwing up my hands in the air and did what I could to sustain self-control.
So to change the subject in my mind I began to wonder. Do players go through the same agony of being bad like I do before gradually becoming better? Like what was it like behind the scenes when players like say Ret began his switch to SC2. It'd be interesting to find out wouldn't it? It's not like they were magically amazing at the game from the very beginning to where they are now. Looking at win/loss ratios of some great players, they've all must've had their share of awful losing streaks.
So yeah, one can't help but wonder what goes through their minds as they improve and gradually get to where they are today.
If the truth of the matter is that they mass mass games to just get good and bite the bullet when they hit those losses, I'm about to just man up and go lose another 20 games tonight until either I outplay every tactic like a robot or my mechanics get so good that it doesn't matter how silly I play.
 
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I'm sure for many people, being "good" doesn't feel much different from being "decent" or "bad." There's always people better than you, there's always room for improvement, and even the best players lose and get frustrated and work hard to become stronger.
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I can't motivate myself to play because of Blizzard's MMR system... I'm like 400 points and i get matched up with 1800 points players, only to gain like 15,16 points.
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What rank were you on bw? There was a wall you hit once you get past the average. For most I played with it was B-/B, literally people that were C+/B- could never get past that no matter how hard they tried. Onlyrandom once said something like "the game is addictive to you now, but once you actually get good this game is crack". He always called it starcrack. So being good on sc2 would mean the same thing it meant on bw - the game becomes insanely interesting and you actually feel that you get it. You know why you lost and you know what to do at every point in time; pretty much the only thing that stands between you and better players is effort.
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On November 18 2010 13:07 News wrote:
What rank were you on bw? There was a wall you hit once you get past the average. For most I played with it was B-/B, literally people that were C+/B- could never get past that no matter how hard they tried. Onlyrandom once said something like "the game is addictive to you now, but once you actually get good this game is crack". He always called it starcrack. So being good on sc2 would mean the same thing it meant on bw - the game becomes insanely interesting and you actually feel that you get it. You know why you lost and you know what to do at every point in time; pretty much the only thing that stands between you and better players is effort.
In BW all I did was play against a B- Terran player in practice games, like that was my entire BW experience. So yeah I would get rolled tons, like tons of times, but certainly learned more from that than from playing against D- players all day. I know what you mean by that addiction thing, the guy mass games like a psycho, I was kinda scared to actually ladder after seeing him playing so many intense games over and over and over and over... yeah lol.
I'm beginning to get that addiction thing for SC2 as I learn what exactly my mistakes are in my losses. Hopefully that'll help me get better haha. Because my ultimate goal is to one day make it to the Top200, far fetched as it is, just getting there or getting close will be infinitely satisfying.
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Lol I have such a sweet winrate in sc2 in 1v1s (71%...I'm the new jaedong :D) and 4v4s. Then again that's cause I started in bronze league and just used the good ol' C- BW mechanics to own noobs. In 4v4s I have these 3 high diamond friends and we just win all the time cause 4v4 is bad lol. I've only played 7 games at diamond, and I'm 6-1 in those games (stupid void rays -_-) :d. This is low diamond tho. This weekend when I dont have as much work im gonna start to ladder and finally get to mid diamond, which is where i feel my skill is. THEN it's time to get roflstomped by good players lol
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With any game, it would be very boring if you had nothing new to figure out. I think this is perfectly normal.
The only difference was that BW was fun even when you lost. In SC2 losses are very frustrating and wins barely satisfying 
You can also see the statistical approach. If you have a 50% winrate, on 500 games, you have 21% chances to encounter a 10 or more losses streak. It's always good to know 
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You're never good enough lol. When your goal is to become better, you'll never be satisfied with your level of skill. But the key to getting better isn't just mass gaming 24/7. You should just play as much as you feel like playing, and don't worry about rage, everyone rages lol, just take a walk outside or something and get it out of your system.
Don't be down on yourself yo! Anyone can become really good, and you reach that "really good" point before you know it, as long as you keep playing and respect yourself! The truth is though, if you get into that mass gaming mindset, I speak for myself, but you turn on "auto-pilot", and often times you'll start losing to stupid shit just because you aren't giving it your 100%, because you're playing in a much more absent-minded state. In any case, just play, minimize your rage, maximize pleasure!
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On November 18 2010 13:31 endy wrote:With any game, it would be very boring if you had nothing new to figure out. I think this is perfectly normal. The only difference was that BW was fun even when you lost. In SC2 losses are very frustrating and wins barely satisfying You can also see the statistical approach. If you have a 50% winrate, on 500 games, you have 21% chances to encounter a 10 or more losses streak. It's always good to know
I really don't understand why everyone says BW was so much more fun, even if you lost. Playing BW I felt like I lost most games simply because my mechanics were sub-par, not because I didn't play correctly, and that was really frustrating. Playing SC2 is so much more fun because it's a new game and I still have to figure out why I lost and think of new strategies. Although my mechanics can always be better I know that it's not what's limiting me from improving at this point.
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On November 18 2010 13:05 synapse wrote:
I can't motivate myself to play because of Blizzard's MMR system... I'm like 400 points and i get matched up with 1800 points players, only to gain like 15,16 points.
I've never seen anyone who has used up all their bonus pool not at about the correct point level for their skills. I thought it determined whether you were favored by comparing your mmr to their actual points or something? So that even though you get matched up with someone of your own skill level with way more points than you, you're considered unfavored so when you win 50% of your games you rise in points. Anyway, however it works, once you've used up your bonus pool your total points is pretty accurate, i haven't known anyone to downswing more than ~150 points.
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Both SC2 and BW are fun for me I was a C/C+ terran (depends on MU) but since then I played a ton of WOW/SSBM and got out of practice for SC2 so now I'm lowish Diamond. I would say that it is just as fun as BW for me. The reason however that I mention WOW/SSBM is in wow I am legitamatley Semi-pro 2700+ 3's and I am just getting to the good level in SSBM (super smash brothers melee for those who don't know) and I am really having fun. It is really nice to look back and notice how bad I was. The one thing thats annoying about getting "good" is that other "good" players are really good at punishing in almost all games. In Sc2 (as with most competitive games) at higher levels one mistake is game over sometimes and that can be really anoying. Especially in MU's like TVT and don't get me wrong I love that MU but sometimes I will do everything right (obviously to a degree I.E. scout him well counter his build and whatnot) and then make one mis-step and loose half my army to tanks. But I still think its really fun over all, keep trying at it!
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I was never "good" at Brood War. I'm naturally bad at RTS games, I would play the shit out of SC, WC2, WC3 or whatever and just FAIL (I tried to play WC3 like starcraft... doesn't work). When SC2 came out, I played a lot with my room mate from last year (awesome guy) and even though I knew more about the units and strategy in general, he beat me soley on mechanics.
It took a long time to break old habits and get out of bronze. Now I'm plat, and my play slowed down a lot (was doing drugs again, couldn't play). I watch more than I play, but I wanna get back into it because as I got into higher leagues I enjoyed it more and more. Not to say I'm good, I'm still awful compared to 80 percent of the people on TL.
tl;dr I know I'm not good, but I know I enjoyed playing more and more as I got better. As I hit a plateau, it got uninteresting, but lately I've started climbing the skill ladder again, and improving is fun.
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On November 18 2010 13:48 Anihc wrote:Show nested quote +On November 18 2010 13:31 endy wrote:With any game, it would be very boring if you had nothing new to figure out. I think this is perfectly normal. The only difference was that BW was fun even when you lost. In SC2 losses are very frustrating and wins barely satisfying You can also see the statistical approach. If you have a 50% winrate, on 500 games, you have 21% chances to encounter a 10 or more losses streak. It's always good to know I really don't understand why everyone says BW was so much more fun, even if you lost. Playing BW I felt like I lost most games simply because my mechanics were sub-par, not because I didn't play correctly, and that was really frustrating. Playing SC2 is so much more fun because it's a new game and I still have to figure out why I lost and think of new strategies. Although my mechanics can always be better I know that it's not what's limiting me from improving at this point.
this will not be relevant to OP at all but this is a good topic too.
It's not that bw was more fun as a game (even though I think sc2 can't stand up to how fun bw was), bw had all those battlenet channels and clans and friendlists and iccup... Is there anything that can be compared to pgt/iccup as a laddering experience? Getting good, watching replays with friends and fucking around on ums maps after playing for 12 hours straight and ranking up on ladders was amazing; getting the next rank on iccup was amazing, this isn't the same as going from 2000 to 2100 (virtually it means the same thing but w/e)
bw had this special culture where people played to improve even knowing they will never become really good. Last time I played sc2 was during the last stages of beta, I played over 60 games my first day and around 30-40 my 2nd day (it's that massgaming laddering experience from bw). I mean I played sc2 for less than 2 weeks and my record was good enough to be matched vs "qxc" on some livestreamed event with casters ( I believe it was slightly above 1900 or 2000)... even though I got manhandled it just didn't feel the same. I'm sure the game has evolved and to be good nowadays you need a lot more than basic mechanical skills and proper build orders, but the atmosphere itself isn't the same to me. Maybe that's why I still haven't bought sc2
also to answer your question why was bw more fun even if you lost - because you knew that being good required a lot of dedication and losing on a ladder would make you say something like "fuck i just got raped" to your friends while losing on sc2 makes you think "fuck i played this game since it came out and i already suck this much compared to others". I think many people expect to make a splash in sc2 sicne it's a new game but reality is they never will and they'll stop playign as soon as they realize it, while people that played bw for years knew it all along.
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Haha I just logged on again and played some games. I tanked a lot of points, but yeah, at this point I've lost so many times its like w/e. I guess the next step is getting accustomed to losing in silly ways, if anything sometimes I feel like I'm trying to protect myself from raging out but really its quite unavoidable when you're aiming to just get better =(.
If anything I am hoping to lose even more so I'll gradually find that perfect middle ground where I'll face players of even skill, if thats even possible. Because now that I think about it I was on a winning streak last week so it's only expected that I'd run into a losing streak. I'd really rather not stomp on noobs because eventually I'll just get my ass whooped by a better player, several times in a row.
I think that in BW it was still fun to lose, because well I don't know, the strats I faced in BW seemed a lot less obnoxious than the crap people throw at you in SC2. I mean who wouldn't get a bit annoyed at a hellion drop immediately followed up by a banshee? Especially when you're even slightly behind in preparation for it. In BW I was a guinea pig for a lot of crazy timing attacks and just being really really outclassed in mechanics, but they were very respectable. Even if I fell so behind and stared at like 10 SVs flying across my screen irridiating themselves and flying over drones- in fact the first time I saw that happen I actually laughed and said it was awesome.
I don't think many people have the same reaction seeing a hidden cloaked banshee for the first time, I certainly didn't. In both cases you have no one to blame but yourself for getting into the situation but the emotions are entirely different.
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I think once you get really good at the game, you'll have even more fun because instead of worrying about macro and mechanics all the time, you can start devising new strategies and how to counter stuff.
Honestly if BW wasn't so hardcore, I'd love to give it a shot but it's really too late to start now... unless if I'm a masochist and want to go 0-100 on iccup since I never really played BW besides for top vs bottom games on battle.net when I was 10.
Also people give SC2 shit for being a easier game, and it's probably true. But I don't think "easier" is necessarily a bad thing. It'll let casual people enjoy/understand the game more and possibly make them more likely to enjoy/get into the esports scene. I mean it might be bad once the super pro players start hitting the skill cap (we aren't there yet, so it can take 3 months... 2 years... who knows) but in the meantime I think the game makes it easier to introduce new people to esports.
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EPT
