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It's not the first time you hear the question - does SC2 reward the most skilled players?
There's threads directly about the issue and many implying it. Many people still claim SC2 requires no "skill". I think that there is a big misunderstanding as to what "skill" is in SC2.
In Brood War, saying skill is the same thing as saying mechanical skill, essentially. I think the mistake people make when saying that SC2 takes no skill or comments thereabouts fail to realize that "skill" in SC2 is NOT just mechanical. As IdrA himself has said in countless interviews (ok, yeah you could probably count them, but this is for dramatic effect), SC2 is far more strategy based BECAUSE of the lower mechanical skill requirement. In SC2, skill also includes one's intelligence and strategy. It's not a game of who can play the fastest.
I am, of course, dramatizing and exaggerating a bit, but the point is clear. That is all.
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On December 20 2010 16:08 darthcaesar wrote:
In Brood War, saying skill is the same thing as saying mechanical skill, essentially.
No, it absolutely is not. This is completely false. Skill in BW is as much about micro, positioning, and strategy as it is macro.
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Huh? I'm pretty sure skill in Brood War was not just mechanical -_- Is this supposed to be a question or an answer...
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Skill in Brood war is not mechanical skill at all. All the pros have great mechanics. Hell, B-teamers can perform your standard unit micro and macro decently. What differentiates the top pros from the middle of the pack is ingenuity, preparedness, great game sense, and Flash-style maphack.
And if SC2 has a lower mechanical skill requirement, then it could have a comparative advantage in strategy over Brood War, but not necessarily an absolute advantage.
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On December 20 2010 16:12 Craton wrote:Show nested quote +On December 20 2010 16:08 darthcaesar wrote:
In Brood War, saying skill is the same thing as saying mechanical skill, essentially. No, it absolutely is not. This is completely false. Skill in BW is as much about micro, positioning, and strategy as it is macro.
For the record, Micro, and thus positioning, is considered a mechanical skill.
But yeah, I think skill is the overall mechanical ability combined with superior decision making ability (a la Flash) - (especially at the current state of starcraft 2), this can still be trumped by luck, good build orders, mind games, map imbalance, and other little facets to starcraft.
On December 20 2010 16:19 DTK-m2 wrote:
Skill in Brood war is not mechanical skill at all. All the pros have great mechanics. Hell, B-teamers can perform your standard unit micro and macro decently. What differentiates the top pros from the middle of the pack is ingenuity, preparedness, great game sense, and Flash-style maphack.
And if SC2 has a lower mechanical skill requirement, then it could have a comparative advantage in strategy over Brood War, but not necessarily an absolute advantage.
This isn't really true for the most part - some pros are clearly better mechanically than other pros are (Best vs... Backho [even stork's macro isn't AMAZING, but its good enough to support his brilliant builds]) in terms of mechanics (also, consider the difference between muta micro among pros)
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SC2 should require both a ton of mechanical skill and a ton of mental/strategic skill for someone to be good at it. If it doesn't have enough of one or the other, it isn't competitive enough.
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Your analisis seems based on low level broodwar play, where mechanical disparity is signifiant and gives a hudge advantage to the player with better mechanics. In sc2, these situations still occur, but let's face it, macroing and everything in general is easier, so if you're getting outmacroed, well you're probly not that good.
And since attaining perfect, or at least very good mechanics in sc2 is doable with some practice, then yeah, decision making positioning and general brainplay makes the diference in games, cause in every other aspect, the players are equals.
But the same happens at very hight level broodwar, and I might say it is even more important since the lack of AI unit babysitting makes every army move and positional thinking extremely strong.
So in short, mechanical and positional skills are present in both games, broodwar rewards them alot more, and since sc2 offers an even field of mechanical skills at a decent level, strategical skills are what makes a player better than the other.
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"Skill" is one of those versatile words that, when applied, can be backed by many reasons, but can also be applied to very specific activities. Assuming the goal of playing a game is to win, skill in that game most directly refers to the ability to win that game. Many factors can contribute to the ability to win a game, and many of them can be called skills: impeccable macro, precise stutter step with a unit or units, lightning fast splitting of a unit in a situation, comprehension of enemy builds, tendencies, and reads.
Semantically, a game whose goal is to win will always reward those skilled at (winning) the game. The ones who win are demonstrably skilled. The question is what specific skills within the context of the game contribute to one's ultimate skill at the game as a whole, and whether those skills play a significant role in game outcomes compared to factors over which players have no agency (maps, build roulettes.)
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Your claim that BW requires only mechanical skill really shows off that you've probably never been a big follower of pro BW. And if you have, you've missed quite a bit.
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To be successful in BW you had to have amazing mechanics and amazing actual game skill.
In sc2 the mechanics are easier but the skill required otherwise is still very high. Things which are easy to mess up like engaging in the right formation, making the correct unit composition in reaction to your scouting, and choosing your build order according to the given map and spawn positions can all be game deciding.
Do people really say sc2 require no skill? I mean, MorroW and Drewbie haven't had continuous success for no reason (even with MorroW playing a lot of zerg these days.)
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On December 20 2010 16:42 IdrA wrote:
having a weighted coin
Definitely if you are playing in a tournament called dreakhack
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hahah dude, so contriversal, Idra himself commented on this blog. Hi Idra! big fan.
My 2 cents: Playing sc2 is less fun because its harder to be better, bw is more fun because its an achievement for a noob to beat a computer, in sc2 you could 4gate (for example) your way into platinum division.
And it applies at the higher level, its not as impressive to see people play well because it doesn't mean as much. you don't watch people do things that are easy... you watch them do things that are hard. especially in the competitive field, an easy game won't find many spectators....
And the way that sc2 could overcome this would be by being a more diverse game, but thats not the case with the current (very) slight imbalances. Thats why you see them buffing the phoenix etc.
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The idea that mechanics is the greatest separator among low level iccup players in BW I haven't found to be the case either. From the perspective of someone currently learning BW and playing at a low level (C-), when I play practice games vs higher rank players and talk to them afterwards I'm often struck that they have a much better read on what I was doing, their options to it, and the game state as a whole; it's not simply that their unit production is better.
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On December 20 2010 16:42 IdrA wrote:
having a weighted coin
Don't forget playing 5 games a day to supplement your mechanics practice.
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On December 20 2010 16:49 ShadeR wrote:
Starsense.
> all .. it made savior bonjwa
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Place Flash in sc2 and he will own everyone
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lol BW is not just mechanical skill. If you watched and understood high level games, you would see that the top players are owning not just because they have insane multitasking and apm, but also because of their very good decision making.
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On December 20 2010 16:08 darthcaesar wrote:
It's not the first time you hear the question - does SC2 reward the most skilled players?
There's threads directly about the issue and many implying it. Many people still claim SC2 requires no "skill". I think that there is a big misunderstanding as to what "skill" is in SC2.
In Brood War, saying skill is the same thing as saying mechanical skill, essentially. I think the mistake people make when saying that SC2 takes no skill or comments thereabouts fail to realize that "skill" in SC2 is NOT just mechanical. As IdrA himself has said in countless interviews (ok, yeah you could probably count them, but this is for dramatic effect), SC2 is far more strategy based BECAUSE of the lower mechanical skill requirement. In SC2, skill also includes one's intelligence and strategy. It's not a game of who can play the fastest.
I am, of course, dramatizing and exaggerating a bit, but the point is clear. That is all.
The way it worked in broodwar is that you needed an even higher level of mechanical skill to even compete.
In reality, BW required far more skill than sc2 ever will, and that is simply a fact. There is really not any more strategy in either game or intelligence.
Skill is simply your knowledge of the game + your mechanics as well as your on the spot decision making and builds.
"intelligence and strategy" is mostly what you know about the game and your decision making to use it.
A lot of people seem to think they were bad a BW because it rewarded the fastest players and not the smartest players, when the smartest players were typically also the fastest because their brain could compute enough to support that kind of speed. If you were bad at BW you weren't smart enough at the game to compete. I am much better at sc2 than I was at BW mostly because I wasn't thinking about BW or RTS games in the right way, and to a lesser extent my mechanics were bad. A lot of people are better at sc2 because their mechanics were bad.
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EPT
