Well, I've been playing Starcraft 2 for about half a year now. I started out at the bottom of the bronze league, a total noob. With a few months of practice, I slowly but steadily improved and now I am in gold league. I've definitely become a better player, but... I've had some misgivings about putting the effort in that this game demands. I'm very proud of my skill. To my own friends, I am an expert, a master. I watch Day9 Dailies, view casts and tourneys, read TL posts in my spare time and play fairly frequently. If I put this much effort into a less sophisticated game, I would expect to be amongst the higher levels. But the problem with Starcraft? Everyone is like me. All intellectual computer nerds with keyboard talent and the willpower to train for hours a day. I'm not unique in the SC2 community. Elsewhere, I stand out for my skills and knowledge. Here, I am dumb by gamer standards. And above all, everyone is so good at starcraft. There seems to be no way to get to the top of the ranks. Laddering is incredibly challenging for me. And when I see all these people who somehow got to platinum in their first placement matches; who go round dissing 'dem lower league noobs'; that people in diamond are considered 'noobs' by the majority who are master league players, while I in gold just imagine being a diamond, well, the will to try get to the top leaves me. I feel like I'd be so much happier with my achievements if I played a game where the enire user base are not such highly skilled, dedicated players.
I wonder if I will get better with more practice. It seems others get to master with no effort. Am I just a terrible gamer? I don't know.
I know what you mean. Everytime I feel down about SC2, I feel that everyone below me just doesn't care about their rank as I do and everyone above me is many degrees better than me.
If you're not enjoying it anymore, consider a break in playing. You can still watch casts and stuff though~
Try to get enjoyment from your own improvement instead of judging yourself on some absolute scale of "bad to good". The challenge inherent in laddering is the most fun part of Starcraft (or any game), the part where you are learning and gaining skill is by far more rewarding than being able to tell people you hit level X or Y.
Want another secret? When people tell you they hit diamond/masters/gm and make it sound like it was no effort they're lying. Everyone on the internet wants to be Good Will Hunting, some dude who 'spends no effort but is a genius' but none of them are. Everyone downplays their success in this hobby.
Play some with friends or find training partners, laddering is actually a lonesome experience as you basically just Q up and defeat(or get beaten by) a non-no random. Defeating your friends and or practice partners is much more gratifying and they can help you analyze what you have done wrong too, it makes for a much more entertaining experience.
No bruh, same story here. I pwned in CoD and TF2 and various other games.
All I can tell you is to do it one step at a time. You can set simple goals such as "i wanna get to top 25 gold" and be happy that way. Don't be discouraged, and remember why you play this game: to have fun.
If you get frustrated like me sometimes, have a wind-down game like Minecraft or Fallout that you can just chill and pwn people in. Then come back.
I have the same story. started at bronze and want to get to the top.
Just look at how far youve come. bronze to gold. its a good run. youve come a long way, and you have a long way to go. its just like anything. if you put in the work youl get there. remember that when your losing or if you feel like you want to be better, that every game brings you a little closer to your goal, whatever it may be.
its better to be a small fish in a big pond than a big fish in a small pond. if you played an easier game, youd probably win more, but it wouldnt be as much of an accomplishment, because you wouldnt have had to work at it. and youd know it deep down
On August 03 2011 17:06 HavokTheorem wrote: I wonder if I will get better with more practice. It seems others get to master with no effort. Am I just a terrible gamer? I don't know.
Most people are masters because of these things:
1) They started playing a long time ago. Their MMR is way more consistent and they always get the same players of the same level, which are also masters. They don't suddenly drop to diamond/platinum opponents and then lose MMR hardcore 2) They play really, really often. They mass 100 games/3 days and eventually their MMR will get better and better, due to blizzard's system. 3) They have luck by getting bad opponents. Trust me, being masters means nothing. I am in Diamond now but consider myself way over the average master's niveau. Why? Most master league players I face(and ironically I face master's players all the time lol) are so terribad... With 36 supply after 7 minutes, no scouting at all and no mechanics whatsoever. It's not even funny. I apply pressure on them with some units to get myself an expansion and they call me an "all inning cheeser" because they have nothing. Typical 15~18 minutes, 4 bases, maxed army and full tech rush. Such all inning bad play, ugh -_-' So don't let yourself fool by people that say "i'm masters, you're gold, therefore i'm better". Thats not true.
However, don't take this as an offense, but you are nothing special. We all want to be among the best and it is good that we want that, otherwise we wouldn't do j**** sh****. But just leaving and saying "I go play WoW because there people are bad so I can feel special there" is not the right way to do it.
Maybe you don't practice enough, maybe you don't practice efficient enough, maybe you are just not concentrated enough or don't see everything in your replays...
Approach the game from a different angle. Kick out all the buildorder crap, kick out all the day9 daily stuff you can't comprehend. Just focus on playing fast and precisely, reacting good and becoming better and reflect your play everytime. Eventually, this will make you better and bring you to at least "diamond standard".
Does everyone who plays Tennis/Soccer/whatever play it because they want to be a pro or best of best?
Nah, many play because its fun playing the sport with people of similar levels.
So have fun and enjoy playing people of your level, eventually with enough practice and dedication your level will improve.
Be happy with your achievements and make sure you respect the achievements of others, no matter if those achievements are greater or lesser than your own. Just because some dude in masters thinks gold league isn't an accomplishment, doesn't mean it isn't.
Play for yourself and enjoy being part of one of the best communities in gaming.
Remember that improvement comes gradually; worst thing you can do is get discouraged at your failures. This makes you overlook many small improvements that are actually happening. Failure is a necessity in the learning process.
Everyone has bad days, and everyone has slumps, it is something that has to be accepted for the sake of sanity.
Its not that they got there easily its just that they were probably in your position at some point then put in the effort and got better and now that there good when they see noobier people its just like haha i can do this now
Set a goal to achieve, and just enjoy playing the game. I watch games until I get the bug to play, then I go and enjoy. When I start getting overwhelmed, I stop. But my goals are very easy to achieve (play my best, fuck if I win or lose).
I quit the game 2 months ago coz I told myself "Heck, why am I stressing so much over a game? I'm spending so much time for this game even though I don't aim to be pro". It's always hard to quit when you have put so much time and even have friends, but I couldn't accept that SC2 became a "work" to do. After that I decided to quit SC2 but retain the improvement mentality and put it in practice in other real life- activities, and I feel much more liberated.
How many times do you actually play a day? And what do you focus on? I think I played at least 25ish games a day before I got into masters (A lot of my practice partners play a lot less even). Most of it are ladder games where it's good to have one solid build to practice against various cheeses, and my games vs my practice partners will be to experiment with different builds or to figure out the timings and drill certain builds (i.e. trying to figure out roach bling drop vs 7 gate +2 blink stalkers). I really also just focus on scouting (there's so many different scouting tricks as you probably know) and just keeping my minerals and gas as low as possible. Pretty sure this is what your average diamond/master player does.
I mean you probably know how to analyze a replay better than most players and have a more organized checklist since you watch day9 daily. I remember catching one episode where he analyzes deeply how to watch a replay by showing some guy trying to mimic the timings of a pro very systematically. Took him something like 15 tries to get it. That should be enough I imagine to get to diamond or masters. You just have to put in the 20 or so games mastering one solid build.
There could be a dozen subtle things you're doing wrong that none of us can even know (Maybe you stop making probes or drones at 35 which I see a lot of non-diamonds do but are unaware that theyre doing it). Just grab someoene from the practice thread (Or from this thread) who's diamond and get them to play you. They can probably tell you exactly what you're doing wrong and how to improve. Of course, the best way to improve is to probably get a coach. So why not do that if you really feel lost even if you are playing 20 games a day refining and focusing one build and developing macro and scouting. You just have to keep in mind that it's better to focus on 1 or 2 things at once and get really good at them (i.e. macro/scouting) instead of many things at once (timings, build orders, mindgames, worker splitting etc.). And further more especially if you're a novice 80% of your improvement will come from practicing 20% of the ideas floating around, the most fundamental basic ones i.e. macro/scouting--Specifically constantly creating drones/probes, keeping your gas and mins even and low, and knowing when to expand, and mastering your race's macro mechanics.
Lastly if you don't find the game fun then don't play. When I first got sc2 I was so excited I played all night long, and probably 15 hours straight. When I focused too much on my ranks I got really hung up on losing and I was afraid to lose/ladder for a little while. Once you focus on result-oriented goals (rank, winrate, achievements) instead of process oriented goals (improving, the fun of playing, mastering the game) then you will become easily frustrated by the game and you'll just lose a lot and never improve.
On August 03 2011 17:06 HavokTheorem wrote: I wonder if I will get better with more practice. It seems others get to master with no effort. Am I just a terrible gamer? I don't know.
Most people are masters because of these things:
1) They started playing a long time ago. Their MMR is way more consistent and they always get the same players of the same level, which are also masters. They don't suddenly drop to diamond/platinum opponents and then lose MMR hardcore 2) They play really, really often. They mass 100 games/3 days and eventually their MMR will get better and better, due to blizzard's system. 3) They have luck by getting bad opponents. Trust me, being masters means nothing. I am in Diamond now but consider myself way over the average master's niveau. Why? Most master league players I face(and ironically I face master's players all the time lol) are so terribad... With 36 supply after 7 minutes, no scouting at all and no mechanics whatsoever. It's not even funny. I apply pressure on them with some units to get myself an expansion and they call me an "all inning cheeser" because they have nothing. Typical 15~18 minutes, 4 bases, maxed army and full tech rush. Such all inning bad play, ugh -_-' So don't let yourself fool by people that say "i'm masters, you're gold, therefore i'm better". Thats not true.
However, don't take this as an offense, but you are nothing special. We all want to be among the best and it is good that we want that, otherwise we wouldn't do j**** sh****. But just leaving and saying "I go play WoW because there people are bad so I can feel special there" is not the right way to do it.
Maybe you don't practice enough, maybe you don't practice efficient enough, maybe you are just not concentrated enough or don't see everything in your replays...
Approach the game from a different angle. Kick out all the buildorder crap, kick out all the day9 daily stuff you can't comprehend. Just focus on playing fast and precisely, reacting good and becoming better and reflect your play everytime. Eventually, this will make you better and bring you to at least "diamond standard".
You already have what it takes. Use it.
This is more of a rant on masters players in general than regarding the OP. If I am masters and you are gold, I consider myself better 100% of the time lol.
If you care so much about being "the best", then yes, you shouldn't play starcraft or any competitive game for that matter. Starcraft has a huge skill cap which takes years of dedication to reach. If you can't stand not being the best, don't play such a hugely competitive game.
If you enjoy heavy competitition, though, SC is really the only RTS where you'll find a good amount of it. Most other RTS games are flooded with imbalance issues, which leads to people quitting after a small amount or just spamming unbeatable rushes. Not so with SC, and if you enjoy good competition, this is a game that will keep you entertained for years.
On August 03 2011 17:06 HavokTheorem wrote: I wonder if I will get better with more practice. It seems others get to master with no effort. Am I just a terrible gamer? I don't know.
Most people are masters because of these things:
1) They started playing a long time ago. Their MMR is way more consistent and they always get the same players of the same level, which are also masters. They don't suddenly drop to diamond/platinum opponents and then lose MMR hardcore 2) They play really, really often. They mass 100 games/3 days and eventually their MMR will get better and better, due to blizzard's system. 3) They have luck by getting bad opponents. Trust me, being masters means nothing. I am in Diamond now but consider myself way over the average master's niveau. Why? Most master league players I face(and ironically I face master's players all the time lol) are so terribad... With 36 supply after 7 minutes, no scouting at all and no mechanics whatsoever. It's not even funny. I apply pressure on them with some units to get myself an expansion and they call me an "all inning cheeser" because they have nothing. Typical 15~18 minutes, 4 bases, maxed army and full tech rush. Such all inning bad play, ugh -_-' So don't let yourself fool by people that say "i'm masters, you're gold, therefore i'm better". Thats not true.
However, don't take this as an offense, but you are nothing special. We all want to be among the best and it is good that we want that, otherwise we wouldn't do j**** sh****. But just leaving and saying "I go play WoW because there people are bad so I can feel special there" is not the right way to do it.
Maybe you don't practice enough, maybe you don't practice efficient enough, maybe you are just not concentrated enough or don't see everything in your replays...
Approach the game from a different angle. Kick out all the buildorder crap, kick out all the day9 daily stuff you can't comprehend. Just focus on playing fast and precisely, reacting good and becoming better and reflect your play everytime. Eventually, this will make you better and bring you to at least "diamond standard".
You already have what it takes. Use it.
This is more of a rant on masters players in general than regarding the OP. If I am masters and you are gold, I consider myself better 100% of the time lol.
Why? Can you certainly, for 100%, say that you will beat the OP when you face him? (Considering you are masters.). I have reason to doubt that you would. There are so many master league players that constantly lose to plat/diamonds and would even lose to bronze players, and there are many on the forums that openly admit it.
It is no rant as I don't care about how good other players are and I don't care which league I'm in either, it's just the fact that OPs focus on the leagues is not justified as leagues are no intentions of skill whatsoever.
Just because you are masters doesn't mean you are good. And just because you are gold doesn't mean that you are worse than master league players. The ladder leagues are no real visualizations of skill.
On August 03 2011 17:06 HavokTheorem wrote: I wonder if I will get better with more practice. It seems others get to master with no effort. Am I just a terrible gamer? I don't know.
Most people are masters because of these things:
1) They started playing a long time ago. Their MMR is way more consistent and they always get the same players of the same level, which are also masters. They don't suddenly drop to diamond/platinum opponents and then lose MMR hardcore 2) They play really, really often. They mass 100 games/3 days and eventually their MMR will get better and better, due to blizzard's system. 3) They have luck by getting bad opponents. Trust me, being masters means nothing. I am in Diamond now but consider myself way over the average master's niveau. Why? Most master league players I face(and ironically I face master's players all the time lol) are so terribad... With 36 supply after 7 minutes, no scouting at all and no mechanics whatsoever. It's not even funny. I apply pressure on them with some units to get myself an expansion and they call me an "all inning cheeser" because they have nothing. Typical 15~18 minutes, 4 bases, maxed army and full tech rush. Such all inning bad play, ugh -_-' So don't let yourself fool by people that say "i'm masters, you're gold, therefore i'm better". Thats not true.
However, don't take this as an offense, but you are nothing special. We all want to be among the best and it is good that we want that, otherwise we wouldn't do j**** sh****. But just leaving and saying "I go play WoW because there people are bad so I can feel special there" is not the right way to do it.
Maybe you don't practice enough, maybe you don't practice efficient enough, maybe you are just not concentrated enough or don't see everything in your replays...
Approach the game from a different angle. Kick out all the buildorder crap, kick out all the day9 daily stuff you can't comprehend. Just focus on playing fast and precisely, reacting good and becoming better and reflect your play everytime. Eventually, this will make you better and bring you to at least "diamond standard".
You already have what it takes. Use it.
This is more of a rant on masters players in general than regarding the OP. If I am masters and you are gold, I consider myself better 100% of the time lol.
Why? Can you certainly, for 100%, say that you will beat the OP when you face him? (Considering you are masters.). I have reason to doubt that you would. There are so many master league players that constantly lose to plat/diamonds and would even lose to bronze players, and there are many on the forums that openly admit it.
It is no rant as I don't care about how good other players are and I don't care which league I'm in either, it's just the fact that OPs focus on the leagues is not justified as leagues are no intentions of skill whatsoever.
Just because you are masters doesn't mean you are good. And just because you are gold doesn't mean that you are worse than master league players. The ladder leagues are no real visualizations of skill.
I think you're taking that a bit too far. Just because you beat some master league players who had a 20 loss streak doesn't suddenly make it the shittiest division that loses to bronze players. Leagues don't represent skill at all? What the fuck? You could argue that it's not the clearest indicator of skill, but saying it doesn't mean absolutely anything sounds more like you trying to belittle masters league just because you can't get there. Leagues show how well you do on the ladder. All good players do well on the ladder so go figure.
You almost sound like those people who make a thread about all the cheese and all-ins on the ladder and go "Oh I would be grandmasters, if it wasn't for all the noobs who cheese on the ladder. They just don't allow me to show my true skill."
On August 03 2011 17:06 HavokTheorem wrote: I wonder if I will get better with more practice. It seems others get to master with no effort. Am I just a terrible gamer? I don't know.
Most people are masters because of these things:
1) They started playing a long time ago. Their MMR is way more consistent and they always get the same players of the same level, which are also masters. They don't suddenly drop to diamond/platinum opponents and then lose MMR hardcore 2) They play really, really often. They mass 100 games/3 days and eventually their MMR will get better and better, due to blizzard's system. 3) They have luck by getting bad opponents. Trust me, being masters means nothing. I am in Diamond now but consider myself way over the average master's niveau. Why? Most master league players I face(and ironically I face master's players all the time lol) are so terribad... With 36 supply after 7 minutes, no scouting at all and no mechanics whatsoever. It's not even funny. I apply pressure on them with some units to get myself an expansion and they call me an "all inning cheeser" because they have nothing. Typical 15~18 minutes, 4 bases, maxed army and full tech rush. Such all inning bad play, ugh -_-' So don't let yourself fool by people that say "i'm masters, you're gold, therefore i'm better". Thats not true.
However, don't take this as an offense, but you are nothing special. We all want to be among the best and it is good that we want that, otherwise we wouldn't do j**** sh****. But just leaving and saying "I go play WoW because there people are bad so I can feel special there" is not the right way to do it.
Maybe you don't practice enough, maybe you don't practice efficient enough, maybe you are just not concentrated enough or don't see everything in your replays...
Approach the game from a different angle. Kick out all the buildorder crap, kick out all the day9 daily stuff you can't comprehend. Just focus on playing fast and precisely, reacting good and becoming better and reflect your play everytime. Eventually, this will make you better and bring you to at least "diamond standard".
You already have what it takes. Use it.
This is more of a rant on masters players in general than regarding the OP. If I am masters and you are gold, I consider myself better 100% of the time lol.
Why? Can you certainly, for 100%, say that you will beat the OP when you face him? (Considering you are masters.). I have reason to doubt that you would. There are so many master league players that constantly lose to plat/diamonds and would even lose to bronze players, and there are many on the forums that openly admit it.
It is no rant as I don't care about how good other players are and I don't care which league I'm in either, it's just the fact that OPs focus on the leagues is not justified as leagues are no intentions of skill whatsoever.
Just because you are masters doesn't mean you are good. And just because you are gold doesn't mean that you are worse than master league players. The ladder leagues are no real visualizations of skill.
I think you're taking that a bit too far. Just because you beat some master league players who had a 20 loss streak doesn't suddenly make it the shittiest division that loses to bronze players.
Thats right. Because when I see that these master league players have a win streak of 6-7 and it gets broken by me I face "only the shitty players", lol..Thats not my point and if you reread what I wrote you would know that.
Yes, SOMETIMES leagues represent skill. It is rather arbitrary but sometimes it happens. But since there is no clear line between the leagues other then win/loss ratios and some other formulas based around that we can never tell for sure. There will always be good players(by the standard people look at the leagues) in lower leagues and bad players in higher leagues. They might even be the same skill level and both belong to platinum or something like that, still they are both in the leagues they are because of other factors.
You almost sound like those people who make a thread about all the cheese and all-ins on the ladder and go "Oh I would be grandmasters, if it wasn't for all the noobs who cheese on the ladder. They just don't allow me to show my true skill."
What? I'm saying that I BEAT these people. How can you understand that I'm flaming that I DON'T beat these people? Are you even reading? I say that I face master league players and they play terribad. I say that other master league players admit that they play terribad. Yet, they are all still in masters.
Why should OP feel bad about himself? There's nothing wrong with being gold as chances are high that he is as good as those master league players. How good that actually is can't really be said until we see replays and actually see him playing.
The only real rant in my posting is that those master league players that always say "I'm masters you're gold you're bad hahahah" don't actually know what they are talking about. If someone said "Okay, showmatch between gold and master league player. Who will win?" I had no idea what to say because it is very likely that the gold player will roflstomp the master league player.
I can only repeat that the OP shouldn't care the slightest about his league. Just keep practicing if you feel like you want to.
EDIT(Also kinda TL;DR) To the post below me: No, the leagues are a measure of win and lose ratios, not skill.
Regarding some posts in this thread, I don't actually play SC2 (Which makes me feel I'm entitled to give advice) , but if all these "noobs" are getting to Masters League then if you can't do it what does it make you? SC2's only real measure of skill in terms of laddering is the league system.
On topic though, when you are playing with complete strangers the standards of the community as a whole start sticking to you. You should never ever let this happen
No one faults themselves. "u played like complete fuckin shit but still win fuckin lucky noob" is a common phrase in all of gaming that is even the slightest competitive.
You will NEVER EVER go through playing a game happily if you start picking that stuff up. In your head you will in some form or another think to yourself "fuck i suck, i got lucky, i'm so bad" because the standard of the community is "people are only good if they are as good as me" this combined with the thinking of "people who beat me are fuckin lucky noobs" means that no matter how good you are you will probably be considered "bad"
Just think about this logically. You're gold league, you improve and go to plat, improve more go to diamond, improve even more and get to masters. GUESS WHAT YOU'RE ACTUALLY SHIT BECAUSE ACCORDING TO A POST ON TL, MASTER LEAGUE PLAYERS ARE ACTUALLY WORSE THAN SOME BRONZE PLAYERS. (Which I cannot actually believe surfaced in this thread.) And after that, you're grandmasters, but guess what SC2 is actually an easier game than Brood War so you're still fucking shit. This cycle doesn't make any sense at all
My advice is to just not care about skill level. Play more get better is something that will never change. Even if you approach your improvement in a wrong way, playing the game will always make you a better player. Have fun, reach masters, don't give a shit about what people say.
You aren't good at SC2 if you watch tons of vods, read the forums all day and discuss balance and strategies to no end. You're good at SC2 when you can play at a high level and do all of that stuff.
I was sitting around silver in the same position "I'm so good at starcraft why aren't I higher ranked?". I decided to play at least 3 games of SC2 a day or at least an hour a day, whichever one I fulfilled first. 2 months later I hit diamond. I tried a bit for masters but decided to focus more on Hon.
You get better at starcraft by playing starcraft. In the same way you don't sit on the couch and watch soccer for 6 months then run out on to the field and play soccer at an international level.
EPT
