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On March 05 2012 00:03 ZerONine09 wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2012 23:44 Jealous wrote:On March 04 2012 23:37 Blazinghand wrote:On March 04 2012 23:34 young J wrote:Maybe I am not understanding something, but if people don't ladder, how do they get stratified into Gold/Plat/Diamond? Do you mean that it is purely representative of activity (and placement matches I guess)? If I had to sum up this post in one sentence, it would be: "Until you reach Masters league, mass gaming gives equal results to actual skill, and the actual skill level is still low." In other words, something like this: + Show Spoiler +Yes? @ young J, I think you're missing the point of this post. The point of this post is that when Master League players say they're bad, it's because they have a different perspective on what "bad" means than what a Plat or Gold player might have. That graph is way off the mark anyways because it only looks at players who play 1v1s. Bronze isn't the lowest league: "doesn't play starcraft 2" is the lowest league, or "doesn't play ladder/melee" or "doesn't play 1v1s" or whatever you determine. For some people, they view the lowest "real" league as Master. Bad is relative. We're all George Thorogood and we're all NesTea. Edit: Like, the very fact that you're trying to place people into leagues when they don't play 1v1 shows that you've missed the point because I articulated it poorly or something. You're trapped in the contextualization of 1v1 ladder as "the entire range of sc2 skill". Why young J? I was trying to clarify for myself, I don't know anything about SC2 ladder. This post clarified it a lot. I will defend my graph in this case, as there is a relative 0 point before Bronze (the line goes all the way to the axis). I think you misunderstood ME, I never claimed that this was the entire range of skill... Obviously I did not place pro players on this graph lol. So, with those 2 explanations, does this not still fit your description of how skill is distributed according to your post? This is what I think he's saying in analogy form. Imagine that you are an amateur runner/enthusiast. You run pretty much every single day. Most people chomping down McDonalds in the drive through would probably be panting at the end of a jog through the neighborhood, but you don't compare yourself to people who exercise. However, when you compare yourself to other serious runners who are better than you and you realize that you will never achieve times that would get you in the spotlight.
I see. That makes sense. Nice first post ^^
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I got an account from a friend, so I had to play through all the ranks again. It was quite fun, exactly because gold/platinum/diamond players are so willing to blame the game or their opponent instead of theirselves. I've had players call me a complete noob, because I ''abused'' something. Me as high master/gm player who gets called bad, and abuser by gold players. I sure had a good laugh. People in Master tell themselves they are bad, because they see the obvious and (NUMEROUS) flaws in their play, whilst gold and platinum players don't. They have just become good enough to truly understand how bad they are.
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Nice blog, at the start I was like, wtf is he talking about (comparing urself to all non-sc2players :D), but it all gets clear in the end and I totally agree 
A player doesn't compare himself with the people below him, but the ones above him (if you can be critical about yourself at least).
Just a physical thing, no maths/graphs involved
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On March 04 2012 23:34 Jealous wrote:![[image loading]](http://i41.tinypic.com/bz9j9.png)
I second the validity of this picture.
That being said, I like what OP is trying to do, but this is something that I at least assumed was the general consensus, that we're all really fucking bad. Even some pros are horrible at the game, heck even the Code S, MLG National, and Dreamhack Champions are bad. 10000000000^10000000 times better than us more casual, but there is so much to be refined.
In BW it would take years to get to a reasonable ladder ranking, I wish it was as hard in sc2.
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By the way, ladder position slash league you belong to in SC2 is not a valid way to measure anyone's skill. It really isn't. If it really has to mean something, I'd say one can use it to measure the progress made since a given moment, but to use it to compare players... it sounds silly for me.
Also, getting into masters is already challenging, but you have to realize that most people that get there have the ambitions to improve, and achieving the promotion or one of the top spots there is quite a feat. Hence people, who are concious about their mistakes and faults tend to overcriticize themselves, as they believe that way they can develop a proper mindset with which they should approach the game.
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On March 05 2012 00:10 TemujinGK wrote:I second the validity of this picture. That being said, I like what OP is trying to do, but this is something that I at least assumed was the general consensus, that we're all really fucking bad. Even some pros are horrible at the game, heck even the Code S, MLG National, and Dreamhack Champions are bad. 10000000000^10000000 times better than us more casual, but there is so much to be refined. In BW it would take years to get to a reasonable ladder ranking, I wish it was as hard in sc2.
You misunderstood the OP too then, like many others ;p
it's about the perspective that a player has, not the actual skills of the player. It's more abstract. That's why he said that graph should gtfo and isn't related at all.
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I think you can sum it up like this:
The better you become at Starcraft, the more obvious your lack of understanding becomes. I've always liked comparing it to martial arts. A black belt in a martial art isn't a symbol of your mastery. It's something that other martial artists can look at and say "okay, now he finally has the tools to really start learning."
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Most decent Masters players say they're bad because they realize it's true. Learning to macro is just the beginning of the skill tree and I think it's at Masters where people start accumulating a good amount of losses to things that cannot be attributed purely to bad macro. It's when both players start churning out close to the optimal amount of stuff given their build where a lot more strategy and mechanical skills comes into play.
Stuff like positioning, unit composition, multitask, scouting, knowledge on when to attack or defend, micro and build order sudenly becomes way more important in separating yourself from other players.
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The leagues are based off active 1v1 players, not active sc2 accounts which you seem to claim?. Allthough that counts everyone playing at least their placement match/matches. In the end master players say they are bad because they play like shit compared to pro's and they know it.
edit: i have been guilty of calling myself shit, but thinking about it a master league player calling himself bad is pretty much a dick move towards anyone in leagues lower than him and not really a thing that should be encouraged!
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On March 05 2012 00:28 MrBitter wrote:
I think you can sum it up like this:
The better you become at Starcraft, the more obvious your lack of understanding becomes. I've always liked comparing it to martial arts. A black belt in a martial art isn't a symbol of your mastery. It's something that other martial artists can look at and say "okay, now he finally has the tools to really start learning."
Wow this is definitely like the condensed version of the OP's post (no offense), but I so happen to be doing English homework and I was wondering when he was going "get to the point" of his blog.
I think a lot of the pro gamers have beat this idea to the ground though, about how they are bad compared to Korean players. Usually it goes like this:
bronze-gold league players: need assistance in understanding the game and are usually stuck in a casual gaming sense until the light bulb turns on.
and then you have the plat/diamond players: trying to find ways to quickly get to master league without actually understanding the game as a whole. So IF they do get to master's league, then they are like "Shit, now what do I do?"
masters/G. masters - As the OP said, they consider themselves bad at the game, because they have a greater grasp of the game's competitive concept. They try to perfect their timing attacks, they analyze replays for hours on end, they attempt to understand the matchup from beginning to end.
Professionals: think of master's/Grandmaster's thought process and MORE. Now we're talking about meta-gaming, adjusting to game patches, constant repetition and practice, custom games with fellow professional gamers to learn their mindset for BoX series.
If this explanation helps anyone out... great!
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This is actually very well written and has some good insight into the mindset, It hits home because I often tell people i'm awful and they're like "wtf?".
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I think the OP is awesome, because I get your point and can follow your arguments even though I have a completely different opinion. I think that's what really shows a quality argumentation.
Myself, I am gold and pretty ok with being average by definition of all 1v1 players. If I would think I would suck in everything even 0.1% of all people are better than me, I would have used a strong rope already. Think positive
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reminds me of Gheed's post:
Why play Starcraft, the game populated by the most masochistic bunch of gamers who all collectively wallow in a feeling of self-disgust at how horrible they are, even if they are decent?
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I'm in masters league and I am bad, I don't say it to make lower players or the 98% as you put it feel like shit. Simply compared to the best people in the game who we watch on streams and in tournaments daily I am in fact. Bad.
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On March 05 2012 01:12 grs wrote:I think the OP is awesome, because I get your point and can follow your arguments even though I have a completely different opinion. I think that's what really shows a quality argumentation. Myself, I am gold and pretty ok with being average by definition of all 1v1 players. If I would think I would suck in everything even 0.1% of all people are better than me, I would have used a strong rope already. Think positive
I understand your mindset, although I must disagree with your conclusion. Right now, you're in gold league, and you say that you would figuratively kill yourself if you thought you were terrible as a high masters player, I would consider you simply consider this a matter of perspective. currently you're gold, and you don't consider yourself very good, yes? but lets say you continue to play this game, and you eventually get promoted to platinum, why, you've indeed gotten better, but as you get better the holes in your play become more apparent. if you've ever seen a recursive painting, if one zooms in on the focal point of the picture to 100x zoom, it will look like the same picture, and yet to someone at 1x zoom it will look like a distant speck. That zoom is your opinion of your own play, and as you progress that zoom increases, and yet the picture, or your opinion of your play, remains essentially the same, for while you can acknowledge that you can SEE more than you once did, you can also see how much further room there is for improvement. Food for thought...
an example of a recursive painting,
![[image loading]](http://www.greatfunnypictures.com/pictures/4391-Amazing-Recursive-Painting.jpg)
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You know what also sucks? Anyone who plays on NA gets no recognition for being GM, because "the GM system is broken". They don't even get the privelege of thinking they're bad; if anyone says they're GM in NA (actually SEA too, to a greater extent), everyone just shits all over them and says it takes no skill. :/
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On March 05 2012 01:26 theshrabster wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2012 01:12 grs wrote:I think the OP is awesome, because I get your point and can follow your arguments even though I have a completely different opinion. I think that's what really shows a quality argumentation. Myself, I am gold and pretty ok with being average by definition of all 1v1 players. If I would think I would suck in everything even 0.1% of all people are better than me, I would have used a strong rope already. Think positive I understand your mindset, although I must disagree with your conclusion. Right now, you're in gold league, and you say that you would figuratively kill yourself if you thought you were terrible as a high masters player, I would consider you simply consider this a matter of perspective. currently you're gold, and you don't consider yourself very good, yes? but lets say you continue to play this game, and you eventually get promoted to platinum, why, you've indeed gotten better, but as you get better the holes in your play become more apparent. if you've ever seen a recursive painting, if one zooms in on the focal point of the picture to 100x zoom, it will look like the same picture, and yet to someone at 1x zoom it will look like a distant speck. That zoom is your opinion of your own play, and as you progress that zoom increases, and yet the picture, or your opinion of your play, remains essentially the same, for while you can acknowledge that you can SEE more than you once did, you can also see how much further room there is for improvement. Food for thought... an example of a recursive painting,
Yes, I fully agree: that's a matter of perspective; that's what I meant with "Think positive". I have done a lot of competitive sports in my life and I think I was "low master league" in one of them for some time.
At the age of 15 I played table tennis in the highest adolescence league in Germany. It had multiple divisions with about 12 teams of 6 players each, but still it was the highest league at that time. Our team got utterly chrushed and we got demoted a season afterwards, and while I was able to win about 1/3rd of my games, me and really all of us were pretty down after that season and - if recall correctly - we all stopped playing competitively after that year. We considered ourselves terrible (likeminded with the idea of the masters SC2 players from the OP).
This still was the best competitive result I ever had in my life and most of us will never be truly elite in any competition. For me there is a big difference in recognizing, that there are people much better and thinking you are terrible yourself.
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Fun fact for everyone - i'm actually the blue Zerg in the second picture.
Blazinghand probe rushed and left me, his only source of defense, to die.
Edit: On March 05 2012 00:28 MrBitter wrote:
I think you can sum it up like this:
The better you become at Starcraft, the more obvious your lack of understanding becomes. I've always liked comparing it to martial arts. A black belt in a martial art isn't a symbol of your mastery. It's something that other martial artists can look at and say "okay, now he finally has the tools to really start learning."
Not sure if you have done martial arts, MrBitter, but coming from someone who has, this statement is 100% correct, and is a very good comparison to the article by BH.
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EPT
