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Scheduling for these tournaments always sucks for every team. Worst scenario occurs a lot, which is when a mix of korean, usa, and european players are all competing in a match, in which case the only time that works is usually having the usa players playing their matches at 7-9 am.
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On September 13 2012 12:57 Falling wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2012 12:16 Myrddraal wrote:On September 12 2012 13:51 Falling wrote:
I really am not a fan of the all-kill format. I like the head games of when coaches are trying to decide who to send out against who. It seems to me, the different roles in a team come much more into play. Specialist players to knock out x player or race, Ace player to bring the team home, etc.
Rather than we'll just send out our most dominant player and you try and find someone to beat him. It just doesn't seem that interesting to me. This seems like a very biased and narrow minded explanation of both formats. Here's how I would probably write it: I really am not a fan of the proleague format. I like the head games of when coaches are trying to decide who to send out against who. It seems to me, the different roles in a team come much more into play. Specialist players to snipe x player or race, Ace player to bring the team home, etc. Rather than we'll just send out our most dominant player as the ace and you try and find someone to beat him. It just doesn't seem that interesting to me. I'm don't understand your post. Obviously I'm biased because I prefer another format. People that like all-kill are biased towards that. What matters is the explanation. But simply switching one word doesn't make the rest of what I said suddenly apply to your argument. All-kill is potentially very front-end loaded. Send out the big gun and have him rip through the entire team. You can't have that when it's 4 1v1's. I think there's a lot more head games when you can't rely on your big gun to do all the heavy lifting. (But they're still very important for winning that Ace match. I think the proleague format lends itself to more race specific snipers or players and therefore more head games on who to send next. Rather than, well Taeja (for instance) is tearing it up... who's next up to bat?
From my perspective it actually does apply perfectly to my argument. If it's a more in-depth explanation you want, here you go:
All-kill provides the mind games where the coach has to choose a player for who to send out, but in my opinion it is a better more complicated mind game because you then have to realise what players the other team can send out to counter that player. Sure you can send out your best player to take someone down but then you have to worry about the other team having planned a specific snipe for that player on a specific map of their choosing.
The different roles come in to play quite well in all-kill format, you can send out a streaky player first (like GuMiho) hoping that they can take a few wins/allkill or you can send a new/underexposed player which their opponent might not know their style and the Coach may not know who would be best to take them down. Then you have snipers set up for specific matchups or players and of course the trusty ace to send out either at the end or when all their likely snipers are already down.
My point was that all these things you mentioned are perfectly applicable to the All-Kill format and in my opinion (which I also admit to be biased) All-Kill does them all better. Yes, All-Kill is potentially front-end loaded, but I don't have a problem with it in this context. If a player is playing so well that they can take down a whole team that has most likely prepared specific strategies against them on specific maps, I think that is quite an accomplishment.
My main problem with your posts is that you are way oversimplifying the mentality of teams going in to games in the All-Kill format, such that your explanation of it is to be blunt, wrong, and you are doing a disservice to the teams. Take Liquid for example, if you actually look at their wins in IPLTAC3 for the most part they did their best with their other players first before relying on Taeja as the ace, just because he pulled through with the majority of their wins doesn't mean that before each match they just went "Okay guys, everyone else just do whatever, Taeja can beat everyone anyway".
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I watched SPL for the first time the past few months and I did not see any of the supposed strategy invovled. Maybe because it had that weird BW/SC2 combination and stuff, but it just seemed like all the Coaches picks were made prior and that there were no picks reactive to who the opponent is. What I love about All-Kill format is that it exhibits a strategy whereby the coach of the team who just lost knows who the opponent is and has to make a decision on the spot of who to send out to best counter that player. Or they may have to choose between a sniper and an all-around player. That's strategy. Selecting 4 names to play in separate 1v1s? I can't see how there's strategy in that beyond just mindgames about what the opposing coach would set the lineup as, but that's not much beyond sheer guessing.
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As long as we mix Korean, American and European teams in all leagues, its hard to find a fitting time to play games. These guys are proffessional players though, and we should expect them to perform well at any given situation, no?
I like the "all-kill" format, but I also like the 4xBO1 + Ace match.
The 4xBO3 that EGMC uses I think is to long, you could risk having 12 matches even before the ACE match, thats a long time watching one game, especially if you hit some TvT or something...
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hero was robbed 
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My main problem with your posts is that you are way oversimplifying the mentality of teams going in to games in the All-Kill format, such that your explanation of it is to be blunt, wrong, and you are doing a disservice to the teams. Take Liquid for example, if you actually look at their wins in IPLTAC3 for the most part they did their best with their other players first before relying on Taeja as the ace, just because he pulled through with the majority of their wins doesn't mean that before each match they just went "Okay guys, everyone else just do whatever, Taeja can beat everyone anyway".
The thing about that is, it doesn't really matter if they 'did their best' or not, at the end of the day one single player had more wins than the rest of the team combined.
Also, on topic of snipers and specific builds etc... how often do you actually see REALLY tailored builds in AK format games? Not very often at all except maybe against teams that overly rely on 1 player, because generally you want and need your players to take more than 1 game. It simply makes no sense to send out a player with the thought of, "he'll snipe this guy and afterwards, whatever" in AK format, at least unless you're in the lead already. Whereas in PL format, you might not be preparing for a specific player very often either, but you do have a lot of very map-specific and race-specific builds, which can be a very cool thing to see, especially in PvZ / PvP.
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All-kill has been way overdone in SC2 in my opinion. I greatly appreciate leagues like the EG MCSL because of the variance that they bring and I was really disappointed when I saw that this season of IPTL was keeping the same old format. Its a bad format that can many times result in the better team losing just because the other team had one hot player. Thats not my only problem with the format but I just find it boring in many cases at this point and I think almost all leagues should do away with it.
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On September 13 2012 11:52 StarStruck wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2012 10:06 Bumblebee wrote:On September 13 2012 04:23 StarStruck wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
Since some fans believe that addressing this after a match is making excuses, i'll take it to my blog. I write this as a nerd with a big mouth - i have nothing to do with player scheduling, line up decisions, league management etc.
<hr>
So without taking too much away from the fact that Stephano won, i'll address a lot of the comments about Taeja and Hero's performance/making mistakes. These two games were played between 2:30 and 3:30am korean time - hero had just played his code s matches (at around 5pm) then came home to wait for this. Scheduling matches internationally fucking sucks - its pretty common that you can be in worse or better condition that your opponent just based on scheduling (it was about 9pm EU, 3pm US when stephano/taeja played, and probably 230pm US/130am KR when Sheth played). Iirc we had basically hit the limit for delaying this set, so delaying the games wasn't really an option.
Robin (our player manager), disagrees with me that the timing affected either Taeja or Hero's performance (that they are on odd sleeping patterns), but i think there has to be some value to the idea that if your physical and mental condition isn't at it's peak, you aren't going to play as well as you can.
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
JYP and Puma both had to play under the same conditions so it's possible that we could have lost earlier (5-2/5-3) if it was in their favor (Sheth played from US). Teams play with the idea that whatever time you agree on is the time, and you just deal with the unfortunate consequences of having your players spread all around the world. It's kind of like in the MMA world where you never really come into a fight without some bumps, bruises,dehydration - i think a lot of fans just assume everyone is always at 100%.
Because of the IPTL winner-stays format, you cant just schedule certain matches for better timing. There's not an optimal solution for timings right now. Ideally your players are in the best possible mental condition when they play hard matches due to the cerebral nature of SC2...it's just not as feasible as we'd like.
Until we have all players in central locations or some better solution you just have to factor in more variance in performance/decision making for all your favorite players.
It leads me to question if a winner-stays format is really the best for players in the long run considering they are all spread around. EGMC is a 4xBo3 with a Bo3 Ace match which is a different dynamic for predicting and sniping, but also allows for scheduling that is a bit more forgiving (robin can probably give better details on this).
I'm interested to know if you think an all-kill format where more play variance exists is more "fun" or "interesting" to watch than a 4xBo3 that players can prep/schedule for. You guys need to get a handle on your players. They don't like listening but you are trying to do what's best for them and they'll appreciate it more in the long run. Robin says the players were fine. Taeja most certainly didn't look that way against Stephano, lol. The game prior was a bit of a squash as well, so you cannot really get a good read. Anyway, I never did like all these bush leagues and I would like to see a central tour/league as well that way everyone is on the same sleep schedule opposed to delaying and trying to micro manage your players sleep patterns through online tournament to online tournament. I personally think the All-Kill format has been over done and I've never been a big fan of the GSTL format amongst the rest either. I prefer season play carried throughout a world circuit. So every pro player and team could compete at each destination. That would only happen if all the major organizers actually start working together to create one circuit where each plays host to a number of cities and get the broadcast rights. On September 13 2012 03:58 101998 wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
This is a much more interesting topic to me than timezones (in regard to a player being at “100%”). I am constantly dumbfounded at why pro players/teams don’t take physical/mental preparation more seriously. In every pro sport the diet of the player is closely monitored to make sure their body is running at peak efficiency. I have read interviews talking about how F1 drivers will do weekly blood/urine draws to make sure their bodies are absorbing nutrients correctly and that their brain is in the best possible state for a race. Then with all the studies flying around showing how much diet/exercise directly effects mental state/awareness/focus I am amazed that teams are not dictating a clean diet to their players. Feels like full amateur mode in an environment where everyone is claiming to be a professional. It's called better coaching & managing. It's as if everyone needs to be treated as an MC where he has his personal assistants. You need to teach them and inform them of how to take better care of their health so they're always alert and getting the job done. Like a Hawk. On September 13 2012 03:37 Randomrichie wrote:
Stephano won NASL yet had to play multiple games at stupid times in the early morning due to time differences :| I distinctly remember him waking up at like 3am simply to play a match then go back to bed. Sure it sucks but it obviously didn't affect him as much as is being made out here. The kids got skills. He most certainly does. EG doesn't really need to worry about him so much which is a good thing. We can all improve. Running team's as a professional sport is still very young and we're all learning, but I really think you need to slow down. You think a lot of things that aren't true and a lot of things have more than what meets your eye. On top of that TaeJa didn't play well - there can be many reasons to this, but one thing is for sure is that there's absolutely no reason to make excuses for why he didn't play well. He played greedy, didn't see the bust coming and generally just got out-played by Stephano who is a great player. It might be new to you guys, but treating them like actual athletes is all about mindset. Professional athletes receive all sorts of seminars and workshops to deal with media, watch their nutritition levels, etc. I'd like to know what exactly you find untrue BB? Ofc he didn't play well and we're only talking about a few variables. You cannot control everything, but for the things you can control it's our duty to do our best to make sure each player is prepared mentally and physically. If that means taking a power nap right after coming back from the GOM studio then so be it. I'm not making excuses. That's not like me. There are none. You own up to everything you do and there's nothing to take away from Stephano. We know how good he is. Everyone wishes the game was a bit more entertaining though. ;/
You are overvaluing the treatment MC gets. Also I think you think/want ESPORTS to be further ahead than it really is from a financial standpoint.
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All kill shouldnt be a common thing. The only reason i used to stay through matches with the format is because of the exclusivity. The chance to see that (R)AK was worth it.
Now a lot of the stuff i see are the 4 hour epics that i cant make time for.
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On September 13 2012 22:26 Bumblebee wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2012 11:52 StarStruck wrote:On September 13 2012 10:06 Bumblebee wrote:On September 13 2012 04:23 StarStruck wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
Since some fans believe that addressing this after a match is making excuses, i'll take it to my blog. I write this as a nerd with a big mouth - i have nothing to do with player scheduling, line up decisions, league management etc.
<hr>
So without taking too much away from the fact that Stephano won, i'll address a lot of the comments about Taeja and Hero's performance/making mistakes. These two games were played between 2:30 and 3:30am korean time - hero had just played his code s matches (at around 5pm) then came home to wait for this. Scheduling matches internationally fucking sucks - its pretty common that you can be in worse or better condition that your opponent just based on scheduling (it was about 9pm EU, 3pm US when stephano/taeja played, and probably 230pm US/130am KR when Sheth played). Iirc we had basically hit the limit for delaying this set, so delaying the games wasn't really an option.
Robin (our player manager), disagrees with me that the timing affected either Taeja or Hero's performance (that they are on odd sleeping patterns), but i think there has to be some value to the idea that if your physical and mental condition isn't at it's peak, you aren't going to play as well as you can.
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
JYP and Puma both had to play under the same conditions so it's possible that we could have lost earlier (5-2/5-3) if it was in their favor (Sheth played from US). Teams play with the idea that whatever time you agree on is the time, and you just deal with the unfortunate consequences of having your players spread all around the world. It's kind of like in the MMA world where you never really come into a fight without some bumps, bruises,dehydration - i think a lot of fans just assume everyone is always at 100%.
Because of the IPTL winner-stays format, you cant just schedule certain matches for better timing. There's not an optimal solution for timings right now. Ideally your players are in the best possible mental condition when they play hard matches due to the cerebral nature of SC2...it's just not as feasible as we'd like.
Until we have all players in central locations or some better solution you just have to factor in more variance in performance/decision making for all your favorite players.
It leads me to question if a winner-stays format is really the best for players in the long run considering they are all spread around. EGMC is a 4xBo3 with a Bo3 Ace match which is a different dynamic for predicting and sniping, but also allows for scheduling that is a bit more forgiving (robin can probably give better details on this).
I'm interested to know if you think an all-kill format where more play variance exists is more "fun" or "interesting" to watch than a 4xBo3 that players can prep/schedule for. You guys need to get a handle on your players. They don't like listening but you are trying to do what's best for them and they'll appreciate it more in the long run. Robin says the players were fine. Taeja most certainly didn't look that way against Stephano, lol. The game prior was a bit of a squash as well, so you cannot really get a good read. Anyway, I never did like all these bush leagues and I would like to see a central tour/league as well that way everyone is on the same sleep schedule opposed to delaying and trying to micro manage your players sleep patterns through online tournament to online tournament. I personally think the All-Kill format has been over done and I've never been a big fan of the GSTL format amongst the rest either. I prefer season play carried throughout a world circuit. So every pro player and team could compete at each destination. That would only happen if all the major organizers actually start working together to create one circuit where each plays host to a number of cities and get the broadcast rights. On September 13 2012 03:58 101998 wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
This is a much more interesting topic to me than timezones (in regard to a player being at “100%”). I am constantly dumbfounded at why pro players/teams don’t take physical/mental preparation more seriously. In every pro sport the diet of the player is closely monitored to make sure their body is running at peak efficiency. I have read interviews talking about how F1 drivers will do weekly blood/urine draws to make sure their bodies are absorbing nutrients correctly and that their brain is in the best possible state for a race. Then with all the studies flying around showing how much diet/exercise directly effects mental state/awareness/focus I am amazed that teams are not dictating a clean diet to their players. Feels like full amateur mode in an environment where everyone is claiming to be a professional. It's called better coaching & managing. It's as if everyone needs to be treated as an MC where he has his personal assistants. You need to teach them and inform them of how to take better care of their health so they're always alert and getting the job done. Like a Hawk. On September 13 2012 03:37 Randomrichie wrote:
Stephano won NASL yet had to play multiple games at stupid times in the early morning due to time differences :| I distinctly remember him waking up at like 3am simply to play a match then go back to bed. Sure it sucks but it obviously didn't affect him as much as is being made out here. The kids got skills. He most certainly does. EG doesn't really need to worry about him so much which is a good thing. We can all improve. Running team's as a professional sport is still very young and we're all learning, but I really think you need to slow down. You think a lot of things that aren't true and a lot of things have more than what meets your eye. On top of that TaeJa didn't play well - there can be many reasons to this, but one thing is for sure is that there's absolutely no reason to make excuses for why he didn't play well. He played greedy, didn't see the bust coming and generally just got out-played by Stephano who is a great player. It might be new to you guys, but treating them like actual athletes is all about mindset. Professional athletes receive all sorts of seminars and workshops to deal with media, watch their nutritition levels, etc. I'd like to know what exactly you find untrue BB? Ofc he didn't play well and we're only talking about a few variables. You cannot control everything, but for the things you can control it's our duty to do our best to make sure each player is prepared mentally and physically. If that means taking a power nap right after coming back from the GOM studio then so be it. I'm not making excuses. That's not like me. There are none. You own up to everything you do and there's nothing to take away from Stephano. We know how good he is. Everyone wishes the game was a bit more entertaining though. ;/ You are overvaluing the treatment MC gets. Also I think you think/want ESPORTS to be further ahead than it really is from a financial standpoint.
How so? It's a lot easier to manage one player compared to a team that is all over the place. In terms of micro managing MC I'd say it's a lot easier due to the volume alone. That's just logic and SK has someone always looking out for him.
I don't think where anywhere near the point of unification, but I do push for it in my agenda to get rid of most of the bush league crap we see going on.
On September 14 2012 00:31 Warpath wrote:
All kill shouldnt be a common thing. The only reason i used to stay through matches with the format is because of the exclusivity. The chance to see that (R)AK was worth it.
Now a lot of the stuff i see are the 4 hour epics that i cant make time for.
It does lose it's novelty after a while.
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I think this is fair statement to make, and will always have an affect in some way or another.
However:
EVERY professional gamer will have to play in suboptimal conditions. Part of an amazing player is succeeding against all odds, enemies, situations. It' already a given that not everyone is at 100% - maybe someone got a bad night of selep before mlg etc etc. Such conditions cannot be used to justify bad performance or something of the like - players will never always play at their best and thats just how it is.
tl;dr it exists for everyone so it shouldnt be a factor in determining the "validity" of a match or tournament.
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On September 13 2012 22:26 Bumblebee wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2012 11:52 StarStruck wrote:On September 13 2012 10:06 Bumblebee wrote:On September 13 2012 04:23 StarStruck wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
Since some fans believe that addressing this after a match is making excuses, i'll take it to my blog. I write this as a nerd with a big mouth - i have nothing to do with player scheduling, line up decisions, league management etc.
<hr>
So without taking too much away from the fact that Stephano won, i'll address a lot of the comments about Taeja and Hero's performance/making mistakes. These two games were played between 2:30 and 3:30am korean time - hero had just played his code s matches (at around 5pm) then came home to wait for this. Scheduling matches internationally fucking sucks - its pretty common that you can be in worse or better condition that your opponent just based on scheduling (it was about 9pm EU, 3pm US when stephano/taeja played, and probably 230pm US/130am KR when Sheth played). Iirc we had basically hit the limit for delaying this set, so delaying the games wasn't really an option.
Robin (our player manager), disagrees with me that the timing affected either Taeja or Hero's performance (that they are on odd sleeping patterns), but i think there has to be some value to the idea that if your physical and mental condition isn't at it's peak, you aren't going to play as well as you can.
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
JYP and Puma both had to play under the same conditions so it's possible that we could have lost earlier (5-2/5-3) if it was in their favor (Sheth played from US). Teams play with the idea that whatever time you agree on is the time, and you just deal with the unfortunate consequences of having your players spread all around the world. It's kind of like in the MMA world where you never really come into a fight without some bumps, bruises,dehydration - i think a lot of fans just assume everyone is always at 100%.
Because of the IPTL winner-stays format, you cant just schedule certain matches for better timing. There's not an optimal solution for timings right now. Ideally your players are in the best possible mental condition when they play hard matches due to the cerebral nature of SC2...it's just not as feasible as we'd like.
Until we have all players in central locations or some better solution you just have to factor in more variance in performance/decision making for all your favorite players.
It leads me to question if a winner-stays format is really the best for players in the long run considering they are all spread around. EGMC is a 4xBo3 with a Bo3 Ace match which is a different dynamic for predicting and sniping, but also allows for scheduling that is a bit more forgiving (robin can probably give better details on this).
I'm interested to know if you think an all-kill format where more play variance exists is more "fun" or "interesting" to watch than a 4xBo3 that players can prep/schedule for. You guys need to get a handle on your players. They don't like listening but you are trying to do what's best for them and they'll appreciate it more in the long run. Robin says the players were fine. Taeja most certainly didn't look that way against Stephano, lol. The game prior was a bit of a squash as well, so you cannot really get a good read. Anyway, I never did like all these bush leagues and I would like to see a central tour/league as well that way everyone is on the same sleep schedule opposed to delaying and trying to micro manage your players sleep patterns through online tournament to online tournament. I personally think the All-Kill format has been over done and I've never been a big fan of the GSTL format amongst the rest either. I prefer season play carried throughout a world circuit. So every pro player and team could compete at each destination. That would only happen if all the major organizers actually start working together to create one circuit where each plays host to a number of cities and get the broadcast rights. On September 13 2012 03:58 101998 wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
This is a much more interesting topic to me than timezones (in regard to a player being at “100%”). I am constantly dumbfounded at why pro players/teams don’t take physical/mental preparation more seriously. In every pro sport the diet of the player is closely monitored to make sure their body is running at peak efficiency. I have read interviews talking about how F1 drivers will do weekly blood/urine draws to make sure their bodies are absorbing nutrients correctly and that their brain is in the best possible state for a race. Then with all the studies flying around showing how much diet/exercise directly effects mental state/awareness/focus I am amazed that teams are not dictating a clean diet to their players. Feels like full amateur mode in an environment where everyone is claiming to be a professional. It's called better coaching & managing. It's as if everyone needs to be treated as an MC where he has his personal assistants. You need to teach them and inform them of how to take better care of their health so they're always alert and getting the job done. Like a Hawk. On September 13 2012 03:37 Randomrichie wrote:
Stephano won NASL yet had to play multiple games at stupid times in the early morning due to time differences :| I distinctly remember him waking up at like 3am simply to play a match then go back to bed. Sure it sucks but it obviously didn't affect him as much as is being made out here. The kids got skills. He most certainly does. EG doesn't really need to worry about him so much which is a good thing. We can all improve. Running team's as a professional sport is still very young and we're all learning, but I really think you need to slow down. You think a lot of things that aren't true and a lot of things have more than what meets your eye. On top of that TaeJa didn't play well - there can be many reasons to this, but one thing is for sure is that there's absolutely no reason to make excuses for why he didn't play well. He played greedy, didn't see the bust coming and generally just got out-played by Stephano who is a great player. It might be new to you guys, but treating them like actual athletes is all about mindset. Professional athletes receive all sorts of seminars and workshops to deal with media, watch their nutritition levels, etc. I'd like to know what exactly you find untrue BB? Ofc he didn't play well and we're only talking about a few variables. You cannot control everything, but for the things you can control it's our duty to do our best to make sure each player is prepared mentally and physically. If that means taking a power nap right after coming back from the GOM studio then so be it. I'm not making excuses. That's not like me. There are none. You own up to everything you do and there's nothing to take away from Stephano. We know how good he is. Everyone wishes the game was a bit more entertaining though. ;/ You are overvaluing the treatment MC gets. Also I think you think/want ESPORTS to be further ahead than it really is from a financial standpoint.
While I think this guy is being too critical with his statements, his core point merits more attention. Maybe sending players to media training and getting blood draws to test nutrition (SpectraCell is about $100+ a pop) is too much in the current climate, but nothing is stopping teams from adopting the mentality that these types of things are important and focusing on low/no-cost ways of stepping up. Telling players they have to eat clean and giving them a lifting routine to follow isn’t asking that much when the potential increase in performance/consistency is so high. Media training and sports counseling does cost a lot, but reading great books (War of Art by Steven Pressfield or Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill are a good place to start) and taking improv/stand-up classes at local theater are really cheap ways of bringing out personality and hardening resolve. Solutions are available if the mentality shift to thinking of the player’s life as a whole continuum (rather than just looking at in-game performance) happens. Rationalizing that money is somehow a factor is kind of BS.
To go beyond that the attitude as a whole in SC feels really amateur and immature. My impression of player’s practicing is grinding out games for 8 hours+ a day, which has to be the most inefficient way to practice I can think of. I guess this idea came from Korea where their mentality is “more effort and time will solve the problem”, but can you picture Tiger Woods, Michael Schumacher, Kobe Bryant or Rafael Nadal practicing this way? Arnold didn’t win all those bodybuilding competitions because he spent the most time in the gym, he won because sat down and figured out exactly what he needed to do to be the best and then executed those ideas like a motherfucker. SC feels like a lot of blind execution with not a lot of planning. Looking at books like The Power of Full Engagement by Tony Swartz talking directly about applying modern business efficacy theory to sports players it seems odd that resources like this are not used in SC. Maybe these principals are being applied and those conversations are just not made public, if so my apologies for the criticism.
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On September 14 2012 01:39 101998 wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2012 22:26 Bumblebee wrote:On September 13 2012 11:52 StarStruck wrote:On September 13 2012 10:06 Bumblebee wrote:On September 13 2012 04:23 StarStruck wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
Since some fans believe that addressing this after a match is making excuses, i'll take it to my blog. I write this as a nerd with a big mouth - i have nothing to do with player scheduling, line up decisions, league management etc.
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So without taking too much away from the fact that Stephano won, i'll address a lot of the comments about Taeja and Hero's performance/making mistakes. These two games were played between 2:30 and 3:30am korean time - hero had just played his code s matches (at around 5pm) then came home to wait for this. Scheduling matches internationally fucking sucks - its pretty common that you can be in worse or better condition that your opponent just based on scheduling (it was about 9pm EU, 3pm US when stephano/taeja played, and probably 230pm US/130am KR when Sheth played). Iirc we had basically hit the limit for delaying this set, so delaying the games wasn't really an option.
Robin (our player manager), disagrees with me that the timing affected either Taeja or Hero's performance (that they are on odd sleeping patterns), but i think there has to be some value to the idea that if your physical and mental condition isn't at it's peak, you aren't going to play as well as you can.
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
JYP and Puma both had to play under the same conditions so it's possible that we could have lost earlier (5-2/5-3) if it was in their favor (Sheth played from US). Teams play with the idea that whatever time you agree on is the time, and you just deal with the unfortunate consequences of having your players spread all around the world. It's kind of like in the MMA world where you never really come into a fight without some bumps, bruises,dehydration - i think a lot of fans just assume everyone is always at 100%.
Because of the IPTL winner-stays format, you cant just schedule certain matches for better timing. There's not an optimal solution for timings right now. Ideally your players are in the best possible mental condition when they play hard matches due to the cerebral nature of SC2...it's just not as feasible as we'd like.
Until we have all players in central locations or some better solution you just have to factor in more variance in performance/decision making for all your favorite players.
It leads me to question if a winner-stays format is really the best for players in the long run considering they are all spread around. EGMC is a 4xBo3 with a Bo3 Ace match which is a different dynamic for predicting and sniping, but also allows for scheduling that is a bit more forgiving (robin can probably give better details on this).
I'm interested to know if you think an all-kill format where more play variance exists is more "fun" or "interesting" to watch than a 4xBo3 that players can prep/schedule for. You guys need to get a handle on your players. They don't like listening but you are trying to do what's best for them and they'll appreciate it more in the long run. Robin says the players were fine. Taeja most certainly didn't look that way against Stephano, lol. The game prior was a bit of a squash as well, so you cannot really get a good read. Anyway, I never did like all these bush leagues and I would like to see a central tour/league as well that way everyone is on the same sleep schedule opposed to delaying and trying to micro manage your players sleep patterns through online tournament to online tournament. I personally think the All-Kill format has been over done and I've never been a big fan of the GSTL format amongst the rest either. I prefer season play carried throughout a world circuit. So every pro player and team could compete at each destination. That would only happen if all the major organizers actually start working together to create one circuit where each plays host to a number of cities and get the broadcast rights. On September 13 2012 03:58 101998 wrote:On September 12 2012 12:05 Kennigit wrote:
An interesting side note to this is that at the IPL TAC 3 final, taeja didn't eat breakfast and refused to have anything besides water (and some coke) during the first set where he destroyed IM. He had a sandwich and coke between the two sets, but i think that was pretty much it.
At MLGs i yell at HerO when i see him drinking Dr. Pepper and ask him to eat a banana instead (he ignores me ;_;).
This is a much more interesting topic to me than timezones (in regard to a player being at “100%”). I am constantly dumbfounded at why pro players/teams don’t take physical/mental preparation more seriously. In every pro sport the diet of the player is closely monitored to make sure their body is running at peak efficiency. I have read interviews talking about how F1 drivers will do weekly blood/urine draws to make sure their bodies are absorbing nutrients correctly and that their brain is in the best possible state for a race. Then with all the studies flying around showing how much diet/exercise directly effects mental state/awareness/focus I am amazed that teams are not dictating a clean diet to their players. Feels like full amateur mode in an environment where everyone is claiming to be a professional. It's called better coaching & managing. It's as if everyone needs to be treated as an MC where he has his personal assistants. You need to teach them and inform them of how to take better care of their health so they're always alert and getting the job done. Like a Hawk. On September 13 2012 03:37 Randomrichie wrote:
Stephano won NASL yet had to play multiple games at stupid times in the early morning due to time differences :| I distinctly remember him waking up at like 3am simply to play a match then go back to bed. Sure it sucks but it obviously didn't affect him as much as is being made out here. The kids got skills. He most certainly does. EG doesn't really need to worry about him so much which is a good thing. We can all improve. Running team's as a professional sport is still very young and we're all learning, but I really think you need to slow down. You think a lot of things that aren't true and a lot of things have more than what meets your eye. On top of that TaeJa didn't play well - there can be many reasons to this, but one thing is for sure is that there's absolutely no reason to make excuses for why he didn't play well. He played greedy, didn't see the bust coming and generally just got out-played by Stephano who is a great player. It might be new to you guys, but treating them like actual athletes is all about mindset. Professional athletes receive all sorts of seminars and workshops to deal with media, watch their nutritition levels, etc. I'd like to know what exactly you find untrue BB? Ofc he didn't play well and we're only talking about a few variables. You cannot control everything, but for the things you can control it's our duty to do our best to make sure each player is prepared mentally and physically. If that means taking a power nap right after coming back from the GOM studio then so be it. I'm not making excuses. That's not like me. There are none. You own up to everything you do and there's nothing to take away from Stephano. We know how good he is. Everyone wishes the game was a bit more entertaining though. ;/ You are overvaluing the treatment MC gets. Also I think you think/want ESPORTS to be further ahead than it really is from a financial standpoint. While I think this guy is being too critical with his statements, his core point merits more attention. Maybe sending players to media training and getting blood draws to test nutrition (SpectraCell is about $100+ a pop) is too much in the current climate, but nothing is stopping teams from adopting the mentality that these types of things are important and focusing on low/no-cost ways of stepping up. Telling players they have to eat clean and giving them a lifting routine to follow isn’t asking that much when the potential increase in performance/consistency is so high. Media training and sports counseling does cost a lot, but reading great books (War of Art by Steven Pressfield or Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill are a good place to start) and taking improv/stand-up classes at local theater are really cheap ways of bringing out personality and hardening resolve. Solutions are available if the mentality shift to thinking of the player’s life as a whole continuum (rather than just looking at in-game performance) happens. Rationalizing that money is somehow a factor is kind of BS. To go beyond that the attitude as a whole in SC feels really amateur and immature. My impression of player’s practicing is grinding out games for 8 hours+ a day, which has to be the most inefficient way to practice I can think of. I guess this idea came from Korea where their mentality is “more effort and time will solve the problem”, but can you picture Tiger Woods, Michael Schumacher, Kobe Bryant or Rafael Nadal practicing this way? Arnold didn’t win all those bodybuilding competitions because he spent the most time in the gym, he won because sat down and figured out exactly what he needed to do to be the best and then executed those ideas like a motherfucker. SC feels like a lot of blind execution with not a lot of planning. Looking at books like The Power of Full Engagement by Tony Swartz talking directly about applying modern business efficacy theory to sports players it seems odd that resources like this are not used in SC. Maybe these principals are being applied and those conversations are just not made public, if so my apologies for the criticism.
I see where you're coming from, but there's more to it than what meets the eye. If you look at the Olympics and the Chinese. Any competition that requires repitition in training, the Chinese dominate at. For what reason do you think?
But I agree, there are many things we can do to get better and things are coming slowly. Our players actually do read a lot of books - especially Sheth and TLO. However, we're continuing to work on our media, practice and management every single day. Things will come, but they will take time.
And to the other guy about MC being alone on a team, yeah sure. That's true. But I don't think MC is better managed that our guys are, nor in terms of attention they get from management.
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All kill can certainly be more entertaining, and usually is from my perspective.
But that isn't to say the EGMC format isn't entertaining, it just doesn't leave room for something like an epic 4-0 Taeja all kill.
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On September 14 2012 11:59 ThaZenith wrote:
All kill can certainly be more entertaining, and usually is from my perspective.
But that isn't to say the EGMC format isn't entertaining, it just doesn't leave room for something like an epic 4-0 Taeja all kill.
EGMC format though better shows which team is the better team not which team has the best ringers and the best lucky streaks
not to take anything away from any players but everyone would agree bo1 is the worst way to decide the better player
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On September 13 2012 20:31 Salazarz wrote:Show nested quote +My main problem with your posts is that you are way oversimplifying the mentality of teams going in to games in the All-Kill format, such that your explanation of it is to be blunt, wrong, and you are doing a disservice to the teams. Take Liquid for example, if you actually look at their wins in IPLTAC3 for the most part they did their best with their other players first before relying on Taeja as the ace, just because he pulled through with the majority of their wins doesn't mean that before each match they just went "Okay guys, everyone else just do whatever, Taeja can beat everyone anyway". The thing about that is, it doesn't really matter if they 'did their best' or not, at the end of the day one single player had more wins than the rest of the team combined. Also, on topic of snipers and specific builds etc... how often do you actually see REALLY tailored builds in AK format games? Not very often at all except maybe against teams that overly rely on 1 player, because generally you want and need your players to take more than 1 game. It simply makes no sense to send out a player with the thought of, "he'll snipe this guy and afterwards, whatever" in AK format, at least unless you're in the lead already. Whereas in PL format, you might not be preparing for a specific player very often either, but you do have a lot of very map-specific and race-specific builds, which can be a very cool thing to see, especially in PvZ / PvP.
It does matter, because I am talking about the mentality and strategy involved, not the end result.
You see them pretty much all the time actually, because the loser gets to pick the map, it would be stupid not to practice specific strategies for the map and the race. I never said they would snipe and "afterwards, whatever", they would then try to anticipate their counter sniper and prepare for that as well. I'll admit that PL format allows for more specific planning, but to assume that players don't plan specific snipes in AK format is just ignorant.
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I don't see anything wrong with Kennigits statement. I see some logical fallacies here in these counter arguments.. as in... your not even arguing about the same thing really.
Kennigit - "I think Global Time Zone Online All-Kill format is a sub-optimal method of playing, as it presents the oppourtunity to provide unesseccary advantages for players, favoring or disfavoring. In conclusion, Is All kill format worth ditching to play in better more optimal conditions?"
Everyone Else - "A loss is a loss and no one ever plays perfectly in perfect conditions. Since this is true, mitigating these things in anyway is pointless and you should just take your losses like a champ."
So the rebuttal to:
"Is proactivley mitigating undesireable factors worth changing a popular format , if said format is the format of the popular majority?"
is:
"Absolute mitigation is impossible, so theorycrafting proactive mitigation is dumb, and you should feel dumb for suggesting it!"
With so many intelligent people writing in this blog, I can't see how this is even an arguemnt. Your not even butting heads really lol.
Of course the format could be better to mitigate such a problem. But like he said (and was asking) is the allure of the format more important than this fact? So many responses not even adressing the question, and then denying thinking about proactively suggesting a positive change, based on the fact that nothing can be perfect?what?huh?...
Also, no clue in hell why people ae saying Kennigit was making an excuse for the team loosing, he was making a motion for an opinion on a situation.
Seriously a little confused right now...
EDIT: In retrospect, this reminds me alot about that HUGE debacle about cross server play in the eg team league. In that particular thread, everyone was debating what was the best way to mitigate undesireable conditions. I understand this comes after a game played, but does that make the notion any less legitimate? Or is it simply illigitamate because Kennigit posted it being TL staff, even though he states quite a few times he is merely a spectator in the affair?
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On September 14 2012 01:22 Pokebunny wrote:
I think this is fair statement to make, and will always have an affect in some way or another.
However:
EVERY professional gamer will have to play in suboptimal conditions. Part of an amazing player is succeeding against all odds, enemies, situations. It' already a given that not everyone is at 100% - maybe someone got a bad night of selep before mlg etc etc. Such conditions cannot be used to justify bad performance or something of the like - players will never always play at their best and thats just how it is.
tl;dr it exists for everyone so it shouldnt be a factor in determining the "validity" of a match or tournament.
Agreed Poke.
It's really up to the players to make sure they're well rested and manage themselves accordingly under these conditions. You cannot control everything, but for those things you can do to prep yourself. By all means do it!
BD
On September 14 2012 12:26 Forikorder wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2012 11:59 ThaZenith wrote:
All kill can certainly be more entertaining, and usually is from my perspective.
But that isn't to say the EGMC format isn't entertaining, it just doesn't leave room for something like an epic 4-0 Taeja all kill. EGMC format though better shows which team is the better team not which team has the best ringers and the best lucky streaks not to take anything away from any players but everyone would agree bo1 is the worst way to decide the better player
If you ask me it's all bush league and if IPL or GSTL did things another way, I'm sure the Masters Cup would probably lean towards a different format as well.
You know, just to be different.
I like it's current format and the fact each team meets. Reminds me of the WGTour Clan League which isn't a bad thing, but a good thing.
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Russian Federation483 Posts
PL format shows team's depth. For me that's the most important.
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I prefer the 4x Bo3 format because it reminds me of WC3L...i wish team leagues were more important
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EPT
