On July 25 2025 02:57 Ze'ev wrote: I was thinking of organising a tourny for fun but ive been out of the scene for like ten years: are there still any community casters around/what are their names? I just want to send a feeler out to see if anyone would be interested in casting the tourny at all because I would prefer not to do it myself haha
Some of the CPL casters might be willing to help out. You can find them in the CPL Discord, I'm guessing.
Any idea generally when the next ASL is happening.
I'm going to Japan in September to walk to the Kumano Kodo, I am considering stopping by in Korea before or after my hiking trip, would be awesome to see some BW in person at least once in my life.
On July 25 2025 20:54 thezanursic wrote: Any idea generally when the next ASL is happening.
I'm going to Japan in September to walk to the Kumano Kodo, I am considering stopping by in Korea before or after my hiking trip, would be awesome to see some BW in person at least once in my life.
On July 27 2025 06:19 Ze'ev wrote: Do people still use challonge to organise tournaments or is that out of date?
They do yes. It s somewhat normal to have the chats and coordination on discord and the results/bracket on challonge (in particular for 1v1 tournaments). Team leagues typically have their own pages/drives/grids
Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
It is a symptom of tunnel vision. These players don't play these games, then make the stupidest macro decisions in tournament. It is the same reason snow lost all respect for his asl credibility on troy. These players just don't play varied map pools and literally fail at basics. It is also why 76 produced the most memorable games in ASL 15. The fact they voted for this is the most hilarious part. A map as big as troy is never going to favour pvz, but I'm talking on deaf ears. They sideswipe 100% win rate in small maps blindsiding the zerg with early zealot pressure and pick closed large maps like they help stopping zerg mobility. It is stupidity in practice.
Anyone know what map this is that Effort is playing? I randomly tuned in and it's some UMS. He's playing T and building ghosts which apparently start with higher hp and shoot as fast or faster than marines. Some other things I noticed are DT's can cast maelstorm and the zerg can build infested kerrigans somehow? No clue what the other changes, if any, have been made.
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
Honestly feels like you haven't developed the idea beyond the "what if..." phase, disregarding the obvious consequences of such a change, but I'll humor the premise in case you honestly don't see the issue.
I guess first and foremost, ladder is by definition competitive, and having imbalanced oddball maps in a competitive ladder would undercut the whole competitive aspect thereof. If there are maps where one race is favored over another by a significant margin, that makes the ladder inherently unfair. It creates an uneven playing field.
If your friends have no interest in improving/competing at BW, then ladder really isn't the place for them. Custom lobbies exist, and are the perfect avenue for hosting imbalanced maps.
Let's explore why this idea is bad by looking at the immediate consequences. Introducing silly maps specifically for lower ranked players makes an already overwhelming learning experience even more demanding. Instead of learning standard build orders for standard maps, shitty players who can barely process what is happening will be tasked with grappling with an even more varied and imbalanced map pool. Then, if they manage to find some niche approach to these imbalanced maps, that knowledge immediately becomes useless once they graduate to the "real" maps and they get beaten back down into shitter tier on ladder. In other games this is called "bronze hell" or something like that; you can't escape, and changing the competitive landscape in this juncture makes it even more difficult to overcome.
The imbalances of the maps themselves will also result in an imbalanced racial distribution of players who make it that far. For example, let's say we have Lost Temple, an island map, the short rush distance map, and Hunters in the map pool. Terran players would ban the short rush distance map, making it a ZvZ graveyard, while keeping standard maps + LT/islands. Any Zerg that matches against Terran on these maps will have a bad time. So, more Terrans will be graduating to the "real" maps while Zergs continue to play Rock Paper Scissors on short rush distance map and losing to Terran everywhere else.
So, I guess what you would have to do is have an equal amount of imbalanced maps for each race? 2 Zerg maps, 2 Protoss maps, 2 Terran maps, etc. But then, people will just ban the maps that are not favorable for their race, right? And mirror matches will abound. Most people do not enjoy mirror matches as much as the other matchups. I don't think forcing more of them would make more people stick around.
There are plenty of other issues - such as Blizzard being slow to make any changes and having low interest in BW in general, thus making any change a risk - but these alone are enough to highlight why this is a dumb idea.
TLDR: The competitive ladder needs to cater to the people who actually want to play a competitive ladder, not noob tourists who already have an outlet in unrated lobby games.
ETA: One should think of standard maps as a blank canvas more than a restriction IMO. Imbalanced maps actually constrain your build choices far more than standard ones do. There are far more options on FS than on an island map, for example.
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
It is a symptom of tunnel vision. These players don't play these games, then make the stupidest macro decisions in tournament. It is the same reason snow lost all respect for his asl credibility on troy. These players just don't play varied map pools and literally fail at basics. It is also why 76 produced the most memorable games in ASL 15. The fact they voted for this is the most hilarious part. A map as big as troy is never going to favour pvz, but I'm talking on deaf ears. They sideswipe 100% win rate in small maps blindsiding the zerg with early zealot pressure and pick closed large maps like they help stopping zerg mobility. It is stupidity in practice.
Gotta love the perennial pattern of random D rank keyboard warrior scrubs saying that progamers don't know what they are doing and "fail at basics". If you're so smart and know better than they do, why don't we see you competing in ASL or at least in BSL? Oh wait, it's because you are shit at the game and see it through the same shitty lens. Dunning-Kruger effect on display in full swing.
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
Honestly feels like you haven't developed the idea beyond the "what if..." phase, disregarding the obvious consequences of such a change, but I'll humor the premise in case you honestly don't see the issue.
I guess first and foremost, ladder is by definition competitive, and having imbalanced oddball maps in a competitive ladder would undercut the whole competitive aspect thereof. If there are maps where one race is favored over another by a significant margin, that makes the ladder inherently unfair. It creates an uneven playing field.
If your friends have no interest in improving/competing at BW, then ladder really isn't the place for them. Custom lobbies exist, and are the perfect avenue for hosting imbalanced maps.
Let's explore why this idea is bad by looking at the immediate consequences. Introducing silly maps specifically for lower ranked players makes an already overwhelming learning experience even more demanding. Instead of learning standard build orders for standard maps, shitty players who can barely process what is happening will be tasked with grappling with an even more varied and imbalanced map pool. Then, if they manage to find some niche approach to these imbalanced maps, that knowledge immediately becomes useless once they graduate to the "real" maps and they get beaten back down into shitter tier on ladder. In other games this is called "bronze hell" or something like that; you can't escape, and changing the competitive landscape in this juncture makes it even more difficult to overcome.
The imbalances of the maps themselves will also result in an imbalanced racial distribution of players who make it that far. For example, let's say we have Lost Temple, an island map, the short rush distance map, and Hunters in the map pool. Terran players would ban the short rush distance map, making it a ZvZ graveyard, while keeping standard maps + LT/islands. Any Zerg that matches against Terran on these maps will have a bad time. So, more Terrans will be graduating to the "real" maps while Zergs continue to play Rock Paper Scissors on short rush distance map and losing to Terran everywhere else.
So, I guess what you would have to do is have an equal amount of imbalanced maps for each race? 2 Zerg maps, 2 Protoss maps, 2 Terran maps, etc. But then, people will just ban the maps that are not favorable for their race, right? And mirror matches will abound. Most people do not enjoy mirror matches as much as the other matchups. I don't think forcing more of them would make more people stick around.
There are plenty of other issues - such as Blizzard being slow to make any changes and having low interest in BW in general, thus making any change a risk - but these alone are enough to highlight why this is a dumb idea.
TLDR: The competitive ladder needs to cater to the people who actually want to play a competitive ladder, not noob tourists who already have an outlet in unrated lobby games.
ETA: One should think of standard maps as a blank canvas more than a restriction IMO. Imbalanced maps actually constrain your build choices far more than standard ones do. There are far more options on FS than on an island map, for example.
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
It is a symptom of tunnel vision. These players don't play these games, then make the stupidest macro decisions in tournament. It is the same reason snow lost all respect for his asl credibility on troy. These players just don't play varied map pools and literally fail at basics. It is also why 76 produced the most memorable games in ASL 15. The fact they voted for this is the most hilarious part. A map as big as troy is never going to favour pvz, but I'm talking on deaf ears. They sideswipe 100% win rate in small maps blindsiding the zerg with early zealot pressure and pick closed large maps like they help stopping zerg mobility. It is stupidity in practice.
Gotta love the perennial pattern of random D rank keyboard warrior scrubs saying that progamers don't know what they are doing and "fail at basics". If you're so smart and know better than they do, why don't we see you competing in ASL or at least in BSL? Oh wait, it's because you are shit at the game and see it through the same shitty lens. Dunning-Kruger effect on display in full swing.
I'm 40. Also, red herrings are common among TROLLs on this website, one more doesn't make any difference. I'm okay with dropping one or two depending on the matchup - different maps have different win rates remember, or are you painting them with the same broad strokes shifting the blame and claiming I said it? Stupidity is not practicing and being a laughing stock. PS: I'm thinking you are a snow fan. Grow up - Mini and Bisu have won ASLs. Both can deal with small maps and aren't afraid of them, increasing their winning chances. PS: I didn't want to say it, but punks like yourself know Flash is some terran god don't know terrans were the biggest whiners who complained zerg can rush two dozen hydras and they cannot defend with two tanks and ten marines in the mean time. That is how zerg got nerfed and you see flash beat jaedong eventhough he didn't need tanks or marines to do so, he was the vulture revolutionary. So in the end, whiners got an undeserved domination and they KEEP whining.
On July 29 2025 03:47 CuteSmallHydra wrote: Anyone know what map this is that Effort is playing? I randomly tuned in and it's some UMS. He's playing T and building ghosts which apparently start with higher hp and shoot as fast or faster than marines. Some other things I noticed are DT's can cast maelstorm and the zerg can build infested kerrigans somehow? No clue what the other changes, if any, have been made.
랜덤 능력 크래프트 or "random ability craft"
popular korean ums map where units have random abilities
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
Honestly feels like you haven't developed the idea beyond the "what if..." phase, disregarding the obvious consequences of such a change, but I'll humor the premise in case you honestly don't see the issue.
I guess first and foremost, ladder is by definition competitive, and having imbalanced oddball maps in a competitive ladder would undercut the whole competitive aspect thereof. If there are maps where one race is favored over another by a significant margin, that makes the ladder inherently unfair. It creates an uneven playing field.
If your friends have no interest in improving/competing at BW, then ladder really isn't the place for them. Custom lobbies exist, and are the perfect avenue for hosting imbalanced maps.
Let's explore why this idea is bad by looking at the immediate consequences. Introducing silly maps specifically for lower ranked players makes an already overwhelming learning experience even more demanding. Instead of learning standard build orders for standard maps, shitty players who can barely process what is happening will be tasked with grappling with an even more varied and imbalanced map pool. Then, if they manage to find some niche approach to these imbalanced maps, that knowledge immediately becomes useless once they graduate to the "real" maps and they get beaten back down into shitter tier on ladder. In other games this is called "bronze hell" or something like that; you can't escape, and changing the competitive landscape in this juncture makes it even more difficult to overcome.
The imbalances of the maps themselves will also result in an imbalanced racial distribution of players who make it that far. For example, let's say we have Lost Temple, an island map, the short rush distance map, and Hunters in the map pool. Terran players would ban the short rush distance map, making it a ZvZ graveyard, while keeping standard maps + LT/islands. Any Zerg that matches against Terran on these maps will have a bad time. So, more Terrans will be graduating to the "real" maps while Zergs continue to play Rock Paper Scissors on short rush distance map and losing to Terran everywhere else.
So, I guess what you would have to do is have an equal amount of imbalanced maps for each race? 2 Zerg maps, 2 Protoss maps, 2 Terran maps, etc. But then, people will just ban the maps that are not favorable for their race, right? And mirror matches will abound. Most people do not enjoy mirror matches as much as the other matchups. I don't think forcing more of them would make more people stick around.
There are plenty of other issues - such as Blizzard being slow to make any changes and having low interest in BW in general, thus making any change a risk - but these alone are enough to highlight why this is a dumb idea.
TLDR: The competitive ladder needs to cater to the people who actually want to play a competitive ladder, not noob tourists who already have an outlet in unrated lobby games.
ETA: One should think of standard maps as a blank canvas more than a restriction IMO. Imbalanced maps actually constrain your build choices far more than standard ones do. There are far more options on FS than on an island map, for example.
On July 29 2025 03:30 mtcn77 wrote:
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
It is a symptom of tunnel vision. These players don't play these games, then make the stupidest macro decisions in tournament. It is the same reason snow lost all respect for his asl credibility on troy. These players just don't play varied map pools and literally fail at basics. It is also why 76 produced the most memorable games in ASL 15. The fact they voted for this is the most hilarious part. A map as big as troy is never going to favour pvz, but I'm talking on deaf ears. They sideswipe 100% win rate in small maps blindsiding the zerg with early zealot pressure and pick closed large maps like they help stopping zerg mobility. It is stupidity in practice.
Gotta love the perennial pattern of random D rank keyboard warrior scrubs saying that progamers don't know what they are doing and "fail at basics". If you're so smart and know better than they do, why don't we see you competing in ASL or at least in BSL? Oh wait, it's because you are shit at the game and see it through the same shitty lens. Dunning-Kruger effect on display in full swing.
I'm 40. Also, red herrings are common among TROLLs on this website, one more doesn't make any difference. I'm okay with dropping one or two depending on the matchup - different maps have different win rates remember, or are you painting them with the same broad strokes shifting the blame and claiming I said it? Stupidity is not practicing and being a laughing stock. PS: I'm thinking you are a snow fan. Grow up - Mini and Bisu have won ASLs. Both can deal with small maps and aren't afraid of them, increasing their winning chances. PS: I didn't want to say it, but punks like yourself know Flash is some terran god don't know terrans were the biggest whiners who complained zerg can rush two dozen hydras and they cannot defend with two tanks and ten marines in the mean time. That is how zerg got nerfed and you see flash beat jaedong eventhough he didn't need tanks or marines to do so, he was the vulture revolutionary. So in the end, whiners got an undeserved domination and they KEEP whining.
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
Honestly feels like you haven't developed the idea beyond the "what if..." phase, disregarding the obvious consequences of such a change, but I'll humor the premise in case you honestly don't see the issue.
I guess first and foremost, ladder is by definition competitive, and having imbalanced oddball maps in a competitive ladder would undercut the whole competitive aspect thereof. If there are maps where one race is favored over another by a significant margin, that makes the ladder inherently unfair. It creates an uneven playing field.
If your friends have no interest in improving/competing at BW, then ladder really isn't the place for them. Custom lobbies exist, and are the perfect avenue for hosting imbalanced maps.
Let's explore why this idea is bad by looking at the immediate consequences. Introducing silly maps specifically for lower ranked players makes an already overwhelming learning experience even more demanding. Instead of learning standard build orders for standard maps, shitty players who can barely process what is happening will be tasked with grappling with an even more varied and imbalanced map pool. Then, if they manage to find some niche approach to these imbalanced maps, that knowledge immediately becomes useless once they graduate to the "real" maps and they get beaten back down into shitter tier on ladder. In other games this is called "bronze hell" or something like that; you can't escape, and changing the competitive landscape in this juncture makes it even more difficult to overcome.
The imbalances of the maps themselves will also result in an imbalanced racial distribution of players who make it that far. For example, let's say we have Lost Temple, an island map, the short rush distance map, and Hunters in the map pool. Terran players would ban the short rush distance map, making it a ZvZ graveyard, while keeping standard maps + LT/islands. Any Zerg that matches against Terran on these maps will have a bad time. So, more Terrans will be graduating to the "real" maps while Zergs continue to play Rock Paper Scissors on short rush distance map and losing to Terran everywhere else.
So, I guess what you would have to do is have an equal amount of imbalanced maps for each race? 2 Zerg maps, 2 Protoss maps, 2 Terran maps, etc. But then, people will just ban the maps that are not favorable for their race, right? And mirror matches will abound. Most people do not enjoy mirror matches as much as the other matchups. I don't think forcing more of them would make more people stick around.
There are plenty of other issues - such as Blizzard being slow to make any changes and having low interest in BW in general, thus making any change a risk - but these alone are enough to highlight why this is a dumb idea.
TLDR: The competitive ladder needs to cater to the people who actually want to play a competitive ladder, not noob tourists who already have an outlet in unrated lobby games.
ETA: One should think of standard maps as a blank canvas more than a restriction IMO. Imbalanced maps actually constrain your build choices far more than standard ones do. There are far more options on FS than on an island map, for example.
On July 29 2025 03:30 mtcn77 wrote:
On July 29 2025 01:04 Ze'ev wrote: Is there some technical reason why maps on ladder arent tied to skill? The maps we use are a reflection of balance but balance isnt an essentialist feature of maps, its dependent on skill and knowledge. All the maps are land maps with lots of money and fairly long rush distances, no cliffs. Its a rather constrained pool compared to what could be played in the early 2000's or even the mid 2000's or even the late 2000's. And while obviously I cant dispute any claim about balance for Flash, or even top Amateurs like Eonzerg, I honestly dont understand why D and E rank players arent given a broader map pool. One of the barriers to entry for broodwar is just the sameness of the maps. To compare it to chess: we had the romantic era, and now we have huge line memorisation. If you are really into chess the fact that Magnus Carlson goes for some obscure line on a common opening is exciting. But the average player doesnt understand the subtlety of that and doesnt care. They can choose freely to play however they'd like. Broodwar is unlike chess in that the map determines the amplitude of the game itself. Why are so many lines cut out of the game for like 90 or less APM players? I had three friends in real life who grew up with me playing Starcraft (were in our early thirties now) and compared to me they're dogshit at the game; they have careers, wives, kids. They arent intending on getting better but they still enjoy melee games. They want to ladder. But the ladder for them (again, the subtlety is lost on bad players) is just the same type of map endlessly repeated.
Is there some technical reason why the bottom of the ladder doesnt have more map diversity? I dont understand the intricate mechanics of these kind of things so maybe its silly, but to me it seems like you could have 5-6 maps on the bottom of the pool and if your playing someone past the cut off where these maps are used (as you are ranking up) you would simply be defaulted back to Fighting spirit/and a couple other maps that all players would share in common. Is there just not enough players for this to be viable? I just feel that the average person who picks up chess likely wants to play in a romantic swashbuckling way not 40 lines memorised, and the average broodwar player wants island maps, semi island maps, rushy maps, cliffs, and just the full diversity of broodwar. But instead they get maps designed for the balance of a small minority of people.
It is a symptom of tunnel vision. These players don't play these games, then make the stupidest macro decisions in tournament. It is the same reason snow lost all respect for his asl credibility on troy. These players just don't play varied map pools and literally fail at basics. It is also why 76 produced the most memorable games in ASL 15. The fact they voted for this is the most hilarious part. A map as big as troy is never going to favour pvz, but I'm talking on deaf ears. They sideswipe 100% win rate in small maps blindsiding the zerg with early zealot pressure and pick closed large maps like they help stopping zerg mobility. It is stupidity in practice.
Gotta love the perennial pattern of random D rank keyboard warrior scrubs saying that progamers don't know what they are doing and "fail at basics". If you're so smart and know better than they do, why don't we see you competing in ASL or at least in BSL? Oh wait, it's because you are shit at the game and see it through the same shitty lens. Dunning-Kruger effect on display in full swing.
I'm 40. Also, red herrings are common among TROLLs on this website, one more doesn't make any difference. I'm okay with dropping one or two depending on the matchup - different maps have different win rates remember, or are you painting them with the same broad strokes shifting the blame and claiming I said it? Stupidity is not practicing and being a laughing stock. PS: I'm thinking you are a snow fan. Grow up - Mini and Bisu have won ASLs. Both can deal with small maps and aren't afraid of them, increasing their winning chances. PS: I didn't want to say it, but punks like yourself know Flash is some terran god don't know terrans were the biggest whiners who complained zerg can rush two dozen hydras and they cannot defend with two tanks and ten marines in the mean time. That is how zerg got nerfed and you see flash beat jaedong eventhough he didn't need tanks or marines to do so, he was the vulture revolutionary. So in the end, whiners got an undeserved domination and they KEEP whining.
Bisu has in fact not won an ASL.
I think there are at least a few people considering MSLs higher up than ASL. Quote; "More players trained in the Kespa days".
Seems like a boring argument you guys are having but OBVIOUSLY it was way more competitive during the kespa days. The Ro16 for ASL is like 90% the same every season, compared to like < 50% for MSL/OSL season to season.
EPT
i know this moment ![[image loading]](https://i.imgur.com/WyfWLWU.png)
