On May 27 2025 17:25 Soft_General_5023 wrote: you have to speak korean and live in korea i guess, just to have a chance to be accepted to play proleagues and sponmatches, only that way you can get skill to compete vs top.
similar to: can foreigners be successful at sumo
The best rikishi right now is literally from Mongolia
Mongolia already had a strong wrestling environment. Its a national sport of sorts. The best Sumo wrestlers have been from Mongolia for a while now. They also have much better training that's more modern than Japanese Sumo training is in the present day. Much less bound by traditionalism and much more progressive.
On May 27 2025 17:25 Soft_General_5023 wrote: you have to speak korean and live in korea i guess, just to have a chance to be accepted to play proleagues and sponmatches, only that way you can get skill to compete vs top.
similar to: can foreigners be successful at sumo
The best rikishi right now is literally from Mongolia
Mongolia already had a strong wrestling environment. Its a national sport of sorts. The best Sumo wrestlers have been from Mongolia for a while now. They also have much better training that's more modern than Japanese Sumo training is in the present day. Much less bound by traditionalism and much more progressive.
I didn’t have learning a bit about Mongolians being good at sumo wrestling on my bingo card for the day, but I’m happy I did
As a fan of both BW and sumo, the comparison makes a lot of sense to me.
Sure, foreign wrestlers have been dominating the sport for decades, but they live in Japan, and train 24/7 in a Japanese sumo stable. This is a requirement to be allowed to compete in Japanese pro sumo. They join at a young age, and endure crazy training for years. Their situation is very similar to pros in Korean houses back in the day.
"Real" foreign wrestlers, however, who take part in international sumo championships, fight in a plastic ring, and wear stuff under their belt, have no access whatsoever to Japanese wrestlers and tournaments. Completely separate worlds. They also hardly ever practice sumo as a full time job. Their situation is very similar to BW foreign scene.
And, as you can imagine, the skill gap between international sumo and Japanese pro sumo is abysmal, maybe even worse than in BW.
I don't see how you could become as good as the champions if you don't train nearly as much, play with slightly different rules, and don't have access to the strongest opposition on a regular basis.
Well Rain is pretty good and I’ve been told he’s practicing mostly against a computer.
I think what you say is 100% true back in the KESPA days where you didn’t have streamers publicly displaying build orders and strategies in first person, like they do now.
In my opinion (which really isn’t worth much tbh) BW mechanics is so ridiculously difficult, so if you have optimal speed and mechanics (around Bisu peak levels) you can get away with a lot.
On May 27 2025 03:16 SiarX wrote: Years ago foreign scene was a total a joke, any serious Korean player would walk over any foreigner.
Maybe you weren't around but foreigners used to have a much better chance, imo. Players like bonyth and dewalt are definitely respectable but back in the day we had some real legends. Mondragon who for whatever reason was always near the level of the koreans. Draco who literally was on a korean pro team, along with LX and PJ. Later NonY, ret, and IdrA. Even guys like G5, who's still around, would from time to time lay some smack down on a well known korean. Everyone knows he beat boxer on a stage, but i remember watching him beat GoRush who was on skt1, with fucking scouts.
The player pool for non koreans used to be much stronger.
Pretty much this. I would’ve given more of a chance to guys back in the day like Mondragon, Sen, Testie, Nony, Draco, Idra, etc.
Testie actually had an offer early on to join a Korean progaming team (Mondragon did too if I remember correctly) but they both turned it down. It was around the time Draco went to Korea in 2006.
As a matter of fact, I remember Testie giving Bisu a hard time at that Blizzard tournament in 2007, only to find out near the end of the game that he had forgotten Dragoon range — LOL.
Good old times. But yeah, it’s kind of like asking an amateur Muay Thai fighter who’s been training for 5–10 years to go fight Saenchai or Buakaw. Jean-Charles Skarbowsky is a good example. He was at that time by far the best Muay Thai foreigner fighter and he fought Buakaew at Lumpinee and it wasnt even close despite Jean-Charles being a beast.
This question is similar to questions like, “why isn’t ghost used more often in TvP?” or, “why don’t we see more DA usage in late game PvZ?”
Hypothetically those things are possible, just like hypothetically foreigners might one day pose a challenge to Korean pros… but I’m not expecting a new era of TvP ghost usage and until it happens it’s just theory-crafting. Both questions seem interesting at first glance but…
On May 28 2025 22:55 Vasoline73 wrote: This question is similar to questions like, “why isn’t ghost used more often in TvP?” or, “why don’t we see more DA usage in late game PvZ?”
Hypothetically those things are possible, just like hypothetically foreigners might one day pose a challenge to Korean pros… but I’m not expecting a new era of TvP ghost usage and until it happens it’s just theory-crafting. Both questions seem interesting at first glance but…
Yup, pretty much. Theoretically possible, but highly unlikely. Nevertheless an interesting topic to discuss.
Edit: What if Serral really applied himself to BW for a year? What chances would you give him? It might actually happen, since SC2 is pretty much going down the shitter at this point.
On May 27 2025 03:16 SiarX wrote: Years ago foreign scene was a total a joke, any serious Korean player would walk over any foreigner.
Maybe you weren't around but foreigners used to have a much better chance, imo. Players like bonyth and dewalt are definitely respectable but back in the day we had some real legends. Mondragon who for whatever reason was always near the level of the koreans. Draco who literally was on a korean pro team, along with LX and PJ. Later NonY, ret, and IdrA. Even guys like G5, who's still around, would from time to time lay some smack down on a well known korean. Everyone knows he beat boxer on a stage, but i remember watching him beat GoRush who was on skt1, with fucking scouts.
The player pool for non koreans used to be much stronger.
Pretty much this. I would’ve given more of a chance to guys back in the day like Mondragon, Sen, Testie, Nony, Draco, Idra, etc.
Testie actually had an offer early on to join a Korean progaming team (Mondragon did too if I remember correctly) but they both turned it down. It was around the time Draco went to Korea in 2006.
As a matter of fact, I remember Testie giving Bisu a hard time at that Blizzard tournament in 2007, only to find out near the end of the game that he had forgotten Dragoon range — LOL.
Good old times. But yeah, it’s kind of like asking an amateur Muay Thai fighter who’s been training for 5–10 years to go fight Saenchai or Buakaw. Jean-Charles Skarbowsky is a good example. He was at that time by far the best Muay Thai foreigner fighter and he fought Buakaew at Lumpinee and it wasnt even close despite Jean-Charles being a beast.
As you go back in time, foreigners had more chance to succeed since the pro scene in korea and game meta were still in its early age. As time passes the gap got wider because korean players evolved much faster. It has nothing to do with the foreign scene being less good. In fact, our foreigners have never been so strong, all these guys you mentioned were playing the game in times protoss were discovering fast expand vs zerg come on.
On May 27 2025 03:16 SiarX wrote: Years ago foreign scene was a total a joke, any serious Korean player would walk over any foreigner.
Maybe you weren't around but foreigners used to have a much better chance, imo. Players like bonyth and dewalt are definitely respectable but back in the day we had some real legends. Mondragon who for whatever reason was always near the level of the koreans. Draco who literally was on a korean pro team, along with LX and PJ. Later NonY, ret, and IdrA. Even guys like G5, who's still around, would from time to time lay some smack down on a well known korean. Everyone knows he beat boxer on a stage, but i remember watching him beat GoRush who was on skt1, with fucking scouts.
The player pool for non koreans used to be much stronger.
Pretty much this. I would’ve given more of a chance to guys back in the day like Mondragon, Sen, Testie, Nony, Draco, Idra, etc.
Testie actually had an offer early on to join a Korean progaming team (Mondragon did too if I remember correctly) but they both turned it down. It was around the time Draco went to Korea in 2006.
As a matter of fact, I remember Testie giving Bisu a hard time at that Blizzard tournament in 2007, only to find out near the end of the game that he had forgotten Dragoon range — LOL.
Good old times. But yeah, it’s kind of like asking an amateur Muay Thai fighter who’s been training for 5–10 years to go fight Saenchai or Buakaw. Jean-Charles Skarbowsky is a good example. He was at that time by far the best Muay Thai foreigner fighter and he fought Buakaew at Lumpinee and it wasnt even close despite Jean-Charles being a beast.
As you go back in time, foreigners had more chance to succeed since the pro scene in korea and game meta were still in its early age. As time passes the gap got wider because korean players evolved much faster. It has nothing to do with the foreign scene being less good. In fact, our foreigners have never been so strong, all these guys you mentioned were playing the game in times protoss were discovering fast expand vs zerg come on.
I mean, I agree with everything you said, lol.
And back then, the Koreans were given a salary and a team house to play and practice 12+ hours a day. The first time I saw that in e-sports in North America was when Jason Lake bought Complexity and hired players, paying them back in 2004.
The whole Counter-Strike scene in NA were shitting on them because people didnt understand that concept. Also, we didn’t have the resources they had in Korea.
On May 28 2025 22:55 Vasoline73 wrote: This question is similar to questions like, “why isn’t ghost used more often in TvP?” or, “why don’t we see more DA usage in late game PvZ?”
Hypothetically those things are possible, just like hypothetically foreigners might one day pose a challenge to Korean pros… but I’m not expecting a new era of TvP ghost usage and until it happens it’s just theory-crafting. Both questions seem interesting at first glance but…
Yup, pretty much. Theoretically possible, but highly unlikely. Nevertheless an interesting topic to discuss.
Edit: What if Serral really applied himself to BW for a year? What chances would you give him? It might actually happen, since SC2 is pretty much going down the shitter at this point.
If he’s doing it on his own, not much. If he’s being actively coached and helped, has consistent practice partners, maybe he does something.
The mechanical skill is clearly there, the brain is there.
But you have to circumvent and speed up the learning of the idiosyncrasies, if you don’t, a huge amount of that year is just figuring out all that knowledge and tricks your competition already know. It’s not in grinding to get to a certain level.
I played WC3 to a not horrific standard in and around release for a few years. I had no aspirations of being high level coming back, but even for me I found I spent a hell of a lot of time just finding and learning the info, the meta, the optimisations that occurred in the preceding 15 years etc. Initially, a lot more than just playing the game. So ofc when I am just grinding games having that more knowledge, my mechanics, or that kind of instinctual knowledge of ‘here’s two armies, scan them, is this a good fight to take?’ were lacking.
I’m 100% convinced if all parties were motivated, and you had a real handful of top pros on board to spread the load, translators you probably could do a StarCraft University project to get someone like Serral to at least qualify for ASL.
As good as top BW foreigners are at the game, your best candidate probably is somebody like Serral. His mechanics are ridiculous, he’s a long, long span of dealing with the demands of being an actual progamer.
SC2 isn’t quite as demanding, but given the structures were in place. look how quickly Kespa players got really, really fucking good. I think the reverse is absolutely possible, but I think it really needs to be a project that multiple people commit to.
And maybe it’s not a year, maybe it’s a bit longer. Different game sure but Serral, Reynor, Clem are amongst the best RTS players to have ever lived. If all those factors lined up, they could pull off an ASL qualification at the least. They’ll not beat Flash anytime soon, but the competition to qualify for the ASL isn’t Flash, it’s some very, very good BW players. Some legit pros, some pros but never really did much, and some very gifted amateur players.
Without wishing to ignite an SC2 versus BW debate, I think (my) SC2 GOAT, who’s younger than a lot of the competition, with a dedicated fast track training regime could at least get to ASL Ro24 level.
I am sorry, but this constant glazing of white dudes that dominate a SC2 era which is by far the lowest competitive wise is ridiculous. Serral may challenge BSL if he trained for a year, but that's it. It is clear that Serral or whoever wouldn't even win a big title when Kespa team houses were still around in SC2 and they all trained 12 hours a day.
You can argue with hypotheticals and skill levels (I don't seen any ridiculous skill with current SC2 pros, and even back then during its most competitive era, there wasn't much showcasing)
We have had hundreds of foreigners that trained much harder than the current crop of SC2 pros pre 2010, and nobody even came close to that skill level. The closest may had been PJ or Idra, and they were barely even B-teamers. That is a fact. We have had dozens of foreigners even try out courage tournament, and nobody won it, and that would be even below b-teamer. If serral/clem/reynor would be in a korean team, they wouldn't even be skilled enough to wash their dishes.
On May 29 2025 03:35 Expensive-Law-9830 wrote: I am sorry, but this constant glazing of white dudes that dominate a SC2 era which is by far the lowest competitive wise is ridiculous. Serral may challenge BSL if he trained for a year, but that's it. It is clear that Serral or whoever wouldn't even win a big title when Kespa team houses were still around in SC2 and they all trained 12 hours a day.
You can argue with hypotheticals and skill levels (I don't seen any ridiculous skill with current SC2 pros, and even back then during its most competitive era, there wasn't much showcasing)
We have had hundreds of foreigners that trained much harder than the current crop of SC2 pros pre 2010, and nobody even came close to that skill level. The closest may had been PJ or Idra, and they were barely even B-teamers. That is a fact. We have had dozens of foreigners even try out courage tournament, and nobody won it, and that would be even below b-teamer. If serral/clem/reynor would be in a korean team, they wouldn't even be skilled enough to wash their dishes.
This entire thread is literally people saying Koreans are way better than everyone else. Nobody said Serral would dominate the scene, it was just a question of how good he could get. So I don’t know where you get «constant glazing of white dudes» from. Sir, do you have some issues you need resolved?
Thanks for your input Wombat
Artosis has taken games off of progamers in bw, and he lost pretty hard against Scarlett, so it’s not entirely impossible that Serral could at least qualify for ASL with enough time and practice.
One of the key differences now and during KESPA era is the wast amount of knowledge available after people started streaming, so there’s that..
On May 29 2025 05:49 Timebon3s wrote: This entire thread is literally people saying Koreans are way better than everyone else. Nobody said Serral would dominate the scene, it was just a question of how good he could get. So I don’t know where you get «constant glazing of white dudes» from. Sir, do you have some issues you need resolved?
Thanks for your input Wombat
Artosis has taken games off of progamers in bw, and he lost pretty hard against Scarlett, so it’s not entirely impossible that Serral could at least qualify for ASL with enough time and practice.
One of the key differences now and during KESPA era is the wast amount of knowledge available after people started streaming, so there’s that..
I lack SC2 knowledge. Would you say Serral is way stronger mechanically than Soo ?
Im asking that question cuz Soo has comeback to BW but i have the feeling those SC2 mechanics not necessarily transfered to BW. Or atleast didnt show an impact i would say. (even if Soo had a BW background and a decent BW career before SC2). So Basically Serral would require to start from nothing.
On May 29 2025 05:49 Timebon3s wrote: This entire thread is literally people saying Koreans are way better than everyone else. Nobody said Serral would dominate the scene, it was just a question of how good he could get. So I don’t know where you get «constant glazing of white dudes» from. Sir, do you have some issues you need resolved?
Thanks for your input Wombat
Artosis has taken games off of progamers in bw, and he lost pretty hard against Scarlett, so it’s not entirely impossible that Serral could at least qualify for ASL with enough time and practice.
One of the key differences now and during KESPA era is the wast amount of knowledge available after people started streaming, so there’s that..
I lack SC2 knowledge. Would you say Serral is way stronger mechanically than Soo ?
Im asking that question cuz Soo has comeback to BW but i have the feeling those SC2 mechanics not necessarily transfered to BW. Or atleast didnt show an impact i would say. (even if Soo had a BW background and a decent BW career before SC2). So Basically Serral would require to start from nothing.
In SC2 he was, soO was a monster, Serral’s lategame with technical armies, on another level.
Peak soO, if he’s just macroing and pumping out midgame armies, at his best, possibly better than anyone. But Serral would be close to his main strength, soO wasn’t really close when it came to Serral’s strengths
I’m trying to think of a BW equivalent to how soO played SC2, it’s maybe Best. Crazy midgame macro, if he can roll you, he often would. If not, maybe that’s gonna be a tough game for him.
A stylistic Serral equivalent? I really don’t know. It’s probably Flash. Not comparing the two levels, but they’re both at worst 8/10, generally 9/10 thru 10/10 at basically every element of the game. And the smartest players going.
Nobody else has that package.
Someone might beat Flash in a specific area if we were to do Top Trumps. He wins every other part of the card. Serral’s pretty similar to those not familiar with SC2. He’s not just rounded, and balanced, he beats most in the scene in every category.
My macro definitely transferred to SC2, the only problem is that everybody could do it So I gave up and went back to brood war where I could feel special lol. It was hilarious though seeing bronze terran microing your like they are fucking Flash haha.
I think a lot of it has to do with broodwar being integrated into Korean culture. Koreans have always had the biggest player base, support and passion for the game. When you and all your real life friends play the game and watch the game, talk about the game and idolize pros within the country who are treated like gods it makes it easier for you to have motivation to get better at the game. It think it makes it harder for foreigners to kind of obtain that attitude and passion. This culture also accelerates everyone’s progression and pushes the skill further before the rest of the world can catch up. I believe internet speed also plays a part in it as well. These Koreans are use to playing on TR24 low latency because everyone in the country is so close together, just look at ASL and look at all these insane micro moves some of these players can pull off. In BSL we have some fantastic players but they’re spread all over the world and playing on TR14 and 16. They never have the opportunity to play low latency games consistently against various high level opponents with various different styles and strategies. Pro Koreans won’t even consider a TR14 or 16 game to be real game of SC. Just my outlook and opinion
On May 29 2025 05:49 Timebon3s wrote: This entire thread is literally people saying Koreans are way better than everyone else. Nobody said Serral would dominate the scene, it was just a question of how good he could get. So I don’t know where you get «constant glazing of white dudes» from. Sir, do you have some issues you need resolved?
Thanks for your input Wombat
Artosis has taken games off of progamers in bw, and he lost pretty hard against Scarlett, so it’s not entirely impossible that Serral could at least qualify for ASL with enough time and practice.
One of the key differences now and during KESPA era is the wast amount of knowledge available after people started streaming, so there’s that..
If I was a rich man, which is a problem as I am not for this hypothetical.
Assuming they’re actually interested and motivated, I think it’s borderline inconceivable that, with an actual coaching setup you couldn’t get Serral, or Clem, or Reynor to an ASL after a bit.
The talent is obviously there, Clem was doing business after like a week versus people who’d been playing nothing but Stormgate. Serral streamed AoE4 for like a week to two and he was already up there on ladder.
Give those guys a year+ with a coaching team, come on they’re making an ASL.
Getting to a Ro8 or beyond, unless they’re actually prodigious at BW rather than ‘very good RTS player playing a new game’, I think probably takes a lot longer. You’re competing against programing legends with years of experience.
No diss whatsoever, I miss his occasional casting these days, and he’s clearly fucking good.
But really? In a hypothetical. Which this obviously is. Not just the greatest foreigner but arguably the greatest in SC2 history, with a coaching team couldn’t get to Scan’s level?
"ever" means all of time, correct? well we already had that with IdrA... i heard when he was in estro he was regularly beating all the top koreans it was only when he joined cj did he have so struggles as a b teamer
EPT
