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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
Haji's article spurred a reaction.
When I read that article I knew that a lot of sentiments surrounding WCG had been compiled and posted in a way that needed attention. I communicated with my contacts in WCG USA and began discussing what needs to change.
Today I had a 1 hour phone conversation with 2 of the top WCG USA people. The premise of the conversation was in what way can WCG improve? Understandably, I can only speak to WCG USA people. But with WCG USA being one of the largest markets for WCG I think change here can be change elsewhere as well. Much less it can be immediate change in an area riddled with problems as it stands, USA.
Some things need to be cleared up.
Some of the "bad" games we see at WCG are a necessity. They are there because they paid to be there. In doing so they are funding larger more important games like Starcraft, Warcraft and Counterstrike. Complaining about those in the long run is illogical because they are what we need essentially.
Additionally, WCG has stuck with SC for all these years. They have gained from this for sure. But they also deserve our gratitude. WCG representatives read everything published here in regard to WCG. Our voice counts, TL has a powerful hand when it comes to community sentiment. If sponsors see an article like that, it could be the lynchpin that moves them away from WCG which ultimately hurts us, the gamers. Personally, I think that cost is outweighed by the message but it is something to consider. Haji's article is a necessity in my opinion, but additional articles (not that there will be or anything) could be redundant and harmful.
Lastly, I think a lot of people lose sight that WCG isn't just a gaming tourney: it is a business. With that in mind they cannot always do what is best for the gamer at the cost of what will keep them from growing and continuing to support gaming. This is more of a framework argument that I'd ask you all to keep in mind when regarding WCG. It isn't an excuse but a reality.
What is being done
WCG USA will have a conference call with me that will be documented and used as a resource. The subject will be "What can WCG USA do to fix its issues and better itself?"
I have taken the liberty of being the spokesperson. I think this wise as I have already made connections in WCG USA but also (hopefully you all for the most part agree) I am a market/gaming minded person that handles said people very well.
One of the things that will change is better replay accessibility. Too often have prelims, offline prelims and finals been void of replays. That will change. I brought up that integrity aside, compiling the replays of an offline tourney (especially) is beneficial to them. Hosting those replays and then mirroring them on gg.net, tl.net and the other community websites means 500k hits on their website. People viewing ads, touring the site etc. It makes all the sense in the world to have replays readily available and easily accessible. Such a little change goes a LONG way in fixing WCG. These are the kind of things we are looking for.
That being said I am opening this thread as a place for people to post ideas and discuss things that can be done. This is specifically for WCG USA but I am more than willing to hear the ideas of non Americans. Sometimes great ideas come from outside the USA as well. Joking aside, this is serious. They recognize that the SC community is unhappy and are willing to change. Think in regard to the prelim level. The offline prelim level. The administrative level.. the national finals etc. Maps, hacks, refs etc I want your thoughts.
WCG wants to improve. Lets help them.
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Good luck with the call. The main thing I'd really liked to see is a easy to use ah launcher (similar to ICCUPs or Chaos) and more current maps. It's nice to see games played on older maps but it's also nicer and more of a necessity to have the games played on maps that everyone plays currently (IE pro maps) I'm sure you'll address this though.
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GrandInquisitor
New York City13113 Posts
WCG needs people within the Starcraft scene running its game. I'm sure they field complaints about this on other games too, but without someone who is intimately connected with the Starcraft zeitgeist running or even advising the event, it ends up being like a European without any background in American football being asked to run the NFL. Without a TL admin running WCG, WCG will never have the full respect or trust of the Starcraft community.
Maybe merge TSL/WCG?
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
Before i start i'll just say that i think this is a really good idea but for those who post - the most important thing is SOLUTIONS. We all know the issues with hacks, last minute maps etc, but from an organizational perspective the solutions are the most important part.
1) If someone is a known hacker in amateur starcraft leagues with legitimate proof, or there is evidence to suggest they have hacked in WCG prelims in the past then they should not be allowed to participate. How would this be determined? Perhaps have a couple refs who's main focus is removing hackers - these things can never be 100%, but this is a tournament not the court. I don't expect WCG organizers to stay on top of who has been caught hacking etc but there should be some format where they can take information from sites like Teamliquid/WGT/Gosugamers etc that "know" what is going on.
i'll add more when i get back from work.
<font size="5">Note also ill be deleting any crap posts from this thread with great fervor.</font>
THAT MEANS YOU ZULU. GO TROLL SOMEWHERE ELSE
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 03:43 DeadVessel wrote:
Good luck with the call. The main thing I'd really liked to see is a easy to use ah launcher (similar to ICCUPs or Chaos) and more current maps. It's nice to see games played on older maps but it's also nicer and more of a necessity to have the games played on maps that everyone plays currently (IE pro maps) I'm sure you'll address this though.
Maps are something they will speak to me specifically on. We can impact this on a national level but the international tourney is ran by Korea. That map change (RoV?) was over the top on WCG USA and was forced on everyone.
nobody has an answer for it though.. that map change didn't help the koreans and it surely didn't help the tourney. No idea what can be done about that.
On the national level though YES! We have discussed this issue and will continue to do so. WHen it comes time to pick maps I'd love to hear the community on that one.
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Kennigit, check ur PMs please 
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 03:45 GrandInquisitor wrote:
WCG needs people within the Starcraft scene running its game. I'm sure they field complaints about this on other games too, but without someone who is intimately connected with the Starcraft zeitgeist running or even advising the event, it ends up being like a European without any background in American football being asked to run the NFL. Without a TL admin running WCG, WCG will never have the full respect or trust of the Starcraft community.
Maybe merge TSL/WCG?
This was one of the main points of my conversation.
The issue that was raised was that the company that runs the offline prelims, the online prelims etc.. has to be so large and resourceful that it is nearly impossible to find a replacement (for the one that is hired currently) or MORE importantly to give the current company incentive to improve. Yes we are talking about a monopoly.
In response to that I offered myself as a resource that wouldn't need to be hired for big bucks or anything that could be a consultant if not a direct administrator and work with the current company.
People would have to put a lot of pride aside however to allow something like that.. but I pressed the issue because it makes _no_ sense (as you said) to have people disconnected from SC but even gaming in general make decisions for said game and then blindly hope they are cohesive to how that game is ran (and has been ran for 10 years).
The problem btw with merging TSL with WCG would be that each WCG national tourney is fairly independent. TSL is international and my influence extends only to WCG USA (at the moment).
They had however heard of TSL (heard a lot).
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8748 Posts
Regional event dates and locations need to be announced earlier. Gamers play in the online prelim without knowing if they can attend the regional prelim. Gamers have to pay more for plane tickets because of short notice and/or they have a greater inconvenience from job/school because of short notice. The earlier the date and location is solidified and announced, the more of these problems are alleviated.
Why doesn't USA send more people to the grand final? Even after we got first in 2007, we're still sending 1 player or team for nearly every game. If it's a matter of money, then is it possible to spend a bit less on the national finals?
I have heard that people aren't able to pay their own way to the grand finals because by the time the USA plays its national finals, the number of slots available for USA at the grand finals are already locked in. If the USA played the national final earlier, could this problem be fixed? I have noticed that USA is always one of the last countries to play its national finals...
Wouldn't we own Halo 3 at the grand final if the best MLG teams could actually play in WCG? Is there no way to fix this? A guaranteed gold medal would be really nice...
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 03:53 Liquid`NonY wrote:
Regional event dates and locations need to be announced earlier. Gamers play in the online prelim without knowing if they can attend the regional prelim. Gamers have to pay more for plane tickets because of short notice and/or they have a greater inconvenience from job/school because of short notice. The earlier the date and location is solidified and announced, the more of these problems are alleviated.
Why doesn't USA send more people to the grand final? Even after we got first in 2007, we're still sending 1 player or team for nearly every game. If it's a matter of money, then is it possible to spend a bit less on the national finals?
I have heard that people aren't able to pay their own way to the grand finals because by the time the USA plays its national finals, the number of slots available for USA at the grand finals are already locked in. If the USA played the national final earlier, could this problem be fixed? I have noticed that USA is always one of the last countries to play its national finals...
Wouldn't we own Halo 3 at the grand final if the best MLG teams could actually play in WCG? Is there no way to fix this? A guaranteed gold medal would be really nice...
These are all REALLY good ideas. This is the kind of post I am looking for.
They discussed a new model for the prelims -> finals. The date issue is huge and I will make sure that it is one of the action issues raised during the conference.
More slots (especially now) is an issue that I will discuss with them as well. Especially in conjunction with the date issue that allows for better MLG teams to participate. I know this is one of the reasons why top CS teams avoid WCG.. if that could be fixed USA would dominate each year in overall medals (imo).
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 03:45 Kennigit wrote:
Before i start i'll just say that i think this is a really good idea but for those who post - the most important thing is SOLUTIONS. We all know the issues with hacks, last minute maps etc, but from an organizational perspective the solutions are the most important part.
1) If someone is a known hacker in amateur starcraft leagues with legitimate proof, or there is evidence to suggest they have hacked in WCG prelims in the past then they should not be allowed to participate. How would this be determined? Perhaps have a couple refs who's main focus is removing hackers - these things can never be 100%, but this is a tournament not the court. I don't expect WCG organizers to stay on top of who has been caught hacking etc but there should be some format where they can take information from sites like Teamliquid/WGT/Gosugamers etc that "know" what is going on.
i'll add more when i get back from work.
Note also ill be deleting any crap posts from this thread with great fervor.
This was an issue I discussed with them specifically. The issue was marketing and the detachment from reality on their behalf. They were worried about persecuting a person wrongfully and catching flak for not having hard proof when they banned a player from WCG. Without going into names I think we all know the situation we are talking about.
I informed them that in its current state SC cannot rely on physical proof to root out its malevolent players. We rely on a jury by community. That speaks to the issue that WCG needs a person connected with SC to be their person "on the ground" and making informed decisions based on how SC is ran these days.
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why even bother having regionals or prelims?
Just have regionals if you are going to have any at all.... the prelim then regional shit is stupid.
Online is dumb too, just do regionals -------> you go to finals, theres no need to play online if you have to end up going to the regional anyway and it would be more fun because more people could go and you could meet more people.
IMO the year i ended up going, 04 I believe, was the best year because top 2 from each prelim went and there were lots of prelims all across the country so lots of people got to go.
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I think it would be much more reasonable to have TL involved in organizing WCG rather than a merger between the TSL and WCG. WCG is a big tournament for more than just one game while the TSL is meant to be focused on StarCraft, the best game. If anything were to be arranged between the two then I think the best would be some good advice on tournament organization and execution. But personally I dont think that would be the best combination.
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51399 Posts
On November 13 2008 03:56 {88}iNcontroL wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 03:53 Liquid`NonY wrote:
Regional event dates and locations need to be announced earlier. Gamers play in the online prelim without knowing if they can attend the regional prelim. Gamers have to pay more for plane tickets because of short notice and/or they have a greater inconvenience from job/school because of short notice. The earlier the date and location is solidified and announced, the more of these problems are alleviated.
Why doesn't USA send more people to the grand final? Even after we got first in 2007, we're still sending 1 player or team for nearly every game. If it's a matter of money, then is it possible to spend a bit less on the national finals?
I have heard that people aren't able to pay their own way to the grand finals because by the time the USA plays its national finals, the number of slots available for USA at the grand finals are already locked in. If the USA played the national final earlier, could this problem be fixed? I have noticed that USA is always one of the last countries to play its national finals...
Wouldn't we own Halo 3 at the grand final if the best MLG teams could actually play in WCG? Is there no way to fix this? A guaranteed gold medal would be really nice... More slots (especially now) is an issue that I will discuss with them as well. Especially in conjunction with the date issue that allows for better MLG teams to participate. I know this is one of the reasons why top CS teams avoid WCG.. if that could be fixed USA would dominate each year in overall medals (imo).
actually pretty much all the best teams in America attended the WCG USA finals this year (mainly due to the fact EM LA was running at the same time too)
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 04:38 SpiralArchitect wrote:
I think it would be much more reasonable to have TL involved in organizing WCG rather than a merger between the TSL and WCG. WCG is a big tournament for more than just one game while the TSL is meant to be focused on StarCraft, the best game. If anything were to be arranged between the two then I think the best would be some good advice on tournament organization and execution. But personally I dont think that would be the best combination.
We can pretty much end talks of a "merger" in regard to TSL and WCG. Both are seperate entities with seperate goals etc.
Also TL wouldn't run WCG for more of the same reasons, and some that you can probably think up on your own.
Trying to get a international organization to run an American event is a bad idea. Especially when it would require lots of hands on work.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 04:41 GTR-2-Go wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 03:56 {88}iNcontroL wrote:On November 13 2008 03:53 Liquid`NonY wrote:
Regional event dates and locations need to be announced earlier. Gamers play in the online prelim without knowing if they can attend the regional prelim. Gamers have to pay more for plane tickets because of short notice and/or they have a greater inconvenience from job/school because of short notice. The earlier the date and location is solidified and announced, the more of these problems are alleviated.
Why doesn't USA send more people to the grand final? Even after we got first in 2007, we're still sending 1 player or team for nearly every game. If it's a matter of money, then is it possible to spend a bit less on the national finals?
I have heard that people aren't able to pay their own way to the grand finals because by the time the USA plays its national finals, the number of slots available for USA at the grand finals are already locked in. If the USA played the national final earlier, could this problem be fixed? I have noticed that USA is always one of the last countries to play its national finals...
Wouldn't we own Halo 3 at the grand final if the best MLG teams could actually play in WCG? Is there no way to fix this? A guaranteed gold medal would be really nice... More slots (especially now) is an issue that I will discuss with them as well. Especially in conjunction with the date issue that allows for better MLG teams to participate. I know this is one of the reasons why top CS teams avoid WCG.. if that could be fixed USA would dominate each year in overall medals (imo). actually pretty much all the best teams in America attended the WCG USA finals this year (mainly due to the fact EM LA was running at the same time too)
Teams in the past have missed WCG due to the scheduling. Halo3 was poorly represented this year etc.. it goes beyond CS but I know historically it was a CS issue as well.
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Since I've never tried to qualify for WCG, I have no idea how the system works, and therefore I don't know what's broken and what works. Could you explain the basic process for all of us? I assume that there is some sort of ladder, where the winners compete in a tournament, and from there, an offline tournament, but those are just guesses.
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On November 13 2008 03:56 {88}iNcontroL wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 03:53 Liquid`NonY wrote:
Regional event dates and locations need to be announced earlier. Gamers play in the online prelim without knowing if they can attend the regional prelim. Gamers have to pay more for plane tickets because of short notice and/or they have a greater inconvenience from job/school because of short notice. The earlier the date and location is solidified and announced, the more of these problems are alleviated.
Why doesn't USA send more people to the grand final? Even after we got first in 2007, we're still sending 1 player or team for nearly every game. If it's a matter of money, then is it possible to spend a bit less on the national finals?
I have heard that people aren't able to pay their own way to the grand finals because by the time the USA plays its national finals, the number of slots available for USA at the grand finals are already locked in. If the USA played the national final earlier, could this problem be fixed? I have noticed that USA is always one of the last countries to play its national finals...
Wouldn't we own Halo 3 at the grand final if the best MLG teams could actually play in WCG? Is there no way to fix this? A guaranteed gold medal would be really nice... These are all REALLY good ideas. This is the kind of post I am looking for. They discussed a new model for the prelims -> finals. The date issue is huge and I will make sure that it is one of the action issues raised during the conference. More slots (especially now) is an issue that I will discuss with them as well. Especially in conjunction with the date issue that allows for better MLG teams to participate. I know this is one of the reasons why top CS teams avoid WCG.. if that could be fixed USA would dominate each year in overall medals (imo).
It is from my understanding that MLG teams aren't allowed to participate at WCG due to their contracts, which enable them to compete only for and at MLG events. A similar thing is going on with CGS, but they seem to be a little more lenient on letting their contracted players compete outside of CGS as long as the players request is accepted by the organization.
Otherwise, you guys have got a lot of great ideas!
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national online prequalify > national offline qualify > grand finals
Right?
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 04:58 Colbi wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 03:56 {88}iNcontroL wrote:On November 13 2008 03:53 Liquid`NonY wrote:
Regional event dates and locations need to be announced earlier. Gamers play in the online prelim without knowing if they can attend the regional prelim. Gamers have to pay more for plane tickets because of short notice and/or they have a greater inconvenience from job/school because of short notice. The earlier the date and location is solidified and announced, the more of these problems are alleviated.
Why doesn't USA send more people to the grand final? Even after we got first in 2007, we're still sending 1 player or team for nearly every game. If it's a matter of money, then is it possible to spend a bit less on the national finals?
I have heard that people aren't able to pay their own way to the grand finals because by the time the USA plays its national finals, the number of slots available for USA at the grand finals are already locked in. If the USA played the national final earlier, could this problem be fixed? I have noticed that USA is always one of the last countries to play its national finals...
Wouldn't we own Halo 3 at the grand final if the best MLG teams could actually play in WCG? Is there no way to fix this? A guaranteed gold medal would be really nice... These are all REALLY good ideas. This is the kind of post I am looking for. They discussed a new model for the prelims -> finals. The date issue is huge and I will make sure that it is one of the action issues raised during the conference. More slots (especially now) is an issue that I will discuss with them as well. Especially in conjunction with the date issue that allows for better MLG teams to participate. I know this is one of the reasons why top CS teams avoid WCG.. if that could be fixed USA would dominate each year in overall medals (imo). It is from my understanding that MLG teams aren't allowed to participate at WCG due to their contracts, which enable them to compete only for and at MLG events. A similar thing is going on with CGS, but they seem to be a little more lenient on letting their contracted players compete outside of CGS as long as the players request is accepted by the organization. Otherwise, you guys have got a lot of great ideas!
Ah that was something I didn't know / think about. Hopefully it can be worked on.. I will bounce this off of the WCG guys.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 04:58 Senx wrote:
national online prequalify > national offline qualify > grand finals
Right?
I know you are responding to the guy who asked how it functions but to be honest this is a thread about fixing a situation that is important to gaming. If someone doesn't know anything about it.. I don't really want to hear their ideas.
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On November 13 2008 04:24 Sadist wrote:
why even bother having regionals or prelims?
Just have regionals if you are going to have any at all.... the prelim then regional shit is stupid.
Online is dumb too, just do regionals -------> you go to finals, theres no need to play online if you have to end up going to the regional anyway and it would be more fun because more people could go and you could meet more people.
IMO the year i ended up going, 04 I believe, was the best year because top 2 from each prelim went and there were lots of prelims all across the country so lots of people got to go.
I'd imagine eliminating players online is a lot cheaper and easier than organizing offline events. No doubt regionals should still be held. But by having the online prelims, you can have much more manageable regional events with a set # of players who are going to be at a consistent skill level. Ie. 20 decent players as opposed to 40-60 players, most of which can't make B-. EDIT: Granted I wouldn't know specifically how these things turn out, just considering the merits of online games.
As far as WCG G/F, I'd suggest they take care of some of the small details like ensuring the players have sound proof headphones so that the commentators can actually do their job.
Most of the other things that come to mind have already been mentioned (maps, scheduling, hackers, etc.)
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
actually the point about soundproof gear is really good. It has happened numerous times that a stage match is a huge problem cause the commentators are revealing crap to the players.
Booths perhaps a bit much on the national level but surely soundproof headphones can be used? Great idea. I will bring that up.
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Antihack at online prelim is nessicary, competent admins are another nessecity
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On November 13 2008 05:35 {88}iNcontroL wrote:
actually the point about soundproof gear is really good. It has happened numerous times that a stage match is a huge problem cause the commentators are revealing crap to the players.
Booths perhaps a bit much on the national level but surely soundproof headphones can be used? Great idea. I will bring that up.
maybe not sound proof but noise canceling head phones would be good
just have to make sure that they stay on the whole time
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On November 13 2008 07:21 Machine[USA] wrote:
Antihack at online prelim is nessicary, competent admins are another nessecity
theres no point in even playing online.
Its not like by playing online you win money or a trip or something, i am surprised more people dont think online is ridiculous. Anyone should be able to show up for the regional.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 07:46 Sadist wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 07:21 Machine[USA] wrote:
Antihack at online prelim is nessicary, competent admins are another nessecity theres no point in even playing online. Its not like by playing online you win money or a trip or something, i am surprised more people dont think online is ridiculous. Anyone should be able to show up for the regional.
There are always going to be people that cannot afford to go to a regional. Having it online is the only way to give everyone the chance at least (most reasonable chance) to compete in WCG.
Lemme clarify by saying it is more logical to "afford" to go to an offline prelim where 2 of the 4 will go to the USA finals as oppose to a giant offline prelim where 2 of 40 go. Especially since you could eliminate most of that "garbage" by having it online (relatively free) and just get the cream of the crop at the offline prelims->finals.
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On November 13 2008 07:49 {88}iNcontroL wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 07:46 Sadist wrote:On November 13 2008 07:21 Machine[USA] wrote:
Antihack at online prelim is nessicary, competent admins are another nessecity theres no point in even playing online. Its not like by playing online you win money or a trip or something, i am surprised more people dont think online is ridiculous. Anyone should be able to show up for the regional. There are always going to be people that cannot afford to go to a regional. Having it online is the only way to give everyone the chance at least (most reasonable chance) to compete in WCG. Lemme clarify by saying it is more logical to "afford" to go to an offline prelim where 2 of the 4 will go to the USA finals as oppose to a giant offline prelim where 2 of 40 go. Especially since you could eliminate most of that "garbage" by having it online (relatively free) and just get the cream of the crop at the offline prelims->finals.
if you win the online prelim, do you get a paid for trip to the regional?
Why couldn't you just do both if that was the case.
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Online is very problematic. There are hacks/admin problems every year. Also, it is inconvenient to have to show up online all week long at a certain time for some people.
Offline regionals are just so much easier and solve all these problems. It is also a lot more fun and no one will feel cheated if they don't qualify. Turnout is not really a big deal, and if lan centers/wcg really wanted to they could charge like 5/10 dollars and I don't think anyone would complain.
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WCG in general needs more advertising, hype, and transparency. I, as a starcraft fan, often find myself not knowing what the hell is happening in wcg, and this is suppose to be the biggest offline starcraft tournament of the year. it's really hard to appreciate wcg if one has to extrapolate what happens from the ramblings and rants of third parties. The wcg website also has to be one of the worst sites ever made. It lags and crashes like a mofo. VODs and results are extremely inaccessible as well. it's a travesty that one has to go to mymym.com three days after the event happened to read about the olympics of esport. wcg sounds frickin awesome from the blogs and such, but why dont the organizers tell us that themselves, instead of making the fans wait until the participants have time to blog about it.
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You don't get a paid trip to go to regionals, you have to get there yourself.
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I'd like the WCG site to be a bit better. It's very laggy, crashes, and just seems poorly made. WCG is suppose to be the worlds largest e-sports tournie, but I find almost any other tournament easier to follow and keep up to date on than the WCG is.
I like the online qualifiers because they give everyone a chance but to be honest, I think offline only would be a better system. Sure not as many people would be able to attend, but they are more exciting and ten times easier to referee.
Really pleased you have a dialog with them {88}iNcontrol.
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WCG as the way I see it run in the US has a lot of things that can improve.
Some already mentioned but i guess the more we say this things the more attention they will get.
1) Admins with knowledge in Starcraft IS a MUST, this problem not only happens in the US but in Mexico as well, where they put like 4 to 5 admins to run the entire event, all the games and they know crap about each game, Im sure some people would gladly be admins with minimum payment or even for free. (For WCG this is money, for TL.net this is a neeed to do things right).
2) At online prelims, they SHOULD DO IT with either antihack junction OR in an antihack server like ICCUP, also with refs that have experience at running tournaments and know their shit in starcraft.
3) IF they are not gonna pay you the whole trip to an offline regional... at least help players find cheaper planes/bus tickets, help them with some money or hell JUST HELP by announcing definite places and dates like 1 month in advance, here in Mexico at least this is the only thing they do right.
I think those are the 3 big USA WCG problems that need to be fixed.
Glad incontrol is taking care of this, you are experienced as well and should convince them or improving for next WCG !
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Awesome post. I have almost no idea about how to make WCG better, since ive never been there... but i definitely put my 2 cents with the only thing i really can. Change the "beyond the game" music. Reminds me too much of pokemon, not "olympics".
Then again, i don't know if this post will help or will just be catalogued into the rants section. Great job though InControl. Thumbs up!
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Having unbiased administrators who know and care about Starcraft would be a good start.
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Sweden33719 Posts
1) Best of 5s for the semi-finals and finals. I don't know why WCG has stuck with BO3s for their entire 7 (8?) year existance but I'd like to see this changed. I didn't follow the WCG USA Prelims closely this year, but I think they were BO3 as well? If I'm wrong, sorry!
2) This is a complaint for the grand finals, I don't know if WCG USA can do anything about it, but there has to be a way to avoid players dropping games in the group stages in order to setup more favorable brackets.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 09:53 FrozenArbiter wrote:
1) Best of 5s for the semi-finals and finals. I don't know why WCG has stuck with BO3s for their entire 7 (8?) year existance but I'd like to see this changed. I didn't follow the WCG USA Prelims closely this year, but I think they were BO3 as well? If I'm wrong, sorry!
2) This is a complaint for the grand finals, I don't know if WCG USA can do anything about it, but there has to be a way to avoid players dropping games in the group stages in order to setup more favorable brackets.
Yeah it was bo3 again. Groups are bo3 -> top 4 are bo3 double elimination.
Personally I dont mind the system. Some places (WCG Finals anyone?) do bo1 which in my mind is ludicrous. Bo3 is the standard.. more than that is really nice but I think not a big deal imo.
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Katowice25012 Posts
WCG Finals being bo1 was absolutely insane, I hope you get a chance to bring that up with them at some point in the future.
As an observer, I would like more coverage of the event itself. I understand this is only a national tournament, but it is a reasonably important tournament and just finding results can be difficult. Ultimately I want games to have online broadcasts with a commentator, but I think that is a ways off yet. A site that cleanly has groups, brackets, and replays with maybe some comments on each series, that is updated at a regular interval through the tournament would help to grow the brand easily and cheaply.
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On November 13 2008 09:53 FrozenArbiter wrote:
2) This is a complaint for the grand finals, I don't know if WCG USA can do anything about it, but there has to be a way to avoid players dropping games in the group stages in order to setup more favorable brackets.
Just randomly assign each 1st place player to a 2nd place player.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
I agree with ya'll that the website needs serious revamping. I will def ask about that. I wrote it off as fairly worthless years back.. haven't checked since then but I assume more of the same.
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just put in a loser's bracket
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FuDDx
United States5008 Posts
I have a couple that really bother me, the have allready been brought up.
I really dislike the offline tourny, my first wcg experince was an offline prelim that lasted all weekend all the games were being played and we had 25-26 Brood war players at the event.I had a blast as did everyone I got to talk to.Also its much harder to cheat,abuse,hack in offline events.
My second wvg prelim also an offline event had less people than my first and only lasted a day but i still had a blast with 8-10 people showing.
Also the dates being announced/changed at the last minute.If I had enough time to plan id be at many more events (as long as the wife dosent enforce more children,shes hopeful,im saying no)
more than likely just to show some support, feed the corprate entity.
O yeah and fix the dang website its horrid to navigate and you cant find anything without 300 people on a thread pointing you in the right direction.
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1. lend a helping hand to wcg canada, or would it be possible for both countries to cooperate the national grand final event. (ie. have the national final for both canada and usa in same location/date.. it would of course gather more gamers at one event, probably be beneficial for sponsors instead of splitting, (or canada mooching off usa little bit).
2. more offline prelims, less online prelims, and don't "filter" players.. I don't see a reason why hackers should not be allowed to compete in offline...If a guy cares enough to come to the event, that's all it matters..more the merrier.
3. more players to qualify for national finals. I know it sounds pretty counterintuitive, since gamers will be "tired" and too many gamers = "timeconsuming". C'mon, the WCG event is like 2 or 3 day event... better organization can definitely pull it off, and it'll be better economically. (more players show up, more people staying at hotels and such, more crowd, more ppl exposed to sponsors, etc.)
4. consistency in format. whatever format of tournament the WCG Final holds, WCG national finals should do it the same.. (ie. group stage -> single elim tournament). Sure, one can argue one way is better than the other, but it's WCG's tournament. If they decide to do it certain format in the grand final, then the national finals should do the same. For this year's case.. I thought splitting it into 4 groups of 3's (1 group of 4), with best two advancing would have been a lot better for players like Idra and Incontrol. Two groups of 5's seemed pretty ridiculous.
5. website.. or any other medium of delivering information would be great. I don't know about USA's case, but wcg canada had really poor modes of informing gamers and even lans! I know there were "wcg starcraft qualifiers", and some people qualified, then wcg canada announced that the game is off the list.
I'd like to stress on my first point. It would be awesome for canadian gamers to meet with usa players on a less "international" level. Possibly, it'd attract more media, and more attention. Of course, the tournaments will be held separately for Canada and USA.
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offline quals in major cities is all i give a fuck about
Edit: and announce locations at least a while in advance so ppl acn prepare their lives.
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On November 13 2008 11:48 red.venom wrote:
offline quals in major cities is all i give a fuck about
Edit: and announce locations at least a while in advance so ppl acn prepare their lives.
depends on the city.
I went to Chicago, it was fucking horrible
like $25 to park and shit =(, maybe in the burbs of a major city or something.
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WCG Prelims need anti-hack (preferably on iccup not that piece of shit gameon). WCG Online Prelims need to happen on 1 day, not 1 match each day throughout the week. No obs should be allowed in any of the wcg online games. Offline and online admins need to speak fluent english, know starcraft and how to judge winners / make better decisions in disconnect issues etc... WCG National Finals is so disorganized, almost everything about it just seems like a big cluster fuck. They also do NOT know which games should be played on stage / which matches should be played on stage. At WCG USA GF they did the groups by skill, not by seeding (the night before the tournament). This is absolutely absurd especially when you look at the groups and realize that you have the only 2 foreign progamers, me (who placed 2nd in the entire tournament) and the defending champion in 1 group. Whoever decided those brackets on "skill" obviously doesn't know what he was doing / the sc scene and that should NEVER..... EEEEEEEEEEEEVER happen again. And of course, letting the players know where the regionals will be A LOT sooner. We spend so much to travel there. Personally, I think there should also be travel stipends at regionals as well, depending on how far away they live from said event. Because I always loose a shit load at regionals, with flight and hotel... its horrible. Just to get to go to NF? And if I loose at regionals, its a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuge waste. Shit like this needs to be fixed. Either provide a travel stipend or do what I personally prefer.... have regionals online with an anti-hack.
Personally I think there needs to be more common sense around WCG USA, from a business standpoint and from a gamers standpoint. If WCG put me on there payroll and I worked for them, I damn well guarantee a much better tournament / organization. Especially since they have all year to work on it. You need smart people who actually play the games in the tournaments.
Edit: oh and of course... making it so that players on the stage can't hear the damn commentators at NF.... That along with the small round table we played on where my keyboard and mousepad was balancing on the edges cuss they are so big and its a fucking circle table. Everything about the main stage screamed amateurism. Which is a shame since the screens and set up actually looked nice. But everything beyond the look of it, was complete shit.
This is all just me spit-balling. Hopefully some of this helped.
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coordinating with Canada is a really interesting idea IMO o_O; although I believe USA and Canada have too many to have a joint-WCG unless we send top 3 or 4 to the grand final.
for example, Baltic states do this (Czech + Slovakia joint WCG, Lithuania + Latvia + Estonia joint WCG), but IMO Canada and USA have too many players.
WCG Canada is just another issue in itself.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
WCG canada is also like the backyard neighbor's kids version of WCG in comparison to WCG USA. WCG USA is a huge company and is pretty damn serious. WCG Canada is falling a part basically.
Eric a lot of what you said in your post is good.. that was stuff I brought up and will pursue. They have already said they are looking to do a more "gamer" friendly model for the prelim stages. Forking that much cash for a prelim is ludicrous I agree.
Keep em coming guys.
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the best change that can be done in wcg finals:
The group winner choose either we moves out from 1st or 2nd spot. This would completely remove the gaving away games aspect.
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Is there any reward for a country, which gets a lot of (gold) medals? I don't think so but maybe including something like performance in the pay/sponsor package regarding the WCG GF could ensure that the national organizers care more about who they send to the grand final (i.e. not some random people but the very best).
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I'm more experienced as an admin for other games, but like someone suggested... online tournaments needs some hype as well. Just having some sort of commentary to a few selected games will improve interest a great deal. There's a reason for online prelims. If it's just gonna be bothersome and no hype, then people won't be arsed to participate because they have more entertaining things to do. I'm sure there's people willing to help out with this. Either make something out of the online tournament or skip it by having some "foreign ranking" or similar.
If there's more focus on the foreign scene, more people will find it rewarding to participate and improve. There's a need for a boost in the competitive scene for foreigners. This boost might just be starcraft 2.
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they need to make an official partnership with tl or at least gg.net to just do coverage and news about the event (just something like gom where susie is staff and can make newses about it). there were like 3 people in the first online qualifier because nobody knew it was starting yet. theres just a lack of information throughout the event, or the information is buried somewhere in their site and no one can find it. could also be solved by fixing their site, but cooperating with tl, which everyone already reads, would be quite a bit easier.
needs to be more structured and official. the night before wcg usa they decide to re-arrange the groups "by skill" (someone who knows nothing about the bw scene puts the 4 best players in one group). stuff like that just cant be done by a professional organization. i dont even know what to say about it, except that they need to use common sense. same thing with the online qualis, some random guy who doesnt know what hes doing is given final say over basically everything. if he fucks up, and he invariably does, people get screwed and they cant do anything about it.
really, they just need someone who knows bw and is in touch with the competitive scene to run the thing.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
On November 13 2008 22:19 IdrA wrote:
they need to make an official partnership with tl or at least gg.net to just do coverage and news about the event (just something like gom where susie is staff and can make newses about it). there were like 3 people in the first online qualifier because nobody knew it was starting yet. theres just a lack of information throughout the event, or the information is buried somewhere in their site and no one can find it. could also be solved by fixing their site, but cooperating with tl, which everyone already reads, would be quite a bit easier.
needs to be more structured and official. the night before wcg usa they decide to re-arrange the groups "by skill" (someone who knows nothing about the bw scene puts the 4 best players in one group). stuff like that just cant be done by a professional organization. i dont even know what to say about it, except that they need to use common sense. same thing with the online qualis, some random guy who doesnt know what hes doing is given final say over basically everything. if he fucks up, and he invariably does, people get screwed and they cant do anything about it.
really, they just need someone who knows bw and is in touch with the competitive scene to run the thing.
Yeah I am pressing for the "partnership" or at the very least a liason that knows the community. It wouldn't take much to get people informed PRIOR to a WCG prelim as oppose to after hehe.
Also a better website seems viable to fix a lot of these problems. We will see.. I think websites are really expensive (I have no idea) on that level.
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I think they need to completely revamp the qualification process. The offline regional structure eliminates players in three unreasonable ways:
1. Players who have limited ability to travel are often unable to attend at all. Good players who deserve a slot int he finals may not get to attend because they can't travel 500 miles to the nearest regional event. This is unacceptable.
2. Players who have the ability to travel at will have the advantage of qualifying for regionals where they "do not belong" and competing in what could be seen as an easier field for whatever reason.
3. Starcraft is geographically imbalanced in the USA, and as a result you get some weird condensing of players at the regional events. Most of the best players are west/east coast, and there is hardly anyone in the south. For example, people who actually live within driving distance of the south regional are basically nony, lzgamer and myself - whereas at the pacific regional you have half the US community piling into one event.
My solution for the qualification process is this: ICCup + community oversight = win. WCG should recognize the community's ability to regulate and run itself. I have no doubt WCG could use a small staff of quality BW volunteers and work with ICCup to have a WCG USA ladder/tournament system/whatever that is free of hacks and monitored for abuse. Clear rules defining what is and what is not abuse/cheating and enforcement of said rules would help here too.
A pure ladder or pure tourney system would each have too many flaws to be viable, but a ladder that then went into a very large, or several smaller, double elimination tournaments would be ideal. If the objective is, after all, to have the best possible candidates at the finals, then the competitors should be competing with one another in serious fashion to qualify.
So say the top 64 of the ladder go into 4 16 player double elimination tournaments and then the top 4 from each go to the finals. This format would give the same seeding as regionals and a similar "format" but allow greater participation and remove the arbitrary nature of geographic distribution of USA players.
That last part hints at what I see as the last piece of this restructuring - a larger player pool at the finals. I think all of us could agree that a larger pool of good players at the finals would only improve the competition. The immediate issue here would be cost for WCG, but eliminating offline regionals saves money for both WCG and the players. If players didn't have to spend hundreds of dollars to attend the regionals, then spending a few hundred for the finals would seem like less of a hurdle.
Of course along with all this we need the improvements others have already mentioned - such as better, more timely scheduling, 3 slots at the grand finals, etc. But there is definitely hope for WCG USA.
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On November 13 2008 12:14 G5 wrote:
Edit: oh and of course... making it so that players on the stage can't hear the damn commentators at NF.... That along with the small round table we played on where my keyboard and mousepad was balancing on the edges cuss they are so big and its a fucking circle table. Everything about the main stage screamed amateurism. Which is a shame since the screens and set up actually looked nice. But everything beyond the look of it, was complete shit.
Nail on the head. That whole thing demonstrated just how sloppy and unorganized WCG USA really was when it comes to actually running the gaming tournament. These are things a marketing oriented organizer might not ever consider but if they had one actual gamer involved they would've dealt with that stuff ahead of time.
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I won game prizes at the Dayton regional event I attended years back. (the one sadist is talking about.)
WCG never sent them to me. I contacted them and their official response was that it was the fault of their partner and they didn't do business with them anymore and if I wanted my prizes I would have to fight the other company.
This made me think of WCG as a shady half-ass organization.
You should encourage them to have integrity regarding promotions and prizes.
I agree with Sadist's posts and everyone should be able to attend regionals. The event I attended was a lot of fun and my starcraft love was enhanced by watching better players over the shoulder and getting to meet fellow starcraft competitors face to face. One memorable moment was seeing the pylon/cannoncannon/pylon cheese behind the minerals for the first time(there were no public replays with that strat at the time of the regionals if I remember correctly).
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FuDDx
United States5008 Posts
On November 14 2008 13:14 ChoboCop wrote:
I won game prizes at the Dayton regional event I attended years back. (the one sadist is talking about.)
WCG never sent them to me. I contacted them and their official response was that it was the fault of their partner and they didn't do business with them anymore and if I wanted my prizes I would have to fight the other company.
This made me think of WCG as a shady half-ass organization.
You should encourage them to have integrity regarding promotions and prizes.
I agree with Sadist's posts and everyone should be able to attend regionals. The event I attended was a lot of fun and my starcraft love was enhanced by watching better players over the shoulder and getting to meet fellow starcraft competitors face to face. One memorable moment was seeing the pylon/cannoncannon/pylon cheese behind the minerals for the first time(there were no public replays with that strat at the time of the regionals if I remember correctly).
I also had a prize that never came a digital cmaera i had won thru there website.
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I'm from Germany and travelled to WCG Cologne on Saturday to get the chance to watch my favourite Korean players. I was psyched to see the big names first time in real life and over all it was amazing to see all the games played on such a high level from international players.
The good thing:
You could get very close to the players, they were hanging out near the lan playing area (about 24 computers) and get a glimpse of them playing in close proximity.
The bad thing:
There was no way to watch a single game beside the one (Jaedong vs Stork) beeing played on stage. Everyone (about 100 people) was standing very tight behind the barriers trying to watch the half finals over their shoulders. You could see nothing. They had only one screen showing the brackets of the tournament that was updated two hours after the games took place. No commentary, no spectators, no information, no chance to watch the games! It sucked.
Its supposed to be the biggest offline tournament, the olympics of e-sport, it takes place in a huge hall in the heart of a town of one million people with the european headquarter of electronic arts and place of the new Gamescom next year - and they don't get the idea of actually showing the games to the people who travelled 500 km and payed to see them??? Just in case you wonder, the same happened to all the other games (warcraft3, Age of Empires, C&C...) It was SO disappointing to take up all the hassle and loose this chance in a livetime for this tournament beeing in Germany. I still can't believe it.
What they should do:
1. Set up a big extra screen over the heads of each player in the lan area so everyone can watch them play 1st person from behind - great!
2. Set up a separate smaller viewing theater for every game inkluding live commentary. - wow!
WCG has one big misconception. The people going there want to see their favourite games, not all games. I did not come to Cologne to watch Carom 3D on stage. No one is into watching 12 different games one after another because the nature of computer games makes it not understandable and outright boring to watch games you never played and don't care for. Its not the olympics where the art and power of the athletes reveals itself to the spectator. How am I supposed to appreciate the skill and taktics of a Fifa or Need For Speed or Virtua Fighter player if I never played it? Through the commentary? I tried it. It just doesn't work. You have to understand and feel the game mechanics and inner dynamics to get into it. You need much more knowledge to follow the action than in non e-sports.
So if you want people to go there - show the games. Its easy.
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On November 14 2008 14:15 FuDDx wrote:Show nested quote +On November 14 2008 13:14 ChoboCop wrote:
I won game prizes at the Dayton regional event I attended years back. (the one sadist is talking about.)
WCG never sent them to me. I contacted them and their official response was that it was the fault of their partner and they didn't do business with them anymore and if I wanted my prizes I would have to fight the other company.
This made me think of WCG as a shady half-ass organization.
You should encourage them to have integrity regarding promotions and prizes.
I agree with Sadist's posts and everyone should be able to attend regionals. The event I attended was a lot of fun and my starcraft love was enhanced by watching better players over the shoulder and getting to meet fellow starcraft competitors face to face. One memorable moment was seeing the pylon/cannoncannon/pylon cheese behind the minerals for the first time(there were no public replays with that strat at the time of the regionals if I remember correctly). I also had a prize that never came a digital cmaera i had won thru there website.
psh
none of you didnt get your computer.
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they outa pay for the players trip to the national finals also. 250$ for a plane ticket (that has to be last minute since they give you 0 notice) plus all your food and stuff for the weekend means that anyone who doesnt live in-state or doesnt get top 3 is going at a loss.
get rid of the idiotic childish FREE STUFF! shit on stage and use that money to pay for it.
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On November 14 2008 22:04 IdrA wrote:
they outa pay for the players trip to the national finals also. 250$ for a plane ticket (that has to be last minute since they give you 0 notice) plus all your food and stuff for the weekend means that anyone who doesnt live in-state or doesnt get top 3 is going at a loss.
get rid of the idiotic childish FREE STUFF! shit on stage and use that money to pay for it.
Was it just me or was the FREE STUFF ... stuff ... a little on the frightening side? They had this huge mob of kids worked into a fucking bloodlust over xbox memory cards and prima guides...
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On November 13 2008 04:01 {88}iNcontroL wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 03:45 Kennigit wrote:
Before i start i'll just say that i think this is a really good idea but for those who post - the most important thing is SOLUTIONS. We all know the issues with hacks, last minute maps etc, but from an organizational perspective the solutions are the most important part.
1) If someone is a known hacker in amateur starcraft leagues with legitimate proof, or there is evidence to suggest they have hacked in WCG prelims in the past then they should not be allowed to participate. How would this be determined? Perhaps have a couple refs who's main focus is removing hackers - these things can never be 100%, but this is a tournament not the court. I don't expect WCG organizers to stay on top of who has been caught hacking etc but there should be some format where they can take information from sites like Teamliquid/WGT/Gosugamers etc that "know" what is going on.
i'll add more when i get back from work.
Note also ill be deleting any crap posts from this thread with great fervor. This was an issue I discussed with them specifically. The issue was marketing and the detachment from reality on their behalf. They were worried about persecuting a person wrongfully and catching flak for not having hard proof when they banned a player from WCG. Without going into names I think we all know the situation we are talking about. I informed them that in its current state SC cannot rely on physical proof to root out its malevolent players. We rely on a jury by community. That speaks to the issue that WCG needs a person connected with SC to be their person "on the ground" and making informed decisions based on how SC is ran these days.
as for the banning can't they just put the person's name and info on a permanent ban list?
also aren't most hacks obvious? I thought there were lot of anit hack programs to check for these stuff...
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Id really like to know how many of you have ever claimed to have run a tournament or a tournament organization of that magnitude?
While you have some valid points, i dont think anyone is considering the backgrounds of how events like these even come to be.
Complaining about why WCG uses bad or not so popular games is worthless. Those bad games pay for games like SC to even still be around.
Complaining about those freebies on stage and those rabid people is absolutely stupid. Sponsors care most for those rabid fans, not the gamers. Those rabid fans are the ones who will buy their products, not the whiny pros.
Its not that different in any professional sport. You think game rule changes are because players whine? Uh No, its the TV companies that decide that timeouts last 20 secs so they can go to commercial and make more money.
ROI determines what goes on the events. RETURN ON INVESTMENT. And keeping the rabid fans and sponsors happy is what keeps WCG going on every year, not giving into every demand of a disgruntled player.
Frankly , i have been on both sides of this argument, and still am, and if you want to make money playing your game, your just going to have to realize that some things just suck.
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Valhalla18444 Posts
On November 19 2008 05:52 ggnoob wrote:
Id really like to know how many of you have ever claimed to have run a tournament or a tournament organization of that magnitude?
While you have some valid points, i dont think anyone is considering the backgrounds of how events like these even come to be.
Complaining about why WCG uses bad or not so popular games is worthless. Those bad games pay for games like SC to even still be around.
Complaining about those freebies on stage and those rabid people is absolutely stupid. Sponsors care most for those rabid fans, not the gamers. Those rabid fans are the ones who will buy their products, not the whiny pros.
Its not that different in any professional sport. You think game rule changes are because players whine? Uh No, its the TV companies that decide that timeouts last 20 secs so they can go to commercial and make more money.
ROI determines what goes on the events. RETURN ON INVESTMENT. And keeping the rabid fans and sponsors happy is what keeps WCG going on every year, not giving into every demand of a disgruntled player.
Frankly , i have been on both sides of this argument, and still am, and if you want to make money playing your game, your just going to have to realize that some things just suck.
The things being addressed in this thread are routinely thoughtless and illogical decisions by wcg staff and referees. We all realize that it has to add up financially, and that sponsors need a return, but there are many aspects of WCG that simply need to be fixed to smooth the process for the players themselves.
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Most of those aspects are decided because of financial decisions.
If youve played in WCG since the beginnig of its entrance to the USA, you would see that things have gotten "worse" every year. The budgets have gotten smaller every year. You do the math.
Also, while some of those referee decisions on disconnects and cheaters have been somewhat questionable, I would rather have someone reffing my match that I know has no connection to the Starcraft community so I dont have to worry about favoritism. If i get fucked, so be it, at least i know it was unbiased.
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On November 19 2008 06:01 ggnoob wrote:
Also, while some of those referee decisions on disconnects and cheaters have been somewhat questionable, I would rather have someone reffing my match that I know has no connection to the Starcraft community so I dont have to worry about favoritism. If i get fucked, so be it, at least i know it was unbiased.
So true!
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8748 Posts
ggnoob what have been the budgets of wcg usa every year? i haven't noticed a big change in the three years i've been attending the national finals. the prelims have been the same with the US Open, an online ladder and 4 4-player regional events. the national finals have been similar events in las vegas, orlando and los angeles. travel stipend every year. prizes actually have gone up. on the SC side of things, 2006-2008 have seemed very similar.
your first post was really out of context. you remember that the OP is stating that the organizers of WCG USA want to know how to improve the event according to the gamers? of course it's their responsibility to only make cost-effective changes and to stay within the budget, but i don't understand how your statements are informing this discussion at all. perhaps when changes don't happen in 2009 because of financial reasons and the gamers are upset, you can chime in explaining how businesses work
anyway, WCG knows that the gamers need to be satisfied. they have survived because there is no competition and because they're good enough to not simply skip. where WCG does have competition, like MLG for some, WCG loses out on some of the best players. if that became a widespread problem, their event would fall apart. the level of dissatisfaction for many of the gamers is to the point where if a new tournament popped up at the same time as WCG, and prize money / difficulty level were equal, they'd go to the new tournament in a heartbeat.
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Well lets look at some facts between this year and last year.
1. In the past there have been more US final spots from qualifiers. The US Open was at different locations before NY, the reason NY is used is because its FREE - aka Samsung Experience.
2. ORLANDO vs E4All - E4all was practically free (E4all is desperate, anyone whos been to previous e4alls and e3's would know this), renting universal studios for a week IS NOT CHEAP.
3. The travel stipend continues to remain $250 even though airline ticket prices continue to rise and oh yea inflation!
4. I remember before 2007, the US sending more players for several games to the world finals. In fact I remember in 2005 we sent 3 SC players (Yosh, Day and someone else) , 3 WC3 (wiz short and someone else) players and other nice amounts to Singapore.
And I hate to break it to all of you -
ICM IS FOR SALE. ICM is the company that owns WCG. Samsung wants to sell off ICM because they dont think theres any value anymore. If you talk to any of the SP's (Samsung Partners) in the different countries, they will all tell you their budgets keep getting cut every year. In fact with a little research you should be able to find several articles about countries either cancelling their WCG qualis or having to scale back quite a bit.
The people who supported ICM within Samsung got fired or quit because of fraud and other dispicable things.
I am not stating that the organizers want to change how things are, im pointing out that half of the comments on this post about how to change things are absolutely ridiculous.
And plz, no matter how bad some of you might feel an event is, your going to play in it, even if someone popped up to compete against WCG, youd play in it. Unfortunately being SC players, you wouldnt really be able to test that because noone runs SC tournaments outside of Korea.
Ask any CS player how bad ESWC, CGS, CPL Kode5 have been, and theyve gotten screwed, and they keep going back to play in them because thats what you do when your trying to get something like esports to succeed.
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if you can talk to them about other things than Starcraft bring up that people like there being many games as long as important games that have proved to stand their ground in competitive play are represented.
I'm talking about Quake and Street Fighter but there are probably others.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
Hey ggnoob my name is incontrol, I'm going to be tooling your asshole now.
lets take a look at the logic of your posting here for a minute before we delve into the nuances of your posts.
Logically, you'd like us to be content with a declining tourney. Not just "a" tourney btw, THE tourney for SC players. You'd like us to be ok with non sound proof stage matches, with refs who have no idea what game they are administrating and logistical errors that could be easily fixed, hell even cost effectively fixed but you'd rather we just remain complacent. Stagnate, and watch our favorite game decline alongside the tourney. You are the prototypical voice that occurs in every instance of change. Logically you'd like us to accept what we have got and just twiddle our thumbs. That kind of stagnation might be appropriate for the ball sucking gamers of other genres, but it won't work here. We play SC. We have 30 inch cocks as it is.
Now in the literal sense I'd like to address a few points:
You didn't read my OP very carefully. WCG is headed by two close friends of mine (as of relatively recently) and change is abound. They want to know what the community wants to see. This thread is functioning as that venue. You nay saying the very spirit of this thread is right from the beginning in error.. an error you yourself could have corrected had you read more carefully (hopefully that is the case anyways).
Half the posts in this thread are "ridiculous" as you say. Which is fine. That is true in any public discussion. That does not warrant the sweeping arguments you laid out. So don't try and scapegoat there.
Additionally I CAN play the same game. The other half of the posts in this thread are about literal problems that functionally occur right now. Bad refs, horrible map switches, bad regional choices.. are all things that have actually happened and need to stop. No tourney in the history of man kind has been ran "perfectly" and as such, people are entitled to search for that perfection. You arguing against that change is a logical nightmare but also it has no historical precedent (not a successful one anyways).
ROI is rooted in numerous things. Simply saying the people who get thrown prizes off the stage represent that "ROI" is so short of what actually brings in investment I don't even know where to begin. People are there to see games played first and foremost. That means the gamers are the primary function. People WILL stop going to those events if the cream of the crop are elsewhere playing in a tourney that fixed/learned from the mistakes of WCG. That is the big picture. I could extrapolate on this but I hope you know where I am going with it.
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Every year I read the complaints on this forum and every year you make a case and I dont see much change at all.
Dont think i decide to speak here as a random person, I guarantee ive been in esports longer than most of you.
And i hate to break it to you, but your friends in WCG , probably David and Paul, yes I know them too, have jobs to do, and as much as they want to help you, they have bosses in Korea and a new boss (not announced yet) who probably wont know esports like their old boss.
Seriously, GEOFF I was making a point towards the multiple screams of the same complaints over and over.
The online refs have always been iffy, but the us finals refs have always been top notch. Horrible map switches which are controlled in Korea. Bad regional choices because noone wants to hold a WCG regional, you take what you can get.
You can "tool my asshole" all you want, but I promise I know more about whats going on than you ever could dream of.
And seriously, ROI is whats most important to sponsors. They want numbers and facts, they want to see that 10000 spectators showed up. You need to take some time and do a survey, 95% of the people there didnt come to see a game played. TO's know that people will come watch matches, those arent the important people. Its the general public, the passer-bys thats important. People who know nothing about gaming is the number one priority. Do some research, you might be surprised.
Im not naysaying or telling you to shut your piehole. If you even bothered to read my posts, Im trying to adjust peoples way of thinking.
"Spend money on something else", "get rid of those bad games", "the stage looked liked shit".
Those comments dont help anything.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
If you really are replying to the people who don't know that it takes money to run these tourneys then you are wasting your time and confusing a thread that doesn't need confusion. I addressed in numerous posts on this subject (including this thread) that the "bad" games are needed for money. If people cry about them still it is because they don't know anything and don't really need to be pandered to.
This post is for the public btw.. I am talking to ggnoob on MSN  He too is a friend (hehe).
Listen: Is WCG going to be the best tourney ever next year? Probably not.. but what can be done should be done. And what can be worked on should be addressed. Even in trying times when eSports isn't a priority and companies are under strife like CGS, ICM, WCG etc.. we can still improve. In fact I'd say it is MOST IMPORTANT to improve in those times. The old model didn't work. Wasn't lucrative enough. If you think that eSports in general is a failed market you would be mistaken. The people trying to find that market are what is failing.
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iNcontroL, I commend you for your initiative on this issue and stepping up as a community spokesperson. We are all lucky to have you around as someone who can understand the issues and sort through the suggestions people post in order to have a real impact on an organization that affects all of us.
As I cannot speak to the gaming issues, I'd like to add some thoughts from a media and promotion standpoint. The lack of communication between WCG USA and eSportsTV, the broadcast company hired for the USA Finals, was rather difficult to work with. eSportsTV brought Diggity, Moletrap, Phreak, and also PsyonicReaver to commentate SC and WC3, and there ended up being very little for them to do because only two SC bo3s (and no WC3 games) were presented onstage, as you know. The attitude of the mainstage program director towards RTS games was very disappointing (apparently RTS is a "crowd-killer"), and it was worse than pulling teeth for Moletrap and me to convince him to get an a second SC match onstage after the first match where the in-game action wasn't even shown on the stage screen because of technical difficulties. The big screen footage was limited to whatever the man with the handheld roaming stage camera could pick up from filming your monitors onstage over your shoulders. This was not because of eSportsTV's technical capabilities, as demonstrated in the second onstage match where the obs computer was able to connect to the big screen, but rather lack of communication and very last-minute changes in the mainstage programming schedule. As there wasn't any sort of specific timetable for when the semifinals and finals were to be played, all of the players were out to lunch when the mainstage programming director decided around 2pm on the second day that he could afford to replace FIFA with an SC match, and then he informed me that there was nothing he could do because the players had all left the convention center.
Luckily, the MCs for the mainstage were friendlier to the RTS cause and let me give them information to announce about the finals being played in the tournament area. When Psyonic and I heard that the losers bracket finals were going to be brought onstage on the third day, we ran around the convention hall with the big SCBW sign encouraging people to head over to the mainstage area and watch the games, which actually worked - the audience ended up being pretty full. Moletrap and Diggity were not very happy about the quality of their casting for the onstage games because they couldn't reveal critical strategic information due to the lack of soundproof headphones for the players, but nonetheless their work was appreciated by the audience, if not (it seemed) WCG USA itself.
Moletrap and Diggity specifically made promotional videos for the WCG USA finals and uploaded them to YouTube so that the online community could be informed as to where they could watch live or replay footage of the SC tournament. They also spent a great deal of time in the week after the event commentating the replays. As far as I know, none of those replays or the great interviews that Diggity conducted with many of the players have made it to the wcglive website. In my opinion, WCG USA missed a great opportunity to build its online presence by not working with eSportsTV staff to promote and facilitate these efforts. In the future, WCG USA should establish better communication with its broadcast production partner and be more proactive in working with production to boost the visibility of the event live and online.
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
Excellent post Peanut.
I think some of the greatest ideas to be discussed/generated from this thread are the ones where it would cost WCG virtually nothing to fix (aside from being attentive) and can actually go a long way. Imagine had they done just a few things to be more helpful to the diggity crew and had the stage match done properly. Aside from a better stage match you'd have a happier online community.
That actually goes a long way because the more hits WCG gets on it's website, the more videos that are watched related to WCG.. are all FREE marketing and good PR.
These are more of the same though. Anyone in the food industry will bend over backwards to win over a customer. That person might tell 1-2 people about how good the service was. But if the service is bad they are more likely to tell 5+ people how bad it was. WCG has ignored this philosophy or at least not taken it seriously. Very little fixes like this can go a LONG way.
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Perhaps a bit off topic (sorry!), but ... what would one have to do in order to become a ref?
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speak limited english and know very little about broodwar, and be capable of becoming an angry little child when your poor judgement is questioned
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that means 99% of BW players are qualified to referee WCG USA, awesome.
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So ... what would one have to do in order to become a ref? 
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do you meet any of the requirements idra was talking about? lol
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looks like hes already got the illiteracy under control
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On November 13 2008 03:45 GrandInquisitor wrote:
WCG needs people within the Starcraft scene running its game. I'm sure they field complaints about this on other games too, but without someone who is intimately connected with the Starcraft zeitgeist running or even advising the event, it ends up being like a European without any background in American football being asked to run the NFL. Without a TL admin running WCG, WCG will never have the full respect or trust of the Starcraft community.
Maybe merge TSL/WCG?
You do know that all WCG Referee's are from WGT >.> But I think you're talking about having a actual TL/WGT admin working with WCG in the SC part. That will never happen as they only hire koreans.
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On November 21 2008 02:57 ShoCkeyy wrote:Show nested quote +On November 13 2008 03:45 GrandInquisitor wrote:
WCG needs people within the Starcraft scene running its game. I'm sure they field complaints about this on other games too, but without someone who is intimately connected with the Starcraft zeitgeist running or even advising the event, it ends up being like a European without any background in American football being asked to run the NFL. Without a TL admin running WCG, WCG will never have the full respect or trust of the Starcraft community.
Maybe merge TSL/WCG? You do know that all WCG Referee's are from WGT >.> But I think you're talking about having a actual TL/WGT admin working with WCG in the SC part. That will never happen as they only hire koreans.
this thread is about WCG USA and not about the finals
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On November 21 2008 02:24 IdrA wrote:
looks like hes already got the illiteracy under control
idra.. why the BM?
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On November 20 2008 22:02 IdrA wrote:
speak limited english and know very little about broodwar, and be capable of becoming an angry little child when your poor judgement is questioned
haha nice one greg ^.^
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On November 21 2008 03:27 never_toss wrote:Show nested quote +On November 21 2008 02:24 IdrA wrote:
looks like hes already got the illiteracy under control idra.. why the BM?
I'm going to assume it's because he likes the unorganization rather than someone with knowledge and concern. I guess this answers why WCG USA refs fail so hard. Oh well, I tried.
/ontopic
You're awesome, Inc. Thx for stepping up.
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EPT
