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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
On October 02 2008 02:41 lgdDante wrote:Show nested quote +On October 02 2008 02:35 Chill wrote:
Either way it doesn't matter. The players are trying to get familiar with a format they've never tried before and to play Brood War while talking. The commentators are trying to read multiple IRC channels, PMs and BNet while striking a balance between calling the play, asking questions and making jokes.
It would be stupid to judge someone's charisma based on that alone. It is stupid to do that. Then why are certain players able to do it so easily and other struggle so badly? If i remember right mondragon was able to beat nony while talking to you guys. I'm not asking for the guy to be doing a stand up routine while playing but is it honestly you think over 3 hours there isn't ample chance for someones personality to shine through? It's not like they are locked in a heated game for 3 hours straight. And once again i wasn't talking about you.
Have you ever tried to play and talk 0_0....it's quite challenging. You are derailing this thread entirely - its not about people showing personality while playing, its about being a good caster in general.
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On October 02 2008 02:39 Kennigit wrote:Show nested quote +On October 02 2008 02:36 lgdDante wrote:On October 02 2008 02:31 Kennigit wrote:
Are you talking about chill or the players? The players, Chill is actually pretty good in those things, especially in more of a supporting techincal role where he can just pop in every minute or so and provide some insight. I was responding to whoever said that if a top foreigner took up commentating they would surpass 99% of people in 2 weeks. Because I don't know if they are just burned out on the game but most of them seem incapable of getting excited about a game of starcraft, there's definately some expections out there that would probably be good at it like mondragon, incontrol. But just because you are good at something doesnt mean you would be good a commentating on it, theres a reason why only certain NFL players start commentating. Saying that all top bw players don't have personality is pretty ridiculous. Yes there's some that a quite bland but alot of the top americans would be awesome casters.
Didn't i say that in my post? Someone blatantly said that any top player given 2 weeks would surpass 99% of the commentators around now. Skills in commentary isn't directly related to skill, and that was my point. I'm not on some crusade to say all BW players are boring drones, I even pointed out 2 players who I'd love to listen to, I'm saying that commentary is a completely different skill all together, and while skill and experience in the game is a big part, so are the other things i mentioned such as charsima, personality etc.
Remember we are talking about who would be the best caster, not who could make the best FPVod, obviously TL is at one extreme of the audience spectrum in the starcraft community, they would probably like more techincal commentary, but that doesn't mean those people are the best in general.
You need a mix of those 2 things to be a great commentator, that was my point.
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Zurich15325 Posts
You guys should all read very carefully what RaGe said, both his posts explain everything that has been brought up in this thread.
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"But us four, along with other commentators at sc2gg.com, have been providing consistent, comprehensive English casting of the OSL, MSL, and Proleague for several seasons now. That's hundreds of games that are no where else cast in a language that most foreign viewers can understand. We have received hundreds, if not thousands, of messages saying that those games wouldn't be watched if not for our commentaries. This adds to the eSports scene in general, which benefits Teamliquid, Tasteless, the chances of eSports being broadcast in the US, and all other good things."
I think this is an important point. Just because a caster isn't considered the 'best', or doesn't appeal to the 'best players', doesn't mean it's not worth it, or some sort of sin to starcraft, or something. I'm a terrible terrible player and a casual fan, and my favourite commentators are tasteless and artosis (looking forward to blizzcon...), but when I look for a game on youtube I'm delighted when I find that it's been commentated by one of the sc2gg guys. For myself, and many others, it's very much appreciated, whether or not it's at the same level as people who are getting paid for their work.
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Braavos36374 Posts
I think we're slacking on the TL Attack casting preparation, and this is something that will be worked on and fixed in the future. I think Rage and Chill have great, dynamic personalities but frankly we're all a bit burned out by the work we have to do organizing everything else (like shirts, news, tsl, etc) and they sort of just wing the casting. If we're going to make TL Attack professional we have to really step up how we prepare questions and interact with the players. Simply having them there doesn't cut it. Chill, Rage, and whoever else casts knows this and we're going to be better in the future. Remember, they don't just cast and do nothing else, they have a lot of responsibilities other than that.
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
See this is where TL gets labeled as elitist or a niche wanting and wanting a more technical aspect. I don't this this is true at all - tasteless has repeatedly said that his casts right now are cattering to a more general audience and Teamliquid members still enjoy them. Why? Because the TL mantra has always been to only present material of the highest quality possible.
Chill records tons of zerg commentaries but only releases 1 or 2 because he has set a standard for himself. Yes sc2gg has provided consistent coverage but is quantity better than quality. I would say absolutely not. I would rather see maybe 10 commentaries per season that blew me away rather than every single match of every set cast at a mediocre level.
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Calgary25977 Posts
On October 02 2008 02:39 CholeraSC wrote:Show nested quote +On October 02 2008 02:29 Chill wrote:
Tasteless mentions a lot of high level ideas in his casts, actually. He just doesn't harp on them and mentions them in passing, but they are there. Most times the most technical detail I hear is, "he's building a supply depot on the bottom of the CC to squeeze the SCV out nearer to his minerals", or something like "X is going for a fast reaver drop, which is a great counter to a T fast expand, if the T doesn't know about it, and they don't because they can't get the early Comsat...". These are things that can be, and are, in videos like mine. I do hear some high-level ideas, but like you say, they aren't emphasized, and I bet you don't watch his videos just for that 3 second snip of high-level analysis. Anyway, I'm not asking TL to like my videos, or those of my friends, as much as Tasteless'. I understand that his style might be more energetic, his jokes funnier, and his active membership here more endearing. But I just ask that you don't judge our videos by the supposed lack of technical merit, since I do not think that is not the criteria you judge his professional casts by, either.
That's all I judge on. Artosis = most technical = best; Tasteless = close second, everyone else = zero.
That's what I've always said. O_O
Edit: Maybe that's the royal you? :D
Edit2: Ugh God. Maybe zero isn't the right word but like... Given the choice of listening to an English commentary or Korean, I have no preference (except for Diggity). They (other than Diggity) add nothing to the experience for me, so the choice is between listening to commentary I don't fully understand, or commentary I don't care about.
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On October 02 2008 02:59 Chill wrote:Show nested quote +On October 02 2008 02:39 CholeraSC wrote:On October 02 2008 02:29 Chill wrote:
Tasteless mentions a lot of high level ideas in his casts, actually. He just doesn't harp on them and mentions them in passing, but they are there. Most times the most technical detail I hear is, "he's building a supply depot on the bottom of the CC to squeeze the SCV out nearer to his minerals", or something like "X is going for a fast reaver drop, which is a great counter to a T fast expand, if the T doesn't know about it, and they don't because they can't get the early Comsat...". These are things that can be, and are, in videos like mine. I do hear some high-level ideas, but like you say, they aren't emphasized, and I bet you don't watch his videos just for that 3 second snip of high-level analysis. Anyway, I'm not asking TL to like my videos, or those of my friends, as much as Tasteless'. I understand that his style might be more energetic, his jokes funnier, and his active membership here more endearing. But I just ask that you don't judge our videos by the supposed lack of technical merit, since I do not think that is not the criteria you judge his professional casts by, either. That's all I judge on. Artosis = most technical = best; Tasteless = close second, everyone else = zero. That's what I've always said. O_O Edit: Maybe that's the royal you? :D
It is the plural you, ustedes. But do watch the videos I did with Louder, especially games 2 and 3, to see some pretty darn technical videos.
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"Oh yeah, Artosis sure is the best, I mean, look at this probe, it won't die you know"
I actually hear him while I type that haha
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Calgary25977 Posts
On October 02 2008 03:04 CholeraSC wrote:Show nested quote +On October 02 2008 02:59 Chill wrote:On October 02 2008 02:39 CholeraSC wrote:On October 02 2008 02:29 Chill wrote:
Tasteless mentions a lot of high level ideas in his casts, actually. He just doesn't harp on them and mentions them in passing, but they are there. Most times the most technical detail I hear is, "he's building a supply depot on the bottom of the CC to squeeze the SCV out nearer to his minerals", or something like "X is going for a fast reaver drop, which is a great counter to a T fast expand, if the T doesn't know about it, and they don't because they can't get the early Comsat...". These are things that can be, and are, in videos like mine. I do hear some high-level ideas, but like you say, they aren't emphasized, and I bet you don't watch his videos just for that 3 second snip of high-level analysis. Anyway, I'm not asking TL to like my videos, or those of my friends, as much as Tasteless'. I understand that his style might be more energetic, his jokes funnier, and his active membership here more endearing. But I just ask that you don't judge our videos by the supposed lack of technical merit, since I do not think that is not the criteria you judge his professional casts by, either. That's all I judge on. Artosis = most technical = best; Tasteless = close second, everyone else = zero. That's what I've always said. O_O Edit: Maybe that's the royal you? :D It is the plural you, ustedes. But do watch the videos I did with Louder, especially games 2 and 3, to see some pretty darn technical videos.
For the sake of a fully informed discussion, I will. It should also be noted Louder is a retard so that will probably weigh in on my enjoyment.
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Braavos36374 Posts
The one side of commentating (the voice, tone, pace, charisma, personality, etc) is extremely difficult to learn and you get small gains only through large amounts of practice. You can noticeably see the improvement in a lot of the SC2GG guy's styles.
Also, I think Rage's rhetoric is a bit overstated but true too. I'm not going to toot my own horn but I think my strategical understanding of all the non mirror matches (non TvT PvP ZvZ) is pretty solid. I don't play at a B level at all. But at the same time, a lot of my knowledge was really enhanced by playing and learning from people like Chill. I'm not great at BW but I'm not horrible either, I'd say I'm roughly C level. You can read the editorials I've written in the TLFE section, and I think I've proven in there and in that one cast we did for Proleague finals to at least be competent strategy wise. So I disagree a bit, I think you don't have to be a great player, but at least a decent and thoughtful one.
To be honest I think this whole "strategical knowledge" divide really can be solved quickly and painlessly by just having open communication between people who watch progaming. Having this big divide between "good players" and "broader audience" is really silly. You can appeal to both camps pretty well just by having a good balance.
Especially if you have dual casters in a VOD, like Chill and Artosis for TSL. I think they appealed well to all audiences.
Again I'll just pitch that you guys should post your commentaries and participate more on TL and especially don't get offended by a few idiots. I think this helps both you guys in that you get a lot more feedback and participation from our community and it helps us in that it generates interest and discussion on something (english casting) that we don't provide here.
The relationship between our sites doesn't have to be so... adversarial. If you want some stickied dedicated threads to commentaries we can do that, if you want to post stuff in blogs we can do that. I can't imagine you're satisfied with the youtube comments and the relatively low activity level on the SC2GG forums. Perhaps our communities interacting more we can both have more users.
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United States13896 Posts
On October 02 2008 03:12 Hot_Bid wrote:
The one side of commentating (the voice, tone, pace, charisma, personality, etc) is extremely difficult to learn and you get small gains only through large amounts of practice. You can noticeably see the improvement in a lot of the SC2GG guy's styles.
Also, I think Rage's rhetoric is a bit overstated but true too. I'm not going to toot my own horn but I think my strategical understanding of all the non mirror matches (non TvT PvP ZvZ) is pretty solid. I don't play at a B level at all. But at the same time, a lot of my knowledge was really enhanced by playing and learning from people like Chill.
To be honest I think this whole "strategical knowledge" divide really can be solved quickly and painlessly by just having open communication between people who watch progaming. Having this big divide between "good players" and "broader audience" is really silly. You can appeal to both camps pretty well just by having a good balance.
Especially if you have dual casters in a VOD, like Chill and Artosis for TSL. I think they appealed well to all audiences.
Again I'll just pitch that you guys should post your commentaries and participate more on TL and especially don't get offended by a few idiots. I think this helps both you guys in that you get a lot more feedback and participation from our community and it helps us in that it generates interest and discussion on something (english casting) that we don't provide here.
The relationship between our sites doesn't have to be so... adversarial. If you want some stickied dedicated threads to commentaries we can do that, if you want to post stuff in blogs we can do that. I can't imagine you're satisfied with the youtube comments and the relatively low activity level on the SC2GG forums. Perhaps our communities interacting more we can both have more users.
Eloquently stated Hot_Bid. In the past it's been the a vocal few who really beat down the production of more/better commentaries. As someone who frequents both sites often, I'm glad to see this.
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On October 02 2008 03:12 Hot_Bid wrote:
The one side of commentating (the voice, tone, pace, charisma, personality, etc) is extremely difficult to learn and you get small gains only through large amounts of practice. You can noticeably see the improvement in a lot of the SC2GG guy's styles.
Also, I think Rage's rhetoric is a bit overstated but true too. I'm not going to toot my own horn but I think my strategical understanding of all the non mirror matches (non TvT PvP ZvZ) is pretty solid. I don't play at a B level at all. But at the same time, a lot of my knowledge was really enhanced by playing and learning from people like Chill.
To be honest I think this whole "strategical knowledge" divide really can be solved quickly and painlessly by just having open communication between people who watch progaming. Having this big divide between "good players" and "broader audience" is really silly. You can appeal to both camps pretty well just by having a good balance.
Especially if you have dual casters in a VOD, like Chill and Artosis for TSL. I think they appealed well to all audiences.
Again I'll just pitch that you guys should post your commentaries and participate more on TL and especially don't get offended by a few idiots. I think this helps both you guys in that you get a lot more feedback and participation from our community and it helps us in that it generates interest and discussion on something (english casting) that we don't provide here.
The relationship between our sites doesn't have to be so... adversarial. If you want some stickied dedicated threads to commentaries we can do that, if you want to post stuff in blogs we can do that. I can't imagine you're satisfied with the youtube comments and the relatively low activity level on the SC2GG forums. Perhaps our communities interacting more we can both have more users.
Thank you for this post. I'll send it over to some of the other head staff at sc2gg.com. I've always thought it'd be a good idea for these two sites to work together rather than compete, to be honest, and that's part of my motivation in posting here. I have not participated in any of the small flamewars on either site, and I don't plan to.
By the way, you're right about my not having personally been "blown off" in the sense of receiving no responses or feedback. I did post a few games up a long time ago and got a few comments, of which most were positive. I suppose there just isn't as big of a venue to post English commentated videos here, which I would hope could change.
By the way, for the OP - I'm in charge of helping out/organizing new commentators at SC2GG.com (like Ahzz, for example), so PM me here or there with any technical questions or whatever and I can try to help.
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Braavos36374 Posts
I think the elitist attitude of TL is both an positive and a negative.
The community is extremely close knit and is the closest thing to having real people cheer next to you on the couch for progaming matches. After you get to a few thousand posts and a year on the forums, there's a level of comfort and fun with other members that is really different, whether on Battle.net, IRC, Ventrilo, or just on the forums.
However, being a newbie isn't easy here. You get made fun of sometimes, you don't get all the inside jokes or know the customs, and the atmosphere can seem intimidating or even discouraging. But it really is worth it once you stay and get to know everyone.
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I agree with if you're not good at starcraft you shouldn't cast. If you don't understand something you shouldn't pretend you do and talk non stop about it.
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On October 02 2008 02:21 FConnectionUK wrote:
Knowing what you're saying and blurting out what you're thinking makes the biggest difference in the world. And yes, we can also see what's going on in the game as well as you can.
You may provide us with some excitement, to say the least, but what else? Oh, the big factor: We get to hear it in English. But I will still never watch your commentating. Why should I? I can get the same excitement hearing the beasty voice of "mahhhhhhhhhhhk".
The sole purpose of doing the subtitle thread was because I wanted everyone to see the insight of the Korean games. Not seeing what's happening, but understanding what's happening allows us to appreciate the game that much more.
This is my final answer, and you can't deny it; you have to have pretty darn good understanding of the game. IMO, for a foreigner to prove this, you need at least very high ranking in ICCUPs. So what's your iccup ranking? (I think this is Tastee's point too)
It's true. Korean commentators aren't good at playing starcraft at all, but they have as much as insight as the top tier(!) progamers.
There was a popular starcraft show called StarBrains. Two players play as one team, one who directs and plans, and the other just follows order and macro. Caster Um (the fat one with MAHHHHHK) was the brain and Luxury(before he was good, Yarn was far more superior/famous at this time) was the player playing against Caster Kim (Carrier Kim) with Chalreng. ZvP.
Caster Um opened with Muta opening and later switched to Hydra Lurkers. While Caster Kim defended the harrass making few archons then proceeded to collect some high templar. At the MOST PERFECT timing after building 298374987 hydras/lurks, caster Um orders Lux, "Let's build 6 mutas right about now. I don't understand why progamers dont do this, but this is such powerful strategy." Yes, he created 6 Mutas with this sole purpose: to snipe all the newly made templars. This was unthinkable even for pros at that time. Once they switched to hydra lurk, no one thought of reusing the mutas(well... only for all-in). But ever since caster Um introduced this strat, every pro zerg on planet abused this strat, sniping templars because going in with mass hydra lurk army.
At this point, you're going to say 'see? Iccup ranking doesn't mean everything'. You're right. But unless you're korean, you still have to show me your ICCUP ranking. Otherwise, I'm not buying it.
You can have very good commentating, I do not know. But no matter what, unless you either have very high iccup ranking, or you are a korean, don't waste your time. No matter how good your commentating will be, unless backed up by iccup ranking, no one will be interested.
And yes, I consider Tastee as a pure-bred Korean.
All my posts, everyone hates it with a passion. lol... <3 FBH /activate Flameproofx2
Umm, arent half of theese commentators ex-progamers or ex-coaches? IIRC half of them were once progamers or involved with the pro scene at one point, thats where the game knowledge comes from.
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Kennigit
Canada19447 Posts
Not all of them are ex-progamers.
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Everyone underestimates the skill difference between the iccup ranks. The skill difference that gives one a more complete understanding of what they're seeing. I know this because when I was D, I thought I could imagine what D+ and C or B would feel like. I completely underestimated it. When I reached C-, I thought I could more clearly see what the higher ranks of C+ and B- would look like. Once again, I was entirely caught off guard by the tremendous depth of knowledge that was required to obtain those ranks. (As any race besides Protoss... ^^)
You just don't see it until you reach it, and you look down, and you see how far you've come. You think you can see the top, but the cliffs reveal a great distance more to go.
When your SCV is scouting the enemy base, it looks very simple to a lower rank player. But to reach higher ranks, you really have to learn how important that scout is. Sure, you can, by association and experience, explain to me that this SCV scout is very important, but you can't tell me, or any of your viewers, what specifically it is looking for. Counting pylons, probecuts, how many eggs does he use and when? You just don't know from a players perspective, how much this scout has seen, what value the information has, or how the Terran should or might adapt. Too many times have I seen english commentaries totally glaze over the really obvious things. A shuttle dropping DT's.
You're thinking (and commentating,) "How much damage will this drop do?!" Whereas the experienced ladder players clearly see the arb tech and are wondering how many scans he can waste for the Terran.
Or when Muta's are raping a Terran's natural, all the turrets are dead at the natural. The Terran moves his army out into the middle of the map. I was watching the Tasteless cast and even he missed the obvious answer. He thought it was just a bad decision on the Terran's part, but instead he was liberating his natural by proxy, by threatening something of more value to the Zerg. Zerg retreated, Terran replaced turrets in his natural, and though he lost his mnm's in the middle of the map, his natural was back up, and he took out 2 or 3 muts at the same time. Tasteless ended up realizing that and explaining it, whereas I'm certain a D level commentator would not have.
That's why game knowledge and ability are so important. I know that I will miss many important aspects that Artosis or Tasteless will be able to explain and articulate. Whereas, when I'm listening to the lower rank casts... I just have no confidence that any deep level thought is going into it. And though you can hear my examples and say "I woulda picked up on that," in reality, you don't. You're not bad commentators, you just don't have the skill and game knowledge to give any real deep insight.
The thing is. If you listen to Artosis and Chill commentaries, even introductory players can enjoy and understand a lot of what's being said. While at the same time, competitive players enjoy it immensely aswell. To be a truly good commentator, you have to be able to do both. Sure, for people who have never played SC, or people who just want a voice to listen to, those commentaries are fine. But in terms of professional commentating or dreams of making it big.. To give real, insightful commentary, you have to have experience behind that screen, defending that DT or Muta harass, and knowing everything that's going on in their heads.
I'm certain there's tons that goes over my head. That's why I love Artosis and Tasteless. I trust them to give me real insight because they've been there. Whereas, I've already been an ignorant observer who can see all the superficial developments of a pro SC game. I don't need to hear those thoughts again.
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I myself am not a very good SC player, no pretenses there, but more than anything the thing I enjoy most about watching sc is the drama, the competitiveness, and amazing skills of the players, and I think that if you want to appeal to a wider audience then those things should take precedence over, for example, certain technical aspects. I'm not saying that technical aspects are unimportant, but really the truth is I know I'll never be as good as any of the pros even if I was taught all the tricks and the exact build orders through the videos. It's the beauty of sc that keeps me coming back, and if a commentator can capture that then they're doing a fine job in my book.
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If you seriously want to learn strategy, don't watch commentary, watch a replay. It's impossible to cover every aspect of the game in a commentary. The limitations of commentaries are so clear, replays are better for learning strategies.
If you want entertainment, watch a commentary. 
Thought I'd just throw my thoughts out there
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EPT
