|
On May 12 2011 13:52 Zrana wrote:
You didn't mention NaDa or July as much as you should have. Both amazing at sc1 (capable of beating flash/JD at times iirc but not rocking SC2 as hard as you say they should)
Different game, different skills. Mechanics mean slightly less, strategy slightly more. Sure some is transferable, but this really seems like more of the same tired old BW was better whine.
You say that there are hundreds of players who could come in and dominate SC2 at any moment. Well why haven't they? There's nothing to stop them taking the GSL, TSL and NASL prize pools. More than enough incentive.
The answer is that SC2 is still being figured out, and it takes a different sort of player to excel at a young game than a game where the rules have already been written.
Also you imply that SC2 is invalid as a sport until we have some godllike figure like Flash. Was football invalid before Beckham, Formula 1 before Schumacher?
No, they were still fun to watch. (well i dont like football but lots do)
I was going to write something akin to this, but this poster summed up my thoughts pretty well.
I will elaborate a little on the differences between games. I never played BW and only watched it sparingly, but from the few facts I know about it (such as lack of rallying for SCVs) I can conclude that BW had way more mechanical tasks.
And this is where I begin to disagree with "BW is a harder therefore more legit game" argument. Will a human ever match AI's ability to instantly direct newly produced SCV's to mine? No. It's a very simple task for a program to execute, yet human brain is different. It excels at things computers have a much harder time with. Let's say I'm a programmer tasked with writing a part of the BW AI that directs newly made SCV's to mine -- boom done. It's a 5 min piece of code assuming I'm familiar with the code base. Now let's say I'm tasked with a piece of code responsible for some sort of AI strategy -- now this becomes interesting and infinitely harder.
My point in this is precisely why I find SC2 that much more appealing -- reduction in the amount of mechanical work that lets players focus on the creative part of the game.
The recent example from GSL is a perfect case for my argument. Let's look at July vs Anypro and Nestea vs Anypro. Comparing July and Nestea, the former seems to be mechanically faster, while the latter is "average" in micro yet his game breathes intelligence. July's play (pardon me, his fans) often looks very inflexible and downright dumb. To my amateur eye he just looks like a type of player who's much more likely to succeed in a game that requires speed and mechanical attention to detail (BW) than in a game that is more forgiving to players who lack in these areas (Nestea). If you watch Nestea play you won't be blown away by his impeccable micro and unhuman speed, but he's a very smart player who often does innovative stuff (the 3 offensive spine crawlers in game 1 vs Anypro as an example). Here's a guy that I can not see doing much in BW at all, again, because he is not outstanding in the mechanical parts of the game. But the fact that SC2 is more forgiving in these aspects lets his talents shine though.
So that is my counter argument for the 300 guys who can switch and dominate Sc2 any day now. As to Flash and JD, I haven't seen them and honestly have no idea what they would be capable of. I have watched the latest BW winner, Fantasy, and to the untrained eye of mine that doesn't appreciate the amount of effort it takes to manually rally scvs the games looked meh compared to top SC2 games. As a human, I appreciate the things human brain can excel at over the stuff it takes a programmer 5 mins to code.
|
I wish BW players would switch over so that this cult that surrounds the Korean game and BW scene in particular would be dispelled once and for all.
|
On May 13 2011 00:30 ak1knight wrote:Show nested quote +On May 13 2011 00:23 omegaslast wrote:
I am saying that there are 300 current pros and semi-pros that have the potential to come in and dominate SC2 at any moment, with a latency of a few months from the day they switch.
is to get a list of the salaries of the top 300 sc2 players. Anyone got that?  I have a feeling its not 70k-80k (or more) for more than 50 of the 300 players... which leads to why arent the other 250 jumping on the chance to make $450k a year in CRUSHING defeats? There's too much volatility right now where the most skilled players aren't winning every game. By measurement of skill, Idra should be winning pretty much every NA tourny, but he isn't. Players like MC and Inca can 4-gate to victory and MKP with his marines. SC2 is too much of a risk, even if they're making 50k$ a year.
ah so
I am saying that there are 300 current pros and semi-pros that have the potential to come in and dominate SC2 at any moment, with a latency of a few months from the day they switch.
is completely false? that was my point...
|
On May 13 2011 00:37 TheFrankOne wrote:
I am a little confused by the claims that MBS and automine make sc2 worse than bw from an esports/spectator perspective. Yes, BW macro is harder but I would just call the mechanics "clunky" not creating a better "skill cap". This claim is not made in the OP but is made by a lot of BW fans in the thread.
As a couple posters have pointed out from a spectator point of view these mechanical differences seem to add nothing to the game. I don't see how people can claim that because of the easier (smoother) mechanics of SC2 that there is less enjoyment in watching the game. When spectating I am interested in the army movements, map control, and battles that are going on. I dont care if a player has to hit 1 hotkey or 5 to select his 5 factories, nor would I expect the commentators to focus much on macro other than a few comments about how it is amazing, as it should be at the pro level.
Regardless of the skill cap difference, real or perceived, I just don't understand how mechanical differences influence some peoples enjoyment of the game as a spectator sport. Maybe they are talking about playing competitively rather than spectating, which is different, or have the OP's problem with the level of competition. Still, I just don't understand why players being able to focus less on mechanics ruins the competition in game or enjoyment from spectating the game. Would someone please explain this to me?
Well honestly this is a bit of a different debate but no of course MBS and auto-mining doesn't make the game less spectator friendly.
In the end BW is in my opinion more spectator friendly because you have a lot less deathballs (marginal effectiveness of adding more troops is alot lower because large armies are harder to control due to how units group, AI and limited control groups) so alot more harassy type of games and battles on multiple fronts.
Also good players control over their units is just a joy to watch rather than the occasional cool micro trick you see in SC2.
In the end though alot of the joy from watching BW comes from having experience with the game yourself and know just how stupidly hard many aspects of it are to execute.
|
On May 13 2011 00:49 Condor Hero wrote:Show nested quote +On May 13 2011 00:34 Legatus Lanius wrote:On May 13 2011 00:33 jacobmarlow wrote:
I do not like the condescending tone the OP takes when referring to SC2 players.
This is all speculation. July won his golden mouse when players like Flash Jaedong and Bisu were already in their prime.
Is he dominating Sc2? definitely not. People playing Sc2 are a lot more motivated than when they played SC1 becuase there are a lot more barriers to entry to SC1. Sc2 is much much more accessible at the competitive level.
Bottom line the main article has little to no actualy validity to it. It's purely based on logical flaws and assumptions. july won his golden mouse by bashing bad protoss players in ever 2008 lol Best wasnt bad lol he was dominating then but PvZ was his worst matchup by far, and thats because july never allowed him to macro. btw if sc2 nerds were watching the 2008 OSL there would be a billion nerd rage threads that makes MC vs WhiteRa look like a dignified fencing match
yeah you're right, best was (and still is i guess) a good player, but the point i was trying to make was that zvp was really the only matchup july could manage in 08 and he got blessed with an incredibly lucky draw, mainly playing mediocre pvz players. there have been some really hard final paths (jaedong playing the top 3 terrans on hard maps in bigfile for eg) and there have been some relatively easy ones (like julyzerg beating best, backho and therock in ever)
|
The poster is correct that there are tons of sc1 pros who would be better at sc2 than the top sc2 players in Korea now. Two thoughts though...
1) The Korean sc2 pro scene now is still above what the sc1 pro scene was when sc1 was only 10 months old before any expansions.
2) Yes I agree Flash Jaedong Bisu and Stork would pwn everyone at sc2 if they ever switched. As for the other top sc1 pros in Korea, there is no basis of comparison between them and the international former wc3 players who are dominating sc2 at the moment (Korea for sc2 seems to be becoming the minor leagues compared to TSL, NASL, Dreamhack, etc).
|
On May 13 2011 00:52 oneofthem wrote:
it's not insulting. just teaching younglings some respect and maybe encourage them to explore the BW scene that they know nothing of.
It's fun to watch pro BW but unrealistic to expect a lot of new players are going to pick up playing it. Sorry dudes the king is aging.
|
I have a question: Artosis mentioned on twitter that he disagreed with this article. I also saw he streamed today, did he talk about this on his stream? (sorry if this was already mentioned earlier in the thread :/ )
|
Decent article, though I was hoping you'd shed some light on how current BW pros would change the state of the game when they switch over, not how they would stomp over everyone. Also, you did mention that all the SC2 pros who've been successful did play BW but were bad regardless. But what about BW players who switched over and have been performing terribly. What about Ret and Tyler? They were way better than a player like Huk at BW, weren't they? So why's Huk the one in code S while Tyler has had absolutely no success in sc2?
|
I think the BW elitism is getting out of hand , SC2 is not a different game as it is a NEW game ,
as the OP stated the less the godly players that are the punching bag of Flash and Co can switch or stay for that matter i dont care , but you can bet your ass that the NEW BLOOD and the NEXT FLASH (altough i like the dong better) will rise in SC2 if not in this wave then the next , nothing can stop the train of progress .
so currently of course flash and co are unique and will demolish the sc2 scene , but the question is : will the next Flash will play SC2 or BW , i bet on SC2.
my first ever post after reading this forum for 2 years now 
|
On May 13 2011 00:50 jaydee81 wrote:
Ok I got this;
You like BW, a large part of the current SC2 community doesn't give a shit about your game and your heros, so you go and piss on some SC2 players.? Ok, did I miss something important?
Oh maybe I did. For some reason you don't talk about the players that have probably have a lot of fans around this site.
Jinro (as a 2 time GSL semi), Ret ant Tyler (as pretty successful BW foreigners). Oh, for some reason you didn't wanna shit on them? That's... surprising...
Cheers.
You can find what I really want to tell you on reddit, as I'd get banned for it around here.
User was not banned for this post!
Jinro and Ret were not even good enough at BW to be practice partners for the Koreans. Tyler was praised as Sangho as "he could be A-team if he tried" but he didn't.
You're pretty unaware/ignorant/dumb.
|
A few thoughts:
It's true that the entry of new players into the SC2 scene (new to SC2, that is) could completely change the nature of the competition. That would be true, however, even if there weren't a cadre of Brood War players who haven't made the switch.
Furthermore, if the primary motivating factor thus far for switching from BW to SC2 has been financial (a logical argument, I think, and also apparently backed up by some evidence), then it seems likely that the most successful BW players (both in terms of tournament performance and in terms of financial compensation) will remain the least likely to switch in the short term. Based on the OP's analysis of past switches, it would seem that the odds of a Flash or a Jaedong suddenly deciding to make the shift to SC2 would be rather low.
Finally, the ability of any actor to dominate a strategic environment is ultimately relative, due to the dynamic interactions between the various actors. In SC2, this strategic interaction takes place on both the level of gameplay and of metagame. One possible outcome of the emergence of new SC2 pros (either newly-minted or from BW) might be that these new actors dominate. Another possible outcome is that the emergence of new pros forces the existing bunch to step up their game. Given what we know now, I'm not sure how accurate our speculations can be at this point.
The only prediction I would be willing to get behind at this point is that SC2 is still going strong and growing: the best is yet to come.
|
So what you're basically saying is that Flash and JaeDong has something (I suspect it's raw talent, since everything else can be trained) that no one can fight against. It obviously isn't so. It's however quite ironic that while writing the biggest (and most one sided) SC2 rant in the history of the game, you discover the actual difference by chance.
What the South Korean SC1 model is meant to do is to bring forth the players with an iron will. You say it yourself, most people never rise to the top, most players never get to play Pro League. So what the system does, is to filter out anyone but the few very determined players who can set everything else aside. Granted talent and other skillsets have an implication on it, but that doesn't take anything away from the fact that a bigger part of the things you need to do to become a good SC1 player is to practice mechanisms. And that is highly trainable.
I don't even want to go into the discussion about comparing players with 100 games to players with 500 games. That's just too dumb.
|
On May 13 2011 00:54 Fleebenworth wrote:
I wish BW players would switch over so that this cult that surrounds the Korean game and BW scene in particular would be dispelled once and for all.
I wish the top BW players switched over too, and it would shut up the people willfully ignorant about it once and for all. Flash, Jaedong and Bisu would dominate the (comparatively whimsical) players that are currently considered good in SC2. However, I am more unsure about anyone beneath the level of those three, I doubt others would dominate to the same degree.
|
On May 13 2011 00:49 spinnaker wrote:Show nested quote +On May 12 2011 23:27 kardinal wrote:
All the starcraft 1 players will read this while nodding their heads and humming agreements that they were right all along, that starcraft 2 was, is and forever will be trash until it gets more of the starcraft 1 influence.
Starcraft 2 players will read this and be offended by the starcraft 1 elitist saying their game is trash, watching trashy players play trashy games and in effect make the viewers trash too.
When I first clicked on the link I thought I would get to read a well thought out interesting article but what a disappointing flame bait. Maybe the author intended it to sound less horribly biased and more neutral but if that's the case, he failed miserably.
There is a reason why there's a SC2 section and a SC1 section of the forum. quoted for truth. For my personal taste, it's way too much speculation. For example, people like Jaedong and Flash can draw from a pool of experience that covers easily more than a decade of intense playing. There is just no such thing for starcraft 2 to yet. There's still so much to explore and refine. Keeping that in mind, i think that these BW-Elites might dominate in SC2, but don't necessarly have to.
It seems that to the OP, there are only 2 types of people, SC1 players and SC2 players. What about the "majority" here on TL that supports both game (or at least doesn't "hate" the other game)?
|
On May 12 2011 13:52 Zrana wrote:
You didn't mention NaDa or July as much as you should have. Both amazing at sc1 (capable of beating flash/JD at times iirc but not rocking SC2 as hard as you say they should)
Different game, different skills. Mechanics mean slightly less, strategy slightly more. Sure some is transferable, but this really seems like more of the same tired old BW was better whine.
You say that there are hundreds of players who could come in and dominate SC2 at any moment. Well why haven't they? There's nothing to stop them taking the GSL, TSL and NASL prize pools. More than enough incentive.
The answer is that SC2 is still being figured out, and it takes a different sort of player to excel at a young game than a game where the rules have already been written.
Also you imply that SC2 is invalid as a sport until we have some godllike figure like Flash. Was football invalid before Beckham, Formula 1 before Schumacher?
No, they were still fun to watch. (well i dont like football but lots do)
ekhm
im not into football but it got me nonetheless, nothing against beckham though
|
intrigue is def my Mancrush TL writer! Awesome stuff dude!!
Anyway about the text, I agree BW scene (if they get to switch) will def come out and destroy most of those "code S" players we see now.
|
Korean sc2 is sort of like Japan for baseball; The top few players compete near the top level at the world scene (Ichiro, Matsui, etc), but overall the league does not have the number of top players that MLB in the US has. Korean sc2's top players, MC and I propose Bomber, can compete near or at the highest level in the world, but overall international tournaments have more players playing near the top level than GSL.
|
On May 13 2011 00:54 omegaslast wrote:Show nested quote +On May 13 2011 00:30 ak1knight wrote:On May 13 2011 00:23 omegaslast wrote:
I am saying that there are 300 current pros and semi-pros that have the potential to come in and dominate SC2 at any moment, with a latency of a few months from the day they switch.
is to get a list of the salaries of the top 300 sc2 players. Anyone got that? I have a feeling its not 70k-80k (or more) for more than 50 of the 300 players... which leads to why arent the other 250 jumping on the chance to make $450k a year in CRUSHING defeats? There's too much volatility right now where the most skilled players aren't winning every game. By measurement of skill, Idra should be winning pretty much every NA tourny, but he isn't. Players like MC and Inca can 4-gate to victory and MKP with his marines. SC2 is too much of a risk, even if they're making 50k$ a year. ah so Show nested quote +
I am saying that there are 300 current pros and semi-pros that have the potential to come in and dominate SC2 at any moment, with a latency of a few months from the day they switch.
is completely false? that was my point...
If BW progamers started to transition to SC2 on a large scale, then they'd actually have to compete against other really strong players, and as a result would be unable to dominate the scene.
That's why they're not riskying the salaries and stability BW offers.
|
I hope that JD, Bisu, Flash won't switch just to prove that the others guys are bad lol.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
