On March 14 2012 14:02 TheYango wrote: FFS I don't even know why people are arguing about the transferrable skillset. What I'm talking about had absolutely nothing to do with that.
My point is that Western progamers suck at practicing. To anyone who's watched any LoL progamer, this should be painfully obvious. To my knowledge, no Western ESports organization has replicated the successes and practice model of Chinese DotA or Korean Starcraft. The better practice environment is the *reason* that the level of competition in these countries has eventually outstripped their Western counterparts. So it doesn't matter how much of one's fundamentals from DotA transfer over to LoL--so long as progamers in Korea and China are better at improving, they will eventually surpass Western teams. It might take 2 years, it might take 5, but unless a Western LoL team really steps up, I believe it will happen.
This times and times and times again.
What most western progamers call "practice" is nothing more than playing a game. The practice routines and mindsets most of the western pros use are simply atrocious.
The real question for me is: Why is it so damn hard for western gamers to accept the same concepts that apply to every goddamn human trying to improve a certain task on this planet? - We're talking about stuff here that's common knowledge in basically every field I can think of - EXCEPT "professional gaming".
What Korean SC or Chinese DotA (from what I understand) does is nothing else than applying the same concepts behind training that work pretty damn well for humans since a few thousand years.
PS: I'm one of those people who believe that any "westerner" with the correct training+mindset will achieve just as much as any Korean or Chinese pro. People just tend to glorify their skill as something that they are unable to achieve due to some constraints in their DNA. -.-
Not to perpetuate cultural stereotypes but the western scene seems far to concerned with being a "troll" or a "bro" then actually learning to properly practice, I think it just comes from maturing later on then the rest of the world who knows but the fact is westerners rarely take anything as serious as they should and the ones that do usually shine above the rest.
I think Westerners have trouble conforming together to reach a common goal actually.
I am all for individualism and even go so far to practice an individualistic philosophy and apply it to my political beliefs, but I find it stupid when people try to be individualistic in a team game where the rules are specifically designed for people to work as 5 to destroy the Nexus.
To give an example, whenever I play with my friends, most of them demand top, mid, or AD Carry Bot and the only way they can have fun is if they perform well and have the spotlight. I was once supporting my friend who was playing Corki and me on Soraka. My buddy got a Penta Kill in one team fight at Baron and I screamed with joy and excitement whereas my other buddy who was on Katarina said the game was boring as hell.
The Katarina felt insignificant and I tried to tell him that he was just as important to the team as the Corki because even though Kat has less of an effect, we still needed her to win. I do not know why these guys have such a narcissistic mindset...it is disgusting.
On March 14 2012 14:24 overt wrote: And honestly I'm not convinced Eve isn't viable but I think no one wants to really spam games as her trying to get her to work somewhere.
This sums up the major problem with the current LoL pro scene. If Eve truly is just that god awful and unviable then fine, but nobody even attempts to 'practice' in the sense that 'we're going to lose this scrim, and probably every scrim tonight, and maybe this week, but by god we're going to actually learn shit in our losses instead of just going through the motions in wins.'
I remember watching team IM's SC2 stream during a practice session once, and in one game their coach actually played for the first 10 minutes, paused the game, then told MVP to sit down and play from the position he was left with(massively behind). Now perhaps this isn't as great of an example because it did seem like even coach was having some fun with it, but the idea that they weren't just practicing by 1v1ing eachother 'randomly,' and were actually trying to recreate events in game, or specific build orders and cheeses, is what's important.
I really wonder if the 2 CLG teams will figure out that they have the best opportunity to do this right now, as they can amicably ask eachother 'look, this has been wrecking us lately, so you guys play this against us in ever game until we figure it out please.' No other 'organization' has 2 teams that can practice against eachother in such a way, they would have to hope a rival team would give a shit to help someone else improve.
Even m5 queueing as 5 for 10 hours a day in prep for IEM isn't some pinnacle of productivity(although it's far better than soloQ with mixed in scrims), that should be something that reinforces your decision making and mechanics and whatnot that you have mastered through actual practice.
On March 14 2012 16:28 Shiragaku wrote: I think Westerners have trouble conforming together to reach a common goal actually.
I am all for individualism and even go so far to practice an individualistic philosophy and apply it to my political beliefs, but I find it stupid when people try to be individualistic in a team game where the rules are specifically designed for people to work as 5 to destroy the Nexus.
To give an example, whenever I play with my friends, most of them demand top, mid, or AD Carry Bot and the only way they can have fun is if they perform well and have the spotlight. I was once supporting my friend who was playing Corki and me on Soraka. My buddy got a Penta Kill in one team fight at Baron and I screamed with joy and excitement whereas my other buddy who was on Katarina said the game was boring as hell.
The Katarina felt insignificant and I tried to tell him that he was just as important to the team as the Corki because even though Kat has less of an effect, we still needed her to win. I do not know why these guys have such a narcissistic mindset...it is disgusting.
That's part of the mindset I was talking about. Yango linked me some translated VODs of a chinese DotA guy (2009) who went on to manage/coach a team after he quit his career as a player.
What just astonished me there was his attitude towards the goal of the game and the goal of them as a team. It starts with him emphasizing how different competitive play is from pubs because you are no longer one person but part of a team that has to work together. There was one moment in that specific game he was commentating (a pretty damn big final) where their main carry lost an important part of his radiance due to failing with the courier which really made the mindset shine.
To put it into LoL perspective, imagine you're ahead and your AD carry can buy his IE at 16 minutes... and the item gets destroyed by the enemy team because your AD carry misclicked. In every single one of the LoL "professional teams" this would lead to 40 minutes of yelling and bitching just to lose the game over it. So, how did he describe the situation in retrospect?
"Honestly speaking if the Sacred Relic wasn't lost the situation wouldn't have been drawn out like this. But since it was delayed, what could we have done? Could you blame your teammate? No, we couldn't because we took an airplane to Malaysia together."
Where your typical (unprofessional) progamer would bitch and yell in such a situation someone with a professional attitude simply accepts the facts as facts and has to work around them. I see a lot of people focus on things beyond their control and waste energy that way. That's an attitude that would get them kicked out of most professional sports or workplaces in the long run.
Edit @red_: M5 is another great example. Their training habits are FAR from perfect. Hell, I'd say they aren't even good. It's just they are WAY AHEAD of everyone else which lets them perform like this. People should look at the context, not only at the results.
I have high hopes for CLG.eu in that regard, since they seem to be the only team that actually tries to understand why they lost, etc, and not just clash all the egos they can find against each other to determine who has The Biggest.
M5 is dominant right now, because while they may "only" queue 5's the whole day, that's way more than any other team does.
On March 14 2012 14:02 TheYango wrote: FFS I don't even know why people are arguing about the transferrable skillset. What I'm talking about had absolutely nothing to do with that.
My point is that Western progamers suck at practicing. To anyone who's watched any LoL progamer, this should be painfully obvious. To my knowledge, no Western ESports organization has replicated the successes and practice model of Chinese DotA or Korean Starcraft. The better practice environment is the *reason* that the level of competition in these countries has eventually outstripped their Western counterparts. So it doesn't matter how much of one's fundamentals from DotA transfer over to LoL--so long as progamers in Korea and China are better at improving, they will eventually surpass Western teams. It might take 2 years, it might take 5, but unless a Western LoL team really steps up, I believe it will happen.
This times and times and times again.
What most western progamers call "practice" is nothing more than playing a game. The practice routines and mindsets most of the western pros use are simply atrocious.
The real question for me is: Why is it so damn hard for western gamers to accept the same concepts that apply to every goddamn human trying to improve a certain task on this planet? - We're talking about stuff here that's common knowledge in basically every field I can think of - EXCEPT "professional gaming".
What Korean SC or Chinese DotA (from what I understand) does is nothing else than applying the same concepts behind training that work pretty damn well for humans since a few thousand years.
PS: I'm one of those people who believe that any "westerner" with the correct training+mindset will achieve just as much as any Korean or Chinese pro. People just tend to glorify their skill as something that they are unable to achieve due to some constraints in their DNA. -.-
They never have the right mindset because they are raised to be lazy and feel entitled to everything.
Look at players like hotshotgg who can't even assemble a simple ikea couch. Yet thinks he is the best player in LoL, when he is actually quite garbage, and a liability to his team.
User was warned for this post
Still riding on the HSGG hate since the LR thread from IEM?
On another note, I just feel that current teams aren't exploring enough with powercurves on champions. Like (relative items/damage output vs amount of gold), Often people will generalize it about "mid game" or "late midgame", and what not, but that doesn't really mathamatically worked out. I also feel people don't really work out good team comps, because the laning phase is so fragile, in that a single loss in a lanephase can destroy a certain type of team comp. I think that's why CLG does decent with their playstyle, because their focus on farm, and passivity, almost garuntee's their team comp goes into lategame.
to be honest, CLG.us did a great job in IEM. Throws happen, and I don't think anyone can say that "m5 thrashed clg".
I think the CLGus vs CLGeu scrims helped both teams a lot, and I think CLG's 3rd place finish showed that. Clg dominated groupstage fairly hard, only dropping one game.
The problematic team setup is something like TSM, in which they LIVE IN A TEAM HOUSE, and they fail so fucking hard. So unnacceptable, it's embarassing.
On March 14 2012 16:27 Shiragaku wrote: What bugs me especially is how self centered many players are. They not only demand to play a certain role, but a certain character even though it will not benefit the team. They will say over and over again that LoL is a team sport when criticizing their team, but they in reality are the ones that ultimately fail at it.
Well, some players just aren't good with certain champions, no matter how much it'll benefit their team comps. Do you really want TRM on irelia, despite maybe being best pick for team comp?
On March 14 2012 17:48 wei2coolman wrote: to be honest, CLG.us did a great job in IEM. Throws happen, and I don't think anyone can say that "m5 thrashed clg".
I think the CLGus vs CLGeu scrims helped both teams a lot, and I think CLG's 3rd place finish showed that. Clg dominated groupstage fairly hard, only dropping one game.
The problematic team setup is something like TSM, in which they LIVE IN A TEAM HOUSE, and they fail so fucking hard. So unnacceptable, it's embarassing.
On March 14 2012 16:27 Shiragaku wrote: What bugs me especially is how self centered many players are. They not only demand to play a certain role, but a certain character even though it will not benefit the team. They will say over and over again that LoL is a team sport when criticizing their team, but they in reality are the ones that ultimately fail at it.
Well, some players just aren't good with certain champions, no matter how much it'll benefit their team comps. Do you really want TRM on irelia, despite maybe being best pick for team comp?
Oh yes, I am completely aware that some people are not good with certain champions but I know these guys well enough to know what they are good with and what they are bad with, but seriously, picking Shaco when we are building for a late game comp? It reminds me of those guys in ranked who can only play one champion.
For example, we needed a tanky solo top because our jungler was Shaco and so the person picks Kennen because he apparently does not know what else to pick. I do not care how good you are with a certain character, it will ultimately hurt us against a team comp where people are decent with their roles, but perfect team comp.
TSM needs a coach. Or at least an adult/figurehead who can keep them in check so they take the whole teamhouse concept properly. You don't need a hardass per say but at least someone who can make sure they are improving together and not just screwing around in solo que all day/spending skrims blaming each other.
How CLG.NA manages to do it as well as they do makes me wonder what would happen if they actually didn't argue with each other half the time.
clg.eu setting the example of how to have fun and still be serious(for the most part) in games together.
Also I think Westerners are justifiably putting in less hardcore practice because they focus on making money from their streams/sites, which is actually pretty fucking genius.
On March 14 2012 18:13 Parnage wrote: TSM needs a coach. Or at least an adult/figurehead who can keep them in check so they take the whole teamhouse concept properly. You don't need a hardass per say but at least someone who can make sure they are improving together and not just screwing around in solo que all day/spending skrims blaming each other.
How CLG.NA manages to do it as well as they do makes me wonder what would happen if they actually didn't argue with each other half the time.
clg.eu setting the example of how to have fun and still be serious(for the most part) in games together.
Maybe CLG.NA's plan of shitting all over doublelift, just works for them? Sure it doesn't seem as productive, but maybe that's their style, and it makes for amazing stream watching.
On March 14 2012 17:36 r.Evo wrote: What just astonished me there was his attitude towards the goal of the game and the goal of them as a team. It starts with him emphasizing how different competitive play is from pubs because you are no longer one person but part of a team that has to work together. There was one moment in that specific game he was commentating (a pretty damn big final) where their main carry lost an important part of his radiance due to failing with the courier which really made the mindset shine.
To put it into LoL perspective, imagine you're ahead and your AD carry can buy his IE at 16 minutes... and the item gets destroyed by the enemy team because your AD carry misclicked. In every single one of the LoL "professional teams" this would lead to 40 minutes of yelling and bitching just to lose the game over it. So, how did he describe the situation in retrospect?
"Honestly speaking if the Sacred Relic wasn't lost the situation wouldn't have been drawn out like this. But since it was delayed, what could we have done? Could you blame your teammate? No, we couldn't because we took an airplane to Malaysia together."
Where your typical (unprofessional) progamer would bitch and yell in such a situation someone with a professional attitude simply accepts the facts as facts and has to work around them. I see a lot of people focus on things beyond their control and waste energy that way. That's an attitude that would get them kicked out of most professional sports or workplaces in the long run.
I watched that game live and it was possibly the most impressive thing I've ever seen.
ZSMJ farmed a Sacred Relic(costs 3800 gold so pretty damn much) in like 20min and bought it at the secret shop, but then the courier got killed and the sacred relic got destroyed. So yeah, what would most people do? Give up? Change their gameplan?
ZSMJ was like oh np, went back to farming, he even ganked a bit, and then got a second Sacred Relic at 27 minutes and then finished the Radiance soon after and went on to carry his team to a victory.
And indeed if that happened in like TSM they'd have probably ragequit in the spot, it's just amazing a player can just immediately adapt and go with it and in the end still carry
On March 14 2012 18:13 Parnage wrote: TSM needs a coach. Or at least an adult/figurehead who can keep them in check so they take the whole teamhouse concept properly. You don't need a hardass per say but at least someone who can make sure they are improving together and not just screwing around in solo que all day/spending skrims blaming each other.
How CLG.NA manages to do it as well as they do makes me wonder what would happen if they actually didn't argue with each other half the time.
clg.eu setting the example of how to have fun and still be serious(for the most part) in games together.
Maybe CLG.NA's plan of shitting all over doublelift, just works for them? Sure it doesn't seem as productive, but maybe that's their style, and it makes for amazing stream watching.
Could you please stop idolizing CLG and trying to put every.single.move they make into a good light? It's fine having a hard-on for a team, but trying to argue that undermining and shittalking a certain player is a good thing in ANY imaginable scenario is just meh.
Also, but that's just an opinion, if people enjoy one person getting yelled at by their so called teammates and friends, might aswell go watch Jersey Shore.
On March 14 2012 18:13 Parnage wrote: TSM needs a coach. Or at least an adult/figurehead who can keep them in check so they take the whole teamhouse concept properly. You don't need a hardass per say but at least someone who can make sure they are improving together and not just screwing around in solo que all day/spending skrims blaming each other.
How CLG.NA manages to do it as well as they do makes me wonder what would happen if they actually didn't argue with each other half the time.
clg.eu setting the example of how to have fun and still be serious(for the most part) in games together.
Maybe CLG.NA's plan of shitting all over doublelift, just works for them? Sure it doesn't seem as productive, but maybe that's their style, and it makes for amazing stream watching.
Could you please stop idolizing CLG and trying to put every.single.move they make into a good light? It's fine having a hard-on for a team, but trying to argue that undermining and shittalking a certain player is a good thing in ANY imaginable scenario is just meh.
Also, but that's just an opinion, if people enjoy one person getting yelled at by their so called teammates and friends, might aswell go watch Jersey Shore.
Actually if someone doesn't listen when trying to explain things to him properly shittalking them very well might help. Seeing as it's doublelift he's probs too dumb to understand normal critisicm.
Can I point out that TSM =/= the NA scene. Or the western scene. In terms of team disfunction and bad practice habits they're an outlier.
Curse and Goose practice well. Epik practices well when they actually practice. Dignitas practices extremely well - better than anyone else except M5 (which is why they took #1 and #2 at IEM, really). Honestly CLG.na has been practicing decently - especially since the shit between doublelift and HSGG kinda stopped since DL managed to never lose his temper (which is absolutely amazing). Yeah, they pretty much all could practice better (except dignitas of course).
But European teams don't practice better than NA teams. There's this mystique about euro teams that somehow developed - even before Moscow 5 came along, when European teams were losing to NA teams pretty much every tournament. But they're just as likely to troll and practice badly and shit-talk in Europe as in NA. People see TSM, who're in this completely garbage place as a team, and extrapolate to all NA - but again, they're an outlier.
EPT
