EPT[H][D] Can 'anyone' be Masters? - Page 12
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EtherealDeath
United States8366 Posts
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Powerstrike
50 Posts
ps. work on macro and multitasking - most important, micro is when you reach rly high level of play. | ||
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LF9
United States537 Posts
I like to say, there's a reason people say "good luck, have fun": because there IS an element of luck to the game, no matter how good you are, and after all, it's supposed to be for fun, since again, no matter how good you are, you aren't going to be pro forever and support yourself for life playing a game! | ||
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lorkac
United States2297 Posts
Only the top 2% can be Masters. Let's put it this way. If only 100 people play SC2--only two of them are Masters. Does everyone have the potential to be in the top 2%? Yes. Could this be done by improving/opponents deproving? Yes. But no matter your skill level, you still won't change the math. Only the top 2 of every 100 players get to be Masters. Let's put it another way. Are you only slightly worse than the top 80% of the total player base of your region? Then you're Platinum. | ||
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Bommes
Germany1226 Posts
On February 19 2012 02:23 lorkac wrote: Let's get to brass tacks. Only the top 2% can be Masters. Let's put it this way. If only 100 people play SC2--only two of them are Masters. Does everyone have the potential to be in the top 2%? Yes. Could this be done by improving/opponents deproving? Yes. But no matter your skill level, you still won't change the math. Only the top 2 of every 100 players get to be Masters. Let's put it another way. Are you only slightly worse than the top 80% of the total player base of your region? Then you're Platinum. I think thats a very underlooked point, you can also see this at ICCup in Broodwar, only the most dedicated people still played Broodwar so it was quite decent to be C-/C, even if it was not even near the Top 2% of ICCup. I think the Master league will get better over time, in 4-5 years from now it will actually be worth something  | ||
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K3Nyy
United States1961 Posts
APM isn't really about how fast you are, it's just how well you remember to do stuff. (at least APM without spam) When you get better and constantly macro and control your army, your APM will naturally increase. If there are people with a natural talent in RTS games, it should show further than masters league. It's possible to not play much and still get to masters. As long as they have a basic understanding of the game, they can maintain masters league quite easily. If you've been playing 3 hours a day since season 1 and have only reached plat, I think it's something fundamentally you're doing wrong. Try to understand why you're doing some things instead of just doing it. Don't practice without trying to improve in mind. If you still feel like you can't improve, just ask like a master player to obs a game or two or yours and tell you what you're doing wrong. | ||
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Monkeyballs25
531 Posts
On February 19 2012 02:59 K3Nyy wrote: APM isn't really about how fast you are, it's just how well you remember to do stuff. (at least APM without spam) When you get better and constantly macro and control your army, your APM will naturally increase. This isn't true. I often encounter situations, especially in the lategame, when I remember and know exactly what I need to do, I just can't execute it quickly enough. I laugh when people say "oh all you need is 60 APM". 60 apm is me playing on a great night Could I overcome this problem with enough practice? Possibly. But it'd require a *lot* of drilling and repetition, far more than the couple games a day some people here are suggesting. | ||
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NostalgiaTag
Canada508 Posts
But yeah I think some people have a better spacial control and are able to be better at these games than others.. i dont know if i would say that EVERYONE can be masters, but a large majority of people can become a m,asters player with dedication | ||
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Footler
United States560 Posts
I tried to outline a method that helped me in the spoiler below, obviously it's a lot easier said than done. + Show Spoiler + One thing that really helped me develop as an RTS player back in my BW days was to basically do this - find a few different solid, aggressive (but not all in) opening builds and begin trying to execute them as perfectly as possible. And it needs to be aggressive because this is going to push you to keep track of all the different aspects of the game even if it is just 1-2 bases. Eventually, you should start executing the builds pretty damn good - ie you are able to be effective with your opening army (not just attack moving) WHILE keeping up worker production, supply, tech/upgrades, chrono/mule/injects, expanding if your aggression permits, etc. As you improve and fight tougher opponents you should start getting a better feel for when you can safely take that 3rd/4th base and subsequently be able to manage that much more. Don't get in the mindset that you HAVE to play safe, macro games because this gets you comfortable just flipping between your bases and never really stretches your ability to manage multiple fronts. You need to develop this sort of game sense and multitask ability before you can really take advantage of the benefits the safe, macro builds provide. | ||
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Skyro
United States1823 Posts
On February 19 2012 02:59 K3Nyy wrote: 3 hours a day is enough to get you in GM. Even if age was somehow limited your APM and skill level, it would not affect anywhere near master's league. I think you're overthinking things, it's not that high a level. APM isn't really about how fast you are, it's just how well you remember to do stuff. (at least APM without spam) When you get better and constantly macro and control your army, your APM will naturally increase. If there are people with a natural talent in RTS games, it should show further than masters league. It's possible to not play much and still get to masters. As long as they have a basic understanding of the game, they can maintain masters league quite easily. If you've been playing 3 hours a day since season 1 and have only reached plat, I think it's something fundamentally you're doing wrong. Try to understand why you're doing some things instead of just doing it. Don't practice without trying to improve in mind. If you still feel like you can't improve, just ask like a master player to obs a game or two or yours and tell you what you're doing wrong. Yeah I feel like people liken APM to something people just naturally have and either you have it or you don't. APM is the product of doing something so often it is hardwired into your brain and thus minimizes your reaction time to perform actions in-game. For example if you only had 1 build and got to the point you performed it perfectly, I guarantee your APM will be significantly higher doing any other build you are not as familiar with. Although I do disagree with a lot of people in this thead saying grinding X amount of games is anywhere near an efficient way to improve. IMO once you get to the point where you are familiar with the build so you don't have to actively think about it anymore, if you want to improve further you have to consciously force yourself to multi-task above your current level, e.g. say previously you are only used to doing 1 action during the time you are waiting for a round of warp-ins to finish as protoss. As you attempt to improve, you should consciously force yourself to do 2 actions until it is comfortable for you to do so. It is similar to learning how to read faster, in that the trick is actually to just force yourself to read faster until it is comfortable. | ||
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Kajarn
United States126 Posts
However, I learned quickly, thankfully because the game was new, despite being a new player I was learning along with everyone else. Today, I believe Masters is MUCH harder, especially with Terran. As a certain Poll thread showed, Terran's learning curve becomes steepest at around the masters level. Now everyone always posts and says PLAY MORE, but I don't think people quite illustrate what that actually means. PLAY MORE, requires a certain mentality. With Terran, you should have your first 10 minutes nailed down to a T. Every building, supply depot, and army movement. As you are Platinum, I belive this is the first step. Next, do everything as fast as you can. make the 10 depot right when you have 100 minerals, get stim the second you have 100 gas, ect. Every second counts. Lastly, keybind/control group/camera save as much as possible. Be concious to how much you control group every game(should be alot). Get in the habit of using camera saves. The more you play the better aslong as you are making the concious effort to improve your mechanics. Here is a tip to try next time you play: Try constantly reminding yourself to build units out of a barracks as soon you press stim and get the chance. This way even while your attacking or being attacked youll remember to macro or multitask. | ||
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Fairwell
Austria195 Posts
On February 16 2012 11:01 Belial88 wrote: Just get out there and play dude. Masters really isn't high level at all, and even if it was, you are just holding yourself back by not playing. I guarentee you, you play 2,000 games, you'll easily be masters. While this can certainly help it's not necessary. I personally never ever played an RTS game before sc2. I had no clue that I need to make more than 8-9 probes a base, was floating like 1k minerals on one base etc when I started ... when I hit masters I had played like 300-400games in total (right now I still don't have the 750 win portrait for my race yet but I'm doing custom games vs clanmates now ... joined a clan when I reached masters for clanwars etc). I guess it comes down to the person how quickly you can manage to get decent game mechanics. If you are used to play computer games and spend a ton of time on your pc you won't have issues remembering hotkeys etc at all. If you never played any computer games I bet that you start of as quite a terrible player. For me the biggest thing I needed to learn in order to get into masters was what the hell I am supposed to do in those matchups and I learned that by watching some streams and reading TL. Btw terrantosaur, I'd be willing to help you out a bit for free. If you are interested pm me. I play masters on EU and NA servers. I did some free coaching already and I don't mind helping out. However there is one single thing I'm not willing to do which is repeating for about 100 times an hour that you need to make more workers and units (seems to be a common problem people have until low masters ...). :-) | ||
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Ainvar
United States68 Posts
On February 19 2012 04:18 Monkeyballs25 wrote: This isn't true. I often encounter situations, especially in the lategame, when I remember and know exactly what I need to do, I just can't execute it quickly enough. I laugh when people say "oh all you need is 60 APM". 60 apm is me playing on a great night Could I overcome this problem with enough practice? Possibly. But it'd require a *lot* of drilling and repetition, far more than the couple games a day some people here are suggesting. I'm right there with you. What you need is specific repetition of the things you're slow at. Think about piano players. They don't just play through pieces, they practice scales, etc. So the sc2 equivalent is practice marine splitting, or not getting supply blocked, or defending muta harass or whatever. Focus your practice and you will get fast at those things. | ||
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RoboBob
United States798 Posts
Also consider that there's a LOT fewer people playing SC2 today compared to a year ago. The people who are really good tend to continue playing; the people who suck tend to stop playing. Which is why Silver players today are much better than Silver players from a year ago. So even if you weren't improving in leagues, you'd still be improving in skill. Another important thing to remember is that TL is, by nature, a very elitist community. I would not be surprised if Masters players vastly outnumber Bronze players on this site. If you are a low league player who gets discouraged easily, then spending too much time on TL.net could actually make you feel like you are worse than you actually are. | ||
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zaradron
Canada15 Posts
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Belha
Italy2850 Posts
But despite what many say, you do not need a lot of "hand skill" just to be a master, you need to be smart and have a faster brain than higher apm. Helping some friends (i'm mid/top master in na) i find that their analysis of the game is pretty superficial, they usually can't see stuff that i find pretty obvious; and during the games that became much worse. That's why some players can be in masters with just some games of practice, they are just smarter and can understand deeper stuff ni much faster and better way. That's imo the big difference. | ||
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rOse_PedaL
Korea (South)450 Posts
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DemonDeacon
United States158 Posts
On February 17 2012 07:37 Bonneyi wrote: I heard that this also depends on the region , for example KR is tougher than NA and so on . I feel like just playing a lot is not helping me , i played 1500 games and im heading to diamond soon , im kindoff worried and feel like im doing something wrong , ust not sure what . less than 400 games and got into masters league : / might be a mechanics/gameplay issue | ||
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Hotshot_NA
Australia12 Posts
I had minimal RTS experience, playing a little bit of broodwar (off-line) and a little age of empires...i came into SC2 season 1 and qualified for bronze league 1v1.... i have a full time job (work 8-6pm monday to friday), travel overseas for about 3 months of the year (at seperate times where i dont have access to play the game) and was completeing my university degree up until last november..also play sport 4 times a week..basically what im saying is that i was able to play for an hour or so a day at BEST and a couple hours on the weekend here and there.... by watching pro-level games and getting some basic concepts down i was at diamond before the end of season 1. (i had played about 60 1v1 games total) i had much more fun playing team games so i gave up on 1v1 for about 3-4 seasons and got my masters 2v2, 3v3 and 4v4 (random team and actual team).... anyway this season i decided to push for that 1v1 masters icon and since season 6 launch i have gone 38 wins from 48 games on my NA account to reach rank 8 masters.. anyway, the point is...i, like you have a full time job and lots of outside work activities that take up most of my time...i barely have any time for SC2 (as much as i love it and would spend all my time on it)....however if you pratice the right things you will get to masters eventually.. oh and by the way..my APM would sit below 100 average... goodluck to you! | ||
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Dialogue
Singapore125 Posts
On February 18 2012 13:42 LF9 wrote: Honestly dedication is the most important thing. That, and not letting frustration/discouragement get in the way of playing as many games as your life will permit. And going on tilt because you lost a few in a row is also bad obviously. I would say the best way to improve is to not have the goal of getting promoted, but just having the goal of getting better. The best players are the ones who don't have to make themselves play. If you ever get so good you go pro, it can become a chore to actually "train" (practicing against a specific build order that is dominant in your matchup on a specific map that you have to play on 50 games in a row can get kind of frustrating) but otherwise just don't let losing, or even getting your ass kicked get you down. If you get your ass kicked, just tell yourself that the person has probably played 20x more games than you. Realize that if you had played 10,000 1v1 games of SC2 more than he had, you probably would have kicked his ass just as hard, if not harder. A good way to improve is to count the number of games you play, starting tomorrow or whenever. And every single subsequent day, make it your personal goal to play at least ONE MORE game than the previous day. If you keep doing this, you will eventually find out that you have more free time than you think, because you will start having to cut out a lot of time wasting and bullshitting on the internet that a lot of people do that cuts down significantly on their playtime. The main difference between the people in Grandmasters and the people posting on TL asking how to get promoted is that the GM players are playing instead of posting. Limit your browsing time to 30 minutes a day (google chrome even has a tool to let you do this) or whatever you know you do. A lot of people say they get ladder anxiety, I don't know what to tell you about that; why would you be afraid of losing, do you think people seriously judge you on your ladder rank, and your losses? You are anonymous on Battle.net unless you're a progamer using your main id, and there will always be room to grow and get ahead, so consider losing a good thing and let it motivate you. If you won every single game, you would start to get lazy and your play would slip. It happens when really good players are unable to get practice games vs equally good players, hence pros having teamhouses. Even MVP, MMA, DRG, etc. lose ladder games. No one wins all the time, this just isn't that kind of game. Just play, play, play, and have fucking fun. I like to say, there's a reason people say "good luck, have fun": because there IS an element of luck to the game, no matter how good you are, and after all, it's supposed to be for fun, since again, no matter how good you are, you aren't going to be pro forever and support yourself for life playing a game! You have changed my whole outlook on the game. Thanks for this. Awesome read. | ||
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