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On March 04 2013 17:11 FireMonkey wrote:
Okay so to new players it helps, we've established that. What about experienced players so say platinum players
I have coached my friends from gold/plat to diamond/masters in ~6 month time. They put in a lot of work on their own, but we would do lessons almost every day. The real question you have to ask, would they have reached that level of play without coaching? If you asked them they would say probably not. Or at least not in that short of a time frame.
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On March 13 2013 07:29 Donger wrote:Show nested quote +On March 04 2013 17:11 FireMonkey wrote:
Okay so to new players it helps, we've established that. What about experienced players so say platinum players I have coached my friends from gold/plat to diamond/masters in ~6 month time. They put in a lot of work on their own, but we would do lessons almost every day. The real question you have to ask, would they have reached that level of play without coaching? If you asked them they would say probably not. Or at least not in that short of a time frame.
6 month isnt short at all, especially with daily lessons. 3 month to master league (doesnt matter where to start, even bronze) with one lesson per week is easily doable. I posted an example earlier.
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On March 13 2013 05:27 JustAGame wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2013 03:46 SC2John wrote:On March 13 2013 03:23 Emporium wrote:
I still think people are looking at this incorrectly.
The guitar analogy is good in some ways, but still misses the point, completely.
1 lesson won't make you a god at the game, or even good, it might make you improve 1 specific outlook on it, but realistically it may not even do that.( as people have said is similar with guitar lessons)
But, and this is where the point is missed completely between the 2 comparisons, you can't and don't have to 'beat' the guitar.
The guitar won't react to what you are doing, and try and throw you off.
But even aside from all that the other reason the guitar comparison isn't good, is that say you get to a really high level with the guitar, does that suddenly mean you can win compeitions ? No of course it doesn't because it is only 1 part of being good at it, there are other things then that will need to be improved, mental and phsycial improvements, that will enhance your skill level that you have gained from practicing the guitar.
This is the same for sc2, and most games, you will improve in a bubble and get to GM, does this mean you can now start to win tournaments, no ofcourse it doesn't, you MAY be able to if inherently you can keep calm under pressure, but alot of people need to coach themselves at this, or phsically can't last the full X amount of days a tournament is under the stress. Both of these things can be improved by coaching.
....do you play an instrument? i thought the EXACT same thing... music instruments are pretty much the same as sc2 .. you have mechanical skills, you have knowledge and experience.. you have buildorders ( called songs) that require you to hit the right button/string at the right timing and you got improvising with the rest of your band, which requires you to react and listen to the song. It requires a pretty euqal skill set. The only difference i can see, here is that music goes to your ear and playing sc2 goes to your eyes.
I haven't played the guitar for ages, but yeah i used to play.
All the above you state, is just fundamentals if you were to enter a competition the above skills would be a given, but what they would be marking you on is your expression of the music, your ability to handle the pressure and your execution under such pressure.
Which is why the sc2 and this differ, becuase up until now then yeah they are similar, you may do as you have said, (the above) to get better, but to be truly great at a game, is the ability to ingame, get in your opponents head and win there, it will have nothing to do with with your execution of a build or how well you macro, or learn a BO, but how well you can undermine your opponent, befroe the game has even started, as the rest of the skills in your arsenal, should be a given at this level.
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On March 13 2013 17:01 Emporium wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2013 05:27 JustAGame wrote:On March 13 2013 03:46 SC2John wrote:On March 13 2013 03:23 Emporium wrote:
I still think people are looking at this incorrectly.
The guitar analogy is good in some ways, but still misses the point, completely.
1 lesson won't make you a god at the game, or even good, it might make you improve 1 specific outlook on it, but realistically it may not even do that.( as people have said is similar with guitar lessons)
But, and this is where the point is missed completely between the 2 comparisons, you can't and don't have to 'beat' the guitar.
The guitar won't react to what you are doing, and try and throw you off.
But even aside from all that the other reason the guitar comparison isn't good, is that say you get to a really high level with the guitar, does that suddenly mean you can win compeitions ? No of course it doesn't because it is only 1 part of being good at it, there are other things then that will need to be improved, mental and phsycial improvements, that will enhance your skill level that you have gained from practicing the guitar.
This is the same for sc2, and most games, you will improve in a bubble and get to GM, does this mean you can now start to win tournaments, no ofcourse it doesn't, you MAY be able to if inherently you can keep calm under pressure, but alot of people need to coach themselves at this, or phsically can't last the full X amount of days a tournament is under the stress. Both of these things can be improved by coaching.
....do you play an instrument? i thought the EXACT same thing... music instruments are pretty much the same as sc2 .. you have mechanical skills, you have knowledge and experience.. you have buildorders ( called songs) that require you to hit the right button/string at the right timing and you got improvising with the rest of your band, which requires you to react and listen to the song. It requires a pretty euqal skill set. The only difference i can see, here is that music goes to your ear and playing sc2 goes to your eyes. I haven't played the guitar for ages, but yeah i used to play. All the above you state, is just fundamentals if you were to enter a competition the above skills would be a given, but what they would be marking you on is your expression of the music, your ability to handle the pressure and your execution under such pressure. Which is why the sc2 and this differ, becuase up until now then yeah they are similar, you may do as you have said, (the above) to get better, but to be truly great at a game, is the ability to ingame, get in your opponents head and win there, it will have nothing to do with with your execution of a build or how well you macro, or learn a BO, but how well you can undermine your opponent, befroe the game has even started, as the rest of the skills in your arsenal, should be a given at this level.
So you basically say: (correct me if i am wrong)
sc2: basic skills that can be learned/coached at first
pressure / talent after
music: basic skills that can be learned/coached at first
pressure (concert) / talent after
For me this sounds quite similiar. You cannot coach a musician to become really good, but thats the same everywhere. You can only coach the skill set and guide the people to get solid understanding / mechanical skills.
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Yeah BASICALLY i say that.
But I am assuming you can look deeper than that, and see that, as a musician, the guitar isn't suddenly going to gain an extra string, or change it's shape or do any numerous other things that can throw you off, when you are under alot of pressure on a stage, with people watching.
But and this is why the analogy breaks down, in games it does, and you can coach people to better handle situations of pressure where unusal things happen, because you are playing against somebody else.
So and this is BASICALLY what I am saying, no matter how hard you train at SC2 there IS going to be unexpected things happening all the time ingame, whereas when you go on stage, you know that all the important constants will be the same, you the guitar and your practice, suddenly don't disappear, SC2 has another level, in as much that on top of all that, you also have to mentally battle with your opponent.
So BASICALLY your right, inasmuch you can see the woods for the trees.
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On March 13 2013 18:33 Emporium wrote:
Yeah BASICALLY i say that.
But I am assuming you can look deeper than that, and see that, as a musician, the guitar isn't suddenly going to gain an extra string, or change it's shape or do any numerous other things that can throw you off, when you are under alot of pressure on a stage, with people watching.
But and this is why the analogy breaks down, in games it does, and you can coach people to better handle situations of pressure where unusal things happen, because you are playing against somebody else.
So and this is BASICALLY what I am saying, no matter how hard you train at SC2 there IS going to be unexpected things happening all the time ingame, whereas when you go on stage, you know that all the important constants will be the same, you the guitar and your practice, suddenly don't disappear, SC2 has another level, in as much that on top of all that, you also have to mentally battle with your opponent.
So BASICALLY your right, inasmuch you can see the woods for the trees.
I don't necessarily believe that each concert will be the same without hardships. Oftentimes instruments might become damaged (strings breaking, tuning problems) and even interaction with audiences are radically different who sometimes may actually have members that "throw you off."
On the note of coaching, it is good to receive advice from someone who acts as a third eye because that is the only way for a person to understand what they are overlooking in their own game analyses. Furthermore gaps in knowledge and reasoning can also be filled through a coach. People also vary greatly in their learning techniques, some may be better learners through independent study (replays) or by watching streamers while others may learn better through discussion and coaching. As others have noted, however, coaching is bad if one is simply dictating a build because this limits the creativity and personal thinking of the actual player.
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One time, when I was noober, I had some guy coach me who was streaming online. I gave him 20 bucks for an hour and he was happy to help. I don't know who that kid was but now I realize he was not a pro and only masters. He pointed out a few things I was doing wrong. Can't remember what they were.
Now I realize playing alone a 1v1 against AI and repeating a build many times over is 1,000 times more effective in improving mechanics, macro and overall game play. The only downside is the realization that after hours of build repetition, it's still imperfect and requiring a lot of work. Still, that guy owes me my 20 bucks back cause he totally took advantage of a silver leaguer.
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It could definately help in my opinion, but your coach must be kind of close to you, know you, your situation, or can help you with issues you have in matchups. I saw the light when one of my team members pointed something out in PvZ. Not sure if you can classify that as coaching. I think you need to do it regularly, with the same person though.
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On March 13 2013 09:23 JustAGame wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2013 07:29 Donger wrote:On March 04 2013 17:11 FireMonkey wrote:
Okay so to new players it helps, we've established that. What about experienced players so say platinum players I have coached my friends from gold/plat to diamond/masters in ~6 month time. They put in a lot of work on their own, but we would do lessons almost every day. The real question you have to ask, would they have reached that level of play without coaching? If you asked them they would say probably not. Or at least not in that short of a time frame. 6 month isnt short at all, especially with daily lessons. 3 month to master league (doesnt matter where to start, even bronze) with one lesson per week is easily doable. I posted an example earlier.
I would be interested to see how 12 lessons could get someone to Master's league from Bronze.
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My team offers free coaching from time to time, gotten some good comments on it. As much as it helps to have someone tell you probes and pylons I think the real benefit is sitting down and discussing one aspect of a match up. I have watched a number of coaches who will get a bit too diverse, but If you sit and say, "I have trouble with roaches, at time X:XX in the game," there is much more value. To the starting player it isn't worth it much at all, too much they still need to learn.
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On March 04 2013 16:15 FireMonkey wrote:
i dont know if this should go in strat or general. but does 'coaching' actually help a player? as far as i know the pro player will just tell you to build probes and give build orders you should do which you can just look up on youtube and liquidpedia for free anyways. ive never had it nor do i intend on having it so maybe someone who has can confirm.
I saw a post on sc2 forums about it and someone said that he pictures a babysitter figure reading a newspaper and just saying every 17 seconds 'build probe'
have you improved after this? how so? how is it any differant from having a friend teaching you how to play? how does it differ your play from looking up a build/playstyle? what progress thus far have you made because of it?
discuss
So do you think professional athletes don't need coaches? They're already experienced, right? So what more could they possibly gain from having a MORE EXPERIENCED person talk to them about their game?
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This thread only reinforces my idea that some people are beyond help.
Coaching only works when you're truly dedicated to what you're doing and very receptive to what you're being told. You also need to have a certain amount of "talent" to improve past a certain level.
I don't know how many times I've seen streamed lessons where the student is just an idiot who won't shut up and listen to what they're being told, or when the student is just so utterly terrible that they can't even perform the simple tasks they're being told to perform in a timely enough manner. I've personally spent about 3 hours altogether coaching a friend of mine from bronze up to gold league. I've also experienced coaching someone with brain damage (not a joke - car accident victim who had to relearn how to walk) and while his improvement was noticeable it was so frustrating that I had to stop. I spent 2 hours coaching another friend who was in gold and by the next day he was in plat after putting in 20 games.
I don't consider any of the success or failure I have experienced to be proof that coaching "works" per se, but I consider the confidence that coaching gives to inspire people with the right mindset to be better.
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On March 14 2013 02:26 Donger wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2013 09:23 JustAGame wrote:On March 13 2013 07:29 Donger wrote:On March 04 2013 17:11 FireMonkey wrote:
Okay so to new players it helps, we've established that. What about experienced players so say platinum players I have coached my friends from gold/plat to diamond/masters in ~6 month time. They put in a lot of work on their own, but we would do lessons almost every day. The real question you have to ask, would they have reached that level of play without coaching? If you asked them they would say probably not. Or at least not in that short of a time frame. 6 month isnt short at all, especially with daily lessons. 3 month to master league (doesnt matter where to start, even bronze) with one lesson per week is easily doable. I posted an example earlier. I would be interested to see how 12 lessons could get someone to Master's league from Bronze.
Once upon a time there was a build called the "4-gate".
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On March 14 2013 02:26 Donger wrote:Show nested quote +On March 13 2013 09:23 JustAGame wrote:On March 13 2013 07:29 Donger wrote:On March 04 2013 17:11 FireMonkey wrote:
Okay so to new players it helps, we've established that. What about experienced players so say platinum players I have coached my friends from gold/plat to diamond/masters in ~6 month time. They put in a lot of work on their own, but we would do lessons almost every day. The real question you have to ask, would they have reached that level of play without coaching? If you asked them they would say probably not. Or at least not in that short of a time frame. 6 month isnt short at all, especially with daily lessons. 3 month to master league (doesnt matter where to start, even bronze) with one lesson per week is easily doable. I posted an example earlier. I would be interested to see how 12 lessons could get someone to Master's league from Bronze.
The starting league doesnt actually matter. The trick is to not teach someone 1000 different game situations which needs hundreds of lessons, but to teach the concept behind it, to allow them to understand the game, which needs only a few lessons. After that the player can easily understand the game on his own.
This is what you see in many places in real life as well. Once again i want to point out my experience with music lessons:
My first teacher just gave me one song to play, it took me a few lessons to play it. After that we did the second song etc...
A year after i was able to play a few songs... but thats it.
My new guitar teacher gave me the scales and the theory behind it. Now i can play those songs right from the paper.. and i am not limited to a few, but i can actually play everything i want, or even write my own songs (even though those are kinda crappy:D)
Feel free to pm me for testing it out on your own.
*Edit*
On March 14 2013 02:57 dUTtrOACh wrote:
Coaching only works when you're truly dedicated to what you're doing and very receptive to what you're being told. You also need to have a certain amount of "talent" to improve past a certain level.
I needed to quote this because its the most important thing ever. So many people think coaching makes you better.. this is wrong.. it just helps you to practice more effiently.. if you do not practice.. no coaching on earth will make you a better player.
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Perception that coaching alone will make you better is likely false. In the same way as taking private lessons for music, the real improvement does not occur during the coaching session. Your instructor simply shows you techniques and narrows your focus on things to work on in practice.
Ultimately it comes down to the user's willingness to put time and effort into practicing those techniques that will produce results.
Even the highest level players would benefit from sharing ideas with another, obviously not for basics or mechanics but for expanding your style, just the same as musicians do.
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If you are diamond and lower don't get coaching from pros. A high master player will help you just as much for free or almost free. Idk why bronze players pay ridiculous prices for things anyone can teach them. If ur masters getting coaching from pros can be worth it but you have to have specific things you want to improve not just general macro which you can practice on your own
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I didn't feel like coaching helped me a lot. A little, yes, but not much. I can spot most of my crucial mistakes alone, it's often more a matter of just forgetting or bad mechanics. I wouldn't recommend paying for it (neither did I). However, what I do feel was incredibly helpful is playing many games in a row against the same race. It's much better than playing ladder, you can really concentrate on a one matchup.
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On March 14 2013 12:33 1v1Alpha wrote:
If you are diamond and lower don't get coaching from pros. A high master player will help you just as much for free or almost free. Idk why bronze players pay ridiculous prices for things anyone can teach them. If ur masters getting coaching from pros can be worth it but you have to have specific things you want to improve not just general macro which you can practice on your own
This just isn't true.
I don't know what you think 'general macro' is, but macro never happens in a vacuum. There is always an opponent in the game, changing variables all the time. A coach can help greatly with macro just like anything else.
Also, like my previous post suggested, coaching is a separate skill. You don't just say, "Hey, Dennis Rodman is a great basketball player, let's make him coach our youth team." It doesn't work that way.
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On March 14 2013 13:52 Dwayn wrote:
I didn't feel like coaching helped me a lot. A little, yes, but not much. I can spot most of my crucial mistakes alone, it's often more a matter of just forgetting or bad mechanics. I wouldn't recommend paying for it (neither did I). However, what I do feel was incredibly helpful is playing many games in a row against the same race. It's much better than playing ladder, you can really concentrate on a one matchup.
Have you considered you got a bad coach?
The main points from my experience
Everyone improves. Plat-diamond improve significantly.
The best amount of time to buy is 3 hours (one for each mu)
YOU MUST PRACTICE WHAT IS TAUGHT OR IT WAS POINTLESS ( probably the most irritating. I'll have people message me a few days later with a replay only to see they aren't following the build I gave them at all. Builds are a huge deal. Or I'll have people argue with me insisting their way is better...equally irritating)
No you wont go from silver to gm after one lesson
No coaching is not required to improve, it however is a shortcut to improving faster. Yes you can figure it out on your own.
Coaching will help your Macro/micro/mechanics
To people who say it doesn't help, well you are wrong. I have wayyyy to many testimonials from people messaging me days after a lesson telling me how much it helped.
If you didn't learn a lot from coaching you either had a bad coach or you weren't listening
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I got coaching from Axlslav about a year and a half ago and is did help me a lot.
I was very specific with what I wanted help with, which was PvP and proper responses when opening with an Eco blink build.
In 2hrs it went from a helpless matchup to being one of my favorites. He did help me understand the finer nuances of the game so for me it was money well spent.
I think it comes down to what your expectations are. To just improve your over all game there is only one way, play the game.. A lot. For help with specific issues I really do think it helps.
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EPT
