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Mechanics = The utilization of the keyboard, mouse and user interface to execute actions in the quickest and most efficient way.
The Korean Gap = "Korean's own white dudes" -Moon at IEM
The Korean Gap
Effective Actions per minute = a value that can evaluate mechanical skill
![[image loading]](http://wordpress.tools.majorleaguegaming.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/players.jpg)
Sc2 Gears Replay Analysis from IEM world championship, MLG winter arena, Assembly winter, EU Bnet invitational
![[image loading]](http://s18.postimage.org/w8726s4o9/mechanicxs.png)
"Koreans really do own white dudes" - The data
Here is what I think truly defines the Korean Gap in Starcraft 2. Koreans have better mechanics and only the foreigners with the best mechanics can even hope to compete. In the top 30 of the Effective or Efficient actions per minute chart we can see that only a handful of foreigners are present. Idra, Ret, nerichio, stephano, select? The very top of the EAPM shows some ridiculous feats of mechanics by DRG, Losira, Taeja. Notice, Stephano one of the top foreign players, also has one of the top EAPM's competing with the top Korean's.
While not necessarily indicating skill it would seem to reaffirm my Hypothesis that Koreans have much better mechanics on average and the top foreign big names have some of the best mechanics out of all foreigners. So for to foreigners to decrease this gap, it would seem a top level Starcraft player needs to aim for about 350 APM and 200 or so EAPM to compete with the titans winning all the tournaments.
TEAM USA?
The myths lower level players in NA face. Are they destroying mechanics?
MACRO IS KING?
Destiny clearly mentions improving mechanics, but most low level players really focused in on the macro part. I cannot tell you how many lower level players i have tried to talk to say "You mean macro?" when I mention mechanics. There are macro mechanics and micro mechanics but in general "mechanics" is not "macro" or "micro".
Further discussion
[D] Underused Tactic in Lower Leagues
http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=326528
How many bronze and silver level players are out there trying to focus on building workers, but clicking on the bottom right of the screen rather than using a hotkey. How many silver level players are getting their zerglings fried, because they tried to double click a fast moving group of unhotkeyed zerglings instead of control clicking them? How many gold players miss a few pylons because they sent a stalker to a watchtower by clicking and boxing it manually rather than cloning (Shift+deselect portraits)? How many platinum players cant keep their money low after 2 bases because they don't know how to tap to check their production? How many diamond players lost their entire army to a flank because they were watching their probes build at the nexus? How many masters players lost 20 drones to a stimmed marine drop, and responded to it too slow, cause the hotkeyed queen died and they don't use screen hotkeys? I hope you get my damn point.
You can't learn how to macro and micro until you know the correct way's to get around the screen.
Well, I am mad now, North American ladder needs to be like the korean ladder. But for the ladder to become competitive we need more competition. We need more plat's to become diamonds, and diamonds to become masters. We need to teach our lower level players better fundamentals. And our NA pro's could swallow their pride a bit and improve their mechanics also.
I leave you with possibly one of the most useful Day9 daily's of all time.
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mechanics are only half the battle.
in bw, if you had good mechanics, but crappy mind games and bad on spot decision making you were getting nowhere.
same is true in sc2..
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I got to masters on pure mechanics, now I'm getting my ass handed to me because I never learned real strategy, scouting, etc.
I still fucking destroy high diamonds though, so its not like I'm not masters material.
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the time you're making pointless threads koreans are playing ladder... could be a reason why they're better.
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your entire argument involve EAPM being the definition of mechanics.
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There is obviously more to the game than just mechanics like strategy. However, strategy without mechanics is a joke. This was just an opinion article with facts.
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I never realized stephano had such high apm. I wonder if him using grid has any effect in any way
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I believe Ace said that quote at IEM not Moon.
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Zenio has highest EAPM in GSL, but does it make him very successful? Mechanics are good, but there are tons of example where people with bad (progamer wise) mechanics do very well. your evidence doesnt support your argument...
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United States97276 Posts
On April 10 2012 08:12 IronSaint wrote:
I believe Ace said that quote at IEM not Moon.
It was moon. They tried to hype it up again when Huk beat him at dreamhack and when Moon came over for MLG Columbus in 2011
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On April 10 2012 08:10 Angel_ wrote:
your entire argument involve EAPM being the definition of mechanics.
Effective Actions per minute = a value that can evaluate mechanical skill
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On April 10 2012 08:13 Corsica wrote:
Zenio has highest EAPM in GSL, but does it make him very successful? Mechanics are good, but there are tons of example where people with bad (progamer wise) mechanics do very well. your evidence doesnt support your argument...
See this is what people will derail this thread into. My argument is that koreans on average have better mechanics, therefore korean's are better on average. Not that having the high eapm will make you the best player, only that you have the necessary mechanics to become one of the best players.
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On April 10 2012 08:12 andeh wrote:
I never realized stephano had such high apm. I wonder if him using grid has any effect in any way
I don't think it's grid-layout per se that does the trick. Your hotkey setup needs 2 things:
- Hotkeys not too far apart, easy to reach. Having everything all over the keyboard will slow you down due to the time it takes for your fingers to move around.
- Something you're used to. With many games played comes muscle memory, letting you hit the hotkeys in rapid succession without missing a beat.
Obviously grid-layout covers the first point, but so do many other layouts that you can design for yourself. The second point comes with practice and more practice. Some people will learn a layout more quickly than others of course.
So just go with what you're comfortable with and if possible swap some keybindings to move the relevant keys closer to the main cluster of hotkeys.
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On April 10 2012 08:17 RedDragon571 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:13 Corsica wrote:
Zenio has highest EAPM in GSL, but does it make him very successful? Mechanics are good, but there are tons of example where people with bad (progamer wise) mechanics do very well. your evidence doesnt support your argument... See this is what people will derail this thread into. My argument is that koreans on average have better mechanics, therefore korean's are better on average. Not that having the high eapm will make you the best player, only that you have the necessary mechanics to become one of the best players.
KR have better mechanics, but it comes from person to person, some of them have low apm and win a lot (nestea), some have highest eapm and lose to foreign terrans (zenio) , depends on person, and many various things, mechanics are just a small particle of kr success..
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On April 10 2012 08:31 Corsica wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:17 RedDragon571 wrote:On April 10 2012 08:13 Corsica wrote:
Zenio has highest EAPM in GSL, but does it make him very successful? Mechanics are good, but there are tons of example where people with bad (progamer wise) mechanics do very well. your evidence doesnt support your argument... See this is what people will derail this thread into. My argument is that koreans on average have better mechanics, therefore korean's are better on average. Not that having the high eapm will make you the best player, only that you have the necessary mechanics to become one of the best players. KR have better mechanics, but it comes from person to person, some of them have low apm and win a lot (nestea), some have highest eapm and lose to foreign terrans (zenio) , depends on person, and many various things, mechanics are just a small particle of kr success..
Did you even read the post you just quoted?
Mechanics a small particle of success? then what are the big particles.
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mechanics is very important obviously, but hard to tell who have better mechanics just by looking at the apm/eapm. you can argue people who are faster generally have better mechanics because they can do more stuff, but what about misclicks and bad unit control?
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Mechanics are important but they're not everything. Boxer while may be sluggish now because of his age, but that doesn't stop him from making successful runs at MLG or taking games off of stronger players. Savior had comparatively very low APM to other progamers, but that never stopped him from becoming a bonjwa. And Flash's APM is lower than someone like Bisu but that hasn't stopped him from being god. You could have the best mechanics/macro but if your planning or decision making is shit, you're not going to get anywhere far. A not so great example would be someone like Idra, who's mechanics are great but his mental attitude is weak. Its the overall package that makes great players.
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Northern Ireland24523 Posts
Mechanics are important put using APM metrics to judge them, while it has validity in like-like comparisons, skews things racially. Protoss players, even the very fastest players just don't have the same APM/EAPM as other races.
There are many, harder things to quantify that seem to separate Koreans, for me noticeably it's their ability to adjust pre-determined builds on the fly, and the clean-ness of their adjusted timing attacks. They also just seem to be able to play a more aggressive/multi-faceted style, i.e non-committal aggression while playing standard which a lot of foreigners shy away from doing for a more passive style.
Again these traits are possible by the OP's point regarding their mechanics being top notch, but just having good mechanics alone does not explain the gap. Mentality/gamesense etc all play a part, if this game was decided purely on mechanics, among foreigners Ret and Idra would stomp face
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On April 10 2012 08:36 HellionDrop wrote:
mechanics is very important obviously, but hard to tell who have better mechanics just by looking at the apm/eapm. you can argue people who are faster generally have better mechanics because they can do more stuff, but what about misclicks and bad unit control?
Well EAPM weeds out a lot of the spam and useless actions. bad unit control is more a decision making issue rather than a mechanical problems. mouse accuracy is part of mechanics the main thing is with superior mechanics can maintain better macro while doing similar or better quality unit control than people without good mechanics. You can have poor mechanics and great macro or great micro, you just cant have both at the same time.
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On April 10 2012 08:42 Wombat_NI wrote:
Mechanics are important put using APM metrics to judge them, while it has validity in like-like comparisons, skews things racially. Protoss players, even the very fastest players just don't have the same APM/EAPM as other races.
There are many, harder things to quantify that seem to separate Koreans, for me noticeably it's their ability to adjust pre-determined builds on the fly, and the clean-ness of their adjusted timing attacks. They also just seem to be able to play a more aggressive/multi-faceted style, i.e non-committal aggression while playing standard which a lot of foreigners shy away from doing for a more passive style.
Again these traits are possible by the OP's point regarding their mechanics being top notch, but just having good mechanics alone does not explain the gap. Mentality/gamesense etc all play a part, if this game was decided purely on mechanics, among foreigners Ret and Idra would stomp face
MC is a very fast player and many of the korean protoss maintain that 300 apm threshold. I agree, I am saying that mechanics are not the only reason for the mechanics gap, but probably the largest. In a foreigner only tournament Ret and Idra would stomp face i do believe.
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There is no myth.... Obviously good macro requires good mechanics. If some lower level players think that good macro and good mechanics are somehow separate, then they are simply ignorant.
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Great analysis and putting a correlation! And i do agree, we don't even truly understand mechanics in sc2 and don't know how to fully utilize, put zero emphasis on it. We even sometimes bash it by saying apm spam is useless and such when it actually sets you up for stronger mechanical play in critical situations. One of my biggest annoyances actually stems from Incontrol, while i do love the guy to death, he almost puts no emphasis on mechanics, has zero drive to improve on them and ignores anyone who points them out (atleast use to, haven't watched him play in awhile). A simple thing he didn't want to bother with was unit queueing beyond 2, he would be wasting 200 minerals by queueing so much.
We're definitly not pushing our physical capabilites and mental capabilites enough in NA, we instead just focus mostly on build orders and reforming meta game to perfection, more of memorization skills then increase mechanical skills.
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Northern Ireland24523 Posts
On April 10 2012 08:46 RedDragon571 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:42 Wombat_NI wrote:
Mechanics are important put using APM metrics to judge them, while it has validity in like-like comparisons, skews things racially. Protoss players, even the very fastest players just don't have the same APM/EAPM as other races.
There are many, harder things to quantify that seem to separate Koreans, for me noticeably it's their ability to adjust pre-determined builds on the fly, and the clean-ness of their adjusted timing attacks. They also just seem to be able to play a more aggressive/multi-faceted style, i.e non-committal aggression while playing standard which a lot of foreigners shy away from doing for a more passive style.
Again these traits are possible by the OP's point regarding their mechanics being top notch, but just having good mechanics alone does not explain the gap. Mentality/gamesense etc all play a part, if this game was decided purely on mechanics, among foreigners Ret and Idra would stomp face MC is a very fast player and many of the korean protoss maintain that 300 apm threshold. I agree, I am saying that mechanics are not the only reason for the mechanics gap, but probably the largest. In a foreigner only tournament Ret and Idra would stomp face i do believe.
Protoss just need a radical redesign from where I see it, there's too little to differentiate mechanically amazing players like MC/Puzzle from average players.
I don't like making a BW comparison, but I mean check out Bisu playing from an FPVoD, he's consistently upper 200+, but he's always actually doing things. Even a really excellent multitasker like Hero just can't get that kind of mileage out of the race because of how it's designed.
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Saying mechanics is important is a bit like saying that having two hands significantly improves your game play. It's obvious, and everyone who's played RTS games even semi-seriously understands that. For lower level players, improving mechanics will obviously help them.
The issue with a lot of lower level players isn't that they don't know this, it's that training mechanics can be incredibly tedious. You have to grind games where 100% of what you focus on is purely mechanical skill, e.g. not missing a production cycle, multitasking, etc. If you enjoy that, then go for it, but I know a lot of my friends want to improve but don't find grinding games to improve their mechanics to be fun, so they don't do it.
At the top levels, I honestly don't feel that mechanics are the separating factor between Koreans and foreigners. Also, EAPM is a ridiculously bad way to look at a players mechanical skill. You can have a high EAPM but bad mechanics with regards to multitasking and micromanagement. Just because an action isn't repetitive doesn't mean it serves a point. Your numbers don't even really support your argument, especially regarding EAPM. Heck, if you want to argue for who should win based on EAPM, then KawaiiRice should crush a lot of foreigners and SeleCT should be a Code S class Korean player. Obviously, that isn't the case, despite their ridiculous mechanical skill.
tl;dr: Mechanics matter, but they don't explain the differences at high levels.
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Is your first image APM or EAPM?? cuz even most BW pros dont have 250+ EAPM lol.
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Really interesting post. I never knew stephano has such high apm, and MMA has scary Eapm...! lol
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On April 10 2012 08:47 liberal wrote:
There is no myth.... Obviously good macro requires good mechanics. If some lower level players think that good macro and good mechanics are somehow separate, then they are simply ignorant.
That's not entirely true. Some players who sit on their butts building workers then just massing crap then A moving units and spamming production are considered to have awesome macro. I hear commentators say, "Look at that macro!" When they've only been just building then massed their blog and are remaxing their army when it engages.
I think good mechanics is 50/50 macro/micro and timing. Not just timing attacks but timing of things coming out or being done researching. How well you execute an attack while macroing. Some of these godly macro players crumble when forced to multitask vs drops or multi pronged attacks.
The best mechanic guys are just awesome multitaskers and you can see it in their fp views,
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I basically agree that excellent "mechanics" are like the basis you need to be at the top - period. If you don´t reach a certain level where you macro comfortably(of course it´s stressful and exhausting but you get the point) and get your things together at a high pace and accurately, you are behind from the get go because it´s not just about the skill how you control the units - but simply who got more stuff will most likely win an engagement.
The other things that comes to play is mindgames and which strategies you choose for which kind of opponent. And here we are at the very peak of the creation of any top level Sc2 player. Being able to outsmart and trick your opponent(based on map/playstyle of opponent...) into setting the pace of the game, don´t letting him do his style or whatever. But without the right mechanics the best strategy - at least on a certain level - will not help you.
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On April 10 2012 08:36 lodeet wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:31 Corsica wrote:On April 10 2012 08:17 RedDragon571 wrote:On April 10 2012 08:13 Corsica wrote:
Zenio has highest EAPM in GSL, but does it make him very successful? Mechanics are good, but there are tons of example where people with bad (progamer wise) mechanics do very well. your evidence doesnt support your argument... See this is what people will derail this thread into. My argument is that koreans on average have better mechanics, therefore korean's are better on average. Not that having the high eapm will make you the best player, only that you have the necessary mechanics to become one of the best players. KR have better mechanics, but it comes from person to person, some of them have low apm and win a lot (nestea), some have highest eapm and lose to foreign terrans (zenio) , depends on person, and many various things, mechanics are just a small particle of kr success.. Did you even read the post you just quoted? Mechanics a small particle of success? then what are the big particles.
Personality - that includes nerve management, overall mentality, being hardworking etc.
thankfully SC is not a game where you just click, you have to think (decsion making) etc...
P.S Nerchio is considered probably 2nd foreigner zerg (after stephano), yet he himself says that his mechanics are bad...
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I agree with this post, without being solid in your mechanics you will never get to a higher leagues, but having good game knowledge will make it easier until a certain point, I think.
Basically, if you're below Grandmasters, work on your mechanics.
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Good post, and this is only the beginning. Wait until the BW koreans start coming en masse.
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A friend of mine who played with Mondragon & smi.Fonger once gave me some insight about how come Koreans play better. It's like their national sport. If the best Soccer players come out of Germany/Italy/Spain and the best Rugby players come out of New Zealand/Australia because those countries focus on that game so much, how is it different to how Korea produces the best SC II players? If such is the case, of course these guys will have better mechanics/macro/eapm.
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On April 10 2012 08:56 Megaliskuu wrote:
Is your first image APM or EAPM?? cuz even most BW pros dont have 250+ EAPM lol.
It's not even the ingame Blizzard EPM value, it's the EPM scaled to real time.
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yes koreans practice more which means they win more.......is this thread worthy?
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I'm a high masters Terran and coach regularly. The #1 thing I notice when observing a student is that they do everything so slowly. They don't have camera save hotkeys. It takes them twice as long to drop a supply depot than me. When they are engaging an enemy they don't have the option of doing anything at home because they simply aren't fast enough, they can only pick one or the other.
They make other big mistakes too like bad build orders, bad micro, bad macro, and I do think those issues should be addressed before mechanics, but I also think people place too little emphasis on APM just because Day 9 and other big names say it doesn't matter.
There's a reason Koreans, the best players by far, are all faster than foreigners. If you can split your army, then instantly drop 2 engineering bays, an armory, and hotkey them, and be back to your army before the fight even starts you're going to be a lot better than the guy that can't do that.
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On April 10 2012 09:27 DemigodcelpH wrote:
Good post, and this is only the beginning. Wait until the BW koreans start coming en masse.
I keep hearing this since the beginning of the release of Sc2... 
I am getting anxious to seeing them in action already! ForGG for example has been quite impressive already, but definitely is not there "yet", to be an example of former BW gosus taking over. Hope they will come soon(er) - even though it will mean a painful goodbye for BW... I can empathize somewhat, since Sc2 also made wc3 obsolete -_-.
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Notice that there are no protoss players anywhere near the top of the list . . .
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On April 10 2012 09:34 KimJong1L wrote:
A friend of mine who played with Mondragon & smi.Fonger once gave me some insight about how come Koreans play better. It's like their national sport. If the best Soccer players come out of Germany/Italy/Spain and the best Rugby players come out of New Zealand/Australia because those countries focus on that game so much, how is it different to how Korea produces the best SC II players? If such is the case, of course these guys will have better mechanics/macro/eapm.
but that doesnt actually answer the question of why does it. thats just stating the question and the answer.
it seems pretty clear in generalities the reason is as simple as time invested. especially during your younger years where you are able to grasp new ideas a lot easier, time put in has a direct correlation to success. this is nothing new and nothing im about to write next is anything new either, people just either dont want to hear it or whatever, but koreans are still ahead and theres no reason to believe that will change any time soon.
now we can look at effective practice as opposed to just laddering. and the Korean team house system still has everyone else beat. some western teams have made houses, by which they mean 'oh ye we bought a house and threw some random players in there gg'. these simplistic recreations are basically worthless.
if you look at people who are considered 'the best' as opposed to those who have random success there's a huge correlation in having a dedicated coach, not wasting time with shows and not streaming much. now this sucks for fans but it really does seem that fan interaction is the biggest sign that someone is bad, or atleast has a bad mindset of 'oh ye i have time to spare with starcraft, i dont need more practice'.
the simplist demonstration of all of this was mma vs stephano at ipl this weekend. stephano has been riding a huge hype train for ages now. now thats not to say he isnt a very talented player, and im not saying hes been lucky or hes bad or whatever...but compared to mma there was no comparison. he was dismantled by superior multitasking alone. what mma did was basically an exercise in macro management. he didnt use the eye popping marine splits of marineking, but instead he put himself in a situation where he would never need to. he approached dropping as a macro mechanic, giving simplistic management to 3+ drops rather than 100% of his attention to one.
this mechanical approach to play is something that only comes from hours of practice, good, effective practice. not streaming for fans and not appearing on talk shows.
so what is the korean difference? its all about their mindset. to become the best they can be is above winning. if you play the best winning will come in time, playing to win is a short sighted goal that favors cheesey play that might work once, instead of well practiced mechanical play that will last for perhaps years. this is slightly tangential to the OPs original post but it seemed relevent.
On April 10 2012 09:52 Biggun69 wrote:
Notice that there are no protoss players anywhere near the top of the list . . .
but notice dde is one of the fastest players in the world and yet is probably a top 200 ish player in terms of skill. lets all draw random conclusions!
On April 10 2012 08:56 Megaliskuu wrote:
Is your first image APM or EAPM?? cuz even most BW pros dont have 250+ EAPM lol.
pretty sure its apm, the mistake in his picture posting could of been caused by the bug in game that reversed the 2 numbers this/last patch idk.
On April 10 2012 08:47 liberal wrote:
There is no myth.... Obviously good macro requires good mechanics. If some lower level players think that good macro and good mechanics are somehow separate, then they are simply ignorant.
the myth is more that if you ladder 8 hours a day in a house that happens to contain other starcraft players you will eventually win a gsl
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i dont read the hole thread but i just have to say thats just logical that higer apm brings you an advantage. for sure its more important on high level then on gold or so.
but it´s clearly that in sc2 mechanics dont are this important they where in bw. when they where, losira would be possible unbeatable.
it´s the mix what´s make you a really good player. savior didn´t had those an high apm for pro conditions and he was just one of the gretest player of all time.
and that koreas have better mechanics it logical too. they just play more.
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On April 10 2012 09:49 xrapture wrote:
I'm a high masters Terran and coach regularly. The #1 thing I notice when observing a student is that they do everything so slowly. They don't have camera save hotkeys. It takes them twice as long to drop a supply depot than me. When they are engaging an enemy they don't have the option of doing anything at home because they simply aren't fast enough, they can only pick one or the other.
They make other big mistakes too like bad build orders, bad micro, bad macro, and I do think those issues should be addressed before mechanics, but I also think people place too little emphasis on APM just because Day 9 and other big names say it doesn't matter.
There's a reason Koreans, the best players by far, are all faster than foreigners. If you can split your army, then instantly drop 2 engineering bays, an armory, and hotkey them, and be back to your army before the fight even starts you're going to be a lot better than the guy that can't do that.
One hundred percent agree, I do think that you have to fix basic mechanical problems like a student not knowing HOW to camera hotkey before the other mistakes. Once they know how to utilize it then you can put other things upfront
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What exactly does eAPM measure? I mean, what actions are discounted from the APM-number?
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On April 10 2012 10:01 RedDragon571 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 09:49 xrapture wrote:
I'm a high masters Terran and coach regularly. The #1 thing I notice when observing a student is that they do everything so slowly. They don't have camera save hotkeys. It takes them twice as long to drop a supply depot than me. When they are engaging an enemy they don't have the option of doing anything at home because they simply aren't fast enough, they can only pick one or the other.
They make other big mistakes too like bad build orders, bad micro, bad macro, and I do think those issues should be addressed before mechanics, but I also think people place too little emphasis on APM just because Day 9 and other big names say it doesn't matter.
There's a reason Koreans, the best players by far, are all faster than foreigners. If you can split your army, then instantly drop 2 engineering bays, an armory, and hotkey them, and be back to your army before the fight even starts you're going to be a lot better than the guy that can't do that. One hundred percent agree, I do think that you have to fix basic mechanical problems like a student not knowing HOW to camera hotkey before the other mistakes. Once they know how to utilize it then you can put other things upfront
Except that most Koreans don't use screen saves consistently :D.
What people misunderstand a lot as far as mechanics go, and which is probably the #1 reason to why Koreans are so good, is mouse precision and speed. It's really all about mouse precision. Without it, you will just be a 121212121212 spammer and that's about it. EAPM come mainly from mouse speed and precision.
A great multitasker is before all someone who can use his minimap and select shit very quickly (btw, you'll note that clicking on the minimap doesn't count towards APM), not someone who hits hotkeys very fast (because the latter is way easier than the former)
So, don't get caught up with fancy hotkey setups and frenetic building selection spam, just work on your mouse precision (in the way that Day9 described in his tutorial), the rest will come by itself.
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this thread doesn't do a very good job of proving your point to me. there are koreans near the higher end that are not doing so well, as well as koreans near the lower end who are considered the best players in the world. there are also many foreigners near the higher end that are not nearly as good as quite a few on the lower end, so this data seems highly inconsistent. people of different skill levels in different regions are not lining up with your projected hypothesis. you're cherry picking what you look at here if you think this shows that APM = skill.
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On April 10 2012 10:36 Herculix wrote:
this thread doesn't do a very good job of proving your point to me. there are koreans near the higher end that are not doing so well, as well as koreans near the lower end who are considered the best players in the world. there are also many foreigners near the higher end that are not nearly as good as quite a few on the lower end, so this data seems highly inconsistent. people of different skill levels in different regions are not lining up with your projected hypothesis. you're cherry picking what you look at here if you think this shows that APM = skill.
That not my hypothesis bro
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I'd say decision making out paces EAPM and APM after 150 or so.
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I think you need to take into consideration of play style as well. The more 'aggressive' players will have more APM because they are probably moving around the map a lot compare with the more 'turtlely' players. Or if someone goes bio vs mech in TvT, it is likely the bio player will have higher APM. The length and type of game also factors in. There are some games where it is low econ and back and forth, those game will have higher APM. Where as some games have a big lull in the middle where the 2 players are just building up on 3/4 bases and end in one engagement.
Of course, you need to have a certain level of APM to be successful.
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On April 10 2012 10:13 m0ck wrote:
What exactly does eAPM measure? I mean, what actions are discounted from the APM-number?
Blizzards EAPM is broken in a way that it does not count repeated actions such as 12341234 spam unless you "do" something with those hotkey circles. Checking build or upgrade progress does not count. Doubletap to building group or controlgroup does not count. Spamming move command does count in blizzards EAPM. In SC2Gears the move thing is cleaned up possibly in a similar way to the original EAPM program for BW where you have to be close to the opponents units or structures for the move APM to count. I'm not sure about this however since when doing some builds (usually in teamgames) mostly ones where you have to stutter step units and just build the same unit over and over, I cant break 85 EAPM no matter what. When I play "normal" I usually have like 120 so something is broken on both ways of counting EAPM.
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People are losing prospective on this. Blah Blah Blah amp doesnt matter as much eapm blah blah blah blah. Look at it like this: If you want to be a running back in the NFL you have to be able to run at a certain speed. Now is the person with the fastest 40 the best running back? No not necessarily. But you still have to be able to go at a certain speed to be able to even compete. Now in starcraft you have the same thing. Having the best mechanics does not automatically make you the best player but your mechanics have to be at a certain level to compete at the highest levels. Having good insight or a good strat or great decison making will only take you so far if your opponents just flat out have more shit than you do and can do more things at once than you can. Anyways massive run on sentence so i will leave it at that.
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On April 10 2012 10:47 Eatme wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 10:13 m0ck wrote:
What exactly does eAPM measure? I mean, what actions are discounted from the APM-number? Blizzards EAPM is broken in a way that it does not count repeated actions such as 12341234 spam unless you "do" something with those hotkey circles. Checking build or upgrade progress does not count. Doubletap to building group or controlgroup does not count. Spamming move command does count in blizzards EAPM. In SC2Gears the move thing is cleaned up possibly in a similar way to the original EAPM program for BW where you have to be close to the opponents units or structures for the move APM to count. I'm not sure about this however since when doing some builds (usually in teamgames) mostly ones where you have to stutter step units and just build the same unit over and over, I cant break 85 EAPM no matter what. When I play "normal" I usually have like 120 so something is broken on both ways of counting EAPM.
I think it basically boils down to "all selection actions don't count, only actions that have an actual effect on the game count".
Anyways, on topic:
I could only take this OP serious until the point where he assumed eAPM are equal to skill (so basically line 3)... which is absurd. Yes, speed does matter - until a certain point where the eAPM cover all basic macro and most micro actions (~100-150 eAPM). After that, timing (i.e. always producing stuff just in time, not too early), game sense and solid decision making are a lot more important.
For example Stephano is not so amazing because he has good mechanics (his mechanics are actually not that good compared to some other top zerg) or because of his speed, it's his incredible game sense which borderlines maphacking and his ability to always make the right decisions from what his game sense tells him. You can't find that in any number, it's something beyond the game itself.
Other example: Goody. Slow but perfect decision making which for a long time allowed him to be on par with a lot of the very fast players (yes, he fell behind now, but he's still good enough to prove a point :p)
If i tried, i could probably get to those eAPM levels but that wouldn't make me a better player (most likely it would make me far worse). Those other - non measureable - skills are a hundred times more important and are the difference between good and great players. They can be trained - to an extend, they are based on intelligence of the player - and that is why koreans are so good. Not only do they have very good mechanics, they also have played so many games that they can see tiny stuff and immedatly know what will come next and react properly to it.
Being in a teamhouse and have practice partners helps a lot for that, too, they can try a hundred builds against you until you recognize them each from the timing of their first probe (slightly exaggerated).
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but notice dde is one of the fastest players in the world and yet is probably a top 200 ish player in terms of skill. lets all draw random conclusions!
DDE is probably among the best foreign Terrans. I don't know if he is focusing on sc now though
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I'm somewhat shocked at how similar MKP and Idra's scores are. You'd think with all of MKP's micro tricks, he'd have a higher APM. But they're nearly identical for EAPM, APM and efficiency.
That alone should say something about the effect of attitude and game approach.
EDIT: And apparently living in the same house has made DeMuslim and Puma synchronize. I wonder if their hearts beat at the same rate.
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Great post. What would be useful now is.... Are there any SPECIFIC drills for practicing mechanics?
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The assumption that EAPM is a true measure of mechanical skill is a flawed one, which unfortunately makes your entire argument a giant failure.
That and the fact that it's just a statement of the obvious to say that the best Starcraft players are the ones with some of the best mechanics. No one who has a brain thinks that foreigners are equal to Koreans in mechanics.
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Why are there 2 MC, 2 Puma and 2 Ret in your chart?
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Considering that both APM and eAPM are such imprecise measures of 'good actions', I think the most interesting fact to take from that chart is the racial distribution of the players. The fastest players are for the most part zergs, with no zerg in the bottom 15. It would seem that the playing zerg at a top level really do require being able to do more actions than playing either protoss or terran.
As another point, it would seem that the protoss players in general have a higher reduction in their effective APM than other races. This might reflect a bias in what eAPM judges as "good actions" versus what is required when playing the race. In other words, eAPM doesn't do a very good job, at least when comparing races.
Could the OP maybe make a similar chart sorted by ordinary APM?
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ThorZaIN has low apm and is definitly one of the top forigners...
MerZ has ridiculous apm and isn't very good for a pro
Your argument is invalid
Koreans are just more dedicated and practice more (efficiently)
Also there are people in masters with like ~70apm
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Is Nestea a fast player? I feel like decision-making/the mental game is an important aspect at the highest levels as well.
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On April 10 2012 11:54 red4ce wrote:
Why are there 2 MC, 2 Puma and 2 Ret in your chart?
Probably different Starcraft 2 accounts.
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What are you trying to prove? Are you trying to claim that the reason Koreans do well is because of APM? Thats definitely not true, if you look on that list many of the foreigners are from broodwar and have high apm. These guys aren't the ones putting out the best results, even though thats why you claim Koreans are so much better.
Are you trying to prove that lower leagues need to focus more on macro? I think we all know why probes and pylons got so popular as a saying. And also, a counter to that would be how you see a fair amount of master league players who can't macro at all, they just got pretty good at their micro with their all-ins.
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On April 10 2012 12:01 KimJongChill wrote:
Is Nestea a fast player? I feel like decision-making/the mental game is an important aspect at the highest levels as well.
He is super fast. Decision making is important, but the foundation is also critical. That is why we see MKP killing people lately. He makes good decisions and then makes them better with micro.
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On April 10 2012 12:01 KimJongChill wrote:
Is Nestea a fast player? I feel like decision-making/the mental game is an important aspect at the highest levels as well.
He's a fast player like many Korean (very good macro, injects and creep spread and such). However his reflexes are probably a bit slow if it makes any sense. He makes very good decisions on the fly, very quickly, because he's very smart, but you will be able to see him lose track of his mutas and not pull them back in time while they fly over marines. In that sense he's not among the fastest players, as opposed to someone like DRG.
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Well, considering his crazy macro, Nestea should be quite fast.
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For me I have different APM depending on races (zerg highest, then terran then protoss) so I don't think comparing APM across players of different races is fair.
A midgame round of production will be something like 16 units for zerg, 10 units for terran, and 8 units for protoss. So it's not that the races require different amounts of skill (you can just hold down a unit hotkey) it's just that each unit built is counted as an action, so different amounts of units built = different APM across similar levels of skill.
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Isn't EAPM pure bullshit anyway?
IIRC it completely removes tabbing through buildings to see if you can warp in units / build a worker at a certain base or whatever.
That's a major thing EAPM should be sunk into, but afaik it's indistinguishable from spaming control groups with probes and the nexus in the first few minutes.
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Russian Federation748 Posts
Knowing Moon's mastery of English, I'd bet someone just had him believe "Koreans own white dudes" means "Thank you a lot for inviting me here".
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This topic has been beat worse then a dead horse. Most of these get closed.
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I hate to tell you but APM =/= Mechanics same as it doesnt equate to skill either.
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You're begging the wrong quest OP.
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Quite possibly the most informative post created on Teamliquid.net SC2 forums.
There are many ways of doing things (mechanics), but the better your mechanics (the more efficient you do things), the better the player you are.
We need a thread dedicated to the most effective way of carrying out each separate mechanic, and the order in which actions should be favored over other actions.
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On April 10 2012 11:08 Morfildur wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 10:47 Eatme wrote:On April 10 2012 10:13 m0ck wrote:
What exactly does eAPM measure? I mean, what actions are discounted from the APM-number? Blizzards EAPM is broken in a way that it does not count repeated actions such as 12341234 spam unless you "do" something with those hotkey circles. Checking build or upgrade progress does not count. Doubletap to building group or controlgroup does not count. Spamming move command does count in blizzards EAPM. In SC2Gears the move thing is cleaned up possibly in a similar way to the original EAPM program for BW where you have to be close to the opponents units or structures for the move APM to count. I'm not sure about this however since when doing some builds (usually in teamgames) mostly ones where you have to stutter step units and just build the same unit over and over, I cant break 85 EAPM no matter what. When I play "normal" I usually have like 120 so something is broken on both ways of counting EAPM. Other example: Goody. Slow but perfect decision making which for a long time allowed him to be on par with a lot of the very fast players (yes, he fell behind now, but he's still good enough to prove a point :p)
Eh.... This is not a whine, but that is strictly only possible with Terran.
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Fruitdealer is super slow, yet he was able to win the first GSL.
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On April 10 2012 14:06 namedplayer wrote:
Fruitdealer is super slow, yet he was able to win the first GSL.
And now he has phased out of professional StarCraft 2, possibly because he could not keep up with the rest in the "mechanics" side of things. Just pointing that out
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You guys are missing the point. You HAVE to be fast in order to even be able to compete. There are people that are faster, but the slowest pro player is still very fast.
Its like in soccer or football, everyone is fast, there are some that are faster and they have an advantage, while other people may have an advantage in other areas, however they are still faster than a regular human being.
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The better your mechanics, the better your strategy. You can read up strategy, you can't read up mechanics.
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I barely play so I'm pretty bad but like with any game you need to be able to make the game do what you want it to do.
I think all the talk about apm might confuse a lot of people. For example, didn't merz say his apm is crazy high because long time ago he heard spamming super fast with the mouse(or something like that) was great?
I'm pretty old and I don't think people said "apm" and "mechanics" back in AoE etc but good players tried to keep the pace up and practiced useful actions back then like repositioning units, the build hotkeys etc. It was still spamming but people tried to spam all types of actions you actually wanted to be able to do as fast as possible instead of just spamming same 2-5 things.
I like this line from liquipedia on mechanics: "Mechanics is pressing the right buttons exactly when they need to be pressed". Perhaps it would help if people think of apm in a similar 101 way, like "Good APM is executing all game commands quickly".
Personally I'm 100% aware of the fact that I need to somewhat be able to make the game(like all games) do what I want to before there's any point with fancy build orders and stuff. And in a game like sc2 there is no cap where it can't get better.
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I've seen nestea play, he is not that fast, not as fast as say, liquid hero.
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I totally agree with the OP, tho we musnt forget that APM which is something that ppl underestimate by saying " OH hes just spamming.." is that little thing that keep the player awarness during the game, for example a higher apm player will have a bigger chance at find that DT that coming into your base a mile away, or a higher apm player will be able to rescue his hellion from getting surround by lings while he babysit them every sec while macroing.
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On April 10 2012 11:47 vorxaw wrote:
Great post. What would be useful now is.... Are there any SPECIFIC drills for practicing mechanics?
Focused Guide to Improving Mechanics
Read it, and you'll see the a behind-the-scenes process (Okay, go through 1-3 first. You want mechanics to have a solid foundation.)
1. Practice with spamming to see if you can top 200 apm constantly
2. Turn the spam APM into eAPM. You banked some "money" and now you "spend it."
To the thread, yeah, Koreans are on average faster. The best players in the world are extremely quick, executing over 400 real actions in real minutes. Over the course of the entire game. Food for thought for progamers that are still 20% behind the top in eAPM and sometimes much more in reg APM.
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Keeping up with near perfect macro with 100APM. But i have to say that i could not handle 3 pronged attacks due to my low apm. I think what the foreigner scene really need is extremely high level multi tasking like stephano. Being able to send roaches from 3 angles WHILE keeping up with injects/macroing/expanding and stuff. The top foreigners are there with their macro, what is lacking is their high level multi tasking with mass drops/ unit positioning / engagement. The koreans are at the tip top with their drop control i have to say.
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It's sad that every time APM and mechanics are discussed the discussion leans toward whether or not mechanics and APM are what makes good players, as in the higher APM = the better player, when this isn't what's important. What should be emphasized is that high APM ENABLES a player to play good, it raises the players potential, which leads to better play. A player can be amazing at 100 APM, but he would probably be a complete beast with 200 APM.
I have about 100 APM on average, high platinum. My friend who is borderline masters has 50-100 APM more than me, and while his strategy is worse when he plays my main race because he doesn't have the experience nor knows any good gameplans, he still plays at a higher level than me with his offrace and my mainrace because he can easily keep up with the macro and also has APM over to do better scouting and has time over to think about his next moves etc.
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APM does NOT necessarily directly relate to better mechanics. I've seen plenty of people that just spam 123 on their keyboards and they get 300ish apm. That said, you know all of drgs insane apm is going to good use and thats one of the main reasons he is the best zerg in sc2. The main thing to take away from this is you can always play faster and be doing more stuff at once/better.
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On April 10 2012 18:13 Neurosis wrote:
APM does NOT necessarily directly relate to better mechanics. I've seen plenty of people that just spam 123 on their keyboards and they get 300ish apm. That said, you know all of drgs insane apm is going to good use and thats one of the main reasons he is the best zerg in sc2. The main thing to take away from this is you can always play faster and be doing more stuff at once/better.
eAPM, which OP also outlines as koreans having significantly more of if you look at the chart, does not count spamming 123 and such. As such your post is essentially useless. Please read up more on the subject matter before you try to contribute to the discussion if you don't even know the difference between APM and eAPM.
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Just for clarification, LiquidRet #1 is the keyboard and LiquidRet #2 is the mouse.
And I agree with some previous posters eAPM does not capture your mechanics as a whole (as they, despite their name, does not capture how effective your actions are), but they are a good hint to start with considering they are something (with that I mean hard data) that you can put your hands on.
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I say let people continue the way they are, if you personally want to improve your mechanics then the time you wasted writing this thread could have been spent improving your own game.
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The data already shows that EAPM is not a good measure of multitasking. People that are known as great multitaskers are MMA and MKP, both seem to be able to control more battles, while expanding, making supply, and producing units. Yet, their EAPM is lower than TAKiii - whoever that is and not at the top of the list.
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"Korean's own white dudes" -Moon at IEM
that was a joke ... he said it when carmac was next and carmac said that before so it was kind of trolling and EVERYONE take him by words ... guys please
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On April 10 2012 18:17 DemigodcelpH wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 18:13 Neurosis wrote:
APM does NOT necessarily directly relate to better mechanics. I've seen plenty of people that just spam 123 on their keyboards and they get 300ish apm. That said, you know all of drgs insane apm is going to good use and thats one of the main reasons he is the best zerg in sc2. The main thing to take away from this is you can always play faster and be doing more stuff at once/better. eAPM, which OP also outlines as koreans having significantly more of if you look at the chart, does not count spamming 123 and such. As such your post is essentially useless. Please read up more on the subject matter before you try to contribute to the discussion if you don't even know the difference between APM and eAPM.
APM , eapm, whatever you want to call it (or whatever blizzard wants to call it), my point still stands. Extremely high apm does not necessarily mean you have great mechanics. Did you sit on a stick recently or...?
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APM is a measurement of how quickly a player is remembering to do everything they think they need to do. However they think the picture of the game should be drawn and how quickly they can draw it. So, you think players should get better mechanically? It's a manifestation of one's understanding of the game.
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Looking at EAPM is bad. It's honestly better to look at raw APM first, then make conjectures with EAPM.
In any case, APM is a good signifier of mechanics, but it's not the end-all. In BW, you needed a BARE MINIMUM of 200APM to make it as a progamer, and the best were usually between 250 (Stork, Savior on the low end), and 350. Nal_rA was really the last progamer to make it with extremely low APM (he was between 150-200 most games iirc). You had exceptions like Jaedong, Nada and Really who pushed 400 regularly, and I don't think anyone can forget July's 900 APM spikes during furious moments.
On the other end, I remember regularly playing against players on iccup in the D level with APM approaching 300 while I barely managed a meager 130-180. Being comfortable smashing out more actions will make it easier to eventually develop that into stronger gameplay/mechanics overall, but no, it's not the end-all.
Mechanics are equally important to strategy to be successful at a high level. At lower levels (anywhere below progamer-level), mechanics are more important. You can emulate build orders and strategies, but you can't emulate good unit control and macro.
All that said, though, yes, Koreans do generally have superior mechanics to their foreign counterparts.
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On April 10 2012 18:31 Ghanburighan wrote:
The data already shows that EAPM is not a good measure of multitasking. People that are known as great multitaskers are MMA and MKP, both seem to be able to control more battles, while expanding, making supply, and producing units. Yet, their EAPM is lower than TAKiii - whoever that is and not at the top of the list.
I think the point is to show that, in general, higher APM and EAPM = better mechanics = better likelihood to win.
Obviously more APM/EAPM does not automatically mean instant win and there will be some statistical anomalies + other factors to consider. But the data seems to suggest that some of the very top players have really high APM/EAPM compared to everyone else, and it does suggest that to be part of that group of elite Code A-Code S level players, you have to have APM/EAPM around that level.
I guess to clarify, think about what Sjow could do with his measly 90-150 APM. Now think about how much more he can do with 200-300 APM.
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On April 10 2012 18:38 Neurosis wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 18:17 DemigodcelpH wrote:On April 10 2012 18:13 Neurosis wrote:
APM does NOT necessarily directly relate to better mechanics. I've seen plenty of people that just spam 123 on their keyboards and they get 300ish apm. That said, you know all of drgs insane apm is going to good use and thats one of the main reasons he is the best zerg in sc2. The main thing to take away from this is you can always play faster and be doing more stuff at once/better. eAPM, which OP also outlines as koreans having significantly more of if you look at the chart, does not count spamming 123 and such. As such your post is essentially useless. Please read up more on the subject matter before you try to contribute to the discussion if you don't even know the difference between APM and eAPM. APM , eapm, whatever you want to call it (or whatever blizzard wants to call it), my point still stands. Extremely high apm does not necessarily mean you have great mechanics. Did you sit on a stick recently or...?
true, apm/eapm does not necessarily equal good mechanics. it basically tells how fast someone can hit keys but not how good someone can multitask/macro/micro. just as an example: many players have high apm but how many of them can micro like mkp or place force fields like mc?
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How many platinum players cant keep their money low after 2 bases because they don't know how to tap to check their production?
I just wanted to ask the OP for clarification, I thought that "tapping" or "cycling," or whatever you want to call it when you continuously check your hotkeyed units and structures, isn't counted by EAPM? My understanding is that that's one of the biggest problems with using EAPM as a measure of strong mechanics.
If that's not, or no longer true, (or if it's only true in Blizz UI's EAPM, but not in SC2 gears, as I also use SC2 gears for my replay analysis) then that's awesome 
If that is still a problem though, do you think it affects your analysis? To me it seems that it wouldn't matter too much if we just evaluate APM. And overall I still agree with your main premise, that mechanics are the primary source of the skill gap in SC2.
The only difference in thought and approach between us is I just don't usually pay much attention to EAPM, and have only really cared about increasing my APM stats in legitimate ways, as in playing faster rather than spamming more. But maybe EAPM really is the better number to evaluate? I'd like to hear you weigh in on the difference between them, and specifically why you prefer EAPM over APM.
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On April 10 2012 19:25 ShoWTimE94 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 18:38 Neurosis wrote:On April 10 2012 18:17 DemigodcelpH wrote:On April 10 2012 18:13 Neurosis wrote:
APM does NOT necessarily directly relate to better mechanics. I've seen plenty of people that just spam 123 on their keyboards and they get 300ish apm. That said, you know all of drgs insane apm is going to good use and thats one of the main reasons he is the best zerg in sc2. The main thing to take away from this is you can always play faster and be doing more stuff at once/better. eAPM, which OP also outlines as koreans having significantly more of if you look at the chart, does not count spamming 123 and such. As such your post is essentially useless. Please read up more on the subject matter before you try to contribute to the discussion if you don't even know the difference between APM and eAPM. APM , eapm, whatever you want to call it (or whatever blizzard wants to call it), my point still stands. Extremely high apm does not necessarily mean you have great mechanics. Did you sit on a stick recently or...? true, apm/eapm does not necessarily equal good mechanics. it basically tells how fast someone can hit keys but not how good someone can multitask/macro/micro. just as an example: many players have high apm but how many of them can micro like mkp or place force fields like mc?
Having good mechanics =/= having good micro. Having good mechanics = Having potential to micro well.
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Does somebody already get that you can force opponent to click fast and multitask (faster than he actually can), and abuse this, even if your own apm is relatively slow?
Cos like, Savior used this trick back in 2006.
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You don't need high apm to do well, you can macro and micro with low actions. The problem with having low apm though is the error in decisions becomes greater and you will have less refined mechanics because of this
Having 200 apm is great for controlling your macro on your bases but you can't have full control on your army or scouting and so one will suffer when you try to control the other.
And this is generally why koreans with high APM are so much better. When it comes down to it there controlling more of there stuff efficiently over you and will gain advantage much more easily.
This comes more into effect when decision making has to be done under pressure, with more APM you can effectively make more decisions in a smaller time frame and so more likely to make the right one
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I can't believe people are actually arguing that EAPM isn't an indication of real skill. Noone is saying that EAPM is the only way to measure it, but there is obviously a correlation between high EAPM and success within the game. Just as previous threads have shown that macro-managing is also one of things that differ between "normal" high level players and pro's.
No it isn't the whole story, and no you shouldn't judge a player based on his EAPM if he is still destroying in tournaments(obviously). But the fact remains, and this is why this is a really good post, that having a high EAPM is a huge step towards becoming a better SC2 player.
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Of course APM is somewhat important. But I think if you have reached a certain amount of average APM (like most pros have)
it becomes less important. Take Savior as an example. He always had rather low APM compared to other Brood War players, but nonetheless he was one of the best players to ever have played the game. I would describe APM rather as a tool for your mechanics, not mechanics per se.
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A lot of the debates about APM is about causation and correlation and much of the bickering could be avoided if people were more familiar with that correlation does not imply causation. It doesn't mean causes can not be found in correlating facts, don't have time to elaborate more but the relevant information is in the linked article.
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If you take that little apm list as a list of skill then I should sign up for the MLG qualifier, I might actually qualify. While I notice I can outmultitask my opponent most of the time that doesn't neccesarily say my macro, micro or decision making is better.
Is that list eapm or apm??? I assume apm since Select's 374 eapm isn't humanly possible.
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On April 10 2012 22:15 Bojas wrote:
If you take that little apm list as a list of skill then I should sign up for the MLG qualifier, I might actually qualify. While I notice I can outmultitask my opponent most of the time that doesn't neccesarily say my macro, micro or decision making is better.
Is that list eapm or apm??? I assume apm since Select's 374 eapm isn't humanly possible.
It's a big sign where it says "EAPM", EFFECTIVE, so + spam + all micro tricks + picking and dropping hurt marines etc. etc.
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One of the pictures in the OP is broken.
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Hi, i noticed you talked about the day9 daily where he speaks about mechanics, i also found it really helpfull. Day9 actually demonstrated in another one where he talks about the same stuff, but with some more info on the subject, i think both of the dailies are really good to check out, especially for low league players. Even some masters can check some tricks there. This is the link, it's day9 daily number 360, entitled "Mental checklist exercises"! This one is totally worth it, one of the best he's made in my humble opinion.
http://blip.tv/day9tv/day-9-daily-360-p1-mental-checklist-exercises-5635566
Would like to know your opinion too.
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I'm starting to incorporate screen keys (F1-F4) typically F1 - base1 F2 Base2 F3 Base3 F4 Rally)
I tell you it's some bitch trying to get my muscle memory to hit these keys to go there. slowly but surely
other then that I have no problem using my hotkeys as I've been doing that for years of quake3/live and WoW.
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I'm starting to incorporate screen keys (F1-F4) typically F1 - base1 F2 Base2 F3 Base3 F4 Rally)
I tell you it's some bitch trying to get my muscle memory to hit these keys to go there. slowly but surely
I actually noticed that the way i use screen keys is EXACTLY the way Grubby does it: at the beggining of the match he programs the two expo's he will be tanking in case of a macro game, and starts spamming those for no reason, just so his hands are used to the idea. I believe he uses the f2, f3 ,f4 keys for that, not sure because there's no way to tell that with his camera angle, but it seems close.
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Stephano actually clicks around the minimap so you saying that lower level players doing this is bad, is incorrect. If that makes any sense. Obviously they dont do it with the same speed or efficiency.
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On April 10 2012 22:21 nucLeaRTV wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 22:15 Bojas wrote:
If you take that little apm list as a list of skill then I should sign up for the MLG qualifier, I might actually qualify. While I notice I can outmultitask my opponent most of the time that doesn't neccesarily say my macro, micro or decision making is better.
Is that list eapm or apm??? I assume apm since Select's 374 eapm isn't humanly possible. It's a big sign where it says "EAPM", EFFECTIVE, so + spam + all micro tricks + picking and dropping hurt marines etc. etc.
So Select has 374 eapm?
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NA players just gotta want to improve, but our society hates gamers lol
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On April 10 2012 22:41 Advocado wrote:
Stephano actually clicks around the minimap so you saying that lower level players doing this is bad, is incorrect. If that makes any sense. Obviously they dont do it with the same speed or efficiency.
TLO was using the cursor keys to scroll around for a long time... (yes, seriously, Day9 even asked his viewers to tell TLO to stop that...)
Just because some pros are doing something one way doesn't make it the best way.
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I think the point is for lower level players not to focus on strategy and more focus on their macro mechanics (injects, supply blocks, spending money, etc). It doesn't matter what build you decide to do as long as you can execute it really well with your superior macro.
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On April 10 2012 22:47 Morfildur wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 22:41 Advocado wrote:
Stephano actually clicks around the minimap so you saying that lower level players doing this is bad, is incorrect. If that makes any sense. Obviously they dont do it with the same speed or efficiency. TLO was using the cursor keys to scroll around for a long time... (yes, seriously, Day9 even asked his viewers to tell TLO to stop that...) Just because some pros are doing something one way doesn't make it the best way.
It works pretty well for him clearly. Obviously work with keybindings, but just using keybindings and not granting the mouse a single thought in mechanics is a mistake. Its a very precise way of getting around the minimap when stuff isnt hotkey.
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your image is missing >_<
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On April 10 2012 22:47 Morfildur wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 22:41 Advocado wrote:
Stephano actually clicks around the minimap so you saying that lower level players doing this is bad, is incorrect. If that makes any sense. Obviously they dont do it with the same speed or efficiency. TLO was using the cursor keys to scroll around for a long time... (yes, seriously, Day9 even asked his viewers to tell TLO to stop that...) Just because some pros are doing something one way doesn't make it the best way.
TLO didn't use army hotkeys for a long time. That was something special.
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I think mechanics are important to play on an certain level like GM. But to be one of the bests u need a very good understanding of the game, and that means not only strategy it means, to know when to engage and where. There are many factors to be the best i think, but they must all be fullfilled.
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On April 11 2012 01:19 VasHeR wrote:
what are screen hotkeys?
You can bind them in SC2s hotkey options. You can bind a screen like a hotkey and press the hotkey to go back to that parituclar view. It's mostly used in BW to hotkey the view of your production structures to macro.
In SC2 it's mainly used for expansions when you want to build more buildings. Also used by protoss when you want to warp in at a particular place at the map while fighting for instance.
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I'm a high masters/grandmaster on NA, and I've never used screen/camera hotkeys.
How important are they? How many of the top koreans or even top foreigners use them?
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On April 11 2012 03:04 M[a]LiCe wrote:
I'm a high masters/grandmaster on NA, and I've never used screen/camera hotkeys.
How important are they? How many of the top koreans or even top foreigners use them?
Koreans use them a lot from what I can tell. I don't really see too many reasons as zerg to use them, since I have high apm and click my minimap fairly efficiently anyway. It's occasionally nice to bind a particularly dangerous base to make sure you're 100% able to get to it as fast as possible if it gets attacked though.
Also hai fellow michigan zerg.
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On April 11 2012 00:27 Advocado wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 22:47 Morfildur wrote:On April 10 2012 22:41 Advocado wrote:
Stephano actually clicks around the minimap so you saying that lower level players doing this is bad, is incorrect. If that makes any sense. Obviously they dont do it with the same speed or efficiency. TLO was using the cursor keys to scroll around for a long time... (yes, seriously, Day9 even asked his viewers to tell TLO to stop that...) Just because some pros are doing something one way doesn't make it the best way. It works pretty well for him clearly. Obviously work with keybindings, but just using keybindings and not granting the mouse a single thought in mechanics is a mistake. Its a very precise way of getting around the minimap when stuff isnt hotkey.
He has notariously bad carpal tunnel. That needs to be taken into account when you're looking to be effective with keyboard hotkeys/mouse.
Also I have no idea what the OP is trying to say. That EAPM is the key to success? because macro is the most important thing. Everyone who is good at sc2 has amazing macro. From there things like EAPM, etc start to seperate the top level pros. But there is a reason that all of them have amazing macro. Example, the Stephano/DRG style 13 minute 200 roach push that even at the pro level is pretty much just 1a and create units until the protoss quits.
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fixed the second picture. :D
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I've been using screen hotkeys since the hotkey update came out.
Its really useful as terran especially because you can go back and build stuff in < 2 seconds.
It also really helps with maynarding workers. Its way faster than clicking on the minimap.
Another huge bonus to it is that it lets you plan out your expansion pattern as Day9 once mentioned. I usually hotkey my main and the next 3-4 bases I'm going to take over the course of a game.
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Those numbers don't entirely support the gap theory.
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On April 10 2012 08:07 jj33 wrote:
mechanics are only half the battle.
in bw, if you had good mechanics, but crappy mind games and bad on spot decision making you were getting nowhere.
same is true in sc2..
Koreans would beat foreigners with extremely weak builds they would never use vs top tier pros purely because of their superior mechanics.
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I think decision making is more important at the highest levels.
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On April 10 2012 08:17 RedDragon571 wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:13 Corsica wrote:
Zenio has highest EAPM in GSL, but does it make him very successful? Mechanics are good, but there are tons of example where people with bad (progamer wise) mechanics do very well. your evidence doesnt support your argument... See this is what people will derail this thread into. My argument is that koreans on average have better mechanics, therefore korean's are better on average. Not that having the high eapm will make you the best player, only that you have the necessary mechanics to become one of the best players.
Better mechanics is one factor. Koreans on average are better at everything in SC 2:
* Mechanics
* Builds
* Tactics
* Game sense
* Meta-game Understanding
* Preparation
But yes, being faster helps.
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i definitely feel mechanics are underrated in SC2. i have heard alot of people say that mechanics are not important at a certain point in sc2 compared to brood war which i think is just false. Even though i would agree that broodwar was harder, the nature of a game like starcraft is you can always get better and i think sc2 is no different then brood war in that way
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So what exactly are they doing whilst at 200 apm waiting for the first probe / drone / scv to build?
Ive watched replays and all i see is selecting (which doesnt count) or movement spam.
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Great write-up.
Of course the individual player's mechanics to individual tournament performance relationship isn't perfect.
But when you compare average EAPM of the koreans to the average EAPM of even the best foreigners, there is an undeniable trend.
And the argument that "OMFG it's just spam with 5 probes" isn't a good one, because that's only a small portion of time in an average pro match,
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I'm sorry, but what? Did you take the time to count through your own data? Because from my tally (counting such people as Select, Real, etc. as foreigners, and excluding the accounts with #2 on them, which are almost always higher than the primary), I've got a tally of 13 foreigners to 17 Koreans. You want to claim that that's significant data? What's more, if I expand the count to 35, I get 18 foreigners to 17 Koreans. Conclusion - The reason foreigners are worse than Koreans is because they have better eAPM, right? Now, there are two people whose eAPM is a bit higher than everyone else - Zenio and Losira. You're cherry-picking data when it supports you, and ignoring the fact that that chart basically proves you wrong.
Also note that you're data is chosen from some odd tournaments - MLG Winter Arena, Assembly Winter, and IEM world championships make some sense, to be sure, but the European battle.net invitational? What a great way to skew your data, by including a tournament that was more than half a year ago, and included only foreign competition. Now, if you took the time to analyze all of the replays from major tournaments starting this year, and were able to show a more compelling trend than you have now, I would be more inclined to believe it. As it stands now, however, you've done a shoddy job of putting together your evidence, and have proceded to draw conclusions that don't even match it.
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On April 10 2012 08:07 jj33 wrote:
mechanics are only half the battle.
in bw, if you had good mechanics, but crappy mind games and bad on spot decision making you were getting nowhere.
same is true in sc2..
Actually that's completely untrue for BW until you get up to the professional level, or at least A or so on iccup. At all levels of play besides the absolute highest, good mechanics won you a majority of your games by themselves.
Only after your mechanics were at close to peak efficiency was when mind games and decision making affected your winrate further beyond what your mechanics could do.
And a lot of SC2 pros are nowhere close to peak efficiency with their mechanics yet, so, take that how you will.
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what happen to select? haven'r heard anything about him
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On April 11 2012 09:43 Angra wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:07 jj33 wrote:
mechanics are only half the battle.
in bw, if you had good mechanics, but crappy mind games and bad on spot decision making you were getting nowhere.
same is true in sc2..
Actually that's completely untrue for BW until you get up to the professional level, or at least A or so on iccup. At all levels of play besides the absolute highest, good mechanics won you a majority of your games by themselves. Only after your mechanics were at close to peak efficiency was when mind games and decision making affected your winrate further beyond what your mechanics could do. And a lot of SC2 pros are nowhere close to peak efficiency with their mechanics yet, so, take that how you will.
Having awful decision making could throw alot of games even if you were better than them mechanic wise.
saying its untrue until A level is absurd, playing mind games at C level or better could net you quite a few wins, once players start to learn to jduge unit count to determine if an all in or anything is coming
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On April 11 2012 10:44 iky43210 wrote:
what happen to select? haven'r heard anything about him
He's going to open a hotel!
But well, he was at the last MLG Championship (unseeded in the open Bracket and didn't reach Pool Play) and at IPL4 (same here). Before he was at Assembly but lost to PuMa in the ro8.
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I think good mechanics and more specifically 'high APM' is underrated in SC2 mainly because of all the people that don't have it using successful pros with relatively low APM to excuse themselves for being bad in that respect.
APM and EAPM do play a great role, and in the hands of someone who knows what to do with them, it's scary.
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On April 10 2012 08:03 RedDragon571 wrote: Mechanics = The utilization of the keyboard, mouse and user interface to execute actions in the quickest and most efficient way. The Korean Gap = "Korean's own white dudes" -Moon at IEM The Korean Gap Effective Actions per minute = a value that can evaluate mechanical skill Sc2 Gears Replay Analysis from IEM world championship, MLG winter arena, Assembly winter, EU Bnet invitational "Koreans really do own white dudes" - The data Here is what I think truly defines the Korean Gap in Starcraft 2. Koreans have better mechanics and only the foreigners with the best mechanics can even hope to compete. In the top 30 of the Effective or Efficient actions per minute chart we can see that only a handful of foreigners are present. Idra, Ret, nerichio, stephano, select? The very top of the EAPM shows some ridiculous feats of mechanics by DRG, Losira, Taeja. Notice, Stephano one of the top foreign players, also has one of the top EAPM's competing with the top Korean's. While not necessarily indicating skill it would seem to reaffirm my Hypothesis that Koreans have much better mechanics on average and the top foreign big names have some of the best mechanics out of all foreigners. So for to foreigners to decrease this gap, it would seem a top level Starcraft player needs to aim for about 350 APM and 200 or so EAPM to compete with the titans winning all the tournaments. TEAM USA? The myths lower level players in NA face. Are they destroying mechanics? MACRO IS KING? Destiny clearly mentions improving mechanics, but most low level players really focused in on the macro part. I cannot tell you how many lower level players i have tried to talk to say "You mean macro?" when I mention mechanics. There are macro mechanics and micro mechanics but in general "mechanics" is not "macro" or "micro". Further discussion [D] Underused Tactic in Lower Leagues http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=326528How many bronze and silver level players are out there trying to focus on building workers, but clicking on the bottom right of the screen rather than using a hotkey. How many silver level players are getting their zerglings fried, because they tried to double click a fast moving group of unhotkeyed zerglings instead of control clicking them? How many gold players miss a few pylons because they sent a stalker to a watchtower by clicking and boxing it manually rather than cloning (Shift+deselect portraits)? How many platinum players cant keep their money low after 2 bases because they don't know how to tap to check their production? How many diamond players lost their entire army to a flank because they were watching their probes build at the nexus? How many masters players lost 20 drones to a stimmed marine drop, and responded to it too slow, cause the hotkeyed queen died and they don't use screen hotkeys? I hope you get my damn point. You can't learn how to macro and micro until you know the correct way's to get around the screen. Well, I am mad now, North American ladder needs to be like the korean ladder. But for the ladder to become competitive we need more competition. We need more plat's to become diamonds, and diamonds to become masters. We need to teach our lower level players better fundamentals. And our NA pro's could swallow their pride a bit and improve their mechanics also. I leave you with possibly one of the most useful Day9 daily's of all time.
"Only true masters of starcraft can clone themselves"
-Ret, MC, PuMa
![[image loading]](http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_5BoBvPjywDk/Rp3yjojTeYI/AAAAAAAAANE/LyhzthTHooQ/s400/horatio460.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/brookproves/ca/images/a/a1/Awww_yeah.jpg)
User was warned for this post
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As long as there are higher league players ready to dismiss this because "I'm masters/diamond," improvement won't really take place. I think it's one thing about the NA or even EU ladder scene that stagnates the growth of players. The willingness to call oneself into question, entertaining the possibly that he or she could be wrong, is paramount of improvement. Sadly, it's also something that a lot of people lack.
I fully agree with the OP, in that mechanics account for a pretty big gap between Korean and foreigner skill level. Far too many times, a Korean player is able to get back into the game because they are able to abuse their stronger mechanics. Terran players with extremely high APM and multitasking like MMA pull foreigner Zergs apart because these Zerg players cannot handle the pressure on multiple fronts. Also, someone like MarineKing, with unmatched unit control. He wins far too many engagements he should not be able to because of his Marine control. Macro doesn't even matter at this point, when you can trap MarineKing's units with forcefields or land cost-efficient Baneling hits.
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The data would only seem to suggest that there's generally more things you can do at a time as Z and T, that are probably more macro orientated, whereas P is more reliant precision micro during battles leading to the high redundancy in their actions. Though at the moment I do not see the trend across the players that scored low APM reduction that would be able to describe them as a single group, as there are probably a variety of reasons that contribute to it.
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On April 11 2012 15:56 timoi210 wrote:
Please dont do that.... :/
Also, everyone in this thread should read what Tobberoth wrote. He gets it...
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Puma, Nestea and MMA don't have APM that stand out.
There's no correlation between extremely high APM and tournament performance.
You're seeing what you want to see.
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mechanics can definitely help you win, but it's not all there is to it.
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APM thread without merz? blasphemy!
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Maybe people just don't care about the game enough to try and understand it on the level that the Koreans have trained themselves to understand it on. Even "professional" players don't ever seem to be putting all that much effort into their training, they just ladder over and over.
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Mechanics is a direct correlation to your skill level. Your skill level is heavily influenced by your mechanics.
You will never see a permanent bronze leaguer with solid mechanics and 150apm nor will you ever see a grand master with crap mechanics and 50 maximum apm.
Polt would probably maintain 250+ apm if you asked him for an exhibition.
There's no use in arguing the fact that mechanics is the single most efficient way of getting better. Pro Koreans train 10+ hours a day on mechanics, not on strategy.
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Yea, Stephano is really really fast. Has allways been one of his strongest asset. But I agree with others APM is only a small part of being a great player but ofcourse it helps
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+ Show Spoiler +On April 10 2012 09:55 turdburgler wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 09:34 KimJong1L wrote:
A friend of mine who played with Mondragon & smi.Fonger once gave me some insight about how come Koreans play better. It's like their national sport. If the best Soccer players come out of Germany/Italy/Spain and the best Rugby players come out of New Zealand/Australia because those countries focus on that game so much, how is it different to how Korea produces the best SC II players? If such is the case, of course these guys will have better mechanics/macro/eapm. but that doesnt actually answer the question of why does it. thats just stating the question and the answer. it seems pretty clear in generalities the reason is as simple as time invested. especially during your younger years where you are able to grasp new ideas a lot easier, time put in has a direct correlation to success. this is nothing new and nothing im about to write next is anything new either, people just either dont want to hear it or whatever, but koreans are still ahead and theres no reason to believe that will change any time soon. now we can look at effective practice as opposed to just laddering. and the Korean team house system still has everyone else beat. some western teams have made houses, by which they mean 'oh ye we bought a house and threw some random players in there gg'. these simplistic recreations are basically worthless. if you look at people who are considered 'the best' as opposed to those who have random success there's a huge correlation in having a dedicated coach, not wasting time with shows and not streaming much. now this sucks for fans but it really does seem that fan interaction is the biggest sign that someone is bad, or atleast has a bad mindset of 'oh ye i have time to spare with starcraft, i dont need more practice'. the simplist demonstration of all of this was mma vs stephano at ipl this weekend. stephano has been riding a huge hype train for ages now. now thats not to say he isnt a very talented player, and im not saying hes been lucky or hes bad or whatever...but compared to mma there was no comparison. he was dismantled by superior multitasking alone. what mma did was basically an exercise in macro management. he didnt use the eye popping marine splits of marineking, but instead he put himself in a situation where he would never need to. he approached dropping as a macro mechanic, giving simplistic management to 3+ drops rather than 100% of his attention to one. this mechanical approach to play is something that only comes from hours of practice, good, effective practice. not streaming for fans and not appearing on talk shows. so what is the korean difference? its all about their mindset. to become the best they can be is above winning. if you play the best winning will come in time, playing to win is a short sighted goal that favors cheesey play that might work once, instead of well practiced mechanical play that will last for perhaps years. this is slightly tangential to the OPs original post but it seemed relevent. Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 09:52 Biggun69 wrote:
Notice that there are no protoss players anywhere near the top of the list . . . but notice dde is one of the fastest players in the world and yet is probably a top 200 ish player in terms of skill. lets all draw random conclusions! Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:56 Megaliskuu wrote:
Is your first image APM or EAPM?? cuz even most BW pros dont have 250+ EAPM lol. pretty sure its apm, the mistake in his picture posting could of been caused by the bug in game that reversed the 2 numbers this/last patch idk. Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:47 liberal wrote:
There is no myth.... Obviously good macro requires good mechanics. If some lower level players think that good macro and good mechanics are somehow separate, then they are simply ignorant. the myth is more that if you ladder 8 hours a day in a house that happens to contain other starcraft players you will eventually win a gsl
DDE is not one of the fastest players in the world. Just because he rapidly spams 1 2 3 4 again and again doesnt meant you are fast and have good apm.
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We are not talking about what it takes to be a great player. We are not talking about unique cases. Its about the correlation of mechanics and skill level. Are you guys too s,s,s,stupid or something?
How about we North Americans suck because we can't keep our big mouths closed long enough for our ears to hear the truth. We always got some argument like look at this guy or that guy that defies the odds. Guess what? For every one special person, there are thousands of average ass clowns like you and I and the only way you and I are gonna stand a chance to get better is through mechanics alone.
Truth.
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On April 10 2012 14:06 namedplayer wrote:
Fruitdealer is super slow, yet he was able to win the first GSL.
No, fruitdealer was not slow.
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On April 12 2012 01:12 Biggun69 wrote:
DDE is not one of the fastest players in the world. Just because he rapidly spams 1 2 3 4 again and again doesnt meant you are fast and have good apm.
There's a reason why there's APM and EAPM.
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On April 11 2012 23:12 ImGonnaRideYou wrote:
Mechanics is a direct correlation to your skill level. Your skill level is heavily influenced by your mechanics.
You will never see a permanent bronze leaguer with solid mechanics and 150apm nor will you ever see a grand master with crap mechanics and 50 maximum apm.
Polt would probably maintain 250+ apm if you asked him for an exhibition.
There's no use in arguing the fact that mechanics is the single most efficient way of getting better. Pro Koreans train 10+ hours a day on mechanics, not on strategy.
YAY! There is intelligence on this planet! I think foreign players and especially NA players look for some gimmick to win, whereas the true way to win is to play solid. IM_MVP dominated until his wrist fell off, based on unique and interesting builds? no, Crazy cheese play? NO Based upon solid mechanics and decision making playing completely standard. YES.. the best players in the world at the moment play completely standard in almost every matchup, they rely on mechanics not insane strategic brilliance to win.
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On April 11 2012 16:52 chambertin wrote:Please dont do that.... :/ Also, everyone in this thread should read what Tobberoth wrote. He gets it...
Lol i laughed.
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On April 12 2012 01:12 Biggun69 wrote:+ Show Spoiler +On April 10 2012 09:55 turdburgler wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 09:34 KimJong1L wrote:
A friend of mine who played with Mondragon & smi.Fonger once gave me some insight about how come Koreans play better. It's like their national sport. If the best Soccer players come out of Germany/Italy/Spain and the best Rugby players come out of New Zealand/Australia because those countries focus on that game so much, how is it different to how Korea produces the best SC II players? If such is the case, of course these guys will have better mechanics/macro/eapm. but that doesnt actually answer the question of why does it. thats just stating the question and the answer. it seems pretty clear in generalities the reason is as simple as time invested. especially during your younger years where you are able to grasp new ideas a lot easier, time put in has a direct correlation to success. this is nothing new and nothing im about to write next is anything new either, people just either dont want to hear it or whatever, but koreans are still ahead and theres no reason to believe that will change any time soon. now we can look at effective practice as opposed to just laddering. and the Korean team house system still has everyone else beat. some western teams have made houses, by which they mean 'oh ye we bought a house and threw some random players in there gg'. these simplistic recreations are basically worthless. if you look at people who are considered 'the best' as opposed to those who have random success there's a huge correlation in having a dedicated coach, not wasting time with shows and not streaming much. now this sucks for fans but it really does seem that fan interaction is the biggest sign that someone is bad, or atleast has a bad mindset of 'oh ye i have time to spare with starcraft, i dont need more practice'. the simplist demonstration of all of this was mma vs stephano at ipl this weekend. stephano has been riding a huge hype train for ages now. now thats not to say he isnt a very talented player, and im not saying hes been lucky or hes bad or whatever...but compared to mma there was no comparison. he was dismantled by superior multitasking alone. what mma did was basically an exercise in macro management. he didnt use the eye popping marine splits of marineking, but instead he put himself in a situation where he would never need to. he approached dropping as a macro mechanic, giving simplistic management to 3+ drops rather than 100% of his attention to one. this mechanical approach to play is something that only comes from hours of practice, good, effective practice. not streaming for fans and not appearing on talk shows. so what is the korean difference? its all about their mindset. to become the best they can be is above winning. if you play the best winning will come in time, playing to win is a short sighted goal that favors cheesey play that might work once, instead of well practiced mechanical play that will last for perhaps years. this is slightly tangential to the OPs original post but it seemed relevent. Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 09:52 Biggun69 wrote:
Notice that there are no protoss players anywhere near the top of the list . . . but notice dde is one of the fastest players in the world and yet is probably a top 200 ish player in terms of skill. lets all draw random conclusions! Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:56 Megaliskuu wrote:
Is your first image APM or EAPM?? cuz even most BW pros dont have 250+ EAPM lol. pretty sure its apm, the mistake in his picture posting could of been caused by the bug in game that reversed the 2 numbers this/last patch idk. Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:47 liberal wrote:
There is no myth.... Obviously good macro requires good mechanics. If some lower level players think that good macro and good mechanics are somehow separate, then they are simply ignorant. the myth is more that if you ladder 8 hours a day in a house that happens to contain other starcraft players you will eventually win a gsl DDE is not one of the fastest players in the world. Just because he rapidly spams 1 2 3 4 again and again doesnt meant you are fast and have good apm.
I don't get your logic. Pressing buttons fast isn't pressing buttons fast because it doesn't fit into your definition of pressing buttons fast? He has high apm. He's efficient. He's good. I don't see what argument you are trying to make.
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On April 10 2012 08:03 RedDragon571 wrote:
Well, I am mad now, North American ladder needs to be like the korean ladder. But for the ladder to become competitive we need more competition. We need more plat's to become diamonds, and diamonds to become masters. We need to teach our lower level players better fundamentals. And our NA pro's could swallow their pride a bit and improve their mechanics also.
errr, you can't get 'more plats to become diamonds' it's a percentage based system. I think you mean you need plat level players be be as good as the current diamond players.
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On April 12 2012 09:59 Kharnage wrote:Show nested quote +On April 10 2012 08:03 RedDragon571 wrote:
Well, I am mad now, North American ladder needs to be like the korean ladder. But for the ladder to become competitive we need more competition. We need more plat's to become diamonds, and diamonds to become masters. We need to teach our lower level players better fundamentals. And our NA pro's could swallow their pride a bit and improve their mechanics also.
errr, you can't get 'more plats to become diamonds' it's a percentage based system. I think you mean you need plat level players be be as good as the current diamond players.
He's saying that it's a moving average so people need to continue to improve in order for ALL of us (but especially those at the top) to improve.
I think people need to stop trying to justify why APM or EAPM doesn't matter and just accept that you absolutely cannot play this game at a high level if you are slow mechanically. A lot of players like to think of this game as "strategy", as chess, but that's absolutely not true. The skill ceiling of SC2 is in a player's execution, not in the player's mental ability. You can have the best, most thought-out plan in the world, but if you cannot execute it against a marine drop at 2 places while the main army is pushing your 3rd, it doesn't matter. That's what most people who start playing SC2 find out...that you cannot learn the game by just watching VODs.
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Looking at mkp's apm and redundancy, its makes me look at my own and think... "why you so redundant?"
i have the same apm as mkp but my redundancy is 51% -_-
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Lol, guys while there is a lot of room for Strategy in SC2...... the best strategy on the world won´t help you if your hands can´t keep up with your brain.
Being smart is important but really decent mechanics are the platform through which you launch your strategy. If you have a weak base the higher functions fall apart.
Dunno why people are arguing that. While APM may not be the best indicator(never was since people started spamming) it does have some correlation with your base mechanics.
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On April 12 2012 10:29 denzelz wrote:Show nested quote +On April 12 2012 09:59 Kharnage wrote:On April 10 2012 08:03 RedDragon571 wrote:
Well, I am mad now, North American ladder needs to be like the korean ladder. But for the ladder to become competitive we need more competition. We need more plat's to become diamonds, and diamonds to become masters. We need to teach our lower level players better fundamentals. And our NA pro's could swallow their pride a bit and improve their mechanics also.
errr, you can't get 'more plats to become diamonds' it's a percentage based system. I think you mean you need plat level players be be as good as the current diamond players. He's saying that it's a moving average so people need to continue to improve in order for ALL of us (but especially those at the top) to improve. I think people need to stop trying to justify why APM or EAPM doesn't matter and just accept that you absolutely cannot play this game at a high level if you are slow mechanically. A lot of players like to think of this game as "strategy", as chess, but that's absolutely not true. The skill ceiling of SC2 is in a player's execution, not in the player's mental ability. You can have the best, most thought-out plan in the world, but if you cannot execute it against a marine drop at 2 places while the main army is pushing your 3rd, it doesn't matter. That's what most people who start playing SC2 find out... that you cannot learn the game by just watching VODs.
Heh, and thats the problem with so many of the supposedly high Bronze low GSL level people that are so vocal sometimes. There is indeed a mechanical component to SC2. Just by understanding the game won´t make you automatically better.
I find it kinda sad that there are so many people who just use the excuse of ¨learning¨ to watch VODS all day (which is not wrong, it is fun to see them) and then proceed to not practice. Having lived through a situation 100 times will always make you better prepared than reading a book on how to handle it.
Ideally both methods should be done, but some of the ladder anxiety people will never improve unless they play the game once in a while.
Meh, I just welcome the Korean overlords
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On April 11 2012 08:52 MrTortoise wrote:
So what exactly are they doing whilst at 200 apm waiting for the first probe / drone / scv to build?
Ive watched replays and all i see is selecting (which doesnt count) or movement spam.
Nothing much... but it does get you into a rhythm for the rest of the game.
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EPT
