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The Armchair Athleticism critical series is an opinion-base article series regarding the issues and sociocultural deficiencies of the E-Sports and StarCraft scene. All articles are perceptive-base and revolving around my own experiences and understanding of the subculture.
+ Show Spoiler [summary introduction] +The Solo Trail – Unbeaten - Posted on October 20th, 2012Short version of credentials: - Manager of 5 progaming teams (50+ professional players)
- Writer for 11 E-sports websites (5 team sites + 4 organizations: 150+ docs/articles)
- Organizer or Contributor of 11 community events (74,000 viewers/attendants)
- Some video-editing for one or two organizations, nothing big, just twitch.tv highlight-editing, presentational writing, etc.
Why are you starting your own space? I was listening to the suggestions of several friends and I finally started this space after I hit a dead-end in my endeavours in E-Sports. I’m at a point where I am not really affiliated with anyone and now’s a better time than ever to do some opinion topics. Doing my own content meant I would be alone and would work around my own initiative, drive and interest. However, it also meant that I may do something that requires more work than I thought and I would be on my own. It meant that the community reception can be more direct and harsh towards me personally and my views as I would not be backed by some credible organization as when I was writer for some. In the end, this series that took me about a month of writing, editing, verification and re-writing will really be everything I’ve learned, observed and felt throughout my time. I started out with three pieces and ended up going to ten. All of them delve into inspecting the five perspectives of the scene: teams, tournaments, players, spectators and contributors. Ultimately, it aims to really take a strong look into the many issues that inhibit the StarCraft community and E-Sports culture.
What Blizzard's World Championship Series Means & Entails - Posted on April 3, 2013
With the announcement of the StarCraft II World Championship Series (2013) made public, many questions and excitement have arose around the scene. Teams, fans and organizers are both delighted with what’s been planned, but also anxious to see how it’ll further the reach of the idea of E-Sports. We called for the idea back in November, 2012 under the article name: Splitting the Scene for Regional Champions with hope that something similar to WCS would be pushed forward to help all scenes and their players prosper and rank amongst one another:
“But at the same time, there is definitely a lack of outlets for foreign players to shine and rank themselves amongst one another with a monetary prize-finish at the end. The suggestion of regional-prized tournaments ranging from different levels helps alleviate the frustrations for many players and connect them back with challengers they can build off from one another.
[…] A good mix of region-based leagues and international tournaments creates a balanced and constant cycling of both aspiring professional players and levels of champions from local to national to international. With a more gradual spread of tournaments, there should be a result of less emphasis on having a Korean (currently the best players) on your team and more demand for foreigners to improve instead of becoming the marketing extremity. This will also add more stable grounds for smaller teams to compete rather than rely on mercenaries to compensate (Team Legion, Check-Six, Alt-Tab) for roster inadequacies.”
This World Championship Series from Blizzard is definitely in the right step, but also has various drawbacks. Their reasons to create this season World Championship Series is a dilemma readers and fans are probably already familiar with:
“First, while the abundance of tournaments spawned tons of lively competition, it also made it difficult for players and teams to avoid scheduling conflicts. More importantly, for spectators, there was nothing tying the events together to create a unified storyline, and it was hard to identify who the best players were from week to week.”
[we wrote the same things in The Lack of Storytelling in E-Sports’ Events (Dec. 2012) and The Overabundance of Tournaments & Branching Problems (Nov. 2012)]
Indeed, as explained in the 2013 WCS overview, this system not only creates a proper boundary schedule for any person’s career (between April and November), it also allows for tournament organizations to properly line up their event for equal distribution of fan-interest as well as high-player attendance (both from the reputable players to the aspiring ones).
In 2010 and 2011, Blizzard was in the background, delegating power and rights to various groups to establish a base of major tournaments and organizations. 2012 and 2013, they shifted away from a background position to being the forefront and captain of the E-Sports boat. Their semi-RIOT LCS (League of Legends) and FGC EVO (fighting games) system enables a consistent format for spectators to comprehend. It streamlines importance for all events of all regions equally and events within WCS (ESL, MLG, GSL, OGN/OSL and Proleague) grant seedings to WCS Season Finals. Here are some of the positives that WCS entails: - Creates an even schedule of multiple seasons, allowing for proper budgetary planning and scheduling for players and teams (I expect contracts to be drawn up less annually and more every two seasons, especially with newer recruits).
- It creates regional champions and helps teams earn reputation and reward for their players (see: Minor Tournaments – A Progamer’s Resume [Jan. 2013])
- Limits power struggles between organizations and the need to “one-up” one another through amount of prize-pool (to thus attract popular progamers) and other tactics.
- Easy system to rank players regionally and worldwide to know who really is the best not through number of achievements, but through consistent performance and ranked points.
- Allows the possibility of new champions rising and recycles those who longer are ahead of the curve.
The drawbacks to this system are evident, but were also inevitable as the scene expanded beyond its capability and reached. What people called “oversaturation” was merely a race to be relevant and a staple to the E-Sport. MLG, ESL and OGN/GSL are clearly the winners here and while Blizzard’s point-system can also be attributed to non-WCS events, it also means the following: - NASL (NA), DreamHack (EU) and Proleague (KeSPA) [KR] will likely be part of the scoop of points attributed to WCS rankings and seeds, it also means they are considered second-class events due to their less impactful effect on a WCS season.
- This point-system also means that any other tournament organizations looking to get involved in StarCraft II will have a steeper climb to reach relevancy.
- Minor tournaments will likely see even less activity and participation as WCS online components of participation will attract many aspiring players (since it is more likely to attract a major team’s attention: see; Minor Tournaments – A Progamer’s Resume [Jan. 2013])
- Events that are not associated with WCS nor receiving points to attribute to WCS seedings will have to fit their events within the championship series (and also create a reason why people should watch it).
As stated, the drawbacks are minor given the downward slope in terms of number of new tournaments and competitions being created. The online portion of WCS will also attract cheaters and potential hackers, but that is something that is both inevitable and small in exchange for convenience and widening the ability to attract as many new competitors as possible.
The truth of it all is that Blizzard’s World Championship Series is a step in the right direction, few disagree, many don’t agree with some of the smaller issues such as the pseudo-region lock. Such as ways to bypass the system in which Koreans will be in North American system knowing they are not up to snuff to prevail in the GSL/OSL and Proleague. The point system can also be trouble if improperly balanced where we may see another Pool Play issue (players who have not been succeeding, continue to maintain seedings and points due to their achievement many months ago). In short, the faults and issues with the World Championship Series are both minor and hastening the process that was occurring already, the upside to it all is that the prize-money is elevated, the opportunity to compete is less costly and stories are created. With Blizzard’s WCS, the foundation of competition is elevated and the next step for StarCraft II has begun!
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Good overview for people who missed it. I think you nailed the whole analysis!
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Great write up. 
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I think you would do yourself a favor by spreading your text out - as it stands, it is too dense. Hard to read and easy to skip. Thanks for your effort in any case!
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The points ranking system could really ruin the whole thing if they don't get it right. For example if say Stephano, Nerchio, Huk, Scarlett, Grubby etc... completely dominate their regions they could theoretically end up with more points than any Koreans just off dominating their regionals even if they bomb out of the end of season Globals, just because the Korean scene is likely to be a lot more fluid in terms of winners/successful players than the foreign scenes.
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Good write-up
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I think you should have waited to post this. When I woke up this morning, I was eager to be blown away by the news but it was underwhelming. There is very little details regarding the intricacies of the system and though it is in spirit a step in the right direction, I wonder if it's going to work as well as planned. Nevertheless I think the subject warrants a deeper analysis down the road - which I'm eagerly awaiting to read because right now I have little opinion on the matter.
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On April 04 2013 05:18 Aeroplaneoverthesea wrote:
The points ranking system could really ruin the whole thing if they don't get it right. For example if say Stephano, Nerchio, Huk, Scarlett, Grubby etc... completely dominate their regions they could theoretically end up with more points than any Koreans just off dominating their regionals even if they bomb out of the end of season Globals, just because the Korean scene is likely to be a lot more fluid in terms of winners/successful players than the foreign scenes.
I am sure Blizzard will get it right. Point systems in leagues have always been part of playing the "game" of competing and strategic decisions on which events to attend is part of that game. I think it is good that some Korean players will have to look at their ranking and say "damn, I need to go to Dream Hack/NASL to make sure I qualify for WCS this season."(Assuming the points can be applied to any region).
It is part of the fun and part of being a competitor. Do you practice and focus on the next event or do you make travel time to go to another event to secure WCS points? Which is better. Do you double down and try to place highly, or spread yourself a bit thinner?
It is part of a complex league is playing the system within the league. As long as the system is fair and all events have appropriate weight, it will be a blast to watch and speculate about.
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Great GREAT move by Blizzard. SC2 has been at each others throats for a while I feel like, with so many tournaments and diminishing market share, it's awesome to see Blizzard really attempting to put together a viable, long term structure that while not perfect (cmon we should know that by now), is built to last a very long time.
Blizzard could have easily raked in profits, sat back, and slowly developed LotV, but instead, shows incredible passion to develop a huge, worldwide event structure.
Bravo.
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Good write-up, I think you nailed the case spot on. I'm personally greatly looking forward to this new, cleaner system of competitive Starcraft 2.
One thing though:
Indeed, as explained in the 2013 WCS overview, this system not only creates a proper bordoundary schedule for any person’s career (between April and November), it also allows for tournament organizations to properly line up their event for equal distribution of fan-interest as well as high-player attendance (both from the reputable players to the aspiring ones).
What does this word mean, I can't find it on any translator! Is it a typo for border?
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I will have to see if MLG/ESL are winners in this case. They will have to hire some extra/new employees to handle all that content and it being online... i dont think it will draw a lot of viewers but i dont know if Blizzard will pay for the production as well etc so will see.
NASL is basically screwed but i think Dreamhack only wins from this hole situation if you get some WCS points at their events, in that case they only gain something without having to invest anything and they loose nothing.
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Thank you! This is great!
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Very good write-up. I remember what iNcontroL said yesterday in Lo3 this move is just not "good" but it is freaking awesome (or something to that effect). It is indeed a move in the right direction and even if there are valid concerns about the finer details of WCS, I am sure Blizz will do something to address those.
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Thanks guys (: I could use the feedback! checkout my other articles for interesting content
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Limits power struggles between organizations and the need to “one-up” one another through amount of prize-pool (to thus attract popular progamers) and other tactics.
That's neutral. It has drawbacks in itself because competition is healthy for business and even though Blizzard increased their prize pool by just over double who's to say organizers and sponsors won't feel that need to put more into it.
Easy system to rank players regionally and worldwide to know who really is the best not through number of achievements, but through consistent performance and ranked points.
The system isn't that easy. Have to wait and see how they split the points and I don't like the idea of points being awarded for Team Leagues. I think those results should be separate because it makes the system more complicated than need be. The WCS should stand on it's own and the points for premiere tournaments should be minimal.
Allows the possibility of new champions rising and recycles those who longer are ahead of the curve.
That was never an issue to begin with. As we've seen with the short SC2 history. Champions change all the frigging time. Eras are relatively short but some names make themselves relevant like MC. That's where you have to consider how many more tournaments he plays in though at the same time. Sort of helps when you are the ambassador for SK in SC2.
The drawbacks to this system are evident, but were also inevitable as the scene expanded beyond its capability and reached. What people called “oversaturation” was merely a race to be relevant and a staple to the E-Sport. MLG, ESL and OGN/GSL are clearly the winners here and while Blizzard’s point-system can also be attributed to non-WCS events, it also means the following:
- NASL (NA), DreamHack (EU) and Proleague (KeSPA) [KR] will likely be part of the scoop of points attributed to WCS rankings and seeds, it also means they are considered second-class events due to their less impactful effect on a WCS season.
This doesn't address the saturation problem. Yes premiere tournaments reward you with points but the WCS is still another tournament. Instead of one season. We now have three. I would not consider the tournaments you described as 2nd class tournaments. They stand alone on themselves just like Iron Squid and look at how well they did. I'm sure tournaments like the Iron Squid will find a good time slot for the players who make it to the final.
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The main thing I am confused about is the system for qualification to later seasons... How does the qualification system into the WCS regional seasons work? How will a new player, or a player that failed to qualify previously be able to make it into the season matches?
Basic questions -
How many players can play in each region per season?
How are these players decided?
What do players outside of the WCS seasons do while they are unable to gain points through the season they are missing?
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On April 04 2013 06:55 StarStruck wrote:Show nested quote +Limits power struggles between organizations and the need to “one-up” one another through amount of prize-pool (to thus attract popular progamers) and other tactics. That's neutral. It has drawbacks in itself because competition is healthy for business and even though Blizzard increased their prize pool by just over double who's to say organizers and sponsors won't feel that need to put more into it. Show nested quote +Easy system to rank players regionally and worldwide to know who really is the best not through number of achievements, but through consistent performance and ranked points. The system isn't that easy. Have to wait and see how they split the points and I don't like the idea of points being awarded for Team Leagues. I think those results should be separate because it makes the system more complicated than need be. The WCS should stand on it's own and the points for premiere tournaments should be minimal. Show nested quote +Allows the possibility of new champions rising and recycles those who longer are ahead of the curve. That was never an issue to begin with. As we've seen with the short SC2 history. Champions change all the frigging time. Eras are relatively short but some names make themselves relevant like MC. That's where you have to consider how many more tournaments he plays in though at the same time. Sort of helps when you are the ambassador for SK in SC2. Show nested quote +The drawbacks to this system are evident, but were also inevitable as the scene expanded beyond its capability and reached. What people called “oversaturation” was merely a race to be relevant and a staple to the E-Sport. MLG, ESL and OGN/GSL are clearly the winners here and while Blizzard’s point-system can also be attributed to non-WCS events, it also means the following:
- NASL (NA), DreamHack (EU) and Proleague (KeSPA) [KR] will likely be part of the scoop of points attributed to WCS rankings and seeds, it also means they are considered second-class events due to their less impactful effect on a WCS season. This doesn't address the saturation problem. Yes premiere tournaments reward you with points but the WCS is still another tournament. Instead of one season. We now have three. I would not consider the tournaments you described as 2nd class tournaments. They stand alone on themselves just like Iron Squid and look at how well they did. I'm sure tournaments like the Iron Squid will find a good time slot for the players who make it to the final.
I agree with team-leagues shouldn't be awarding points, but I also agree with Blizzard's move with the point-system to ensure that the current surviving tournaments do not die out by their new seasonal WCS.
Putting more money into it doesn't really change much because they are no longer competing with one another for viewership because they should be having all their separate time (and also their own players if this region-lock kicks in). That said, they probably won't put in more and that's also a potential downside.
Champions change, but favourites stay the same, even though some have low achievements (or none at all). Some players who aren't known beat top-players all the time. I want these WCS regions to be their stage (hopefully). They may not win, but the point-system, should be able to retain some competent competitors.
That's what I mean.
I don't understand how that doesn't address the saturation problem? You didn't explain.
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So excited to watch wcs, its awesome how much blizz is putting into esports, i think this is going to be an awesome move by them
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So there are 5 spots given to the finals of this season just based off this one GSL correct? But how will they decide the 5th because there is top 4 and then top 8, no top 5 
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One thing I'm sad you glossed over was the pseudo-region lock and the inevitable "Korean domination" that a region lock is supposed to prohibit. It's like you confronted the other "issues" but then noted this one and completely avoided it. Considering this is the biggest problem facing ESPORTS (NA scene in particular losing more and more options for competent players because there's nothing for them to play for), I was disappointed.
I say that, but all I really want is Sundance, NASL, and IPL to come out and admit that they not only lied to NA players, but screwed us. This is just me shitting the bed, as I'm wont to do when the different regional scenes are brought up. Because on paper WCS is awesome. I won't deny that at all. But I'm getting more and more tired of these companies saying they'll throw us a bone (because they swear they know its worth it) only to "forget" they ever said they'd even go to the goddamn store.
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On April 04 2013 07:44 Mauldo wrote:
One thing I'm sad you glossed over was the pseudo-region lock and the inevitable "Korean domination" that a region lock is supposed to prohibit. It's like you confronted the other "issues" but then noted this one and completely avoided it. Considering this is the biggest problem facing ESPORTS (NA scene in particular losing more and more options for competent players because there's nothing for them to play for), I was disappointed.
I say that, but all I really want is Sundance, NASL, and IPL to come out and admit that they not only lied to NA players, but screwed us. This is just me shitting the bed, as I'm wont to do when the different regional scenes are brought up. Because on paper WCS is awesome. I won't deny that at all. But I'm getting more and more tired of these companies saying they'll throw us a bone (because they swear they know its worth it) only to "forget" they ever said they'd even go to the goddamn store.
My view on it is that it is inevitable or the other way around would be both a semantical (loophole) thing and a huge headache to handle (is Violet Korean or USA?). It's a huge "between a rock and a hard place" sort of situation.
To detail all that would require another 1,000 words.
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Excellent write-up, i only don't agree when you say minor tournaments will suffer a setback, well i don't totally agree with it to be honest, because as we can see from the list from DH: Stockholm, lot of koreans already signed up and others are on the way to be announced (CoCa and Creator), this might be because of the overflow some teams have from not going to IPL6, but the future is not as grim as you paint it for DH.
Great articule nonetheless
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With Blizzard’s WCS, the foundation of competition is elevated and the next step for StarCraft II has begun!
Why keep this sentence for the end, that's all I needed to know :D
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1000 words and no substance, I expect better from this series.
You refer to problems but neither flesh them out or offer solutions.
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On April 04 2013 07:44 Mauldo wrote:
One thing I'm sad you glossed over was the pseudo-region lock and the inevitable "Korean domination" that a region lock is supposed to prohibit. It's like you confronted the other "issues" but then noted this one and completely avoided it. Considering this is the biggest problem facing ESPORTS (NA scene in particular losing more and more options for competent players because there's nothing for them to play for), I was disappointed.
I say that, but all I really want is Sundance, NASL, and IPL to come out and admit that they not only lied to NA players, but screwed us. This is just me shitting the bed, as I'm wont to do when the different regional scenes are brought up. Because on paper WCS is awesome. I won't deny that at all. But I'm getting more and more tired of these companies saying they'll throw us a bone (because they swear they know its worth it) only to "forget" they ever said they'd even go to the goddamn store.
As an American you should probably know better than anyone that the only duty Sundance/IPL/NASL have is to make money and given how hard that is in this business you can't really blame them for doing what's profitable (getting big Koreans names to their tournament) over taking the moral high ground by helping out the local scene.
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This was a decent write-up and I think will be a good thing overall and what we have been dreaming of. I really want to watch State of the Game now, to see what they say!
I hope its not all rainbows and unicorns though, InControl makes me think he will be swagging in there making everyone agree its the best thing ever, I may call for the first time ever and add balance to that if they all go in slavishly praising Blizzard up and down although I do give props and respect to Blizz for what they've done.
What was kinda funny is NASL was never about the North Americans, I mean they did participate but it was basically for Koreans and some Euros when all said and done. People treating Dreamhack and NASL as somehow equal regional only tournaments bothers me. Dreamhack had far more Euro flavor than NASL had NA flavor IMHO. Now Iron Squid really doesn't need to exist even more, I felt like they got buried from this, since DH is a minor tourney what does that make Squid?
It is what it is though anyway, haven't given up on SC2 eSports yet and really want to see if the groups are cool and watch some great games. :D I may not watch subsequent games if its All Korean in all leagues though and switch to DoTA or something I dunno what, SC2 seems really unfair at this moment.
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On April 04 2013 08:09 E.L.V.I.S wrote:Show nested quote +With Blizzard’s WCS, the foundation of competition is elevated and the next step for StarCraft II has begun! Why keep this sentence for the end, that's all I needed to know :D
I'm an optimist, but try to keep it real lolo
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On April 04 2013 05:06 Torte de Lini wrote:
NASL (NA), DreamHack (EU) and Proleague (KeSPA) [KR] will likely be part of the scoop of points attributed to WCS rankings and seeds, it also means they are considered second-class events due to their less impactful effect on a WCS season.
I think organizing things in this way will increase total eyeballs on sc2 events, NASL/DH/PL will benefit from this. They gain a lot less than the tournies which are in the core of the new tournament ecosystem but they certainly aren't losing anything from it.
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The World Championship Series is in itself another tournament Torte. That's what I meant when I said the problem of over-saturation still exists because we will still have all those other tournaments running on top of this. Similarly to what we had when players were playing/qualifying for MLG and now they'll have this on top of it. It's a lot. Not just from a viewing standpoint but from a gamer standpoint too.
I don't see how this addresses the current viewership at all because I see the numbers of people tuning into majors being roughly the same when they tune into the twitch stream. It's the same market we're dealing with.
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On April 04 2013 07:52 Torte de Lini wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2013 07:44 Mauldo wrote:
One thing I'm sad you glossed over was the pseudo-region lock and the inevitable "Korean domination" that a region lock is supposed to prohibit. It's like you confronted the other "issues" but then noted this one and completely avoided it. Considering this is the biggest problem facing ESPORTS (NA scene in particular losing more and more options for competent players because there's nothing for them to play for), I was disappointed.
I say that, but all I really want is Sundance, NASL, and IPL to come out and admit that they not only lied to NA players, but screwed us. This is just me shitting the bed, as I'm wont to do when the different regional scenes are brought up. Because on paper WCS is awesome. I won't deny that at all. But I'm getting more and more tired of these companies saying they'll throw us a bone (because they swear they know its worth it) only to "forget" they ever said they'd even go to the goddamn store. My view on it is that it is inevitable or the other way around would be both a semantical (loophole) thing and a huge headache to handle (is Violet Korean or USA?). It's a huge "between a rock and a hard place" sort of situation. To detail all that would require another 1,000 words.
Citizenship is the traditional and easiest way to determine a player's region.
Blizzard hasn't explained a great deal as to why they've decided to do regions differently with this WCS. Assuming players are very mobile, then doing regions by player choice encourages a more even distribution of skilled players across the world. WCS wouldn't really be NA, EU and KR, but rather one big competition that is arbitrarily split into thirds and then combined at the end of the year. Ideally this would make NA and EU players better because the chance for them to practice and regularly compete with higher skilled (Korean) players goes way up. But Blizzard has stated that they don't think cross-regional play will be common and so this must not be their intention. The only major thing I can think of is that they don't want to punish players who have moved between continents. There have been players from each region living in each of the other major regions due to sponsorships, local competitions and personal reasons. Having to give up on WCS would be a huge sacrifice and make everyone extremely immobile, although the typical NA/EU player moving to KR essentially is giving up on WCS anyway.
It really just seems kind of an odd situation, where Blizzard wants some people to be able to take advantage of the choice (like EG's EU players living in NA) but sort of admit that it could be a problem if too many people take advantage. It's like they don't want to punish people for moving but neither do they want to encourage people to move. They don't want to limit opportunities like an NA team recruiting a European but they don't want a whole Korean team moving to NA.
I'm hoping that as more details and Q&A's and interviews come out, this issue becomes clearer.
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On April 04 2013 10:10 StarStruck wrote:
The World Championship Series is in itself another tournament Torte. That's what I meant when I said the problem of over-saturation still exists because we will still have all those other tournaments running on top of this. Similarly to what we had when players were playing/qualifying for MLG and now they'll have this on top of it. It's a lot. Not just from a viewing standpoint but from a gamer standpoint too.
I don't see how this addresses the current viewership at all because I see the numbers of people tuning into majors being roughly the same when they tune into the twitch stream. It's the same market we're dealing with.
Tournaments cannot be run during WCS. Oversaturation was extremely prevalent when we had scheduling conflicts between events. OGN and GSL are now alternating and ESL, DH are no longer conflicting nor is MLG with NASL (and IPL just closed down).
ASUS ROG and Assembly are also of a much lesser relevance as well as ESET Masters UK (though some would disagree).
That WCS does is segment their regionals into a seasonal to annual scheduling that cannot be overlapped. Events such as TeSPA's TSL, CSL and Iron Squid are no longer saturated, but more in line with being in-between "specials" so to speak, probably more geared towards different audiences (CSL and University participants) as well as on an invited level rather than going through qualifiers like the major tournaments will.
This is all conjecture, but this is vastly different than the check-mix of overabundant tournaments and no stream-line event to tie up the important ones.
With these regional WCS, we'll be seeing diverse players qualify and participate in a diverse tournaments. Which means the oversaturation of the same players in different settings will less occurring than previously.
You add that all up + the emphasis of WCS being the crowning of these events and its own tournament should definitely ease up the amount of events + also be separated as chapters of several weeks.
I think viewership will stay the same, different participants may spice it up, but I'm expecting WCS Finals to be a lot more popular than last year: hoping at least (could be just all Koreans in the end).
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On April 04 2013 10:54 NonY wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2013 07:52 Torte de Lini wrote:On April 04 2013 07:44 Mauldo wrote:
One thing I'm sad you glossed over was the pseudo-region lock and the inevitable "Korean domination" that a region lock is supposed to prohibit. It's like you confronted the other "issues" but then noted this one and completely avoided it. Considering this is the biggest problem facing ESPORTS (NA scene in particular losing more and more options for competent players because there's nothing for them to play for), I was disappointed.
I say that, but all I really want is Sundance, NASL, and IPL to come out and admit that they not only lied to NA players, but screwed us. This is just me shitting the bed, as I'm wont to do when the different regional scenes are brought up. Because on paper WCS is awesome. I won't deny that at all. But I'm getting more and more tired of these companies saying they'll throw us a bone (because they swear they know its worth it) only to "forget" they ever said they'd even go to the goddamn store. My view on it is that it is inevitable or the other way around would be both a semantical (loophole) thing and a huge headache to handle (is Violet Korean or USA?). It's a huge "between a rock and a hard place" sort of situation. To detail all that would require another 1,000 words. Citizenship is the traditional and easiest way to determine a player's region. Blizzard hasn't explained a great deal as to why they've decided to do regions differently with this WCS. Assuming players are very mobile, then doing regions by player choice encourages a more even distribution of skilled players across the world. WCS wouldn't really be NA, EU and KR, but rather one big competition that is arbitrarily split into thirds and then combined at the end of the year. Ideally this would make NA and EU players better because the chance for them to practice and regularly compete with higher skilled (Korean) players goes way up. But Blizzard has stated that they don't think cross-regional play will be common and so this must not be their intention. The only major thing I can think of is that they don't want to punish players who have moved between continents. There have been players from each region living in each of the other major regions due to sponsorships, local competitions and personal reasons. Having to give up on WCS would be a huge sacrifice and make everyone extremely immobile, although the typical NA/EU player moving to KR essentially is giving up on WCS anyway. It really just seems kind of an odd situation, where Blizzard wants some people to be able to take advantage of the choice (like EG's EU players living in NA) but sort of admit that it could be a problem if too many people take advantage. It's like they don't want to punish people for moving but neither do they want to encourage people to move. They don't want to limit opportunities like an NA team recruiting a European but they don't want a whole Korean team moving to NA. I'm hoping that as more details and Q&A's and interviews come out, this issue becomes clearer.
I'm definitely hoping the Q&A will reveal a lot, but I have my doubts (especially if they're selective on some things). The answer I'm definitely going to be expecting is that this year they are trying and will make new policies each season (it's several weeks per season, thus new seasons can be changed to adjust for any initial issues).
I think this is definitely a prototype first season and then make adjustments accordingly. If you pick one region for WCS, you're there for a year. That's a huge consequence for an initial choice.
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On April 04 2013 10:58 Torte de Lini wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2013 10:10 StarStruck wrote:
The World Championship Series is in itself another tournament Torte. That's what I meant when I said the problem of over-saturation still exists because we will still have all those other tournaments running on top of this. Similarly to what we had when players were playing/qualifying for MLG and now they'll have this on top of it. It's a lot. Not just from a viewing standpoint but from a gamer standpoint too.
I don't see how this addresses the current viewership at all because I see the numbers of people tuning into majors being roughly the same when they tune into the twitch stream. It's the same market we're dealing with. Tournaments cannot be run during WCS. Oversaturation was extremely prevalent when we had scheduling conflicts between events. OGN and GSL are now alternating and ESL, DH are no longer conflicting nor is MLG with NASL (and IPL just closed down). ASUS ROG and Assembly are also of a much lesser relevance as well as ESET Masters UK (though some would disagree). That WCS does is segment their regionals into a seasonal to annual scheduling that cannot be overlapped. Events such as TeSPA's TSL, CSL and Iron Squid are no longer saturated, but more in line with being in-between "specials" so to speak, probably more geared towards different audiences (CSL and University participants) as well as on an invited level rather than going through qualifiers like the major tournaments will. This is all conjecture, but this is vastly different than the check-mix of overabundant tournaments and no stream-line event to tie up the important ones. With these regional WCS, we'll be seeing diverse players qualify and participate in a diverse tournaments. Which means the oversaturation of the same players in different settings will less occurring than previously. You add that all up + the emphasis of WCS being the crowning of these events and its own tournament should definitely ease up the amount of events + also be separated as chapters of several weeks. I think viewership will stay the same, different participants may spice it up, but I'm expecting WCS Finals to be a lot more popular than last year: hoping at least (could be just all Koreans in the end).
They will be filling in the gaps though and they're basing it off the other premiere tournaments at the same time. It's still the same audience.
On April 04 2013 11:01 Torte de Lini wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2013 10:54 NonY wrote:On April 04 2013 07:52 Torte de Lini wrote:On April 04 2013 07:44 Mauldo wrote:
One thing I'm sad you glossed over was the pseudo-region lock and the inevitable "Korean domination" that a region lock is supposed to prohibit. It's like you confronted the other "issues" but then noted this one and completely avoided it. Considering this is the biggest problem facing ESPORTS (NA scene in particular losing more and more options for competent players because there's nothing for them to play for), I was disappointed.
I say that, but all I really want is Sundance, NASL, and IPL to come out and admit that they not only lied to NA players, but screwed us. This is just me shitting the bed, as I'm wont to do when the different regional scenes are brought up. Because on paper WCS is awesome. I won't deny that at all. But I'm getting more and more tired of these companies saying they'll throw us a bone (because they swear they know its worth it) only to "forget" they ever said they'd even go to the goddamn store. My view on it is that it is inevitable or the other way around would be both a semantical (loophole) thing and a huge headache to handle (is Violet Korean or USA?). It's a huge "between a rock and a hard place" sort of situation. To detail all that would require another 1,000 words. Citizenship is the traditional and easiest way to determine a player's region. Blizzard hasn't explained a great deal as to why they've decided to do regions differently with this WCS. Assuming players are very mobile, then doing regions by player choice encourages a more even distribution of skilled players across the world. WCS wouldn't really be NA, EU and KR, but rather one big competition that is arbitrarily split into thirds and then combined at the end of the year. Ideally this would make NA and EU players better because the chance for them to practice and regularly compete with higher skilled (Korean) players goes way up. But Blizzard has stated that they don't think cross-regional play will be common and so this must not be their intention. The only major thing I can think of is that they don't want to punish players who have moved between continents. There have been players from each region living in each of the other major regions due to sponsorships, local competitions and personal reasons. Having to give up on WCS would be a huge sacrifice and make everyone extremely immobile, although the typical NA/EU player moving to KR essentially is giving up on WCS anyway. It really just seems kind of an odd situation, where Blizzard wants some people to be able to take advantage of the choice (like EG's EU players living in NA) but sort of admit that it could be a problem if too many people take advantage. It's like they don't want to punish people for moving but neither do they want to encourage people to move. They don't want to limit opportunities like an NA team recruiting a European but they don't want a whole Korean team moving to NA. I'm hoping that as more details and Q&A's and interviews come out, this issue becomes clearer. I'm definitely hoping the Q&A will reveal a lot, but I have my doubts (especially if they're selective on some things). The answer I'm definitely going to be expecting is that this year they are trying and will make new policies each season (it's several weeks per season, thus new seasons can be changed to adjust for any initial issues). I think this is definitely a prototype first season and then make adjustments accordingly. If you pick one region for WCS, you're there for a year. That's a huge consequence for an initial choice.
Especially for players on a sixth month contract derp.
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Still reaching far with my opinion, but I definitely see contracts being relegated towards seasons rather than annual or per month. So in that regard, probably see a lot of change-ups around November to Feb or something in the future.
Wouldn't that be interesting :D
Gaps will be filled, yes.
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On April 04 2013 10:54 NonY wrote:Show nested quote +On April 04 2013 07:52 Torte de Lini wrote:On April 04 2013 07:44 Mauldo wrote:
One thing I'm sad you glossed over was the pseudo-region lock and the inevitable "Korean domination" that a region lock is supposed to prohibit. It's like you confronted the other "issues" but then noted this one and completely avoided it. Considering this is the biggest problem facing ESPORTS (NA scene in particular losing more and more options for competent players because there's nothing for them to play for), I was disappointed.
I say that, but all I really want is Sundance, NASL, and IPL to come out and admit that they not only lied to NA players, but screwed us. This is just me shitting the bed, as I'm wont to do when the different regional scenes are brought up. Because on paper WCS is awesome. I won't deny that at all. But I'm getting more and more tired of these companies saying they'll throw us a bone (because they swear they know its worth it) only to "forget" they ever said they'd even go to the goddamn store. My view on it is that it is inevitable or the other way around would be both a semantical (loophole) thing and a huge headache to handle (is Violet Korean or USA?). It's a huge "between a rock and a hard place" sort of situation. To detail all that would require another 1,000 words. Citizenship is the traditional and easiest way to determine a player's region.
Citizenship would mean kicking all foreigners out of Korea.
Remember, anything you apply to Koreans outside of Korea, should be applied to foreigners in Korea. Unless Koreans should be treated differently to everyone else. This is really the key point.
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I think the Koreans lose out more than the foreigners in Korea.
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Thoughts on OGN and GOMTV broadcasting each others' content at the same time?
Without going into who has the better casters, but it is obvious to all that most viewers prefer and gravitate towards Tastosis and thus the GOMTV stream. The broadcast for OGN earlier was like 200+ viewers compared to the tens of thousands for GOMTV during GSL earlier. It is not a problem considering it is GOMTV's product after all. But I would be curious to see the numbers for OSL. Could this partnership potentially hurt OGN?
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Thank you for this. Clarifies a lot.
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On April 05 2013 00:05 OopsOopsBaby wrote:
Thoughts on OGN and GOMTV broadcasting each others' content at the same time?
Without going into who has the better casters, but it is obvious to all that most viewers prefer and gravitate towards Tastosis and thus the GOMTV stream. The broadcast for OGN earlier was like 200+ viewers compared to the tens of thousands for GOMTV during GSL earlier. It is not a problem considering it is GOMTV's product after all. But I would be curious to see the numbers for OSL. Could this partnership potentially hurt OGN?
It's another case of Early Birds get the worm and perhaps in this scenario: the early-bird gets Blizzard's blessing (especially when they catered to foreign fans majorly).
To be real honest, I think the partnership could hurt OGN, but there's something we don't know that makes OGN oh-so comfortable with all this.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/kwkQa.png)
![[image loading]](http://tortedelini.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/wcs-schedule.jpg?w=584&h=328)
