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The Penny Arcade Report has an interesting article today on Blizzard's WCS 2013. The main thesis seems to be the following:
Disperse the South Koreans! How Blizzard’s new tournament design saved its StarCraft 2 competitions
Okay, so that's really the title. But the feature itself does move towards that conclusion, concluding that...
Last year's StarCraft 2 Battle.net World Championship was a flop. It had some good moments, and it introduced many viewers to Scarlett, one of North America's fan favorites, but the overall championship proved disappointing.
and
The upside was that we got to meet new hometown heroes like Scarlett, and ViBE. The downside was that they then went on to the World Championships in Shanghai just to get beat by more experienced Korean players.
...
The result was a final tournament that was boring to watch, and that's the kiss of death for a spectator sport. With only four South Korean players allowed in the tournament, some of the best players were excluded.
The feature continues on to discuss to briefly mention the changes Blizzard made for 2013, and how those changes have played out so far with a special look at the WCS EU Finals. (Overall, as you can imagine, WCS EU was praised a bit more than WCS NA.)
The author describes WCS 2013 as...
This is what Blizzard was aiming for all along: The creation of active local scenes with hometown heroes. The missing ingredient was an Apollo Creed for these Rocky Balboa's to face off against. When all of the unknowns play against each other, nobody watches. But when the unknowns are playing against the greats then people tune in, and the unknowns are given a chance to gain fans.
I'm not too sure of one of the statements made ("After all, it was Riot that pioneered much of the league structure that Blizzard has adopted for StarCraft 2") but overall the feature makes an okay case for the main theme - that the WCS structure as it is now, "sprinkling" Koreans into the overall regional structure as a method to nudge regional player skill up while giving the underdog Foreigner tournaments an "Apollo Creed" to fight against to produce a better tournament from the storyline viewpoint. It's worth the read, I think. But I would be interested in hearing from others how they feel about the point it's making. Do you agree that spreading out the Koreans among the other regions is "good" for the scene?
I think the author misses several nuances and deeper reasons for why WCS 2012 might not have been all that great (co-locating WCS NA with an MLG weekend event) and misses some of the great parts (WCS EU at Dreamhack was amazing) as well as trying to paint WCS as a "savior" of the scene. I appreciate the visibility the PAR is giving WCS, but I think there are parts of this article that should be discussed.
How say you all?
+ Show Spoiler +
This is the first thread I've ever posted on TL, as far as I know this article hasn't been mentioned anywhere, and dear god please don't crucify me. Damn, edited to fix link after I previewed it 3 times :/
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I do agree with the sentiment for the most part. I also agree, however, that there still needs to be some stuff that is focused solely on regional players, like Shoutcraft America. You shouldn't really have one without the other.
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Nice blinders this guy got on. Can't wait for PAR to release an opposite opinion come November and Blizzcon finals...
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One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"*
Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events.
*source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg
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On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg
Interesting viewpoint. But I think NA as a region has significant purely geographical issues when compared to Korea - the best players are generally within a small region generally close to each other. The EU is more spread out, but has better internal transportation infrastructure and shorter distances (excluding, say, Russia - although I'm not sure, this is mostly based on anecdotal evidence regarding relatively easy train travel across most of Europe). The North American region (which is a bit of misnomer, because it encompasses damn near an entire hemisphere of the globe, North and South) has pretty much neither thing. (Unless more people start moving to California, but MLG seems to be stubborn about NYC for their offices while I don't know if the Columbus studio will ever be done.)
Of course, I'd say that Australia, New Zealand, and anyone in the Middle East or African continent have it fairly bad, as well, when it comes to purely geographical concerns (player density and travel) under the WCS system. One of the things the PAR fails to mention is how the current WCS structure pretty much shafts China and the "SEA" region. (Even without the oops MLG had for the qualifiers, it is still problematical from a simple travel perspective for anyone in that area. Fortunately, China and SEA seem to have okay communities themselves - I mean, Moonglade is one of two foreigners in the top of WCS NA.
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On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg
How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening?
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Okay some things (NA players) are maybe right but everything else is somehow retarded, or?
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Why would Koreans living outside of Korea do any hardcore practice with foreigner? Wouldn't they practice with other Koreans who are at their skill level?
Foreigners may get better from playing with Koreans, but the Koreans have no incentives to practice with worse players. Even if they live in NA/EU
Edit: Also the language barrier would greatly hinder the effectiveness of Korean-Foreigner practice. It's been said many times that one of the strengths of Korean-style practice is their collective approach to theorycrafting.
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On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening?
I mentioned this in a previous post but I think they need to tie the ladder into the WCS some way. Maybe giving WCS points for high ladder placings. This would also discourage barcode laddering which is another issue (albeit a minor one) that Blizzard has mentioned before. There's issues with account sharing and hacking but considering that they have online qualifiers anyway, that is something they need to deal with anyway.
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On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening?
The LAN part that is going to be extended in the future - the korean talent that is going to participate in WCS AM/EU in the future is likely to have to move over to the WCS region for longer periods. And while in AM, they could just practice in KR ladder anyway - the ladder will only take you so far ( except for some exceptional people like Polt and Stephano ) - so they will need some practice partners (and preferrably a coach if the team is well sponsored enough).
Unless a whole korean team is going to move over ( which is unlikely since i dont think that a whole roster of players are willing to move to another region) only way the most koreans can "make it" in WCS EU/AM is when they will be in foreign team - or partner up with a foreign team that most likely will have some local talent too - who will benefit from playing with the korean who come from more higher level background.
Also the fact that in WCS/GSL style league - when everyone has can prepare to his opponent for a week - instead of preparing a random new player, many europeans and americans have to prepare for someone of higher level, and just looking at his vods and trying to figure out how to beat that will likely result in better experience compared to just looking at some random players qualifier vods and then laddering&streaming a bunch.
I admit that currently, the blizzard plan has not panned out quite yet, since it is still way too easy to just come over, play few weeks, win all the money and points and go back to korea - but if playing in NA/EU would require a bit bigger commitment this will help the regions way more compared to locking the regions down completely and in the future only talent who benefit the region will stay, and the ones who only fly in for "ez points&money" will choose WCS KR region again.
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Much better article OP than a lot that are posted. (especially the fact you included excerpts rather than just a link to the page)
As excepted, there will be some journalistic errors b/c the mainstream gaming press just isn't as familiar with the background/context of the scene, but being on the front page (on the side bar, below the fold) of penny arcade is pretty nice exposure.
It's nice to see that the comments are much less ignorant than those sometimes seen on gamestop...
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On May 29 2013 04:48 felisconcolori wrote:+ Show Spoiler +
This is the first thread I've ever posted on TL, as far as I know this article hasn't been mentioned anywhere, and dear god please don't crucify me. Damn, edited to fix link after I previewed it 3 times :/
I mentioned it! 
I actually agree with the general idea that it's a good thing for Koreans to come over as long as it doesn't reach WCS AM levels and they have to stay over here for a period of time. Just as a football club can benefit from having a couple of strong foreigners to lift the level of your youth products.
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On May 29 2013 06:26 rename wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening? The LAN part that is going to be extended in the future - the korean talent that is going to participate in WCS AM/EU in the future is likely to have to move over to the WCS region for longer periods. And while in AM, they could just practice in KR ladder anyway - the ladder will only take you so far ( except for some exceptional people like Polt and Stephano ) - so they will need some practice partners (and preferrably a coach if the team is well sponsored enough). Unless a whole korean team is going to move over ( which is unlikely since i dont think that a whole roster of players are willing to move to another region) only way the most koreans can "make it" in WCS EU/AM is when they will be in foreign team - or partner up with a foreign team that most likely will have some local talent too - who will benefit from playing with the korean who come from more higher level background. Also the fact that in WCS/GSL style league - when everyone has can prepare to his opponent for a week - instead of preparing a random new player, many europeans and americans have to prepare for someone of higher level, and just looking at his vods and trying to figure out how to beat that will likely result in better experience compared to just looking at some random players qualifier vods and then laddering&streaming a bunch. I admit that currently, the blizzard plan has not panned out quite yet, since it is still way too easy to just come over, play few weeks, win all the money and points and go back to korea - but if playing in NA/EU would require a bit bigger commitment this will help the regions way more compared to locking the regions down completely and in the future only talent who benefit the region will stay, and the ones who only fly in for "ez points&money" will choose WCS KR region again.
The problem is that LAN won't solve much. Due to the size of the Americas region (and to a lesser extent EU) the LAN component of the WCS tournaments will remain compressed to a short period of time as just happened in the WCS EU finals. A player from South America won't be able to make a weekly trip to the US without heavy sponsorship, for instance. So even if most Koreans are excluded by a LAN format, many good players from the local region will be excluded as well.
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Honestly, I think WCS EU is achieving the right balance of promoting and developing 'local' European heroes while improving the quality of competition overall.
I think WCS NA is an embarrassment and a fucking failure. And without additional support in the form of tournaments/leagues outside of MLG/WCS, the NA pro scene is actually going to shrink over the next year, as NA players and teams realize that the only big-money tournament is impossible to qualify for due to the over-saturation of players from the China, SEA and Korean servers.
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On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening?
The real dispersal won't come until WCS moves more offline, but until then, having Koreans participating is nessecary for the tournament to be relevant.
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On May 29 2013 06:12 Holdenintherye wrote:
Why would Koreans living outside of Korea do any hardcore practice with foreigner? Wouldn't they practice with other Koreans who are at their skill level?
Foreigners may get better from playing with Koreans, but the Koreans have no incentives to practice with worse players. Even if they live in NA/EU
Edit: Also the language barrier would greatly hinder the effectiveness of Korean-Foreigner practice. It's been said many times that one of the strengths of Korean-style practice is their collective approach to theorycrafting.
If they are recruited by a foreign team, the potential salary and winnings from NA/EU regions might make it worthwhile to participate in team practice and improving his english.
On May 29 2013 06:44 Serek wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 06:26 rename wrote:On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening? The LAN part that is going to be extended in the future - the korean talent that is going to participate in WCS AM/EU in the future is likely to have to move over to the WCS region for longer periods. And while in AM, they could just practice in KR ladder anyway - the ladder will only take you so far ( except for some exceptional people like Polt and Stephano ) - so they will need some practice partners (and preferrably a coach if the team is well sponsored enough). Unless a whole korean team is going to move over ( which is unlikely since i dont think that a whole roster of players are willing to move to another region) only way the most koreans can "make it" in WCS EU/AM is when they will be in foreign team - or partner up with a foreign team that most likely will have some local talent too - who will benefit from playing with the korean who come from more higher level background. Also the fact that in WCS/GSL style league - when everyone has can prepare to his opponent for a week - instead of preparing a random new player, many europeans and americans have to prepare for someone of higher level, and just looking at his vods and trying to figure out how to beat that will likely result in better experience compared to just looking at some random players qualifier vods and then laddering&streaming a bunch. I admit that currently, the blizzard plan has not panned out quite yet, since it is still way too easy to just come over, play few weeks, win all the money and points and go back to korea - but if playing in NA/EU would require a bit bigger commitment this will help the regions way more compared to locking the regions down completely and in the future only talent who benefit the region will stay, and the ones who only fly in for "ez points&money" will choose WCS KR region again. The problem is that LAN won't solve much. Due to the size of the Americas region (and to a lesser extent EU) the LAN component of the WCS tournaments will remain compressed to a short period of time as just happened in the WCS EU finals. A player from South America won't be able to make a weekly trip to the US without heavy sponsorship, for instance. So even if most Koreans are excluded by a LAN format, many good players from the local region will be excluded as well.
This is a good point - but so far as far as i know MLG/ESL/Blizzard has paid for travel inside the region, so its not about player sponsorship - but more about how willing the tournament organizers are going to be about accommodating the players.
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On May 29 2013 06:26 rename wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening? The LAN part that is going to be extended in the future - the korean talent that is going to participate in WCS AM/EU in the future is likely to have to move over to the WCS region for longer periods. And while in AM, they could just practice in KR ladder anyway - the ladder will only take you so far ( except for some exceptional people like Polt and Stephano ) - so they will need some practice partners (and preferrably a coach if the team is well sponsored enough). Unless a whole korean team is going to move over ( which is unlikely since i dont think that a whole roster of players are willing to move to another region) only way the most koreans can "make it" in WCS EU/AM is when they will be in foreign team - or partner up with a foreign team that most likely will have some local talent too - who will benefit from playing with the korean who come from more higher level background. Also the fact that in WCS/GSL style league - when everyone has can prepare to his opponent for a week - instead of preparing a random new player, many europeans and americans have to prepare for someone of higher level, and just looking at his vods and trying to figure out how to beat that will likely result in better experience compared to just looking at some random players qualifier vods and then laddering&streaming a bunch. I admit that currently, the blizzard plan has not panned out quite yet, since it is still way too easy to just come over, play few weeks, win all the money and points and go back to korea - but if playing in NA/EU would require a bit bigger commitment this will help the regions way more compared to locking the regions down completely and in the future only talent who benefit the region will stay, and the ones who only fly in for "ez points&money" will choose WCS KR region again.
Pretty much every advantage of Blizzard's WCS system is tied to them extending the offline portion more. The only issue is that if Blizzard is planning to make a NA eSports hub, they should announce where people should be gathering around. Right now MLG's studio is in NYC but more teams are on the west coast. If Blizzard were to announce more of their future plans instead of just being secret about it, I think the spectators and team managers would definitely benefit. As of now, we have to speculate on why they haven't released that information.
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On May 29 2013 06:22 cablesc wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening? I mentioned this in a previous post but I think they need to tie the ladder into the WCS some way. Maybe giving WCS points for high ladder placings. This would also discourage barcode laddering which is another issue (albeit a minor one) that Blizzard has mentioned before. There's issues with account sharing and hacking but considering that they have online qualifiers anyway, that is something they need to deal with anyway.
WCS points for ladder positions is actually a great idea. Cheaters wouldn't benefit at all, as they would never earn the other points necessary to qualify for the grand finals, but for the players on the bubble it could make a big difference. Make the caveat that you only get points for your position in your regions ladder and I like it a lot.
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On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening?
Can someone please explain what it is in NA that makes it so hard for their players to improve compared to EU? I know NA had more Koreans than EU, but on the flip side i am also certain that some of the Koreans would not have made it to RO8 in EU.
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On May 29 2013 07:33 Prog455 wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening? Can someone please explain what it is in NA that makes it so hard for their players to improve compared to EU? I know NA had more Koreans than EU, but on the flip side i am also certain that some of the Koreans would not have made it to RO8 in EU.
You don't think that if NA's THIRTEEN Koreans in Premiere League were in EU it wouldn't have been similar results? EU had 4 Koreans in Premier league and 2 made it into the top 4.
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On May 29 2013 07:45 Fries wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 07:33 Prog455 wrote:On May 29 2013 05:59 TotalBiscuit wrote:On May 29 2013 05:37 rename wrote:One of the best NA league of legends players Doublelift on why he doesnt think his team will catch up to koreans: "the infrastructure here makes it so we can't find competent training partners at the rate that Korea does. Talent breeds talent over there"* Blizzard looks to attempt to disperse the talent, but this first season has not worked out quite well yet. Perhaps when IM-SK will partner up with a NA/EU team for Mvp and Nestea and maybe even send in some coaching advice this dispersing on talent will start to help actual NA/EU talent to become competitive not just in their region, but in global events. *source: http://www.reddit.com/r/leagueoflegends/comments/1f76hr/doublelift_ama_postallstars/ca7gkrg How can they possibly disperse the talent? It doesn't make any sense, I argued this with Blizzard in a phone conversation. These players are not going to participate on ladder unless you force them to, they're not going to become practice partners for foreign players and in this system, there is little to no incentive to even live in the region right now due to a lack of region locking. There is no difference at all between this and standard tournaments. The koreans come, they take the money and then they leave. How exactly is the level of these foreign players being raised by this happening? Can someone please explain what it is in NA that makes it so hard for their players to improve compared to EU? I know NA had more Koreans than EU, but on the flip side i am also certain that some of the Koreans would not have made it to RO8 in EU. You don't think that if NA's THIRTEEN Koreans in Premiere League were in EU it wouldn't have been similar results? EU had 4 Koreans in Premier league and 2 made it into the top 4.
No i don't think so. Aside from Hero there is not a single Korean in RO8 that i would say is definitely better than; TLO, Lucifron, Vortix, Naniwa, Sase, Stephano or Babyknight. During group stage there was not a single time where a Korean made it out as number 1. To be perfectly honest i don't think that the competition was harder in NA than it was in EU.
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Katowice25012 Posts
I don't know that the fact that NA is a weak division is really a solvable problem, but he's right in that the system Blizzard set up actually makes it more interesting for spectators since random interesting matches happen in the regular season before a world final. I'd guess there are a lot of people who aren't that interested in watching Shoutcraft but who will tune in to see GSL semifinalist play relative-unknown Euro up-and-comer.
On May 29 2013 06:26 rename wrote:
Also the fact that in WCS/GSL style league - when everyone has can prepare to his opponent for a week - instead of preparing a random new player, many europeans and americans have to prepare for someone of higher level, and just looking at his vods and trying to figure out how to beat that will likely result in better experience compared to just looking at some random players qualifier vods and then laddering&streaming a bunch.
I think this part has panned out nicely too, there have been a lot of amusing and cute builds people have prepared for specific opponents. It doesn't touch the heart of the issue that it's not an ideal situation for players in NA or EU but the article is about how they set up a better environment for spectators, and he has a point in that it is an improvement, for Blizzard's system specifically. Whether or not it's good overall for everyone remains to be seen but Blizzard succeeded in making their own event interesting.
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On May 29 2013 05:20 KrazyTrumpet wrote:
I do agree with the sentiment for the most part. I also agree, however, that there still needs to be some stuff that is focused solely on regional players, like Shoutcraft America. You shouldn't really have one without the other.
The problem is that with the current state of WCS it is ALWAYS ON and there is no opening for any other competition to shine. Thus any such competition has to fight against WCS and that is bad. "Live and let live" is a great saying, but WCS does not follow it.
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On May 29 2013 12:09 Rabiator wrote:Show nested quote +On May 29 2013 05:20 KrazyTrumpet wrote:
I do agree with the sentiment for the most part. I also agree, however, that there still needs to be some stuff that is focused solely on regional players, like Shoutcraft America. You shouldn't really have one without the other. The problem is that with the current state of WCS it is ALWAYS ON and there is no opening for any other competition to shine. Thus any such competition has to fight against WCS and that is bad. "Live and let live" is a great saying, but WCS does not follow it.
WCS doesn't run on weekends, and that's exactly for other tournaments to operate during that time. It's already built into the system.
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EPT
