On June 30 2013 00:20 forumtext wrote: Save SC while we still can!
I think we need to begin to face the fact that SC2 as an epsort game is simply lacking some areas. I was watching SC2 MLG last night and keep hearing the crowds cheers from the other sections, so I decided to watch some LOL seriously for the first time, just to see why it has succeed in the shadows of BW whereas SC2, the rightful heir is fading away.
And the conclusion is - hope!
In competitions, hope is a powerful incentive that keeps the fans on their toes and stops players from giving up. In almost every LOL battle, there is always hope at the end of it that the losing team can still win the war, and for the victorious, there is hope that they will capitalise the advantage and wins the game.
Now let's go back to the state of SC2 today. More than 90% of the game I watch follows this pattern: Player build up their deathballs*, deathballs meet, one of them wins and usually with >40% of their army alive (imho it's due to perfect AI combined with fast pace game play but that's for anther debate), and here is where hope ends in SC2. I am not saying you cannot come back from this spot, but for anyone that watches Pro SC2 regularly, we all know that the chances are close to impossible. Sadly. most of the time our instinct is correct and the loser will just roll-over and dies. Sure, someone will probably bring up examples of games where players do come back from a deficit, but that is a scarce occurrence in today's SC2.
Without hope, players gives up after that first "Deathball v Deathball" encounter. Fans lose interests too because they know the result will likely to be the same as the other 9000+ "Deathball v Deathball" encounters they've watched. Evidence of players giving up includes the now extremely common Deathball battle -> GG. And for the viewers, you just need to see the amount of "lol GG" "ouch that's bad, GG" comments right after the first battle.
The threshold for a deathball army varies depending on which stage of the game we are at. But under most scenarios, deathball = ~90% of your current army supply.
I'd rather watch 10-15 minutes of intense SC2 than 1hr of moba where 90% of the time you know who's going to win, even if there's slight hope of a turnaround.
One of my biggest complaints about SC2, however, is that it's not THAT much of a strategy game. You build up an army, and go kill your opponent's nat/third.
On June 29 2013 23:41 theking1 wrote: I think it is more beneficial for the korean sc2 scene at this time to have one teamleague to have all of the sc2 talent in one league than divided into 2 leagues.it will bring,more viewers,sponsors and interest if the teams merge.If you wanna have like 2 leagues you could have one major one and one lets say amateur one from which teams can qualify to the major league.Sort of a code a-code s type of thing
Yeah, the BW structure already in place is a bit too grandiose for what SC2 is in Korea right now.
I think things are looking a bit better than it did for WC3 in Korea back in the day tho. Wonder if China will ever be able to get on the SC2 boat or if a non-free game is just never going to make it as an esport in China (yeah I know WC3 wasnt free in theory. In theory).
On June 29 2013 23:41 theking1 wrote: I think it is more beneficial for the korean sc2 scene at this time to have one teamleague to have all of the sc2 talent in one league than divided into 2 leagues.it will bring,more viewers,sponsors and interest if the teams merge.If you wanna have like 2 leagues you could have one major one and one lets say amateur one from which teams can qualify to the major league.Sort of a code a-code s type of thing
Yeah, the BW structure already in place is a bit too grandiose for what SC2 is in Korea right now.
I think things are looking a bit better than it did for WC3 in Korea back in the day tho. Wonder if China will ever be able to get on the SC2 boat or if a non-free game is just never going to make it as an esport in China (yeah I know WC3 wasnt free in theory. In theory).
I doubt it. Blizzard seems to be trying a bit ( WCS Finals in China and stuff ) But in comparison of Valve full adaptation of their game, and how Icefrog communicate so much with the Chinese community.. It's no contest.
On June 29 2013 23:41 theking1 wrote: I think it is more beneficial for the korean sc2 scene at this time to have one teamleague to have all of the sc2 talent in one league than divided into 2 leagues.it will bring,more viewers,sponsors and interest if the teams merge.If you wanna have like 2 leagues you could have one major one and one lets say amateur one from which teams can qualify to the major league.Sort of a code a-code s type of thing
Yeah, the BW structure already in place is a bit too grandiose for what SC2 is in Korea right now.
I think things are looking a bit better than it did for WC3 in Korea back in the day tho. Wonder if China will ever be able to get on the SC2 boat or if a non-free game is just never going to make it as an esport in China (yeah I know WC3 wasnt free in theory. In theory).
Yeah, this structure is too big. But then the question is why is it shrinking this way? Why are the Kespa teams that are left still paying a bunch of coaches and have huge B-team lineups that don't play and so forth? Why is it that the cost of running a team stays really high, while some teams drop out, instead of the teams all scaling back their expenditures but staying alive? You could have 10+ teams with infrastructure on the level of Startale and have a perfectly good league, and that seems a lot cheaper (no data on this) than just 2 or 3 of the big Kespa teams.
On June 30 2013 00:20 forumtext wrote: Save SC while we still can!
I think we need to begin to face the fact that SC2 as an epsort game is simply lacking some areas. I was watching SC2 MLG last night and keep hearing the crowds cheers from the other sections, so I decided to watch some LOL seriously for the first time, just to see why it has succeed in the shadows of BW whereas SC2, the rightful heir is fading away.
And the conclusion is - hope!
In competitions, hope is a powerful incentive that keeps the fans on their toes and stops players from giving up. In almost every LOL battle, there is always hope at the end of it that the losing team can still win the war, and for the victorious, there is hope that they will capitalise the advantage and wins the game.
Now let's go back to the state of SC2 today. Around 80% of the game I watch follows this pattern: Player build up their deathballs*, deathballs meet, one of them wins and usually with >40% of their army alive (imho it's due to perfect AI combined with fast pace game play but that's for anther debate), and here is where hope ends in SC2. I am not saying you cannot come back from this spot, but for anyone that watches Pro SC2 regularly, we all know that the chances are close to impossible. Sadly. most of the time our instinct is correct and the loser will just roll-over and dies. Sure, someone will probably bring up examples of games where players do come back from a deficit, but that is a scarce occurrence in today's SC2.
Without hope, players gives up after that first "Deathball v Deathball" encounter. Fans lose interests too because they know the result will likely to be the same as the other 9000+ "Deathball v Deathball" encounters they've watched. Evidence of players giving up includes the now extremely common Deathball battle -> GG. And for the viewers, you just need to see the amount of "lol GG" "ouch that's bad, GG" comments right after the first battle.
The threshold for a deathball army varies depending on which stage of the game we are at. But under most scenarios, deathball = ~90% of your current army supply.
1.Actually the reason why you used to hear screams form other zones is because this years mlg venue is a lot smaller compared to last years and the noise issolation is quite bad.The crowd that you mostly likely hear is the COD crowd since I think,but not too certain they are the center stage and basicly anybody can hear them. 2.moreover you would be surprised but in really exiciting game such as Catz vs Dragon or Illusion vs Incontrol sc2 fans were actually loud and cod and lol people in chat complained quite a lot.And i know this since i had all 3 streams open at the same time.And it is normal.The venue is small and every time something exciting happens in any game and the crowd starts yelling the noise is heard by all of the other crowds and hence all of the other streams. 3.Actually comebacks are quite rare in lol.You may have heard about the term known as "snowballing" used by lots of moba players 4.Lol is very fun to watch just like sc2.If you like lol why don't you simply watch lol without derailing the thread with a pessimisitic "sc2 is dying post"
meh, if the company doesn't go completely down (and I do mean completely), STX Soul probably won't be affected. The money they are paying them is nothing. Nothing whatsoever. I guess it's the same like you buying a fucking ice cream once every 25 years or something.
On June 29 2013 23:17 Pandemona wrote: How can successful teams be in debt so much. This is quite silly >.< Poor management imo. So said if they go "/ Will end up killing KESPA by KESPA. EG Innovation inc?
ProLeague needs ANOTHER team now as well?
Im pretty sure like everyone else STX Soul is dead now unless in the next month there is a heavily funded new investor, which i doubt they will get. Of course it can be remade and such but that probably wont happen either?
What is this post?
Do you seriously think the success of the SC2 team has ANYTHING to do with the success of the company that sponsors it? There is absolutely no link between the two.
On June 30 2013 00:20 forumtext wrote: Save SC while we still can!
I think we need to begin to face the fact that SC2 as an epsort game is simply lacking some areas. I was watching SC2 MLG last night and keep hearing the crowds cheers from the other sections, so I decided to watch some LOL seriously for the first time, just to see why it has succeed in the shadows of BW whereas SC2, the rightful heir is fading away.
And the conclusion is - hope!
In competitions, hope is a powerful incentive that keeps the fans on their toes and stops players from giving up. In almost every LOL battle, there is always hope at the end of it that the losing team can still win the war, and for the victorious, there is hope that they will capitalise the advantage and wins the game.
Now let's go back to the state of SC2 today. Around 80% of the game I watch follows this pattern: Player build up their deathballs*, deathballs meet, one of them wins and usually with >40% of their army alive (imho it's due to perfect AI combined with fast pace game play but that's for anther debate), and here is where hope ends in SC2. I am not saying you cannot come back from this spot, but for anyone that watches Pro SC2 regularly, we all know that the chances are close to impossible. Sadly. most of the time our instinct is correct and the loser will just roll-over and dies. Sure, someone will probably bring up examples of games where players do come back from a deficit, but that is a scarce occurrence in today's SC2.
Without hope, players gives up after that first "Deathball v Deathball" encounter. Fans lose interests too because they know the result will likely to be the same as the other 9000+ "Deathball v Deathball" encounters they've watched. Evidence of players giving up includes the now extremely common Deathball battle -> GG. And for the viewers, you just need to see the amount of "lol GG" "ouch that's bad, GG" comments right after the first battle.
The threshold for a deathball army varies depending on which stage of the game we are at. But under most scenarios, deathball = ~90% of your current army supply.
1.Actually the reason why you used to hear screams form other zones is because this years mlg venue is a lot smaller compared to last years and the noise issolation is quite bad.The crowd that you mostly likely hear is the COD crowd since I think,but not too certain they are the center stage and basicly anybody can hear them. 2.moreover you would be surprised but in really exiciting game such as Catz vs Dragon or Illusion vs Incontrol sc2 fans were actually loud and cod and lol people in chat complained quite a lot.And i know this since i had all 3 streams open at the same time.And it is normal.The venue is small and every time something exciting happens in any game and the crowd starts yelling the noise is heard by all of the other crowds and hence all of the other streams. 3.Actually comebacks are quite rare in lol.You may have heard about the term known as "snowballing" used by lots of moba players 4.Lol is very fun to watch just like sc2.If you like lol why don't you simply watch lol without derailing the thread with a pessimisitic "sc2 is dying post"
lol The guy tunes in to LoL for the first time and thinks the game is about hope? I guess now would be a good time to tell him there are more throws in the NA LoL scene compared to the rest. Yes, snowballing is a factor but these NA teams do make a lot of mistakes and that's what causes the comebacks. There were a couple of entertaining games last night, but let's not kid ourselves. There's a lot of improvement these boys can make and they have a long way to go to catch up to the Koreans just like every other game. If he were to tune into let's say the Korean scene he would see a much different story. Way less throws and once one side wins a couple of team fights. Oh boy, do they ever snowball hard.
STX Pan Ocean is in deep shit. Stocks of both STX Group and STX Pan Ocean have been tanking since 2009. "STX Pan Ocean plunged to 2,565 won Tuesday from 10,900 won Dec. 15, 2008, and STX Offshore & Shipbuilding also 067250.SE +1.53% nosedived to 2,595 won from 14,500 won during the same period." That's a few years ago but the company hasn't really recovered since. Just last week, "STX Pan Ocean tumbled 14.9 percent before share trading was suspended," while "STX Corp dropped 14.8 percent and STX Engine slid 13.8 percent." Ouch.
"STX Pan Ocean, which became one of STX Group's most profitable units after emerging from receivership in 2002, swung to a net loss of 91 billion won in 2009. Its loss deepened to 467 billion won last year." I cannot find what percentage of STX Group's income comes from STX Pan Ocean, but most articles state that "90% of the group's sales come from [shipping and shipbuilding industries]." Their official website does not provide much financial information aside from graphs from the period of 2008-2010. Not a lot of info, but based on their graphs 1.) They are still profitable with a net income of 30.5billion Won in 2010 after a disastrous 2009 when they suffered losses of 171.8billion Won; 2.) Debt equity ratio continues to rise; 3.) Cash flow has been very bad, with 2010 reporting a -69.7billion, with most of that cash coming from "financing activities", and the biggest losses coming from their disastrous investments.
However, all is not lost.
"STX Group, with more than 10 trillion won, or $9 billion, in total debt, has sold 1.13 trillion won in assets as part of a 2.5 trillion won asset sale plan announced in May of last year." So they've been trying to repay their debts but so far it hasn't worked out smoothly as "STX Group had put up for sale its almost 36% interest in STX Pan Ocean, but no buyers came forward." Fortunately, "Creditors of ailing STX Offshore & Shipbuilding on Friday injected an additional 250 billion won (US$216 million) in liquidity into the shipbuilder in a bid to tide it over during its cash crunch, officials said." So even though STX Pan Ocean are in deep shit, it looks like its creditors are going to try everything they can in order to keep STX afloat. It looks like the government also has a stake in this as many companies, banks and institutions have investments or connections to STX Group. So yes, STX are in some trouble, but it looks a lot of people are trying to find a way to help them. However, Korea Development Bank, the second largest shareholder of Pan Ocean, decided not to buy out STX Group's shares, so it does look like everyone is skeptical about Pan Ocean's profitability (but STX Group as a whole are doing alright, note).
According to what I've read, " STX Group had a combined 2.86 trillion won in corporate debt to be paid out by 2015, according to NICE Investors Service, a local credit appraiser. Out of such debt, the group has 580 billion won in debt that is due this year." This is what is the most worrying as their most recent financial information states they only have a net income of about 30billion Won. I'm uncertain if the debt payments due this year stated above already includes interest payments or only the principal to be paid. Another problem is that "since the credit crisis, orders to build new ships have plunged. Contracts for new vessels halved to $84.7 billion last year, compared with $174.7 billion in 2008." Either way, if STX can find a way to refinance that debt and have a more frugal investment plan (apparently Kang wants to BUY ALL THE COMPANIES) they should come out of this okay. They also need to either sell of Pan Ocean or find a way to make it profitable (the main problems being: overcapacity of ships means less order for ship, less shipping due to financial downturn means less ships needed). They are still a profitable company that is important for the Korean economy, so I think they will find a way.
I could probably read more but I hate reading about business at home.
SUMMARY: 1. STX Pan Ocean and STX Group are in lots of debt, and STX Pan Ocean is doing terribly as a business 2. STX Pan Ocean and STX Group stocks are tanking 3. STX has been trying to sell of assets as well as a controlling amount of shares in some of its less profitable subsidiaries 4. STX Group, as a whole, is still a very important and profitable company 5. STX Group cannot pay off their debts with their cash flow, but if they can refinance that debt and get rid of Pan Ocean's perennial losses, maybe they can stay afloat. 6. I think STX Group will be ok, but the Pan Ocean business will likely go kaput.
On June 30 2013 00:20 forumtext wrote: Save SC while we still can!
I think we need to begin to face the fact that SC2 as an epsort game is simply lacking some areas. I was watching SC2 MLG last night and keep hearing the crowds cheers from the other sections, so I decided to watch some LOL seriously for the first time, just to see why it has succeed in the shadows of BW whereas SC2, the rightful heir is fading away.
And the conclusion is - hope!
In competitions, hope is a powerful incentive that keeps the fans on their toes and stops players from giving up. In almost every LOL battle, there is always hope at the end of it that the losing team can still win the war, and for the victorious, there is hope that they will capitalise the advantage and wins the game.
Now let's go back to the state of SC2 today. Around 80% of the game I watch follows this pattern: Player build up their deathballs*, deathballs meet, one of them wins and usually with >40% of their army alive (imho it's due to perfect AI combined with fast pace game play but that's for anther debate), and here is where hope ends in SC2. I am not saying you cannot come back from this spot, but for anyone that watches Pro SC2 regularly, we all know that the chances are close to impossible. Sadly. most of the time our instinct is correct and the loser will just roll-over and dies. Sure, someone will probably bring up examples of games where players do come back from a deficit, but that is a scarce occurrence in today's SC2.
Without hope, players gives up after that first "Deathball v Deathball" encounter. Fans lose interests too because they know the result will likely to be the same as the other 9000+ "Deathball v Deathball" encounters they've watched. Evidence of players giving up includes the now extremely common Deathball battle -> GG. And for the viewers, you just need to see the amount of "lol GG" "ouch that's bad, GG" comments right after the first battle.
The threshold for a deathball army varies depending on which stage of the game we are at. But under most scenarios, deathball = ~90% of your current army supply.
1.Actually the reason why you used to hear screams form other zones is because this years mlg venue is a lot smaller compared to last years and the noise issolation is quite bad.The crowd that you mostly likely hear is the COD crowd since I think,but not too certain they are the center stage and basicly anybody can hear them. 2.moreover you would be surprised but in really exiciting game such as Catz vs Dragon or Illusion vs Incontrol sc2 fans were actually loud and cod and lol people in chat complained quite a lot.And i know this since i had all 3 streams open at the same time.And it is normal.The venue is small and every time something exciting happens in any game and the crowd starts yelling the noise is heard by all of the other crowds and hence all of the other streams. 3.Actually comebacks are quite rare in lol.You may have heard about the term known as "snowballing" used by lots of moba players 4.Lol is very fun to watch just like sc2.If you like lol why don't you simply watch lol without derailing the thread with a pessimisitic "sc2 is dying post"
lol The guy tunes in to LoL for the first time and thinks the game is about hope? I guess now would be a good time to tell him there are more throws in the NA LoL scene compared to the rest. Yes, snowballing is a factor but these NA teams do make a lot of mistakes and that's what causes the comebacks. There were a couple of entertaining games last night, but let's not kid ourselves. There's a lot of improvement these boys can make and they have a long way to go to catch up to the Koreans just like every other game. If he were to tune into let's say the Korean scene he would see a much different story. Way less throws and once one side wins a couple of team fights. Oh boy, do they ever snowball hard.
Then what is keeping the fans watching a 40 minute slaughter if they don't have reasonable hope that their team can still win? And also the key differences here being "once one side wins a couple of battles", this is precisely what we need in SC2 instead of the "once one side wins THE battle" we are having now.
Edit:I want SC2 to survive and conquer. For that to happen, we need more fans to show (new)sponsors that this SC2 money is worth it. Right now it seems we are losing both sponsors and fans everyday. Anyway I am starting to derail the thread so I better stop now. Thanks for everyone that provided their own opinions.
On June 30 2013 01:07 lichter wrote: Okay so I decided to do a little reading.
STX Pan Ocean is in deep shit. Stocks of both STX Group and STX Pan Ocean have been tanking since 2009. "STX Pan Ocean plunged to 2,565 won Tuesday from 10,900 won Dec. 15, 2008, and STX Offshore & Shipbuilding also 067250.SE +1.53% nosedived to 2,595 won from 14,500 won during the same period." That's a few years ago but the company hasn't really recovered since. Just last week, "STX Pan Ocean tumbled 14.9 percent before share trading was suspended," while "STX Corp dropped 14.8 percent and STX Engine slid 13.8 percent." Ouch.
"STX Pan Ocean, which became one of STX Group's most profitable units after emerging from receivership in 2002, swung to a net loss of 91 billion won in 2009. Its loss deepened to 467 billion won last year." I cannot find what percentage of STX Group's income comes from STX Pan Ocean, but most articles state that "90% of the group's sales come from [shipping and shipbuilding industries]." Their official website does not provide much financial information aside from graphs from the period of 2008-2010. Not a lot of info, but based on their graphs 1.) They are still profitable with a net income of 30.5billion Won in 2010 after a disastrous 2009 when they suffered losses of 171.8billion Won; 2.) Debt equity ratio continues to rise; 3.) Cash flow has been very bad, with 2010 reporting a -69.7billion, with most of that cash coming from "financing activities", and the biggest losses coming from their disastrous investments.
However, all is not lost.
"STX Group, with more than 10 trillion won, or $9 billion, in total debt, has sold 1.13 trillion won in assets as part of a 2.5 trillion won asset sale plan announced in May of last year." So they've been trying to repay their debts but so far it hasn't worked out smoothly as "STX Group had put up for sale its almost 36% interest in STX Pan Ocean, but no buyers came forward." Fortunately, "Creditors of ailing STX Offshore & Shipbuilding on Friday injected an additional 250 billion won (US$216 million) in liquidity into the shipbuilder in a bid to tide it over during its cash crunch, officials said." So even though STX Pan Ocean are in deep shit, it looks like its creditors are going to try everything they can in order to keep STX afloat. It looks like the government also has a stake in this as many companies, banks and institutions have investments or connections to STX Group. So yes, STX are in some trouble, but it looks a lot of people are trying to find a way to help them.
According to what I've read, " STX Group had a combined 2.86 trillion won in corporate debt to be paid out by 2015, according to NICE Investors Service, a local credit appraiser. Out of such debt, the group has 580 billion won in debt that is due this year." This is what is the most worrying as their most recent financial information states they only have a net income of about 30billion Won. I'm uncertain if the debt payments due this year stated above already includes interest payments or only the principal to be paid. Either way, if STX can find a way to refinance that debt and have a more frugal investment plan (apparently Kang wants to BUY ALL THE COMPANIES) they should come out of this fine. They are still a profitable company that is essential for the Korean economy, so I think they will find a way.
I could probably read more but I hate reading about business at home.
I think PanOcean is like 1/3 of all the shipbuilding activities (providing 90%) and the Shipbuilding, Offshore, and Engineering can make up for the other 2/3.
But again, we are now more like WSJ commenters than anything, probably there's not much VC involved with Soul, barely noticeable amount of fixed costs, and overall I'd say they might close be self-sustaining.
I mean Woongjin is just as bad, should I make a [Rumor] Woongjin isn't selling enough herb tea thread?
On June 30 2013 00:20 forumtext wrote: Save SC while we still can!
I think we need to begin to face the fact that SC2 as an epsort game is simply lacking some areas. I was watching SC2 MLG last night and keep hearing the crowds cheers from the other sections, so I decided to watch some LOL seriously for the first time, just to see why it has succeed in the shadows of BW whereas SC2, the rightful heir is fading away.
And the conclusion is - hope!
In competitions, hope is a powerful incentive that keeps the fans on their toes and stops players from giving up. In almost every LOL battle, there is always hope at the end of it that the losing team can still win the war, and for the victorious, there is hope that they will capitalise the advantage and wins the game.
Now let's go back to the state of SC2 today. Around 80% of the game I watch follows this pattern: Player build up their deathballs*, deathballs meet, one of them wins and usually with >40% of their army alive (imho it's due to perfect AI combined with fast pace game play but that's for anther debate), and here is where hope ends in SC2. I am not saying you cannot come back from this spot, but for anyone that watches Pro SC2 regularly, we all know that the chances are close to impossible. Sadly. most of the time our instinct is correct and the loser will just roll-over and dies. Sure, someone will probably bring up examples of games where players do come back from a deficit, but that is a scarce occurrence in today's SC2.
Without hope, players gives up after that first "Deathball v Deathball" encounter. Fans lose interests too because they know the result will likely to be the same as the other 9000+ "Deathball v Deathball" encounters they've watched. Evidence of players giving up includes the now extremely common Deathball battle -> GG. And for the viewers, you just need to see the amount of "lol GG" "ouch that's bad, GG" comments right after the first battle.
The threshold for a deathball army varies depending on which stage of the game we are at. But under most scenarios, deathball = ~90% of your current army supply.
1.Actually the reason why you used to hear screams form other zones is because this years mlg venue is a lot smaller compared to last years and the noise issolation is quite bad.The crowd that you mostly likely hear is the COD crowd since I think,but not too certain they are the center stage and basicly anybody can hear them. 2.moreover you would be surprised but in really exiciting game such as Catz vs Dragon or Illusion vs Incontrol sc2 fans were actually loud and cod and lol people in chat complained quite a lot.And i know this since i had all 3 streams open at the same time.And it is normal.The venue is small and every time something exciting happens in any game and the crowd starts yelling the noise is heard by all of the other crowds and hence all of the other streams. 3.Actually comebacks are quite rare in lol.You may have heard about the term known as "snowballing" used by lots of moba players 4.Lol is very fun to watch just like sc2.If you like lol why don't you simply watch lol without derailing the thread with a pessimisitic "sc2 is dying post"
lol The guy tunes in to LoL for the first time and thinks the game is about hope? I guess now would be a good time to tell him there are more throws in the NA LoL scene compared to the rest. Yes, snowballing is a factor but these NA teams do make a lot of mistakes and that's what causes the comebacks. There were a couple of entertaining games last night, but let's not kid ourselves. There's a lot of improvement these boys can make and they have a long way to go to catch up to the Koreans just like every other game. If he were to tune into let's say the Korean scene he would see a much different story. Way less throws and once one side wins a couple of team fights. Oh boy, do they ever snowball hard.
Then what is keeping the fans watching a 40 minute slaughter if they don't have reasonable hope that their team can still win? And also the key differences here being "once one side wins a couple of battles", this is precisely what we need in SC2 instead of the "once one side wins THAT battle" we are having now.
Wrong thread, buddy.
edit: Christopher Columbus post hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
I don't see why the team would disband. If anything, it would just lose it's primary sponsor or however that works. Look at Team 8! But this is a bit of a bummer for STX Soul.
On June 30 2013 00:20 forumtext wrote: Save SC while we still can!
I think we need to begin to face the fact that SC2 as an epsort game is simply lacking some areas. I was watching SC2 MLG last night and keep hearing the crowds cheers from the other sections, so I decided to watch some LOL seriously for the first time, just to see why it has succeed in the shadows of BW whereas SC2, the rightful heir is fading away.
And the conclusion is - hope!
In competitions, hope is a powerful incentive that keeps the fans on their toes and stops players from giving up. In almost every LOL battle, there is always hope at the end of it that the losing team can still win the war, and for the victorious, there is hope that they will capitalise the advantage and wins the game.
Now let's go back to the state of SC2 today. Around 80% of the game I watch follows this pattern: Player build up their deathballs*, deathballs meet, one of them wins and usually with >40% of their army alive (imho it's due to perfect AI combined with fast pace game play but that's for anther debate), and here is where hope ends in SC2. I am not saying you cannot come back from this spot, but for anyone that watches Pro SC2 regularly, we all know that the chances are close to impossible. Sadly. most of the time our instinct is correct and the loser will just roll-over and dies. Sure, someone will probably bring up examples of games where players do come back from a deficit, but that is a scarce occurrence in today's SC2.
Without hope, players gives up after that first "Deathball v Deathball" encounter. Fans lose interests too because they know the result will likely to be the same as the other 9000+ "Deathball v Deathball" encounters they've watched. Evidence of players giving up includes the now extremely common Deathball battle -> GG. And for the viewers, you just need to see the amount of "lol GG" "ouch that's bad, GG" comments right after the first battle.
The threshold for a deathball army varies depending on which stage of the game we are at. But under most scenarios, deathball = ~90% of your current army supply.
1.Actually the reason why you used to hear screams form other zones is because this years mlg venue is a lot smaller compared to last years and the noise issolation is quite bad.The crowd that you mostly likely hear is the COD crowd since I think,but not too certain they are the center stage and basicly anybody can hear them. 2.moreover you would be surprised but in really exiciting game such as Catz vs Dragon or Illusion vs Incontrol sc2 fans were actually loud and cod and lol people in chat complained quite a lot.And i know this since i had all 3 streams open at the same time.And it is normal.The venue is small and every time something exciting happens in any game and the crowd starts yelling the noise is heard by all of the other crowds and hence all of the other streams. 3.Actually comebacks are quite rare in lol.You may have heard about the term known as "snowballing" used by lots of moba players 4.Lol is very fun to watch just like sc2.If you like lol why don't you simply watch lol without derailing the thread with a pessimisitic "sc2 is dying post"
lol The guy tunes in to LoL for the first time and thinks the game is about hope? I guess now would be a good time to tell him there are more throws in the NA LoL scene compared to the rest. Yes, snowballing is a factor but these NA teams do make a lot of mistakes and that's what causes the comebacks. There were a couple of entertaining games last night, but let's not kid ourselves. There's a lot of improvement these boys can make and they have a long way to go to catch up to the Koreans just like every other game. If he were to tune into let's say the Korean scene he would see a much different story. Way less throws and once one side wins a couple of team fights. Oh boy, do they ever snowball hard.
Then what is keeping the fans watching a 40 minute slaughter if they don't have reasonable hope that their team can still win? And also the key differences here being "once one side wins a couple of battles", this is precisely what we need in SC2 instead of the "once one side wins THAT battle" we are having now.
Maybe they are not fans of a team or another.Maybe just like any sc2 fan they just want to see a good game.Maybe they want to see the team who qualifies for the global finals.Maybe they just want to see who wins and who is the best NA.Just I would like to see who is the best between flash and innovation and I am not necessarily a fan of neither.Maybe they want to see who is the best team in na.Maybe they want to see some awsome builds to apply on ladder.There are many reasons to watch a league game.And btw starstruck is right.there are more throws in a lol game that in most major esports.You may have heard of the infamous throwshotgg or throwvicious.It is quite common for a team to have a lead and then make a stupid mistake and lose.Not to mention that your "THE BATTLE" analogy is stupid.There are decisive battles in league out of which the winner is decided.especially in late game
On June 30 2013 00:20 forumtext wrote: Save SC while we still can!
I think we need to begin to face the fact that SC2 as an epsort game is simply lacking some areas. I was watching SC2 MLG last night and keep hearing the crowds cheers from the other sections, so I decided to watch some LOL seriously for the first time, just to see why it has succeed in the shadows of BW whereas SC2, the rightful heir is fading away.
And the conclusion is - hope!
In competitions, hope is a powerful incentive that keeps the fans on their toes and stops players from giving up. In almost every LOL battle, there is always hope at the end of it that the losing team can still win the war, and for the victorious, there is hope that they will capitalise the advantage and wins the game.
Now let's go back to the state of SC2 today. Around 80% of the game I watch follows this pattern: Player build up their deathballs*, deathballs meet, one of them wins and usually with >40% of their army alive (imho it's due to perfect AI combined with fast pace game play but that's for anther debate), and here is where hope ends in SC2. I am not saying you cannot come back from this spot, but for anyone that watches Pro SC2 regularly, we all know that the chances are close to impossible. Sadly. most of the time our instinct is correct and the loser will just roll-over and dies. Sure, someone will probably bring up examples of games where players do come back from a deficit, but that is a scarce occurrence in today's SC2.
Without hope, players gives up after that first "Deathball v Deathball" encounter. Fans lose interests too because they know the result will likely to be the same as the other 9000+ "Deathball v Deathball" encounters they've watched. Evidence of players giving up includes the now extremely common Deathball battle -> GG. And for the viewers, you just need to see the amount of "lol GG" "ouch that's bad, GG" comments right after the first battle.
The threshold for a deathball army varies depending on which stage of the game we are at. But under most scenarios, deathball = ~90% of your current army supply.
1.Actually the reason why you used to hear screams form other zones is because this years mlg venue is a lot smaller compared to last years and the noise issolation is quite bad.The crowd that you mostly likely hear is the COD crowd since I think,but not too certain they are the center stage and basicly anybody can hear them. 2.moreover you would be surprised but in really exiciting game such as Catz vs Dragon or Illusion vs Incontrol sc2 fans were actually loud and cod and lol people in chat complained quite a lot.And i know this since i had all 3 streams open at the same time.And it is normal.The venue is small and every time something exciting happens in any game and the crowd starts yelling the noise is heard by all of the other crowds and hence all of the other streams. 3.Actually comebacks are quite rare in lol.You may have heard about the term known as "snowballing" used by lots of moba players 4.Lol is very fun to watch just like sc2.If you like lol why don't you simply watch lol without derailing the thread with a pessimisitic "sc2 is dying post"
lol The guy tunes in to LoL for the first time and thinks the game is about hope? I guess now would be a good time to tell him there are more throws in the NA LoL scene compared to the rest. Yes, snowballing is a factor but these NA teams do make a lot of mistakes and that's what causes the comebacks. There were a couple of entertaining games last night, but let's not kid ourselves. There's a lot of improvement these boys can make and they have a long way to go to catch up to the Koreans just like every other game. If he were to tune into let's say the Korean scene he would see a much different story. Way less throws and once one side wins a couple of team fights. Oh boy, do they ever snowball hard.
Then what is keeping the fans watching a 40 minute slaughter if they don't have reasonable hope that their team can still win?
I thought I already answered that? The reason why I find the NA scene interesting & suspenseful is because of the mistakes. That's why you see some matches become a seesaw; whereas, once one team starts to snowball in the Korean scene. Chances of a comeback are slim to none because they know how to close. If you want a North American example of that, I recommend you check out C9's play because those boys are pretty good when it comes to securing an advantage; holding onto that advantage and most importantly being able to close out a match. I wouldn't call a forty minute game a slaughter either and it depends on certain variables as well. If the game goes 40+ minutes I would ask myself where were opportunities for Team A to close it out. A slaughter to be is when the game looks over by around the 15-20 minute mark and the team with the advantage closes it out around the 30 minute mark. Now, that's what I would call a slaughter and what do you know. C9 did that against Coast last night and I consider Coast to be a pretty decent team.
P.S. I agree with the other guys. If you want to continue this conversation look me up in the LR threads for the LCS and we can continue it further there.
On June 30 2013 01:19 Blargh wrote: I don't see why the team would disband. If anything, it would just lose it's primary sponsor or however that works. Look at Team 8! But this is a bit of a bummer for STX Soul.
On June 30 2013 01:07 lichter wrote: Okay so I decided to do a little reading.
STX Pan Ocean is in deep shit. Stocks of both STX Group and STX Pan Ocean have been tanking since 2009. "STX Pan Ocean plunged to 2,565 won Tuesday from 10,900 won Dec. 15, 2008, and STX Offshore & Shipbuilding also 067250.SE +1.53% nosedived to 2,595 won from 14,500 won during the same period." That's a few years ago but the company hasn't really recovered since. Just last week, "STX Pan Ocean tumbled 14.9 percent before share trading was suspended," while "STX Corp dropped 14.8 percent and STX Engine slid 13.8 percent." Ouch.
"STX Pan Ocean, which became one of STX Group's most profitable units after emerging from receivership in 2002, swung to a net loss of 91 billion won in 2009. Its loss deepened to 467 billion won last year." I cannot find what percentage of STX Group's income comes from STX Pan Ocean, but most articles state that "90% of the group's sales come from [shipping and shipbuilding industries]." Their official website does not provide much financial information aside from graphs from the period of 2008-2010. Not a lot of info, but based on their graphs 1.) They are still profitable with a net income of 30.5billion Won in 2010 after a disastrous 2009 when they suffered losses of 171.8billion Won; 2.) Debt equity ratio continues to rise; 3.) Cash flow has been very bad, with 2010 reporting a -69.7billion, with most of that cash coming from "financing activities", and the biggest losses coming from their disastrous investments.
However, all is not lost.
"STX Group, with more than 10 trillion won, or $9 billion, in total debt, has sold 1.13 trillion won in assets as part of a 2.5 trillion won asset sale plan announced in May of last year." So they've been trying to repay their debts but so far it hasn't worked out smoothly as "STX Group had put up for sale its almost 36% interest in STX Pan Ocean, but no buyers came forward." Fortunately, "Creditors of ailing STX Offshore & Shipbuilding on Friday injected an additional 250 billion won (US$216 million) in liquidity into the shipbuilder in a bid to tide it over during its cash crunch, officials said." So even though STX Pan Ocean are in deep shit, it looks like its creditors are going to try everything they can in order to keep STX afloat. It looks like the government also has a stake in this as many companies, banks and institutions have investments or connections to STX Group. So yes, STX are in some trouble, but it looks a lot of people are trying to find a way to help them.
According to what I've read, " STX Group had a combined 2.86 trillion won in corporate debt to be paid out by 2015, according to NICE Investors Service, a local credit appraiser. Out of such debt, the group has 580 billion won in debt that is due this year." This is what is the most worrying as their most recent financial information states they only have a net income of about 30billion Won. I'm uncertain if the debt payments due this year stated above already includes interest payments or only the principal to be paid. Either way, if STX can find a way to refinance that debt and have a more frugal investment plan (apparently Kang wants to BUY ALL THE COMPANIES) they should come out of this fine. They are still a profitable company that is essential for the Korean economy, so I think they will find a way.
I could probably read more but I hate reading about business at home.
I think PanOcean is like 1/3 of all the shipbuilding activities (providing 90%) and the Shipbuilding, Offshore, and Engineering can make up for the other 2/3.
But again, we are now more like WSJ commenters than anything, probably there's not much VC involved with Soul, barely noticeable amount of fixed costs, and overall I'd say they might close be self-sustaining.
I mean Woongjin is just as bad, should I make a [Rumor] Woongjin isn't selling enough herb tea thread?
From what I've read only Pan Ocean is really in the shits. I still think STX are going to be fine, as a company. The pro-team, I dunno, maybe the rumors of STX disbanding has nothing to do with STX's profitability.
Edit: STOP IT WITH THE LOL vs SC2 TALK SHEESH This thread is not for that discussion. Try to remain on topic please.
EPT
