It wasn't too long ago that WCS America was the most mocked WCS region. It was dominated by Koreans, barely had any foreigners of note make it past the Ro32, and generally seemed to be "Code S Light."
The last month of competition has gone a long way toward changing this perception. Yes, fundamentally you can still say WCS America is a tournament dominated by Koreans, with foreigners barely featuring past the online phase. But what's changed is how we view the Koreans in it, and the rare foreigner who does happen to get to the later rounds.
Players like TaeJa, Jaedong and Polt have fought against the best players KeSPA and eSF have to offer in multiple tournaments, and proved that they are their equals if not their betters. Players like aLive, Oz,and Revival have shown that they could have made it in Code S—but just chose to take advantage of their team situation. And players like Scarlett and Jim have shown that in a post-Stephano world, the best foreigner in the world doesn't have to come from Europe. To put it simply, WCS America can now offer things no other region has.
Although, they're not exactly putting their best foot forward...
The group order for the Ro32 has been shuffled due to DreamHack Bucharest flights, forcing WCS America Season 3 to kick off with a dreaded all-Korean group. Not only is Group D all-Korean, but it's full of Koreans so anonymous that it would have been hard to hand pick a group that attracts less interest. Oh, there's no doubt that these players are good. But as we all know, it's hard for a Korean to receive any attention overseas unless they're a top 10 player, or a top 10 clown.
In any case, we're going to see two of these four guys at the live Ro16:
EG.aLive, a once champion, has recovered much of his past form after joining EG. He placed top eight at the recent WCS Season 2 Finals, and his quiet consistency this year has him sitting in seventh place in WCS points, a near lock to reach the Blizzcon finals. aLive is peculiar in that he seems to be comfortable with his "invisible Terran" nickname (given to him by the Korean community), happy to avoid the spotlight as he hops from one good tournament finish to another.
ST_Hack, though overshadowed by his teammate Bomber, has been a reliable second Terran for Startale. He's played in two Code S tournaments in the past, and has usually been solid for Startale in the GSTL. Unfortunately, the change of GSTL to a best of seven format has reduced his opportunities to impress, as he typically sat on the 4th/5th spot bubble. Not surprisingly for a Code S Terran, he beat out plenty of strong competition such as Sound, BBoongBBoong, ByuL in the qualifiers for WCS America.
IM_ByuLis similar to Hack in having been overshadowed on a team full of stars, but has proved his skill by playing in Code S and performing well in the GSTL. The transition to HotS seemed to trouble ByuL early on, but he hit his stride in time for the WCS AM qualifiers. His WCS AM Challenger run heading into this group: 2 - 0 against Major, Tilea, and Ryung.
The former SlayerS and Western Wolves player Arthur is the least accomplished of the four, and looks to be the weakest player of the group. Although he plays in a considerable number of smaller online tournaments, he still doesn't have a notable result in a major tournament, whether it's online or live.
Prediction
aLive is just too good and consistent not to make it out of this group, even if it's a difficult one with four Koreans. And besides, he needs to advance if he wants to keep up his streak of team-killing EG's foreigners in WCS (Suppy, Stephano, and DeMusliM have been his victims so far). The remaining spot will probably go to Hack or ByuL, but I have to favor ByuL as he gets to play a slightly easier first opponent in Arthur. He did, however, lose to both Arthur and Hack in WCS America qualifiers.
aLive > Hack ByuL > Arthur aLive > ByuL HacK > Arthur ByuL > Hack
On September 17 2013 05:50 azzih wrote: WCS America or rather WCS Korea-with-lag this is so stupid. Make WCS offline tournaments so korean region cheating stops...
And force the Chinese, South Americans, Southeast Asians and all the other unfortunate regions to get plane tickets, right? Even for Challenger just to be sure. Better promote the local (Actually just American) scenes!
On September 17 2013 05:50 azzih wrote: WCS America or rather WCS Korea-with-lag this is so stupid. Make WCS offline tournaments so korean region cheating stops...
And force the Chinese, South Americans, Southeast Asians and all the other unfortunate regions to get plane tickets, right? Even for Challenger just to be sure. Better promote the local (Actually just American) scenes!
On September 17 2013 06:22 Advocado wrote: WCS America! With nothing but koreans! Yay Blizzard. Learn from LCS jesus christ.
So NA competes with KR in LoL, I take it?
Yes. Either way, region locking needs to happen. I'm still looking forward to watching today's games, despite not really caring about any other players (aLive, maybe?). But WCS absolutely needs region-locking.
On September 17 2013 06:22 Advocado wrote: WCS America! With nothing but koreans! Yay Blizzard. Learn from LCS jesus christ.
Just to throw this out there as an example, Edward (support player for Curse) is Armenian, lives in Russia, but ended up playing in the LCS NA because he joined a... wait for it... North American Team! Like Alive being on the North American Team EG and playing in WCS AM? Yeah kinda. So LCS does have some crossover, although their focus on it being only live matches does prevent most region switching.
By now i find it funny how wpeople complain about WCS America: Either the competition sucks because there's no top koreans or it sucks because most of the America region is just so much worse at Starcraft than the participating koreans. So to improve half of you wanna get rid of the koreans, but than it sucks even more for everyone because the competion is laughable.
So how can WCS America ever do right by you people? Or is it just more of the complaining about sc2/balance/blizzard just to have a reason to complain?
On September 17 2013 05:50 azzih wrote: WCS America or rather WCS Korea-with-lag this is so stupid. Make WCS offline tournaments so korean region cheating stops...
User was warned for this post
Why exactly was this warned? o.o Most people agree that "WCS America = WCS Korea light" is rather problematic.
Nevertheless, I like aLive and hope that he makes it out of the group. I think he's very much underestimated and showed great games in the past. He has the skill to make it to Ro8 and further... I don't know/care for the others though. And it's really sad that no Americans are in this WCS America group.
I don't understand why so many people are complaining about too many koreans in other WCS regions. Even if EU and AM were region locked to citizens, they would just get wrecked at season finals..I'd rather watch good matches all throughout WCS.
On September 17 2013 05:50 azzih wrote: WCS America or rather WCS Korea-with-lag this is so stupid. Make WCS offline tournaments so korean region cheating stops...
User was warned for this post
Why exactly was this warned? o.o Most people agree that "WCS America = WCS Korea light" is rather problematic.
Nevertheless, I like aLive and hope that he makes it out of the group. I think he's very much underestimated and showed great games in the past. He has the skill to make it to Ro8 and further... I don't know/care for the others though. And it's really sad that no Americans are in this WCS America group.
Because it's repetitive and adds nothing? You can't make WCS offline without screwing over more people than the Koreans who want to participate. There are probably more Koreans who would benefit than people who aren't Koreans. Scarlett is Canadian. The US is a big place, North and South America are even bigger places.
The South Americans would need to move. Scarlett would need to move. Most Americans would need to move... It's an idiotic suggestion and it's the same thing over and over again. Chinese? Australians? Taiwanese? All the other non-Koreans who don't have their own region?
Or if they don't move, they have to fly regularly, and at what point do you stop it being online? Is Challenger online? It's not an actual solution to the problem.
On September 17 2013 06:22 Advocado wrote: WCS America! With nothing but koreans! Yay Blizzard. Learn from LCS jesus christ.
So NA competes with KR in LoL, I take it?
Yes. Either way, region locking needs to happen. I'm still looking forward to watching today's games, despite not really caring about any other players (aLive, maybe?). But WCS absolutely needs region-locking.
WCS absolutely needs region locking (in 3-5 years when WCS has more regions so region locking would only completely fuck over the minority, because by then hopefully SC2 will be more career based instead of throwing huge amounts of tournament money at 1-4 players and it will then be worthwhile for someone in a terrible area to say "I'm going to take a risk and move to ____ to start a life in eSports!") However, WCS region locking anytime soon would be absolutely ridiculous and is one of the worst ideas anyone could possibly present. All of the people suggesting it should slap themselves for being THAT ignorant.
On September 17 2013 05:50 azzih wrote: WCS America or rather WCS Korea-with-lag this is so stupid. Make WCS offline tournaments so korean region cheating stops...
User was warned for this post
Why exactly was this warned? o.o Most people agree that "WCS America = WCS Korea light" is rather problematic.
Because when a troll makes a post that takes away from the productivity and adds literally nothing because he is attempting to troll and/or express a toxic statement/opinion, he needs to be warned/temp banned.
Rooting for Hack and aLive! Mostly just for Hack though... Aside from him, hope the best player wins.
On September 17 2013 06:22 Advocado wrote: WCS America! With nothing but koreans! Yay Blizzard. Learn from LCS jesus christ.
So NA competes with KR in LoL, I take it?
Yes.
That's why you shouldn't take hallucinogenic drugs kids. The LoL scene is worse than SC2 for NA vs Korean skill level (like Broodwar worse).
Alive has got this group btw, Hack through in 2nd place.
Uhhhh... have you watched the s3 finals that are going on right now? Vulcun (#3 seeded NA team) very nearly beat one of the best Korean teams. The regions are MUCH closer in league than in sc2.
Who's betting on Taeja winning this whole thing? I'm hoping for a Hero vs Taeja finals and Hero's my favorite player, but I'm not sure if he will win like Dreamhack. Does Hero counter Taeja still because he knows his play style or is Taeja on a different level from all the others?
On September 17 2013 07:19 Dodgin wrote: My advice to everyone who hates WCS America:
Learn to like koreans and scarlett or stop watching. The crying is getting old.
IDK man it just is kinda sad to see your fan favorite players not get a shot at playing in WCS. One of the reasons I love ATC, and SC2L is because in a team league you get to see your favorite players come out and play matches. I honestly enjoy watching Europe more than WCS AM. I mean any tournament that has koreans in it you know they are going to be the top 8 hands down.
Also if Taeja isn't considered the best player in the world right now, I don't know what else to say. The guy just wins games he is so solid. That dreamhack win was impressive !
On September 17 2013 07:20 lichter wrote: If WCS were a region locked meritocracy then we'd have WCS CN and force AM players to live in China.
What a bunch of self entitled whiners.
Where are your manners, man? I know, as a writer you won't be getting a warning here for calling people "a bunch of self entitled whiners" (which is sad for tl.net), but... seriously, when you have no arguments left, you call people names?
Also there is no WCS CN and there are no plans for it. But you seem to have a great talent for imagination. If WCS was region locked, it would be probably like IEM is *right now*. We would have a WCS Asia region, including Korea and China, a region Europe + Africa, and a region North+South America. Works fine.
That said - that's not a whine or anything, just a response to this fail post I quoted... -_-
I guess there will always be comparisons amongst regions, but it doesn't change some facts:
a) KR format encourages preparation over instinctive play. b) EU and AM encourage preparation until Semi's, and then encourage a hybrid of instinctive play and planning. c) WCS Finals always encourage a hybrid of instinctive play and planning.
Who's better? Who knows. But it could be argued that EU and AM are just better prepared for a "hybrid of instinctive play and planning format", and that KR are inherently at a disadvantage already. Then again, I haven't seen a non-KR champion in WCS yet.
On September 17 2013 06:22 Advocado wrote: WCS America! With nothing but koreans! Yay Blizzard. Learn from LCS jesus christ.
So NA competes with KR in LoL, I take it?
At least we get actual Foreign teams with foreign players in LCS who has the backing of sponsors instead of koreans hogging all the sponsorship. Its bad for the scene and the WCS finals has a SINGLE NON KOREAN from all regions qualified?!?!
On September 17 2013 06:22 Advocado wrote: WCS America! With nothing but koreans! Yay Blizzard. Learn from LCS jesus christ.
So NA competes with KR in LoL, I take it?
At least we get actual Foreign teams with foreign players in LCS who has the backing of sponsors instead of koreans hogging all the sponsorship. Its bad for the scene and the WCS finals has a SINGLE NON KOREAN from all regions qualified?!?!
Foreign teams in LoL are actually not that bad tho. I know people say the koreans are way better, but based on the World Championship so far koreans arent really much better than everyone else. The problem for Sc2 is that foreigners just ARE much much much worse than the koreans and EVERYONE knows it (countess examples). LCS has been smart in keeping actual regional comparisons to a bare minimum so no one really knows how the regions match up. Its simply too late for sc2 to do the same because there is no doubt, there is no mystery: koreans are far better. So much so that its a joke to consider a foreigner as top 16 talent-wise, and since WCS is meant to put the BEST 16 players in the World Finals, it makes sense that they are korean.
Yeah no doubt that 16 koreans are by far better and deserve to be in the world finals. But this hurts SC2's popularity in longterm. An only-koreans tournament will get less viewers, and koreans invading local leagues and tournaments and winning it every single time only increases the skill gap between foreign and koreans scene.
In middle future the foreign scene will be dead and irrelevant like in Brood War a few years ago, SC will only be a niche here. And with popularity decreasing the money will also go. Why should a company sponsor a game tounament when only having a few people watching? This will also hurt koreans, cause like 80% of the money comes from western companies.
On September 17 2013 17:11 azzih wrote: Yeah no doubt that 16 koreans are by far better and deserve to be in the world finals. But this hurts SC2's popularity in longterm. An only-koreans tournament will get less viewers, and koreans invading local leagues and tournaments and winning it every single time only increases the skill gap between foreign and koreans scene.
In middle feature the foreign scene will be dead and irrelevant like in Brood War a few years ago, SC will only be a niche here. And with popularity decreasing the money will also go. Why should a company sponsor a game tounament when only having a few people watching? This will also hurt koreans, cause like 80% of the money comes from western companies.
There's no way to prevent this besides locking the Koreans away in Korea, this is an inevitability of the scene. People will either accept it and keep watching or move onto something else. I think there are enough fans who will watch Koreans to keep a decently strong foreign scene around for a while yet to come. I mean every single premier tournament in HotS has been won by a Korean player and people are still watching, not as many as before but It's still enough to justify putting the events on.
On September 17 2013 07:20 lichter wrote: If WCS were a region locked meritocracy then we'd have WCS CN and force AM players to live in China.
What a bunch of self entitled whiners.
That said - that's not a whine or anything, just a response to this fail post I quoted... -_-
This has been discussed to death, tbh. It gets pretty tiring when there aren't really any good arguments for region locking right now (there could be in the future, with better support infrastructure and a more even playing field, etc). Very few actually make good arguments for it other than pumping Blizz's cash into the "local scene".
You'd be surprised; I've only ever had one warning and it was for all caps, of all things. And I'm only a temp, I receive no special favors (I'm sure someone else will pick up the slack premaking LR OPs)
Personally I think region locking would be stupid. I want to see top level games with people who can actually compete when the Season finals come around. People will start complaining that WCS America people are just getting to the season finals only to lose instantly if they region lock.
No Americans making it in the WCS America region? Get better at Starcraft. The Koreans don't have super powers, they just have a better work ethic and infrastructure.
Was surprised aLive didn't get out of the group, bit disappointing. Hopefully he can maintain that top 16 spot with all of his other great finishes so far. Blizzcon here we come!
On September 17 2013 11:02 astray71 wrote: Who's betting on Taeja winning this whole thing? I'm hoping for a Hero vs Taeja finals and Hero's my favorite player, but I'm not sure if he will win like Dreamhack. Does Hero counter Taeja still because he knows his play style or is Taeja on a different level from all the others?
I certainly do. For starters, he has a laughable Ro32 group, so that should be a walkover for him. But sill, Polt and Scarlet I guess can give him a run for his money. I would be afraid of Polt in particular, because I am not sure about Taeja's TvT - are there any good recent Taeja TvT that are not against Innovation? He has given him some pretty good beatings, but I think that it doesn't tell a whole lo, Taeja just knows how to play against Inno.
edit: lol, this was already played? TL writers slowly achieving Artosis-level of predictive power? Anyway, I still don't understand why can't you guys put the time of the event in the header of the post ...
On September 17 2013 11:02 astray71 wrote: Who's betting on Taeja winning this whole thing? I'm hoping for a Hero vs Taeja finals and Hero's my favorite player, but I'm not sure if he will win like Dreamhack. Does Hero counter Taeja still because he knows his play style or is Taeja on a different level from all the others?
edit: lol, this was already played? TL writers slowly achieving Artosis-level of predictive power? Anyway, I still don't understand why can't you guys put the time of the event in the header of the post ...
On September 18 2013 02:05 crazyweasel wrote: I bet 2-3 player wont get their visas............
Yeah that'd be really shitty if it happened again. An easy solution would be to move America's WCS region to a more accessible country. Maybe somewhere in South America? It's not like anyone important is really coming out of the North American scene anyway!
On September 18 2013 02:05 crazyweasel wrote: I bet 2-3 player wont get their visas............
Yeah that'd be really shitty if it happened again. An easy solution would be to move America's WCS region to a more accessible country. Maybe somewhere in South America? It's not like anyone important is really coming out of the North American scene anyway!
Why move it to SA when you can just move it a bit North to the easily accessible (and awesome) country of Canada? No one comes out of SA either, but a certain Scarlett hails from Canada ...
On September 18 2013 02:05 crazyweasel wrote: I bet 2-3 player wont get their visas............
Yeah that'd be really shitty if it happened again. An easy solution would be to move America's WCS region to a more accessible country. Maybe somewhere in South America? It's not like anyone important is really coming out of the North American scene anyway!
Move it to Korea, keep the title. Boom, problem solved.
On September 18 2013 02:05 crazyweasel wrote: I bet 2-3 player wont get their visas............
Yeah that'd be really shitty if it happened again. An easy solution would be to move America's WCS region to a more accessible country. Maybe somewhere in South America? It's not like anyone important is really coming out of the North American scene anyway!
Move it to Korea, keep the title. Boom, problem solved.
That's actually a surprisingly good idea! However absurd it sounds, it would bring the whole things to the most relevant players, including all the Chinese and potentially SEA players. But I think we all understand how unlikely it is - I think that while there are not many US players at the moment, the whole point of pretending that WCS NA has something to do with the US is to improve the US viewership. If it were in Korea, would someone really watch it, when you can watch the GSL? Also, how would any resist the temptation to let GOMTV produce it once it is in Korea, losing any distinction between WCS NA an "code some letter very far from S". To this end, also NASL is in the US and they are doing a pretty good job producing the league now.
Ad Canada: I am not sure that it is so easily accessible. Not sure about now, but a couple of years ago, even I would require visa to Canada. Accessibility is really when SA shines, most of the countries don't give a shit who enters, as long as they pay the reciprocity fee, provided that the they come from a country that imposes a visa fee on the given SA country (luckily I have it free everywhere, except for the exit fee from Bolivia, but that's small change).
On September 18 2013 02:05 crazyweasel wrote: I bet 2-3 player wont get their visas............
Yeah that'd be really shitty if it happened again. An easy solution would be to move America's WCS region to a more accessible country. Maybe somewhere in South America? It's not like anyone important is really coming out of the North American scene anyway!
Move it to Korea, keep the title. Boom, problem solved.
That's actually a surprisingly good idea! However absurd it sounds, it would bring the whole things to the most relevant players, including all the Chinese and potentially SEA players. But I think we all understand how unlikely it is - I think that while there are not many US players at the moment, the whole point of pretending that WCS NA has something to do with the US is to improve the US viewership. If it were in Korea, would someone really watch it, when you can watch the GSL? Also, how would any resist the temptation to let GOMTV produce it once it is in Korea, losing any distinction between WCS NA an "code some letter very far from S". To this end, also NASL is in the US and they are doing a pretty good job producing the league now.
Ad Canada: I am not sure that it is so easily accessible. Not sure about now, but a couple of years ago, even I would require visa to Canada. Accessibility is really when SA shines, most of the countries don't give a shit who enters, as long as they pay the reciprocity fee, provided that the they come from a country that imposes a visa fee on the given SA country (luckily I have it free everywhere, except for the exit fee from Bolivia, but that's small change).
Canada is fairly accessible, for the purposes at hand. South Koreans don't need Visas to go to Canada, nor do Americans, and its probably slightly easier for someone who's Chinese to get a Visa to Canada than the U.S. (also, basically all countries in NA or SA need Visas for people from China). Your personal experience might not be the best, since Canada insists on a Visa from Czech people, due to all the people coming here and asking for asylum, but that's an exception, not the rule for European countries.
Yea lets region lock hahaha (NO) If they would region lock imo even more people would stop watching.
I mean doesnt it make sense that people watch a game because its of a good skill. If i see random player X vs random player Y and they both suck, im not having fun. Doesnt matter much where they are from. If i see a match like Innovation vs Soulkey that is fun, just as Alive - Hack will be. (yes hack is good) But well its a fact americans are patriots and thats the problem. U rather watch bad quality american stuff then good quality stuff from outside the border. I watch WCS EU and AM and i enjoy the koreans there, for one they raise play level which makes games more fun to watch, and for 2 (which noone has thought about) They also raise your own american player levels. If they only have to play against themselves they will never get the same level of training as they would with koreans. Suppy is good ,because in EG he can train with Taeja and Hero. Thats just common sense. So just be grateful that koreans are coming to there, so u might see scarlett or suppy actually win a big tourney instead of being fringe (at maximum) forever. Kind regards, and no Offence
Do people really want THIS to be the ultimate StarCraft competition?
Also, here's one positive that for some reason no one seems to consider when this debate comes up: Korean players who dedicate an enormous amount of time to StarCraft and become amazingly good at it can actually make money and compete instead of being stuck in Code B.
It does kind of suck for fans of only foreign players, but all you have to do is manage to be a fan of some Korean players, and your problem is solved. (although I admit, I'm not really sure how easy/hard this would be, since liking Koreans came naturally to me)
EPT
EG.aLive, 
IM_ByuL, 
Arthur
