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WCS AM will continue to include LatAm, Oceania/SEA, CN, and TW/HK/Macau, you can all stop freaking out about it. |
Fantastic news all around. It's about time there was real regional lock. For the people thinking this is a bad thing, let me explain why it's actually important; let's look at Korea to explain.
Koreans are known as being the best SC2 players, and for good reason. The reason they dominate the scene, however, is not due to some genetic trait, but rather cash flow and infrastructure. Players and teams are actually able to invest more of their time into being good at the game, and can afford coaching salaries and such.
Thinking WCS region lock magically reduces skill requirements for players is ludicrous; their training regime to win will still involve playing against Koreans (probably a lot of KR server, for example). The best foreigners don't win against Koreans because they face Koreans in tournaments once in a while, they win because they can beat those Koreans on ladder and in practice. What actually happens with region lock is that the tournament prize money gets infused into the local scene, rather than all the cash getting outsourced to Korea to further finance their dominance. Home-grown infrastructure is necessary if we ever want non-Koreans to be relevant at the highest level of play, and region lock is a step in the right direction to make it happen.
A simple economics example would be protectionism. Let's take the Korean auto market for example; when companies like Kia were just getting started, Korea put tariffs on imported vehicles to give the local underdogs a fighting chance to build up their infrastructure. Nowadays, Kia ships vehicles across the globe. Without that protectionism, everyone would have just bought Hondas and such. In the same way, we want to give Western teams a chance to build themselves up and get the infrastructure going, so that in the future they can compete at the highest level around the world on their own two feet.
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Didn't the last time this happen result in Koreans smashing through every other region/country anyway?
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On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own.
But foreigner are on a lower level..
There is a reason the top16 for Blizzcon is 16 Koreans.
Its an undeniable truth we have to accept that the foreign scene is not as good as the Korean.
It has gotten a lot closer for sure, but it is not close to as good as the Korean scene yet.
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On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own.
The foreigners are getting closer to Koreans BECAUSE they have to compete with koreans on a regular basis. Even now, there's like 3 foreigners out there right now who can consistantly compete with decent Koreans. And to say that if Polt can be taken down any of them can is laughable, Polt probably wouldn't make Code S. The foreign scene benefits from koreans being involved, this will only hurt it.
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On September 05 2014 15:56 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own. The foreigners are getting closer to Koreans BECAUSE they have to compete with koreans on a regular basis. Even now, there's like 3 foreigners out there right now who can consistantly compete with decent Koreans. And to say that if Polt can be taken down any of them can is laughable, Polt probably wouldn't make Code S. The foreign scene benefits from koreans being involved, this will only hurt it.
This is patently untrue. If you think non-Koreans get better from a single best-of-x series in a tournament against Koreans, you don't have any idea how people get good at the game. It's endless hours of practice, long discussions about strategy, and dedication that get you to a good enough level to be able to showcase your skill at a tournament.
The Western scene has been struggling for far too long, having all the money in the scene funnelled out to Korea instead of being invested locally to build the same level of infrastructure that Korea already has.
If you really think having Koreans taking all the prize money from every tournament is beneficial to non-Korean teams, tell me, why are the Koreans still so dominant? In fact, they're far more dominant now than they ever were at WoL's release.
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Fully region-locked, wow. I didn't expect this. I hope it is not too late, especially NA pro scene is already quite dead, hopefuilly this revives it somewhat.
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East Gorteau22261 Posts
On September 05 2014 16:04 iamcaustic wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2014 15:56 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own. The foreigners are getting closer to Koreans BECAUSE they have to compete with koreans on a regular basis. Even now, there's like 3 foreigners out there right now who can consistantly compete with decent Koreans. And to say that if Polt can be taken down any of them can is laughable, Polt probably wouldn't make Code S. The foreign scene benefits from koreans being involved, this will only hurt it. This is patently untrue. If you think non-Koreans get better from a single best-of-x series in a tournament against Koreans, you don't have any idea how people get good at the game. It's endless hours of practice, long discussions about strategy, and dedication that get you to a good enough level to be able to showcase your skill at a tournament. The Western scene has been struggling for far too long, having all the money in the scene funnelled out to Korea instead of being invested locally to build the same level of infrastructure that Korea already has.
You mean infrastructure like local tournaments, the big international tournaments (that all players want to go to) and frequent online cups and invitationals?
Honestly, Korea has three things: teamhouses, Proleague and GSL. The GSL is too small to support all Korean players, Proleague awards no money to individual players and is a huge time sink, and the teamhouses are too few to help all the players. With this change, the foreign scene has much more, because it was arbitrarly decided that they deserve it. I see where you're coming from (as someone said earlier, there are two schools of thought), but I strongly disagree.
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Oh, this seems like overall really bad news. I hope they change the prize pool and WCS points accordingly and make Kor much more worth than EU and EU much more worth than NA. Otherwise we can expect to have undeserving players at Blizzcon.
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Let's just fuck with Koreans because they're better than foreigners, I guess.
WCS KR is untouched, I hope?
E: Axiom just got sucker punched or?
I didn't follow WCS AM before and now I have even less reason to.
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On September 05 2014 16:04 iamcaustic wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2014 15:56 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own. The foreigners are getting closer to Koreans BECAUSE they have to compete with koreans on a regular basis. Even now, there's like 3 foreigners out there right now who can consistantly compete with decent Koreans. And to say that if Polt can be taken down any of them can is laughable, Polt probably wouldn't make Code S. The foreign scene benefits from koreans being involved, this will only hurt it. This is patently untrue. If you think non-Koreans get better from a single best-of-x series in a tournament against Koreans, you don't have any idea how people get good at the game. It's endless hours of practice, long discussions about strategy, and dedication that get you to a good enough level to be able to showcase your skill at a tournament. The Western scene has been struggling for far too long, having all the money in the scene funnelled out to Korea instead of being invested locally to build the same level of infrastructure that Korea already has. If you really think having Koreans taking all the prize money from every tournament is beneficial to non-Korean teams, tell me, why are the Koreans still so dominant? In fact, they're far more dominant now than they ever were at WoL's release.
Many pro players have said they believe having koreans playing on the other ladders has benefitted the overall skill level of those regions. We'd be further behind if there was always region locking. And the truth is dude, the western scene will probably NEVER catch up. I personally would rather see the top koreans do well over the lesser foreigners, even though I like to see foreigners do well.
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I was really surprised by this news, I guess a lot of high-level Koreans will have to return to Korea. This will probably mean the retirement of a lot of players, as they will not be able to find a team or get results that make you any money in Korea (GSL Code S).
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The only positive thing is that we can see Taeja failing to get Code S titles again. But I don't think that the growth potential in NA or EU is big enough to justify killing off a bunch of hard working Koreans.
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On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own.
Lol, foreigners are NOWHERE NEAR as good as Koreans. The only reason they're improving at such a good rate is BECAUSE they play against Koreans regularly.
Snute, Scarlett and Bunny, on their best days, could MAYBE compete with 2nd or 3rd tier Kespa players in the tournament style Korea uses where a player is allowed to prepare for their opponent.
The foreign scene absolutely CANNOT compete with the Korean scene in terms of skill. Even now with this retarded point system that rewards going to weekend tournaments so heavily, there are zero foreigners who are skilled enough to have earned a spot in the WCS top 16. Blizzcon is a joke right now because the best players in the world, the GSL winners and the Proleague stars, don't make up the majority of that roster.
Imagine how much more ridiculously awful it will be when NA and EU "pros," devoid of the increased skill gained from regularly playing against Koreans players, make it to Blizzcon off the backs of easy WCS titles and get stomped 3-0 by the actually good players.
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East Gorteau22261 Posts
On September 05 2014 16:22 Greenei wrote:
The only positive thing is that we can see Taeja failing to get Code S titles again. But I don't think that the growth potential in NA or EU is big enough to justify killing off a bunch of hard working Koreans.
I don't think Taeja will be around for that many more GSLs, honestly. He's done a 180 on "I will retire"-talks before, but there can only be so many times.
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Poland3748 Posts
Ladder should be more relevant, not less.
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I thought the latest trend was complaining that GSL was much harder than WCS EU and AM. Now this will increase the gap even further, and make WCS points system even more unbalanced.
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On September 05 2014 16:09 Zealously wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2014 16:04 iamcaustic wrote:On September 05 2014 15:56 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own. The foreigners are getting closer to Koreans BECAUSE they have to compete with koreans on a regular basis. Even now, there's like 3 foreigners out there right now who can consistantly compete with decent Koreans. And to say that if Polt can be taken down any of them can is laughable, Polt probably wouldn't make Code S. The foreign scene benefits from koreans being involved, this will only hurt it. This is patently untrue. If you think non-Koreans get better from a single best-of-x series in a tournament against Koreans, you don't have any idea how people get good at the game. It's endless hours of practice, long discussions about strategy, and dedication that get you to a good enough level to be able to showcase your skill at a tournament. The Western scene has been struggling for far too long, having all the money in the scene funnelled out to Korea instead of being invested locally to build the same level of infrastructure that Korea already has. You mean infrastructure like local tournaments, the big international tournaments (that all players want to go to) and frequent online cups and invitationals? Honestly, Korea has three things: teamhouses, Proleague and GSL. The GSL is too small to support all Korean players, Proleague awards no money to individual players and is a huge time sink, and the teamhouses are too few to help all the players. With this change, the foreign scene has much more, because it was arbitrarly decided that they deserve it. I see where you're coming from (as someone said earlier, there are two schools of thought), but I strongly disagree.
Local tournaments dish out, what? $100? $200? They're scattered and sparse. Koreans also participate in the online cups, so you're stuck with local LAN to guarantee any spare change to trickle into the pockets of non-Koreans. This ties into something you mentioned the Koreans have: team houses.
Not just a house though. Full training quarters, backed with dedicated coaching staff. I'm talking about the KeSPA teams, of course. You and I both know you can't finance that off the money trickling in from local LANs -- which is the only source where you're guaranteed not to have the vast majority of prize money siphoned by Korea.
Your argument also makes the mistake of just talking about "Korean players", as opposed to the professional Korean players that dominate the scene. There are plenty of Korean players that I can even beat, let alone a non-Korean pro. The players that actually benefit from the Korean infrastructure are easily a level beyond what the rest of the world can produce, save for one or two heroes that we always hold on a pedestal at any given time.
Proleague awards money to the teams, which in turn finance the players' training infrastructure, which in turn makes them better than the rest of the world. It's pretty simple. Individual winnings simply incentivizes the particular player to invest more time, both because they are more capable of affording to (e.g. don't need a second job) and because of the opportunity to win more. The combination results in one region being a class above everyone else.
The GSL, for all practical purposes, is the exact same thing as what WCS now is for the rest of the world. GSL already had region lock; you had to physically be in Korea for the entirety of the tournament, from qualifiers right up to the finals. Qualifying means you need to dedicate yourself geographically for at least 2 seasons if you want to win the Code S finals. It was the other regions that had a more forgiving format, allowing for online play up to the weekend events, allowing anyone to fly in for a few days and sweep the prize. All this region locking change is doing is aligning the other regions to be the same as GSL. Fair is fair.
On September 05 2014 16:15 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2014 16:04 iamcaustic wrote:On September 05 2014 15:56 SetGuitarsToKill wrote:On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own. The foreigners are getting closer to Koreans BECAUSE they have to compete with koreans on a regular basis. Even now, there's like 3 foreigners out there right now who can consistantly compete with decent Koreans. And to say that if Polt can be taken down any of them can is laughable, Polt probably wouldn't make Code S. The foreign scene benefits from koreans being involved, this will only hurt it. This is patently untrue. If you think non-Koreans get better from a single best-of-x series in a tournament against Koreans, you don't have any idea how people get good at the game. It's endless hours of practice, long discussions about strategy, and dedication that get you to a good enough level to be able to showcase your skill at a tournament. The Western scene has been struggling for far too long, having all the money in the scene funnelled out to Korea instead of being invested locally to build the same level of infrastructure that Korea already has. If you really think having Koreans taking all the prize money from every tournament is beneficial to non-Korean teams, tell me, why are the Koreans still so dominant? In fact, they're far more dominant now than they ever were at WoL's release. Many pro players have said they believe having koreans playing on the other ladders has benefitted the overall skill level of those regions. We'd be further behind if there was always region locking. And the truth is dude, the western scene will probably NEVER catch up. I personally would rather see the top koreans do well over the lesser foreigners, even though I like to see foreigners do well.
Ladder regions are not locked. There's nothing stopping pros from playing on KR server. I already mentioned how it's in fact the regular practice against Koreans that provides results, not the single best-of-x at a tournament. These are two different issues.
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1001 YEARS KESPAJAIL22272 Posts
On September 05 2014 16:23 Lunareste wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own. Imagine how much more ridiculously awful it will be when NA and EU "pros," devoid of the increased skill gained from regularly playing against Koreans players, make it to Blizzcon off the backs of easy WCS titles and get stomped 3-0 by the actually good players.
i'd enjoy it
talking to stuchiu so much has made me start loving favorites being crushed and tears being shed
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Well not sure why many of you think that China/TW/Sea wont be able to participate in WCS AM. As it states that players must be legal residents of the region they choose to play in. And USA/Canada/LatAm, Oceania/SEA, CN, and TW/HK/Macau are the part of the region. That would mean if you are a Chinese player, you don't need USA visa - only upon going to offline event (as always). And if you are Korean and get a Taiwanese visa - you can still participate in WCS AM if you qualify through TW qualifier.
OR AM I WRONG ?!?
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On September 05 2014 16:26 lichter wrote:Show nested quote +On September 05 2014 16:23 Lunareste wrote:On September 05 2014 15:51 Shuffleblade wrote:
I read lots of skepticism here, I have to concede that its very unsure how this will turn out.
I will say however that I think a certain degree of lock is good for actually having a fair share of americans in americas WCS. If there is any time when its a good move I think it is now, the foreign scene has exploded the recent months and are getting close to koreas level. If the lock would have come down 1 year ago the european and american scenes would have decayed into a very low level of skill. If they did that then then Polt would keep on winning easy, as it is now Polt can be taken down, any korean can be taken down. You want to argue Polt is still the undisputed god of America just let me remind you of Major, which is just one example.
As it is now the foreign scene can stand on its own and grow from here, the skill and talent are there. Stop saying foreigners are low level or blizzcon will be a joke. An all korean blizzcon is definitely still possible and if foreigners do get there they can hold their own. Imagine how much more ridiculously awful it will be when NA and EU "pros," devoid of the increased skill gained from regularly playing against Koreans players, make it to Blizzcon off the backs of easy WCS titles and get stomped 3-0 by the actually good players. i'd enjoy it talking to stuchiu so much has made me start loving favorites being crushed and tears being shed
gonna add you and stuchiu to my list of mustache twirling evil geniuses.
Lunareste's list of Mustache Twirling Evil Geniuses:
1. lichter
2. stuchiu
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EPT
