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Protoss:
1.  Rain His play is protoss porn. The way he controls vision, scouts, reacts and little details on the defensive end is second to none. Too bad he sucks at PvP in an era with many protoss champions. Once he mixed in aggressive style a little bit, he won GSL in a dominating fashion and retired. Now he goes back to finish business in the BW scene. Personally in terms of level of play, no other protoss is close.
2. sOs Master of deception. Clutch HoTS career. Lacks mechanics but he reminds you SC2 is a real-time STRATEGY game and it can be won strategically.
3. Stats Weaker but more consistent version of Rain. I feel he's always taking a long time to adapt to the game for every new change.
4. PartinG Micro God but lack everything else. Still his micro is good enough to make him an automatic GSL ro8 player.
Honorable mentions: Zest, MC, herO
Zerg:
1.  Rogue Evolved Rogue is the complete package.
2. Life This guy's best talent is game sense. Natural instinct for opening and what the opponent is thinking. Great micro on top of it.
3. soO Great mechanics and micro, but lacks strategic depth on the highest level. His brute force playstyle suits more for a weekender instead of star league where opponent can study his weekness and prepare for it extensively. Unfortunately he does not participate in weekend tournaments close to enough.
4. Dark Great mechanics, micro and complete range of playstyle. His ego and his G7 performance in a big tournament though leaves something to be desired.
Honorable mentions: Soulkey, NesTea, Serral
Terran
1.  INnoVation Macro God. Perhaps the best TvZ player of all time. He wins with overwhelming opponent with more units. He cheeses by getting away with playing super greedy and let his mechanics carry the game for him.
2. Mvp Best SC2 career for a very long time.
3. TY Strategic Terran and potentially the complete package. His ceiling is extremely high since he shows highest level of macro, micro and understanding of the game. OTOH he's too inconsistent.
4. Maru Much like Zest, Maru finds a good build and sticks to it. He relies on perfect execution. His high tempo style offers opponent many chances to make a mistake and once they do, Maru will finish them relentlessly. He is predictable though and always has one weak matchup that stands out.
Honorable mentions: Bomber, Polt, Taeja
Overall (not in terms of career accomplishments):
1. Rogue
2. Rain
3. INnoVation
4. Life
5. Mvp
6. sOs
7. soO
8. TY
9. Stats
10. Dark
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1. INnoVation He has been so good for a long time with some bad times sprinkled here and there.
2. soO The most consistently good player there is, but he has never been #1. Had he been the best for any amount of time I would have considered him the Greatest of All Time.
3. Life Extremely good player, but the career got cut short. He wasn't a top player for a long enough time to get the top spot.
4. TaeJa A player with so many victories but so few of them in longer seasonal play. He won vs the best, but never the prestiege victories.
5. PartinG A superb player that always showed great games. Too bad he didn't win a lot. That one PvT on Habitation Station where PartinG used his mothership core to defeat a Gangnam Terran was an amazing show of micro. 3 marines wins vs a MsC, but PartinG's MsC defeated more than 5 marines. He also had group Protoss in GSL 2014, season 1. That was the best day of GSL that I have ever witnessed.
6. Dark Dark has been great for years now. He has been the top dog and he has been the playoffs loser. The promised 10 trophies was possible at the time, but I think the competition is too high and retirement is too close. Military service will probably take Dark before he has won all the trophies he aspired to win.
7. Mvp One of three great in the early days. The one who showed great stuff for the longest period of those three. MC may have won the most money, but a lot of that depended on the prize pool of their victories, not the skill demonstrated nor the consistency.
8. Zest A player that has showed the highest high in my eyes. Too bad it didn't last long. His form has been a rollercoaster. To be ranked higher you need fewer, shorter and not as low lows as Zest has had.
9. sOs Another player that has had rollercoaster performance. The difference being that sOs has been able to be the best when it mattered. sOs has been among the lower of A-tier players with peaks of greatness. Regarding playstyle: he has been among the best scouters. Probing early game and often acting when weakness is spotted. sOs 2014 PvZ was probe scout that often turned into a cannon rush. In 2015 he won PvTs off of a probe scout and a not-cancelled safety zealot, doing a BW-esque early pressure that turned into victories. On top of that we have his PvP reputation. There are not many players that would rather play sOs than objectively better players. $o$ is scary.
10.Maru The reason for Terran to not be buffed whenever the race is underperforming is often Maru. He plays well when most other Terran players are struggling. He has a very aggressive style and manages to macro as he microes. I specifically looked at Maru's resources during WÉSG this week. He microed marines forwards on creep vs baneling hydra AND kept his mineral count below 200 for more than 1 minute. He target fired tank shots on banelings, spread marines AND built 2 barracks and started 2/2 upgrades (1/1 just finished) within 5 seconds. The man can handle his economy and micro simultaneously. Maru is a beast. His record long win streak in Proleague is a testament to that. I am not sure about this, but I think Maru has always been among the last 4 to be picked in code S group nominations whenever he qualified for the round of 16. The other players are respecting Maru as a top player. Had Maru been as great when Terran does well as he is when Terran does poorly... well, he would have been a contender for GOAT.
Edit: wrote the opposite of what I meant :p
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NONE.
If there were truly a GOAT, it would still be active and crushing today. The moment you stop winning, nobody cares anymore about anything you ever accomplished. Sad but real.
Instead, I recommend the title GOUAT: Greatest-of-One-Upon-A-Time
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On March 19 2018 01:48 yangluphil wrote:soO His brute force playstyle suits more for a weekender instead of star league where opponent can study his weekness and prepare for it extensively.
This is a special kind of factual inaccuracy people would struggle to recreate if they tried.
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On March 19 2018 03:33 Elentos wrote:Show nested quote +On March 19 2018 01:48 yangluphil wrote:soO His brute force playstyle suits more for a weekender instead of star league where opponent can study his weekness and prepare for it extensively. This is a special kind of factual inaccuracy people would struggle to recreate if they tried.
Elaborate.
I will also say this. SoO overachieved in a lot of tournament runs where he ended up as the runner-up. Obvious example was the two GSL runs last year and blizzcon where he was not a top4 player. Bracket luck or not, he deserved credit for placing as high as he did.
SoO attends way more star league tournaments than weekenders and his only champion so far has been kespa cup which is a short event. So I'm curious to see why you think it's such a ridiculous thought?
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On March 19 2018 03:53 yangluphil wrote:Show nested quote +On March 19 2018 03:33 Elentos wrote:On March 19 2018 01:48 yangluphil wrote:soO His brute force playstyle suits more for a weekender instead of star league where opponent can study his weekness and prepare for it extensively. This is a special kind of factual inaccuracy people would struggle to recreate if they tried. Elaborate.
He's a 6-time GSL finalist in 12 Code S runs, on his way to potentially 7 in 13, what more do I really have to say? 3 finals in 17 weekenders, I guess. Sure, the only thing he's won was a weekender, but the format plays a bigger role in getting to the finals than in winning the finals.
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On March 19 2018 03:20 KR_4EVR wrote:
NONE.
If there were truly a GOAT, it would still be active and crushing today. The moment you stop winning, nobody cares anymore about anything you ever accomplished. Sad but real.
Instead, I recommend the title GOUAT: Greatest-of-One-Upon-A-Time
Are you talking about SC2 only? I ask because the conversation of GOAT in other sports is a hot topic and involves both past and present stars.
And a lot of the players who are no longer playing, those who made an impact on the scene, are still regularly talked about. I think the prime example if Life. Imagine if he hadn't done something so stupid, he would still probably be one of the best players around.
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On March 19 2018 03:53 yangluphil wrote:Show nested quote +On March 19 2018 03:33 Elentos wrote:On March 19 2018 01:48 yangluphil wrote:soO His brute force playstyle suits more for a weekender instead of star league where opponent can study his weekness and prepare for it extensively. This is a special kind of factual inaccuracy people would struggle to recreate if they tried. Elaborate. I will also say this. SoO overachieved in a lot of tournament runs where he ended up as the runner-up. Obvious example was the two GSL runs last year and blizzcon where he was not a top4 player. Bracket luck or not, he deserved credit for placing as high as he did. SoO attends way more star league tournaments than weekenders and his only champion so far has been kespa cup which is a short event. So I'm curious to see why you think it's such a ridiculous thought?
soO is one of the best starleague players of all time. He's made more gsl finals than MVP or Inno
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1. Life
2. INnoVation
3. TaeJa
4. Mvp
5. MKP
6. NesTea
7. Dark
8. Rain
9. Stephano
10. NaNiwa
and many more, feels Bad to leave out herO, Zest, MC, sOs, soO, Rogue, Maru, PartinG (he was really good at some Point). also felt the need to add the best foreigners here, for me Stephano and NaNiwa were the hope of the foreigners for a really long time and they were good even when the gap was much bigger. Serral and Neeb, even if they are really good, they are not yet at that level overall.
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On March 19 2018 04:55 Ja.Y. wrote:Show nested quote +On March 19 2018 03:20 KR_4EVR wrote:
NONE.
If there were truly a GOAT, it would still be active and crushing today. The moment you stop winning, nobody cares anymore about anything you ever accomplished. Sad but real.
Instead, I recommend the title GOUAT: Greatest-of-One-Upon-A-Time Are you talking about SC2 only? I ask because the conversation of GOAT in other sports is a hot topic and involves both past and present stars. And a lot of the players who are no longer playing, those who made an impact on the scene, are still regularly talked about. I think the prime example if Life. Imagine if he hadn't done something so stupid, he would still probably be one of the best players around.
Yes, ok no bonjwa in sc2, but we can discuss about GOAT.
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Czech Republic12133 Posts
1 Life
2 Mvp
3 sOs
4 Maru
5 INnoVation
6 Rogue
7 soO
8 Dark
9 Rain
10 PartinG
11 MC
honorable mentions: MMA, Bomber, TaeJa. Sorry my wonderful Terrans, but Protoss bias. But let me assure you - you're not forgotten!
Also I would love to mention NaNiwa & Stephano. Both of them played one of the best foreign SC2 I've ever seen.
Too many players, too few spots 
I was thinking about placing soO 2nd, but honestly, anyone in my top6 can be first(or second).
On March 19 2018 01:48 yangluphil wrote:... 4. PartinG Micro God but lack everything else. Still his micro is good enough to make him an automatic GSL ro8 player. ...
FYI Parting revolutionized Protoss openings in WoL with his Templar opening. He "made" it viable and when he was doing it, he played exactly like Rain, but with much better micro(vision everywhere, reactions, storms everywhere, it was beautiful). Parting was/is stubborn at times(*cough* certain game vs. innovation *cough*), but he's certainly not lacking in other areas. It seems that way as he's stubborn and cocky, but he's not sOs or Zest who have huge deficits in their game(#ZestsMacro).
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EPT
