The GSL took a blow to its vaunted reputation on day one of GSL vs. The World as Code S Season 1 & 2 champions Dark and Maru were both eliminated in the first round.
Dark's embarrassment came at the hands of Poland's Elazer, who took a 3-2 victory after completing a ZvZ trifecta of blocking an all-in, succeeding with his own all-in, and outplaying his opponent in the late-game. In Maru's case, he gave up a clean 3-0 sweep to Stats, whose championship-winning form from ASUS ROG Summer seemed to have carried over directly into GSL vs. The World.
Stats wasn't the only player to build on his momentum from ASUS ROG. Barely a week after putting up an impressive fight in a 2-3 loss against Serral, TIME came through with a 3-0 sweep against soO at GSL vs. The World. While the games themselves weren't as one-sided as the scoreline (in particular, TIME's mech issues from his series against Serral came up again), TIME was still able to make it 2-0 on the day for foreigner vs Korea matches.
Finally, Neeb edged out his old nemesis ShoWTimE in the only foreigner vs foreigner match of the day.
Following the first four matches, team captains Dark and Serral proceeded to select teams for the 10,000,000 KRW (~$8,200 USD) team competition to be played on August 18th. Reynor had the pleasure of being the #1 foreigner picked by Dark, while Maru received the nod from Serral despite his earlier loss to Stats.
Dark picked first after winning the coin toss.
Captains picked in alternating GSL-World order.
Picks order listed in [brackets].
Team Dark: Dark, Reynor[1], Stats[3], TIME[5], TY[7], SpeCial[9], soO[11], HeroMarine[13] Team Serral: Serral, Maru[2], ShoWTimE[4], Classic[6], Elazer[8], Trap[10], Neeb[12], FanTaSy[14]
If Neeb takes out Stats this would be one hell of a wild card-y bracket, but I think once we're out of the Ro16 we're going to see foreigners get knocked out a lot more, since Ill be watching more and thats just my luck.
TIME played exceptionally well but soO also played real bad, I wouldn't be surprised if Elazer gives TIME much more trouble.
On the other hand I don't like Neeb's chances against Stats at all, he got completely stomped at IEM Katowice and his performance against ShowTimE today wasn't impressive either.
Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
The audience was really good considering the day and schedule.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote:
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Do you really think Blizzard would make a new RTS in only a couple years? =D
On August 15 2019 23:05 Danjiapao wrote: As a Chinese, I can't imagine TIME winning so easily
I could.
He has had some of the most well thought out builds tvz in the last while.
He also exploits map features more regularly then everyone else.
I thought Serral was lucky to beat him in asus rog.
He also doesn't react to any kind of ling run by. I'm not sure he beats Stats Classic or TY either should he face them
I thought the near-throw with mech was pretty worrisome, esp combined with how comfortably Serral took out his mech at Assembly (although, Serral seems to beat anyone's mech comfortably). The bio aggression and micro is fucking great tho.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
The WCS reigning champion got 4-0ed recently, Serral the foreign blizzcon champion got beaten by Stats. It’s not 2 matches of GSL vs The world that will change the fact that there is still a gap in general.
Elazer beating Dark isn’t that surprising given he already did it and ZvZ has proven volatile for everyone, like Serral almost dropping to inferior zergs multiple times.
TIME has been playing well but he is playing on the kr server afaik?
I'm so disappointed with Maru. He played so bad today. Maybe he hasn't practiced for a long time (His interview looks like he never want to win this game). There is no chance we can see Maru vs Serral at Blizzcon this year. Terran's only hope this year goes to TY and TIME? (And the next patch....)
Love seeing Maru getting smashed! I've always thought if somebody spent the time to study him he could be made to look foolish. it happened at blizz con, and it happened today. I feel his play is quite gimicky (its perfect but it's like 1 gimick after another such as widow mines, into cloak banshee etc..)
He clearly had not seen stats at asus rog, those 3x orcals rekt him so hard in the second game, and stats had timings to hit maru when he was weak in the 3rd game and kept maru busy at home in the first game when he was weak!
On August 16 2019 01:09 La1 wrote: Love seeing Maru getting smashed! I've always thought if somebody spent the time to study him he could be made to look foolish. it happened at blizz con, and it happened today. I feel his play is quite gimicky (its perfect but it's like 1 gimick after another such as widow mines, into cloak banshee etc..)
He clearly had not seen stats at asus rog, those 3x orcals rekt him so hard in the second game, and stats had timings to hit maru when he was weak in the 3rd game and kept maru busy at home in the first game when he was weak!
Great play!
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
On August 16 2019 01:09 La1 wrote: Love seeing Maru getting smashed! I've always thought if somebody spent the time to study him he could be made to look foolish. it happened at blizz con, and it happened today. I feel his play is quite gimicky (its perfect but it's like 1 gimick after another such as widow mines, into cloak banshee etc..)
He clearly had not seen stats at asus rog, those 3x orcals rekt him so hard in the second game, and stats had timings to hit maru when he was weak in the 3rd game and kept maru busy at home in the first game when he was weak!
Great play!
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
Yes, when he is on point, he is godlike. But today was terrible to watch. If he bombs out of GSL, than at least we can say he is in a bad shape. But if he comes up with a 4-0 first place finish, and beats Stats (easily), than we can be really mad about him. This event should be a honor to represnt your country, other Terrans and Koreans. He had months to prepare, so we can't even talk about his struggles in weekenders, since this was his very first game. My problem with Maru today or in general is, when he is off, he seems worse than Alive/Bunny, etc.. Or at least non interested.. Today his games were non-competitive at all. No idea, no gameplan, his scouting was lazy, no timing attacks, out of place many times. Poor gamesense during the second game against Stats's 3 oracle play. He seemed like someone who plays on ladder with ingamesound off and some spotify in the background. He was clearly not hiding builds or anything, he was playing terrible tbh, and as a fan favourite player, this is really annoying attutide.
On August 16 2019 00:47 NinjaNight wrote: What's the deal Maru? 0-3 Stats is just silly. What happened to the Maru that was on the very brink of beating Stats 3-2 earlier this year?
Maru has 2 different TvPs. There is his ro16/GSL Playoffs TvP which is anywhere from godly to ungodly. Then there is his GSL ro32/non-GSL TvP which is quite mediocre. That's been the case since at least the start of last year.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
User was temp banned for this post.
Wow, you seem really mad. Koreans can't ZvZ as much as Europeans apparently. And Maru? He disappointed like he always does and will keep dodging Serral forever.
On August 16 2019 00:47 NinjaNight wrote: What's the deal Maru? 0-3 Stats is just silly. What happened to the Maru that was on the very brink of beating Stats 3-2 earlier this year?
Maru has always been very inconsistent. So I'd say it's still the old Maru from earlier this year and last year. He seems to suck most of the time but at the rare occasion he does not suck he sometimes wins the whole thing.
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
User was temp banned for this post.
Wow, you seem really mad. Koreans can't ZvZ as much as Europeans apparently. And Maru? He disappointed like he always does and will keep dodging Serral forever.
On August 16 2019 00:47 NinjaNight wrote: What's the deal Maru? 0-3 Stats is just silly. What happened to the Maru that was on the very brink of beating Stats 3-2 earlier this year?
Maru has always been very inconsistent. So I'd say it's still the old Maru from earlier this year and last year. He seems to suck most of the time but at the rare occasion he does not suck he sometimes wins the whole thing.
His builds and timing seems to be figured out by most tosses and he keeps doing the same thing over and over again, the fact of the matter, many terrans copied Maru on ladder and thats what caused Maru "play to decline", same can be said about Innovation even more. The only 3rd horsemen terran who is not suffering this is TY, which has 20differnt builds in each MU. If you look at TIME, his play/macro/multitasking/micro in mid/late game is inferior to Maru, yet since he has his own unique builds, especially in TvZ, hes doing great.
Man, I wish Blizzard would do something to close this skill gap. It's like the only people who can beat foreigners are other foreigners and the best Korean zerg just got knocked out by a mid tier European. Please implement a region lock so the Koreans can grow without continually being beaten down by the powerful invading foreigners.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
Three years of HoTS deeply instilled in many of you guys the idea foreigners can't be good at Sc2 and that inevitably it's a fault of koreans when they get defeated; this totally drives me mad. It's true that the infrastructure crumbled and the depth in scene was greatly reduced but the top players are there, are very strong, and as a whole they are still considerably ahead of foreigners.
On the other hand, koreans are not untouchable gods anymore and the #32 b tier KR player would get absolutely demolished in WCS in 2019; also, there are a couple of aspects in which westerners are indeed ahead of koreans, that are ZvZ meta(Elazer is undoubtly a weaker player than Dark, still he was capable of winning, and that's only the last of many examples) and Serral, the outlier, who was noticeably ahead of top koreans last year and may still very well be the best player in the world right now. Both of these, as well as the upwards trend in viewers, were made possible by region lock that gave WCS enough time to develop without being strangled by an army of objectively superior koreans like they used to be; Legacy of the Void had indeed a part in this process by resetting the way sc2 was played and effectively reducing the gap in few months.
WCS scene may be mature enough for the region lock to be at least partially softened in the near future.
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
Actually he is the one Terran who can win on shit patches.
All this talk about Maru being bad now is ridiculous. This is just TvP on the current patch vs a top protoss who doesn't make huge mistakes. Yeah TY beat Stats at homestory cup a month ago but Stats just looked terrible that day. He said he would be drinking heavily which makes sense since it's homestory cup. It wasn't the same Stats that won Asus last weekend and destroyed Maru today. Maru is still the best XvZ player in the world and is top 3 in TvT. There are no good TvP players at the moment. If TY beats Serral he will get crushed by Trap.
On August 16 2019 02:33 JJH777 wrote: All this talk about Maru being bad now is ridiculous. This is just TvP on the current patch vs a top protoss who doesn't make huge mistakes. Yeah TY beat Stats at homestory cup a month ago but Stats just looked terrible that day. He said he would be drinking heavily which makes sense since it's homestory cup. It wasn't the same Stats that won Asus last weekend and destroyed Maru today. Maru is still the best XvZ player in the world and is top 3 in TvT. There are no good TvP players at the moment. If TY beats Serral he will get crushed by Trap.
I highly doubt that; In the same patches, Maru was both building his consecutive Code S titles mainly on his TvP prowess and being eliminated from weekenders by Protoss only(Inno being the exception at WESG 2018).
Also, TvP hasn't been especially Protoss favored of recent with both Stats and Classic having their worst results in PvT this year.
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
Actually he is the one Terran who can win on shit patches.
Not this time though.
INno is the Terran who win when Terran is strong
Even when Maru was playing godlike in GSL he didn't deliver outside of Code S. Not even on the day1 where the preparational argument cannot be made as he had the time to prepare... so either he doesn't care or there's a mental issue.
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
Uh, he won 4 consecutive Code S titles during several patches, the patch word cannot be used (he won the last one after the major afterBlizzcon patch either...)
You still have to go through RO8/4/Finals. So the easier argument is iffy, also he had to win the first Code S to get the right to move people around, he had to qualify for the first won WESG(through the Korean qualifier)... but sure, it's easier.
Does anyone here beside me think if Koreans have the team support they used to get, they would play a lot better than they currently do? Coaches, teammates, they all play a role.
On August 16 2019 02:46 geokilla wrote: Does anyone here beside me think if Koreans have the team support they used to get, they would play a lot better than they currently do? Coaches, teammates, they all play a role.
Maybe it's the lack of overseers that would force them to train and kept their regime under control?
On August 16 2019 02:46 geokilla wrote: Does anyone here beside me think if Koreans have the team support they used to get, they would play a lot better than they currently do? Coaches, teammates, they all play a role.
Maybe it's the lack of overseers that would force them to train and kept their regime under control?
I mean it might help.
A lot of players prospered in more relaxed environments and enjoyed them, although they had the initial team house grind to build them up in the first place.
Plus players help each other out all the time, things aren’t as locked down to within teams which can help a lot too.
People who went through that system seem to be perfectly able to maintain their level, or close to it. The problem is the lack of Korean tournaments, plus the team houses are really stifling the development of the next generation of players, at least as results seem to show.
Also I mean it’s one series, let’s not go overboard on Maru.
Maru plays a style that to me is often really fragile, high risk moves and hyper aggressive, but if he’s on form he just ekes out so many little advantages over the game and makes even the best PvT players look inferior in the matchup. If he’s off all the little gains he usually make don’t come off and he can look like he’s playing much worse than he is.
Some of his moves were pretty decent today, he did a neat flank to catch Stats’ stalkers and whatnot.
Stats also played rather well today, his target fire was really good throughout, its less obvious and flashy than Terran micro but if you really pay attention it really adds up over multiple engagements.
On August 16 2019 02:46 geokilla wrote: Does anyone here beside me think if Koreans have the team support they used to get, they would play a lot better than they currently do? Coaches, teammates, they all play a role.
Not just that dude. Steady income. That makes staying a pro worth it even if things aren't going amazingly in tournaments for you for a time. The top players have kept playing but over the years we've lost most of the "faceless Koreans who can't do anything in Korea but still dominate everyone at Dreamhack" crowd. Those guys were important to keep the level of practice high.
On August 16 2019 02:46 geokilla wrote: Does anyone here beside me think if Koreans have the team support they used to get, they would play a lot better than they currently do? Coaches, teammates, they all play a role.
Maybe it's the lack of overseers that would force them to train and kept their regime under control?
I mean it might help.
A lot of players prospered in more relaxed environments and enjoyed them, although they had the initial team house grind to build them up in the first place.
Plus players help each other out all the time, things aren’t as locked down to within teams which can help a lot too.
People who went through that system seem to be perfectly able to maintain their level, or close to it. The problem is the lack of Korean tournaments, plus the team houses are really stifling the development of the next generation of players, at least as results seem to show.
There's a reason why so many successfull organizations use tight regime and not freedom. While tight regime kills creativity, it helps where you need just to be really fucking good - e.g. sports.
Also I think it was QXC who touched this subject and he said something very mind blowing - living in the (proper) teamhouse gives you more time to play. Because you don't have to shop, you don't have to cook, you don't have to... etc. Not sure how much accurate it was but thinking about it - makes sense. All these small things take the time away which could have been used for something more useful(e.g. regeneration, so you're not 100 % of the time playing)
On August 16 2019 03:11 Need wrote: Lol koreans embarrassing. Good thing we had a KR vs KR so at least we get one through
soO was expected by many, so the only surprise is the Dark game. Don't get why people write this shit... even TL writers were expecting TIME to advance...
For most of the people it's just a taunt and it is a wrong statement anyway but it can be useful for you to understand how infuriating can it be when people keep spamming senseless and false evaluations regarding certain players or groups of players.
On August 16 2019 02:46 geokilla wrote: Does anyone here beside me think if Koreans have the team support they used to get, they would play a lot better than they currently do? Coaches, teammates, they all play a role.
That is the only reason Koreans always were better. You had a few natural talents that got really good without big teams supporting them like Byun for example but now players have more freedom even if in a "team" to do what they want so the practice they get is less efficient.
But I still think Koreans are better at getting in good practise then the foreign scene.
And you still have teams like Greenwings which has the best players in Korea a lot of the time.
Also Korean server has a higher number of skilled players playing which helps.
If the foreign scene had its own tournament like GSL and same quality teams and practise as koreans its just a question of the individual.
These things are a bit closer now which is why the skill gap is closer
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
Actually he is the one Terran who can win on shit patches.
Not this time though.
INno is the Terran who win when Terran is strong
Even when Maru was playing godlike in GSL he didn't deliver outside of Code S. Not even on the day1 where the preparational argument cannot be made as he had the time to prepare... so either he doesn't care or there's a mental issue.
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
Uh, he won 4 consecutive Code S titles during several patches, the patch word cannot be used (he won the last one after the major afterBlizzcon patch either...)
You still have to go through RO8/4/Finals. So the easier argument is iffy, also he had to win the first Code S to get the right to move people around, he had to qualify for the first won WESG(through the Korean qualifier)... but sure, it's easier.
Except when he won this year's chinese invitational or when he won WESG last year. The fact that he went ro8 and ro4 at blizzcon and katowice last year (eliminated by two of his teanmates) also begs to disagree with you. Lets face it winning 4 GSL in a row makes that or you win a tournament or you are overhyped/out of shape/bad/your results were a fluke or whatever. But the fact that no other, besides Serral, is taken in such high standarts speaks for his skills. Also people here act like if Stats was not the fucking best protoss of LOTV or something. And stats is on fire right now.
On August 16 2019 03:17 Wombat_NI wrote: Also I mean it’s one series, let’s not go overboard on Maru.
Maru plays a style that to me is often really fragile, high risk moves and hyper aggressive, but if he’s on form he just ekes out so many little advantages over the game and makes even the best PvT players look inferior in the matchup. If he’s off all the little gains he usually make don’t come off and he can look like he’s playing much worse than he is.
Some of his moves were pretty decent today, he did a neat flank to catch Stats’ stalkers and whatnot.
Stats also played rather well today, his target fire was really good throughout, its less obvious and flashy than Terran micro but if you really pay attention it really adds up over multiple engagements.
I said before the tournament that it was weird to give Maru the edge in the predictions since it was played before the patch. Plus it wasn’t in a GSL playoff so at best Maru would have won 1 game.
At least Elazer showed that he deserved to be there and that’s fucking great. TIME proved that his great play vs Serral wasn’t a fluke, and that abusing the map layout was a good strategy (1st map).
Neeb's game 5 vs showtime was a PvP masterclass, he just picked the absolute perfect build, and tailored it to what he was seeing flawlessly. Neeb just made better adjustments over the course of the series and read his opponent perfectly.
Also that Elazer VS Dark series was bonkers, we got the full 5 games but felt like Dark spotted him a lead with that game 1 cheese.
Casting and everything else has been on point too. Can't wait for tonight's matches.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
Three years of HoTS deeply instilled in many of you guys the idea foreigners can't be good at Sc2 and that inevitably it's a fault of koreans when they get defeated; this totally drives me mad. It's true that the infrastructure crumbled and the depth in scene was greatly reduced but the top players are there, are very strong, and as a whole they are still considerably ahead of foreigners.
On the other hand, koreans are not untouchable gods anymore and the #32 b tier KR player would get absolutely demolished in WCS in 2019; also, there are a couple of aspects in which westerners are indeed ahead of koreans, that are ZvZ meta(Elazer is undoubtly a weaker player than Dark, still he was capable of winning, and that's only the last of many examples) and Serral, the outlier, who was noticeably ahead of top koreans last year and may still very well be the best player in the world right now. Both of these, as well as the upwards trend in viewers, were made possible by region lock that gave WCS enough time to develop without being strangled by an army of objectively superior koreans like they used to be; Legacy of the Void had indeed a part in this process by resetting the way sc2 was played and effectively reducing the gap in few months.
WCS scene may be mature enough for the region lock to be at least partially softened in the near future.
foreigners obviously improved but you have to be delusional to think that the level of the korean scene is still as high as it was a few years back. There are no teamhouses anymore and a lot of players are way past their prime (Inno, soO, Zest, herO, sOs to name a few). It's definitely both, foreigners improving and koreans getting worse.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
Three years of HoTS deeply instilled in many of you guys the idea foreigners can't be good at Sc2 and that inevitably it's a fault of koreans when they get defeated; this totally drives me mad. It's true that the infrastructure crumbled and the depth in scene was greatly reduced but the top players are there, are very strong, and as a whole they are still considerably ahead of foreigners.
On the other hand, koreans are not untouchable gods anymore and the #32 b tier KR player would get absolutely demolished in WCS in 2019; also, there are a couple of aspects in which westerners are indeed ahead of koreans, that are ZvZ meta(Elazer is undoubtly a weaker player than Dark, still he was capable of winning, and that's only the last of many examples) and Serral, the outlier, who was noticeably ahead of top koreans last year and may still very well be the best player in the world right now. Both of these, as well as the upwards trend in viewers, were made possible by region lock that gave WCS enough time to develop without being strangled by an army of objectively superior koreans like they used to be; Legacy of the Void had indeed a part in this process by resetting the way sc2 was played and effectively reducing the gap in few months.
WCS scene may be mature enough for the region lock to be at least partially softened in the near future.
foreigners obviously improved but you have to be delusional to think that the level of the korean scene is still as high as it was a few years back. There are no teamhouses anymore and a lot of players are way past their prime (Inno, soO, Zest, herO, sOs to name a few). It's definitely both, foreigners improving and koreans getting worse.
Hm, I literally said that? I don't think, however, that top koreans are worse than they used to be and I don't agree that lots of players are WAY past their primes(soO won his biggest tournament in 2019, Inno beat both Maru and Serral to win WESG while the others you mentioned were super competitive the last time in 2017 even if herO is still playing at a very respectable level; you get Maru, Rogue and Trap in return, for example).
What you are stating now doesn't get on well with calling Maru's Code S streak the biggest achievement of all time or valuing his 2018 as high as you do if the korean scene weak as you make it to be. I agree that Code S was harder in the past because it was denser and qualifying was a feat in itself but once you get to ro16 or ro8 the level is still very high.
On August 16 2019 02:46 geokilla wrote: Does anyone here beside me think if Koreans have the team support they used to get, they would play a lot better than they currently do? Coaches, teammates, they all play a role.
Not just that dude. Steady income. That makes staying a pro worth it even if things aren't going amazingly in tournaments for you for a time. The top players have kept playing but over the years we've lost most of the "faceless Koreans who can't do anything in Korea but still dominate everyone at Dreamhack" crowd. Those guys were important to keep the level of practice high.
Well, I think the more important thing was that salaries were closely tied to Proleague results, and Proleague was held regularly for a good chunk of the year. Basically, weekly motivation to practice tied to direct financial benefit for 8+ months of the year. Yeah yeah, idealistically we wanna believe pros are 100% motivated all the time, and spend those X months between Code S Ro32 eliminations doing their best, but they're just humans like the rest of us (except elfi). The kind of extremely weekly pressure tied to your livelihood from the Proleague days must have helped their skill level (and no wonder they consider it the most stressful days of their careers).
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
Three years of HoTS deeply instilled in many of you guys the idea foreigners can't be good at Sc2 and that inevitably it's a fault of koreans when they get defeated; this totally drives me mad. It's true that the infrastructure crumbled and the depth in scene was greatly reduced but the top players are there, are very strong, and as a whole they are still considerably ahead of foreigners.
On the other hand, koreans are not untouchable gods anymore and the #32 b tier KR player would get absolutely demolished in WCS in 2019; also, there are a couple of aspects in which westerners are indeed ahead of koreans, that are ZvZ meta(Elazer is undoubtly a weaker player than Dark, still he was capable of winning, and that's only the last of many examples) and Serral, the outlier, who was noticeably ahead of top koreans last year and may still very well be the best player in the world right now. Both of these, as well as the upwards trend in viewers, were made possible by region lock that gave WCS enough time to develop without being strangled by an army of objectively superior koreans like they used to be; Legacy of the Void had indeed a part in this process by resetting the way sc2 was played and effectively reducing the gap in few months.
WCS scene may be mature enough for the region lock to be at least partially softened in the near future.
foreigners obviously improved but you have to be delusional to think that the level of the korean scene is still as high as it was a few years back. There are no teamhouses anymore and a lot of players are way past their prime (Inno, soO, Zest, herO, sOs to name a few). It's definitely both, foreigners improving and koreans getting worse.
Hm, I literally said that? I don't think, however, that top koreans are worse than they used to be and I don't agree that lots of players are WAY past their primes(soO won his biggest tournament in 2019, Inno beat both Maru and Serral to win WESG while the others you mentioned were super competitive the last time in 2017 even if herO is still playing at a very respectable level; you get Maru, Rogue and Trap in return, for example).
What you are stating now doesn't get on well with calling Maru's Code S streak the biggest achievement of all time or valuing his 2018 as high as you do if the korean scene weak as you make it to be. I agree that Code S was harder in the past because it was denser and qualifying was a feat in itself but once you get to ro16 or ro8 the level is still very high.
every top player that gets removed from the player pool decreases the available quality of practice so logically the top players won't be able to reach the skill level they'd be able to reach otherwise. not to mention the other factors like age, lack of teamhouse environment, lack of weekly Proleague pressure as explained above etc. No the top players aren't as good as they were a few years back (maybe with a few exceptions like Stats, Classic, Maru, arguably Dark but the rest definitely got worse)
soO won his biggest tournament in 2019 true - that doesn't mean though that he's anywhere near his level in 2014 so yes, he's past his peak. winning 1 tournament doesn't change that. I think I don't have to explain how far Inno is away from his peak level when he was crushing everyone.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
Three years of HoTS deeply instilled in many of you guys the idea foreigners can't be good at Sc2 and that inevitably it's a fault of koreans when they get defeated; this totally drives me mad. It's true that the infrastructure crumbled and the depth in scene was greatly reduced but the top players are there, are very strong, and as a whole they are still considerably ahead of foreigners.
On the other hand, koreans are not untouchable gods anymore and the #32 b tier KR player would get absolutely demolished in WCS in 2019; also, there are a couple of aspects in which westerners are indeed ahead of koreans, that are ZvZ meta(Elazer is undoubtly a weaker player than Dark, still he was capable of winning, and that's only the last of many examples) and Serral, the outlier, who was noticeably ahead of top koreans last year and may still very well be the best player in the world right now. Both of these, as well as the upwards trend in viewers, were made possible by region lock that gave WCS enough time to develop without being strangled by an army of objectively superior koreans like they used to be; Legacy of the Void had indeed a part in this process by resetting the way sc2 was played and effectively reducing the gap in few months.
WCS scene may be mature enough for the region lock to be at least partially softened in the near future.
foreigners obviously improved but you have to be delusional to think that the level of the korean scene is still as high as it was a few years back. There are no teamhouses anymore and a lot of players are way past their prime (Inno, soO, Zest, herO, sOs to name a few). It's definitely both, foreigners improving and koreans getting worse.
Hm, I literally said that? I don't think, however, that top koreans are worse than they used to be and I don't agree that lots of players are WAY past their primes(soO won his biggest tournament in 2019, Inno beat both Maru and Serral to win WESG while the others you mentioned were super competitive the last time in 2017 even if herO is still playing at a very respectable level; you get Maru, Rogue and Trap in return, for example).
What you are stating now doesn't get on well with calling Maru's Code S streak the biggest achievement of all time or valuing his 2018 as high as you do if the korean scene weak as you make it to be. I agree that Code S was harder in the past because it was denser and qualifying was a feat in itself but once you get to ro16 or ro8 the level is still very high.
every top player that gets removed from the player pool decreases the available quality of practice so logically the top players won't be able to reach the skill level they'd be able to reach otherwise. not to mention the other factors like age, lack of teamhouse environment, lack of weekly Proleague pressure as explained above etc. No the top players aren't as good as they were a few years back (maybe with a few exceptions like Stats, Classic, Maru, arguably Dark but the rest definitely got worse)
soO won his biggest tournament in 2019 true - that doesn't mean though that he's anywhere near his level in 2014 so yes, he's past his peak. winning 1 tournament doesn't change that. I think I don't have to explain how far Inno is away from his peak level when he was crushing everyone.
We already know that you can reach astonishing levels even in weaker fields(Serral 2018?); can you actually observe a decrease in skill when you watch the games? There are players who got worse and players who got better(Trap is missing) and weirdly so Stats and Classic improved in relatively old age. Being past your prime does not necessarily imply you are playing terribly and KeSpa regime wasn't gold for everyone, there are some who thrive in freedom(see Byun).
By the way, you did not clarify how can Code S still be so hard and prestigious if sc2 in Korea has declined that much. You miss b teamers and you miss new blood, but even without depth the skill ceiling is very high.
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote: Every time I see how foreigners dominate koreans Im reminded of the sad state of sc2. I think the fact that tehy are dropping so many series vs foreigners is even more telling than the really low amount of viewers.
It's really sad. sc2 used to be my favorite game and I reached top 8 masters. But its been 3 years since I stopped playing.
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Its even sadder when you realize Blizzard killed their franchise themselves when they decided to ban all koreans from competing abroad years ago.
7 Posts and thats what you got to say? Get out of here. Please.
I was never a fan of foreign StarCraft and most people would probably put me in the "korean elitist" corner, but your statement is just wrong on so many levels. Obv koreans got worse, but that's caused by the whole breakdown of the infrastructure and not that much else. No reason to "kill a game" because there are still a ton of people out there loving it and actively playing it.
Three years of HoTS deeply instilled in many of you guys the idea foreigners can't be good at Sc2 and that inevitably it's a fault of koreans when they get defeated; this totally drives me mad. It's true that the infrastructure crumbled and the depth in scene was greatly reduced but the top players are there, are very strong, and as a whole they are still considerably ahead of foreigners.
On the other hand, koreans are not untouchable gods anymore and the #32 b tier KR player would get absolutely demolished in WCS in 2019; also, there are a couple of aspects in which westerners are indeed ahead of koreans, that are ZvZ meta(Elazer is undoubtly a weaker player than Dark, still he was capable of winning, and that's only the last of many examples) and Serral, the outlier, who was noticeably ahead of top koreans last year and may still very well be the best player in the world right now. Both of these, as well as the upwards trend in viewers, were made possible by region lock that gave WCS enough time to develop without being strangled by an army of objectively superior koreans like they used to be; Legacy of the Void had indeed a part in this process by resetting the way sc2 was played and effectively reducing the gap in few months.
WCS scene may be mature enough for the region lock to be at least partially softened in the near future.
foreigners obviously improved but you have to be delusional to think that the level of the korean scene is still as high as it was a few years back. There are no teamhouses anymore and a lot of players are way past their prime (Inno, soO, Zest, herO, sOs to name a few). It's definitely both, foreigners improving and koreans getting worse.
Hm, I literally said that? I don't think, however, that top koreans are worse than they used to be and I don't agree that lots of players are WAY past their primes(soO won his biggest tournament in 2019, Inno beat both Maru and Serral to win WESG while the others you mentioned were super competitive the last time in 2017 even if herO is still playing at a very respectable level; you get Maru, Rogue and Trap in return, for example).
What you are stating now doesn't get on well with calling Maru's Code S streak the biggest achievement of all time or valuing his 2018 as high as you do if the korean scene weak as you make it to be. I agree that Code S was harder in the past because it was denser and qualifying was a feat in itself but once you get to ro16 or ro8 the level is still very high.
every top player that gets removed from the player pool decreases the available quality of practice so logically the top players won't be able to reach the skill level they'd be able to reach otherwise. not to mention the other factors like age, lack of teamhouse environment, lack of weekly Proleague pressure as explained above etc. No the top players aren't as good as they were a few years back (maybe with a few exceptions like Stats, Classic, Maru, arguably Dark but the rest definitely got worse)
soO won his biggest tournament in 2019 true - that doesn't mean though that he's anywhere near his level in 2014 so yes, he's past his peak. winning 1 tournament doesn't change that. I think I don't have to explain how far Inno is away from his peak level when he was crushing everyone.
We already know that you can reach astonishing levels even in weaker fields(Serral 2018?); can you actually observe a decrease in skill when you watch the games? There are players who got worse and players who got better(Trap is missing) and weirdly so Stats and Classic improved in relatively old age. Being past your prime does not necessarily imply you are playing terribly and KeSpa regime wasn't gold for everyone, there are some who thrive in freedom(see Byun).
By the way, you did not clarify how can Code S still be so hard and prestigious if sc2 in Korea has declined that much. You miss b teamers and you miss new blood, but even without depth the skill ceiling is very high.
I’m not sure people can, if we were to remove certain markers really spot a real decline in absolute top level play, maybe it’s there as I had a gap in my viewership but a Serral, Stats, Maru or Dark or whoever on top form it seems pretty damn high still to me.
Granted I’m not sure many who trash foreigners could actually discern top foreigners from many Koreans if we took away such signifiers either.
Well there's Dota TI to watch and almost all of the good players on GSL vs the World are already out so thank god i don't need to waste a second more on this mess of a game. And Blizzard is still deciding on which version of their patch they're going to deploy while we watch Katowice repeating itself for 6 months. Hope whoever's left enjoys watching infested terrans shooting at interceptors for 20 minutes.
On August 16 2019 09:59 Morbidius wrote: Well there's Dota TI to watch and almost all of the good players on GSL vs the World are already out so thank god i don't need to waste a second more on this mess of a game. And Blizzard is still deciding on which version of their patch they're going to deploy while we watch Katowice repeating itself for 6 months. Hope whoever's left enjoys watching infested terrans shooting at interceptors for 20 minutes.
Well ok but could you not waste your valuable seconds posting about it while you’re at it?
Not sure what you’re even specifically complaining about here :S Blizzard not implementing a patch they never said they’d implement for this tournament or what?
BL/Infestor, which despite me not being a fan of it compositionally probably saw the most nailbiting game of the day in soO v TIME game two when deployed?
Is Maru that bad, is Stats that good, or is TvP imbalanced? I think Stats is that good for sure. Maru not winning outside of proxy era is really disappointing. I really wish he would win more to reaffirm that he really is a top notch player. I personally feel whenever I watch him win its because the first five minutes were dominated by aggression or gimics. He just doesn't seem like the player was was when he won SSL or even his 2017 form.
Biggest GSL fan here but I'm so happy to see the results yesterday. The World's catching up and that makes for a more gripping viewing experience.
- Elazer vs Dark: You could tell the latest GSL champ's pre-match interview tone was different this time, and for good reason. Like Artosis said: "There's only so many times you can say you'll crush the foreigners only to be beaten". The rest is history. Twitch chat were horribly savage towards Elazer at the start and I'm happy he put the doubters in their place. Bad luck Dark though! You could tell he was feeling a bit emo during the Team Selections afterwards haha. As much of a troll/BM Dark is, he's quite a nice guy in real life. Every time I met him at the GSL studios he was always happy to have a quick chat and photo op.
- TIME vs soO: TIME was AMAZING at ASUS Rog and I honestly felt Serral was lucky he even won. For this match, I knew he was going to be on the ball again during that initial marine/tank push. Such crisp micro and execution--it felt like I was watching Maru, Byun or Bomber at his prime. The mech game wasn't even that bad either--he's quite a masterful harasser and managed to keep soO at bay in order to remax on Thors several times. With that said TIME was pretty lucky he won that game--those Cyclones reinforcements came just in the nick of time. This young Chinese player is just incredible and I hope he keeps it up. His TvZ right now is among the best in the world, although we've yet to see whether his ultra TvZ late-game is up there with Maru and TY.
- Maru vs Stats: Won't lie, this was sad. Maru's my fav but I had a feeling Stats might beat him.
- Neeb vs Showtime: Close series. Better luck next time Showtime!
Today's match: Hoping TY can take it against Serral. Would love him to get revenge for HomeStory Cup.
On August 16 2019 11:13 BisuDagger wrote: Is Maru that bad, is Stats that good, or is TvP imbalanced? I think Stats is that good for sure. Maru not winning outside of proxy era is really disappointing. I really wish he would win more to reaffirm that he really is a top notch player. I personally feel whenever I watch him win its because the first five minutes were dominated by aggression or gimics. He just doesn't seem like the player was was when he won SSL or even his 2017 form.
On August 16 2019 11:13 BisuDagger wrote: Is Maru that bad, is Stats that good, or is TvP imbalanced? I think Stats is that good for sure. Maru not winning outside of proxy era is really disappointing. I really wish he would win more to reaffirm that he really is a top notch player. I personally feel whenever I watch him win its because the first five minutes were dominated by aggression or gimics. He just doesn't seem like the player was was when he won SSL or even his 2017 form.
On August 15 2019 23:05 Danjiapao wrote: As a Chinese, I can't imagine TIME winning so easily
I could.
He has had some of the most well thought out builds tvz in the last while.
He also exploits map features more regularly then everyone else.
I thought Serral was lucky to beat him in asus rog.
Yeah he I think he can go far as long as he keep going bio. I think he lost every single battle mech game he did against Serral and even if he sometimes got into a good position he couldn't finish it.
On August 16 2019 01:07 AttackZerg wrote: Oh... and to voting that scandalized so many of you.
I said, "Elazer better show and up play well because he earned a lot of anti fans".
He showed up and beat the (imo) number 2 zerg in the world. Gotta say I'm impressed.
I now hope he parlays this into an incredible result.
I think he is one of the most interesting zerg players around, let's see if he has the dragon blood to keep going.
Yeah, but had he faced any other race than Zerg he would have been out, so let's be fair here Maybe not against Fanta
On August 16 2019 02:31 Poopi wrote:
On August 16 2019 02:16 La1 wrote:
On August 16 2019 01:17 parksonsc wrote:
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
Actually he is the one Terran who can win on shit patches.
Not this time though.
INno is the Terran who win when Terran is strong
Even when Maru was playing godlike in GSL he didn't deliver outside of Code S. Not even on the day1 where the preparational argument cannot be made as he had the time to prepare... so either he doesn't care or there's a mental issue.
On August 16 2019 02:16 La1 wrote:
On August 16 2019 01:17 parksonsc wrote:
Then explain to me about his 4 GSL wins? Did all his opponent not know how to study him? Come on, even if you are a hater, Maru's play is truly godlike when he's on point.
you watch some of those games back and honestly it doesn't look like they do. or to be honest at least 2 of his GSLs were vs a lot of protoss when the proxy rax/cyclone thing was around which was actually impossible to play against and was really coin-flippy. I remember him beating neeb with just maruders in another proxy as you couldn't confirm which Proxy version of the proxy it was.
I also think it's easier to win GSLs now as you get to move people in the group which to me basically means your vs the two worst players so you basically get a bye to the RO8.
He clearly is an amazing player and has some of the best micro in the game but it's nice to see what i consider gimicky stuff get crushed. hes a Patch Terran
Uh, he won 4 consecutive Code S titles during several patches, the patch word cannot be used (he won the last one after the major afterBlizzcon patch either...)
You still have to go through RO8/4/Finals. So the easier argument is iffy, also he had to win the first Code S to get the right to move people around, he had to qualify for the first won WESG(through the Korean qualifier)... but sure, it's easier.
Except when he won this year's chinese invitational or when he won WESG last year. The fact that he went ro8 and ro4 at blizzcon and katowice last year (eliminated by two of his teanmates) also begs to disagree with you. Lets face it winning 4 GSL in a row makes that or you win a tournament or you are overhyped/out of shape/bad/your results were a fluke or whatever. But the fact that no other, besides Serral, is taken in such high standarts speaks for his skills. Also people here act like if Stats was not the fucking best protoss of LOTV or something. And stats is on fire right now.
OK, so Maru is heavily dominating the Code S yet he is incapable of showing the same domination outside of Code S. Aw. Yeah, he won the invitational where he played player a level bellow him, what a champ! C'mon, I love Maru, but his play in Code S RO8 and forward and everything else is like night and day. He's capable of some incredible plays when he wants, but sometimes it appears he doesn't want to play the game.
And sure, he got a stop by teammates, especially sOs read him like a book, at the same time - check how he played in the Code S and then compare it to his play in those tournaments. He. Was. Worse.
tbh, dark deserved the loss against elazer. the drone pull in game one and the mass ling allin in game two really showed, that he didnt take elazer seriously. if he would have played with a more serious note, like in game 3 and onwards, he would have won the series.
tbh, i dont think that elazer has the slightliest chance against time, but atleast dark hopefully learned, that he has to take every opponent serious, even if its "only" elazer.
On August 16 2019 11:13 BisuDagger wrote: Is Maru that bad, is Stats that good, or is TvP imbalanced? I think Stats is that good for sure. Maru not winning outside of proxy era is really disappointing. I really wish he would win more to reaffirm that he really is a top notch player. I personally feel whenever I watch him win its because the first five minutes were dominated by aggression or gimics. He just doesn't seem like the player was was when he won SSL or even his 2017 form.
His 4th GSL win was outside of the proxy meta
his 1st and 2nd too. He 4-1ed Classic in season 2 who seemed unbeatable in the matchup with mostly straight up play, probably the most impressive display of skill I've ever seen.
On August 16 2019 22:39 M3t4PhYzX wrote: daaaamn.. 5 foreigners and only 3 koreans in the top8?
first time this happened in some major tournament right? or at least first time in "ages"?
also - go, go Elazer ! ! !
If the draw would be korean - foreigner then the ratio would have looked differently. 3 Koreans lost and two of whom were expected losses. while 2 another Koreans lost to Koreans.
On August 16 2019 21:57 dalaiisc2 wrote: tbh, dark deserved the loss against elazer. the drone pull in game one and the mass ling allin in game two really showed, that he didnt take elazer seriously. if he would have played with a more serious note, like in game 3 and onwards, he would have won the series.
tbh, i dont think that elazer has the slightliest chance against time, but atleast dark hopefully learned, that he has to take every opponent serious, even if its "only" elazer.
Elazer is a ZvZ monster in his own right and is continually underestimated not only by his korean opponents but by the TL community aswell. Just go check the GSLvWorld voting thread and take a look at how upset some people were by elazers nomination.
Talk about crazy upsets. I think Stats beating Maru is somewhat expected though given that Stats usually have Maru's number. But to see Dark, soO and Reynor all fall so is crazy! Especially seeing as some of them were 0-3 sweeps.
On August 16 2019 11:13 BisuDagger wrote: Is Maru that bad, is Stats that good, or is TvP imbalanced? I think Stats is that good for sure. Maru not winning outside of proxy era is really disappointing. I really wish he would win more to reaffirm that he really is a top notch player. I personally feel whenever I watch him win its because the first five minutes were dominated by aggression or gimics. He just doesn't seem like the player was was when he won SSL or even his 2017 form.
Did you watch any of his GSLs outside of 2018 season 3?
Season 1 - 9-4 in TvP with 2 proxy games, Beat Dear, sOs, and Stats.
Season 2 - 12-2 in TvP with 1 proxy game. Beat Dear, Patience, Classic, and Zest.
Season 3 - 6-1 in TvP with 7 proxy games. Beat Neeb and Zest.
Season 4 - 13-3 in TvP with 0 proxy games. Beat herO, Dear, Trap, and Classic.
These stats might be a bit off as I did them from memory, but the point was he only proxied heavily in 1/4 seasons that he won. The idea he was only good because of proxy meta is a joke.
On August 16 2019 11:13 BisuDagger wrote: Is Maru that bad, is Stats that good, or is TvP imbalanced? I think Stats is that good for sure. Maru not winning outside of proxy era is really disappointing. I really wish he would win more to reaffirm that he really is a top notch player. I personally feel whenever I watch him win its because the first five minutes were dominated by aggression or gimics. He just doesn't seem like the player was was when he won SSL or even his 2017 form.
Did you watch any of his GSLs outside of 2018 season 3?
Season 1 - 9-4 in TvP with 2 proxy games, Beat Dear, sOs, and Stats.
Season 2 - 12-2 in TvP with 1 proxy game. Beat Dear, Patience, Classic, and Zest.
Season 3 - 6-1 in TvP with 7 proxy games. Beat Neeb and Zest.
Season 4 - 13-3 in TvP with 0 proxy games. Beat herO, Dear, Trap, and Classic.
These stats might be a bit off as I did them from memory, but the point was he only proxied heavily in 1/4 seasons that he won. The idea he was only good because of proxy meta is a joke.
Pretty much, it’d be nice if people didn’t make such sweeping comments without you know, watching the games in question.
Especially given games like him against Dear from season 4 where he went for a true late game toe to toe and still won, can’t remember the set/map off hand but I’m sure you know the game
On August 15 2019 23:42 alestormsabaton1994 wrote:
Blizzard should just kill this game once for all, (like they are doing with all their games) and restart with a new rts franchise in a couple of years.
Do you really think Blizzard would make a new RTS in only a couple years? =D
Yes definitely, but on mobile! We will all be micro-tapping!
As for Maru, it's obvious that he did not take this show match seriously just as he did the last time. By the way, a tournament without s0s is boring.
EPT
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![[image loading]](https://tl.net/staff/Waxangel/misc/gvwbracket1_1.png)
