Welcome, once more, to the TL.net awards! Following our annual tradition, it's time to look back and celebrate another year of competitive StarCraft II. We've already put out a handful of retrospective articles to commemorate some of the coolest moments from 2019. But now it's time to get contentious: we're giving out awards to the players who were the best of the year.
Whether you're here for the awards or here for the comments, we hope you enjoy this article!
[Note: Game of the year, and most entertaining player will be awarded later, pending the release of TL.net's "Best Games of 2019" article.]
Best Ceremony
Winner:
HomeStory Cup XX: Serral Pool Jump
When TakeTV decided upon Tropical Islands—one of the larger indoor water parks in the world—as the location for HomeStory Cup XX, you can be damn sure they were looking for a way to one-up PartinG's pool dive from HSC X in 2014.
What we ended up with was one of the most whimsically enjoyable post-finals sequences in SC2 history, with Serral 'diving' into the big pool with his trophy before being followed by a throng of fans. While we're lauding TakeTV for ending their tournament on such a high note, the pope of plainness does deserve some credit as well. Serral stepped into the water in such a dainty and disinterested manner, it added an element of unintentional comedy that made the moment all the better.
Written by: Wax
Biggest Rivalry
Winner:
Serral vs Reynor
For the 2018 edition of the awards, we opted NOT to give this award to the obvious pick of 'Serral vs Korea,' but instead bequeathed it to their respective fans who bickered throughout the year. A core reason for this was Serral's unwillingness to engage—it's hard to have a rivalry when neither side seems to be taking it seriously.
This year, Serral finally met someone worthy of his attention in Reynor. A hotly contested WCS Winter: EU finals saw Reynor end Serral's undefeated streak on the Circuit events, leading to some rather uncharacteristic behavior from Serral at the following WCS Spring event. In Serral's winner interview after the Spring quarterfinals, he admitted that rather than an easier match-up against goblin, he'd rather face Reynor in a revenge bout. He even went as far as to say his WCS Winter loss to Reynor stung more than his loss to INnoVation at WESG, despite the nearly $100,000 prize money difference in the two finals.
The two traded blows throughout 2019, and Serral seemed to revert to his usual, stoic nature rather than fan the flames of the rivalry. But it became increasingly clear that Reynor was a worthy foe—he defeated Serral in the finals of WCS Summer, which in turn drove Serral to repay the favor at WCS Fall.
That brings us to the WCS Global Finals round-of-four, which was their most important meeting yet. With a finals ticket hanging in the balance, we got the most unexpected result of all: Serral was un-clutch. In the deciding game five, Serral made one of the year's most notable blunders with a confusing late-game swap to Ultralisks, slowly bleeding away what seemed like an insurmountable lead. For Reynor, it was payback for the equally unlikely comeback he gave up to Serral at WCS Montreal in 2018.
Still, the score remains far from settled. Serral has since fought back with victories at HomeStory Cup and NationWars, suggesting that these two will continue to dance well into 2020. It's a rare rivalry at the top of StarCraft II, one where it seems like any result is possible.
Written by: Soularion
Strategy of the Year
Winner:
Nydus Worms + Anything
"Nydus Worms have been used historically for all-in strategies. We want to encourage more late game usage as a transport/harass tool."
The post-BlizzCon design patches are meant to take underutilized or uninteresting units and spice them up, adding a fresh, new element to the game. In the case of Nydus Worms, one might say Blizzard did their job a little too well.
During the first third of 2019, when the biggest topic of balance was Protoss all-ins, we still saw hints of how Nydus + Swarm Host might start to run rampant. Slowly but surely, Zergs began to leverage the power of Nydus Worms in various situations, from executing garden variety all-ins to opening up unending Swarm Host portals in the mid-game.
Rogue, the 'honest Zerg' who admitted to Zerg's OP-ness after winning Code S, might be the player who demonstrated Nydus power the best. He barely used BL-Infestor at all in his championship run, as most of his play revolved around getting quick wins with Nydus Worm all-ins or wearing his opponents down with Nydus-Swarm Host in the mid-game. When he did get to the late game against Trap in the Code S finals, he actually used the odd combination of Nydus + Infestors to break Trap's defenses with mass Infested Terrans. Brood Lord-Infestor—as memed and reviled as the combo was—felt more like Serral's signature move than THE defining Zerg strategy.
Nydus Worms were also influential in the ZvZ match-up. Long used in various Roach timings, "Nydus your opponent's main and get Lurkers in" became a win condition that Zergs went for more and more as the year went on. It even ended up sealing a handful of games for Dark in the WCS Global Finals.
Nydus Worms might seem like too broad a category to call a strategy, but the degree to which it affected all Zerg games this year makes it deserving of being singled out. Hey, it's netted plenty of victories already this year—what's one more win?
Written by: Wax
Breakout Player
Winner:
TIME
Photo: Carlton Beener (via Blizzard)
[Note: "Breakout" player is our less-than-perfect replacement for "Rookie of the year," due to a player's "rookie season" in SC2 being difficult to define.]
TIME is a genuine anomaly within his region. Historically, we've only paid attention to Chinese StarCraft pros when they produced jaw-dropping upsets on home turf, such as iAsonu eliminating two GSL champions at IEM Shanghai or Jim defeating Life and TaeJa at IEM Shenzhen. When Jim—China's closest thing to a consistent, international-level player—made top five at WCS America in 2013, he followed this up by... not making the playoffs of a WCS event ever again.
In 2016, a successful year from TooDming saw him place but 19th in the WCS Circuit Standings. In 2017, iAsonu placed 12th on the back of strong domestic performances, but his poor Circuit Championship showings meant he had no shot at making it to BlizzCon.
In 2018, TIME became the first player from his region to reach the quarterfinals in the modern WCS Circuit system, and then won his match to attain a historic top four finish. In 2019, TIME was unable to match that singular high, but made up for it with consistent strength that saw him reach the top-eight in three Circuit events. He showed tantalizing glimpses of his talent: he gave Neeb his only loss in WCS Winter: Americas and reached the top eight of ASUS ROG Summer while taking Serral to an honorable five games. His reward was a fifth place finish in the WCS Circuit standings, giving China its first Global Finals representative in the modern format.
The next step for TIME is breaking the quarterfinals barrier and becoming a real title contender. He played six quarterfinals sets in premier events over 2019 and lost them all. If he can get past that hump, we could realistically be talking about TIME as the best foreigner Terran this time next year.
Written by: Soularion
Best Terran: WCS Circuit
Winner:
SpeCial
Photo: Carlton Beener (via Blizzard)
For the third straight year, Mexico's SpeCial wins our award for best Circuit Terran player.
Each time we hand SpeCial this award, it bears repeating an old history lesson: foreigner Terrans have always lagged behind their Zerg and Protoss peers, and hit such a nadir in 2013 that TL.net decided this category wasn't even worth awarding. While players like Bunny, uThermal, and MarineLorD showed flashes of brilliance in previous years, it was SpeCial—forged in the fires of Korea—who really restored foreign Terran's reputation with his sustained success in Legacy of the Void.
After a slump in the first quarter of 2019, SpeCial was remarkably steady for the rest of the year. He placed 2nd, top eight, and top four in the latter three WCS Circuit events, and even made two consecutive Code S Ro16 appearances. While his preparation did not avail him at the 2019 Global Finals (where he suffered his first Ro16 elimination), he still showed that "SpeCial-with-preparation" is a deadly opponent by 3-0'ing Reynor at GSL vs. The World.
SpeCial's 2019 campaign was highlighted by his run at WCS Spring, where he finally broke his top-four jinx in major tournaments to reach the finals. While his title shot ended in a sweep at the hands of Serral, he still earned the distinction of being the only player to prevent the WCS Circuit from having only Serral vs. Reynor finals (excluding the WCS Winter: AM finals where Europeans could not participate), and being the first Terran finalist in a WCS Circuit championship since Polt in 2016.
What was 'special' about this year was that the competition for this award was closer than it's ever been. TIME made three top eights on the Circuit, finished reasonably at international events, and somehow upset Maru at the Global Finals. HeRoMaRinE also continued to push himself forward as an eventual candidate for this award, and also scored an upset against Classic at the Global Finals. Could Juanito win a fourth consecutive award in 2020? Time (and TIME) will tell.
Written by: Wax and Soularion
Best Terran: WCS Korea
Winner:
Maru
Photo: Carlton Beener (via Blizzard)
In a year where Zergs hogged the spotlight, Maru was the Terran representative who achieved the most for his faction. His Code S season 1 championship, by itself, is almost enough to cement him as the winner of this category, with only INnoVation matching him in winning a major title (WESG and the 'semi-major' GPC).
While much has been said about Maru's fourth consecutive Code S championship, it's worth reiterating how mind-boggling a feat it was. The depth of the Korean progamer pool might be shallower than in the past, but the competition at the top is as intense as ever. And yet, Maru's victory felt inevitable for the fourth straight tournament, and this time he crushed a gauntlet of top Protoss players (including Dear on a 20-0 PvT streak) to win the championship.
Aside from Maru, few of Korea's Terran elite managed to accomplish much in Code S. GuMiho and TY were as entertaining as ever in their finals runs in the two GSL Super Tournaments, but couldn't repeat that success in the weightier Code S competition. It didn't necessarily feel like Zerg and Protoss were broken—like the good old days of “blink to win” or “Protoss deathballs are broken”—but Terran players collectively underperformed compared to their reputations.
Unfortunately, Maru lost steam after winning that legendary fourth title. Still, he concluded the year with very good tournament results on the whole, placing 3rd at WESG, reaching the top four of Code S Season 3, and playing as Korea's only Terran representative at the WCS Global Finals (he finished top eight after losing to eventual champion Dark). INnoVation, despite his big WESG payday, was far too uneven in other competitions to be awarded best Terran, evidenced by his failure to qualify for the Global Finals by large point margin.
This 'decent' year for Maru would have been excellent by any other Terran's standards, and it was easy to pick him as the winner of this award for two years running.
Written by: Orlok
Best Zerg: WCS Circuit
Winner:
Serral
Photo: Jussi Jääskeläinen
This award has never felt more closely contested, yet paradoxically, the winner claimed a one-sided victory. It's like a boxing match where the judges have unanimously decided in favor of one of the pugilists, but all of the scorecards read 10-9.
Yes, the winner, obviously, is Serral.
As mentioned in the Rivalry of the Year award above, Serral finally found a worthy WCS Circuit Rival in Reynor. The Italian prodigy was triumphant in WCS Winter: EU and WCS Summer, while Serral won the titles at WCS Spring and Fall. How to break the tie after an even, two to two split? Fortunately, we didn't need to argue for too long about whether or not Reynor's WCS Winter: Europe title was worth less than a 'true' Circuit title (it's not).
The thing is, Serral slightly edged out Reynor in international events. Yes, Reynor reached the finals of BlizzCon and even defeated Serral to get there—that's a big point in his favor. However, that was really his only notable international result in 2019. Up until BlizzCon, Reynor was noticeably poor in international competitions—one of the biggest low-lights being his failure to make it out of the open bracket at IEM Katowice. As for Serral, though he failed to win any of the super-major tournaments with $100k+ first-place prizes, he still won GSL vs. The World, took second place at WESG and ASUS ROG Summer, and added two HomeStory Cup trophies to his total.
It's wild to think that this race could be even closer in 2020-21, with Reynor finally unlocking his abilities on the international stage. We look forward to seeing what happens. But until then, the king stays king.
Written by: Wax
Best Zerg: WCS Korea
Winner:
Dark
Photo: Bart Oerbekke (via ESL)
Back in 2016, when SSL and Proleague were still things, the young Dark saw his "potential explode," as the Korean expression goes. He reached two SSL finals, won one of them, and placed runner-up at the WCS Global Finals. As BoxeR's hand-picked protege from SlayerS—the only one plucked away to SK Telecom T1—Dark was already a Proleague star. High expectations for the up-and-coming Zerg, however, took a complicated turn. He demonstrated staggering consistency at the top level of StarCraft, enjoying a prime that never seemed to end. On the other hand, his inability to get over the grand finals hump had him pegged as a loser among winners, a kong in the making.
Not settling for mediocrity is what sets high-flyers apart from the ground-bound. A championship title is what separates the wheat from the chaff—a cliche that only a handful of competitors could ever hope to utter with complete sincerity. Believing anything other than a first place finish to be mediocre, however, is what legends are made of. Dark's ascension to legendary status was a process that took seven years since his TV debut in South Korea.
In June, he faced off against Trap for the Code S championship—the unclaimed prize that had been taunting him for years. Dark rose to the occasion, taking down Trap in a 4-2 series and closing that painful chapter of his career (also becoming the first Zerg Code S champion of LotV in the process). The brakes were violently slammed on Dark's momentum when he lost to Elazer in the first round of GSL vs. The World, but in hindsight, that embarrassment seems to have spurred Dark on even further. He placed top four in the following Code S Season, and then dominated his way to the championship in Super Tournament #2—the last tournament before the WCS Global Finals (particularly notable was his finals vs TY, which he made look like a warm-up match by winning in a 4-0 sweep).
For Dark, a BlizzCon was more than just another tournament to conquer. He’d already reached the finals once before, losing to Byun in 2016. Dark struggled in the group stage of the Global Finals (played from AfreecaTV's studios), and was dragged to full, five-game series by both ShoWTimE and soO. But once he reached the playoff stage at BlizzCon—perhaps with the bitter memories of 2016 fueling him—he returned to dominating form. He ripped apart the opposition, sweeping Maru 3-0 in the quarterfinals, taking another sweep against Classic in the semis, and finally crushing Reynor 4-1 in the finals.
By playing at an elite level all year and winning the two of the most prestigious championships in StarCraft (toss the Super Tournament in there as a bonus), Dark was the only choice as best Korean Zerg of the year.
Written by: Ziggy and Wax
Best Protoss: WCS Circuit
Winner:
Neeb
Photo: Carlton Beener (via Blizzard)
As Circuit Terrans and Zerg players surged to new heights in 2019, Circuit Protoss players were left to pay the price. They accounted for just two of the Circuit spots at the Global Finals, and attained but a single grand finals appearance in all of 2019's major events.
That honor went to Neeb, whose championship run at WCS Winter: Americas reminded everyone that he was once the Circuit's dominant force, prior to Serral's awakening. In the following three 'standard' WCS events, Neeb went on to achieve two top-four finishes and one top-eight finish (only being eliminated by Serral and SpeCial), which allowed him to comfortably lock down the #3 spot in the Circuit standings behind Serral and Reynor. If we went by WCS Circuit results alone, Neeb would be the runaway winner of this award as ShoWTimE and PtitDrogo only managed a single top-four finish a piece.
But Neeb was quite solid at mixed-region events as well, finishing top eight at IEM Katowice (winning matches against Maru and RagnaroK), and top four at GSL vs. The World (defeating Stats in the quarterfinals). By 2017 standards, those would have been considered very good—if not excellent—results for a foreigner, and this section would have read more like a major celebration than a mere pat on the back. Alas, we have become spoiled in this post-Serral world. It's hard to say that Neeb has become worse since 2017, and even if that's the case, it's not drastically so. Once, he was the player who changed the paradigm for foreigners—now, he's simply been overshadowed by the next wave of revolutionaries.
How's this for a new year's resolution: Even if Neeb doesn't commit to spending three months in Korea to try and reach the Code S top four once more, let's try to better appreciate the fact that the Circuit is home to a true, world-class Protoss player.
Written by: Wax
Best Protoss: WCS Korea
Winner:
Trap
Photo: Carlton Beener (via Blizzard)
Trap's late bloom—or second bloom if we count his MLG Anaheim title back in 2014—was one of the more surprising happenings of 2019. We've heard of a lot of tales about certain players being a 'practice-bonjwa' since the Brood War days. So many, in fact, that we mostly rolled our eyes when Maru credited Trap as a top Protoss during his 2018 run. In 2019, we finally understood what he had meant.
Trap placed top four, runner-up, and runner-up in the three Code S tournaments of the year, which is an amazing degree of elite-tier consistency. Indeed, before that freak Maru made winning Code S titles seem easy, just making it to back-to-back finals was actually a record of historical note. It's what set soO apart as a legend, and what marked ByuL as one of the forgotten greats of late HotS. Trap was less successful outside of the GSL, but his domestic success made him the clear #2 seed headed into BlizzCon.
Stats also had a strong case to take this coming in second place at IEM Katowice and winning ASUS ROG Summer (with wins over Serral and Solar). However, he was extremely disappointing in Code S, not once reaching the playoffs in the entire year (Ro32-Ro16-Ro16 finishes). Weighing peaks vs consistency is always difficult, but in this case, Trap's steadiness edged out Stats' high-profile triumph in Finland.
Amusingly enough, Trap seemed to wrest the title of 'best all-around standard Protoss' from Stats in 2019, showing equal proficiency with devious all-ins and patient macro ("that's far too big a generalization!" cried #1 Trap fan GGemini). Trap was unable to overcome Rogue or Dark in the Code S finals, and one could rightfully criticize him for not having the giga-PROTOSSING ability of Classic or Stats at their nastiest. But those two only showed that ability in limited flashes, while it was Trap who was regularly making it to the final rounds of Code S.
It's a scary new world for Protoss fans with herO and Classic gone to the army. But with Trap at the fore (and Zerg somewhat toned down), there's reason to be hopeful. According to Trap's interviews, his sudden rise in 2019 was as simple a matter as getting over his jitters in important matches. If he can further steel his mentality, then he might go from consistent finalist to consistent champion in 2020.
Written by: Wax
Player of the Year
Winner:
Dark
Photo: Carlton Beener (via Blizzard)
At the start of 2019, Dark was one of the most vexing players in StarCraft II. The words 'consistently excellent' were often to describe his regular presence in the depths of the playoffs. But in StarCraft, the word 'consistent' can sometimes be damning with faint praise. It's frequently attached to players who can never go all the way, the ones who can't cross the finish line and lift the trophy. So, too, was it for Dark, whose singular SSL championship run in 2016 protected him from wearing the same letter 'K' around his neck as soO.
All that set the stakes Dark was fighting for in 2019: complete and utter vindication. Now, in 2020, we can say he's earned it.
Dark's long title drought was broken with three championships: Code S Season 2, Super Tournament #2, and the WCS Global Finals. Code S had been the most persistent monkey on his back—his inability to even reach the finals of the most storied and prestigious tournament in Korea was a black mark on his career. Can you be a legend of StarCraft II without winning Code S? Certainly. But for a player like Dark who aspired to unquestioned, unconditional greatness, it was an enormously important box to check off. The Super Tournament title, though not as prestigious, filled the role of the incredibly dominant tournament run an elite player often displays at the apex of their powers. As for the WCS Global Finals—Well, what's to explain? It's the biggest, most lucrative, most desired prize in all of StarCraft II. But for Dark, even the ultimate prize had added meaning, as it had slipped out of his grasp three years prior at BlizzCon 2016. It was both a triumph in the present and redemption for the past.
The highlights of Dark's year were the three championships. But even outside those tournaments, he was constantly playing at a championship level, finishing top four in the two Code S seasons he didn't win, placing top four at IEM Katowice, and top eight at WESG 2018. One doesn't earn the #1 seed in the brutally tough WCS Korea region for nothing.
Now, this award is about celebrating Dark, but we'd be remiss not to address the question: "Why not Serral?"
It does feel a bit odd, even after picking Dark as the winner. Before virtually every tournament in 2019, Serral seemed like the favorite to win—by slim or wide margin. The best word to describe what Serral had might be "force," an old Korean BW term often used to talk about a player's aura of strength; the collective disbelief of the community that they could ever lose a match (it was one of the "criteria" used to judge bonjwas, but we won't get into that here).
The thing is, if Serral was indeed the favorite in all of the tournaments he played in, then why didn't he perform better in them? Which isn't to say he did poorly—he won two WCS titles, two HSC tournaments, and GSL vs The World. But in the most important tournaments with the best players, Dark's overall performance was just better. The WCS Circuit may be getting stronger while the GSL gets weaker with retirements, but Code S is still more meaningful in our eyes than Circuit championships.
Congratulations once more to Dark, on achieving a career-best year that puts him on top of the StarCraft II scene. Many years ago, when Dark was just emerging as a solid Proleague contributor, he said he wanted to win ten championships. It became a point of mockery when he was stuck in a second-place rut, but now it seems like an eminently attainable goal.
For Dark, BlizzCon is merely a checkpoint—not the final destination. Minutes after winning the Global Finals trophy, he said it was unfortunate he didn't get to play Serral in a BlizzCon rematch. Hours later at the press conference, he was already setting his sights on IEM Katowice and all of the big money tournaments coming up ahead. All those goals Dark so loudly proclaims point in the same general direction: his goal isn't to be the player of the year, but to become the best player of all time.
On January 27 2020 08:34 ZigguratOfUr wrote: I'd tend to give Classic the nod over Trap as Protoss of the year if only because he actually won something.
Also looking forward to the Serral or Dark player of the year discussion being rehashed again.
No map of the year award this time?
Maps are.... complicated so probably a separate article
On January 27 2020 08:34 ZigguratOfUr wrote: I'd tend to give Classic the nod over Trap as Protoss of the year if only because he actually won something.
Also looking forward to the Serral or Dark player of the year discussion being rehashed again.
No map of the year award this time?
Maps are.... complicated so probably a separate article
Well it depends. It would be pretty simple to name Kairos "the most balanced map in all LotV" Junction as the map of the year I guess, but addressing the whole issue with maps and terran complaints about reaper cliffs and other issues (some frivolous, some real) would be pretty complicated yeah.
I would have given breakout player to Clem personally since Time was already pretty good last year, also Neeb winning best foreign toss is both right an kind odd.
Player of the Year 2019 would have been a close call in any of case. I understand why you chose Dark and it would have been my pick before Nation Wars; Serral was also more consistent, ro8 being his worst result throughout the year. Thus said, Serral won the title last year and Dark deserved it as much as Byun in 2016 so I'd say it's fair after all.
Thanks for this, writers. I appreciate your time and courage.
I understand your rationale for Dark. I have to say I honestly think if Reynor didn't happen, Serral would have won this award by a country mile. He was the only reason Serral didn't grand slam WCS and I think if he had reached the finals of Blizzcon he would have been favoured to win over Dark.
However, Reynor did exist and the two sharing their glory ended up not quite as high as Dark - so I agree with the decision
Will be interesting to see what 2020 holds. Can't wait!
On January 27 2020 10:56 Paljas wrote: Thanks Wax and all the other writers.
I'm fine with Dark getting the nod, winning Blizzcon and all, but Serral still was the better player last year.
It's a bit of a shame Dark "missed" 4 tournaments where he could have meet Serral, (HSC 19-20, Nation Wars and AsusROG) We would probably have a very clear no1 if he played in them.
Time is a fine choice, but Reynor felt like a break out player this year too because at the start of the year lots of people still thought he was all hype and still hadn't played in a blizzcon.
Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
There's nothing stopping you from writing your own blog post with your alternative PotY analysis
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
You are pointing out Dark's faults without doing the same to Serral. Yeah Dark lost to Elazer and guess what Serral lost to HeroMarine this year. Both of those results are equally out of left field and cancel each other out imo. Besides that Serral lost to Neeb, Reynor x 4, soO, Innovation x 3, Stats x 2. Meanwhile Dark lost to Classic, Maru, Gumiho, Serral, Stats, Rogue. And that's it I believe? At least in major offline events. If you ask me that second list is a lot more impressive. Especially when you take into account that Innovation was not very consistent this year. Serral was also sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang this year. Serral won the head to head yeah but it was in the beginning of the year before Dark won his GSL and went to another level.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
You are pointing out Dark's faults without doing the same to Serral. Yeah Dark lost to Elazer and guess what Serral lost to HeroMarine this year. Both of those results are equally out of left field and cancel each other out imo. Besides that Serral lost to Neeb, Reynor x 4, soO, Innovation x 3, Stats x 2. Meanwhile Dark lost to Classic, Maru, Gumiho, Serral, Stats, Rogue. And that's it I believe? At least in major offline events. If you ask me that second list is a lot more impressive. Especially when you take into account that Innovation was not very consistent this year. Serral was also sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang this year. Serral won the head to head yeah but it was in the beginning of the year before Dark won his GSL and went to another level.
If I felt Serral's losses were that severe, I would've noted them.
Heromarine has been consistently rated right up there close to Neeb and Showtime, much higher than elazer, and Serral's record against him in 2019 was 9-3. You take a short groupstage series loss against a top European player like Heromarine and blow it way out of proportion. Every other one of those players you mentioned that defeated Serral is a top player. Neither Gumiho nor Elazer were anywhere near top10 ranking for 2019.
"Sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang." Serral dropped one map to Zhu, but you make sound like it was a 3-2 score.
If the beginning of the year matters less than the end of the year, then might as well call it "player of the end of the year award." If the end of the year matters more, why not mention Dark's recent loss to Patience, who isn't even on the top40 ranking currently? I'd love to read your counterarguments.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
You are pointing out Dark's faults without doing the same to Serral. Yeah Dark lost to Elazer and guess what Serral lost to HeroMarine this year. Both of those results are equally out of left field and cancel each other out imo. Besides that Serral lost to Neeb, Reynor x 4, soO, Innovation x 3, Stats x 2. Meanwhile Dark lost to Classic, Maru, Gumiho, Serral, Stats, Rogue. And that's it I believe? At least in major offline events. If you ask me that second list is a lot more impressive. Especially when you take into account that Innovation was not very consistent this year. Serral was also sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang this year. Serral won the head to head yeah but it was in the beginning of the year before Dark won his GSL and went to another level.
If I felt Serral's losses were that severe, I would've noted them.
Heromarine has been consistently rated right up there close to Neeb and Showtime, much higher than elazer, and Serral's record against him in 2019 was 9-3. You take a short groupstage series loss against a top European player like Heromarine and blow it way out of proportion. Every other one of those players you mentioned that defeated Serral is a top player. Neither Gumiho nor Elazer were anywhere near top10 ranking for 2019.
"Sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang." Serral dropped one map to Zhu, but you make sound like it was a 3-2 score.
If the beginning of the year matters less than the end of the year, then might as well call it "player of the end of the year award." If the end of the year matters more, why not mention Dark's recent loss to Patience, who isn't even on the top40 ranking currently? I'd love to read your counterarguments.
I'm setting an 0-2 to Heromarine as equal to a 2-3 to Elazer. Especially since one is in ZvT and the other is ZvZ. I consider a ZvT loss much less forgivable considering the years results. I think that's fair to set them equal and cancel each other out. If Dark played Elazer more times he would have ended the year with a good record against him too. Heromarine and Elazer only finished one spot apart in WCS rankings.
I'd argue Gumiho is better than Heromarine and Neeb and was better than Reynor for the first 6 months of the year. If Gumiho is someone's second worst loss in a year you know that's a godly year. Even when he's not performing well he's dangerous to anyone including Serral.
I'm not familiar with where Dark lost to Patience? I'm guessing it was in an olimolileague or one of the online teamleagues? For one Patience is good and can beat anyone. For two it's hard to take online events like that into account especially since Serral doesn't play in anything similar. If Serral was in Korea playing in olimolileague and the Chinese teamleagues he wouldn't be winning every single match either.
On January 27 2020 14:15 JJH777 wrote: I'm setting an 0-2 to Heromarine as equal to a 2-3 to Elazer.
Goal post moving much. You're taking into account two matches of Dark v Elazer, and laser-focusing on Serral's one match loss against Heromarine out of many matches. It's 2-3 vs 3-9 (not 0-2) if you're going to take into account multiple matches.
On January 27 2020 14:15 JJH777 wrote: I'd argue Gumiho is better than Heromarine and Neeb and was better than Reynor for the first 6 months of the year.
I'll give you this.
On January 27 2020 14:15 JJH777 wrote: I'm not familiar with where Dark lost to Patience? I'm guessing it was in an olimolileague or one of the online teamleagues? For one Patience is good and can beat anyone. For two it's hard to take online events like that into account especially since Serral doesn't play in anything similar. If Serral was in Korea playing in olimolileague and the Chinese teamleagues he wouldn't be winning every single match either.
"Good" is relative. He's not ranked top40, because he's lost to a ton to relatively weak players. Just check his match history for reference. He did give Innovation and Dark a hard time. Other than that, nothing too remarkable. He's definitely been off the radar since long before 2019. That bit of strawman at the end was cute. Nobody said Serral should win every single match. In fact, I'd said elsewhere that it's totally within expectation for Serral to lose a few series to top players.
Maybe Dark doesn't treat online cups with much seriousness, and that's an acceptable argument, but the fact remains that if you take into consideration these two's premiere and major tourney winrate against top20 players for 2019, Dark only comes close—he didn't surpass. There's a reason why Serral is still leading the #2 guy on Aligulac by >200 points. He's maintained that gap since September.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
You are pointing out Dark's faults without doing the same to Serral. Yeah Dark lost to Elazer and guess what Serral lost to HeroMarine this year. Both of those results are equally out of left field and cancel each other out imo. Besides that Serral lost to Neeb, Reynor x 4, soO, Innovation x 3, Stats x 2. Meanwhile Dark lost to Classic, Maru, Gumiho, Serral, Stats, Rogue. And that's it I believe? At least in major offline events. If you ask me that second list is a lot more impressive. Especially when you take into account that Innovation was not very consistent this year. Serral was also sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang this year. Serral won the head to head yeah but it was in the beginning of the year before Dark won his GSL and went to another level.
I don't know if it's productive/interesting to look for this kind of 1:1 equivalence when counting bad/unexpected losses.
Personally, I think the strong cases for Serral are that we as fans tend to vastly overblow the difference between 1st and 2nd, and even 1st and top 4.
On January 27 2020 11:14 BisuDagger wrote: Time is a fine choice, but Reynor felt like a break out player this year too because at the start of the year lots of people still thought he was all hype and still hadn't played in a blizzcon.
Yeah we talked about this internally, because some people felt the way you do and there is definitely an argument for it. Personally I was on TIME's side from the beginning, since it would feel REALLY weird to me to award the Break Out award to the same player two times.
Dark the clear winner of PotY by any objective metric, well deserved! It was pretty crazy how good he was for the last couple of months of the season (after being just really good for the first half), he not only won everything, he crushed his opponents, who themselves belong to the very top.
Also, the fact that a type of building can win the Best Strategy award speaks volumes to how bad game design Nydus was. And it's hard to disagree. Hopefully Blizzard are going to be more on top of the balance (and design) game from now on, they actually were doing quite well from the end of 2016 up until late 2018.
I was so sure you would meme me and take the big brain play to put Classic over Trap for protoss of the year but you have restored my faith once more, Mr. Waxangel. I applaud you.
On January 27 2020 21:12 sneakyfox wrote: Dark the clear winner of PotY by any objective metric, well deserved! It was pretty crazy how good he was for the last couple of months of the season (after being just really good for the first half), he not only won everything, he crushed his opponents, who themselves belong to the very top.
Also, the fact that a type of building can win the Best Strategy award speaks volumes to how bad game design Nydus was. And it's hard to disagree. Hopefully Blizzard are going to be more on top of the balance (and design) game from now on, they actually were doing quite well from the end of 2016 up until late 2018.
Dark is player of the year by any sensible metric you throw at him. Champion of Code S, Super Tournament, Blizzcon. ro4 of Code S twice and Katowice.
It's a way better resume than what ByuN had in 2016 when he beat him out for POTY (even if I think Dark should have probably won that time as well).
Classic should have probably gotten protoss of the year though, sure Trap made two Code S finals but Classic actually won something (on top of making ro4 and finals of Code S, and ro4 at blizzcon).
On another note, game of the year should be Maru vs Stats from supertournament, although I would 100% expect it to go to Serral vs soO for storyline purposes.
On January 27 2020 21:12 sneakyfox wrote: Dark the clear winner of PotY by any objective metric, well deserved! It was pretty crazy how good he was for the last couple of months of the season (after being just really good for the first half), he not only won everything, he crushed his opponents, who themselves belong to the very top.
Also, the fact that a type of building can win the Best Strategy award speaks volumes to how bad game design Nydus was. And it's hard to disagree. Hopefully Blizzard are going to be more on top of the balance (and design) game from now on, they actually were doing quite well from the end of 2016 up until late 2018.
Hydra bane wasn't exactly considered "balanced"
I'm not saying that there weren't any balance issues for those years, just that blizz was generally improving the game with their patches and that they were attending to issues when they arose.
For the 2019 season, they not only brought us broken nyduses and BL-infestor again, they didn't respond to the issues when they arose.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
You are pointing out Dark's faults without doing the same to Serral. Yeah Dark lost to Elazer and guess what Serral lost to HeroMarine this year. Both of those results are equally out of left field and cancel each other out imo. Besides that Serral lost to Neeb, Reynor x 4, soO, Innovation x 3, Stats x 2. Meanwhile Dark lost to Classic, Maru, Gumiho, Serral, Stats, Rogue. And that's it I believe? At least in major offline events. If you ask me that second list is a lot more impressive. Especially when you take into account that Innovation was not very consistent this year. Serral was also sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang this year. Serral won the head to head yeah but it was in the beginning of the year before Dark won his GSL and went to another level.
I don't know if it's productive/interesting to look for this kind of 1:1 equivalence when counting bad/unexpected losses.
Personally, I think the strong cases for Serral are that we as fans tend to vastly overblow the difference between 1st and 2nd, and even 1st and top 4.
You are correct and based on Silver's and ro4s as well Serral would be the poty again.
Normally I am a very big advocate of Serral and he has clearly been in Greatest of All Time territory for a while. The only reason im really okay with Dark is :
1) Dark did have a great year and I highly weight BlizzCon, but
2) Serral really shouldn't have lost that many to Reynor, even though Reynor is very very good. Serral is clearly on another level but he just has this hang up with Reynor, I think it is a stylistic thing to be honest. Serral likes to be composed and always making calculated decisions but Reynor plays at a frenetic pace and with rsomewhat eckless abandon. It reminds me of old-school gumiho who would just create a shitstorm and then because he had more experience in shitstorms he tended to do relatively well in them compared to the other player. Basically Reynor does that to Serral and takes away his ability to read the flow of the game like he normally does so he makes more mistakes.
Dark's 2019 gold medals #1, Serral a very close #2 and if we were ranking who seems higher skill alone Serral definitely wins by a long mile.
On January 28 2020 00:16 Fango wrote: Dark is player of the year by any sensible metric you throw at him. Champion of Code S, Super Tournament, Blizzcon. ro4 of Code S twice and Katowice.
It's a way better resume than what ByuN had in 2016 when he beat him out for POTY (even if I think Dark should have probably won that time as well).
Classic should have probably gotten protoss of the year though, sure Trap made two Code S finals but Classic actually won something (on top of making ro4 and finals of Code S, and ro4 at blizzcon).
Dark is player of the year by your standards but not "by any sensible metric" or "clearly"; Serral won more titles, placed higher on average and had a better win ratio. Just want to point this out but I have no intention to discuss it further since I think giving Dark the award was an acceptable decision after all.
Comparing results obtained in different years is kind of pointless, Maru's year in 2018 was better than Dark's in 2019 for example.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
You are pointing out Dark's faults without doing the same to Serral. Yeah Dark lost to Elazer and guess what Serral lost to HeroMarine this year. Both of those results are equally out of left field and cancel each other out imo. Besides that Serral lost to Neeb, Reynor x 4, soO, Innovation x 3, Stats x 2. Meanwhile Dark lost to Classic, Maru, Gumiho, Serral, Stats, Rogue. And that's it I believe? At least in major offline events. If you ask me that second list is a lot more impressive. Especially when you take into account that Innovation was not very consistent this year. Serral was also sliver away from losing to freaking Zhugeliang this year. Serral won the head to head yeah but it was in the beginning of the year before Dark won his GSL and went to another level.
I don't know if it's productive/interesting to look for this kind of 1:1 equivalence when counting bad/unexpected losses.
Personally, I think the strong cases for Serral are that we as fans tend to vastly overblow the difference between 1st and 2nd, and even 1st and top 4.
If we consider IEM, Code S and Blizzcon the most prestigious titles, Dark has 2 out of 5 and 3 top 4 finishers. It's not like he won 2 random tournaments and he received an award, he had a great year in tournaments where it matters. The only one who was better is JAGW
On January 28 2020 00:16 Fango wrote: Dark is player of the year by any sensible metric you throw at him. Champion of Code S, Super Tournament, Blizzcon. ro4 of Code S twice and Katowice.
It's a way better resume than what ByuN had in 2016 when he beat him out for POTY (even if I think Dark should have probably won that time as well).
Classic should have probably gotten protoss of the year though, sure Trap made two Code S finals but Classic actually won something (on top of making ro4 and finals of Code S, and ro4 at blizzcon).
Dark is player of the year by your standards but not "by any sensible metric" or "clearly"; Serral won more titles, placed higher on average and had a better win ratio. Just want to point this out but I have no intention to discuss it further since I think giving Dark the award was an acceptable decision after all.
Comparing results obtained in different years is kind of pointless, Maru's year in 2018 was better than Dark's in 2019 for example.
Serral placed higher in WESG and in GSLvsTW while Dark placed higher in IEM Katowice and Blizzcon. Serral played in 11 tournaments (12 if you count HSC 19) while Dark only played in 9 tournaments. In those Serral has 5 title (1WCS, 1WCS Winter, 1HSC, 1 GSLvsTW and 1 NW) while Dark has 3 title (GSL, ST and Blizzcon). After that it's pretty much up to how you rank the level of these wins.
I will say Dark was overall more dominant in his tournament run 19-4 in GSL, 13-2 in ST and 10-1 in the last day of Blizzcon although the group stage was a bit shaky, while Serral only really was untouchable at WCS fall (17-1), but Dark had a couple of bad loss (Elazer and Rogue)
Damnit a list I can’t really argue with at all, curses!
Dark shaded it over Serral for me, I’d still argue Serral might shade him as being the better player of Starcraft but Dark’s year was a little better for me. There’s a pretty cavernous gap going to number 3 though, whoever one would put in there.
On January 28 2020 01:08 Wombat_NI wrote: Damnit a list I can’t really argue with at all, curses!
Dark shaded it over Serral for me, I’d still argue Serral might shade him as being the better player of Starcraft but Dark’s year was a little better for me. There’s a pretty cavernous gap going to number 3 though, whoever one would put in there.
Reynor, Classic, Trap, Maru, Rogue, soO in no particular order
I'm hoping for 2021 it will become easier to determine who had the best year since we might not have region lock anymore
On January 28 2020 01:37 Kitai wrote: We're 2 pages in and so far only one person had a meltdown about one award. Could this be the least controversial yearly awards yet?!
Good work!
Just you wait for when Rogue-Trap is crown best series of the year.
Agree in all the sections but the best ceremony.... I mean the ceremony was dont by the HS cup team and not the player and any other tournament has a more rigid setting that doesn't allow that level of gimmicky.
Really nice to see that 3 out of my 4 favourite players are in this list, and happy to see Dark being at the "top" of this, he had quite a year and I think he deserves it.
Hoping that 2020 will bring many more epic moments to SC2. ^-^
On January 28 2020 00:16 Fango wrote: Dark is player of the year by any sensible metric you throw at him. Champion of Code S, Super Tournament, Blizzcon. ro4 of Code S twice and Katowice.
It's a way better resume than what ByuN had in 2016 when he beat him out for POTY (even if I think Dark should have probably won that time as well).
Classic should have probably gotten protoss of the year though, sure Trap made two Code S finals but Classic actually won something (on top of making ro4 and finals of Code S, and ro4 at blizzcon).
Dark is player of the year by your standards but not "by any sensible metric" or "clearly"; Serral won more titles, placed higher on average and had a better win ratio. Just want to point this out but I have no intention to discuss it further since I think giving Dark the award was an acceptable decision after all.
Comparing results obtained in different years is kind of pointless, Maru's year in 2018 was better than Dark's in 2019 for example.
Aaaaaah there it is
Let's just say that ranking WCS, GSL vs the world, and Homestory Cups as equal to or greater than Blizzcon, Code S, Super Tournament, or Katowice goes beyond my definiton of "a sensible metric".
Winrates or sheer number of events won (without context) is also not a sensible way to rank players in a game like SC2.
On January 28 2020 00:16 Fango wrote: Dark is player of the year by any sensible metric you throw at him. Champion of Code S, Super Tournament, Blizzcon. ro4 of Code S twice and Katowice.
It's a way better resume than what ByuN had in 2016 when he beat him out for POTY (even if I think Dark should have probably won that time as well).
Classic should have probably gotten protoss of the year though, sure Trap made two Code S finals but Classic actually won something (on top of making ro4 and finals of Code S, and ro4 at blizzcon).
Dark is player of the year by your standards but not "by any sensible metric" or "clearly"; Serral won more titles, placed higher on average and had a better win ratio. Just want to point this out but I have no intention to discuss it further since I think giving Dark the award was an acceptable decision after all.
Comparing results obtained in different years is kind of pointless, Maru's year in 2018 was better than Dark's in 2019 for example.
Aaaaaah there it is
Let's just say that ranking WCS, GSL vs the world, and Homestory Cups as equal to or greater than Blizzcon, Code S, Super Tournament, or Katowice goes beyond my definiton of "a sensible metric".
Winrates or sheer number of events won (without context) is also not a sensible way to rank players in a game like SC2.
Well Serral did pass him in WESG, and GSLvsTW is pretty much a Super Tournament, you got 8 of the best Koreans + Reynor-Serral, I'd take that over most ST Koreans only brackets missing 2 top 10 player. That leaves IEM Katowice, where Dark went 1 round further, but lost to the runner up while Serral lost the champ. Then it depend how you count it, I would say Dark code S + Blizzcon is better than what Serral has personally, but you can make the point he also has more early exit from tournaments.
And you know it's not 2014 anymore, the only players missing from the last HSC were Maru, Rogue, TY and Dark himself, it's not like there's 40 good Koreans anymore. Sure a Bunny is still better than a Namshar but neither Dark or Serral have a habit to lose to any off them, so you know the "code S is better stuff" is less and less clear every year.
Just to be clear, it still was last year, I'm unsure it will still be the case this year with the retirement + fresh WCS blood.
On January 27 2020 10:26 Dave4 wrote: Thanks for this, writers. I appreciate your time and courage.
I understand your rationale for Dark. I have to say I honestly think if Reynor didn't happen, Serral would have won this award by a country mile. He was the only reason Serral didn't grand slam WCS and I think if he had reached the finals of Blizzcon he would have been favoured to win over Dark.
However, Reynor did exist and the two sharing their glory ended up not quite as high as Dark - so I agree with the decision
Will be interesting to see what 2020 holds. Can't wait!
Agreed. The reason Serral didn't win player of the year is that the competition in WCS is so tough with Reynor being there. In GSL Dark has much less competition which is why he could farm that league for easy wins which got him player of the year award
On January 28 2020 05:45 BisuDagger wrote: Has there ever been a player of the year who was greatest the first six months and then was outperformed in the second half?
I think Serral is the best Sc2 player in the world, but Dark had the better 2019. So in my eyes he deserves to be the best player of 2019, he just won the bigger (and harder) competitions. Without Reynor being Serrals Kryptonite, though, i have the feeling Serral would have taken the top spot (because i think he would have beaten Dark in the Blizzcon finals).
On January 28 2020 00:16 Fango wrote: Dark is player of the year by any sensible metric you throw at him. Champion of Code S, Super Tournament, Blizzcon. ro4 of Code S twice and Katowice.
It's a way better resume than what ByuN had in 2016 when he beat him out for POTY (even if I think Dark should have probably won that time as well).
Classic should have probably gotten protoss of the year though, sure Trap made two Code S finals but Classic actually won something (on top of making ro4 and finals of Code S, and ro4 at blizzcon).
Dark is player of the year by your standards but not "by any sensible metric" or "clearly"; Serral won more titles, placed higher on average and had a better win ratio. Just want to point this out but I have no intention to discuss it further since I think giving Dark the award was an acceptable decision after all.
Comparing results obtained in different years is kind of pointless, Maru's year in 2018 was better than Dark's in 2019 for example.
Aaaaaah there it is
Let's just say that ranking WCS, GSL vs the world, and Homestory Cups as equal to or greater than Blizzcon, Code S, Super Tournament, or Katowice goes beyond my definiton of "a sensible metric".
Winrates or sheer number of events won (without context) is also not a sensible way to rank players in a game like SC2.
Well Serral did pass him in WESG, and GSLvsTW is pretty much a Super Tournament, you got 8 of the best Koreans + Reynor-Serral, I'd take that over most ST Koreans only brackets missing 2 top 10 player. That leaves IEM Katowice, where Dark went 1 round further, but lost to the runner up while Serral lost the champ. Then it depend how you count it, I would say Dark code S + Blizzcon is better than what Serral has personally, but you can make the point he also has more early exit from tournaments.
And you know it's not 2014 anymore, the only players missing from the last HSC were Maru, Rogue, TY and Dark himself, it's not like there's 40 good Koreans anymore. Sure a Bunny is still better than a Namshar but neither Dark or Serral have a habit to lose to any off them, so you know the "code S is better stuff" is less and less clear every year.
Just to be clear, it still was last year, I'm unsure it will still be the case this year with the retirement + fresh WCS blood.
So we're missing 3 Code S champions of 2019, a ST Champion of 2019, the future Blizzcon winner and we're missing Classic(how could you?). The best Korean there is Trap who's known for being bad(well, certainly not at his PvT level) in PvZ while facing all the foreign zergs in a game-state considered very pro zerg? I mean, sure, it's not 2014, but let's not pretend the Serral was facing the best of the best either.
Edit> Oh, sorry, forgot we're missing both ST winners as I forgot that the tournament ever happened That's why you shouldn't forget about Classic
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
Again, you make the logic mistake of judging players' caliber based on their number of single elimination big tournament wins. By your silly little metric, soO would be considered stronger than Serral. lol
You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate.
I've already made it clear too many times what metric I use to evaluate a player's average strength, including once in this thread. Dark's a great player, and his 2019 run was epic and almost Serral-like domination—but he didn't quite make it there, and certainly was not the player of the year. Statistics > biased opinions.
Edit: Btw, These people who expect foreigners to participate in these GSL tournaments...hahahaha. They favor Koreans by design. Any foreigner who participates would have to make all kinds of inconvenient and tiresome sacrifices that Koreans wouldn't have to endure. What a joke. GSL has great players, but stop considering this silly tournament as a truly international one—it's primarily for Korean participation, and anyone with brains know it. Just stop using this silly thing as an argument in these debates.
On January 28 2020 16:38 Ej_ wrote: Serral fans in 2018: He won Blizzcon, a GSL weekender and 4 WCS, he's the player of the year
Serral fans in 2019: Weekenders have variance.
Oh, look, another strawman sophist. If you're done clowning, Serral fans are not of one mind. I've always minded the guy's winrate far more than I did the number of trophies he collected. In 2018, his winrate against toprate players was head and shoulders above everyone else's. There were idiots proclaiming Maru to be the better player because he won some GSLs, but I knew better. Most Serral fans probably don't even agree with most of my opinions in this thread. The time-length of a tournament should have no bearing on the variance, so I don't know why you mention "weekenders".
On January 27 2020 10:26 Dave4 wrote: Thanks for this, writers. I appreciate your time and courage.
I understand your rationale for Dark. I have to say I honestly think if Reynor didn't happen, Serral would have won this award by a country mile. He was the only reason Serral didn't grand slam WCS and I think if he had reached the finals of Blizzcon he would have been favoured to win over Dark.
However, Reynor did exist and the two sharing their glory ended up not quite as high as Dark - so I agree with the decision
Will be interesting to see what 2020 holds. Can't wait!
Agreed. The reason Serral didn't win player of the year is that the competition in WCS is so tough with Reynor being there. In GSL Dark has much less competition which is why he could farm that league for easy wins which got him player of the year award
I don't think you can say GSL has less competition than WCS they are probably equal but Serral just has a hang up with Reynor - he seems to thump everyone else for the last 24 months (except maybe innovation weirdly).
On January 27 2020 10:26 Dave4 wrote: Thanks for this, writers. I appreciate your time and courage.
I understand your rationale for Dark. I have to say I honestly think if Reynor didn't happen, Serral would have won this award by a country mile. He was the only reason Serral didn't grand slam WCS and I think if he had reached the finals of Blizzcon he would have been favoured to win over Dark.
However, Reynor did exist and the two sharing their glory ended up not quite as high as Dark - so I agree with the decision
Will be interesting to see what 2020 holds. Can't wait!
Agreed. The reason Serral didn't win player of the year is that the competition in WCS is so tough with Reynor being there. In GSL Dark has much less competition which is why he could farm that league for easy wins which got him player of the year award
I don't think you can say GSL has less competition than WCS they are probably equal but Serral just has a hang up with Reynor - he seems to thump everyone else for the last 24 months (except maybe innovation weirdly).
Ofc you cannot think that, because is the exact opposite. GSL has much more competition than WCS, much more, so much more that, in fact only top 2 of WCS can challenge all top 8 and almost all top 16 of GSL.
I can't believe anyone in their right mind would put Serral over Dark in PoTY contest. Serral didn't win any of the most important/prestigious tournament in 2019, no Katowice, no Blizzcon, no code S, not even fricking WESG which isn't even hard. I'm too lazy to check but I'm damned certain every PoTY in the past had at least won one of these top-tier titles during their year.
On January 28 2020 17:34 yht9657 wrote: I can't believe anyone in their right mind would put Serral over Dark in PoTY contest. Serral didn't win any of the most important/prestigious tournament in 2019, no Katowice, no Blizzcon, no code S, not even fricking WESG which isn't even hard. I'm too lazy to check but I'm damned certain every PoTY in the past had at least won one of these top-tier titles during their year.
What does prestige of an event have anything to do a player's ability? If you think that soO was anywhere near Serral's strength in 2019 because soO earned more money/prestige from winning one giant tournament, then you shouldn't be talking about who's not in their right mind.
I am definitely team Dark this year. Serral's year was again really really good. But Dark was slightly better in my book. Trap feels like a solid choice for Protoss of the year, but the race still needs some help, hopefully some players can step up.
On another note, let's hope we have 32 koreans left to fill Code S in 2020.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
Again, you make the logic mistake of judging players' caliber based on their number of single elimination big tournament wins. By your silly little metric, soO would be considered stronger than Serral. lol
You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate.
I've already made it clear too many times what metric I use to evaluate a player's average strength, including once in this thread. Dark's a great player, and his 2019 run was epic and almost Serral-like domination—but he didn't quite make it there, and certainly was not the player of the year. Statistics > biased opinions.
Edit: Btw, These people who expect foreigners to participate in these GSL tournaments...hahahaha. They favor Koreans by design. Any foreigner who participates would have to make all kinds of inconvenient and tiresome sacrifices that Koreans wouldn't have to endure. What a joke. GSL has great players, but stop considering this silly tournament as a truly international one—it's primarily for Korean participation, and anyone with brains know it. Just stop using this silly thing as an argument in these debates.
The top tournaments of the year are: 2 WC titles> Blizzcon, IEM 3 Code S titles 3 GSL mini-titles - ST1 & 2, GSL v TW
These tournaments have the toughest competition. Out of these 8 titles Dark has 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title. Then he has top4 finish at IEM and 2 Code S.
No matter how you look at it Dark has the best record when the toughest competition was on the line and only 2 bad results.
And I am still avoiding the usage of the Serral 2018 Blizzcon nonsense...
Edit> bah, need them drugs to wake me up Where's the coffee machine?! :D
Edit 2> this is a statistic based on the players who participated and based on the tournament victories. This is not a biased opinion, this is better statistic than what was for Serral's 2018 case.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
Can't believe someone so unsophisticated as you can be an admin here
Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
It's better to ignore such things IMO. Also if you don't like it don't watch it. Or make your own and better tournament I chose the 1st option when it comes to WCS
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
technically that would have been 6 Code S titles in a row
Edit> Also let's face it, nobody from the crowd will agree with you on an official level. (either from fanboys or TL writers)
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
Ah Wax no, what does almost every other sport and competitive activity know about factoring in mentality and the ability to perform under pressure in both creating stakes for spectators and separating the good players from the clutch one.
It’s a shame EPL have guaranteed 3 years of the same tired old unsophisticated format, I was hoping that we wouldn’t have tournaments and would decide each years best players in a 5000 ladder game slugfest. Maybe 10000 if the players can manage it to eliminate pesky variance.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
Ah Wax no, what does almost every other sport and competitive activity know about factoring in mentality and the ability to perform under pressure in both creating stakes for spectators and separating the good players from the clutch one.
It’s a shame EPL have guaranteed 3 years of the same tired old unsophisticated format, I was hoping that we wouldn’t have tournaments and would decide each years best players in a 5000 ladder game slugfest. Maybe 10000 if the players can manage it to eliminate pesky variance.
Saddly I don't think that's enough, it leave all the times a player should have won but ended up losing. We should just put aligulac number into a computer and let it chose the matematicaly correct winner. If 2 player are 50/50 obviously it could be a problem, but then I think a coinflip would be an adequate answer.
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
I’m ok with a bit of foreign bias there to be honest, not for jingoistic reasons but breaking through a glass ceiling. Not quite an equivalent situation exactly but if an amateur player and Tiger Woods had a pretty similar year, I’d give the amateur player it on account of that status.
I think Maru and Serral’s 2018s you can make an argument for either one really. Maru has the 3 prestige titles in a row which hasn’t been done before, Serral has the big one as a foreigner which hasn’t been done before, rampant consistency plus a few statistical streaks including his rather impressive vKorean record.
I don’t find a preference for either particularly egregious, I give it to Serral on a knife edge for breaking that ceiling as a foreigner becoming a consistent S class player. I guess not even so much a foreigner more as a non eSF/Kespa trained, Korea-based player I suppose.
2019 Serral has already broken that ceiling so I’m judging him more on the standards he’s already hit, so him botching against Reynor at Blizzcon vs Dark clutching it gives it to the latter for me.
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
If Serral wasn't a foreigner, Maru would have NEVER won 4 GSL.
There you go, ball is in your corner again
Edit: Just to be clear, I think Dark deserves PotY 2019 as much as Serral deserves PotY 2018
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
Isn't it funny that after all the fuss last year you are forgetting that Maru won a 200k tournament in WESG? I am saying that 3 Code S+WESG>BlizzCon+Code S+ST.
You should face the fact that Serral was crowned POTY in 2018 because he was the best, foreigner or not.
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
If Serral wasn't a foreigner, Maru would have NEVER won 4 GSL.
There you go, ball is in your corner again
Edit: Just to be clear, I think Dark deserves PotY 2019 as much as Serral deserves PotY 2018
Or the opposite, if Maru was a foreigner he would have won all WCS with 2 rax reaper into Bcs at the end of the day he only needs to practice TvZ to win in Europe.
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
Isn't it funny that after all the fuss last year you are forgetting that Maru won a 200k tournament in WESG? I am saying that 3 Code S+WESG>BlizzCon+Code S+ST.
You should face the fact that Serral was crowned POTY in 2018 because he was the best, foreigner or not.
On January 28 2020 20:46 Poopi wrote: Are people seriously arguing that Serral needs PotY over Dark? Lol? Maru had a better year than Serral but Serral won BlizzCon so he got PotY, yet Dark won BlizzCon + Code S + ST and people are now arguing Dark isn't the one who deserves PotY the most in 2019? That is actually mindblowing :o
Winning BlizzCon doesn't automatically means you are player of the year; Serral was awarded POTY in 2018 because BlizzCon's title made him overtake Maru, not just because of that. Maru having a better year than Serral in 2018 was, is and will be the opinion of you and many others, counterbalanced by the opposite opinion of possibly more people.
If Maru won in 2019 what he did in 2018, no BlizzCon title would have granted Dark the POTY award.
So 3 code S < 1 WC title, 1 Code S title, 1 ST title?
Lets face it, Serral won 2018 best player fueled in part by the fact he is a foreigner, if Serral was Korean he would have been put in second place behind Maru.
Isn't it funny that after all the fuss last year you are forgetting that Maru won a 200k tournament in WESG? I am saying that 3 Code S+WESG>BlizzCon+Code S+ST.
You should face the fact that Serral was crowned POTY in 2018 because he was the best, foreigner or not.
Heh true, he also won a weekender!
Most importantly he qualified through Korea But the qualifier is a different year
So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
I wasn’t active at that period but is that actually true on soO? We’ve had Maru’s run subsequently and Trap making consecutive finals recently so it seems more normalised but soO’s streak was uniquely impressive at the time, I would have thought plenty of people would still have lauded soO’s achievement?
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
I wasn’t active at that period but is that actually true on soO? We’ve had Maru’s run subsequently and Trap making consecutive finals recently so it seems more normalised but soO’s streak was uniquely impressive at the time, I would have thought plenty of people would still have lauded soO’s achievement?
Like people were aknowledging he's doing something special but victors took more attention. The difference from what Maru has done(4 titles in a row(and speedrunning )) is IMO bigger. He wasn't completely ignored or something like that but he wasn't mentioned everywhere as the best player. Consistency isn't enough.
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
Most sports fans evidently don't. Have you ever been around them?? They're not exactly intellectually gifted people. Sophisticated people can still get as much if not more enjoyment from a smarter tournament format. Dennis organized the best tournament the entire year, even with 3 of the best players sitting out. So, no, I'm apparently not the only one privy to obvious facts. Large tournament organizers can't be bothered with this time-consuming complexity, because there isn't enough demand from the community.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
Most sports fans evidently don't. Have you ever been around them?? They're not exactly intellectually gifted people. Sophisticated people can still get as much if not more enjoyment from a smarter tournament format. Dennis organized the best tournament the entire year, even with 3 of the best players sitting out. So, no, I'm apparently not the only one privy to obvious facts. Large tournament organizers can't be bothered with this time-consuming complexity, because there isn't enough demand from the community.
Jeez take off the fedora already.
Anyway as far as I’m aware people love HSC because of the irreverent atmosphere and side content, not because it has their preferred bracket structure.
On January 27 2020 11:42 tigon_ridge wrote: Yea, just look at the GSL player's wins, but ignore his terrible performances, like his absolutely getting trashed by Elazer, and ignore Serral's masterful consistent 3-1's steamrolling through every Korean terran and protoss; and ignore Serral's 3-1 v Dark and 2-0 v Rogue in the same year. This article has pro-gsl players bias written from beginning to end. Imagine an article exclaiming "player of the year" opinion that doesn't even remark upon everything salient that happened in that year to the candidates—Oh, it's Wax, I don't have to imagine.
How many Code S titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0 How many World Champion titles in 2k19 go to Serral? 0
Well, the two most important titles of the year were won by soO and Dark(IEM, Blizzcon), Dark added a Code S title, a ST title, 2 top4 finishers in Code S and 1 top4 finisher at IEM. I don't know what kind of metric you want to use to put Serral above all these titles. Especially when Blizzcon was one of the most cited victories which resulted not giving this to Maru at 2k18...
...You have no clue how much of a dice roll these tournament runs are with the crappy SE format designed to appeal to youths and less sophisticated people. It's the same reason why athletic tournaments use the same format, while more sophisticated people, chess players, steer clear from it like the sheer laugh that they know it is. It's more to entertain the stupid crowd than anything legitimate...
Rather than be so patronizing as to believe you're the only one privy to some exclusive knowledge, what if you considered the possibility that most sports fans understand the random nature of common competitive formats, recognize it's a flawed way to determine a champion, but can still internally reconcile the contradiction for the sake of entertainment
Ah Wax no, what does almost every other sport and competitive activity know about factoring in mentality and the ability to perform under pressure in both creating stakes for spectators and separating the good players from the clutch one.
It’s a shame EPL have guaranteed 3 years of the same tired old unsophisticated format, I was hoping that we wouldn’t have tournaments and would decide each years best players in a 5000 ladder game slugfest. Maybe 10000 if the players can manage it to eliminate pesky variance.
I'll take off the fedora as soon as you stop thinking you're clever with blatantly dumb sarcasm like this.
As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 04:20 Xain0n wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:56 deacon.frost wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
Did this guy really use NW to prove a point. You know korea lost that during kespa as well right?
On January 29 2020 21:34 Fango wrote: Take it a step further. Rogue would have won POTY 2017 by the standards of the 2018 list.
I insist, if someone wins BlizzCon he is not automatically Player of the Year. That's how you justify Serral winning in 2018 but there's more to it(and it has been said countless times), you just can't see it because the GSLcentrism blinds you.
It’s contentious enough every year, 2020 may be more difficult yet again for our writers.
Maybe not across scenes, which is always tricky anyway but with past achievements and prestige.
How does a Code S in the coming year compare to ones in previous eras? Will players step up to fill that Classic (and hero/Gumiho) shaped void? Maybe Reynor will try his hand, more likely than Serral anyhow.
We’re starting to look a bit thin in terms of depth, at least of championship tier players who are in form.
On the other hand best case scenario it could be a great year if some of the aforementioned happen, the game is well racially balanced and players like Inno and soO bring their A game.
On January 29 2020 21:34 Fango wrote: Take it a step further. Rogue would have won POTY 2017 by the standards of the 2018 list.
I insist, if someone wins BlizzCon he is not automatically Player of the Year. That's how you justify Serral winning in 2018 but there's more to it(and it has been said countless times), you just can't see it because the GSLcentrism blinds you.
Winning BlizzCon definitely has a 'golden snitch' from Harry Potter quality, although not quite to that extent. Players who are BlizzCon champion quality rarely fail miserably for the rest of the year (qualification system basically ensures that), but I could envision a scenario where a relatively fluky champion can't garner the selection over some other player.
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 04:20 Xain0n wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:56 deacon.frost wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
Not talking about money. WESG is rewarding what, 200k USD? It's not mentioned because it's 3 Koreans and foreigners.
IEM and Blizzcon are the only 2 world champion titles we have. IEM is open to everybody, multiple open qualifications, big prize pool, the best players there. Blizzcon is quite low on the quality(because champions from the first half of the year may get worse - e.g. soO) but it's still a respected WC title and the finish of the season.
The next 3 hardest titles are Code S titles. It's a tournament with the biggest pool of skill. Comparable we can talk about ST1 & 2 but considering there's lower money value we can talk about players more focusing on Code S than ST so I value them a little lower.
The lowest title of the top for me is GSL vs TW. There's voting, there are more foreigners than the ratio of Blizzcon/IEM play offs would suggest is optimal. But still it has pretty stacked skill pool.
That;s why I mentioned these tournaments. If you look with my optics winning a WC title and being good at Code S for the whole year makes you a clear champion. It would get harder to decide with 1 WC title and ST titles vs 1 WC title and Code S domination and just 1 title.
On January 29 2020 21:34 Fango wrote: Take it a step further. Rogue would have won POTY 2017 by the standards of the 2018 list.
I insist, if someone wins BlizzCon he is not automatically Player of the Year. That's how you justify Serral winning in 2018 but there's more to it(and it has been said countless times), you just can't see it because the GSLcentrism blinds you.
Winning BlizzCon definitely has a 'golden snitch' from Harry Potter quality, although not quite to that extent. Players who are BlizzCon champion quality rarely fail miserably for the rest of the year (qualification system basically ensures that), but I could envision a scenario where a relatively fluky champion can't garner the selection over some other player.
That's a long way to say "Unless he's from JinAir"
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 04:20 Xain0n wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:56 deacon.frost wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
Not talking about money. WESG is rewarding what, 200k USD? It's not mentioned because it's 3 Koreans and foreigners.
IEM and Blizzcon are the only 2 world champion titles we have. IEM is open to everybody, multiple open qualifications, big prize pool, the best players there. Blizzcon is quite low on the quality(because champions from the first half of the year may get worse - e.g. soO) but it's still a respected WC title and the finish of the season.
The next 3 hardest titles are Code S titles. It's a tournament with the biggest pool of skill. Comparable we can talk about ST1 & 2 but considering there's lower money value we can talk about players more focusing on Code S than ST so I value them a little lower.
The lowest title of the top for me is GSL vs TW. There's voting, there are more foreigners than the ratio of Blizzcon/IEM play offs would suggest is optimal. But still it has pretty stacked skill pool.
That;s why I mentioned these tournaments. If you look with my optics winning a WC title and being good at Code S for the whole year makes you a clear champion. It would get harder to decide with 1 WC title and ST titles vs 1 WC title and Code S domination and just 1 title.
I'd argue that GSL vs World counts as a Code S title (at least in the last 2 years) and definitely more than a ST title but whatever
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 04:20 Xain0n wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:56 deacon.frost wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
Not talking about money. WESG is rewarding what, 200k USD? It's not mentioned because it's 3 Koreans and foreigners.
IEM and Blizzcon are the only 2 world champion titles we have. IEM is open to everybody, multiple open qualifications, big prize pool, the best players there. Blizzcon is quite low on the quality(because champions from the first half of the year may get worse - e.g. soO) but it's still a respected WC title and the finish of the season.
The next 3 hardest titles are Code S titles. It's a tournament with the biggest pool of skill. Comparable we can talk about ST1 & 2 but considering there's lower money value we can talk about players more focusing on Code S than ST so I value them a little lower.
The lowest title of the top for me is GSL vs TW. There's voting, there are more foreigners than the ratio of Blizzcon/IEM play offs would suggest is optimal. But still it has pretty stacked skill pool.
That;s why I mentioned these tournaments. If you look with my optics winning a WC title and being good at Code S for the whole year makes you a clear champion. It would get harder to decide with 1 WC title and ST titles vs 1 WC title and Code S domination and just 1 title.
I'd argue that GSL vs World counts as a Code S title (at least in the last 2 years) and definitely more than a ST title but whatever
How?? GSL vs The world is fan voting and invitation system which doesn't reflect who is the best at the moment of the tournament, whereas an open qualifier ensures the hottest players of the moment wins.
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 04:20 Xain0n wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:56 deacon.frost wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
Not talking about money. WESG is rewarding what, 200k USD? It's not mentioned because it's 3 Koreans and foreigners.
IEM and Blizzcon are the only 2 world champion titles we have. IEM is open to everybody, multiple open qualifications, big prize pool, the best players there. Blizzcon is quite low on the quality(because champions from the first half of the year may get worse - e.g. soO) but it's still a respected WC title and the finish of the season.
The next 3 hardest titles are Code S titles. It's a tournament with the biggest pool of skill. Comparable we can talk about ST1 & 2 but considering there's lower money value we can talk about players more focusing on Code S than ST so I value them a little lower.
The lowest title of the top for me is GSL vs TW. There's voting, there are more foreigners than the ratio of Blizzcon/IEM play offs would suggest is optimal. But still it has pretty stacked skill pool.
That;s why I mentioned these tournaments. If you look with my optics winning a WC title and being good at Code S for the whole year makes you a clear champion. It would get harder to decide with 1 WC title and ST titles vs 1 WC title and Code S domination and just 1 title.
I'd argue that GSL vs World counts as a Code S title (at least in the last 2 years) and definitely more than a ST title but whatever
How?? GSL vs The world is fan voting and invitation system which doesn't reflect who is the best at the moment of the tournament, whereas an open qualifier ensures the hottest players of the moment wins.
It's not as if the "hottest player of the moment" gets an invite or a an invote...
But honestly, I'm really tired of this discussion. You have yours, I have mine
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 04:20 Xain0n wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:56 deacon.frost wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
Not talking about money. WESG is rewarding what, 200k USD? It's not mentioned because it's 3 Koreans and foreigners.
IEM and Blizzcon are the only 2 world champion titles we have. IEM is open to everybody, multiple open qualifications, big prize pool, the best players there. Blizzcon is quite low on the quality(because champions from the first half of the year may get worse - e.g. soO) but it's still a respected WC title and the finish of the season.
The next 3 hardest titles are Code S titles. It's a tournament with the biggest pool of skill. Comparable we can talk about ST1 & 2 but considering there's lower money value we can talk about players more focusing on Code S than ST so I value them a little lower.
The lowest title of the top for me is GSL vs TW. There's voting, there are more foreigners than the ratio of Blizzcon/IEM play offs would suggest is optimal. But still it has pretty stacked skill pool.
That;s why I mentioned these tournaments. If you look with my optics winning a WC title and being good at Code S for the whole year makes you a clear champion. It would get harder to decide with 1 WC title and ST titles vs 1 WC title and Code S domination and just 1 title.
I'd argue that GSL vs World counts as a Code S title (at least in the last 2 years) and definitely more than a ST title but whatever
How?? GSL vs The world is fan voting and invitation system which doesn't reflect who is the best at the moment of the tournament, whereas an open qualifier ensures the hottest players of the moment wins.
It's not as if the "hottest player of the moment" gets an invite or a an invote...
But honestly, I'm really tired of this discussion. You have yours, I have mine
Suggestion: if you dont want to discuss, better not start your post with "Id argue" and even better to not comment abotu a discussion if you are tired of the topic.
On January 29 2020 05:31 Dave4 wrote: As already mentioned I'm comfortable with Dark as POTY.
However it's nonsense to suggest Dark's year was vastly superior to Serrals, who was in 7 Premier tournament finals and won a team league as well. He has unprecedented consistency and longevity over 24 months to a degree unseen in starcraft 2 before, and has already moved into GOAT discussions.
Anyone still pushing the "foreigners don't mean anything" line is completely naive. GSL vs World proved for good this year that the two scenes are extremely comparable, and Serral/Reynor make 2 of the 3 best players in the world right now. Other foreigners have also demonstrated ongoing success against both foreign and Korean opponents, including Neeb, Special, Time, Elazer and more.
The Korean elitism is seeped in tradition but it is now 3 years since kespa closed its doors. The fact that Korea can't even win nation wars anymore is clear evidence of this.
It astounds me how some people still don't give Serral the credit he deserves, no-one has ever been in the top eschalon for 2 straight years before.
IEM or Blizzcon (both 2019 for obv. reasons ) proved for good that these two scenes are not comparable at all. How many foreigners did we see in RO4/RO8 again?
On January 29 2020 04:20 Xain0n wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:56 deacon.frost wrote:
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners. Also Serral is hurt by WCS which is a weaker competition while Dark was very good in the Code S and ST2.
Out of 8 big titles Serral was competing for 3, which means he has to win some of them to outperform heavily dominating Korean player.
Edit> actually this is quite a nice comparison - soO vs Maru. when soO was winning everything except the finals, he was being aknowledged but victors were still more than his achievement. When Maru started his dominating streak and was winning, people were talking much more differently
That mirrors your incredibly Korea-centric vision of Sc2, which is not shared by everyone and it is not objective truth, either(also, Serral won GSL vs the World that you include in your "big titles", so if Dark was crowned POTY the reason was not Serral not winning any of those).
Being consistent by itself is not enough, you need to actually win titles on top of that and that's why soO wasn't taken into consideration back then: because he was not capable of winning anything. This doesn't mean that consistent players winning few titles(more than zero, ofc) could be preferred over other ones winning more but being incosistent.
I didn't say that Serral won none. Read it again. My posts are about the fact Dark won more and was more consistent in the most important title runs. In the end it's not our fault Serral missed 5 of those, is it?
You're right, Dark won the most important tournaments 2019 (finals) and Serral 2018 so they have one year of being the undisputed best player each. I'm not sure money earnings is the best metric of "best player" but if that's what you want then sure.
Not talking about money. WESG is rewarding what, 200k USD? It's not mentioned because it's 3 Koreans and foreigners.
IEM and Blizzcon are the only 2 world champion titles we have. IEM is open to everybody, multiple open qualifications, big prize pool, the best players there. Blizzcon is quite low on the quality(because champions from the first half of the year may get worse - e.g. soO) but it's still a respected WC title and the finish of the season.
The next 3 hardest titles are Code S titles. It's a tournament with the biggest pool of skill. Comparable we can talk about ST1 & 2 but considering there's lower money value we can talk about players more focusing on Code S than ST so I value them a little lower.
The lowest title of the top for me is GSL vs TW. There's voting, there are more foreigners than the ratio of Blizzcon/IEM play offs would suggest is optimal. But still it has pretty stacked skill pool.
That;s why I mentioned these tournaments. If you look with my optics winning a WC title and being good at Code S for the whole year makes you a clear champion. It would get harder to decide with 1 WC title and ST titles vs 1 WC title and Code S domination and just 1 title.
I'd argue that GSL vs World counts as a Code S title (at least in the last 2 years) and definitely more than a ST title but whatever
GSL v TW isn't a Code S title, I personally rank it even lower than a ST, but for the sake of easier argument I placed in on the same rank, in the end in most of the tournaments there were the best players, the tourney was missing some, but it's not like it was missing all of them. But it doesn't have as big skill pool as IEM or Code S has. (I place IEM higher than Code S because WC title, because openness, but it's not like it's a huge difference)
Edit: Basically what I meant Top tier = WC title, Blizzcon/IEM 2nd tier = Code S title 3rd tier = GSL v TW, GSL ST
On January 29 2020 00:34 UnLarva wrote: So, Serral was the second best of year 2019. Great! How incredibly hard it is to achieve. Like it would be shame to be the second.
Congratz Dark! Maybe Serral was little bit more consistent overall, and statistically little bit better, but when weighting in wins in tournaments, level of competition and trophies, Dark deserves POTY. Maybe its close, but it is nevertheless clear.
And yes, this comes from 100% pure breed Serral fanboi, but Its just petty not to applaud the player who deserve the praise, and what happened 2018 have nothing what-so-ever to do with POTY 2019.
To foreseeable future its easy to predict that Serral isn't yet completely washed up. Maybe 2020 is better year for him. Lol.
soO was so fucking consistent with his 4 Code S finals in a row and almost nobody cared and everybody was talking about winners.
That's not true at all, atleast after his first 2 finals. After 2 a lot of people still saw it as a big fluke, mostly because he got there by winning against parting and in a ZvZ both times, but Classics win was completely overshadowed by soOs story.