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Zealously
East Gorteau22261 Posts
On August 05 2020 09:24 Pandain wrote: Also maybe Reynor? 2nd at Blizzcon is arguably more impressive than Neeb's korean victory. That's very true. I'm not sure why Reynor slipped my mind in that line of thought, since he was part of the reason why I think the competition for second is so interesting. | ||
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Psychonian
United States2322 Posts
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Comedy
469 Posts
So while his double GSL runs are an insane feat, he doesn't belong anywhere near any list of greatest foreigners of all time if you're talking about skill. Even during his achievements, skill-wise he wasn't really near the top. He way overperformed and made amazing runs - but does that warrant his name being thrown around in this discussion? | ||
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Morbidius
Brazil3449 Posts
On August 05 2020 19:58 Psychonian wrote: IdrA should absolutely be at least mentioned here. There's no reasonable argument for him to be above Serral, obviously, but honestly, considering his actual level of play, it was almost against the odds that he didn't win way more than he did. He was a serious favorite to win GSL Open Season 1, and I don't think that was at all an unreasonable idea at the time. He continued to be really dominant in the foreign scene for about a year, and a high level foreigner until his release from EG in 2013. Idra should get bonus points for being a dominant Zerg in a map pool with Steppes of War and Kulas Ravine. I think Stephano and Jinro weren't that good, they were heavily reliant on imbalance and became irrelevant players as soon as their races got nerfed. | ||
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XDEKSDEEXD
622 Posts
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MockHamill
Sweden1798 Posts
Serral: Macro 10/10 Micro 9/10 Decision making: 10/10 Mentality: 10/10 Idra: Macro 8/10 Micro 6/10 Decision making: 4/10 Mentality: 2/10 | ||
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Oukka
Finland1683 Posts
On August 05 2020 18:46 virpi wrote: My list: 1. Serral (There's no debate.) 2. Stephano (The one who made foreign fans believe. Late WoL zerg helped, but he was a pioneer in many ways.) 3. Neeb (He has had some slumps, but he's by far the best foreign P ever.) 4. Snute (The grinder.) 5. Nerchio (Look at esportsearnings. He was more succesful than ppl remember.) 6. Scarlett (Maybe a bit too high...but she's had great success over many years. Sadly, she's woefully inconsistent.) 7. Reynor (Best mechanical player of his generation.) 8. Special (He'd be higher on my list if he had won a big tournament. Best foreign T for me.) 9. Lilbow (insert practice meme here) 10. Naniwa (the true villain of SC2) CNBC: Clem (skill wise he's outstanding, he needs a big win.), Thorzain (never forget the spoon), Jinro (2 nice GSL runs), Huk (pretty good in the first years of SC2), Mana (He's been here like...forever. And he's still capable of great runs.) IdrA is hard to rank. His mindset was his biggest enemy. This is a good list to pull from, however I feel like Reynor gets unfair treatment here just because Serral, you know, exists. If Serral wasn't here we'd all be considering Reynor the current best foreigner, and one of the best foreigners of all time. Now he is so young he won't have the track-record of old timers like Nerchio, but it is hard for me to say that he isn't better than Nerchio. He competes at higher level, beats better opponents and earns higher placements than Nerchio. Whether Scarlett and Neeb should be ahead of Reynor is much more difficult. They have both won titles versus the Koreans, whereas Reynor's trophies are inside the (stacked but still) EU region and he is one of the only players considered an even matchup vs Serral right now. I think places 3-5 can be split between Neeb, Scarlett and Reynor in any way. Depending on how much one values which trophy (and Scarlett's GSL presence), but they have not done what the two ahead of them have. Ahead of them, Stephano changed the way everyone played and understood zerg. Serral has done the same, and has enough silverware that he probably has a biannual subscription to trophycabinet delivery service at this point. Snute, Nerchio, Special all should be the next three players, taking positions 6-8. Again, depending on the exact weighting put on consistency versus peaks, GSL runs vs weekenders etc the internal ranking of this trio can vary. I'd want to rate Snute highest, but then I also think Special could be the best out of these three. Really difficult to say. Naniwa, Huk, Idra and Thorzain go in here taking places 9-12. All of these players have some trophies and more bitterly ended deep tournament runs and they were some of the earliest foreign torchbearers. Lilbow I may be biased against because his peak was in a time I wasn't too keen on starcraft. His highs weren't the highest, and his peak was shortlived. Maybe the argument used in putting him higher is that the competition was stronger then, but I cannot use that to justify rating him any higher. I'd actually rate Mana higher than Lilbow, just because of the longevity. He's been around since forever, and hopefully stays too. Not a championship contender vs the top players, but always capable of taking series against just about anyone if it is one of his good days. Clem, Showtime, Heromarine, Bunny etc etc start from here taking positions 15+ All good players, likely better than some of the people ahead of them in this list, but not enough trophies to show for it. | ||
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Harris1st
Germany7420 Posts
On August 05 2020 22:07 Oukka wrote: This is a good list to pull from, however I feel like Reynor gets unfair treatment here just because Serral, you know, exists. If Serral wasn't here we'd all be considering Reynor the current best foreigner, and one of the best foreigners of all time. Now he is so young he won't have the track-record of old timers like Nerchio, but it is hard for me to say that he isn't better than Nerchio. He competes at higher level, beats better opponents and earns higher placements than Nerchio. Whether Scarlett and Neeb should be ahead of Reynor is much more difficult. They have both won titles versus the Koreans, whereas Reynor's trophies are inside the (stacked but still) EU region and he is one of the only players considered an even matchup vs Serral right now. I think places 3-5 can be split between Neeb, Scarlett and Reynor in any way. Depending on how much one values which trophy (and Scarlett's GSL presence), but they have not done what the two ahead of them have. Right now Neeb >>>>>>>> Reynor in a greatest OF ALL TIME discussion. Doesn't matter that Reynor is better than Neeb right now. It's a GOAT discussion, not a PR discussion In a year or two, it's highly probable that Reynor > Neeb Just my 2 cents | ||
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CicadaSC
United States2003 Posts
On August 05 2020 20:51 MockHamill wrote: Idra is overrated in my opinion. He had good macro by WOL standards but apart from that he was not a very good player. I do not think he belongs on a top 10 list over foreigners. Serral: Macro 10/10 Micro 9/10 Decision making: 10/10 Mentality: 10/10 Idra: Macro 8/10 Micro 6/10 Decision making: 4/10 Mentality: 2/10 lol even if i accept your ratings you can not compare players across 2 different eras this way. Saying things like his macro and micro werent as good as serral is not an argument. Mvp, Fruitdealer, whoever you want to name, did not have as good macro or micro as Serral. They hadn't been playing the game for long enough for these skills to fully develop. To rate a player you have to compare them with players from the same era. So a 2010 idra can only be compared with 2010 players respectively. | ||
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WombaT
Northern Ireland27451 Posts
Neeb and Reynor both have had periods stomping foreigners really consistently (the latter with Serral being the sole barrier to total dominance), and Neeb has a better Code S best and Reynor equals hers, with both of them being in Korea much less. Reynor has his Blizzcon silver too. Scarlett’s Pyeongchang win is obviously a rather impressive feather in her cap. If we’re talking modern active players I’d say that generally people overrate the two long-term Korean-based players in Scarlett and Special and maybe underrate some of the Europeans like Showtime or Elazer slightly. If I was to tier the vaguely modern era and not consider the previous expansions I guess I’d do it as this Code Serral - Serral: He’s smacked foreigners aside for a really long period and showed he’s an equal or indeed better than most Koreans. Temporary Serral’s - Neeb, Reynor: Players that have shown they can belong to Code Serral but haven’t sustained it. In Neeb’s case he’s shown it in the past and may yet get back there, in Reynor he’s shown it but the question is can it extend out into the future. Best of the rest - a long list: A whole bunch of top players who can beat anyone on their day and are generally consistent performers in foreign tournaments too, but one doesn’t really fancy their chances in taking out a bunch of top Koreans/Serral etc in a row in a bracket, or have other flaws like being inconsistent or predictable. | ||
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Creager
Germany1962 Posts
On August 05 2020 07:26 ghos`t wrote: IMO Snute and Lilbow should be on this list; Scarlett and Avilo should not. Hahaha thanks for the reminder, I had almost forgotten of Lilbow :D | ||
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AcrossFromTime
29 Posts
2) This thread can't lead to anything good, so I'm closing it now. | ||
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hoby2000
United States918 Posts
That being said, I laughed so hard when I saw Avilo was the top voted. God damn it guys..... hahahaha | ||
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Rubicant1
115 Posts
On August 06 2020 01:08 AcrossFromTime wrote: 1) No. Serral is not the GOAT of SC2. 2) This thread can't lead to anything good, so I'm closing it now. 1) While I'd agree with you, if you are indeed a moderator, stating a hard personal opinion and then closing a thread seems like a weird way to moderate a forum. 2) Aside from the Serral love/hate, the second best foreigner thing is at least an interesting discussion. | ||
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Xain0n
Italy3963 Posts
I read that he "dominated foreigners" and was the "best of his race for certain times"; you must be joking. Serral dominated Sc2, koreans included, harder than anyone has ever did; and no, he didn't do it while Zerg was overpowered. After that he was still arguably the best player in the world or at worst one of the best and his consistency is unmatched. Neeb crushed foreigners pretty hard and took one historic victory on korean soil but he was never especially strong against korean themselves; Stephano, on the other hand, was both a revolutionary in style and a player who could consistently beat top koreans in tournaments. Koreans truly feared and respected him, he gets the second place. Reynor has emerged in Serral's era and, when he is at his best, he seem to play at the same level Serral does; however, he is still missing a victory in one international tournament even if his second place at BlizzCon is obviously quite relevant. Naniwa, Snute, Nerchio, Thorzain, Huk, Mana, Scarlett are all a step below that despite being able to win tournaments against koreans. The new generation of foreigners is promising, I hope it will be able to surprise us. | ||
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Whatson
United States5357 Posts
On August 05 2020 18:03 deacon.frost wrote: The level of play is higher, the level of competition is lower. When KeSPA joined we had like 48 top players, even Code S ro32 was stacked and RO16 was insane. nowadays? Yeah, players may be faster and better, but we have so few of them. FFS nowadays we don't even have Code S ro32 because we don't have the players for it... WITH FOREIGNERS IN IT. Same fall applies to the foreign scene, where we had like 20 top players now we have maybe 10. There's no accident every ro8 looks similar  Agree with this I tend to think of Stephano as #2 | ||
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Cricketer12
United States14003 Posts
On August 06 2020 01:08 AcrossFromTime wrote: 1) No. Serral is not the GOAT of SC2. 2) This thread can't lead to anything good, so I'm closing it now. Are you now? | ||
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Charoisaur
Germany16100 Posts
On August 05 2020 18:46 virpi wrote: My list: 1. Serral (There's no debate.) 2. Stephano (The one who made foreign fans believe. Late WoL zerg helped, but he was a pioneer in many ways.) 3. Neeb (He has had some slumps, but he's by far the best foreign P ever.) 4. Snute (The grinder.) 5. Nerchio (Look at esportsearnings. He was more succesful than ppl remember.) 6. Scarlett (Maybe a bit too high...but she's had great success over many years. Sadly, she's woefully inconsistent.) 7. Reynor (Best mechanical player of his generation.) 8. Special (He'd be higher on my list if he had won a big tournament. Best foreign T for me.) 9. Lilbow (insert practice meme here) 10. Naniwa (the true villain of SC2) CNBC: Clem (skill wise he's outstanding, he needs a big win.), Thorzain (never forget the spoon), Jinro (2 nice GSL runs), Huk (pretty good in the first years of SC2), Mana (He's been here like...forever. And he's still capable of great runs.) IdrA is hard to rank. His mindset was his biggest enemy. That's a good list - I'd put only Naniwa higher (4th or 5th) and HuK instead of Lilbow. | ||
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Charoisaur
Germany16100 Posts
Still Serral is obviously 1st because his achievements are just way beyond anyone else on this list. | ||
[Phantom]
Mexico2170 Posts
From what I know of Serral, he was a nobody, an absolutely middle of the road player from WoL to HosT. No one would bet anything for him and he didn't win anything. Even in LotV he had only ok results. Then suddenly, from nowhere, he wins the WCS and the qualifier tournaments leading up to that. Is he a "patch zerg"? I understand some people might get angry with that question, he being the foreigner hope and the only one to win a WCS, but is he really that good? Zerg has been doing great all LotV.Is that part of it? I can understand him winning in NA and EU against foreigners, and he AFAIK hasn't played ever in the GSL. But then there is the world championship which he won, and since then it seems he has continued to do relatively well. There's also the fact that since the fall of KeSPA a lot of Korean pros have retired or stopped practicing as hard as they used to. So for those who were actualyl there in 2018 (I think it was 2018?) Is Serral really that good? or was his WCS win a combination of playing against foreigners, koreans practicing less, balance, and getting into a good level skill wise to win matches where others couldn't. Is he a macro zerg? is he a cheeser like SoS? What's his story really? Is he really as good as TL thinks he is since people here are calling him GOAT contender? Or is he the product of being a good player in a decadent scene? How could he improve so much so fast compared to the rest of the scene? Honestl'y I've seen just his WCS games and a couple more here and there. | ||
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