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I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015.
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Greatest of All Time is not the same as Greatest of Current Patch, Greatest of Current Expansion, Greatest of Post-Kespa Era or anything else. Blargh has it right. Serral is king of the void just the same way Mvp is the king of wings. neither of them are part of the GOAT discussion when there is Maru who rocked SC2 in multiple expansions.
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On March 05 2023 00:12 Amoyu7 wrote:
It's okay that you have Maru or Rogue ahead of him in GOAT debate, honestly even after the glowing praise I just gave to Serral I might still give the edge to Maru in this discussion, but putting Serral anywhere lower than top 3 is hilarious and wrong.
Why is it so unreasonable exactly? It really only takes 2 beliefs that were commonly held before Serral's rise to place Serral outside of top 3. Those are:
Region locked tournaments with no Koreans are near worthless in terms of SC2 achievement.
Homestory Cup is worth a lot less than any other premier win besides the aforementioned events without Koreans.
Neither of those were controversial statements before the rise of Serral and those beliefs are all it takes for players like Innovation or Life to be ahead of him in terms of number of premiers won.
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On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015.
That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM!
And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor.
Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT...
Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess.
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On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM!
the competition got better over time in football, so it doesn't apply to sc2. that was the OP's point
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On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor. Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT... Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess.
Funny you bring up Taeja when the exact reason he's not discussed as goat is because of the same reason Serral shouldn't be. He won a lot of premiers but they are mostly stuff with a low amount of KR participation. If all his premiers wins included some amount of starleagues he would've been a top goat candidate until recently.
And ever time you downplay Maru's hots results it just shows that you don't understand the KR scene during hots at all.
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On March 05 2023 07:50 necrosexy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! the competition got better over time in football, so it doesn't apply to sc2. that was the OP's point
Yeah the better comparison would be that Pele can't be considered the Goat because he played in an era when football was way less professional and competitive. And that's a sentiment that is often mentioned in the football Goat debate even though some people still regard him as the Goat.
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On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor. Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT... Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess.
You weren't around pre-LotV were you? Maru was already generally considered a top 10 player all time before he won any of his GSLs.
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On March 05 2023 00:12 Amoyu7 wrote:
The reality is SC2 doesn't have a consensus GOAT like Flash in SC1 did. It's okay, not every sport has one.
Three biggest candidates would be Maru, Serral and Rogue. You can make your argument for any of them and we can agree to disagree.
There seems to be some controversies around Serral, but I do think his last 5 years run from 2018-2023 was legendary and could rival any other player's prime years. You can argue that Serral never played in GSL, but I will counter that Serral have met plenty of top Korean players in international tournaments and he maintains a winning record against almost every single one of them in last 5 years. Since 2018, Serral has a head to head record of:
8-3 Maru, 11-3 Innovation, 7-5 ByuN, 6-0 TY, 7-3 Stats, 3-1 herO, 9-3 Zest, 5-1 Classic, 13-3 Trap, 2-1 Ragnarok, 5-3 Dark, 6-6 Rogue, 6-1 soO, 7-2 Solar
The list goes on, that's include all races so you can't use balance as an excuse. His dominance against peers is almost unprecedented. I don't think you can make the same list for any other player in the history.
Also just by eye test, I do think that Serral displays the highest level of Zerg play on almost every front that I've ever seem, and I've been watching from WoL, and have seen the entire career of other great Zerg players like Nestea, DRG, Life, Soulkey, soO, Rogue, etc. Every time I watch Serral play it still blows my mind and makes me think "man he's just better than any other Zergs in history".
It's okay that you have Maru or Rogue ahead of him in GOAT debate, honestly even after the glowing praise I just gave to Serral I might still give the edge to Maru in this discussion, but putting Serral anywhere lower than top 3 is hilarious and wrong.
Thanks for sharing the H2Hs, i think it's something that's overlooked when it comes to skill and the "greatest" player. I'm curious what Rogue and Maru's H2Hs are against other top players. Serral's dominant H2H makes sense because he really did win a ton of tournaments in 5 years, including international premieres like Dreamhack, TSL, HSC, GSL vs the World, and ofc 2 world championships.
I think in terms of skill, Serral and Rogue (if looking at his skill before he retired) feel a little higher than Maru. Serral and Rogue's achievements are more condensed from 2018-2022 which makes sense, whereas a couple of Maru's titles are more spread out in earlier years. Ofc, his GSL dominance was in 2018-2019 which is recent as well, but Rogue has slightly more concentration in 2017-2022 with getting 3 world championships as well as a few GSLs/Supers in that time. Serral's achievements are slightly more concentrated than Rogue, with them being in 2018-2022, and Serral is still going strong. At first I thought he was going to peak at 2018-2019, but in 2021-2022 he's won several more international tournies that had KRs attend, like HSC/DH/TSL, and it shows that he may still not have reached his peak.
If the scene remains decently competitive in 2023 and Serral continues to pull ahead of Maru, it will solidify that Serral may still be on an uptrend whereas Maru has stagnated and fallen a bit from his 2018-2019 GSL peak. For Rogue, it seemed like he was on a little uphill trend as he was catching up to Maru's case of being #1 GOAT, but in the final months before retirement he wavered a bit so it brings some doubt if he would have continued uphill, he seemed moreso stagnant due to the lackluster final months. For Serral to solidify a case of #1, he would just have to maintain his performance, and he should keep pulling ahead of Maru. If Serral continues with a slight uphill trend, it'll give him a pretty strong case for GOAT.
Either way, I'm happy to think that there are 3 incredible players with incredible records and achievements, and have different arguments for being the best. If only 1 of the Zergs were a Protoss, it would give a much cooler story to SC2.
Also i personally don't get why people would put MVP at #1, he really hasn't won many tournaments at all. He won 3 GSLs, a GSL vs the World invitational (16 players chosen for skill+popularity, rather than actual qualifiers, remember that Tester got invited just cus he was popular in the beta, and half of the 16 were weak foreigners), an MLG, a WCS EU, and not much else really. Compare that to Rogue for example who has won 3 world championships, 4 GSLs, 2 GSL Supers, and a couple other international premieres. Rogue has double the achievements and of much higher caliber, and he ended his career on a strong note whereas MVP was falling off significantly after the first couple years. Him winning the WCS EU was like, not even an expected result because he was no longer strong or consistent in his final year. I know he had wrist issues, but unfortunately we can't give him too much benefit of the doubt when it comes to GOAT discussion. His downhill career shows a lack of ability to adapt and stay competitive, or a lack of effort/will to try harder and win more.
The only reason I see I guess is if you consider the WoL period to have been that more competitive and for it to have been more impressive to win those titles in MVP's time than Rogue to win his. But that would imply that people aren't trying really really hard to win a world championship offering ~$150-250k for 1st place, compared to the old GSLs offering ~$30-50k for 1st place.
On March 05 2023 08:45 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor. Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT... Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess. You weren't around pre-LotV were you? Maru was already generally considered a top 10 player all time before he won any of his GSLs.
I never knew this was a thing?? Since the big tournaments are seeing significant contraction, can we have a new thread like that and create a new community ranking for top 10 GOAT?
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On March 05 2023 08:45 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor. Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT... Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess. You weren't around pre-LotV were you? Maru was already generally considered a top 10 player all time before he won any of his GSLs.
You do understand, as the one who did that post back then, that this is just a popularity vote, right? It isn't backed up by...well, anything. If 200 people back then would have thought it would be funny, that vote would have shown Has or Harstem as the best player of all time.
Why would you even include Maru in a pre-2018 Top 10 and leave out actual GSL winners like herO, Soulkey, GanZi or countless others? Probably the only reason Maru was even included by some people back then was because it was days after his WESG win.
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On March 05 2023 13:08 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 08:45 Charoisaur wrote:On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor. Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT... Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess. You weren't around pre-LotV were you? Maru was already generally considered a top 10 player all time before he won any of his GSLs. You do understand, as the one who did that post back then, that this is just a popularity vote, right? It isn't backed up by...well, anything. If 200 people back then would have thought it would be funny, that vote would have shown Has or Harstem as the best player of all time. Why would you even include Maru in a pre-2018 Top 10 and leave out actual GSL winners like herO, Soulkey, GanZi or countless others? Probably the only reason Maru was even included by some people back then was because it was days after his WESG win.
OSL and SSL were both equivalent to GSL so no reason to choose a 1 time starleague champion over him. As has been pointed out many times in this thread he was the proleague GOAT which was the most important tournament in Korea while it was going. Countless last Terran standing performances in GSL and other tournaments while Terran was weak during certain parts of hots. 2nd places in WESG and IEM. People voting for him there had almost nothing to do with his WESG win.
Also it's funny to see you bashing this for being a popularity poll when a few pages ago you were saying that Serral is the goat because most people think he is (if they even do). Aka using his popularity to say he's goat.
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France12911 Posts
On March 05 2023 13:08 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 08:45 Charoisaur wrote:On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor. Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT... Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess. You weren't around pre-LotV were you? Maru was already generally considered a top 10 player all time before he won any of his GSLs. You do understand, as the one who did that post back then, that this is just a popularity vote, right? It isn't backed up by...well, anything. If 200 people back then would have thought it would be funny, that vote would have shown Has or Harstem as the best player of all time. Why would you even include Maru in a pre-2018 Top 10 and leave out actual GSL winners like herO, Soulkey, GanZi or countless others? Probably the only reason Maru was even included by some people back then was because it was days after his WESG win.
Didn’t GanZi win code A and not code S? It’s not considered a « GSL win »
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I think the most interesting remaining outcome of this thread is whether Char and JJ can hit a post rate of 1/3rd to 1/2 of the responses.
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On March 05 2023 10:51 Yoshi Kirishima wrote:
Also i personally don't get why people would put MVP at #1, he really hasn't won many tournaments at all. He won 3 GSLs, a GSL vs the World invitational (16 players chosen for skill+popularity, rather than actual qualifiers, remember that Tester got invited just cus he was popular in the beta, and half of the 16 were weak foreigners), an MLG, a WCS EU, and not much else really. Compare that to Rogue for example who has won 3 world championships, 4 GSLs, 2 GSL Supers, and a couple other international premieres. Rogue has double the achievements and of much higher caliber, and he ended his career on a strong note whereas MVP was falling off significantly after the first couple years. Him winning the WCS EU was like, not even an expected result because he was no longer strong or consistent in his final year. I know he had wrist issues, but unfortunately we can't give him too much benefit of the doubt when it comes to GOAT discussion. His downhill career shows a lack of ability to adapt and stay competitive, or a lack of effort/will to try harder and win more.
Early SC2 was a different beast. Strategies came and went incredibly quickly, and with them certain players. It was not uncommon for someone to dominate and then suddenly vanish as the meta evolved. Inca made the GSL finals with dark templars, a blue flame hellion opening just straight up won a tournament, and patches changed things incredibly quickly.
During this time it was incredibly rare to be consistent. MVP was the only exception. There was a GomTvT era, and MVP's rise came after it. In fact, during his period of domination, Terran would be nerfed regularly. He was significantly ahead of other top Terrans, like MMA or Bomber.
His greatest strength is his ability to innovate and execute: he always found a way to victory. This is something that is incredibly overlooked in the current game, since everything is figured out. MVP basically invented Terran. He used everything and anything and somehow he was able to win. If you combined SoS and Rogue, MVP would be the result.
I will always remember his GSL final against Squirtle as one of the best Starcraft matches. He built battlecruisers in g5 and was going to win with them until an archon toilet turned the tides. At that time battlecruisers were an awful unit - TotalBiscuit had a series going where he would try to win them because they were so terribly bad. I think the modern equivalent would be using HTs normal attack to try to kill someone - it's such a dumb idea that you wouldn't even try. But MVP not only made it work, he used a never before seen build in a GSL final.
His career was cut short due to a wrist injury. Saying he had a lack of effort or will is just ignorant. He won WCS EU despite this injury - by completely remaking his playstyle to be less micro intensive. He also greatly reduced his practice schedule, meaning that for MVP playing below standard was still enough to win a premier tournament during a period where competition was at its peak.
MVP is underrated in the GOAT discussion. GOAT isn't a question of most tournament wins or the most prize money. It's rather a question of who's greatest. MVP is undisputedly the king of wings, while no one else is considered the king of their era. His star may have shined briefly, but it was brighter than any other.
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I'm gonna be honest, I don't really value WoL all that much. The level of play back then was really, really bad. I have fond memories of many players and events from back then, but I'd be lying to myself if I said I thought the era of SC2 where nobody knew how to play the game was worth much in the GOAT discussion.
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On March 05 2023 15:39 StasisField wrote:
I'm gonna be honest, I don't really value WoL all that much. The level of play back then was really, really bad. I have fond memories of many players and events from back then, but I'd be lying to myself if I said I thought the era of SC2 where nobody knew how to play the game was worth much in the GOAT discussion.
this is an interesting pov. also I remember when Naniwa won an mlg just by 4 gating everybody.
moreover, I would extend this line of reason to hots too, since it was just broodlord infestor "fest". no wonder stephano was at times the goat back then.
also to the ppl above saying "you can't factor in tournament money and not team contracts", well I have some bad news for you, contracts take a % of your tournament wins. so in the best case, you break even. All in all Serral is the GOAT by money ranking. period
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On March 05 2023 16:08 xsnac wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 15:39 StasisField wrote:
I'm gonna be honest, I don't really value WoL all that much. The level of play back then was really, really bad. I have fond memories of many players and events from back then, but I'd be lying to myself if I said I thought the era of SC2 where nobody knew how to play the game was worth much in the GOAT discussion. this is an interesting pov. also I remember when Naniwa won an mlg just by 4 gating everybody. moreover, I would extend this line of reason to hots too, since it was just broodlord infestor "fest". no wonder stephano was at times the goat back then.
I find it hard to consider LotV results as being as prestigious because there's a massive lack of competition. We've had the same players go against each other for years now.
I don't think you can discard results for being a lower standard of play. You have to compare them to their era.
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On March 05 2023 16:21 Monochromatic wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 16:08 xsnac wrote:On March 05 2023 15:39 StasisField wrote:
I'm gonna be honest, I don't really value WoL all that much. The level of play back then was really, really bad. I have fond memories of many players and events from back then, but I'd be lying to myself if I said I thought the era of SC2 where nobody knew how to play the game was worth much in the GOAT discussion. this is an interesting pov. also I remember when Naniwa won an mlg just by 4 gating everybody. moreover, I would extend this line of reason to hots too, since it was just broodlord infestor "fest". no wonder stephano was at times the goat back then. I find it hard to consider LotV results as being as prestigious because there's a massive lack of competition. We've had the same players go against each other for years now. I don't think you can discard results for being a lower standard of play. You have to compare them to their era.
Yes, you can discard achievements.
When some1 wins a premier tournament using 4 gates we can safely say the scene was bad.
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On March 05 2023 13:08 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 08:45 Charoisaur wrote:On March 05 2023 07:48 Balnazza wrote:On March 05 2023 01:41 Blargh wrote:
I still don't see how you all care about the 5 least relevant years of Sc2 more than the 7 before that. I almost wouldn't even include Serral in the discussions for "greatest of all time" when he only played in the worst era of SC2. He has zero relevance to WoL or HotS. Whereas a number of Korean players, such as Innovation, sOs, Maru especially, have been highly relevant from the beginning of their career all the way to present day. That's 5-7 years more time! And the competition was absolutely the highest when Kespa merged. I'd say that a Top 4 or Top 2 finish then has more weight than a 1st place today.
I don't think there's any denying that Serral is the most dominant player of this current era (last 5 years), but his complete absence from the rest of SC history makes it hard to call him GOAT. He can be a SC2 bonjwa though! No one cared about GOAT titles anyway, it was always about bonjwas. And Maru, Serral, Rogue would all be SC2 bonjwas!
Looking back on results historically, we clearly all have a lot of recency bias, because even Rogues dominant streak was after 2016, which is about when I'd put StarCraft 2s decline. Players like sOs, Stats, Innovation really stand out when looking at 2012-2015. That's a weird way to measure "greatest of all time" tbh. With that logic, no one that was present at the start of a game can ever rise to that title. Or in the case of real sports, no one can hold this title at all. Messi can't be the GOAT in football, because he wasn't around in the '54 WM! And just to give you some perspective: Maru didn't win much pre-LotV either. He didn't win anything in WoL and got two titles in HotS and another Top 2 finish (in Premier events). Before LotV even Jaedong or HyuN have better records than Maru, to pick two random players. So Maru was "around", but he wasn't really a factor. Rogue? Didn't win anything pre-LotV at all, like Serral and Reynor. Oh and sOs? He won nothing in WoL and LotV, and not that much Premier events in HotS either. Do you know which player has won the most Premier events pre-LotV? TaeJa. Don't hear his name much in terms of being the GOAT... Don't get me wrong, the LotV players definetly have a few statistical advantages. Yes, the scene is shrinking, though I wouldn't say the level of play has necessarily dropped by that. And of course, LotV is the longest running addon (as in...it runs forever) because it is the last one, so LotV-players like Serral, Reynor and Maru can ramp up much more titles than anyone before. They peaked in the right time I guess. You weren't around pre-LotV were you? Maru was already generally considered a top 10 player all time before he won any of his GSLs. You do understand, as the one who did that post back then, that this is just a popularity vote, right? It isn't backed up by...well, anything. If 200 people back then would have thought it would be funny, that vote would have shown Has or Harstem as the best player of all time. Why would you even include Maru in a pre-2018 Top 10 and leave out actual GSL winners like herO, Soulkey, GanZi or countless others? Probably the only reason Maru was even included by some people back then was because it was days after his WESG win.
So people's opinion about who's the Goat is irrelevant because it's just based on popularity? Based on that assumption every Goat debate is completely pointless so why are you even here?
Your takes about the scene back then are so wrong, just admit you weren't around and have no idea what you're talking about. Maru was one out of 4 people who won 2 Starleagues during the Kespa era (along with Zest, Inno and Classic) and as already mentioned arguably the best Proleague player which was the most important tournament for koreans back then. That already puts him in the top 5 of players in the most competitive era of sc2 (2013-2016).
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France12911 Posts
On March 05 2023 16:08 xsnac wrote:Show nested quote +On March 05 2023 15:39 StasisField wrote:
I'm gonna be honest, I don't really value WoL all that much. The level of play back then was really, really bad. I have fond memories of many players and events from back then, but I'd be lying to myself if I said I thought the era of SC2 where nobody knew how to play the game was worth much in the GOAT discussion. this is an interesting pov. also I remember when Naniwa won an mlg just by 4 gating everybody. moreover, I would extend this line of reason to hots too, since it was just broodlord infestor "fest". no wonder stephano was at times the goat back then. also to the ppl above saying "you can't factor in tournament money and not team contracts", well I have some bad news for you, contracts take a % of your tournament wins. so in the best case, you break even. All in all Serral is the GOAT by money ranking. period
Broodlord infestor being imba was late WoL, it was nerfed in HotS.
Early HotS was horrible because of swarm host and one hour games though.
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EPT
