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Just clicked through a few of Dark's matchups vs top pros on Aligulac, match winrates: he's 68% vs Stats, 34% vs herO, and very close to 50% vs trap/zest. He's 50% vs Maru & Byun, 57% vs inno, 72% vs TY (as pointed out), the four horsemen. He's 56% vs soo&solar, 46% vs rogue.
So it looks like he's pretty close to 50/50 in ZvP and ZvZ against the top Koreans, and he has winning records vs the top KR Terrans. Clearly among the best, but if you throw in the finals winrates... it's a bit hard to call Dark dominant beyond just "consistent"
I guess the arguments for soO and Rain over Dark are their consistency and by-eye strength at their peaks (I think Dark's play rarely *looks* like the best in the world, even when he's playing like it, since his play is just so messy and crafty), while the arguments for TY and sOs are their legendary peak winrates in a harder era of SC2. I wouldn't agree for my personal list, but I can see the arguments.
Edit: Miz, I see you'll about it more in the blog post, so I'll let it be! I definitely agree that Dark is incredibly consistent while managing to pull some of the most miraculous single maps out, and I'll be 100% looking forward to the blog post. I guess the rest of 11-15 must be Stats, Reynor... byun? gumiho? MC/nestea? Solar? Excited to read it. And above all 100% respect the methodology and the research!
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United States1913 Posts
On February 21 2024 07:44 arcane1129 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2024 06:15 TheDougler wrote:First of all Miz, excellent work. Your writing is so fun to read as always. The quasi-confirmation that Dark didn't make the top 10 really surpised me though. Let's look at the comparison to Rain, specifically. Notable tournament finishes (Rain): 2012 WCS Asia: 1st place 2012 OnGameNet Starleague: 1st place 2013 OnGameNet Starleague: 2nd place 2013 GSL Hot6ix Cup: 1st place 2015 IEM San Jose: 2nd place 2015 Code S Season 2: 1st place 2015 HomeStory Cup 11: 1st place Notable Tournament Finishes (Dark): 2016 Code S Season 1: 1st Place 2016 WCS Korea: 1st Place 2016 WCS Global Championships: 2nd Place 2019 GSL Code S Season 2: 1st Place 2019 GSL AfreecaTV Super Tournament 2: 1st Place 2019 WCS Global Finals: 1st Place 2020 Teamliquid StarLeague 6: 1st Place 2021 GSL Season 2: 1st Place 2022 GSL Afreeka TV Super Tournament 1: 2nd Place 2023 GSL Code S Season 2: 2nd Place There's plenty of other tournaments, including premier tournaments that Dark placed in the top 4 of that I haven't even mentioned above. I simply cannot see a logic behind including Rain but not him. Heck, I'm not sure that TY even deserves his spot above Dark. Let's look at the justification of that: The Placement TY and #10 player Rain are similar for their consistent, high-level play in Korean Individual Leagues, and their list of top-four finishes is very similar (TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 finishes // Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4).
However, TY gets the nod for ninth place by surpassing Rain in a couple of key areas. The biggest differentiating factor was TY's results in world championship-tier tournaments—TY won both IEM and WESG, while Rain's best result was top 3 at BWC/WCS 2012. Also, TY's stretch of consistently great domestic play lasted for five years, compared to Rain's three and a half. Overall, TY was the obvious choice to slot in right ahead of Rain. Okay, so let's look at top four finishes in Korean Individual Leagues, and world championship tournaments. Fortunately, Miz already did the math for us: ![[image loading]](https://tl.net/staff/Waxangel/GOAT2024/TY9/chart2.png) Korean Individual Leagues: TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4 Dark: 2x first place, 3x second place, 4x RO4. So, equal number of first places, but more consistent finals and semi-finals appearances for Dark. Let's look at world championship events: TY: 1st Place IEM 2017, 1st Place WESG 2017 Rain: 3rd Place BWC/WCS 2012 Dark: 1st Place WCS 2019, 2nd Place WCS Global Championships 2016 Here we see that the logic that places TY above Rain unquestionably puts Dark above Rain as well. So, what gives? Could it be that Dark's winrate against fellow S-tier competition is much poorer (which I don't have the statistics for, but feel like could certainly be the case)? I don't think it's that either, as Miz notes Dark's impressive win-rate against TY: ![[image loading]](https://tl.net/staff/Waxangel/GOAT2024/TY9/chart4.png) From what I can read from the TY article, it's mostly this 3% lower overall win-rate in Korean Individual Leagues, despite having the more impressive record in terms of Top4+ appearences in those leagues when compared to TY: ![[image loading]](https://tl.net/staff/Waxangel/GOAT2024/TY9/chart3.png) TY's consistent strength is also apparent in his overall win-loss record in Korean Individual Leagues. From the start of LotV up until his military service, he was neck-and-neck with Maru in terms of having the best statistics. TY's map win-rate of 64.9% (170W-92L) was slightly head of Maru's 63.8% (166W-94L), while his series win-rate of 69.8% (60W-26L) was second only to Maru's 73.2% (60W-22). When it comes to Dark, Stats, and Rogue, the other top players during this time frame, their win-rates all trail slightly or considerably behind TY. We should note however, that even by that math, the match win rate (which I'd argue is more important than map win rate) is even closer. Heck, LOOK at that consistency from Dark, the only one on that chart to qualify for every listed event in that table! To me, there's just something not-correct about puttin Rain above Dark for the top 10, given the criteria we know about. When we look at weekenders, this becomes even more apparent, but I won't belabor that point as they're weighted lightly by the criteria we know about. Yeah, it's super strange. I'm waiting to see Miz's full explanation, but assuming there's no twist to the final spots (i.e. a tie with 4 players in the top 3), I can't even figure out a possible rationale for keeping Dark off the list. Personally, I don't feel like any of the stats used in the articles, such as particular winrates over a narrowly defined set of time where the player hit a peak, are particularly meaningful in the face of the long term, consistent success. And by that metric, Dark smokes every single player in SC2 history besides Serral and Maru. I can see the argument for MVP having better peak dominance, Inno having more success in the most competitive years, and Rogue having more premier golds, so that comes down to preference to whoever is making the list and what they personally weigh more heavily. But when players are on the list for having careers that are essentially just Dark's but worse, I take issue with that.
Dark got very lucky being younger than most players. He's a very good player, but if he's born three years earlier (that would make him as old as soO) Dark retires for military somewhere in 2019-2020 and would have a far worse resume.
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Why are we only looking at tournament results?
Look at the single-handed impact of Mvp in getting ghost snipe nerfed into oblivion. No other player can boast a massive balance change based only on their performance.
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United States1913 Posts
On February 21 2024 09:02 Pentarp wrote:
Why are we only looking at tournament results?
Look at the single-handed impact of Mvp in getting ghost snipe nerfed into oblivion. No other player can boast a massive balance change based only on their performance.
ByuN being a reaper patch terran caused some big nerfs and Scarlett got that disgusting unbeatable elevator ling build nerfed as well. I'd say both of those were more obnoxious as Mvp is way better than either.
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On February 21 2024 08:58 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2024 07:44 arcane1129 wrote:On February 21 2024 06:15 TheDougler wrote:First of all Miz, excellent work. Your writing is so fun to read as always. The quasi-confirmation that Dark didn't make the top 10 really surpised me though. Let's look at the comparison to Rain, specifically. Notable tournament finishes (Rain): 2012 WCS Asia: 1st place 2012 OnGameNet Starleague: 1st place 2013 OnGameNet Starleague: 2nd place 2013 GSL Hot6ix Cup: 1st place 2015 IEM San Jose: 2nd place 2015 Code S Season 2: 1st place 2015 HomeStory Cup 11: 1st place Notable Tournament Finishes (Dark): 2016 Code S Season 1: 1st Place 2016 WCS Korea: 1st Place 2016 WCS Global Championships: 2nd Place 2019 GSL Code S Season 2: 1st Place 2019 GSL AfreecaTV Super Tournament 2: 1st Place 2019 WCS Global Finals: 1st Place 2020 Teamliquid StarLeague 6: 1st Place 2021 GSL Season 2: 1st Place 2022 GSL Afreeka TV Super Tournament 1: 2nd Place 2023 GSL Code S Season 2: 2nd Place There's plenty of other tournaments, including premier tournaments that Dark placed in the top 4 of that I haven't even mentioned above. I simply cannot see a logic behind including Rain but not him. Heck, I'm not sure that TY even deserves his spot above Dark. Let's look at the justification of that: The Placement TY and #10 player Rain are similar for their consistent, high-level play in Korean Individual Leagues, and their list of top-four finishes is very similar (TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 finishes // Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4).
However, TY gets the nod for ninth place by surpassing Rain in a couple of key areas. The biggest differentiating factor was TY's results in world championship-tier tournaments—TY won both IEM and WESG, while Rain's best result was top 3 at BWC/WCS 2012. Also, TY's stretch of consistently great domestic play lasted for five years, compared to Rain's three and a half. Overall, TY was the obvious choice to slot in right ahead of Rain. Okay, so let's look at top four finishes in Korean Individual Leagues, and world championship tournaments. Fortunately, Miz already did the math for us: Korean Individual Leagues: TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4 Dark: 2x first place, 3x second place, 4x RO4. So, equal number of first places, but more consistent finals and semi-finals appearances for Dark. Let's look at world championship events: TY: 1st Place IEM 2017, 1st Place WESG 2017 Rain: 3rd Place BWC/WCS 2012 Dark: 1st Place WCS 2019, 2nd Place WCS Global Championships 2016 Here we see that the logic that places TY above Rain unquestionably puts Dark above Rain as well. So, what gives? Could it be that Dark's winrate against fellow S-tier competition is much poorer (which I don't have the statistics for, but feel like could certainly be the case)? I don't think it's that either, as Miz notes Dark's impressive win-rate against TY: From what I can read from the TY article, it's mostly this 3% lower overall win-rate in Korean Individual Leagues, despite having the more impressive record in terms of Top4+ appearences in those leagues when compared to TY: TY's consistent strength is also apparent in his overall win-loss record in Korean Individual Leagues. From the start of LotV up until his military service, he was neck-and-neck with Maru in terms of having the best statistics. TY's map win-rate of 64.9% (170W-92L) was slightly head of Maru's 63.8% (166W-94L), while his series win-rate of 69.8% (60W-26L) was second only to Maru's 73.2% (60W-22). When it comes to Dark, Stats, and Rogue, the other top players during this time frame, their win-rates all trail slightly or considerably behind TY. We should note however, that even by that math, the match win rate (which I'd argue is more important than map win rate) is even closer. Heck, LOOK at that consistency from Dark, the only one on that chart to qualify for every listed event in that table! To me, there's just something not-correct about puttin Rain above Dark for the top 10, given the criteria we know about. When we look at weekenders, this becomes even more apparent, but I won't belabor that point as they're weighted lightly by the criteria we know about. Yeah, it's super strange. I'm waiting to see Miz's full explanation, but assuming there's no twist to the final spots (i.e. a tie with 4 players in the top 3), I can't even figure out a possible rationale for keeping Dark off the list. Personally, I don't feel like any of the stats used in the articles, such as particular winrates over a narrowly defined set of time where the player hit a peak, are particularly meaningful in the face of the long term, consistent success. And by that metric, Dark smokes every single player in SC2 history besides Serral and Maru. I can see the argument for MVP having better peak dominance, Inno having more success in the most competitive years, and Rogue having more premier golds, so that comes down to preference to whoever is making the list and what they personally weigh more heavily. But when players are on the list for having careers that are essentially just Dark's but worse, I take issue with that. Dark got very lucky being younger than most players. He's a very good player, but if he's born three years earlier he retires for military somewhere in 2019-2020 and would have a far worse resume.
So? Is he being penalized for a hypothetical that didn't happen? Because we could play that game with anyone. Serral is a very good player, but if he's born fifty years earlier he would have a far worse SC2 resume. If Maru were born blind he'd have a far worse SC2 resume too.
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United States1913 Posts
On February 21 2024 09:07 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2024 08:58 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 21 2024 07:44 arcane1129 wrote:On February 21 2024 06:15 TheDougler wrote:First of all Miz, excellent work. Your writing is so fun to read as always. The quasi-confirmation that Dark didn't make the top 10 really surpised me though. Let's look at the comparison to Rain, specifically. Notable tournament finishes (Rain): 2012 WCS Asia: 1st place 2012 OnGameNet Starleague: 1st place 2013 OnGameNet Starleague: 2nd place 2013 GSL Hot6ix Cup: 1st place 2015 IEM San Jose: 2nd place 2015 Code S Season 2: 1st place 2015 HomeStory Cup 11: 1st place Notable Tournament Finishes (Dark): 2016 Code S Season 1: 1st Place 2016 WCS Korea: 1st Place 2016 WCS Global Championships: 2nd Place 2019 GSL Code S Season 2: 1st Place 2019 GSL AfreecaTV Super Tournament 2: 1st Place 2019 WCS Global Finals: 1st Place 2020 Teamliquid StarLeague 6: 1st Place 2021 GSL Season 2: 1st Place 2022 GSL Afreeka TV Super Tournament 1: 2nd Place 2023 GSL Code S Season 2: 2nd Place There's plenty of other tournaments, including premier tournaments that Dark placed in the top 4 of that I haven't even mentioned above. I simply cannot see a logic behind including Rain but not him. Heck, I'm not sure that TY even deserves his spot above Dark. Let's look at the justification of that: The Placement TY and #10 player Rain are similar for their consistent, high-level play in Korean Individual Leagues, and their list of top-four finishes is very similar (TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 finishes // Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4).
However, TY gets the nod for ninth place by surpassing Rain in a couple of key areas. The biggest differentiating factor was TY's results in world championship-tier tournaments—TY won both IEM and WESG, while Rain's best result was top 3 at BWC/WCS 2012. Also, TY's stretch of consistently great domestic play lasted for five years, compared to Rain's three and a half. Overall, TY was the obvious choice to slot in right ahead of Rain. Okay, so let's look at top four finishes in Korean Individual Leagues, and world championship tournaments. Fortunately, Miz already did the math for us: Korean Individual Leagues: TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4 Dark: 2x first place, 3x second place, 4x RO4. So, equal number of first places, but more consistent finals and semi-finals appearances for Dark. Let's look at world championship events: TY: 1st Place IEM 2017, 1st Place WESG 2017 Rain: 3rd Place BWC/WCS 2012 Dark: 1st Place WCS 2019, 2nd Place WCS Global Championships 2016 Here we see that the logic that places TY above Rain unquestionably puts Dark above Rain as well. So, what gives? Could it be that Dark's winrate against fellow S-tier competition is much poorer (which I don't have the statistics for, but feel like could certainly be the case)? I don't think it's that either, as Miz notes Dark's impressive win-rate against TY: From what I can read from the TY article, it's mostly this 3% lower overall win-rate in Korean Individual Leagues, despite having the more impressive record in terms of Top4+ appearences in those leagues when compared to TY: TY's consistent strength is also apparent in his overall win-loss record in Korean Individual Leagues. From the start of LotV up until his military service, he was neck-and-neck with Maru in terms of having the best statistics. TY's map win-rate of 64.9% (170W-92L) was slightly head of Maru's 63.8% (166W-94L), while his series win-rate of 69.8% (60W-26L) was second only to Maru's 73.2% (60W-22). When it comes to Dark, Stats, and Rogue, the other top players during this time frame, their win-rates all trail slightly or considerably behind TY. We should note however, that even by that math, the match win rate (which I'd argue is more important than map win rate) is even closer. Heck, LOOK at that consistency from Dark, the only one on that chart to qualify for every listed event in that table! To me, there's just something not-correct about puttin Rain above Dark for the top 10, given the criteria we know about. When we look at weekenders, this becomes even more apparent, but I won't belabor that point as they're weighted lightly by the criteria we know about. Yeah, it's super strange. I'm waiting to see Miz's full explanation, but assuming there's no twist to the final spots (i.e. a tie with 4 players in the top 3), I can't even figure out a possible rationale for keeping Dark off the list. Personally, I don't feel like any of the stats used in the articles, such as particular winrates over a narrowly defined set of time where the player hit a peak, are particularly meaningful in the face of the long term, consistent success. And by that metric, Dark smokes every single player in SC2 history besides Serral and Maru. I can see the argument for MVP having better peak dominance, Inno having more success in the most competitive years, and Rogue having more premier golds, so that comes down to preference to whoever is making the list and what they personally weigh more heavily. But when players are on the list for having careers that are essentially just Dark's but worse, I take issue with that. Dark got very lucky being younger than most players. He's a very good player, but if he's born three years earlier he retires for military somewhere in 2019-2020 and would have a far worse resume. So? Is he being penalized for a hypothetical that didn't happen? Because we could play that game with anyone. Serral is a very good player, but if he's born fifty years earlier he would have a far worse SC2 resume. If Maru were born blind he'd have a far worse SC2 resume too.
No, of course not. I just enjoy the infinite sliding doors moments that occur in sports. I truly delight in these things.
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On February 21 2024 09:16 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2024 09:07 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On February 21 2024 08:58 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 21 2024 07:44 arcane1129 wrote:On February 21 2024 06:15 TheDougler wrote:First of all Miz, excellent work. Your writing is so fun to read as always. The quasi-confirmation that Dark didn't make the top 10 really surpised me though. Let's look at the comparison to Rain, specifically. Notable tournament finishes (Rain): 2012 WCS Asia: 1st place 2012 OnGameNet Starleague: 1st place 2013 OnGameNet Starleague: 2nd place 2013 GSL Hot6ix Cup: 1st place 2015 IEM San Jose: 2nd place 2015 Code S Season 2: 1st place 2015 HomeStory Cup 11: 1st place Notable Tournament Finishes (Dark): 2016 Code S Season 1: 1st Place 2016 WCS Korea: 1st Place 2016 WCS Global Championships: 2nd Place 2019 GSL Code S Season 2: 1st Place 2019 GSL AfreecaTV Super Tournament 2: 1st Place 2019 WCS Global Finals: 1st Place 2020 Teamliquid StarLeague 6: 1st Place 2021 GSL Season 2: 1st Place 2022 GSL Afreeka TV Super Tournament 1: 2nd Place 2023 GSL Code S Season 2: 2nd Place There's plenty of other tournaments, including premier tournaments that Dark placed in the top 4 of that I haven't even mentioned above. I simply cannot see a logic behind including Rain but not him. Heck, I'm not sure that TY even deserves his spot above Dark. Let's look at the justification of that: The Placement TY and #10 player Rain are similar for their consistent, high-level play in Korean Individual Leagues, and their list of top-four finishes is very similar (TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 finishes // Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4).
However, TY gets the nod for ninth place by surpassing Rain in a couple of key areas. The biggest differentiating factor was TY's results in world championship-tier tournaments—TY won both IEM and WESG, while Rain's best result was top 3 at BWC/WCS 2012. Also, TY's stretch of consistently great domestic play lasted for five years, compared to Rain's three and a half. Overall, TY was the obvious choice to slot in right ahead of Rain. Okay, so let's look at top four finishes in Korean Individual Leagues, and world championship tournaments. Fortunately, Miz already did the math for us: Korean Individual Leagues: TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4 Dark: 2x first place, 3x second place, 4x RO4. So, equal number of first places, but more consistent finals and semi-finals appearances for Dark. Let's look at world championship events: TY: 1st Place IEM 2017, 1st Place WESG 2017 Rain: 3rd Place BWC/WCS 2012 Dark: 1st Place WCS 2019, 2nd Place WCS Global Championships 2016 Here we see that the logic that places TY above Rain unquestionably puts Dark above Rain as well. So, what gives? Could it be that Dark's winrate against fellow S-tier competition is much poorer (which I don't have the statistics for, but feel like could certainly be the case)? I don't think it's that either, as Miz notes Dark's impressive win-rate against TY: From what I can read from the TY article, it's mostly this 3% lower overall win-rate in Korean Individual Leagues, despite having the more impressive record in terms of Top4+ appearences in those leagues when compared to TY: TY's consistent strength is also apparent in his overall win-loss record in Korean Individual Leagues. From the start of LotV up until his military service, he was neck-and-neck with Maru in terms of having the best statistics. TY's map win-rate of 64.9% (170W-92L) was slightly head of Maru's 63.8% (166W-94L), while his series win-rate of 69.8% (60W-26L) was second only to Maru's 73.2% (60W-22). When it comes to Dark, Stats, and Rogue, the other top players during this time frame, their win-rates all trail slightly or considerably behind TY. We should note however, that even by that math, the match win rate (which I'd argue is more important than map win rate) is even closer. Heck, LOOK at that consistency from Dark, the only one on that chart to qualify for every listed event in that table! To me, there's just something not-correct about puttin Rain above Dark for the top 10, given the criteria we know about. When we look at weekenders, this becomes even more apparent, but I won't belabor that point as they're weighted lightly by the criteria we know about. Yeah, it's super strange. I'm waiting to see Miz's full explanation, but assuming there's no twist to the final spots (i.e. a tie with 4 players in the top 3), I can't even figure out a possible rationale for keeping Dark off the list. Personally, I don't feel like any of the stats used in the articles, such as particular winrates over a narrowly defined set of time where the player hit a peak, are particularly meaningful in the face of the long term, consistent success. And by that metric, Dark smokes every single player in SC2 history besides Serral and Maru. I can see the argument for MVP having better peak dominance, Inno having more success in the most competitive years, and Rogue having more premier golds, so that comes down to preference to whoever is making the list and what they personally weigh more heavily. But when players are on the list for having careers that are essentially just Dark's but worse, I take issue with that. Dark got very lucky being younger than most players. He's a very good player, but if he's born three years earlier he retires for military somewhere in 2019-2020 and would have a far worse resume. So? Is he being penalized for a hypothetical that didn't happen? Because we could play that game with anyone. Serral is a very good player, but if he's born fifty years earlier he would have a far worse SC2 resume. If Maru were born blind he'd have a far worse SC2 resume too. No, of course not. I just enjoy the infinite sliding doors moments that occur in sports. I truly delight in these things.
Fair enough 
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United States1913 Posts
On February 21 2024 09:19 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2024 09:16 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 21 2024 09:07 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On February 21 2024 08:58 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 21 2024 07:44 arcane1129 wrote:On February 21 2024 06:15 TheDougler wrote:First of all Miz, excellent work. Your writing is so fun to read as always. The quasi-confirmation that Dark didn't make the top 10 really surpised me though. Let's look at the comparison to Rain, specifically. Notable tournament finishes (Rain): 2012 WCS Asia: 1st place 2012 OnGameNet Starleague: 1st place 2013 OnGameNet Starleague: 2nd place 2013 GSL Hot6ix Cup: 1st place 2015 IEM San Jose: 2nd place 2015 Code S Season 2: 1st place 2015 HomeStory Cup 11: 1st place Notable Tournament Finishes (Dark): 2016 Code S Season 1: 1st Place 2016 WCS Korea: 1st Place 2016 WCS Global Championships: 2nd Place 2019 GSL Code S Season 2: 1st Place 2019 GSL AfreecaTV Super Tournament 2: 1st Place 2019 WCS Global Finals: 1st Place 2020 Teamliquid StarLeague 6: 1st Place 2021 GSL Season 2: 1st Place 2022 GSL Afreeka TV Super Tournament 1: 2nd Place 2023 GSL Code S Season 2: 2nd Place There's plenty of other tournaments, including premier tournaments that Dark placed in the top 4 of that I haven't even mentioned above. I simply cannot see a logic behind including Rain but not him. Heck, I'm not sure that TY even deserves his spot above Dark. Let's look at the justification of that: The Placement TY and #10 player Rain are similar for their consistent, high-level play in Korean Individual Leagues, and their list of top-four finishes is very similar (TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 finishes // Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4).
However, TY gets the nod for ninth place by surpassing Rain in a couple of key areas. The biggest differentiating factor was TY's results in world championship-tier tournaments—TY won both IEM and WESG, while Rain's best result was top 3 at BWC/WCS 2012. Also, TY's stretch of consistently great domestic play lasted for five years, compared to Rain's three and a half. Overall, TY was the obvious choice to slot in right ahead of Rain. Okay, so let's look at top four finishes in Korean Individual Leagues, and world championship tournaments. Fortunately, Miz already did the math for us: Korean Individual Leagues: TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4 Dark: 2x first place, 3x second place, 4x RO4. So, equal number of first places, but more consistent finals and semi-finals appearances for Dark. Let's look at world championship events: TY: 1st Place IEM 2017, 1st Place WESG 2017 Rain: 3rd Place BWC/WCS 2012 Dark: 1st Place WCS 2019, 2nd Place WCS Global Championships 2016 Here we see that the logic that places TY above Rain unquestionably puts Dark above Rain as well. So, what gives? Could it be that Dark's winrate against fellow S-tier competition is much poorer (which I don't have the statistics for, but feel like could certainly be the case)? I don't think it's that either, as Miz notes Dark's impressive win-rate against TY: From what I can read from the TY article, it's mostly this 3% lower overall win-rate in Korean Individual Leagues, despite having the more impressive record in terms of Top4+ appearences in those leagues when compared to TY: TY's consistent strength is also apparent in his overall win-loss record in Korean Individual Leagues. From the start of LotV up until his military service, he was neck-and-neck with Maru in terms of having the best statistics. TY's map win-rate of 64.9% (170W-92L) was slightly head of Maru's 63.8% (166W-94L), while his series win-rate of 69.8% (60W-26L) was second only to Maru's 73.2% (60W-22). When it comes to Dark, Stats, and Rogue, the other top players during this time frame, their win-rates all trail slightly or considerably behind TY. We should note however, that even by that math, the match win rate (which I'd argue is more important than map win rate) is even closer. Heck, LOOK at that consistency from Dark, the only one on that chart to qualify for every listed event in that table! To me, there's just something not-correct about puttin Rain above Dark for the top 10, given the criteria we know about. When we look at weekenders, this becomes even more apparent, but I won't belabor that point as they're weighted lightly by the criteria we know about. Yeah, it's super strange. I'm waiting to see Miz's full explanation, but assuming there's no twist to the final spots (i.e. a tie with 4 players in the top 3), I can't even figure out a possible rationale for keeping Dark off the list. Personally, I don't feel like any of the stats used in the articles, such as particular winrates over a narrowly defined set of time where the player hit a peak, are particularly meaningful in the face of the long term, consistent success. And by that metric, Dark smokes every single player in SC2 history besides Serral and Maru. I can see the argument for MVP having better peak dominance, Inno having more success in the most competitive years, and Rogue having more premier golds, so that comes down to preference to whoever is making the list and what they personally weigh more heavily. But when players are on the list for having careers that are essentially just Dark's but worse, I take issue with that. Dark got very lucky being younger than most players. He's a very good player, but if he's born three years earlier he retires for military somewhere in 2019-2020 and would have a far worse resume. So? Is he being penalized for a hypothetical that didn't happen? Because we could play that game with anyone. Serral is a very good player, but if he's born fifty years earlier he would have a far worse SC2 resume. If Maru were born blind he'd have a far worse SC2 resume too. No, of course not. I just enjoy the infinite sliding doors moments that occur in sports. I truly delight in these things. Fair enough
I always wonder about what random part I might have played in soO winning Katowice 2019. I had helped him with some transportation stuff the prior year (at a point Korea starts issuing one year passports to those who haven't yet done military to make it even harder for you to travel), but he lost before the group stage. If he doesn't go in 2018, does he drop early in 2019? Or did going once start some cosmic chain of events that culminated the following year? Who knows?!?!
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On February 21 2024 09:22 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2024 09:19 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On February 21 2024 09:16 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 21 2024 09:07 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On February 21 2024 08:58 Mizenhauer wrote:On February 21 2024 07:44 arcane1129 wrote:On February 21 2024 06:15 TheDougler wrote:First of all Miz, excellent work. Your writing is so fun to read as always. The quasi-confirmation that Dark didn't make the top 10 really surpised me though. Let's look at the comparison to Rain, specifically. Notable tournament finishes (Rain): 2012 WCS Asia: 1st place 2012 OnGameNet Starleague: 1st place 2013 OnGameNet Starleague: 2nd place 2013 GSL Hot6ix Cup: 1st place 2015 IEM San Jose: 2nd place 2015 Code S Season 2: 1st place 2015 HomeStory Cup 11: 1st place Notable Tournament Finishes (Dark): 2016 Code S Season 1: 1st Place 2016 WCS Korea: 1st Place 2016 WCS Global Championships: 2nd Place 2019 GSL Code S Season 2: 1st Place 2019 GSL AfreecaTV Super Tournament 2: 1st Place 2019 WCS Global Finals: 1st Place 2020 Teamliquid StarLeague 6: 1st Place 2021 GSL Season 2: 1st Place 2022 GSL Afreeka TV Super Tournament 1: 2nd Place 2023 GSL Code S Season 2: 2nd Place There's plenty of other tournaments, including premier tournaments that Dark placed in the top 4 of that I haven't even mentioned above. I simply cannot see a logic behind including Rain but not him. Heck, I'm not sure that TY even deserves his spot above Dark. Let's look at the justification of that: The Placement TY and #10 player Rain are similar for their consistent, high-level play in Korean Individual Leagues, and their list of top-four finishes is very similar (TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 finishes // Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4).
However, TY gets the nod for ninth place by surpassing Rain in a couple of key areas. The biggest differentiating factor was TY's results in world championship-tier tournaments—TY won both IEM and WESG, while Rain's best result was top 3 at BWC/WCS 2012. Also, TY's stretch of consistently great domestic play lasted for five years, compared to Rain's three and a half. Overall, TY was the obvious choice to slot in right ahead of Rain. Okay, so let's look at top four finishes in Korean Individual Leagues, and world championship tournaments. Fortunately, Miz already did the math for us: Korean Individual Leagues: TY: 2x first place, 2x second place, 2x RO4 Rain: 2x first place, 1x second place, 3x RO4 Dark: 2x first place, 3x second place, 4x RO4. So, equal number of first places, but more consistent finals and semi-finals appearances for Dark. Let's look at world championship events: TY: 1st Place IEM 2017, 1st Place WESG 2017 Rain: 3rd Place BWC/WCS 2012 Dark: 1st Place WCS 2019, 2nd Place WCS Global Championships 2016 Here we see that the logic that places TY above Rain unquestionably puts Dark above Rain as well. So, what gives? Could it be that Dark's winrate against fellow S-tier competition is much poorer (which I don't have the statistics for, but feel like could certainly be the case)? I don't think it's that either, as Miz notes Dark's impressive win-rate against TY: From what I can read from the TY article, it's mostly this 3% lower overall win-rate in Korean Individual Leagues, despite having the more impressive record in terms of Top4+ appearences in those leagues when compared to TY: TY's consistent strength is also apparent in his overall win-loss record in Korean Individual Leagues. From the start of LotV up until his military service, he was neck-and-neck with Maru in terms of having the best statistics. TY's map win-rate of 64.9% (170W-92L) was slightly head of Maru's 63.8% (166W-94L), while his series win-rate of 69.8% (60W-26L) was second only to Maru's 73.2% (60W-22). When it comes to Dark, Stats, and Rogue, the other top players during this time frame, their win-rates all trail slightly or considerably behind TY. We should note however, that even by that math, the match win rate (which I'd argue is more important than map win rate) is even closer. Heck, LOOK at that consistency from Dark, the only one on that chart to qualify for every listed event in that table! To me, there's just something not-correct about puttin Rain above Dark for the top 10, given the criteria we know about. When we look at weekenders, this becomes even more apparent, but I won't belabor that point as they're weighted lightly by the criteria we know about. Yeah, it's super strange. I'm waiting to see Miz's full explanation, but assuming there's no twist to the final spots (i.e. a tie with 4 players in the top 3), I can't even figure out a possible rationale for keeping Dark off the list. Personally, I don't feel like any of the stats used in the articles, such as particular winrates over a narrowly defined set of time where the player hit a peak, are particularly meaningful in the face of the long term, consistent success. And by that metric, Dark smokes every single player in SC2 history besides Serral and Maru. I can see the argument for MVP having better peak dominance, Inno having more success in the most competitive years, and Rogue having more premier golds, so that comes down to preference to whoever is making the list and what they personally weigh more heavily. But when players are on the list for having careers that are essentially just Dark's but worse, I take issue with that. Dark got very lucky being younger than most players. He's a very good player, but if he's born three years earlier he retires for military somewhere in 2019-2020 and would have a far worse resume. So? Is he being penalized for a hypothetical that didn't happen? Because we could play that game with anyone. Serral is a very good player, but if he's born fifty years earlier he would have a far worse SC2 resume. If Maru were born blind he'd have a far worse SC2 resume too. No, of course not. I just enjoy the infinite sliding doors moments that occur in sports. I truly delight in these things. Fair enough I always wonder about what random part I might have played in soO winning Katowice 2019. I had helped him with some transportation stuff the prior year (at a point Korea starts issuing one year passports to those who haven't yet done military to make it even harder for you to travel), but he lost before the group stage. If he doesn't go in 2018, does he drop early in 2019? Or did going once start some cosmic chain of events that culminated the following year? Who knows?!?!
It's the Butterfly Mizenhauer Effect!
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United States1913 Posts
On February 20 2024 13:30 Nasigil wrote:
Miz, I really appreciate your GOAT list write up, but I do find it a bit lacking in terms of the signature games listed in the end. In the old GOAT list in 2015 each player has like 20 games listed and you really could dive into them to get a grasp on how their play styles are like. This list just give you like 5 games, and often not even include some of their most iconic games.
Like how do you have an sOs article without listing his proxy Nexus against Bunny? Or Innovation's legendary WESG finals against Serral? Mvp one is okay tho. We need more games! Especially for whatever top 3 you are cooking up.
You're in luck! The next player will actually have a separate blog of games in addition to the article because I love them so much.
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On February 21 2024 09:02 Pentarp wrote:
Why are we only looking at tournament results?
Look at the single-handed impact of Mvp in getting ghost snipe nerfed into oblivion. No other player can boast a massive balance change based only on their performance.
There are actually several players that single-handedly got a unit nerfed. San with Khaydarin Amulet, Maru with liberators, ThorZaIN with thors, the entire SlayerS Terran line-up and blue flame hellions.
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On February 21 2024 09:40 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On February 20 2024 13:30 Nasigil wrote:
Miz, I really appreciate your GOAT list write up, but I do find it a bit lacking in terms of the signature games listed in the end. In the old GOAT list in 2015 each player has like 20 games listed and you really could dive into them to get a grasp on how their play styles are like. This list just give you like 5 games, and often not even include some of their most iconic games.
Like how do you have an sOs article without listing his proxy Nexus against Bunny? Or Innovation's legendary WESG finals against Serral? Mvp one is okay tho. We need more games! Especially for whatever top 3 you are cooking up. You're in luck! The next player will actually have a separate blog of games in addition to the article because I love them so much.
You're switching soO to number 3??
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Maru solely got Ravens nerfed in early 2018. In 2 out of the 3 big premiers (GSL S1 and WESG) on the raven patch he was the only Terran in the ro8. In Katowice TY also made top 8 but him and Maru were the only Terrans in top 12. If you include the super tournament and WCS that took place on that patch there was also Special and Inno making a ro8 each.
It's pretty dumb that Terran got nerfed so hard despite objectively doing terrible on that patch besides Maru. And their compensation was 10 viking hp....
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I wonder if Life is eligible for these lists or if he's too verboten.
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On February 21 2024 10:25 JJH777 wrote:
Maru solely got Ravens nerfed in early 2018. In 2 out of the 3 big premiers (GSL S1 and WESG) on the raven patch he was the only Terran in the ro8. In Katowice TY also made top 8 but him and Maru were the only Terrans in top 12. If you include the super tournament and WCS that took place on that patch there was also Special and Inno making a ro8 each.
It's pretty dumb that Terran got nerfed so hard despite objectively doing terrible on that patch besides Maru. And their compensation was 10 viking hp....
Terran players were just not that great at that time
TY career is famous for whining and complaining about other races even when terran was overpowered
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On February 21 2024 10:57 Fighter wrote:
I wonder if Life is eligible for these lists or if he's too verboten.
Off-topic, but I'm always amazed that 'verboten' has made it into the international lexicon since in ordinary German there is nothing about its semantics which is particularly different from everyday English words like 'forbidden' or 'impermissible'.
Perhaps the language itself makes the word seem more schaurig.
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On February 21 2024 10:57 Fighter wrote:
I wonder if Life is eligible for these lists or if he's too verboten.
I think at the very least it would require a separate blog post or something to explain why he wouldn't be eligible if not, because by every metric of reasoning that the writer used to put MVP on the list, Life was just better, denying mvp the g5l is just the icing on the cake. In fact if im being 100% honest I feel its been only very recently that rogue/serral have finally caught up/surpassed lifes achievements nearly 10 years after his last game. For all the rioting about Dark, I still don't think hes surpassed life's resume even tho hes had a good 8 years to catch up in the dwindling scene, but ill let the stat nerds dig in and fact check that.
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On February 21 2024 11:33 Woosixion wrote:Show nested quote +On February 21 2024 10:57 Fighter wrote:
I wonder if Life is eligible for these lists or if he's too verboten. I think at the very least it would require a separate blog post or something to explain why he wouldn't be eligible if not, because by every metric of reasoning that the writer used to put MVP on the list, Life was just better, denying mvp the g5l is just the icing on the cake. In fact if im being 100% honest I feel its been only very recently that rogue/serral have finally caught up/surpassed lifes achievements nearly 10 years after his last game. For all the rioting about Dark, I still don't think hes surpassed life's resume even tho hes had a good 8 years to catch up in the dwindling scene, but ill let the stat nerds dig in and fact check that.
It’s not about results, he’s banned from progaming for match fixing, I think it’s very reasonable to draw the line there when you make a goat list to celebrate the good things about an esport.
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WHY IS MVP NOT NUMBER 1 
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EPT
