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On July 02 2024 17:35 MJG wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 01:48 rwala wrote:On July 02 2024 00:31 Balnazza wrote:On July 01 2024 23:31 rwala wrote:On June 30 2024 20:37 Balnazza wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 04:57 Bennito_bh wrote:
The Rogue angle is a bit silly TBF, though as a solid 3rd-4th place contender it certainly isn't absurd by any stretch. It only works if you rate GSLs as high as Kato/BCs and ignore Maru's better Proleague record. Rogue's more of an $o$ figure than GOAT material - albeit with more success in Korea - albeit he only did that in the period where Zerg was vastly overperforming relative to T and P.
From what I've read the community's backlash against Arty has less to do with the claim and more to do with how he presents it. Insulting people and treating them like morons may generate engagement (and thus $$) on a Twitch stream, but it does not actually help when presenting yourself as a credible source. Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue. One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is. People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. So...not a scientific field then? Because if there is one things scientist universally can't do is keeping it short. And that is good. Because keeping it short means omitting things. Not "trivia", but actual important data, facts or even speculations. If you explain your data and reasoning, yes, you make yourself vulnerable. But you make yourself even more vulnerable if you just willy-nilly throw out your arguments and don't cover as much ground as possible. This gets more true the bigger the scope of the problem at hand. Yes, if you need to decide what colour your office should be painted in, the argument should be done in under five minutes, otherwise you ramble. But if you want to cover a very hard to quantify era of 14 years of professional SC2 over three different iterations...I might think five minutes could cut it tight just a tad. I'm a lawyer, but I work in advocacy, 90% of which is figuring out how to persuade people. And ironically the science on this is very clear, which is that long, voluminous interventions don't tend to persuade because, again, it's just very easy to get lost in the details and lose track of what is important and why. Your point about science is interesting. Most scientists I know don't even need words, they can just look at the data. Even longer academic scientific articles are largely descriptive, not normative, and a very significant amount of the text is devoted to simply explaining the methodology so the reader can understand what the data means. There's very little by way of "argumentation" in science as the scientific method is largely about data development and observation. If science is what you're looking for, you have found very little of it in these threads, and the closest thing you'll get is some regression analysis that will require many more tables and graphs and many fewer words. that depends in what field of science you work. You can only describe data if you have definitive data and a clear set of executing them correctly. I work in a field in which data is often not available easily, tends to be contradicting or you first have to filter out any bias out of the raw sources. And I promise you, historians can not cut themselves short...german historians in fact are notorious for not even being able to keep their book-titles short. And this discussion is much more one close to history than physic for example. You have different eras, different weighting systems, different parameters. And in the end, you can only form an argument-based opinion. But for that, you have to explain your arguments, have to look at the different options, have to explain your own weighting-systems. Did this discussion convince someone to change sides from Serral to Maru or vice-versa? No, probably not, at best a few people. But did it enlight me about the things other people look for in a GOAT, the way they see the history of SC2? Yes, tremendously. If I had just said at the start "Serral is the best because A and B and C" and then never visited this or other threads, I would have continued my life thinking "Serral is the undisputed GOAT and there is literally no argument against it"...which would be false and very narrow-minded. So yes, I enjoy this discussions, even if they might not convince someone to change sides. But that isn't necessarily the goal of science. There will never be a 100% clear scientific answer who is the GOAT, because there is no data-point for GOATness. If you ask "who is the best at throwing a spear?", the guy who threw it the farthest in a fair enviroment is clearly the World Record Holder. But if you ask who is the GOAT of throwing a spear...is it the guy who holds the WR or is it the other guy who beat the WR-Holder three Olympics in a row? And there you already have to do a weighting. And with that, it leaves the clear cut-and-dry field of STEM-science. (Disclaimer: I have literally no clue about or interesting in Spear-Throwing, it was just an example...don't want to enrage the passionate Spear-Thrower community, since...well, they know how to throw a spear...) I agree you won't find a scientific answer to this question, but you're the one who raised science so I was just explaining that you're getting nothing like a scientific approach with all this data and "analysis" being thrown around in these forums. Most of it is obfuscating more than it's illuminating, which was my point. I also agree with you that much of this comes down to how you decide to weigh and value various factors, but I disagree that you need anything like a history dissertation to effectively do this. I did it in a few sentences in another post, but if that's too boiled down, surely it can be done in a few minutes. In my experience if you're not able to do that, your case is probably weak, or at minimum lacks clarity. For those who want more, the good news is you have it since thankfully Miz and the tl.net editors invested the time and energy to produce this series! I guess I really wasted my time writing a ~300 page thesis for my doctorate. My case was clearly weak and lacked clarity.  Miz has done a great job laying out his statistics-driven approach in his articles. Because it's a statistics-driven approach, and because statistics is very much a science, full detail is needed for those who want to scrutinise the conclusions drawn. Those scrutinising the conclusions drawn are likely to provide similar levels of detail, else it'd be far too easy to ignore or dismiss a potential counter-argument. If you're only interested in a summary of the conclusions drawn then that's fine, but that wasn't the purpose of the articles, nor does it need to be the direction of discourse surrounding the articles. It has nothing to do with anyone having a weak or unclear case. EDIT: Show nested quote +There's very little by way of "argumentation" in science as the scientific method is largely about data development and observation. You've clearly never seen what happens when two different professors interpret the same data in different ways...
As a professor who has written many and published quite a few (long) academic articles, and interpreted the same data as others differently, I understand a little bit about these things and I don’t disagree with your main points. It’s not that context and detail don’t matter, and I’m sure every word of your dissertation is 100% essential, but yes it absolutely is true that if you’re incapable of summarizing it in five minutes, your argument lacks clarity and force.
As I said, I appreciated all the work that went into this series and I personally read every word unlike many in these threads who are clearly commenting on things that were addressed in the intro or substantive articles. But even Miz concedes that having the summary bullets was important, and he’s not wrong.
p.s. I think you’re a bit confused about what statistics is and isn’t as a “science”…it’s not just numbers = statistics. It’s the method by which you compile, organize, and analyze numbers via regression analysis or other computational approaches that often require powerful statistical modeling software like STATA. The numbers and data provided as context for the conclusions in these articles is super interesting and useful, and at the same time it’s quite silly to claim that it adheres to anything even close to the methodological rigor that would be required in even most social science fields let alone data sciences or other hard sciences.
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On July 02 2024 02:15 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 01:48 rwala wrote:On July 02 2024 00:31 Balnazza wrote:On July 01 2024 23:31 rwala wrote:On June 30 2024 20:37 Balnazza wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 04:57 Bennito_bh wrote:
The Rogue angle is a bit silly TBF, though as a solid 3rd-4th place contender it certainly isn't absurd by any stretch. It only works if you rate GSLs as high as Kato/BCs and ignore Maru's better Proleague record. Rogue's more of an $o$ figure than GOAT material - albeit with more success in Korea - albeit he only did that in the period where Zerg was vastly overperforming relative to T and P.
From what I've read the community's backlash against Arty has less to do with the claim and more to do with how he presents it. Insulting people and treating them like morons may generate engagement (and thus $$) on a Twitch stream, but it does not actually help when presenting yourself as a credible source. Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue. One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is. People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. So...not a scientific field then? Because if there is one things scientist universally can't do is keeping it short. And that is good. Because keeping it short means omitting things. Not "trivia", but actual important data, facts or even speculations. If you explain your data and reasoning, yes, you make yourself vulnerable. But you make yourself even more vulnerable if you just willy-nilly throw out your arguments and don't cover as much ground as possible. This gets more true the bigger the scope of the problem at hand. Yes, if you need to decide what colour your office should be painted in, the argument should be done in under five minutes, otherwise you ramble. But if you want to cover a very hard to quantify era of 14 years of professional SC2 over three different iterations...I might think five minutes could cut it tight just a tad. I'm a lawyer, but I work in advocacy, 90% of which is figuring out how to persuade people. And ironically the science on this is very clear, which is that long, voluminous interventions don't tend to persuade because, again, it's just very easy to get lost in the details and lose track of what is important and why. Your point about science is interesting. Most scientists I know don't even need words, they can just look at the data. Even longer academic scientific articles are largely descriptive, not normative, and a very significant amount of the text is devoted to simply explaining the methodology so the reader can understand what the data means. There's very little by way of "argumentation" in science as the scientific method is largely about data development and observation. If science is what you're looking for, you have found very little of it in these threads, and the closest thing you'll get is some regression analysis that will require many more tables and graphs and many fewer words. that depends in what field of science you work. You can only describe data if you have definitive data and a clear set of executing them correctly. I work in a field in which data is often not available easily, tends to be contradicting or you first have to filter out any bias out of the raw sources. And I promise you, historians can not cut themselves short...german historians in fact are notorious for not even being able to keep their book-titles short. And this discussion is much more one close to history than physic for example. You have different eras, different weighting systems, different parameters. And in the end, you can only form an argument-based opinion. But for that, you have to explain your arguments, have to look at the different options, have to explain your own weighting-systems. Did this discussion convince someone to change sides from Serral to Maru or vice-versa? No, probably not, at best a few people. But did it enlight me about the things other people look for in a GOAT, the way they see the history of SC2? Yes, tremendously. If I had just said at the start "Serral is the best because A and B and C" and then never visited this or other threads, I would have continued my life thinking "Serral is the undisputed GOAT and there is literally no argument against it"...which would be false and very narrow-minded. So yes, I enjoy this discussions, even if they might not convince someone to change sides. But that isn't necessarily the goal of science. There will never be a 100% clear scientific answer who is the GOAT, because there is no data-point for GOATness. If you ask "who is the best at throwing a spear?", the guy who threw it the farthest in a fair enviroment is clearly the World Record Holder. But if you ask who is the GOAT of throwing a spear...is it the guy who holds the WR or is it the other guy who beat the WR-Holder three Olympics in a row? And there you already have to do a weighting. And with that, it leaves the clear cut-and-dry field of STEM-science. (Disclaimer: I have literally no clue about or interesting in Spear-Throwing, it was just an example...don't want to enrage the passionate Spear-Thrower community, since...well, they know how to throw a spear...) I agree you won't find a scientific answer to this question, but you're the one who raised science so I was just explaining that you're getting nothing like a scientific approach with all this data and "analysis" being thrown around in these forums. Most of it is obfuscating more than it's illuminating, which was my point. I also agree with you that much of this comes down to how you decide to weigh and value various factors, but I disagree that you need anything like a history dissertation to effectively do this. I did it in a few sentences in another post, but if that's too boiled down, surely it can be done in a few minutes. In my experience if you're not able to do that, your case is probably weak, or at minimum lacks clarity. For those who want more, the good news is you have it since thankfully Miz and the tl.net editors invested the time and energy to produce this series! Yes, you have boiled it down and if that is enough for you, you can stay at that. No problem. But you can easily attack each of the arguments you bring for each players. You can in- or decrease the value of WCs and GSLs, you can argue about the "most competitive era" and you didn't even acknowledge the fact that Serral did everything he did without the effect of teamhouses buffing him andandand. I know in law and often in economics, there is this five minute rule. In history, if you think your deep-dive into a topic is covered in five minutes, you probably fucked up 90% of your work. One mistake fresh history students make is to pick their topic too large. They then want to write their first essay about "The Fall of the Roman Empire" or "the consequences of the American Civil War". And every good history professor will ask them how they plan to attack this problem in ten pages or whatever your first essay might be long. It's impossible. The question "Who is the GOAT of SC2" is probably one of the biggest questions data-wise you can ask about SC2. You can't discuss this in five minutes and cover all your bases. Not possible. Btw, if you wonder "how do historians even finish anything then": They usually just fully admit at the start of their books what they focus on...and mention several things they actively omitted. It generally also ends with an explanation which aspects of their topic need further research and thoughts. I would assume that are two things you can't really do in the field of law, starting your argument with "well, I won't cover this because I couldn't be bothered (or it didn't help my client)", but that is effectively what you do with boiling everything down to five minutes tops.
This is almost the perfect example of what I’m talking about. It is very easy when you are undisciplined with your methodology to become distracted or bogged down in irrelevant or minor details. Teamhouses are not really a relevant factor in the grand scheme of things. In every GOAT debate there are often significant variations in the quality, quantity, and character of training, but of course it becomes entirely too pedantic to start nerfing and buffing the value of a GOAT candidate’s accomplishments based on the relative training resources that were available to them. Or I suppose you could make the case that this is a critical factor to be considered, but you and others who have pointed this out didn’t. And that’s quite telling. When all details matter, no details matter.
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On July 02 2024 17:25 MyLovelyLurker wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 01:48 rwala wrote:On July 02 2024 00:31 Balnazza wrote:On July 01 2024 23:31 rwala wrote:On June 30 2024 20:37 Balnazza wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 04:57 Bennito_bh wrote:
The Rogue angle is a bit silly TBF, though as a solid 3rd-4th place contender it certainly isn't absurd by any stretch. It only works if you rate GSLs as high as Kato/BCs and ignore Maru's better Proleague record. Rogue's more of an $o$ figure than GOAT material - albeit with more success in Korea - albeit he only did that in the period where Zerg was vastly overperforming relative to T and P.
From what I've read the community's backlash against Arty has less to do with the claim and more to do with how he presents it. Insulting people and treating them like morons may generate engagement (and thus $$) on a Twitch stream, but it does not actually help when presenting yourself as a credible source. Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue. One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is. People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. So...not a scientific field then? Because if there is one things scientist universally can't do is keeping it short. And that is good. Because keeping it short means omitting things. Not "trivia", but actual important data, facts or even speculations. If you explain your data and reasoning, yes, you make yourself vulnerable. But you make yourself even more vulnerable if you just willy-nilly throw out your arguments and don't cover as much ground as possible. This gets more true the bigger the scope of the problem at hand. Yes, if you need to decide what colour your office should be painted in, the argument should be done in under five minutes, otherwise you ramble. But if you want to cover a very hard to quantify era of 14 years of professional SC2 over three different iterations...I might think five minutes could cut it tight just a tad. I'm a lawyer, but I work in advocacy, 90% of which is figuring out how to persuade people. And ironically the science on this is very clear, which is that long, voluminous interventions don't tend to persuade because, again, it's just very easy to get lost in the details and lose track of what is important and why. Your point about science is interesting. Most scientists I know don't even need words, they can just look at the data. Even longer academic scientific articles are largely descriptive, not normative, and a very significant amount of the text is devoted to simply explaining the methodology so the reader can understand what the data means. There's very little by way of "argumentation" in science as the scientific method is largely about data development and observation. If science is what you're looking for, you have found very little of it in these threads, and the closest thing you'll get is some regression analysis that will require many more tables and graphs and many fewer words. that depends in what field of science you work. You can only describe data if you have definitive data and a clear set of executing them correctly. I work in a field in which data is often not available easily, tends to be contradicting or you first have to filter out any bias out of the raw sources. And I promise you, historians can not cut themselves short...german historians in fact are notorious for not even being able to keep their book-titles short. And this discussion is much more one close to history than physic for example. You have different eras, different weighting systems, different parameters. And in the end, you can only form an argument-based opinion. But for that, you have to explain your arguments, have to look at the different options, have to explain your own weighting-systems. Did this discussion convince someone to change sides from Serral to Maru or vice-versa? No, probably not, at best a few people. But did it enlight me about the things other people look for in a GOAT, the way they see the history of SC2? Yes, tremendously. If I had just said at the start "Serral is the best because A and B and C" and then never visited this or other threads, I would have continued my life thinking "Serral is the undisputed GOAT and there is literally no argument against it"...which would be false and very narrow-minded. So yes, I enjoy this discussions, even if they might not convince someone to change sides. But that isn't necessarily the goal of science. There will never be a 100% clear scientific answer who is the GOAT, because there is no data-point for GOATness. If you ask "who is the best at throwing a spear?", the guy who threw it the farthest in a fair enviroment is clearly the World Record Holder. But if you ask who is the GOAT of throwing a spear...is it the guy who holds the WR or is it the other guy who beat the WR-Holder three Olympics in a row? And there you already have to do a weighting. And with that, it leaves the clear cut-and-dry field of STEM-science. (Disclaimer: I have literally no clue about or interesting in Spear-Throwing, it was just an example...don't want to enrage the passionate Spear-Thrower community, since...well, they know how to throw a spear...) I agree you won't find a scientific answer to this question, but you're the one who raised science so I was just explaining that you're getting nothing like a scientific approach with all this data and "analysis" being thrown around in these forums. Most of it is obfuscating more than it's illuminating, which was my point. I also agree with you that much of this comes down to how you decide to weigh and value various factors, but I disagree that you need anything like a history dissertation to effectively do this. I did it in a few sentences in another post, but if that's too boiled down, surely it can be done in a few minutes. In my experience if you're not able to do that, your case is probably weak, or at minimum lacks clarity. For those who want more, the good news is you have it since thankfully Miz and the tl.net editors invested the time and energy to produce this series! I'd push back a bit on these points. Science doesn't happen by forums, that's not how new materials are discovered or how nuclear fusion will be solved. It happens by publication in journals, and scientists taking months to expound on their findings and present the long-form in a paper, the short form (10-15 mins) in an oral at a conference, the TLDR (2 to 5 mins) on a poster. So just because the TLDR is 'the GOAT case is a balanced (1/3, 1/3, 1/3) categorical between Maru, Serral and Rogue' doesn't mean there's not plenty of good stuff to be uncovered by exploratory data analysis, it just needs to be done carefully and presented clearly. That's months of work and dedication, and Miz' series is the closest we've got so far, so we should appreciate it consequently. We're evidently having fun and doing nothing of the hard scientific variety on the forum. But even the weightings point could be illuminated, if not solved, by meta-analyses. Another point: this debate itself is in flux, as new SC2 results come in and make the situation evolve. For instance, much as I like Rogue, he's fallen quite behind the other 2 due to military. And ceteris paribus, it's very likely that Serral will keep on keeping on and soon present an indisputable GOAT case somewhere around next year on current trends [terms and conditions apply, the future is not written yet]. We should therefore enjoy this lengthy debate as much as we can while it's hot, and while things are, well, debatable.
I don’t disagree with any of this. Just because I said that anyone should be able to make their argument in 5 minutes does not mean that this is the only form or format that the argument should exist in. I appreciated the articles on many levels, not least of which I was reminded of many things that I had forgotten and some surprising things that I didn’t know. A true public service for sure!
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On July 02 2024 17:50 MyLovelyLurker wrote:
Yeah, I was close to writing 'tell me you've never designed/patented an algorithm without telling me', but that's entirely too snarky given how earnestly and honestly rwala is making their point.
I wonder how many of us are STEM/quant PhDs on the forum, Poopi or another Frenchman has one too IIRC. There is a world in which we start a shared Overleaf... just sayin'...
Snark away you won’t bother me! And that’s pretty cool re: a SC2 Overleaf!
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France12758 Posts
On July 02 2024 21:18 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 17:50 MyLovelyLurker wrote:
Yeah, I was close to writing 'tell me you've never designed/patented an algorithm without telling me', but that's entirely too snarky given how earnestly and honestly rwala is making their point.
I wonder how many of us are STEM/quant PhDs on the forum, Poopi or another Frenchman has one too IIRC. There is a world in which we start a shared Overleaf... just sayin'... Snark away you won’t bother me! And that’s pretty cool re: a SC2 Overleaf!
We can also use / share github / gitlab or whatever else open source for the compute on top of the overleaf 
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On July 02 2024 21:05 rwala wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 02:15 Balnazza wrote:On July 02 2024 01:48 rwala wrote:On July 02 2024 00:31 Balnazza wrote:On July 01 2024 23:31 rwala wrote:On June 30 2024 20:37 Balnazza wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 04:57 Bennito_bh wrote:
The Rogue angle is a bit silly TBF, though as a solid 3rd-4th place contender it certainly isn't absurd by any stretch. It only works if you rate GSLs as high as Kato/BCs and ignore Maru's better Proleague record. Rogue's more of an $o$ figure than GOAT material - albeit with more success in Korea - albeit he only did that in the period where Zerg was vastly overperforming relative to T and P.
From what I've read the community's backlash against Arty has less to do with the claim and more to do with how he presents it. Insulting people and treating them like morons may generate engagement (and thus $$) on a Twitch stream, but it does not actually help when presenting yourself as a credible source. Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue. One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is. People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. So...not a scientific field then? Because if there is one things scientist universally can't do is keeping it short. And that is good. Because keeping it short means omitting things. Not "trivia", but actual important data, facts or even speculations. If you explain your data and reasoning, yes, you make yourself vulnerable. But you make yourself even more vulnerable if you just willy-nilly throw out your arguments and don't cover as much ground as possible. This gets more true the bigger the scope of the problem at hand. Yes, if you need to decide what colour your office should be painted in, the argument should be done in under five minutes, otherwise you ramble. But if you want to cover a very hard to quantify era of 14 years of professional SC2 over three different iterations...I might think five minutes could cut it tight just a tad. I'm a lawyer, but I work in advocacy, 90% of which is figuring out how to persuade people. And ironically the science on this is very clear, which is that long, voluminous interventions don't tend to persuade because, again, it's just very easy to get lost in the details and lose track of what is important and why. Your point about science is interesting. Most scientists I know don't even need words, they can just look at the data. Even longer academic scientific articles are largely descriptive, not normative, and a very significant amount of the text is devoted to simply explaining the methodology so the reader can understand what the data means. There's very little by way of "argumentation" in science as the scientific method is largely about data development and observation. If science is what you're looking for, you have found very little of it in these threads, and the closest thing you'll get is some regression analysis that will require many more tables and graphs and many fewer words. that depends in what field of science you work. You can only describe data if you have definitive data and a clear set of executing them correctly. I work in a field in which data is often not available easily, tends to be contradicting or you first have to filter out any bias out of the raw sources. And I promise you, historians can not cut themselves short...german historians in fact are notorious for not even being able to keep their book-titles short. And this discussion is much more one close to history than physic for example. You have different eras, different weighting systems, different parameters. And in the end, you can only form an argument-based opinion. But for that, you have to explain your arguments, have to look at the different options, have to explain your own weighting-systems. Did this discussion convince someone to change sides from Serral to Maru or vice-versa? No, probably not, at best a few people. But did it enlight me about the things other people look for in a GOAT, the way they see the history of SC2? Yes, tremendously. If I had just said at the start "Serral is the best because A and B and C" and then never visited this or other threads, I would have continued my life thinking "Serral is the undisputed GOAT and there is literally no argument against it"...which would be false and very narrow-minded. So yes, I enjoy this discussions, even if they might not convince someone to change sides. But that isn't necessarily the goal of science. There will never be a 100% clear scientific answer who is the GOAT, because there is no data-point for GOATness. If you ask "who is the best at throwing a spear?", the guy who threw it the farthest in a fair enviroment is clearly the World Record Holder. But if you ask who is the GOAT of throwing a spear...is it the guy who holds the WR or is it the other guy who beat the WR-Holder three Olympics in a row? And there you already have to do a weighting. And with that, it leaves the clear cut-and-dry field of STEM-science. (Disclaimer: I have literally no clue about or interesting in Spear-Throwing, it was just an example...don't want to enrage the passionate Spear-Thrower community, since...well, they know how to throw a spear...) I agree you won't find a scientific answer to this question, but you're the one who raised science so I was just explaining that you're getting nothing like a scientific approach with all this data and "analysis" being thrown around in these forums. Most of it is obfuscating more than it's illuminating, which was my point. I also agree with you that much of this comes down to how you decide to weigh and value various factors, but I disagree that you need anything like a history dissertation to effectively do this. I did it in a few sentences in another post, but if that's too boiled down, surely it can be done in a few minutes. In my experience if you're not able to do that, your case is probably weak, or at minimum lacks clarity. For those who want more, the good news is you have it since thankfully Miz and the tl.net editors invested the time and energy to produce this series! Yes, you have boiled it down and if that is enough for you, you can stay at that. No problem. But you can easily attack each of the arguments you bring for each players. You can in- or decrease the value of WCs and GSLs, you can argue about the "most competitive era" and you didn't even acknowledge the fact that Serral did everything he did without the effect of teamhouses buffing him andandand. I know in law and often in economics, there is this five minute rule. In history, if you think your deep-dive into a topic is covered in five minutes, you probably fucked up 90% of your work. One mistake fresh history students make is to pick their topic too large. They then want to write their first essay about "The Fall of the Roman Empire" or "the consequences of the American Civil War". And every good history professor will ask them how they plan to attack this problem in ten pages or whatever your first essay might be long. It's impossible. The question "Who is the GOAT of SC2" is probably one of the biggest questions data-wise you can ask about SC2. You can't discuss this in five minutes and cover all your bases. Not possible. Btw, if you wonder "how do historians even finish anything then": They usually just fully admit at the start of their books what they focus on...and mention several things they actively omitted. It generally also ends with an explanation which aspects of their topic need further research and thoughts. I would assume that are two things you can't really do in the field of law, starting your argument with "well, I won't cover this because I couldn't be bothered (or it didn't help my client)", but that is effectively what you do with boiling everything down to five minutes tops. This is almost the perfect example of what I’m talking about. It is very easy when you are undisciplined with your methodology to become distracted or bogged down in irrelevant or minor details. Teamhouses are not really a relevant factor in the grand scheme of things. In every GOAT debate there are often significant variations in the quality, quantity, and character of training, but of course it becomes entirely too pedantic to start nerfing and buffing the value of a GOAT candidate’s accomplishments based on the relative training resources that were available to them. Or I suppose you could make the case that this is a critical factor to be considered, but you and others who have pointed this out didn’t. And that’s quite telling. When all details matter, no details matter.
And that is exactly why I don't think you should boil everything down to the bare minimum and say "whelp, that's done". The point about "Serral has no teamhouses available" is not a particularly good one - if it is one at all. But you can address it, you can make a point out of it. Especially since you yourself now claim that "teamhouses are not really a relevant factor" - if they are not a relevant factor, then that should decrease the Proleague-era quite a bit, as one of the big factors why it is considered so competitive was in fact the teamhouses.
And this is why you need to stay open, need to take the discussion in. In the past, many scientists across all fields have diregarded aspects because they either didn't fit into their system or they just genuinely thought it wasn't important. And then someone else came in and pointed out that the disregarded aspect is actually the key. Or maybe that person was completly wrong aswell, who knows.
THis isn't purely a discussion about who is the GOAT. It is also a discussion about how different people value "GOATness". Because I honestly don't believe there is a definitive, absolute system to decide that in SC2. So all we do here is trying to find an approximation. And as I said, I personally find that much more interesting than the pure question who is the GOAT. Said it before: To see what other people value and disvalue. And yes, also sometimes to see the bias for or against players.
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On July 02 2024 22:29 Balnazza wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 21:05 rwala wrote:On July 02 2024 02:15 Balnazza wrote:On July 02 2024 01:48 rwala wrote:On July 02 2024 00:31 Balnazza wrote:On July 01 2024 23:31 rwala wrote:On June 30 2024 20:37 Balnazza wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:
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Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue.
One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is.
People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. So...not a scientific field then? Because if there is one things scientist universally can't do is keeping it short. And that is good. Because keeping it short means omitting things. Not "trivia", but actual important data, facts or even speculations. If you explain your data and reasoning, yes, you make yourself vulnerable. But you make yourself even more vulnerable if you just willy-nilly throw out your arguments and don't cover as much ground as possible. This gets more true the bigger the scope of the problem at hand. Yes, if you need to decide what colour your office should be painted in, the argument should be done in under five minutes, otherwise you ramble. But if you want to cover a very hard to quantify era of 14 years of professional SC2 over three different iterations...I might think five minutes could cut it tight just a tad. I'm a lawyer, but I work in advocacy, 90% of which is figuring out how to persuade people. And ironically the science on this is very clear, which is that long, voluminous interventions don't tend to persuade because, again, it's just very easy to get lost in the details and lose track of what is important and why. Your point about science is interesting. Most scientists I know don't even need words, they can just look at the data. Even longer academic scientific articles are largely descriptive, not normative, and a very significant amount of the text is devoted to simply explaining the methodology so the reader can understand what the data means. There's very little by way of "argumentation" in science as the scientific method is largely about data development and observation. If science is what you're looking for, you have found very little of it in these threads, and the closest thing you'll get is some regression analysis that will require many more tables and graphs and many fewer words. that depends in what field of science you work. You can only describe data if you have definitive data and a clear set of executing them correctly. I work in a field in which data is often not available easily, tends to be contradicting or you first have to filter out any bias out of the raw sources. And I promise you, historians can not cut themselves short...german historians in fact are notorious for not even being able to keep their book-titles short. And this discussion is much more one close to history than physic for example. You have different eras, different weighting systems, different parameters. And in the end, you can only form an argument-based opinion. But for that, you have to explain your arguments, have to look at the different options, have to explain your own weighting-systems. Did this discussion convince someone to change sides from Serral to Maru or vice-versa? No, probably not, at best a few people. But did it enlight me about the things other people look for in a GOAT, the way they see the history of SC2? Yes, tremendously. If I had just said at the start "Serral is the best because A and B and C" and then never visited this or other threads, I would have continued my life thinking "Serral is the undisputed GOAT and there is literally no argument against it"...which would be false and very narrow-minded. So yes, I enjoy this discussions, even if they might not convince someone to change sides. But that isn't necessarily the goal of science. There will never be a 100% clear scientific answer who is the GOAT, because there is no data-point for GOATness. If you ask "who is the best at throwing a spear?", the guy who threw it the farthest in a fair enviroment is clearly the World Record Holder. But if you ask who is the GOAT of throwing a spear...is it the guy who holds the WR or is it the other guy who beat the WR-Holder three Olympics in a row? And there you already have to do a weighting. And with that, it leaves the clear cut-and-dry field of STEM-science. (Disclaimer: I have literally no clue about or interesting in Spear-Throwing, it was just an example...don't want to enrage the passionate Spear-Thrower community, since...well, they know how to throw a spear...) I agree you won't find a scientific answer to this question, but you're the one who raised science so I was just explaining that you're getting nothing like a scientific approach with all this data and "analysis" being thrown around in these forums. Most of it is obfuscating more than it's illuminating, which was my point. I also agree with you that much of this comes down to how you decide to weigh and value various factors, but I disagree that you need anything like a history dissertation to effectively do this. I did it in a few sentences in another post, but if that's too boiled down, surely it can be done in a few minutes. In my experience if you're not able to do that, your case is probably weak, or at minimum lacks clarity. For those who want more, the good news is you have it since thankfully Miz and the tl.net editors invested the time and energy to produce this series! Yes, you have boiled it down and if that is enough for you, you can stay at that. No problem. But you can easily attack each of the arguments you bring for each players. You can in- or decrease the value of WCs and GSLs, you can argue about the "most competitive era" and you didn't even acknowledge the fact that Serral did everything he did without the effect of teamhouses buffing him andandand. I know in law and often in economics, there is this five minute rule. In history, if you think your deep-dive into a topic is covered in five minutes, you probably fucked up 90% of your work. One mistake fresh history students make is to pick their topic too large. They then want to write their first essay about "The Fall of the Roman Empire" or "the consequences of the American Civil War". And every good history professor will ask them how they plan to attack this problem in ten pages or whatever your first essay might be long. It's impossible. The question "Who is the GOAT of SC2" is probably one of the biggest questions data-wise you can ask about SC2. You can't discuss this in five minutes and cover all your bases. Not possible. Btw, if you wonder "how do historians even finish anything then": They usually just fully admit at the start of their books what they focus on...and mention several things they actively omitted. It generally also ends with an explanation which aspects of their topic need further research and thoughts. I would assume that are two things you can't really do in the field of law, starting your argument with "well, I won't cover this because I couldn't be bothered (or it didn't help my client)", but that is effectively what you do with boiling everything down to five minutes tops. This is almost the perfect example of what I’m talking about. It is very easy when you are undisciplined with your methodology to become distracted or bogged down in irrelevant or minor details. Teamhouses are not really a relevant factor in the grand scheme of things. In every GOAT debate there are often significant variations in the quality, quantity, and character of training, but of course it becomes entirely too pedantic to start nerfing and buffing the value of a GOAT candidate’s accomplishments based on the relative training resources that were available to them. Or I suppose you could make the case that this is a critical factor to be considered, but you and others who have pointed this out didn’t. And that’s quite telling. When all details matter, no details matter. And that is exactly why I don't think you should boil everything down to the bare minimum and say "whelp, that's done". The point about "Serral has no teamhouses available" is not a particularly good one - if it is one at all. But you can address it, you can make a point out of it. Especially since you yourself now claim that "teamhouses are not really a relevant factor" - if they are not a relevant factor, then that should decrease the Proleague-era quite a bit, as one of the big factors why it is considered so competitive was in fact the teamhouses. And this is why you need to stay open, need to take the discussion in. In the past, many scientists across all fields have diregarded aspects because they either didn't fit into their system or they just genuinely thought it wasn't important. And then someone else came in and pointed out that the disregarded aspect is actually the key. Or maybe that person was completly wrong aswell, who knows. THis isn't purely a discussion about who is the GOAT. It is also a discussion about how different people value "GOATness". Because I honestly don't believe there is a definitive, absolute system to decide that in SC2. So all we do here is trying to find an approximation. And as I said, I personally find that much more interesting than the pure question who is the GOAT. Said it before: To see what other people value and disvalue. And yes, also sometimes to see the bias for or against players.
You're conflating the methods of training and preparation with the value and importance of the competitions players trained for. How one gets to the conclusion that the existence of teamhouses reduces the value and importance the "Proleague-era quite a bit" is a level of mental gymnastics I'm not sure I'm capable of.
I've taken the discussion in, I'm still taking it in. I'm probably one of the very few willing to admit I've changed my mind. I felt the GOAT was Rogue after he won his 4th GSL, but after Serral's ridiculous Katowice performance (the best ever in any premier tournament?), I felt on an instinctual level it was Serral because it really feels like he's the best player to ever play the game. And maybe that's what matters most. Miz convinced me that longevity of top tier/peak performance and results in SC2's most competitive era matter the most, and thus convinced me it's Maru. (The GOAT intro article explaining the methodology is in my view the most important article in the series.) And then Artosis persuaded me that the WC-tier wins that Rogue has also matter quite a bit more than I was giving credit to in terms of a legacy of greatness. So now I'm back to Rogue.
I can be convinced of any of the three (I can maybe even be convinced of Mvp, though that would be a tough sell). What I do not find very convincing is outcome-oriented reasoning, which is 90% of what is happening in these threads. You admit now that your point about teamhouses was not a very good one, but what is really required is some introspection for why you raised this point in the first place. Almost certainly it was for no other reason that you felt it conferred some kind of advantage in making the case for Serral, but what I don't think people understand is that these kinds of efforts to throw spaghetti at the wall end up merely making a mess.
Outcome-oriented thinking creates pressure to search and find any "details" that you think may bolster your case rather than interrogating the values and principles that really matter to you, and letting those lead wherever they may go (irrespective of where you may in your heart want to go). I'd love for Maru to be the GOAT. He has been my favorite player since 2016. But if I'm being honest with myself, I just don't think he is based on my own set of values and principles in how to think about the greatest of all time.
In one of the articles (maybe one of the addendums), Miz talks about how he had players in various tiers and how players shifted in their position based on how the criteria or weighting shifted. This to me demonstrates a degree of objectivity that it would be nice to see more broadly. The folks who categorically dismiss even the possibility that the GOAT could be someone like Maru or Rogue give me strong Dunning-Kruger vibes.
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Northern Ireland23702 Posts
On July 02 2024 13:33 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 02:37 WombaT wrote:On July 02 2024 00:28 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 22:48 WombaT wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 04:57 Bennito_bh wrote:
The Rogue angle is a bit silly TBF, though as a solid 3rd-4th place contender it certainly isn't absurd by any stretch. It only works if you rate GSLs as high as Kato/BCs and ignore Maru's better Proleague record. Rogue's more of an $o$ figure than GOAT material - albeit with more success in Korea - albeit he only did that in the period where Zerg was vastly overperforming relative to T and P.
From what I've read the community's backlash against Arty has less to do with the claim and more to do with how he presents it. Insulting people and treating them like morons may generate engagement (and thus $$) on a Twitch stream, but it does not actually help when presenting yourself as a credible source. Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue. One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is. People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. I don’t think that’s the case with you, but I would also ask you whether this volume of back-and-forth in this forum has added more illumination than heat with all this “detail.” It’s often the case that spewing “detail” serves to obfuscate more than clarify, which is why you see folks just throwing out random “details” like how much money someone made if they think it’ll bolster their argument. It’s much more important to be clear about your definitions, values, methodologies, which further clarifies which details, factors, and elements are important, and which are not. It really depends on what you’re attempting to argue. Complex problems can require complex solutions. You see this being a very apparent phenomenon in politics where the folks who promise simple solutions to complex problems appear to many to be the more convincing to many a voter because folks respond better to confident assertions than a ‘well this issue is complicated and I’m not sure about x’. Doesn’t necessarily give us good policy. Miz alluded to this complexity from the off and did at least explain his methodology pretty damn thoroughly. Not saying you didn’t, but it’s not really his fault that other people critical of his list didn’t actually read all his rationales. I mean I’ve long said there are too many incomparable factors to really have a definitive GOAT anyway, it’s a hell of a lot easier in BW which had a pretty consistent competition structure for most of its pro shelf life Rogue was still a good player in the Proleague era, but perhaps an A class player and not an S class killer like someone like Innovation, or a Maru/Zest and players like that. He clearly did become that S class player from 2017 onwards, but equally Maru won 4 GSLs in a row shortly after. Serral’s got a ridiculous resume in that span with similar big accomplishments but a consistency nobody else has ever really had. In combination it feels hard to stick Rogue at #1 and I think his finals record gives him more a ‘most clutch’ cache and is a tad overrated re overall greatness. I know that’s an unpopular opinion but it’s to me indicative of a streaky player who’s great when they’re in the zone. If somebody could correct me, as I briefly scanned it the other day I don’t think Serral has a worse than Ro8 performance in some 6/7 years of competition, has won more tournaments and has better win rates than anyone in that span. Rogue’s finals record does attest to his ability to perform on the big stage when it counts, but the flipside of it given he frequently would drop out early in tournaments where he wasn’t making finals is ‘when Rogue is in good form he’ll win, and when he isn’t he doesn’t make finals’. Whereas a player who can still drag himself to a final even out of form and by sheer force of will and lose it will still ultimately get the loss in that column. For me one of Mvp’s greatest achievements was even reaching a GSL finals against Life despite injuries clearly impacting his play to the degree he changed style considerably, and still almost pulled it off. Rogue also has lost finals which is why the stat kept morphing until it’s ‘has never lost a finals in a Bo7 offline’ form it currently is. Which is still bloody impressive but the more caveats you add to a stat the less impressive it becomes. In short I think you probably need a little more than 5 minutes for this one! I want to clarify that I think Miz and the editorial team did a really wonderful job with the article series. I think the articles are very well written and the arguments are cogent. I personally enjoy all the detail and context. In fact, what I perhaps enjoyed most about the article series was the intro article explaining the methodology. It was very well done and frankly I think most of the disputes here come down to disagreeing with the methodology. My only point was that I don't think you need all this extra context to make a simple and straightforward case, and that sometimes when you go down the rabbit hole, you end up losing the forest for the trees (mixed metaphors, sorry....). Regarding Rogue I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has similar international WC-tier tourney results to Serral plus the 4 GSLs so depending on how much value you put on one tournament category versus the other it's very easy to see how Rogue could be the GOAT. Regarding Serral, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the best international WC-tier tourney results, and is widely considered to be the "best" player to ever play the game both in terms of perception of his peers and his head-to-head win rates against other top players. Regarding Maru, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the ridiculous GSL wins, and is the only one to be a dominant player in the most competitive eras of SC2 (via his KIL and Proleague performances). There's a lot more that can be said, but I don't think you lose a lot by boiling it down like this, and if anything it helps clarify where the fault lines are. As I alluded to with politics, and you did through legal advocacy and the skill set required, persuasion in making a clear, concise argument is important. Although I was a bit more negative in how we’re susceptible to confident assertions as a species, be that some innate biological trait or something more cultural. I do basically agree here actually, but it’s a 1-2 punch of sorts. You need a strong core argument, then you deal with the complex stuff when you have to deal with likely, or emerging counter-arguments. Your Serral argument is basically verbatim mine for example, I think it’s a pretty potent argument. Others do exist of course! I guess it’s the difference between making a clear, compelling argument, which is simple enough, versus arriving at a generally accepted answer, which is considerably harder. Going back to say the political realm it’s extremely easy to make a ‘poverty is bad’ argument, but gaining consensus on its root causes never mind solutions is exceptionally difficult Wax and I attempted to do a TLDR with the bullet points at the top of each piece so readers could choice how much time they wanted to invest sorting through the nuances of each player's case. I would always encourage people to read the entire piece because we're all vain, attention seeking humans, but I understand that sometimes people just skip to the end and shit on the predictions :D I also situationally agree with those who are saying that a proposal/argument/similar type deal needs to be succinct, but I really think it comes down to what field you're in and the industry standard. Submitting books to a literary agent (something I've done a lot) varies from agency to agency. Sometimes they want a 10 page sample with a (fill in the number of words) synopsis. Other times they just want a paragraph or two to see if it's worth asking for more material. Either way, you don't have a lot of space to make your case when you're pitching a 100k+ word book, but you just have to make due with the opportunity you're given, Thankfully, the wonderful editors (and other staff members) on tl.net (wax, olli, cosmicspiral etc) have frequently given me the leniency to indulge in some meandering musings along the way.
Agreed, I mean often I’m commenting on the thread’s direction, various tangents and arguments by posters more than the originating article here. There is discourse re the article, and that inspired by the overall topic so it can get a bit chaotic.
I think you (and I suppose Wax as you frequently credit, so should I) did strike a decent balance between succinct summaries and more of a deep-dive
So props on that, as someone who actually read them. Quite a while ago now I think, the topic has continued for many moons!
It annoyed me no end on r/Starcraft when people were complaining purely based on the ranking who hadn’t actually read the series, so god knows how irritating that must have been for yourself
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United States1798 Posts
On July 03 2024 02:10 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On July 02 2024 13:33 Mizenhauer wrote:On July 02 2024 02:37 WombaT wrote:On July 02 2024 00:28 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 22:48 WombaT wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 04:57 Bennito_bh wrote:
The Rogue angle is a bit silly TBF, though as a solid 3rd-4th place contender it certainly isn't absurd by any stretch. It only works if you rate GSLs as high as Kato/BCs and ignore Maru's better Proleague record. Rogue's more of an $o$ figure than GOAT material - albeit with more success in Korea - albeit he only did that in the period where Zerg was vastly overperforming relative to T and P.
From what I've read the community's backlash against Arty has less to do with the claim and more to do with how he presents it. Insulting people and treating them like morons may generate engagement (and thus $$) on a Twitch stream, but it does not actually help when presenting yourself as a credible source. Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue. One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is. People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. I don’t think that’s the case with you, but I would also ask you whether this volume of back-and-forth in this forum has added more illumination than heat with all this “detail.” It’s often the case that spewing “detail” serves to obfuscate more than clarify, which is why you see folks just throwing out random “details” like how much money someone made if they think it’ll bolster their argument. It’s much more important to be clear about your definitions, values, methodologies, which further clarifies which details, factors, and elements are important, and which are not. It really depends on what you’re attempting to argue. Complex problems can require complex solutions. You see this being a very apparent phenomenon in politics where the folks who promise simple solutions to complex problems appear to many to be the more convincing to many a voter because folks respond better to confident assertions than a ‘well this issue is complicated and I’m not sure about x’. Doesn’t necessarily give us good policy. Miz alluded to this complexity from the off and did at least explain his methodology pretty damn thoroughly. Not saying you didn’t, but it’s not really his fault that other people critical of his list didn’t actually read all his rationales. I mean I’ve long said there are too many incomparable factors to really have a definitive GOAT anyway, it’s a hell of a lot easier in BW which had a pretty consistent competition structure for most of its pro shelf life Rogue was still a good player in the Proleague era, but perhaps an A class player and not an S class killer like someone like Innovation, or a Maru/Zest and players like that. He clearly did become that S class player from 2017 onwards, but equally Maru won 4 GSLs in a row shortly after. Serral’s got a ridiculous resume in that span with similar big accomplishments but a consistency nobody else has ever really had. In combination it feels hard to stick Rogue at #1 and I think his finals record gives him more a ‘most clutch’ cache and is a tad overrated re overall greatness. I know that’s an unpopular opinion but it’s to me indicative of a streaky player who’s great when they’re in the zone. If somebody could correct me, as I briefly scanned it the other day I don’t think Serral has a worse than Ro8 performance in some 6/7 years of competition, has won more tournaments and has better win rates than anyone in that span. Rogue’s finals record does attest to his ability to perform on the big stage when it counts, but the flipside of it given he frequently would drop out early in tournaments where he wasn’t making finals is ‘when Rogue is in good form he’ll win, and when he isn’t he doesn’t make finals’. Whereas a player who can still drag himself to a final even out of form and by sheer force of will and lose it will still ultimately get the loss in that column. For me one of Mvp’s greatest achievements was even reaching a GSL finals against Life despite injuries clearly impacting his play to the degree he changed style considerably, and still almost pulled it off. Rogue also has lost finals which is why the stat kept morphing until it’s ‘has never lost a finals in a Bo7 offline’ form it currently is. Which is still bloody impressive but the more caveats you add to a stat the less impressive it becomes. In short I think you probably need a little more than 5 minutes for this one! I want to clarify that I think Miz and the editorial team did a really wonderful job with the article series. I think the articles are very well written and the arguments are cogent. I personally enjoy all the detail and context. In fact, what I perhaps enjoyed most about the article series was the intro article explaining the methodology. It was very well done and frankly I think most of the disputes here come down to disagreeing with the methodology. My only point was that I don't think you need all this extra context to make a simple and straightforward case, and that sometimes when you go down the rabbit hole, you end up losing the forest for the trees (mixed metaphors, sorry....). Regarding Rogue I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has similar international WC-tier tourney results to Serral plus the 4 GSLs so depending on how much value you put on one tournament category versus the other it's very easy to see how Rogue could be the GOAT. Regarding Serral, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the best international WC-tier tourney results, and is widely considered to be the "best" player to ever play the game both in terms of perception of his peers and his head-to-head win rates against other top players. Regarding Maru, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the ridiculous GSL wins, and is the only one to be a dominant player in the most competitive eras of SC2 (via his KIL and Proleague performances). There's a lot more that can be said, but I don't think you lose a lot by boiling it down like this, and if anything it helps clarify where the fault lines are. As I alluded to with politics, and you did through legal advocacy and the skill set required, persuasion in making a clear, concise argument is important. Although I was a bit more negative in how we’re susceptible to confident assertions as a species, be that some innate biological trait or something more cultural. I do basically agree here actually, but it’s a 1-2 punch of sorts. You need a strong core argument, then you deal with the complex stuff when you have to deal with likely, or emerging counter-arguments. Your Serral argument is basically verbatim mine for example, I think it’s a pretty potent argument. Others do exist of course! I guess it’s the difference between making a clear, compelling argument, which is simple enough, versus arriving at a generally accepted answer, which is considerably harder. Going back to say the political realm it’s extremely easy to make a ‘poverty is bad’ argument, but gaining consensus on its root causes never mind solutions is exceptionally difficult Wax and I attempted to do a TLDR with the bullet points at the top of each piece so readers could choice how much time they wanted to invest sorting through the nuances of each player's case. I would always encourage people to read the entire piece because we're all vain, attention seeking humans, but I understand that sometimes people just skip to the end and shit on the predictions :D I also situationally agree with those who are saying that a proposal/argument/similar type deal needs to be succinct, but I really think it comes down to what field you're in and the industry standard. Submitting books to a literary agent (something I've done a lot) varies from agency to agency. Sometimes they want a 10 page sample with a (fill in the number of words) synopsis. Other times they just want a paragraph or two to see if it's worth asking for more material. Either way, you don't have a lot of space to make your case when you're pitching a 100k+ word book, but you just have to make due with the opportunity you're given, Thankfully, the wonderful editors (and other staff members) on tl.net (wax, olli, cosmicspiral etc) have frequently given me the leniency to indulge in some meandering musings along the way. Agreed, I mean often I’m commenting on the thread’s direction, various tangents and arguments by posters more than the originating article here. There is discourse re the article, and that inspired by the overall topic so it can get a bit chaotic. I think you (and I suppose Wax as you frequently credit, so should I) did strike a decent balance between succinct summaries and more of a deep-dive So props on that, as someone who actually read them. Quite a while ago now I think, the topic has continued for many moons! It annoyed me no end on r/Starcraft when people were complaining purely based on the ranking who hadn’t actually read the series, so god knows how irritating that must have been for yourself
Reddit will reddit. Personally, I'm hoping for an eventful EWC so I'll have a reason to revisit the list in earnest.
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Northern Ireland23702 Posts
On July 03 2024 15:48 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2024 02:10 WombaT wrote:On July 02 2024 13:33 Mizenhauer wrote:On July 02 2024 02:37 WombaT wrote:On July 02 2024 00:28 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 22:48 WombaT wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 04:57 Bennito_bh wrote:
The Rogue angle is a bit silly TBF, though as a solid 3rd-4th place contender it certainly isn't absurd by any stretch. It only works if you rate GSLs as high as Kato/BCs and ignore Maru's better Proleague record. Rogue's more of an $o$ figure than GOAT material - albeit with more success in Korea - albeit he only did that in the period where Zerg was vastly overperforming relative to T and P.
From what I've read the community's backlash against Arty has less to do with the claim and more to do with how he presents it. Insulting people and treating them like morons may generate engagement (and thus $$) on a Twitch stream, but it does not actually help when presenting yourself as a credible source. Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue. One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is. People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. I don’t think that’s the case with you, but I would also ask you whether this volume of back-and-forth in this forum has added more illumination than heat with all this “detail.” It’s often the case that spewing “detail” serves to obfuscate more than clarify, which is why you see folks just throwing out random “details” like how much money someone made if they think it’ll bolster their argument. It’s much more important to be clear about your definitions, values, methodologies, which further clarifies which details, factors, and elements are important, and which are not. It really depends on what you’re attempting to argue. Complex problems can require complex solutions. You see this being a very apparent phenomenon in politics where the folks who promise simple solutions to complex problems appear to many to be the more convincing to many a voter because folks respond better to confident assertions than a ‘well this issue is complicated and I’m not sure about x’. Doesn’t necessarily give us good policy. Miz alluded to this complexity from the off and did at least explain his methodology pretty damn thoroughly. Not saying you didn’t, but it’s not really his fault that other people critical of his list didn’t actually read all his rationales. I mean I’ve long said there are too many incomparable factors to really have a definitive GOAT anyway, it’s a hell of a lot easier in BW which had a pretty consistent competition structure for most of its pro shelf life Rogue was still a good player in the Proleague era, but perhaps an A class player and not an S class killer like someone like Innovation, or a Maru/Zest and players like that. He clearly did become that S class player from 2017 onwards, but equally Maru won 4 GSLs in a row shortly after. Serral’s got a ridiculous resume in that span with similar big accomplishments but a consistency nobody else has ever really had. In combination it feels hard to stick Rogue at #1 and I think his finals record gives him more a ‘most clutch’ cache and is a tad overrated re overall greatness. I know that’s an unpopular opinion but it’s to me indicative of a streaky player who’s great when they’re in the zone. If somebody could correct me, as I briefly scanned it the other day I don’t think Serral has a worse than Ro8 performance in some 6/7 years of competition, has won more tournaments and has better win rates than anyone in that span. Rogue’s finals record does attest to his ability to perform on the big stage when it counts, but the flipside of it given he frequently would drop out early in tournaments where he wasn’t making finals is ‘when Rogue is in good form he’ll win, and when he isn’t he doesn’t make finals’. Whereas a player who can still drag himself to a final even out of form and by sheer force of will and lose it will still ultimately get the loss in that column. For me one of Mvp’s greatest achievements was even reaching a GSL finals against Life despite injuries clearly impacting his play to the degree he changed style considerably, and still almost pulled it off. Rogue also has lost finals which is why the stat kept morphing until it’s ‘has never lost a finals in a Bo7 offline’ form it currently is. Which is still bloody impressive but the more caveats you add to a stat the less impressive it becomes. In short I think you probably need a little more than 5 minutes for this one! I want to clarify that I think Miz and the editorial team did a really wonderful job with the article series. I think the articles are very well written and the arguments are cogent. I personally enjoy all the detail and context. In fact, what I perhaps enjoyed most about the article series was the intro article explaining the methodology. It was very well done and frankly I think most of the disputes here come down to disagreeing with the methodology. My only point was that I don't think you need all this extra context to make a simple and straightforward case, and that sometimes when you go down the rabbit hole, you end up losing the forest for the trees (mixed metaphors, sorry....). Regarding Rogue I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has similar international WC-tier tourney results to Serral plus the 4 GSLs so depending on how much value you put on one tournament category versus the other it's very easy to see how Rogue could be the GOAT. Regarding Serral, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the best international WC-tier tourney results, and is widely considered to be the "best" player to ever play the game both in terms of perception of his peers and his head-to-head win rates against other top players. Regarding Maru, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the ridiculous GSL wins, and is the only one to be a dominant player in the most competitive eras of SC2 (via his KIL and Proleague performances). There's a lot more that can be said, but I don't think you lose a lot by boiling it down like this, and if anything it helps clarify where the fault lines are. As I alluded to with politics, and you did through legal advocacy and the skill set required, persuasion in making a clear, concise argument is important. Although I was a bit more negative in how we’re susceptible to confident assertions as a species, be that some innate biological trait or something more cultural. I do basically agree here actually, but it’s a 1-2 punch of sorts. You need a strong core argument, then you deal with the complex stuff when you have to deal with likely, or emerging counter-arguments. Your Serral argument is basically verbatim mine for example, I think it’s a pretty potent argument. Others do exist of course! I guess it’s the difference between making a clear, compelling argument, which is simple enough, versus arriving at a generally accepted answer, which is considerably harder. Going back to say the political realm it’s extremely easy to make a ‘poverty is bad’ argument, but gaining consensus on its root causes never mind solutions is exceptionally difficult Wax and I attempted to do a TLDR with the bullet points at the top of each piece so readers could choice how much time they wanted to invest sorting through the nuances of each player's case. I would always encourage people to read the entire piece because we're all vain, attention seeking humans, but I understand that sometimes people just skip to the end and shit on the predictions :D I also situationally agree with those who are saying that a proposal/argument/similar type deal needs to be succinct, but I really think it comes down to what field you're in and the industry standard. Submitting books to a literary agent (something I've done a lot) varies from agency to agency. Sometimes they want a 10 page sample with a (fill in the number of words) synopsis. Other times they just want a paragraph or two to see if it's worth asking for more material. Either way, you don't have a lot of space to make your case when you're pitching a 100k+ word book, but you just have to make due with the opportunity you're given, Thankfully, the wonderful editors (and other staff members) on tl.net (wax, olli, cosmicspiral etc) have frequently given me the leniency to indulge in some meandering musings along the way. Agreed, I mean often I’m commenting on the thread’s direction, various tangents and arguments by posters more than the originating article here. There is discourse re the article, and that inspired by the overall topic so it can get a bit chaotic. I think you (and I suppose Wax as you frequently credit, so should I) did strike a decent balance between succinct summaries and more of a deep-dive So props on that, as someone who actually read them. Quite a while ago now I think, the topic has continued for many moons! It annoyed me no end on r/Starcraft when people were complaining purely based on the ranking who hadn’t actually read the series, so god knows how irritating that must have been for yourself Reddit will reddit. Personally, I'm hoping for an eventful EWC so I'll have a reason to revisit the list in earnest.
Reddit gon’ Reddit is a huge part of the reason I only dip my toes in occasionally and have like 20k posts on here
I wonder what the candidates for movement would be here? Assuming winners here rather than deep runs.
Maru/Serral continue their jostling. Off the back of the first GSL win as a father, if Dark won this there’d be definitely a case to shift him up.
Along with their other accomplishments, I think herO or Reynor maybe have a case to enter if they take home SC2’s biggest ever prize.
The rest of the field who are legit contenders I think are either too far away from a GOAT top 10 to enter even with a win, or aren’t contenders IMO, although a win would see some upward movement.
Exciting times although alas I don’t think I’ll be watching this one. Part moral issues I have, although also partly my schedule being disgusting around the time, which does make it rather easy to play the good little boycotter
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United States1798 Posts
On July 03 2024 15:59 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On July 03 2024 15:48 Mizenhauer wrote:On July 03 2024 02:10 WombaT wrote:On July 02 2024 13:33 Mizenhauer wrote:On July 02 2024 02:37 WombaT wrote:On July 02 2024 00:28 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 22:48 WombaT wrote:On June 29 2024 21:47 rwala wrote:On June 29 2024 11:42 Mizenhauer wrote:On June 29 2024 08:27 rwala wrote:
[quote]
Whether he presents himself as a credible source is beside the point. He is a credible source, but that's also beside the point, because he presents a sound argument. I actually think Arty has done a better job than anyone at very clearly and concisely defining what GOAT means, and explaining his reasoning for why Rogue is the GOAT in less than 5 minutes with a very simple chart that compares accomplishments. Which is why he doesn't get into excuses like you're doing with the above balance whining or random irrelevant things like how much money someone made. Arty's the only one who has explained the difference betweeen a bonjwa and the GOAT, and explained why head-to-head records are not the appropriate metric (e.g. some progamers have winning head-to-head records against Flash, the undisputed BW GOAT). He persuaded me, and I am not someone who is inclined to want to attribute GOAT status to Rogue.
One thing I'm not sure Arty touched on was Rogue's insane 13-1 offline tournament finals record. This in and of itself is not only one of the greatest accomplishments in SC2, but in all of esports. It's kind of hard to overestimate how insane this is.
People can disagree with me, but I think it's impossible to discuss the GOAT argument in sufficient detail in five minutes. In an ideal world you would have to take Rogue's performances in Proleague (he was never an ace player, but was very solid), his lack of individual results pre 2017, the fact that his win percentage is wanting (compared to other goat candidates) in long running tournaments (Code S) as well as on a year by year basis into account. Head to head matters as well, just as analyzing the strength of the field in the events in which he won (or was eliminated surprisingly early) without incorporating too much subjectivity. The 13-1 record in premier finals is a huge point in his favor but, you also need to look at how he performed in the R8 and R4 over the years (a great example is soO, who is 0-6 in Code S finals, but 13-1 in the quarter/semifinals). Artosis raises some good points, but bonjwa is an absurdly nebulous term and you need way more context to establish what "Great" means in the context of the rankings and how "Greatest player" differs from "Greatest Career". I personally feel like Rogue's combined achievements place him ahead of Mvp (who I had fourth), but his lack of consistency set him on a tier below Serral and Maru. I'm cutting this short because I could go on and on about all the elements that go into something like this (this is my opinion so, again, feel free to disagree), but I'm 100% certain that you can't cover all the factors listed above (let alone apply them when discussing one players profile versus another's) in that amount of time. Agree to disagree. I live and work in a world in which if you can’t present your argument in 5 minutes, it’s probably because your argument isn’t very good. I don’t think that’s the case with you, but I would also ask you whether this volume of back-and-forth in this forum has added more illumination than heat with all this “detail.” It’s often the case that spewing “detail” serves to obfuscate more than clarify, which is why you see folks just throwing out random “details” like how much money someone made if they think it’ll bolster their argument. It’s much more important to be clear about your definitions, values, methodologies, which further clarifies which details, factors, and elements are important, and which are not. It really depends on what you’re attempting to argue. Complex problems can require complex solutions. You see this being a very apparent phenomenon in politics where the folks who promise simple solutions to complex problems appear to many to be the more convincing to many a voter because folks respond better to confident assertions than a ‘well this issue is complicated and I’m not sure about x’. Doesn’t necessarily give us good policy. Miz alluded to this complexity from the off and did at least explain his methodology pretty damn thoroughly. Not saying you didn’t, but it’s not really his fault that other people critical of his list didn’t actually read all his rationales. I mean I’ve long said there are too many incomparable factors to really have a definitive GOAT anyway, it’s a hell of a lot easier in BW which had a pretty consistent competition structure for most of its pro shelf life Rogue was still a good player in the Proleague era, but perhaps an A class player and not an S class killer like someone like Innovation, or a Maru/Zest and players like that. He clearly did become that S class player from 2017 onwards, but equally Maru won 4 GSLs in a row shortly after. Serral’s got a ridiculous resume in that span with similar big accomplishments but a consistency nobody else has ever really had. In combination it feels hard to stick Rogue at #1 and I think his finals record gives him more a ‘most clutch’ cache and is a tad overrated re overall greatness. I know that’s an unpopular opinion but it’s to me indicative of a streaky player who’s great when they’re in the zone. If somebody could correct me, as I briefly scanned it the other day I don’t think Serral has a worse than Ro8 performance in some 6/7 years of competition, has won more tournaments and has better win rates than anyone in that span. Rogue’s finals record does attest to his ability to perform on the big stage when it counts, but the flipside of it given he frequently would drop out early in tournaments where he wasn’t making finals is ‘when Rogue is in good form he’ll win, and when he isn’t he doesn’t make finals’. Whereas a player who can still drag himself to a final even out of form and by sheer force of will and lose it will still ultimately get the loss in that column. For me one of Mvp’s greatest achievements was even reaching a GSL finals against Life despite injuries clearly impacting his play to the degree he changed style considerably, and still almost pulled it off. Rogue also has lost finals which is why the stat kept morphing until it’s ‘has never lost a finals in a Bo7 offline’ form it currently is. Which is still bloody impressive but the more caveats you add to a stat the less impressive it becomes. In short I think you probably need a little more than 5 minutes for this one! I want to clarify that I think Miz and the editorial team did a really wonderful job with the article series. I think the articles are very well written and the arguments are cogent. I personally enjoy all the detail and context. In fact, what I perhaps enjoyed most about the article series was the intro article explaining the methodology. It was very well done and frankly I think most of the disputes here come down to disagreeing with the methodology. My only point was that I don't think you need all this extra context to make a simple and straightforward case, and that sometimes when you go down the rabbit hole, you end up losing the forest for the trees (mixed metaphors, sorry....). Regarding Rogue I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has similar international WC-tier tourney results to Serral plus the 4 GSLs so depending on how much value you put on one tournament category versus the other it's very easy to see how Rogue could be the GOAT. Regarding Serral, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the best international WC-tier tourney results, and is widely considered to be the "best" player to ever play the game both in terms of perception of his peers and his head-to-head win rates against other top players. Regarding Maru, I don't think the argument is that complicated. He has the ridiculous GSL wins, and is the only one to be a dominant player in the most competitive eras of SC2 (via his KIL and Proleague performances). There's a lot more that can be said, but I don't think you lose a lot by boiling it down like this, and if anything it helps clarify where the fault lines are. As I alluded to with politics, and you did through legal advocacy and the skill set required, persuasion in making a clear, concise argument is important. Although I was a bit more negative in how we’re susceptible to confident assertions as a species, be that some innate biological trait or something more cultural. I do basically agree here actually, but it’s a 1-2 punch of sorts. You need a strong core argument, then you deal with the complex stuff when you have to deal with likely, or emerging counter-arguments. Your Serral argument is basically verbatim mine for example, I think it’s a pretty potent argument. Others do exist of course! I guess it’s the difference between making a clear, compelling argument, which is simple enough, versus arriving at a generally accepted answer, which is considerably harder. Going back to say the political realm it’s extremely easy to make a ‘poverty is bad’ argument, but gaining consensus on its root causes never mind solutions is exceptionally difficult Wax and I attempted to do a TLDR with the bullet points at the top of each piece so readers could choice how much time they wanted to invest sorting through the nuances of each player's case. I would always encourage people to read the entire piece because we're all vain, attention seeking humans, but I understand that sometimes people just skip to the end and shit on the predictions :D I also situationally agree with those who are saying that a proposal/argument/similar type deal needs to be succinct, but I really think it comes down to what field you're in and the industry standard. Submitting books to a literary agent (something I've done a lot) varies from agency to agency. Sometimes they want a 10 page sample with a (fill in the number of words) synopsis. Other times they just want a paragraph or two to see if it's worth asking for more material. Either way, you don't have a lot of space to make your case when you're pitching a 100k+ word book, but you just have to make due with the opportunity you're given, Thankfully, the wonderful editors (and other staff members) on tl.net (wax, olli, cosmicspiral etc) have frequently given me the leniency to indulge in some meandering musings along the way. Agreed, I mean often I’m commenting on the thread’s direction, various tangents and arguments by posters more than the originating article here. There is discourse re the article, and that inspired by the overall topic so it can get a bit chaotic. I think you (and I suppose Wax as you frequently credit, so should I) did strike a decent balance between succinct summaries and more of a deep-dive So props on that, as someone who actually read them. Quite a while ago now I think, the topic has continued for many moons! It annoyed me no end on r/Starcraft when people were complaining purely based on the ranking who hadn’t actually read the series, so god knows how irritating that must have been for yourself Reddit will reddit. Personally, I'm hoping for an eventful EWC so I'll have a reason to revisit the list in earnest. Reddit gon’ Reddit is a huge part of the reason I only dip my toes in occasionally and have like 20k posts on here I wonder what the candidates for movement would be here? Assuming winners here rather than deep runs. Maru/Serral continue their jostling. Off the back of the first GSL win as a father, if Dark won this there’d be definitely a case to shift him up. Along with their other accomplishments, I think herO or Reynor maybe have a case to enter if they take home SC2’s biggest ever prize. The rest of the field who are legit contenders I think are either too far away from a GOAT top 10 to enter even with a win, or aren’t contenders IMO, although a win would see some upward movement. Exciting times although alas I don’t think I’ll be watching this one. Part moral issues I have, although also partly my schedule being disgusting around the time, which does make it rather easy to play the good little boycotter
Dark, Reynor and herO have the most upwards mobility. A few other players could creep into the top 15/20.
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Rogue winning with only a couple months back from the military would be crazy as well. I think it'd be hard to deny him number 1 if he somehow wins EWC fresh out of military. Based purely on trophies without taking longevity and consistency into account he already was #1 before he retired for military but then Serral and Maru surpassed him. If he won EWC it would be clear that the only reason they surpassed him at all was because he had to do military.
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Ranking movement seems like it'd come really slowly at this point:
I don't think the arbitrary "world championship" labels give as much boost to ranking as any other premiere tournament with the same level of players. It's not any harder to win than any other weekender with the same level of comp.
I also don't value today's wins nearly as much as when the game was more alive. As an analogy, say the NBA lost a lot of it's following and was down to 12 teams instead of 30, less people played it, less competition overall (not less skill, just competition) etc. And some dude we'll call Jichael Mordan came and won 10 rings in a row. Would he be on the all time list? IDK, not to me. But maybe to people who only watched the 12 team era, Jichael would be the GOAT.
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United States1798 Posts
On July 04 2024 15:02 radracer wrote:
Ranking movement seems like it'd come really slowly at this point:
I don't think the arbitrary "world championship" labels give as much boost to ranking as any other premiere tournament with the same level of players. It's not any harder to win than any other weekender with the same level of comp.
I also don't value today's wins nearly as much as when the game was more alive. As an analogy, say the NBA lost a lot of it's following and was down to 12 teams instead of 30, less people played it, less competition overall (not less skill, just competition) etc. And some dude we'll call Jichael Mordan came and won 10 rings in a row. Would he be on the all time list? IDK, not to me. But maybe to people who only watched the 12 team era, Jichael would be the GOAT.
Normally I would say that analogies (especially sports ones) are dumb because they complicate things more than clarify them
BUT! In this case you hoisted yourself with your own petard. You are almost exactly describing Bill Russell, a universal top 10 player all time and, for some, a top 5 player. Even more amusing is that Jerry west, who was farmed by Russell during his career is also a universal top 20 player, who many consider to be top 15 all time.
Thank you for this moment. I rarely get a chance to so comprehensively dismantle someone's argument.
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Northern Ireland23702 Posts
On July 04 2024 15:02 radracer wrote:
Ranking movement seems like it'd come really slowly at this point:
I don't think the arbitrary "world championship" labels give as much boost to ranking as any other premiere tournament with the same level of players. It's not any harder to win than any other weekender with the same level of comp.
I also don't value today's wins nearly as much as when the game was more alive. As an analogy, say the NBA lost a lot of it's following and was down to 12 teams instead of 30, less people played it, less competition overall (not less skill, just competition) etc. And some dude we'll call Jichael Mordan came and won 10 rings in a row. Would he be on the all time list? IDK, not to me. But maybe to people who only watched the 12 team era, Jichael would be the GOAT.
At least from what snippets I’ve heard about how they prepped some of the top Euro guys were focusing on Kato and pocketing builds way out in advance. Between the prestige and the bigger paycheck as motivators you probably see (nerves aside) people bringing their absolute A game and thus I think a non-arbitrary justification to weigh the WC a little higher.
Yeah the scene has a decline in competitive depth, but equally a certain amount of continuity at the same time.
In the context of your analogy if I were to extend it, the NBA lost its following halfway into its hypothetical existence, and Michael Jordan was still active for Jichael Mordan’s entire career to date.
And also Jebron Lames and others only maintained GOAT level form for half, if even the time the aforementioned managed.
So it does make it a somewhat tricky proposition. I mean I personally rank Inno higher than Rogue, bit of a Machine lover, but it’s not like he was cleaning house as the scene dropped a bit.
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Normally I would say that analogies (especially sports ones) are dumb because they complicate things more than clarify them
BUT! In this case you hoisted yourself with your own petard. You are almost exactly describing Bill Russell, a universal top 10 player all time and, for some, a top 5 player. Even more amusing is that Jerry west, who was farmed by Russell during his career is also a universal top 20 player, who many consider to be top 15 all time.
Thank you for this moment. I rarely get a chance to so comprehensively dismantle someone's argument.
I already thought about that when I made my post, but no, it doesn't. In fact, Russell's accolades should have him in GOAT talks but due to his era they don't usually have him up there. (It's also an argument against Babe Ruth who many call the goat of bball) But the MAJOR The difference is as time passed in the NBA, both skill AND competition grew, it never declined from it's peak, like SC has. So maybe the analogy was confusing after all. xD
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On July 04 2024 15:47 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On July 04 2024 15:02 radracer wrote:
Ranking movement seems like it'd come really slowly at this point:
I don't think the arbitrary "world championship" labels give as much boost to ranking as any other premiere tournament with the same level of players. It's not any harder to win than any other weekender with the same level of comp.
I also don't value today's wins nearly as much as when the game was more alive. As an analogy, say the NBA lost a lot of it's following and was down to 12 teams instead of 30, less people played it, less competition overall (not less skill, just competition) etc. And some dude we'll call Jichael Mordan came and won 10 rings in a row. Would he be on the all time list? IDK, not to me. But maybe to people who only watched the 12 team era, Jichael would be the GOAT.
At least from what snippets I’ve heard about how they prepped some of the top Euro guys were focusing on Kato and pocketing builds way out in advance. Between the prestige and the bigger paycheck as motivators you probably see (nerves aside) people bringing their absolute A game and thus I think a non-arbitrary justification to weigh the WC a little higher. Yeah the scene has a decline in competitive depth, but equally a certain amount of continuity at the same time. In the context of your analogy if I were to extend it, the NBA lost its following halfway into its hypothetical existence, and Michael Jordan was still active for Jichael Mordan’s entire career to date. And also Jebron Lames and others only maintained GOAT level form for half, if even the time the aforementioned managed. So it does make it a somewhat tricky proposition. I mean I personally rank Inno higher than Rogue, bit of a Machine lover, but it’s not like he was cleaning house as the scene dropped a bit.
Yeah, that's a good point, for creating the list. But I think the movement upwards on the GOAT list is just a bit slower now, moving forward. (And as the scene dies, less and less value on the championships/goathood)
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Northern Ireland23702 Posts
On July 04 2024 16:02 radracer wrote:Show nested quote +On July 04 2024 15:47 WombaT wrote:On July 04 2024 15:02 radracer wrote:
Ranking movement seems like it'd come really slowly at this point:
I don't think the arbitrary "world championship" labels give as much boost to ranking as any other premiere tournament with the same level of players. It's not any harder to win than any other weekender with the same level of comp.
I also don't value today's wins nearly as much as when the game was more alive. As an analogy, say the NBA lost a lot of it's following and was down to 12 teams instead of 30, less people played it, less competition overall (not less skill, just competition) etc. And some dude we'll call Jichael Mordan came and won 10 rings in a row. Would he be on the all time list? IDK, not to me. But maybe to people who only watched the 12 team era, Jichael would be the GOAT.
At least from what snippets I’ve heard about how they prepped some of the top Euro guys were focusing on Kato and pocketing builds way out in advance. Between the prestige and the bigger paycheck as motivators you probably see (nerves aside) people bringing their absolute A game and thus I think a non-arbitrary justification to weigh the WC a little higher. Yeah the scene has a decline in competitive depth, but equally a certain amount of continuity at the same time. In the context of your analogy if I were to extend it, the NBA lost its following halfway into its hypothetical existence, and Michael Jordan was still active for Jichael Mordan’s entire career to date. And also Jebron Lames and others only maintained GOAT level form for half, if even the time the aforementioned managed. So it does make it a somewhat tricky proposition. I mean I personally rank Inno higher than Rogue, bit of a Machine lover, but it’s not like he was cleaning house as the scene dropped a bit. Yeah, that's a good point, for creating the list. But I think the movement upwards on the GOAT list is just a bit slower now, moving forward. (And as the scene dies, less and less value on the championships/goathood)
We can only look at what we’ve got I suppose. And I think it maybe is so normalised now that we kinda forget how impressive some Finnish bloke outside the seemingly impenetrable Korean bastion breaking that glass ceiling was.
But perhaps other things are rarely mentioned too. The Kespa influx that dominated the game were phenomenal, but they were switching from another game.
I’ve heard it said that regardless of system (I think region lock helped), ultimately why we have a Clem, Serral or Reynor was that we had kids who grew up playing SC2 as one of their first games, from an early age, whereas previously a lot of the foreign scene started a bit older, and switched from other games in many cases.
So in a sense I feel the collapse of the Kespa system deprived us more of a Korean Serral equivalent etc.
It was really the hypothetical future generation that was taken, whereas the existing top talent did remain and gradually siphoned out.
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On July 04 2024 16:30 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On July 04 2024 16:02 radracer wrote:On July 04 2024 15:47 WombaT wrote:On July 04 2024 15:02 radracer wrote:
Ranking movement seems like it'd come really slowly at this point:
I don't think the arbitrary "world championship" labels give as much boost to ranking as any other premiere tournament with the same level of players. It's not any harder to win than any other weekender with the same level of comp.
I also don't value today's wins nearly as much as when the game was more alive. As an analogy, say the NBA lost a lot of it's following and was down to 12 teams instead of 30, less people played it, less competition overall (not less skill, just competition) etc. And some dude we'll call Jichael Mordan came and won 10 rings in a row. Would he be on the all time list? IDK, not to me. But maybe to people who only watched the 12 team era, Jichael would be the GOAT.
At least from what snippets I’ve heard about how they prepped some of the top Euro guys were focusing on Kato and pocketing builds way out in advance. Between the prestige and the bigger paycheck as motivators you probably see (nerves aside) people bringing their absolute A game and thus I think a non-arbitrary justification to weigh the WC a little higher. Yeah the scene has a decline in competitive depth, but equally a certain amount of continuity at the same time. In the context of your analogy if I were to extend it, the NBA lost its following halfway into its hypothetical existence, and Michael Jordan was still active for Jichael Mordan’s entire career to date. And also Jebron Lames and others only maintained GOAT level form for half, if even the time the aforementioned managed. So it does make it a somewhat tricky proposition. I mean I personally rank Inno higher than Rogue, bit of a Machine lover, but it’s not like he was cleaning house as the scene dropped a bit. Yeah, that's a good point, for creating the list. But I think the movement upwards on the GOAT list is just a bit slower now, moving forward. (And as the scene dies, less and less value on the championships/goathood) We can only look at what we’ve got I suppose. And I think it maybe is so normalised now that we kinda forget how impressive some Finnish bloke outside the seemingly impenetrable Korean bastion breaking that glass ceiling was. But perhaps other things are rarely mentioned too. The Kespa influx that dominated the game were phenomenal, but they were switching from another game. I’ve heard it said that regardless of system (I think region lock helped), ultimately why we have a Clem, Serral or Reynor was that we had kids who grew up playing SC2 as one of their first games, from an early age, whereas previously a lot of the foreign scene started a bit older, and switched from other games in many cases. So in a sense I feel the collapse of the Kespa system deprived us more of a Korean Serral equivalent etc. It was really the hypothetical future generation that was taken, whereas the existing top talent did remain and gradually siphoned out.
That's true but Serral, Clem and Reynor are only 3 players. The biggest effect of the Kespa collapse is imo that there's nobody to replace the current generation of top (korean) players, so they can just stay at the top forever regardless of slumps or declining mechanics without new talent taking over. A good example here is Dark who self-admittedly says he's playing much worse than before and it's also apparent in his play with him making basic macro mistakes like getting hard supply-blocked early in the game multiple times. But because everyone else (from the koreans) is also in the same boat he's still able to make finals and win tournaments despite playing significantly worse than before.
I struggle to assign winning tournaments in this environment the same value as winning tournaments 5 or 10 years ago.
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EPT
