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Northern Ireland26262 Posts
On August 14 2025 14:08 Charoisaur wrote:Show nested quote +On August 14 2025 08:00 WombaT wrote:On August 14 2025 00:35 Charoisaur wrote:On August 13 2025 22:32 WombaT wrote:On August 13 2025 22:02 Charoisaur wrote:
Trap won 6 premier tournaments + NeXT Winter which also had a stacked field during a time span of 7 months. During those runs he beat everyone including winning bo7s against Serral, Reynor and Stats. He was by all means the strongest player in the scene during that period.
Serral btw back then had a weaker phase and didn't win a single tournament during those 7 months (being knocked out twice by Trap). It's absolutely revisionist history to say Serral was still stronger at that time
Who said Serral was stronger? One assesses favourites for tournaments blind going in, one assesses who was stronger over a period afterwards. If Trap wins 7 tournaments in a period in which Serral wins 0 tournaments, then he should be the favorite over Serral in the next given tournament, no? Should somebody be the favourite, and them actually being the favourite don’t always match up. I have quite good memories of this period, being a Protoss lad, and being a Trap fan of like, continually saying Trap was being slept on. Why I did that? Because many posters absolutely were sleeping on him, I remember it quite well. One, completely understandable reason why at that time was, when it came to the big final(s) in GSL he got butchered in PvZ, and there were many good Zergs around. And, with his Super Tournament wins, Serral and Reynor weren’t there. Excellent PvP, the best PvT, and a decent PvZ that sometimes faltered against elite ZvPers. The latter is kind of a problem if, at the time the field of consistent tournament contenders and winners is stacked with Zerg. Trap absolutely answered those questions on his run, he was generally not the tournament favourite actually going into any of them though. Results absolutely count overall as well, but there’s a ‘form is temporary, class is permanent’ element to favourites too, especially at the big events. Rogue could be posting mediocre results, but it’s a WC, it’s Rogue. Maru had a pretty atrocious 2025 but people still felt he was a champ contender for EWC. I actually think he showed that some of that faith was merited, but made a few flubs against Cure. Which was a bit of a shame, the two biggest ‘unknowns’ I wanted to see, namely what Maru could bring to the table, and if Clem’s PvT could really cut it in a high stakes, WC tier playoff match, I didn’t get to. Well, I think we have to agree to disagree here about the favorite thing. But even if some people still considered Serral the favorite in every tournament back then, it definitely was far from an unanimous opinion.
Well yeah if you wanna make up arguments and factoids we can agree to disagree.
Given I’m the only person in the thread to even attempted to ascertain who was the favourite via betting odds in that span. Data that was too patchy for my tastes.
And I even said ‘Serral wasn’t the favourite for every tournament’, outright so, I dunno where you’re getting that from.
Anyway what I got was largely what I’d expected. I’ll note I skimmed and didn’t super deep-dive:
1. Serral was not always the favourite. Maru was the favourite for Kato 2019 for example, and understandably so
2. He was the favourite most often though, and his average given odds are the best.
Serral not being the favourite in a tournament, if we’re going down this rabbit hole, as per GOAT chat only realty matters if a direct rival is the favourite
If it’s Trap for a bit, Dark for a bit I mean, it’s not Maru either.
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On August 14 2025 08:00 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On August 14 2025 00:35 Charoisaur wrote:On August 13 2025 22:32 WombaT wrote:On August 13 2025 22:02 Charoisaur wrote:
Trap won 6 premier tournaments + NeXT Winter which also had a stacked field during a time span of 7 months. During those runs he beat everyone including winning bo7s against Serral, Reynor and Stats. He was by all means the strongest player in the scene during that period.
Serral btw back then had a weaker phase and didn't win a single tournament during those 7 months (being knocked out twice by Trap). It's absolutely revisionist history to say Serral was still stronger at that time
Who said Serral was stronger? One assesses favourites for tournaments blind going in, one assesses who was stronger over a period afterwards. If Trap wins 7 tournaments in a period in which Serral wins 0 tournaments, then he should be the favorite over Serral in the next given tournament, no? Should somebody be the favourite, and them actually being the favourite don’t always match up. I have quite good memories of this period, being a Protoss lad, and being a Trap fan of like, continually saying Trap was being slept on. Why I did that? Because many posters absolutely were sleeping on him, I remember it quite well. One, completely understandable reason why at that time was, when it came to the big final(s) in GSL he got butchered in PvZ, and there were many good Zergs around. And, with his Super Tournament wins, Serral and Reynor weren’t there. Excellent PvP, the best PvT, and a decent PvZ that sometimes faltered against elite ZvPers. The latter is kind of a problem if, at the time the field of consistent tournament contenders and winners is stacked with Zerg. Trap absolutely answered those questions on his run, he was generally not the tournament favourite actually going into any of them though. Results absolutely count overall as well, but there’s a ‘form is temporary, class is permanent’ element to favourites too, especially at the big events. Rogue could be posting mediocre results, but it’s a WC, it’s Rogue. Maru had a pretty atrocious 2025 but people still felt he was a champ contender for EWC. I actually think he showed that some of that faith was merited, but made a few flubs against Cure. Which was a bit of a shame, the two biggest ‘unknowns’ I wanted to see, namely what Maru could bring to the table, and if Clem’s PvT could really cut it in a high stakes, WC tier playoff match, I didn’t get to.
That’s also what makes Serral so great. Most players peak and have their moment for a couple months (most less than a year). However Serral been able to maintain this form for 7 years and counting
Also it’s safe to say (based on all the weekly cups) Clem’s pvt is good against everyone except Maru (which we haven’t seen yet). I have yet to see any Protoss that correctly win against a late game against Terran’s mass liberator with ghost support
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Exactly.
And as WombaT pointed out... Serral (and Reynor) didn't play in the GSL Supers which are 3 of the 6 tournaments that Trap won in that time frame. Serral won DH Winter Finals versus Stats in the Finals (where Trap placed 9th-12th) and was closely defeated by Trap in Last Chance two months later. Then Trap went on to win the GSL Supers, so if we count the tournaments where Serral participated and Trap went into as - perhaps - a slight favorite we have 2 or 3 at most, if any at all.
Even if we look at singular tournaments where Serral wasn't the favorite... he was the favorite for most of the tournaments in comparison to all other players, so I don't really understand what this extremely small time frame or tournament count should prove.
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On August 14 2025 14:37 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On August 14 2025 14:08 Charoisaur wrote:On August 14 2025 08:00 WombaT wrote:On August 14 2025 00:35 Charoisaur wrote:On August 13 2025 22:32 WombaT wrote:On August 13 2025 22:02 Charoisaur wrote:
Trap won 6 premier tournaments + NeXT Winter which also had a stacked field during a time span of 7 months. During those runs he beat everyone including winning bo7s against Serral, Reynor and Stats. He was by all means the strongest player in the scene during that period.
Serral btw back then had a weaker phase and didn't win a single tournament during those 7 months (being knocked out twice by Trap). It's absolutely revisionist history to say Serral was still stronger at that time
Who said Serral was stronger? One assesses favourites for tournaments blind going in, one assesses who was stronger over a period afterwards. If Trap wins 7 tournaments in a period in which Serral wins 0 tournaments, then he should be the favorite over Serral in the next given tournament, no? Should somebody be the favourite, and them actually being the favourite don’t always match up. I have quite good memories of this period, being a Protoss lad, and being a Trap fan of like, continually saying Trap was being slept on. Why I did that? Because many posters absolutely were sleeping on him, I remember it quite well. One, completely understandable reason why at that time was, when it came to the big final(s) in GSL he got butchered in PvZ, and there were many good Zergs around. And, with his Super Tournament wins, Serral and Reynor weren’t there. Excellent PvP, the best PvT, and a decent PvZ that sometimes faltered against elite ZvPers. The latter is kind of a problem if, at the time the field of consistent tournament contenders and winners is stacked with Zerg. Trap absolutely answered those questions on his run, he was generally not the tournament favourite actually going into any of them though. Results absolutely count overall as well, but there’s a ‘form is temporary, class is permanent’ element to favourites too, especially at the big events. Rogue could be posting mediocre results, but it’s a WC, it’s Rogue. Maru had a pretty atrocious 2025 but people still felt he was a champ contender for EWC. I actually think he showed that some of that faith was merited, but made a few flubs against Cure. Which was a bit of a shame, the two biggest ‘unknowns’ I wanted to see, namely what Maru could bring to the table, and if Clem’s PvT could really cut it in a high stakes, WC tier playoff match, I didn’t get to. Well, I think we have to agree to disagree here about the favorite thing. But even if some people still considered Serral the favorite in every tournament back then, it definitely was far from an unanimous opinion. Well yeah if you wanna make up arguments and factoids we can agree to disagree. Given I’m the only person in the thread to even attempted to ascertain who was the favourite via betting odds in that span. Data that was too patchy for my tastes. And I even said ‘Serral wasn’t the favourite for every tournament’, outright so, I dunno where you’re getting that from. Show nested quote + Anyway what I got was largely what I’d expected. I’ll note I skimmed and didn’t super deep-dive:
1. Serral was not always the favourite. Maru was the favourite for Kato 2019 for example, and understandably so
2. He was the favourite most often though, and his average given odds are the best. Serral not being the favourite in a tournament, if we’re going down this rabbit hole, as per GOAT chat only realty matters if a direct rival is the favourite If it’s Trap for a bit, Dark for a bit I mean, it’s not Maru either.
Well, the statement that Serral was the favorite in every tournament he entered was what started this whole argument. If you disagree with that statement, I'm not sure what we're arguing about here, but I guess then we agree to agree.
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The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created 
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On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created
In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016.
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I always read (and thoroughly enjoyed) these articles mainly as a celebration of the decades+ of content Starcraft has given us. I think Mizenhauer's closing remarks reflected that:
When Maru made his debut in the first open season of Code S at the age of 13, we all hoped for future greatness. None of us would have expected for his story and the history of professional StarCraft II to become one and the same. And, that is why Maru deserves to be called the GOAT. Expansions are released, patches are applied, and players come and go. But even as the days, months, and years have flown by, Maru has remained immutable. He is the lone constant, the Greatest of All Time.
I don't read any of that as an authoritative claim, but more as a narrative choice - that paragraph could only really have been written about one player, and since this was as much about celebrating the history of the game, the final piece had to be about someone who was there every step of the way.
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Northern Ireland26262 Posts
On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016.
Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for.
Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has.
In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally.
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On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally.
I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses...
Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk.
I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before.
+ Show Spoiler +
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Northern Ireland26262 Posts
On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:Show nested quote +On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler +
Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric.
It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration.
The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in.
Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too.
Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever.
Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that.
Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic.
And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent.
I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent.
My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition.
I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things.
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United States1913 Posts
On August 17 2025 00:50 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler + Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric. It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration. The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in. Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too. Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever. Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that. Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic. And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent. I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent. My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition. I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things.
Region lock worked!
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On August 17 2025 04:27 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On August 17 2025 00:50 WombaT wrote:On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler + Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric. It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration. The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in. Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too. Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever. Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that. Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic. And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent. I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent. My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition. I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things. Region lock worked!
It definitely achieved what was desired.
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On August 17 2025 04:27 Mizenhauer wrote:Show nested quote +On August 17 2025 00:50 WombaT wrote:On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler + Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric. It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration. The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in. Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too. Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever. Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that. Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic. And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent. I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent. My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition. I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things. Region lock worked!
Which saved the scene for many years, since the Korean scene was dying due to their own fault. Matchmixing, uneven prize pool distribution etc
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Maru reigned when SC2 competitiveness was at its height. The competition was 100 times fiercer. Serral has dominated in an era that is not even comparable. You already lose the GOAT discussion right there imo
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On August 17 2025 21:24 Drahkn wrote:
Maru reigned when SC2 competitiveness was at its height. The competition was 100 times fiercer. Serral has dominated in an era that is not even comparable. You already lose the GOAT discussion right there imo
Your argument would have more strength, if you specified the years of Maru’s dominance.
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United States1913 Posts
On August 17 2025 16:28 TeamMamba wrote:Show nested quote +On August 17 2025 04:27 Mizenhauer wrote:On August 17 2025 00:50 WombaT wrote:On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler + Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric. It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration. The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in. Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too. Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever. Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that. Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic. And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent. I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent. My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition. I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things. Region lock worked! Which saved the scene for many years, since the Korean scene was dying due to their own fault. Matchmixing, uneven prize pool distribution etc
It's not really their fault that people stopped playing sc 2 and started playing league. The last KeSPA draft was held in 2013 and, of the six player drafted, Bunny is the only one who did anything individually. The players a) stopped coming in and b) the ones that did try didn't have the ability to catch up to established pros (stagnant water theory).
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On August 17 2025 16:28 TeamMamba wrote:Show nested quote +On August 17 2025 04:27 Mizenhauer wrote:On August 17 2025 00:50 WombaT wrote:On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler + Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric. It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration. The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in. Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too. Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever. Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that. Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic. And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent. I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent. My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition. I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things. Region lock worked! Which saved the scene for many years, since the Korean scene was dying due to their own fault. Matchmixing, uneven prize pool distribution etc
I mean it's not like the foreign scene was/is running organically. Blizz/esl were pumping money in. So I would say while it is slightly healthier it's not like the foreign scene was popping and the kr scene was just dead.
The kr scene obviously took a huge nose dive because without pro league how is it possible to sustain the amount of players who were playing? And then I do agree that the prize pool distribution is a factor because unless you are a top top player you probably won't make much if any money in the individual tournaments
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On August 17 2025 00:50 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler + Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric. It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration. The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in. Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too. Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever. Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that. Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic. And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent. I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent. My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition. I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things.
I'm not sure what you're arguing against.
I wasn't trying to sing the praises of KeSPA or their corporate teams. They had plenty of problems.
But the fact remains that since then our scene has fewer top tier players, fewer top tier teams, fewer top tier tournaments, shallower top tier tournaments, fewer viewers, less outside interest and less (outside of Saudi sportswashing) tournament money.
How is that a scene aging well?
It's aged poorly.
Like milk.
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On August 17 2025 21:24 Drahkn wrote:
Maru reigned when SC2 competitiveness was at its height. The competition was 100 times fiercer. Serral has dominated in an era that is not even comparable. You already lose the GOAT discussion right there imo
lol when is Maru reign of dominance? Pre 2018 he was nothing but a gatekeeper. Maru started to dominated Korea starting 2018, but that was the same time Serral dominated Maru for 7 years and counting
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Northern Ireland26262 Posts
On August 18 2025 04:19 MJG wrote:Show nested quote +On August 17 2025 00:50 WombaT wrote:On August 16 2025 21:03 MJG wrote:On August 16 2025 11:12 WombaT wrote:On August 15 2025 22:52 MJG wrote:On August 15 2025 22:30 TropicalHaze wrote:The discussion here has gone to a weird direction of "was Serral #1 player for every single second, minute and hour counting from 2018 to now". The main point being IMO that we can easily agree that for the most part he was and still is and taking a look at the thread we are currently on - in hindsight calling Maru #1 has aged like a milk even though it was already a controversial pick back when this thread was created In hindsight the SC2 scene has aged like milk since 2016. Aye, it’s a shame everyone forgot how to play the game after 2016, and there weren’t innumerable tournaments with good prize pools for progamers to shoot for. Personally I think for a game’s pro scene to be legitimate, Korean players should have the advantage of sponsored team houses, that nobody else has. In a game with both a bigger playerbase and viewer base internationally. I must have hallucinated the EG Lair and all the other foreign team houses... Speaking of EG, and of Koreans competing against Foreigners, a mid-tournament series like Jaedong vs. NaNiwa probably generated a dozen times more interest than the entirety of EWC did. That's what I'm referring to when I say that the scene aged like milk. I'm still passionate about this game, despite all of its many flaws, but I'm not going to fool myself into the belief that what we have now is anywhere near as great as what came before. + Show Spoiler + Proleague’s numbers weren’t always stellar, if we’re going off interest as a metric. It’s a competition I personally loved, and also loved what the Kespa teams brought. But also, something of a distorting aberration. The scene has always been more individual than team focused, by a huge margin, and regular international LANs a huge part. Kespa come in, Proleague is king now, to the degree it’s prioritised over things fans are more invested in. Another problem, it wasn’t organically sustainable. So you get a dual problem where foreigners (the bigger audience and playerbase) can’t compete for a while really, but also that that system gave Kespa players a basically insurmountable edge versus the next Korean generation too. Going back to team houses, foreign ones did exist, but as per my previous post on the scene not being team competition focused, you see problems in maximising that. And how some of their rosters look. EG being one example. InControl (RIP) brings a ton of value to EG in various capacities, and fully merits his place, but say, Idra isn’t going to hugely level up grinding games against him. And many foreign rosters look similar, to this day. A big hitter or two, a solid pro or two, and a few guys who can play, but are there for other reasons, a historic staple, they help manage the team or whatever. Another problem is, there isn’t an atypically strong non-Korean country, so where do you do a team house? If, arbitrarily speaking Korea had 20/30 of the top players, and say, France had 5/30, well you’d probably have some French all-star team, which would be a lot of fun given how passionate the French fans are! But we don’t have that. Say Basilisk wanted to make a team house environment. Who’s moving, and to where? Serral doesn’t seem to much like spending too long at a time outside Finland, Reynor seems more down with travel. Trigger’s likely going to have to suck it up and cross the Atlantic. And just players. They tend to be young so not too many kiddos are around, but partners might not want to relocate to another country or continent. I’m not ragging on Kespa, although it may appear thus! But not my intent. My contention is merely that the scene is potentially healthier without it. One of the problems is that nobody put up plans and money to enable that transition. I’d argue if it were any other game, and Korea wasn’t historically StarCraft Mecca, people would be way more critical about how Kespa went about things. I'm not sure what you're arguing against. I wasn't trying to sing the praises of KeSPA or their corporate teams. They had plenty of problems. But the fact remains that since then our scene has fewer top tier players, fewer top tier teams, fewer top tier tournaments, shallower top tier tournaments, fewer viewers, less outside interest and less (outside of Saudi sportswashing) tournament money. How is that a scene aging well? It's aged poorly. Like milk.
Fewer top players, fewer top tier tournaments wasn’t a problem for at least some of the post-Kespa years.
I don’t believe it’s your position, I’m arguing against the idea that everything post-Kespa is completely devalued that some espouse.
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