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To achieve greatness you must make the difference between playing to win and playing to learn. When you're laddering you're not really playing to win, of course you will try to win the game, but you only reason for really wanting to win is to show people you've improved.
Stop thinking like that. I remember when MorroW switched races from Terran to Zerg. Whenever he made a silly mistake (which didn't mean he would've lost and he would most likely win vs his opponent anyway) he left the game. Why? He want to learn the game correctly, and it's with that mindset you will improve in a very rapid and solid fashion. Do not think of your loses as you being worse than them or whatever they dont give them any emotional value simply see them as resources since you clearly lost because you made a mistake and was punished for it.
What I am trying to say is: Don't care about losing some stupid ladder game, care about yourself instead.
Peace bro and gl hf with your improving ^^
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On September 14 2011 06:14 L_Master wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 04:58 Half wrote:
bullshit. you aren't top league because you're afraid to find out the limits of your talent, and pin your lack of success to a lack of effort,a ubiquitous yet common commodity in surplus in the world. Those who have no talent; Well they have nothing to lose.
Nice brag post though. Sorry for being blunt it'll help you in the long run. Your status as "only" a diamond player is less than impressive as well. Uhh....what? Afraid to find out how good you can be? That makes no sense whatsoever, or maybe I just don't understand what it is your trying to say here.
Because if he hits a certain rank and can't go above that, he will realise that his talent has a limit, it can only take him so far. Maybe on a subconscious level, he doesn't want to find out whether he's the best or not, because if he isn't the best then what's the point?
(This is something I just made up considering the OP, etc)
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Good read.
Idd, this is just like looking in the mirror, but I'm the hard worker and my friend is u. I got into masters in this season, he is stucked in diamond! YAY
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On September 14 2011 06:14 L_Master wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 04:58 Half wrote:
bullshit. you aren't top league because you're afraid to find out the limits of your talent, and pin your lack of success to a lack of effort,a ubiquitous yet common commodity in surplus in the world. Those who have no talent; Well they have nothing to lose.
Nice brag post though. Sorry for being blunt it'll help you in the long run. Your status as "only" a diamond player is less than impressive as well. Uhh....what? Afraid to find out how good you can be? That makes no sense whatsoever, or maybe I just don't understand what it is your trying to say here.
I understand what hes saying completely because I fall under that mentality as well. If you do your best and find out you aren't at the very top; it can be devastating in its own way.
You grow up with parents/people telling you you're special and the best and then the real world comes in and you either choose to try and be the best you can be and live with that, or lie to yourself that you could be the best if you just tried, then not try so you never really find out. I think it happens to a fair number of us.
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I don't think there's much of a talent factor in starcraft until the highest levels. Things like mechanics/game sense are achieved through experience/practice; nobody really has those as innate traits.
If you've ever played BW you no longer have an ego for most competitive games. Everyone in BW started at D rank, and when they'd gotten 200 APM and read tons of strategy guides and mastered their builds they were still D+ or C-. And then, even if you made it to the top level of foreign level starcraft after lots and lots of practice, you knew any random korean B teamer or amateur could smash you 99 times out of 100. And then, pro gamers could smash any of those people 90 times out of 100 and the top tier ones have an 80% win rate vs those progamers.
In a game where there's a pretty high skill ceiling, it's hard to have an ego for me because you can't imagine doing what the pros do. Being above average in the lowest bracket of skill for the game is not something to have an ego about anyways.
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ketomai,would you be surprise that it really takes some talent just to figure out what you have figured out. Many people doesn't even have enough talents to realize they don't have talents.
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I like your username. Definite provides quite the mental image.
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On September 14 2011 07:37 rei wrote:
ketomai,would you be surprise that it really takes some talent just to figure out what you have figured out. Many people doesn't even have enough talents to realize they don't have talents.
I'm getting that you're saying talent plays a bigger role in learning starcraft than I give it credit for.
There's some talent while learning starcraft, yes, but I'm sure Mozart didn't instantly play Bach within the first week he could touch a piano. Mechanical skill is pretty much the biggest thing you have to learn while learning starcraft, I don't think anyone has talent in that because practice/repetition is required to learn it and nothing else (stronger wrists!!?!). That's why I'm skeptical to call even someone who has an extrapolated version of whatever the OP has talented because there's no such thing in gold or platinum league.
Things like game sense, I can see there being talent involved, but once again, that's not even relevant until higher levels of play. Until then, the thing that separates most people are mechanics and builds, which you can get without any talent whatsoever. Like the things that separate the top tier BW pros are pretty much always game sense. Everyone has perfect micro/macro at that level because it's a given that you practiced your ass off to get it.
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There are different talents for different tasks in our world, the talent we speak of in the context of starcraft is the ability to always make the right decision consistently under high pressure. It has nothing to do with mechanics, being strong mechanically at starcraft comes form practice, that's what Idra has, and talent is what idra lacks, his talents are what limited him from getting anywhere in korean BW scene, not his efforts.
Some people said that hard work practice can overcome talents, if you put that in context of bw and sc2, you can think of someone who practices so much that he experienced literally every known cheese, every known all-in and every known timing attack there is, and learned from his mistakes on how to deal with them. That's the limits and peak of what someone without talent is capable of by practicing his ass off. But such player will get conquer when someone throw something totally unknown to him, or trick him into thinking the wrong thing, especially when they are under pressure, there will be a lot of mistakes.
and about talent only matters on higher levels of play, you are right on that, we shouldn't even speak of talent for those who doesn't have the mechanics to achieve top 200 in NA. when mechanics are solid and only thing that separates winning and losing between the 2 player who are equal in mechanics would be their decision making.
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On the topic of setting aside Ego to spend more time actually playing the game, I believe I've finally reached the equilibrium of not caring and wanting to play. I was also working on this back in my ICCUP days, where I'd spend 20 minutes gearing up to play one or two games and be done for a couple of days.
What changed since then was watching life pass by around me. There's no time to get emotional over "small" things, when I know people getting married, losing jobs, getting jobs, making babies, losing partners... when I want to play, I'll just play. As Day[9] mentioned in his AMA, "don't spend time in deliberation." If Starcraft is competitive, there WILL BE wins and losses; Happiness and Sadness (and.. RAAAAAGGGGEEEE). But life is a roller coaster anyways. Spin your teacup!
And of course... with a grain of salt. This is just my experience I want to share.
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On September 14 2011 05:56 Blazinghand wrote:Show nested quote +On September 14 2011 05:51 Twistacles wrote:
If there was no talent, then wouldn't everyone learn at an equal pace? If they put in the same effort, yes-- but remember that it's not "practice makes perfect," it's "good, dedicated practice makes perfect."
It's a fact that some people learn faster than others. All through my High School years I was in the toughest classes and watched people struggle through classes, going to tutorial, asking questions, doing the hw, ect ect ect, while I was half-asleep in class. I got better grades than all those people. In fact, the only person who had superior grades than me was a girl who, no matter her natural intelligence, worked as hard as she humanly could. She probably had a 99% global average too. Yes she worked hard, but some people worked just as hard and had much, much lower grades.
This simply goes to show that some people can pick up things faster than others. Some people *suck* in sport and they could work hard at it and never be good. Think about your gym class. There's always those kids that picked up a football for the first time and managed to make a nice cigar after a few throws. They're naturals. That's what the op means when he talks about natural talent. You're not good at things you've never tried, obviously, but you'll improve much faster than anyone else.
I've always looked at those people who work their ass off and felt sorry for them, mainly because I could pull off what they did without any effort. Twist makes a very valid point when he says that this has limitations. I'm currently in University and regardless of my natural ability for learning, I still have to study a lot to fully understand the material. Those people who used to study more than me still need to, yet the gap has shortened. It's the same thing in anything else in life. The better you get at something, the more it is based on the amount of effort you put into it rather than your natural abilities.
Dear Twist, your ego is your biggest ally, as it is for me. My ego is my primary motivation whenever I work. You've watched me in Cegep and there are some classes I worked very hard for my grade. I don't actually give a shit about a number man. Hard work is actually so satisfying, it keeps me going in life. I challenge myself all the time and rarely fail because I know my ego can't take the hit, and of course I know that if anyone can do this, I can.
And so, no matter how shameful a loss was, it's easy to requeue when you understand that the you don't lose when you fail to achieve victory. When you close your game out of frustration and give up, that's when you lose.
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I don't mean to be harsh and I wish you the very best. These are my thoughts on your OP:
I think the post with the fear point on page 1 is the best one. You may very well be super talented at this game, but constantly telling yourself you're very talented and you've just never applied yourself masks a real fear of failure. Calling it an Ego issue I think is lying to yourself. After all, no man wants to admit he's afraid.
And it's nothing to be ashamed of - fear of failure is prevalent in every part of society. How many hipsters at coffee shops think to themselves "I'm brilliant, if I only put my all into guitar I'd be the next hendrix". The same applies to professional athletes - it seems like every professional team has that player who's "enigmatic" or doesn't work that hard and has good results once in a while or is the one everyone is "waiting to break out" but never does. Lastly, in HS/College/life, there are plenty of guys who won't ask a girl out because that means putting themselves out there and finding out they're "not good enough".
That being said, you can conquer fear of failure easily. How? Just by doing whatever it is over and over again. I'm not saying you'll succeed and be the next Flash, but when you've given your absolute all there won't be any shame in losing any more - your ego won't be hurt because you'll be proud of yourself for going after it 100%. I think your friend Steel (seeing his last post) is there with his approach to SC2/life.
Cheers dude. Go out there and get GM - I'll be rooting for you.
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stop thinking you got natural talent LOL
plats nothing to be proud of
it took me a month to get to diamond for me
and i only played 100 games lool
EDIT: once i got to diamond i kept playing and after a buncha hard laddering i got to mid high masters through working hard and talent EZ
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I have to agree with 1a, though it might be a bit harsh, I don't think you have "natural talent". Also natural talent can only take you so far, hard work is the ONLY way to go in order to be the best at anything.
You have a case of ladder anxiety, as do many people, your friend Steel has just learned the rule that humans live by (but don't nearly acknowledge enough) in order to learn: failure teaches more than success.
I'm kind of the same as you, Steel, in regards to school. I always fucked around in high school, didn't study, didn't pay attention, and yet I still managed to get in top 5 of every class. I used to laugh at the people that used to work their asses off just to get a similar or slightly higher grade than I did, but now I envy them. I thought when I entered university that I could do the same thing as I did in high school and breeze by with similar grades. But I was wrong, the hardest part of me adjusting to university was learning how to learn, I had to teach myself how to study, how to actually learn things by working hard.
I've come to realize the higher the difficulty of anything requires more attention, more hard work, and more dedication. I don't believe in "talent", I think it's highly overrated. Talent can only take you so far, look at Flash, Jaedong, Bisu, or Einstein for instance, sure they're geniuses at what they do (or did), but they certainly didn't get there by just appearing and slacking off. Flash, Jaedong, Bisu all practice for like what , 12 hours a day? How many times did Einstein fail at an experiment before he came up with something that would amaze someone? Hundreds? Thousands?
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On September 15 2011 05:13 1a wrote:
stop thinking you got natural talent LOL
plats nothing to be proud of
it took me a month to get to diamond for me
and i only played 100 games lool
EDIT: once i got to diamond i kept playing and after a buncha hard laddering i got to mid high masters through working hard and talent EZ
Diamond didn't exist back in the beta, way to miss the point. Platinum WAS the highest league.
On September 15 2011 08:26 The-Ice-Inside wrote:
I'm kind of the same as you, Steel, in regards to school. I always fucked around in high school, didn't study, didn't pay attention, and yet I still managed to get in top 5 of every class. I used to laugh at the people that used to work their asses off just to get a similar or slightly higher grade than I did, but now I envy them. I thought when I entered university that I could do the same thing as I did in high school and breeze by with similar grades. But I was wrong, the hardest part of me adjusting to university was learning how to learn, I had to teach myself how to study, how to actually learn things by working hard.
I had the same problem in College aswell, and it took a big fuck-up (failing a class) to finally get my shit together. Hard to do.
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On September 14 2011 03:59 Twistacles wrote:
Talent and Hard Work. Used together, one can master or do anything, quickly. Hard work alone will achieve the same results. Talent, however, is a mixed bag.
I come to you today as someone that, if categorized, would fall under 'natural talent.' I write to tell you how bittersweet this gift really is. Or, if you're like me, maybe we can relate to eachother.
I've always been 'good' at video games. Well, most of anything, really, if it captured my interest. Whether it was Counterstrike, Battlefield, Starcraft, anything. I've never picked up a game I like and not soared to the top percentiles within ~2 months. I never truly got to the tip-top of anything, however, because this very talent that helped me become good was hindering me in other ways.
How can this be?
Well, let's make an analogy to starcraft, shall we?
I picked up this game in the beta, having never played an RTS in my life. Within a few days I was already gold, and I didn't even know warpgate technology existed. (LoL) I really enioyed the game, but for the first few months I didn't take it that seriously. I did, however, reach platinum, at the same time as my friend, Steel.
What's peculiar about this situation is that for every game I would play, Steel would play 3. or 4. Steel is the perfect example of a hard-worker, someone who can keep plugging away at something for the sake of hard work- wins weren't that important. As such, he isn't an ego-centric person.
I, however, am. Immensely. Being able to crush 90% of people's faces at anything, with little practice, tends to bolster the ego. To disproportionate heights. This causes many problems, though none are apparent immediately.
Fast forward a year. The game is released, it's been a few months, and I'm still at the same relative skill as my friend. He, however, is still plugging much more time into the game than I am.
"How do you do it? I get so mad when I lose, I can't do more than like 4-5 games a day" I say.
He shrugs. "Sometimes it bothers me, but it's not bad. I just re-queue."
At this point in time, he's invested much more time into the game than I have (though I have put considerable time myself) and it's starting to show. Slowly, as the months creep by, he starts winning more and more games when we practice. And the trend never stops. I see this and practice harder and harder to keep up, but by now it's too late.
This trend isn't exclusive to my friend, but to all of ladder. For people like myself, it's only going to get worse unless we learn humility, or how to get our ego out of the game. We stagnate on ladder, whereas hard workers improve. We rage quit, they re queue. They get promoted, we get demoted. To improve we must lose, but our ego can't take that. What happened to our dominance? What happened to our face crushing ability?
It's gone, and the only way to get it back is hard work and practice, and that's the hardest lesson of all. Especially for people like me.
I say, if you're anything like me, join me. Let's learn to cast aside our egos, and let's turn this talent into results.
I was this exact way with World of Warcraft for a while (wow's community as a whole is a complete cess pool compared to tl).
I came back to playing sc2 (finally was able to afford a new computer) and I was really really bad, I had forgotten so much muscle memory that all I could do was 2 rax (and I would forget to expand too).
It was very frustrating at first, but I knew I was bad, and that the only way I can get better was to play and lose and then watch my replay to see what I did wrong that might not have been obvious.
I'm now master league after 2 months of playing catch up.
Though my friend who's played like 100+ games is still platinum and just can't get over his own flaws and just blames imbalance. With sc2 your games played doesn't really matter if you don't improve at all.
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On September 14 2011 06:17 Mr_Wo_Ot wrote:
To achieve greatness you must make the difference between playing to win and playing to learn. When you're laddering you're not really playing to win, of course you will try to win the game, but you only reason for really wanting to win is to show people you've improved.
Stop thinking like that. I remember when MorroW switched races from Terran to Zerg. Whenever he made a silly mistake (which didn't mean he would've lost and he would most likely win vs his opponent anyway) he left the game. Why? He want to learn the game correctly, and it's with that mindset you will improve in a very rapid and solid fashion. Do not think of your loses as you being worse than them or whatever they dont give them any emotional value simply see them as resources since you clearly lost because you made a mistake and was punished for it.
What I am trying to say is: Don't care about losing some stupid ladder game, care about yourself instead.
Peace bro and gl hf with your improving ^^
Anyone that leaves early instead of playing it out is a loser and a quitter that will never amount to anything significant except for a little niche of success that serves to somewhat ease the hunger of failure that they experience on a daily basis.
How the fuck can you "Learn" the game correctly if you don't tough it out through your mistakes?
ANYBODY, can be playing well when they're playing perfect (As obvious as this may seem), the difference between the truly great and the never-will-be is the way that they play in the situation of discomfort and adversity (your 3rd exp is destroyed, your opponent just took and secured his 4th)
You want to be good at something? Accept that you're fucking shit and improve from there, don't think you're good and think you deserve success and that anything that would otherwise contradict it is simply wrong because you are you! You're special, jk you're shit.
Boxer is the most obvious example of this, he NEVER ggs early and never quits until the opposing army has destroyed pretty much everything but his main base.
Same goes for Slayers_Dragon, even with every single scv in his base killed by helion harass he kept playing and eventually came back to win the game.
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