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On November 17 2013 00:27 esdf wrote:Show nested quote +On November 16 2013 23:18 Ouija wrote:On November 16 2013 22:33 esdf wrote:didn't really care much about your team or you up till now, and didn't really mind all the negative attitude towards it. was always nice seeing you guys compete in teamleagues (as Ax-Acer) or individual ones. but this, 4) If it were not our players "taking away opportunities" it would be other Korean players. Our players knock other Korean players out of Premier league just as much as they do foreigners. The system is at fault. If not us, some other Korean players. There are plenty lining up to do it. There may be more next year. Heck I think the only thing keeping a lot of them away from WCS America is the fact that it's becoming the strongest tournament outside of Korea. If it were easy to descend on the easiest WCS region, that being Europe, I'm sure they would, but massive RO32 lag disadvantage alongside travel costs and a lack of facilities in Europe for Korean players keep them at bay, for now. Pulling all of Axioms players from WCS America would not create opportunities for American players while the system remains as broken as it is. So basically, what you're saying is that you know it's wrong, you know what's wrong, and you still decide to "abuse" it because if not you then some other guy will? I agree, pulling all of Ax players from WCSAM won't create opportunities for native players, but such a proponent of growing a local scene like yourself should do whatever is in your power to help it grow. Instead, you're using a bullshit excuse for doing it and at the same time propheticising about importance of local, homegrown talent & scene. :D C'mon...  He is not "abusing" the system. All TB is doing is trying to put his players in the best possible position to be successful(which is his job as manager of Team Axiom). Blizzard created this WCS system which in his opinion should be fixed, so just because that's what he feels you think his players should be punished for it by not allowing them to play in the region they qualified for? On Blizzard's WCS website they clearly state that they encourage players to choose their own region to play in rather than creating residency requirements. I'm simply saying that he should not preach about growing a local scene while he's one of the guys preventing that growth. Simple as that.
It's not his choice which region Axiom plays in, it's the players, and it's TB's job to allow them the opportunities that he's capable of providing. That is his duty, not sacrificing his own players careers just for some pyrrhic stand.
But I'm sure actual reality isn't as fun for you to be a drama-whore over.
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How exactly does "fixing" WCS improve the quality of the matches on display?
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On November 17 2013 01:55 blackone wrote:Show nested quote +On November 17 2013 00:07 Garnet wrote:
I agree with your point that there should be some kind of region lock, but your examples are cringe-worthy. American baseball is NOT the best in the world. Barcelona and Juventus would not stomp everything in Premier League. Barca is only slightly better than the top teams, and Juventus is on par with them. Especially since SC2 is not a team sport. And in almost every individual sport, all top level tournaments are open to players from the entire world. There's no "Americans only" rule in the US Open. If there was a country that had all the best tennis players, they'd win every major tournament in the world because they can participate in all of them. Same story for golf, or track&field etc. Most of those sports have national championships and/or the olympics on top of that, but I can't think of a popular professional individual sport where the main competitions are region based. People want to see Nadal/Federer/Djokovic in Wimbledon, the US Open, the French Open and the Australian Open, because they're the best.
Your analogy is flawed... There's a great differance between tennis and star craft and you can see it in almost every post on this site.
It's the team flags in everyones signature. There are no teams in tennis. Instead, you root for a country. You may even root for a player you never heard of, if he represents your country - quite like with a newly acquired team member.
So the Davis Cup and Fed Cup would be the equivalant to the GSTL, ATC and such. So if nationality is the team, what is the region? What differentiates whole parts of the tennis scene?
Well, there's the ATP and the WTA.
Do you suggest that Federer and Nadal should be allowed to play in the womans tournaments? Would that step up the game and encourage better matches?
Or how about all women have to compete in the ATP?
Sure, there are some who would be capable of doing so, but what would be the result?
Looking at star craft it would be exactly the situation, we have right now with the WCS.
And what is the reality?
There are some people, who also claim, that the ATP is better than the WTA, cause the mens matches have a higher quality and such. But WTA gets better viewer scores cause many people find womens tennis more entertaining.
And there you have your final piece in the analogy.
Koreans are better at the game but many people find foreigners more entertaining to watch, even if it is a "lower level of play"
TB mentioned the unability to spot the difference and the enjoyment of more even matches.
Well, most people can't see the leap of differance in play between the mens and womens finals in a grand slam or just don't bother, cause they just like intense even matches.
And on top of all that, a look at the discussions about prize pools in ATP and WTA shine a great light on discussions about prize pools in region locked tournaments. There's quality of play and entertainment value. They're hard to balance, but it is achieveable and in the end determined by the consumer.
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On November 17 2013 10:46 mishimaBeef wrote:
How exactly does "fixing" WCS improve the quality of the matches on display?
It's easy to say things like "quality of matches" because it's actually a completely nebulous, meaningless buzz term. Already mentioned earlier that I firmly believe most viewers can't actually tell the difference and/or really care about the difference between 2 Americans playing and 2 Koreans playing. A healthier scene will in the long-term elevate everybodies play then you can have all the "quality of matches" you could ask for. If you want "quality of matches", you can watch GSL, where you will see the highest level there is.
Viewers don't want to watch the highest possible level, that's not their priority, just looking at the WCS numbers proves that.
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In BW, the TeamLiquid Star League was a huge event. Koreans weren't allowed to participate in it, and it invigorated the foreign players and everyone wanted to watch, despite them being fans of the Korean pro league; the skill gap between Korean pros and foreigners was HUGE in BW.
If it weren't for "foreigner" only tournaments in BW, there wouldn't be many big names to come out of BW. There wouldn't be fans. Koreans would have won every tournament and even the best of foreigners would have been ridiculed. In SC 2, the gap isn't that big. It's simply big enough to keep the money in Korea and make it hard to devote the time needed to close the gap further.
What makes good games, for the most part, is when players play at an "acceptable"/palatable level, where the players are around the same level, making for close/tense games.
Given that there are Korean tournaments and they have the best players in the world, you can still always watch the best players in the world... As long as there's still tournaments (whether WCS tournaments or not) that satisfy the curiosity of people, where the best foreigners get to play against the Koreans, then everyone wins.
Not all tournaments can be restricted. Not all tournaments can allow everyone. You need moderation and sensibility. At the moment, it's pretty clear which tournaments are needed more of, not less of. And for that, one can only thank totalbiscuit for.
I, personally, have no problem with TB sending his players/allowing them to play in WCS AM. People play by the rules... it's a lot easier to remain quiet about something that is benefiting you than to speak up on it... I haven't seen anyone else speaking up on it, too much, that has benefited from it. Ridiculous that the last person deserving blame seems to often find a way to be the first in line..
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Major kudos for daring to hold controversial personal opinions. Any would-be criticizers with even an ounce of common sense would realize that running the team takes a lot of effort and determination. It's obvious the trollish bandwagon loves their hypocrites. The vitriol characterizes the active posting forumgoers. Those that would like to see Axiom still competing and having great games just read the threads and smile and go on.
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On November 17 2013 12:44 Reteq wrote:Show nested quote +On November 17 2013 01:55 blackone wrote:On November 17 2013 00:07 Garnet wrote:
I agree with your point that there should be some kind of region lock, but your examples are cringe-worthy. American baseball is NOT the best in the world. Barcelona and Juventus would not stomp everything in Premier League. Barca is only slightly better than the top teams, and Juventus is on par with them. Especially since SC2 is not a team sport. And in almost every individual sport, all top level tournaments are open to players from the entire world. There's no "Americans only" rule in the US Open. If there was a country that had all the best tennis players, they'd win every major tournament in the world because they can participate in all of them. Same story for golf, or track&field etc. Most of those sports have national championships and/or the olympics on top of that, but I can't think of a popular professional individual sport where the main competitions are region based. People want to see Nadal/Federer/Djokovic in Wimbledon, the US Open, the French Open and the Australian Open, because they're the best. Your analogy is flawed... There's a great differance between tennis and star craft and you can see it in almost every post on this site. It's the team flags in everyones signature. There are no teams in tennis. Instead, you root for a country. You may even root for a player you never heard of, if he represents your country - quite like with a newly acquired team member. So the Davis Cup and Fed Cup would be the equivalant to the GSTL, ATC and such. So if nationality is the team, what is the region? What differentiates whole parts of the tennis scene? Well, there's the ATP and the WTA. Do you suggest that Federer and Nadal should be allowed to play in the womans tournaments? Would that step up the game and encourage better matches? Or how about all women have to compete in the ATP? Sure, there are some who would be capable of doing so, but what would be the result? Looking at star craft it would be exactly the situation, we have right now with the WCS. And what is the reality? There are some people, who also claim, that the ATP is better than the WTA, cause the mens matches have a higher quality and such. But WTA gets better viewer scores cause many people find womens tennis more entertaining. And there you have your final piece in the analogy. Koreans are better at the game but many people find foreigners more entertaining to watch, even if it is a "lower level of play" TB mentioned the unability to spot the difference and the enjoyment of more even matches. Well, most people can't see the leap of differance in play between the mens and womens finals in a grand slam or just don't bother, cause they just like intense even matches. And on top of all that, a look at the discussions about prize pools in ATP and WTA shine a great light on discussions about prize pools in region locked tournaments. There's quality of play and entertainment value. They're hard to balance, but it is achieveable and in the end determined by the consumer.
You twisted the difference between tennis and Starcraft pros to an incredibly strange place, as though the separation of men and women was the same as region locking. Nationality matters in tennis too, but tennis fans don't favor tilting draws to help players for the sake of ratings.
But tennis certainly has its own problems and maybe Starcraft should go in a different direction.
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On November 15 2013 13:53 Junho.C wrote:Show nested quote +On November 15 2013 13:47 TotalBiscuit wrote:On November 15 2013 13:45 Junho.C wrote:On November 15 2013 13:32 TotalBiscuit wrote:On November 15 2013 13:27 Junho.C wrote:On November 15 2013 13:18 TotalBiscuit wrote:On November 15 2013 13:17 Junho.C wrote:On November 15 2013 13:12 TotalBiscuit wrote:On November 15 2013 13:08 Junho.C wrote:
Impact did not compete in WCS AM S3 because by the time he joined Axiom, WCS AM S3 was already in progress. If your entire team composed of Koreans are competing in WCS AM and taking opportunities away from regional players that you, yourself, are criticizing about. Have the decency to not criticize the format that your team and players are exploiting. Shoutcraft is a very good idea and I'm all for it. But, your two-faced attitude about region lock and developing regions DO NOT help to promote Shoutcraft or your intention of promoting global SC2 as a whole. I like how you didn't bother to respond to any of the things I said at all. Also since you were the person who posted the misconception this blog posts exists to respond to, to begin with I'd have thought you'd put in a bit more effort to refute some of the stuff I just said. Impact is competing in WCS America because he's playing in WCS Korea and qualified for Challenger. Also we very specifically talked about that with him before we even signed him and he wants to play in Korea. There's nothing two-faced about my attitude and the only people saying that are those looking for "gotcha" crap and with too simplistic an understanding of the situation to have good grounds on which to form an opinion. I added this, so consider this as well: Also, you may now defend your team as not America-based. You have previously said that your team is America based when your team first competed in WCS AM. SC2 community also consider your team as American team, as well. Also, there was no misconception about the clear fact that you have criticized WCS system for a long time, yet your team and players have taken advantage of the format and competed in WCS AM for more exposure. This is the obvious thing to do in a business stand point, but you should not criticize the system that your team and players are exploiting. Why should I not criticize the system that our team and players are exploiting? Give me one good reason. Your arguments seem nothing more than purely faux-academic, in the vein of those that think you win arguments by earning fallacy points. That's not how the real world works. Also feel free to find a quote where I said my team was American. I certainly don't remember that, but then I have dyspraxia induced memory problems so hey! I can't easily find a quote from hundreds, if not thousands of messages and comments you've made since then. However, the public awareness of this should suffice as a support for this. If I'm the only one remembering it, the post I've made would not have such an impact. There's no reason why you shouldn't criticize a system you are exploiting, but it is very hypocritical in others' perspective. It's similar to a religious zealot who preach people, yet he does the things that he preaches against. You lose credibility of your argument. Their perspective is bullshit. There is absolutely nothing hypocritical about it and if you can't convince people of that with evidence and reasoning then they're not worthy of your time at all. I think once people get past college age, the realise that any specific ideas and arguments they had regarding "hypocrisy" are purely academic and nothing more than that. There is no scoring system for arguments, you don't get to win by just pulling out a book of fallacies and declaring victory and that's even if you could prove my attitude is hypocritical, which it isn't. Do you consider the millions of people's perspective bull shit? Many news articles have criticized president's Obama for taking actions that goes against the statements and promises before he became president. That is just among countless examples throughout history. Yes, those millions of people are past college age and quite educated. I do support what you are doing to give exposure to the NA players, but your singling out Blizzard and WCS which has helped much to develop the scene while you are taking advantage of it is questionable at best. Especially when all the major tournaments in SC2 eSports have not region locked their tournaments while having the name of the region in their tournament name. I am flabbergasted but not surprised that you would break out a ridiculous comparison like President Obama. People criticized his actions because he made promises he didn't keep (and or did the opposite of). I did not create WCS and have little if any power to change it. Pulling my players from WCS America would do precisely dick. Jeopardising my position as a caster by publicly criticising WCS on the other hand not only has some effect but is actually as a risk to me. Come back to me when you take risks for your beliefs. Then you might have a new appreciation for my position. It had actually 0 effect, as you were hired by Blizzard to cast Hearthstone at Blizzcon. I only used President Obama as an example as he is the one the people will most recognize. While he criticized the surveillance of citizens and allies, he has done precisely the thing he criticized after he became the president. Similar to how you criticized the non region locked system of WCS, yet your team took advantage of it and used it once WCS started. Why have you not addressed my point about the other major tournaments doing similar things long before WCS started? You have not criticized them for not region locking as far as I'm aware.
TotalBiscuit pointed out pretty clearly that he has no control over where his players are going to go, and that he knows the system is flawed but that his professional duty must come before his personal belief. Do you even know how to read?
It's like IdrA with the extended series rule (at an MLG a long time ago). He talked about how stupid the rule was, and yet said (when it was going to benefit him as he had already won a a Bo3): "Yeah, it's a stupid rule, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to take advantage of it".
In the real world, people have to get by doing things that are less than ideal. Get used to that fact, and come out of your fantasy world where it is professionally and economically viable to do only the things your ideal world contains.
Since TotalBiscuit's team is benefiting from the current state of affairs, it's really pathetic logic to show anything but respect for his criticism of those same affairs. That is where your arguments fall to pieces most clearly.
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TotalBiscuit is really hard to like. It's not easy to appreciate everything he's done for the scene while he acts up in this blog.
My advice, look at football managers and emulate how they handle the public. Take your AMAs(press conferences), answer the common questions without being defensive and biting the "reporters" head off. Then let your actions speak for you. We can love you for the players you sign and stand behind and the events that you support and invest in.
In regards to this specific debate, you're using your prominence to fight a good fight. But lead as a general, why waste your valuable time fighting against us nobodies in the trenches of Twitter/Reddit? You seem well aware that you are more informed on the matter than the public. You've stated that we are not worth your time to convince. Why then?
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TB is not being a hypocrite here. He's not criticizing other teams for sending players to AM. He's criticizing the system that allows it. The difference might seem subtle, but it is significant.
He's saying that the system is broken and needs to be fixed. Until it is fixed, all of the teams (including Axiom) will exploit it for the benefit of their own players. It wouldn't change anything if one team didn't send players to AM. Some other team would send other Koreans to fill the spots. It's up to Blizzard to fix the system.
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On November 17 2013 21:58 kaos00 wrote:
TotalBiscuit is really hard to like. It's not easy to appreciate everything he's done for the scene while he acts up in this blog.
My advice, look at football managers and emulate how they handle the public. Take your AMAs(press conferences), answer the common questions without being defensive and biting the "reporters" head off. Then let your actions speak for you. We can love you for the players you sign and stand behind and the events that you support and invest in.
In regards to this specific debate, you're using your prominence to fight a good fight. But lead as a general, why waste your valuable time fighting against us nobodies in the trenches of Twitter/Reddit? You seem well aware that you are more informed on the matter than the public. You've stated that we are not worth your time to convince. Why then?
The last thing this scene needs is to emulate football's public relations. Theres no other way you're going to get such an intimate level of community interaction between the scene's personalities, which a lot of people like yourself often take for granted when a personality doesn't fluff and censor himself. If TB wants to bite someone's head off, thats his prerogative. It certainly doesn't prevent other people from biting off his regardless.
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On November 17 2013 21:58 kaos00 wrote:
TotalBiscuit is really hard to like. It's not easy to appreciate everything he's done for the scene while he acts up in this blog.
Frankly? Why would I cater to such shallow people? Anyone who thinks this way "Well he's done X, Y and Z really good things for the scene but sometimes he's blunt and a bit mean in this blog thread so I don't like him" is just so horribly childish and thin-skinned that they're not even worth the time.
I've dealt with enough of this scenes bullshit. Not to turn this into a pity party or anything but ever since early 2010 when I started doing work in this scene it's been constant flaming. I've paid my fucking dues by this point several times over, if I didn't love this game as much as I do I'd have been long gone by now.
I really don't care if I'm hard to like at this point, I've had enough of it. People can like it or lump it. Actions speak louder than words. I'm not going to pretend that I like the attitude of the vocal minority in this community just because it might be the more PR friendly way of dealing with things. If people with influence had come down harder on the terrible behavior of that vocal minority earlier, we'd have a better and more positive scene and this blog wouldn't even have to exist.
"NO FLUFF!" cries the community, with the caveat "EXCEPT WHEN THE FLUFF SOMEHOW IMPLICATES US IN SOME WRONGDOING AND/OR SOUNDS A BIT MEAN". Make your bloody minds up.
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Ok so you quote half of my post and instead of replying to the question asked: "Why waste your valuable time fighting against us nobodies in the trenches of Twitter/Reddit? You seem well aware that you are more informed on the matter than the public. You've stated that we are not worth your time to convince. Why?"
Instead of replying, you go to the TotalBiscuit staple of straw-manning and bullying any hint of detraction on a forum. This is what you are.
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Northern Ireland23303 Posts
While I do agree with the gist of your last invective, it's not 'the community', there are plenty of us who like you, respect you and people who even if they don't like you, don't shit on you.
I guess it's the Internet nearly encapsulated, that or the Dunning-Kruger effect. Those with the most idiotic views are the most vocal and confident in their views.
It's infuriating. They'll post something, sometimes fully inaccurate. Even when challenged and every point addressed they don't respond to what's in your rebuttal. I can see the value in interacting in the way you do because if you don't, factual inaccuracies or conjecture become fact.
Anyway, keep up the good work, might treat myself to some Axiom merch.
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I dont believe you
The internet branded you as a Angry Demon person that is here to ruin esport and steal all of SC2 money
U will have to live your whole life with that
I LOVE YOu
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Oh god, this thread was worth reading just to see how somebody who has a stupid belief that they haven't thought through properly tries to wiggle out of it. I think everyone's been in that situation once or twice, but this one was in full classic evade mode:
1. The constant misdirection via switching topics to irrelevant things like the TaKe-Genna situation
2. Couldn't explain why a logical fallacy was important or tell when it was appropriate (A+ material here)
3. Only responding to one minor sentence or idea when TB posted a wall of text that -completely- debunks everything else.
4. Incredibly, wildly bad analogies - literally some of the worst I've ever seen on the internet. I could write better analogies in support of any of his arguments, and I don't even agree with his positions!
It's like a guy who is sailing along and shoots a cannon at another ship. The ship is made of steel whereas theirs is made of wood, but they didn't happen to notice that difference until after they shot the cannonball. So the ship is quickly destroyed and the guy hangs to driftwood, still pretending that everything is totally fine despite occasionally having to switch pieces of driftwood since those are getting destroyed too.
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I think this blog was really good at the first page because it clearly explained all the faults in the reasoning that was used to detract from TB's decisions as a manager. But I have to agree with others in that there comes a point where its actually not worth replying to people anymore, it doesn't really accomplish anything and just turns the thread into a series of pages filled with invective attacks on people's intelligence and heavy use of sarcasm which is no longer really a learning opportunity but just more of an opportunity to gang up on someone and bring them down as much as possible. Even if they do deserve it the point is it doesn't actually lead anywhere for either party, its overwhelming likely that the person has a deep bias against the other and won't change and it'll just keep getting worse.
Of course TB doesn't have to care what people think of him etc., no one is saying he must but its just food for thought about whether certain activities are really useful. It would actually be better for all parties if they moved on. People would like TB better, maybe support him and his team more, and things would appear more professional and composed. Plus he would likely be less stressed (maybe?  )
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On November 17 2013 12:49 TotalBiscuit wrote:
Viewers don't want to watch the highest possible level, that's not their priority, just looking at the WCS numbers proves that.
Speak for yourself. Everyone I know, including casuals and ppl I dragged to WCS Toronto that didn't really like starcraft could 100% notice the difference between a top NA game (low level) and a game between top koreans. Just the same way anyone can notice the difference between a high school basketball game and the NBA finals. It's the silliest pro-region lock argument one can make.
You can have region lock OR equal skill. You can't have both. Foreigners just aren't good enough to sustain that.
I'm a hardcore fan and I watch every WCS region right now... if we get region lock, I will only watch korean, guaranteed.
My friend is a casual fan, and will only watch a few matches anyway. He won't waste time on low level play, he will only (and I will only link him to) top highlight WCS Kr matches.
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On November 18 2013 12:24 ffadicted wrote:Show nested quote +On November 17 2013 12:49 TotalBiscuit wrote:
Viewers don't want to watch the highest possible level, that's not their priority, just looking at the WCS numbers proves that. Speak for yourself. Everyone I know, including casuals and ppl I dragged to WCS Toronto that didn't really like starcraft could 100% notice the difference between a top NA game (low level) and a game between top koreans. Just the same way anyone can notice the difference between a high school basketball game and the NBA finals. It's the silliest pro-region lock argument one can make. You can have region lock OR equal skill. You can't have both. Foreigners just aren't good enough to sustain that. I'm a hardcore fan and I watch every WCS region right now... if we get region lock, I will only watch korean, guaranteed. My friend is a casual fan, and will only watch a few matches anyway. He won't waste time on low level play, he will only (and I will only link him to) top highlight WCS Kr matches.
None of this really matters, it's anecdotal evidence vs hard numbers. EU, weakest region, most foreigner vs foreigner matches, highest views, consistently. You can claim all you want that everyone really wants the "highest level of play" but they constantly prove otherwise by not rewarding that level of play with their eyeballs.
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EPT
