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Dominican Republic463 Posts
On August 20 2010 11:41 a176 wrote: Many diamonds don't belong in diamond. That's the first problem. diamonds are already 5% of the server population on average, what would you have diamond be? 1%?
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On August 20 2010 13:56 SwaY- wrote:Show nested quote +On August 20 2010 11:41 a176 wrote: Many diamonds don't belong in diamond. That's the first problem. diamonds are already 5% of the server population on average, what would you have diamond be? 1%?
Top 1-2 % at the most imo.
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yeah diamonds are pretty rare apparently.
the rock
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United States10774 Posts
On August 20 2010 14:20 Bosu wrote:Show nested quote +On August 20 2010 13:56 SwaY- wrote:On August 20 2010 11:41 a176 wrote: Many diamonds don't belong in diamond. That's the first problem. diamonds are already 5% of the server population on average, what would you have diamond be? 1%? Top 1-2 % at the most imo. only diamonds should be those who are good enough to be 700+ in it. (on a skill measurement)
it's really surprising how bad some of the diamond players are. they don't really know how to play at all :o
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Is Diamond really only 5% of the server population? That must be wrong. I thought it was closer to 20%.
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Think it's the regional constraints. If it was international the top 5% would look a lot more impressive.
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I got into diamond without knowing any builds. Make diamond 1% plz =(
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On August 20 2010 15:01 OneOther wrote:Show nested quote +On August 20 2010 14:20 Bosu wrote:On August 20 2010 13:56 SwaY- wrote:On August 20 2010 11:41 a176 wrote: Many diamonds don't belong in diamond. That's the first problem. diamonds are already 5% of the server population on average, what would you have diamond be? 1%? Top 1-2 % at the most imo. only diamonds should be those who are good enough to be 700+ in it. (on a skill measurement) it's really surprising how bad some of the diamond players are. they don't really know how to play at all :o
I think it's probably point inflation... I was having problems around 300 diamond a few weeks ago, but I came back last week (I don't really have a lot of time to play games on a consistent basis these days ) and stomped my way to 550ish after ripping off an 8 game winning streak or so. It seemed like every zerg was trying to kill me outright with early aggression, and when that failed, to try to kill me with baneling/roaches... which never worked, because I would go straight to voidrays after they tried their economy wrecking ling garbage. Seems like maybe half of my PvPs are won on a 2-3 gate robo when my opponent completely fails to react properly- it's not like I'm doing a super early robo either, I'm just playing economical and beating them because their micro/unit composition is terrible.
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Sounds like the topic starter is the one having problems. He wants his macro mid-game position but is unable to get there in most games due to inability to adapt to his opponents.
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Diamond isn't nearly as indicative of skill as you think.
Cheese is absolutely a valid strategy, as is aiming to end the game early. If you're facing Idra, who you know is a macro machine, and you blow at macro, why the hell would you wanna go late game? Furthermore, if you know he's going to use a macro build because he's bad at early game micro, why would you not exploit it?
These are always the worst arguments. People whine about getting all-in'ed when it's so obvious that they are going for a pure macro build. Bitching about someone using one all-in build is stupid if you don't realize that and adapt yourself.
Plus, just because he has 800 games and 6ooled doesnt mean that's his go-to strat. Tears of six pool victims are like crack. There is no rage like that of someone who just 6pooled, especially someone at a high rank.
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United States47024 Posts
On August 20 2010 12:11 The_Pacifist wrote: People in general, including the OP, I think, overestimate the Diamond rank.
It can take less than 20 games to get into Diamond. I personally see it as the equivalent of D+ on ICCUP. The problem isn't that cheesers can get into Diamond, it's that there's nothing above Diamond. Like ICCUP if it only had D-, D, and D+. If D+ is the top, then all the C, B, and A players are stuck there as well.
Bronze = D- Silver = D- Gold = D- or D Platinum = D or D+ Diamond = D+ all the way to A Top Players/Pros = Don't really ladder to practice seriously (Who can actually "improve" if you have a win percentage over 80% on ladder, anyway?). Custom games to practice and improve.
And since I see Diamond as including the D+ equivalent players, I don't get shocked when I see cheese at top Diamond. I agree with the point, and I would say even this setup is ambitious. I know a fair number of people who were D- at BW and are Diamond now. What's more, mechanics was never the issue in their play--it's their decision-making that was always way more suspect.
IMO it will take a long time for the skill level of the game to even out. Over time, the divisions will be more meaningful because not only will everyone get better at the game, you can expect a large chunk of players at the lower end to drop out and move on once the next big triple-A title comes out.
Of course, expect those people to come back when HotS and LotV come out.
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On August 21 2010 00:41 Hawk wrote: Diamond isn't nearly as indicative of skill as you think.
Cheese is absolutely a valid strategy, as is aiming to end the game early. If you're facing Idra, who you know is a macro machine, and you blow at macro, why the hell would you wanna go late game? Furthermore, if you know he's going to use a macro build because he's bad at early game micro, why would you not exploit it?
These are always the worst arguments. People whine about getting all-in'ed when it's so obvious that they are going for a pure macro build. Bitching about someone using one all-in build is stupid if you don't realize that and adapt yourself.
Plus, just because he has 800 games and 6ooled doesnt mean that's his go-to strat. Tears of six pool victims are like crack. There is no rage like that of someone who just 6pooled, especially someone at a high rank.
Someone pointed out the same thing as your first sentence a page ago, and I conceded that this was the case, but it doesn't affect the overall point I was making, which is that the vast majority of players seemingly don't know the best way to improve, or spend their time efficiently.
Cheese is a valid strategy, so are rushes, so are specific builds, but I don't think it's an efficient way to spend your time if you're just looking to improve, by just doing the same cheese, rush, or rigid build over, and over again. If you're looking to just win now, then maybe it's a good idea, but I assume most people are trying to improve as players, and I think playing long, hard games, and not quick rush games are the best way to do that.
If I was just concerned about myself, I wouldn't even say anything, I beat these players quite easily. Any one who does a quick rush, or a specific rigid build I find easy to defeat because I scout thoroughly and adapt and react to what they are doing. I'm just saying I don't understand why people would play this way if they are looking to improve.
That Zerg player I used as an example fortunately isn't the only case I'm basing this blog off of. 80-90% of the players I play just use a specific build or attack that doesn't adapt or react to the other player, they simply do what they have pre-planned to do and either win or lose with it. I don't think that's effective, do you?
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The bonus pool adds allot of points, you can get to 500-700 points pretty easy in 20 wins or so o_o
However at that point the match finding gets really tough, I had no time for a learning curve because in just a few days...boom I'm ranked 1st in plat and it takes 30 mins to find games now which makes me give up waiting and just play custom games.
I'm not sure quite how the bonus pool is replenished, it seems to add bonus points day by day. I think how the match finding system works also has allot to do with it.
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Piggy-backing off of what Salv was saying -
If you want to win for the sake of winning, any ole strategy will do. All-in builds will continue to be successful until people stop playing SC2, purely because they force the other opponent to react correctly. One mistake and they lose.
If you want to get better at Starcraft 2, however, running those all-in builds is only going to get you so far. You might become the best 4 warpgate rusher in the world, but you're going to immediately be put at a disadvantage when your rush doesn't win the game outright, because you're not going to have practiced builds that cater to later game play.
Sure, practicing cheesey stuff will make your micro better, but what about the other important aspects of the game? Timings, macro (especially later game), expanding, army movement, drop-play/harass, multi-task in general... These are all parts of your game that are going to suffer because you decided that learning to play long-term wasn't your style.
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On August 21 2010 01:08 Salv wrote:Show nested quote +On August 21 2010 00:41 Hawk wrote: Diamond isn't nearly as indicative of skill as you think.
Cheese is absolutely a valid strategy, as is aiming to end the game early. If you're facing Idra, who you know is a macro machine, and you blow at macro, why the hell would you wanna go late game? Furthermore, if you know he's going to use a macro build because he's bad at early game micro, why would you not exploit it?
These are always the worst arguments. People whine about getting all-in'ed when it's so obvious that they are going for a pure macro build. Bitching about someone using one all-in build is stupid if you don't realize that and adapt yourself.
Plus, just because he has 800 games and 6ooled doesnt mean that's his go-to strat. Tears of six pool victims are like crack. There is no rage like that of someone who just 6pooled, especially someone at a high rank. Someone pointed out the same thing as your first sentence a page ago, and I conceded that this was the case, but it doesn't affect the overall point I was making, which is that the vast majority of players seemingly don't know the best way to improve, or spend their time efficiently. Cheese is a valid strategy, so are rushes, so are specific builds, but I don't think it's an efficient way to spend your time if you're just looking to improve, by just doing the same cheese, rush, or rigid build over, and over again. If you're looking to just win now, then maybe it's a good idea, but I assume most people are trying to improve as players, and I think playing long, hard games, and not quick rush games are the best way to do that. If I was just concerned about myself, I wouldn't even say anything, I beat these players quite easily. Any one who does a quick rush, or a specific rigid build I find easy to defeat because I scout thoroughly and adapt and react to what they are doing. I'm just saying I don't understand why people would play this way if they are looking to improve. That Zerg player I used as an example fortunately isn't the only case I'm basing this blog off of. 80-90% of the players I play just use a specific build or attack that doesn't adapt or react to the other player, they simply do what they have pre-planned to do and either win or lose with it. I don't think that's effective, do you?
How can you say doing the same thing over and over won't help you improve?
You don't think your micro will improve if you're constantly doing a micro-heavy rush build?? Not any different from grinding away at PvZ to not suck up at the match up any longer. If you 2gate 15 matches in a row, I guarantee that you'll be pretty damn good at it after a few hours. If you're not good at macro but good at micro, 2gate is much more desirable than FE in PvZ if your opponent expos. And if you're able to learn how to micro and macro early in the game—when every single little thing counts—it quite easily transfers over into fundamentals that are useful in long games.
It's really quite the generalization to assume that every single person gunning for a cheese or a rush has no interest in improving their game. Even with people who do seemingly normal builds but don't deviate from them. Are there people with no interest in getting better?? Of course. But it's totally foolish to assume that everyone is that way.
Don't forget, the morons who developed this game packaged it without chatrooms. If you don't have any friends playing, you are stuck practicing by either rolling the dice on a custom game (IE., play shit opponents) or trying your luck on ladder....which is where anyone worth a damn is. You don't gain anything from practice if you're stomping bronze people in custom games. You can't learn if the build you're trying is viable if your random custom opponent is so terrible that you'd beat him with just SCVs.
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On August 21 2010 04:03 Hawk wrote:Show nested quote +On August 21 2010 01:08 Salv wrote:On August 21 2010 00:41 Hawk wrote: Diamond isn't nearly as indicative of skill as you think.
Cheese is absolutely a valid strategy, as is aiming to end the game early. If you're facing Idra, who you know is a macro machine, and you blow at macro, why the hell would you wanna go late game? Furthermore, if you know he's going to use a macro build because he's bad at early game micro, why would you not exploit it?
These are always the worst arguments. People whine about getting all-in'ed when it's so obvious that they are going for a pure macro build. Bitching about someone using one all-in build is stupid if you don't realize that and adapt yourself.
Plus, just because he has 800 games and 6ooled doesnt mean that's his go-to strat. Tears of six pool victims are like crack. There is no rage like that of someone who just 6pooled, especially someone at a high rank. Someone pointed out the same thing as your first sentence a page ago, and I conceded that this was the case, but it doesn't affect the overall point I was making, which is that the vast majority of players seemingly don't know the best way to improve, or spend their time efficiently. Cheese is a valid strategy, so are rushes, so are specific builds, but I don't think it's an efficient way to spend your time if you're just looking to improve, by just doing the same cheese, rush, or rigid build over, and over again. If you're looking to just win now, then maybe it's a good idea, but I assume most people are trying to improve as players, and I think playing long, hard games, and not quick rush games are the best way to do that. If I was just concerned about myself, I wouldn't even say anything, I beat these players quite easily. Any one who does a quick rush, or a specific rigid build I find easy to defeat because I scout thoroughly and adapt and react to what they are doing. I'm just saying I don't understand why people would play this way if they are looking to improve. That Zerg player I used as an example fortunately isn't the only case I'm basing this blog off of. 80-90% of the players I play just use a specific build or attack that doesn't adapt or react to the other player, they simply do what they have pre-planned to do and either win or lose with it. I don't think that's effective, do you? How can you say doing the same thing over and over won't help you improve? You don't think your micro will improve if you're constantly doing a micro-heavy rush build?? Not any different from grinding away at PvZ to not suck up at the match up any longer. If you 2gate 15 matches in a row, I guarantee that you'll be pretty damn good at it after a few hours. If you're not good at macro but good at micro, 2gate is much more desirable than FE in PvZ if your opponent expos. And if you're able to learn how to micro and macro early in the game—when every single little thing counts—it quite easily transfers over into fundamentals that are useful in long games. It's really quite the generalization to assume that every single person gunning for a cheese or a rush has no interest in improving their game. Even with people who do seemingly normal builds but don't deviate from them. Are there people with no interest in getting better?? Of course. But it's totally foolish to assume that everyone is that way. Don't forget, the morons who developed this game packaged it without chatrooms. If you don't have any friends playing, you are stuck practicing by either rolling the dice on a custom game (IE., play shit opponents) or trying your luck on ladder....which is where anyone worth a damn is. You don't gain anything from practice if you're stomping bronze people in custom games. You can't learn if the build you're trying is viable if your random custom opponent is so terrible that you'd beat him with just SCVs.
If you look back to what I wrote I said that players who did that are easy to defeat, because after you've defended or taken them to mid-game, they are out of their element. Of course their micro will improve, they will become very adept at two gate pressure in your example, but if it's countered and dealt with, and they are used to ending games at that point, those players tend to fall apart.
I'm using your 2 gate example, but I don't think that really exemplifies what I am trying to say. You can open 2 gate, pressure, and then react and adapt to your opponent and I would say you're being efficient. I am speaking to players who 4 gate all-in, or who 6 pool, or who have a very specific 8:00 minute timing attack that they will use regardless of what's happening. Is a four gating Protoss probably pretty good at 4 gates? Yes. If you defend it, then what happens? They usually fall a part, because the rest of their game is so handicapped by never playing long games.
Like I said, if you have an important match or tournament, it might be worth it to run a couple dozen games to become adept at a specific build, but to just continuously do something and win or lose is pointless, I really doubt people are getting much out of their losses, if anything at all.
If you play a safe, reactionary and adaptive style, I think you're best off. If the opponent cheeses or rushes, you have to have good micro to defend it, if your opponent turtles, you have to have good macro and harass to ensure you'll win in the end, etc. You're playing a wide variety of games that way and sharpening all your skills, not just your early game micro, or your ability to warp in units out of 4 quick gateways.
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On August 21 2010 04:03 Hawk wrote:Show nested quote +On August 21 2010 01:08 Salv wrote:On August 21 2010 00:41 Hawk wrote: Diamond isn't nearly as indicative of skill as you think.
Cheese is absolutely a valid strategy, as is aiming to end the game early. If you're facing Idra, who you know is a macro machine, and you blow at macro, why the hell would you wanna go late game? Furthermore, if you know he's going to use a macro build because he's bad at early game micro, why would you not exploit it?
These are always the worst arguments. People whine about getting all-in'ed when it's so obvious that they are going for a pure macro build. Bitching about someone using one all-in build is stupid if you don't realize that and adapt yourself.
Plus, just because he has 800 games and 6ooled doesnt mean that's his go-to strat. Tears of six pool victims are like crack. There is no rage like that of someone who just 6pooled, especially someone at a high rank. Someone pointed out the same thing as your first sentence a page ago, and I conceded that this was the case, but it doesn't affect the overall point I was making, which is that the vast majority of players seemingly don't know the best way to improve, or spend their time efficiently. Cheese is a valid strategy, so are rushes, so are specific builds, but I don't think it's an efficient way to spend your time if you're just looking to improve, by just doing the same cheese, rush, or rigid build over, and over again. If you're looking to just win now, then maybe it's a good idea, but I assume most people are trying to improve as players, and I think playing long, hard games, and not quick rush games are the best way to do that. If I was just concerned about myself, I wouldn't even say anything, I beat these players quite easily. Any one who does a quick rush, or a specific rigid build I find easy to defeat because I scout thoroughly and adapt and react to what they are doing. I'm just saying I don't understand why people would play this way if they are looking to improve. That Zerg player I used as an example fortunately isn't the only case I'm basing this blog off of. 80-90% of the players I play just use a specific build or attack that doesn't adapt or react to the other player, they simply do what they have pre-planned to do and either win or lose with it. I don't think that's effective, do you? How can you say doing the same thing over and over won't help you improve? You don't think your micro will improve if you're constantly doing a micro-heavy rush build?? Not any different from grinding away at PvZ to not suck up at the match up any longer. If you 2gate 15 matches in a row, I guarantee that you'll be pretty damn good at it after a few hours. If you're not good at macro but good at micro, 2gate is much more desirable than FE in PvZ if your opponent expos. And if you're able to learn how to micro and macro early in the game—when every single little thing counts—it quite easily transfers over into fundamentals that are useful in long games.
If you genuinely want to improve, wouldn't it make more sense that you focus on a macro play-style if your macro is what's lacking?
Micro is cute, and fun, and can swing battles in your favor, but let's be honest - it's only going to carry you so far.
And macroing off of 2 gates is a far cry from macroing off of 12. If it carries over so easily, the hypothetical person from your example wouldn't have macro troubles to begin with...
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Alot of the players just don't have the experience of playing Broodwar competitively for however many years like we do. We were just as dumb as them when we started playing BW, we just have a greater knowledge of the game and it makes them look stupid in comparison.
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This is what i bloged about before..thank god im not the only one...But contributing to the BW vs SC2 skill level i was a Solid D+ terran im a diamond player now 700+.
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