nah i have an old thread solely dedicated to a game of mine and i'm not going to let it continue to cause more problem between me and my friends. i'm going to confirm now that i won't join any tournament organized by this community in the future. as a matter of fact i've never have ever since the incident so i do not understand why this has to be brought up in public like this months later. i'm just playing my game
Ghost's play is very, very suspicious. I completely agree that there is a good chance he is maphacking, but not completely certain. All of the following analysis is giving him the benefit of the doubt. I may be analysing things that he didn't intentionally do if he actually was maphacking. But if he wasn't, I think I can explain some of the things that he did. Going to post these in reponse to Nemo's points.
1)4:48 : I'm puzzled you're not sending your Stalker scout or not trying to control the Xel'Naga at all, but the stalker is clearly needed to defend any reaper, so it's legit. But no Xel'Naga control at all in both games seen is weird.
Well, at there's still a bunker in his base so he leaves the stalker to make sure that gets cancelled first. The bunker is cancelled at 5:07, and his first zealot comes out shortly afterwards. At this time, he only has the zealot and stalker to defend. If he was concerned about the reaper, he wouldn't move the stalker to the watchtower because the potential reaper could sneak into the main and kite the zealot. Also, he wouldn't send a probe to the watchtower either because that's just a free kill for the reaper.
However, to me, it looks like he left his army idle because he felt like it. The watchtower only covers one potential attack path, and having a unit at the watchtower would be one less unit to defend if pRoTimber attacked from the bottom path. Also, because he went 1gate expand into 3gate, he was vulnerable to any pressure (he scouted the 2rax opening), so he might have just wanted to have those units to defend.
2)6:22 : Your stalker is moved from your natural to your main and at the same moment the reaper is nearing the center of the map. Very slight suspicion.
He didn't move it up for the potential reaper. If he was worried about the reaper, he would have moved further up to where reapers are most likely to enter the main, not to the high ground next to the ramp. It was about the time that the pressure should be coming, so he probably expected an attack then. By moving the stalker up, he gained a bit of vision (although the watchtower would have been much better), and if the army did come, he would get a few free shots off from the high ground stalker.
However, that's all assuming that pRoTimber takes the north attack path. If he attacked from the south, then that stalker would be late to the battle. So who knows... perhaps it was just an impulse to move it there.
3)6:47 : Moreover, the Reaper is now south of the map and the stalker leaves the main to come back to the natural: Suspicious go and return move by the Stalker synchronized with the reaper moves.
That might be because he realised what I said above about the potential attack paths, and wanted the stalker to be able to defend just in case. Notice how he only moves it to the bottom of the ramp - if he wanted to stop the reaper, he would go closer to the nexus.
4)6:47 : The army of Timber goes out of his base, you're Chronoing your 3 Warpgate while you have still your bases to saturate. It's suspicious or a perfect timing.
No one does this. Sus. Could just be game sense, or because he knows pRoTimber plays aggressively.
It may be because he was still worried about the pressure and just wanted some units to be safe. He has scouted nothing, so he might be preparing for the worst case scenario.
Or it may be because having the extra units wouldn't hurt him too much. His midgame plan was to do a gateway timing attack, so having the units earlier was no big deal, since he didn't plan to spend it on any tech. (However he did cut probes a bit to get those units, so I don't know. Might just be a genuine mistake, or done deliberately, I know I cut probes a lot in early PvP just to get those gateways out faster).
5)7:10 : The reaper attacks by the south an retreat but you're not pursuing him at all, even without 1 stalker. You're obviously waiting for something but not scouting at all, so you should not know Timber's army arrives. Suspicious.
Reapers are imbalanced and you can never catch them no matter how hard you try.
Jokes aside, not sure about this one either. Suspicious.
Chasing reapers is a lot of effort and half the time they get away, so maybe he just couldn't be bothered.
6)7:26 : Pre-splitting you're stalkers. Not even one waiting for the reaper at the South.
Moving around the army to scare off the reaper messed up his positioning. He repositions his units as soon as they get back into sit-there-and-do-nothing mode, which is what a good player should do.
7)Not a single stalker waiting for the reaper in the main now though the only thing you see from Timber is a Reaper. You perfectly know that Timber is arriving and perfectly ready for his army while without hack you could not know it. For me that's evidence of Map Hacking.
The reaper was last spotted south, at his natural third base, not too long ago. That's very far from his main base, the only way that there would be a reaper in the main was if pRoTimber had made a second reaper.
8)9:14 : You don't see the army of Timber coming to your drone and you still retreat it at the exact moment Timber's army arrives. Again, you don't use your drone to scout around to see what is happening and there was no reason to retreat that drone at that moment, your army was arriving. That can't be luck no more and still absolutely no scouting. Not even once you got to the Xel'Naga, not even once at that moment of the game. For me that's evidence of Map Hacking.
True, I would have expected it to move forward (or upwards towards Timber's natural third) to build another pylon. But this is something really, really small. It could be something that even ghost can't explain. It could just be luck.
As for the whole "no scouting issue", yeah, that makes it very suspicious. But aside from the 3 chronoboosts on warp gates at 6:47, everything seemed kind-of reasonable. He didn't really need to scout. It was a back and forth attack/defend game.
At the start he might have thought "2rax pressure, I can handle that if I have x units at x time". And after the attack, he attacked himself, didn't need to scout there. And after that, he did the forcefield contain. Now he would need to scout to find out the medivac timing with an observer. But he didn't have a robo. When he did have a robo (at 12 mins), he had about 1k minerals 100 gas. He was starving on gas, and may have just decided that he needed some other tech more than the observer.
Well actually, he spent the gas on an immortal, so I don't really know. A collosus den and a second immortal after that. I don't know about that. I would expect the observer, so I guess that is pretty suspicious too.
He might have just assumed "I have seen a lot of barracks units, more than normal. Since he's spending so much money here, his tech is probably delayed and I don't need to worry".
Something else suspicious: At 14 mins, pRoTimber expands to the 7 o clock position with the OC he was forced to lift off at his natural, while he is being contained by forcefields. At 15 mins, Ghost sends a zealot to check out the 1 o clock spawn, and sends another zealot to the 7 o clock. He finds the hidden expansion. Suspicious?
When pRoTimber retreated into his main base, he landed the OC next to the ramp, in plain sight of any unit that walked up the ramp. However, while containing, ghost doesn't scout up the ramp - he has only been forcefielding it. So if you check his vision, as far as he knows, the OC is still there at the ramp. But he sends the zealots anyway.
(he sends the zealot on attack move to check the two other expansions first, the 5 and 6 o clock ones. But it's still pretty suspicious)
Anyway, that's all I have to say about this. Over to you.
Last edited by xGKingdelete; Thu, 5th-Jan-2012 at 6:26 PM.
His decision makings are excellent. Even I would put a stalker on top of them ramp to get the vision at the front, since terran wouldn't have vision up the ramp. I do it with sentries on top but stalkers in front.
I wouldn't do this if I had a nexus at the bottom of the ramp. Just saying.
Also, don't worry. I don't think anyone believes for sure that he is a maphacker, we're just investigating. Just waiting to see what he has to say about this.
I watched the Ghost replay. About the only thing that seems sus to me is the chrono boosting of the 3 gates, and a perhaps the poke up the ramp towards the end.
Everything else seems pretty reasonable, for example moving the stalker up the top seemed more about vision as he didn't move it to the common reaper entry point etc.
It was a bit of a coincidence however was poking up the ramp just as the supply depots were lowered, however it's also feasible that he was seeing how many units were there and it was just lucky timing. I don't think he'd break up anyway and he probably knew that.
In ghosts defence, a few points
- There was some unneeded scouting, such as sending the zealot to the top left base, but this might be to lower suspicion of the zealot scout to the lower right. Saying that, it makes sense that he denied the natural he'd try and float it somewhere else.
- Watching in first person mode there was no camera looking at different fog of war area's, even under the excuse of 'clicking to move to send a scout there'. This isn't proof of one way or another, as I'm not sure what hacks out there are capable of in terms of locking screens etc.
Overall I think he definitely deserves the benefit of the doubt, especially as it's only one replay.
watched one of ghost's replays from drop.sc that was uploaded 14minutes ago and he is one of the lazy players who usually never gets teh xel nagas and it didn't look like he was mhing at all.
http://drop.sc/79896 if anyone is interested. still, he could of turned it off, but i dontt hink he is a hacker... my 2cents
Pulse, you're defending your mate. That's very honorable but not the thing to do. You stated your opinion. Let neutral people give theirs. As you see, people are doing their best to stay balanced and cautious. We all know that this is serious and we must be careful with our conclusions.
There are still 3 replays to analyze (with the one given by Flaunt). It will take time. Let's just stay calm meanwhile and wait for what it will tell.
Sorry, I was so raging and pissed off a little bit.
I apologize for the raging-threads that I made.
P.S. deleted all my posts and statements
There was no need to delete your posts. You opinion is legit. I just advice you to stay calm in a situation that I perfectly understand, is stressful for you.
all pRotimber does is cheese. i matched him 6x in a row and he all ind me every game. his play is pretty predictable after awhile so maybe ghost really did know it was coming
I dont wanna go way back describing the game, I wouldnt call myself master of the game, but i think i understand a little bit about the game. Coming from no rts background, i learn the game by grinding strat after strat. Cheese is part of the game, as i've received many bm and friend's honest opinion(like roz) b4, i know my style is very aggravating, but like Nemo's signature "if ure not attacking ure probably losing", i've always felt this way since i started playing more than a year ago...so..when i dont cheese, some1 else cheeses me instead, so why not i do it 1st? like my teacher cobo and renson who always said "dont play their game, make them play urs instead" but they taught me this for poker instead, not sc2 lol. Many philosophy can be applied into sc2 as well.
So, since i played alot and also cheeses a lot, and also have played people who have experienced my cheese a lot before, is it fair to say if i can notice something doesnt feel right in a game? why out of thousands game i played i would suspect this guy?
Some cheese can be used only once on a player in a long time, or once in a lifetime, nirvana would understand this(my tvp cheeses). It was only the 1st day 1st time i met him on ladder, so unless he is a smurf account and he has played me b4 on other acc, my strat and playstyle should be pretty new to him. Even so, the 1st replay analysis(last game of the day) that was done showed that he sees nothing more than 8 marine, I dont wanna talk about the xelnaga towers anymore cuz previous games he never bothered to take control of them at all, it's ok if he doesn't wanna shoot my marine even once with his 2 stalker down the ramp, but not even shooting once from above the ramp with 5 stalkers+1 sentry and pulling back everything inside the mainbase is what i think that points out the most obvious. And so, i stopped after the game, I've concluded that these minimaphackers can only see pretty dots on the minimap but couldn't stop whats coming, like, can u stop an oncoming train? sometimes i felt they can see production tab too, but mayb thats just my imagination.
sometimes i felt they can see production tab too, but mayb thats just my imagination.
Wow, this just describes a game i had before, guy responds with hydra and 6 spores without me showing any signs of muta in a zvz. I looked at the replay after and it was pretty obvious he was hacking. But this was a custom game on NA so i don't think there is any point going into more detail here.
But he never saw my spire or my mutas or any signs of me going mutas with his camera, but he definately knew i was going mutas, so i think there is a hack that shows a production tab aswell as reveal the map. sorry if that was a bit off topic.
Wow, this just describes a game i had before, guy responds with hydra and 6 spores without me showing any signs of muta in a zvz. I looked at the replay after and it was pretty obvious he was hacking. But this was a custom game on NA so i don't think there is any point going into more detail here.
But he never saw my spire or my mutas or any signs of me going mutas with his camera, but he definately knew i was going mutas, so i think there is a hack that shows a production tab aswell as reveal the map. sorry if that was a bit off topic.
Production tab hacking is real, in fact it would be much more useful in sc2 than maphack.
A quick google search shows the same thing, production tab hacks. Pictures and what-not prove it. Wow that just makes it much more difficult to see if somebody is hacking if they are at all intelligent.
A quick google search shows the same thing, production tab hacks. Pictures and what-not prove it. Wow that just makes it much more difficult to see if somebody is hacking if they are at all intelligent.
I mean, who is lucky and who is hacking?
Which is why more we need more then one replay to prove that people are hacking. Like everyone else has said, it's doubtful that someone that hasn't played at a high level will be able to read their opponent well. Well then again, thats what this thread is for. To analyse the replays that people have uploaded and to make a decision on whether or not the person is hacking.
League :
Map : Metapolis
Length : 15min22
Version 1.4.2
Replay Analysis
3:40 : Scouting Timber base, cliquing the gas, you can see a marine producing.
4:50 : This time you're poking and you are even surprised by the marines that have free shots on your stalker when you're not too much attentive.
6:43 : You're not Chronoing your gates this time. Only one but without real necessity. You seem taken by surprise indeed and your army is spread like the precedent time. You don't throw a single Force field. Might be the surprise or the fact that army seemed really weak.
7:17 you make a pursuit but retreat soon prudently.
7:41 : You're sending a probe, intercepted this time. You're surprised to be.
8:18 : You're taken completely by surprise by Timber army that flanks you. There's also a lot of SCV with his army too now.
9:05 : This time you're scouting again to know where Timber army is, fearing he's again trying to flank you. You're so obviously not Map Hacking in this game. There is no magic here, all your acts show that you're attentive to what COULD happen on this map.
9:11 to 9:25 : You ambush Timber army with luck but this time it's obvious it is true luck because you were super active with your army trying to see before striking while the other time you were waiting him behind the door.
Then you counter and deny Timber natural.
12:21 : Scouting this time again.
13:01 : What do we have there ? A drone controlling the Xel'naga. First time I see you doing that and also first time I'm so sure you're not Map Hacking.
12:40 : Defending a potential drop while there were no drop coming from Timber (not a single Medivac produced yet). That's true game sense. You control all the routes to your base and you can regroup all your armies in case of danger.
13:32 : Even patrolling with 2 groups of stalkers while there was no danger. Interesting thing to note you still has no obs. Might indicate you don't like them because you don't make them even when absolutely clearly not MH.
13:30 : Again taken by surprise by Timber push, even though you had the Xel'Naga. He captures it and destroy your drone without reaction by you. Another proof of no Map Hack this game.
14:41 : Again, surprised by Timber push. Your army is not perfectly set this time. All the zealots are not in front, you have left some units behind to defend a drop that never existed.
15:21 : Timber last chance All-In fails and he gg. Immortals sure are good.
My own conclusion (and it's only a opinion)
This game is so 100% free of Map Hack and this is so obvious ... I'm really reassured that I'm not seeing Map Hacks everywhere now after spending time on Evets replay then on yours ><. That also means that I'm even more confident in what i saw in the other 2 games and quite confirm it was indeed Map Hack in my opinion.
That super strange to defend that drop zone with so many units when you have 2 Robo to produce 2 cheap obs that could have scouted that zone and enemy base instead of "preparing" with so expensive units for something that could never happen. You're and don't use observers at all ? I found that very suspect because it might indicate that you're too much used to have "artificial obs".
The differences with the other game are too big in my opinion:
You were this time scouting a lot
You were genuinely surprised so many times, indeed Timber had his chances when in the other game he had none. All was going in your favor. It was "magic".
Well this is just my opinion. There is still 2 replay to watch and I can't make more than one each evening unfortunately. I will continue tomorrow.
Any external opinions and more importantly Ghost explanations are necessary.
I haven't watched any of the replays, so please take what I'm saying right here with a grain of salt:
Most of the things mentioned in the first replay of ghost are not suspicious or unusual EXCEPT for the timing. Sending a probe out to make a pylon, then pulling it back to be safe is fine, but he did it as the army was approaching. Moving the stalker around is okay. Reapers are common, moving it back down once the standard reaper timing has passed is also just smart play (but it's said it looked like it was mirroring the path of another unit)...
Also spreading your defenses at the natural is just smart. Ghost timings are good, ESPECIALLY on maps like metal where you don't need vision up a ramp to emp the sentries/immortals. So you need to spread. If it's a standard timing push, he maybe looked at his clock and realised it's about right for that and needs to be defensive and spread his units.
It may have looked suspicious (the lack of scouting is rather huge, admittedly), and while I respect Nemo's analysis, I wouldn't feel comfortable accusing unless I see someone who really plays/understands TvP at a very high level comment on the timings as to whether they actually make any sense for ghost without being able to see the terran units.
To Ghost: Thanks for coming out. Don't just post a few select replays, since you have games that old i assume you autosave all your games. Please post a replay pack of all your games this season, or at least 20 games around the time you played Timber (At the start of the season, not recent games after the allegations came out)
At the moment there is alot of suspicion, but if you are really keen to clear your name completely, this will be the fastest way, and people will also give you alot of respect for doing so. After doing so and if found not to be conclusive a formal apology will be made, investigation will stop completely and all posts regarding your case will be deleted.
I haven't watched any of the replays, so please take what I'm saying right here with a grain of salt:
Most of the things mentioned in the first replay of ghost are not suspicious or unusual EXCEPT for the timing. Sending a probe out to make a pylon, then pulling it back to be safe is fine, but he did it as the army was approaching. Moving the stalker around is okay. Reapers are common, moving it back down once the standard reaper timing has passed is also just smart play (but it's said it looked like it was mirroring the path of another unit)...
Also spreading your defenses at the natural is just smart. Ghost timings are good, ESPECIALLY on maps like metal where you don't need vision up a ramp to emp the sentries/immortals. So you need to spread. If it's a standard timing push, he maybe looked at his clock and realised it's about right for that and needs to be defensive and spread his units.
It may have looked suspicious (the lack of scouting is rather huge, admittedly), and while I respect Nemo's analysis, I wouldn't feel comfortable accusing unless I see someone who really plays/understands TvP at a very high level comment on the timings as to whether they actually make any sense for ghost without being able to see the terran units.
Erasmus. I'm really open to the idea of being wrong on the subject, really, but at least watch the replays before giving such an opinion. This is really a serious subject and you can't just comment on the games like that without putting at least some effort on analyzing it.
Beside, wolf, timber, V_andetta, delete12, Nirvana all play whether or and are and have given some opinions on those timings and analysis.
Erasmus. I'm really open to the idea of being wrong on the subject, really, but at least watch the replays before giving such an opinion. This is really a serious subject and you can't just comment on the games like that without putting at least some effort on analyzing it.
Beside, wolf, timber, V_andetta, delete12, Nirvana all play whether or and are and have given some opinions on those timings and analysis.
I didn't realise quite how many new posts there were... all those images make for insane amounts of scrolling. Maybe we should spoiler all the analysis with images so we can flick through a thread and open them when we want to read it.
But looking back at delete... he just said all the things I did. The timings were right. He pre split his army as soon as the units were idle. He moved his stalker at the time of a standard push after that 2 rax opening. The movements don't make sense to be actively stopping the reaper.
So he didn't scout and he randomly chronod warp gates. Since it's been brought up enough times, Timber has a reputation for being a bit cheesy. He does a lot of one base play. The 1 gate expand is a greedy(ish) build. He's unlikely to be behind in economy by doing it. So in a certain way, eliminating the scout and chronoing the warp gates after expanding makes sense against Timber specifically.
No scout at all in one game seems bad cause he could just randomly died to a cloak banshee, and as you said, he never makes observers. He obviously had a robo for immortals though, so maybe he is fine relying on chronoboosting one out if necessary.
Just going to second nirvana and say that his play is a bit odd. It's a little suspicious that a GM would do so little scouting when there's so much variation in builds that Terrans can do. The no scouting replay may have just been an off game. More replays would be nice.
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