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GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

Hi all, I am a diamond level protoss player, and a regular competitor in the weekly GPDs held by Eddie. I love these events, i've played close to 20 (sadly never won ) and I really enjoy the competitive aspect of climbing the brackets, and seeing where abouts I will end up.

When i first began to play in this tournament as a young gold, I would literally be demolished every week in round 1. My aim was to reach the second round (once i got a bye first round, silently fistbumped, my goal was complete :P) I started to get better and better, making it further through each week, until once i made the ro4 where i was once again demolished.

That is the furthest i had ever made it into the tournament. Recently I have been enjoying school holidays and have been playing a lot of games on ladder, making it to the top of my division. I regularly placed against masters players and win occasionally. I feel i am close to a promotion. I entered this weeks GPD with high hopes, I had played considerably more then usual in the holidays, and i felt on ladder that i was at the very top of the diamond division.

This brings me to the point of this somewhat aimless blog. The GPD and SEA tournaments alike are stacked with players far exceeding their competitors in skill, making it almost impossible for new players to win, or even progress deep into the tournament, be this due to smurfing or other reasons. Week after week i feel, the winner of each GPD is a diamond player who has played a total of 5 ladder games, and takes the finals 3-0. Being someone at the top of diamond, i feel that the skill of these players far exceeds any diamond player on ladder. I have heard that this is similar for the weekly BSG as well.

I think that this is bad for the SEA scene. Benji's recent video blog talks about how SEA needs to progress, and how the SEA scene is losing viewers and players alike. The majority of players and spectators are low level players like me, who make up the majority of the audience necessary to progress the SEA scene. We want to mimic the top players, so we join weekly tournaments, only to be destroyed in an unfair manner. This becomes disheartening and frustrating, so much so that I feel it is an unpleasant experience, and will drive away young aspiring players.

As for ideas to solve this problem and let a fresh new stream of aspiring players have at least a chance of winning our low level tournaments, I feel players should be required so meet a certain number of games played recently on ladder in order to compete.

These tournaments have league restrictions for a reason. Imagine an under 8 football league. One team of under 8's is placed up against an under 15 side each weekend. Will the small innocent 8 year old feel that he ever has a chance in the game? Or will the game he loves so much become an unpleasant and unfair experience?

Sorry for babbling on, i hope this was somewhat bearable. Thank you for reading, and remember that we should be trying to accommodate the low level players, the future of our scene and the majority of our audience.

Edit: With some more thought, I guess what i was trying to say all along is this. In a competition that is confined by parameters set by blizzard (league restrictions) it is possible to compete in this tournament when skill exceeds that of the other players by simply not contributing to ones ladder points, and thus avoiding league restriction. I would like you, the reader, to answer this question: Is it okay for someone to enter this tournament who plays minimal ladder games, and instead vigorously practices with and players?

At no point to i believe admins do a poor job and i respect that they volunteer their time, and do a wonderful job for the community. Thanks

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I agree that the GPDs and BSGs feel a lot harder than they should. I competed in BSGs and GPDs as I was climbing the ladder, and noticed that I was doing incredibly well on ladder compared to my tournament performances. I too was crushed in the first round of many GPDs and BSGs, and my highest finish was a Ro4 of a GPD. I got masters before I got even close to winning a GPD.

The only problem is... How do we deal with this? I know at one point the amount of smurfs in BSGs was rediculous and the tournament was becoming a joke, so I made a rule that if you win it, you can't compete in it again. I dont think that was the right solution though, if someone who isn't a smurf manages to win then you end up cutting away legitimate players from the competition. At the same time though, permabanning or temp banning players from sc2sea competitions isn't as effective at discouraging smurfing as you'd hope. I really don't know what the answer is atm.

Tracking down smurfers was also kinda hard (but mostly tedious), as first off you need to have some reason to suspect a player to be smurfing, and as a tournament admin, majority of the games you see are from Ro8 to Finals. Because of this, you rely partially on players to tell you they suspect players are smurfs, which can be a problem if the players are bad at judging if they are a smurf of not. I personally was browsing sc2ranks, checking match histories, looking at leagues and ladders and checking what league they are on NA just to try to determine if someone is smurfing.

BSGs and GPDs are a lot of work because of stuff like this, but I can't see any easy way of stopping it from happening in the future. Either you remove all prizes to discourage smurfs, or you try to find effective ways of discouraging smurfing.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

Well things might have changed since I competed in them but I remember when I was rank 1 diamond and beating gm's on the ladder the farthest I got was the semis, losing was just due to my own poor play and unrefined mechanics and cheese defence. Without being rude I would make doubly sure after watching the replays that you were not just outplayed by another decent diamond player.

If you really feel the tournaments are being smurfed consistently you should probably take this up in private with the tournament admins. If its obvious there is a really high level of play in the replays then smurfers can be banned and thats the only way to stop it from happening.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

No I completely understand as well, we have had smurfing in the wT weekly as well (which has not skill limit) where people have played on other peoples accounts so its only fair that it be treated properly. Problem is the GPD leagues and very loose terms to use and entry, and even then with the minimum number of games a person can still just lose an acceptable amount and win an amount to meet such a requirement.

A better example is I am still in masters but maybe have 5-6 wins a season as I mostly play customs, I would be raped in the masters cup but am uneligible for the GPD as well. Sadly there will always be an exception to the rule, and in this case someone is taking advantage of it

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I'm not sure who told you the Weekly BSG has smurfing in it but I'd suggest you talk to those that actually compete regularly before making that statement.

I don't know about the GPD but I do know from my experience as a tournament admin that some people who go into a tournament expecting to win are often looking for any excuse as to why they get knocked out, the most common of which is smurfing, rather than examining their losses to work on improving their play for next time.

Remember these tournaments are run each week by volunteers and I personally put in many, many unpaid hours for every tournament to ensure it runs smoothly and fairly; I'm sure the GPD admins are the same.

Of course, it's fair enough you want to express your opinion and I respect your courage for putting it out there but next time please at least stick to complaining about the tournaments you know rather than discouraging the stream of new players I spend so much time each week recruiting to the site for the Weekly BSG.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

As a regular player in the BSG. I have seen my share of smurfs, and do you know what happens to them? They get removed. Im in top8 gold for my league and yet I have never made it to the finals. This is not because of Smurfing, it is because I have been out played. Just because you think your good dosent mean there are not people in your league that are better.

Last night I ended up in a bracket with over 5 top 8 golds, I didnt make it past the second round, and the guy who beat me (and was amazingly good) was knocked out in the next. By the time the finals came around a player who I had beaten on several ocassions was in the grand final. This is just the way the tournies work, its half skill and half luck. And over the last few months I have seen many players that I have beaten previously reach the semis or even win it.

One day I will win this darn tournie... one day!

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

Each week i know for the BSG we Search through each player to minimise the risk of smurfs.. For an online event Anywhere around the world There is the risk of smurfs and Cheaters in general. This is always going to be an issue in the Esports community for online events. It is almost impossible to completely remove the possibility that someone may be hacking or even getting someone else to play for them. YOU JUST CANT DO IT.

Like i mentioned before the admins put in alot of time working towards weeding out these players and making it known to the community who they are. Refusing to give prizes and also entry into the tournaments.

Of course players are able to just go out and buy another copy of the game but again they are spending money to purchase a game. More likely then not they are going to be found out again..

So if people wish to continue to smurf

They Will be found out
The will be shamed to the community
They will not be able to enter any more tournaments


So Again, Admins work very hard week in and week out putting these tournaments on And they are trying there best to minimise these smurfs. I am Sure they will start to decrease over time. But of course will not ever completely fade out Until Blizzard Incorporates something into there game to stop it.

Anyways Thats all,

GLHF
peace

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I do not believe that smurfing is a huge issue when it comes to these tournaments. I think that the main issue is people playing countless practice games (I understand playing with friends) but somehow it doesn't seem fair when you meet someone in brackets who just recently played 30 prac games with masters and grandmasters players.

I know that watching replays and working on my own play is what i should be doing, and I do try. However my main point is that becoming a better player would almost certainly mean a promotion. I feel that if a legitimate laddering diamond player has only a small chance at winning the tournament. The level is far higher than ladder.

Please understand that i realise that these events are run by volunteers, and that I in no way feel that there are error made by hard working admins.

I know that it is a difficult problem, and intend this to be more 'Food for Thought', not pointing the blaming finger at others for my scrubish play :P

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

Tournaments are very different to the ladder. If you lose in the ladder it's bad but it's not completely crushing like a tournament loss. When it's a knockout Bo1 everyone is not playing to get better, they are playing to win. So people will cheese and be aggressive and they will do their best builds. You sir are a diamond that is beating masters, so are they. Only one person out of 40 can win and if you have 10 people that are high diamond then 9 will be knocked out. This is the nature of tournaments.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

If there is a lot of smurfing going on make sure you are reporting it to the admins whenever you suspect it!

As someone who has casted several GPDs I have cast one where I believe a player had let his rank on SEA fall drastically below his korean ranking to be eligible. However a player raised this with the admin and I believe he was banned, after losing the finals thankfully.

Other times I've watched players and been bloody amazed at their macro watching their supply grow at a rate similar to progamers! I've even mentioned wtf is this guy a smurfer? Only to see after they crush 3 series in a row in amazing fashion they get absolutely raped by a standard platinum players timing attack. It turned out he was just playing incredibly greedy and actually had very poor scouting and defense and would die to just about any timing attack.

So yeah unfortunately some sad people smurf. Make sure you report to the admins whenever this happens it does get them banned and usually result in a few clean events before the next one comes around!

As for winning a tournament, well that's exceptionally hard to do unless you happen to have a very balanced style, which most players don't until progamer level. Chances are you're either a bit greedier or a bit more aggressive and so your natural playstyle happens to work better against some players then others. As a result it is really damn hard to consistently win or reach the finals of a tournament. Make sure you're examining your own mistakes too!

All this being said I'm glad you included the suggestion of minimum games played as this is at least a deterrent! Perhaps 25 or 50 ladder games played? Do we think this would discourage too many legitimate players from competing?

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

People who tend to win games and are legitimate are always close to the next rank usually gold-> plat, diamond->masters and so have probably faced players of the same skill as to practicing with masters and grandmaster players that is possible and something that can't (and shouldn't) be policed as it is not wrong to practice with other players of higher skill levels. It is very hard to recognise smurfs though and to be able to stop them from participating in tournaments such as these, but I'm sure people who are running these events do so to the best of their ability in order that the 95% of people if not more who are legitimately participating in tournaments such as these can have fun battling it out to be the champion of their division.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I disagree, as someone who's won a BSG cup. I did get promoted to platinum later, after about 3 weeks of pretty solid play (like 20-30 games a day). This put me at peace with my league position - there was no way I was any better than gold. Which is good, because personally there's no accomplishment in winning a BSG tournament as a platinum player, and it is (and should be for everyone) absolutely horrendous if you are that platinum player who plays in the league and gets beat. It's maybe my only personal disagreement with Suipr's "grandfather" rule, letting people play if they get a promo right before the tournament - I respect that as a rule and as long as it covers everyone as a blanket rule, that's fair. However, on an individual level I question the people who actually choose to play in that situation.

One important thing to remember is that tournaments aren't ladder. And ladder rank is not necessarily a good indicator of how someone will perform in a tournament. Otherwise, why bother playing the games? Just have a bunch of people sign up and the person with the most ladder points gets the prize.

First of all, you instantly have an added element of potential stress. You know that the game you are about to play determines whether or not you will go on. Compare this to ladder, where a loss means you... just go on and hit find match the same as you would have if you won. No consequence. Different people deal with stress in different ways, and this means that not every player necessarily plays the same as they will on ladder.

Second, ladder is about consistency. Being a diamond doesn't mean that a player plays every game at a "diamond standard" (whatever that may be) 100% of the time, and does not guarantee you a win against a platinum player. Being in the diamond league means that you can hold it together to beat other diamonds about half the time. That's all. It is not some profound ranking of skill. You might earn a promotion faster if you play during the early afternoon after children get home from school, than you might at 3am, when the other guys queuing for ladder are the hardcorest of the neckbears in your league.

Third, different players have strengths and weaknesses against different styles and types of play. Being a gold player, you might handle facing mutas ok, but struggle against well controlled infestors. Being a diamond player, you might be comfortable against just about any standard composition, but a more unusual thing (like reaper hellion) might throw you off

Fourth - Series formats matter a LOT. Bo1? Extra pressure, sudden death. Bo3? Having a variety of build orders vs being able to solidly execute something, vs being able to read and adjust for a particular strategy your opponent used. And so on.

Yeah, there are always going to be the players who just don't play ladder, and if they did they would shortly get a promotion. But without playing and without lowering their league, what do you determine is "diamond play" and what is "masters play"? To me, this whole post seems like a whinge about a poor performance. I don't feel driven away by these tournaments. I feel compelled to work hard during the week, and come back next week and do better. I understand how it feels to work really hard and FEEL the improvement, and then lose to someone, not because you made a critical mistake or you did stuff wrong, but that the other player just did everything slightly better than you at every corner. That's no reason to take it out on tournaments or their admins. Basically, if you can't handle losing, stick to ladder. Can't handle losing on ladder, try the arcade beta - I'm sure there's plenty of options for you.

Also, your analogy is bad. It's more like... There's an under 8 football team, but one of them is bigger than all the others. Is it fair he gets to play with the kid his own age, or should he be made to play in the higher div? You aren't the helpless under 8 facing the under 15. You could win your games if you just play better. So go do that.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

All good words of advice from everyone. It is true that play style changes between ladder and tournaments, maybe that is something i should work on. Also we should all notice that the very fabric of sc2 allows a player to beat better player due to build order/luck ect. It is interesting how starcraft is extremely different from other sports. In a long distance running race, the fittest man should win. However there are too many factors affecting the game we love, something that bring real credit to players able to stay at the top.

As for my own results, I do aim to win a GPD one day, but in no means am i trying to blame others for that. Thankyou for your words of advice

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

My first GPD (I had never played BSG) was #50. I made it to the finals. I'd say I was only just Diamond level at that point. I played terribly and lost to JoFritz first round the week after. Then the week after that I won. Again, I was still laddering during all this and apparently I was at a high diamond level just from a lot of practice.

The next 2 weeks in a row I lost 0-2 to LauDaiTinHai (I thought he was a smurf but every week I seem to be more incorrect. Two first round exits in a row for him.) in the Ro8. I noticed I was beating players I was better than and losing to players I was worse than (except when I lost to JoFritz, where I just played so horribly that I deserved to lose).

I then got promoted to Masters. So what is this blog saying? That it's unfair that the best players win? I assure you that I am no smurf, yet in the 5 weeks of GPD I played I was absolutely one of the best in GPD. I then improved (from ladder and coaching) even more and got Masters.

Coolbeans, ladder rank doesn't mean that much. Dante can whip the pants off me, yet I'm Masters and he's Diamond. Just because you're top diamond doesn't mean that you're better than whatever mid-diamond guy knocked you out. Maybe I'm missing the point of what you're complaining about, but it's really not too clear.

EDIT: Limiting entry to people with a certain amount of games played is dumb because I alternate between caring about US server and caring about SEA server. Sometimes I'll play 5 games in the whole season on SEA but mass ladder on US or vice versa.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

Meh, it's not like your playing for cattle stations. If you lose, watch the replay, see where you went wrong and fix it. If it happened to be a smurfer that beat you, then so be it. If your long Term goal is to get M/GM, this small issue really means nothing.

I don't think there is a surefire way admins will 100% catch smurfers every time. As AsylumofSouls pointed out, the admins volunteer to get these tournies up and running. I'm just happy to see that players of all leagues have the opportunity to play in a tournament against players who are "generally" around their own skill level.

However, when it all comes down to it. I guess it all depends what your goals are. If your goal is to win a BSG/PD tournie and you have your heart set on it..... I can understand why some people may get so frustrated. In my opinion though, you should really look at the bigger picture and you will realise this is just a small bump on the road to improvement.

Think of it this way, once you hit GM/M... the whole issue of "smurfers" disappears pretty much. Just don't be a sad ass and go join a lower level tournie yourself :P

EDIT: The only suggestion (very retarded I might add :P) I have to rat out smurfers is;

Only let players who are a part of a SEA clan/team eligible to join. That way, at least there is a group of people that know who the participating player is. Come to think of it, this may promote SEA players to get more involved with the community

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I've never played a bsgpd but it sounds to me like you're whining because you aren't winning when these are supposed to be "easy". Easy is relative to your own skill. If you're diamond then you still have the capability to lose to lesser RANKED players, and higher ranked players equally if you just **** something up or have a bad day. Are you playing equally as good on ladder as in the actual tournament? do you get to nervous and not play how you normally practice? these are all issues that affect EVERYONE in ANY tournament. There's a reason the same person doesn't win every tournament, even place close to where they COULD because tournaments are completely different to practice/ladder. Keep practicing and don't cop out thinking it must be smurfers who are beating you when it VERY rarely probably is.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

The number of players who've said to me "go check my NA profile" and given me their mate's silver account details when they themselves are obviously platinum or better on the SEA server but still trying to play the BSG...
This is why we only look at SEA ladder for BSG eligibility.

Also, let me just say it's nice to see someone on the site respond to the comments below their post with some maturity. So many people in my opinion have been recently just going straight defensive and it seems more common now to attack the people who disagree with no consideration or insight whatsoever.

GGWP to you Sir; I hope you DO get a win in the GPD some day. Good Luck!

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

i think that there is smurfs in these tournaments tho but like its just incredibly hard to find out all of the smurfers.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

thanks very much man nice to hear someone understood what i was trying to get across instead of telling me to improve (something i need to do regardless)

Also nice to hear that it is mainly the admins that understand and agree with my statement.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

This is pretty much the case for master cups as well. You'll either get knocked out first round by a GM or get a couple rounds in only to go up against ttpig, mafia or tgun. Not fun knowing you'll never win.

Maybe some heavily moderated middle ground tournaments for GPD and masters/diamond with no TOP GM Pros allowed might be give the layman a chance to feel good winning something (even without prizes).

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I agree that it's hard to combat smurfing but we at the BSG are very practised at it and anyone trying to smurf is found out and removed; Usually before the second round nowadays.

I do not agree that the tournament is unfair if that's what you're suggesting, we put a lot of work in every week making sure of the exact opposite

I know people in the past have tried to do single league tournaments and despite the lower turnout, even those have such a wide skill range and like the other guys have said, anyone can have a good (or a bad) night. You just can't come out of a tournament surprised when you don't win, it's not the correct mindset.

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I agree with this, I feel like the BSG and GPD tournaments have too wide of a league restriction. A gold league player would almost have 0 chance to win or even get close. Ignoring the fact that there may be gm/masters smurfs in the tournament, a legit gold player would not stand a chance against a legit diamond player. I understand that the tournaments are mainly just to give lower tier players an experience in competing for e-sports, but it's always more enjoyable and competitive if you know you have a reasonable chance in getting close to the finals, or even winning the whole thing!

My personal suggestion is to reduce the league ranges in tournaments so like Bronze Silver, Gold Platinum, Diamond Masters, then GM (including the sea pro gamers)? It can be refined better, but just my initial thoughts towards this topic :P

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

Sorry i misunderstood! You make very good and interesting quotes, which make far more impact than the usual, you are wrong blah blah. Please do not think i don't appreciate the hard work that admins put in each week. Thank you for your feedback

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

I can understand where you are coming from, as a rank 4 diamond who has played majority masters in the past few days, to get eliminated early on in the tournament is disheartening, but at the same time it teaches you where holes are in your gameplay, I find that invaluable. As for removing smurfs, could you not just use the bonus pool, rather than a number of games, pick an arbitrary number (say 150) that if its higher than that, they can not compete? its not hard to keep the bonus pool down, and it gives people incentive to do so, whilst making sure that at all stages of the season, the player has played a reasonable amount of games?

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

That sir is a fantastic idea. Perhaps the bonus pool must be less then 10x the number of the GPD. For example, the first gpd of the season, bonus pool must be below 10, 20 for next. (although those numbers may be too low)

Great idea

Re: GPDs and BSGs unfair?
 

It's a good idea yes but do you honestly expect us to check the ladder of each and every single player who signs up? There are several rules in GPD, such as if you were masters at the end of the season before you are ineligible to participate, that we don't really follow because the other high diamonds are usually around that skill level.

Secondly about the masters cup, it's been said numerous times before but I'll say it here. There's a huge skill discrepancy in Masters, from low masters to high masters. Therefore I find that getting masters acts more as you breaking a new threshold, reaching a new tier if you will. Yes it's going to be hard in the beginning but it's added motivation to improve since you're basically at the bottom of that tier.

Thirdly perhaps you've just been unlucky and faced opponents of your skill level in the first / second round. that's nothing to be discouraged by though. Personally I don't mind being knocked out by someone who makes it to the top 4 since I don't really feel like I'm at that level.

Now to actually answer your question, not it's not ok for someone who plays minimal ladder games but whose skill level is well over high diamond. But we can't just say to them that they're not allowed to participate. As I've said before, the idea of the bonus pool is good, but logistically difficult unless the account you sign up with is linked to your b.net profile so that the server can automatically check the bonus pool. But having poor Eddie check all those sign ups by himself, now you can't question his dedication but there is a line between plausible and reasonable. Also as some people have stated, this is a community thing, watched and sponsored by the community. If people are doing what you're proposing, they'll be shamed by this community. Though that might not matter for some people, it does matter to others. Unfortunately we do have to rely on the good will of participants.

Lastly you should take your performance on ladder and a huge indicator for how you should fare in these tournaments.

As a side note, I view these tournaments as chances to play with people in this community, although there are those who are only here for these tournaments. The first place prize and such as just bonuses in my eyes, experiencing a tournament environment is what I sign up for.