On the 24/11/12 at 4:30pm I will be free from university for 3-4 months.
So I thought I'd write a little (or big...haven't decided yet) blog about some things while I take my study breaks.
Zepph, wat have you even been doing lately?
Studying and "studying". I've been drowning in assignments and overdue weekly tasks at school, so I've been desperately trying to catch up to secure the marks I need. Class for me is honestly 80% procrastination 20% work. Alas, this has brought about the neglect of all things StarCraft II. Casting, playing, generally being involved in the community and Immunity...
It sucks.
I'd like to take a moment to say "Sorry friends " to:
Baldie, who has asked me a thousand times if I'm free to cast something but some other thing has always come up and I've had to cancel or decline.
Benji, who (although this was a while back) also asked me a thousand times if I was free to help him out with xGTL, ASL, TCL..whatever it was.
Maynarde, my other casting archon half for ever having to decline any casts and for making him take over the stream when my internet just wouldn't be stable.
Anyone else I missed who I also had to neglect in favour of other things they call "priorities".
Queue self-improvement blog section
Yep. I'm going to shoot for GM SEA over summer break. It's not too hard to do and I just want to be able to say I'm GM somewhere so that I can sound cool when I talk to people. I also wanna be able to compete in small tourneys around SEA for funsies. Being GM SEA will probably at least prevent me from going out 0-2 or 0-4. Of course, such a thing won't come without lots of practice and harassing Mafia. Perhaps I'll stream a little bit with Mafia coaching or something, so maybe other people can learn too or even get motivated to grab some coaching from the big Maf himself (;
And of course it wouldn't be self-improvement part if I didn't add something about going to the gym. So yeah....I'm going to the gym too. Gonna get abs harder than my fists.
Hey, remember when we had CO?
There is still a hole in the weekly SEA schedule where Community Open was. I think it was a great tournament that lots of people enjoyed playing. Right now, the only weekly tournament we have is wT (which is great too, don't get me wrong) but I miss the days when there were a couple of tourneys runnig. Being Monday night, not everyone can play wT and anyway, more tournaments = more chance to win!
So for the duration of summer and perhaps beyond that if it works out, I'm planning to run another weekly tournament. Prizes would likely be in cash/hardware (with help from the Team Immunity & sponsors). Nothing is set in concrete or anything just yet. It's an idea I'm playing around with. I really wanted to ask you guys first about what you thought would be a good day and time to run it. After speaking with some friendlies, Wednesday still seems to be the day people want it on. But please, leave me a comment on this blog and let me know which day/time you would like to see. The idea is to make it as convenient for as many people as possible.
Another way to get involved again
Another idea I was toying with was to start up one of them youtube channel things where I upload VoD casts of recent games. This would include replays from all over the place (not just SEA) and perhaps feature different co-casters as well (it will kind of depend on how well I can get my home recording setup running). This kind of thing has been done to death though. With 999999 other established, upcoming and brand new casters uploading tons of SC2 games per week, it would probably be a channel with a fairly limited audience after getting buried in all the other stuff.
Therefore, if I were to start such a channel I'd want to add a little..."something else" to it to make it more interesting. Whether this be interviews, competitions, other games..whatever. Again I'm asking for your opinions on what you think would be something cool to add to an SC2 youtube channel. I won't be limiting it to just stuff to do with SEA. The idea is to get a wider audience. So please leave me a comment and let me know!
Speaking of wider audiences...
Super proud of our boys slapping nerds down all around the place. MLG, IEM, Korea, WCS... all achievements that seemed so far off just a year ago. All that's left is to head over to Dreamhack with another group of us! The only way is up from here. Congratulations and well done to everyone who has represented SEA in some way -win or lose - over the past few months.
A blog isn't finished until you've had a whinge about something
People are still underrating our players. Articles like the IEM preview on TL today aren't helping.
Every time we see an event preview or a hype thread SEA is either completely ignored or talked down to. We're swept a side with a quick "oh and there's this guy but they're probably not worth mentioning" or a general "SEA is bad" comment(which sometimes doesn't even get sugar coated).
Don't get me wrong, I understand that esports writers aren't always able to stay up to date with the latest on each scene, particularly when a scene like ours get's a lot less exposure. But let's be honest. How long does it take to do a quick liquipedia search of a player's name? How hard is it to check sc2ranks to see what kind of rank they are on NA/KR? How much time does it take to write a sentence or two on their recent results? As an esports writer, isn't it their job to know what they're talking about rather than leaving out the parts they don't know or replacing them with some assumption?
An annoying problem with a very simple solution that an every day hype thread and preview writer can easily implement.
Scrolled right to the whine and then read up. I 10050050000% agree on the esports journalism that is published, some of it is just trash. Wax Angel whilst a good writer for TL hasn't really been a favourite of mine because of his BW elitism and his blatant disrespect of non-korean players, but that is my personal opinion on him.
I would love to see another CO, and I don't really mind if there is no $$ prizes, I would enter just for fun if it was a weekly thing.
___________________________________ #ForeveR, Twitter: Solisgames Solis.286 (add me for games)
Well a group always has the need to feel superior to other groups just like bullying in schools - you got a top bullies bullying the those "under" them and they in turn try to find others "under" them to bully etc
It's unfortunate but TL and NA are just full of wannabe top dogs and SEA is always going to cop shit despite one of only 4 non Koreans players to make top 16 was our own Moonglade.
That said intelligent people will always know better - see Artosis
To address the meat of the blog YES! More tournaments, more events, more casting
Who cares if there is heaps of youtube channels with same stuff - Just do it for fun and for the guys here who would enjoy watching
___________________________________ www.twitch.tv/switchaus@andrewthomasrrr
"The hardest part about playing Protoss is not choking on your dad's d--k" - Kreamy 2013
would luuurrveee to see more weekly tournies, also agree wed is probs best! And about waxangel... I dunno, a good writer says edgy shit so more people read his article, which he did. Ironically, it's probably a good thing for the sea scene, since now so many people hear about the players since everyone is shit talking and kicking up a fuss about it all haha. Waxangel tho does have a point, it's great our players take games here and there, but we are still yet to do anything major in the greater sc2 scene, and it looks a bit childish to keep saying "but our player beat x that one time", but I agree he could have been a bit less of a dick about it. Just my $0.02
Naw it's all gravy baby! Glad to hear you have been successful in getting to the end of this years studies! It's no small thing regardless of how much time you put into it!
I think it's a great idea to offer another tournament. With UHF's idea of a weekly tournament as well we might just have the community flourish with competitions! I'd be more than happy to help out where I can with your weekly given the support you have given mine over the weeks.
wT Weekly will be concluding after next week so there will be a gap to fill until January should it wish to be filled but assuming all goes well wT Weekly will be back early next year!
Enjoy your time off as it doesn't last long "in the real world" before you get chomped up with a million and one different tasks! Love your work keep it up superstar!
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