What Makes the Best Player?

What makes the best player?

Most versatile with all civs
29
60%
Can beat anyone with one civ
19
40%
 
Total votes: 48

No Flag tedere12
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by tedere12 »

gibson wrote:
lordraphael wrote:
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comparing sc2 with aoe is like comparing apples with pears.
it's really not. It's like comparing an apple to a car. Sc2 is a competitive balanced game. Aoe3 is none of those. The only similarities are they're both rts games, which is what the guy asked.

starcraft2 is hardly an rts
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by momuuu »

@gibson Aoe2 is balanced because all the civs are basically the same save for small details. Btw, don't talk shit when you don't know your stuff, makes you look stupid.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by gibson »

@momuuu I literally said I dont know very much about aoe2, what more do you want? Btw, don't talk shit when you don't know your stuff, make you look stupid.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by momuuu »

gibson wrote:@momuuu I literally said I dont know very much about aoe2, what more do you want? Btw, don't talk shit when you don't know your stuff, make you look stupid.

gibson wrote:I wouldnt say aoe2 is a competitive game for the very reason that I don't think its probably balanced. I don't know very much about the game but between all the expansions theres gotta be what like over 20 civs? Games like overwatch and lol can get away with having more than just a few and being competitive because the heroes are much simpler and easy to balance. What I'm saying is that yes, it does make sense for games like aoe2 and aoe3 to force civ variety in tournaments, reason being the games are so unbalanced that playing just one civ would end in the matchup being a bigger factor in who won a game than the skill of the players. Thats the reason why I dont consider the game competitive. Would you call a football match competitive where one team had to run around with 30 pound vests and the other team was sterioded out of their minds?

:hmm:
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by gibson »

Jerom wrote:
gibson wrote:@momuuu I literally said I dont know very much about aoe2, what more do you want? Btw, don't talk shit when you don't know your stuff, make you look stupid.

gibson wrote:I wouldnt say aoe2 is a competitive game for the very reason that I don't think its probably balanced. I don't know very much about the game but between all the expansions theres gotta be what like over 20 civs? Games like overwatch and lol can get away with having more than just a few and being competitive because the heroes are much simpler and easy to balance. What I'm saying is that yes, it does make sense for games like aoe2 and aoe3 to force civ variety in tournaments, reason being the games are so unbalanced that playing just one civ would end in the matchup being a bigger factor in who won a game than the skill of the players. Thats the reason why I dont consider the game competitive. Would you call a football match competitive where one team had to run around with 30 pound vests and the other team was sterioded out of their minds?

:hmm:


gibson wrote:I don't know very much about the game


I know english isn't your 1st language but saying "I don't know very much about the game" is essentially saying " I could be wrong" so I'm not really sure why you're being such an ass about it. It's not like I came in claiming to be an expert or anything
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by momuuu »

But then why do you even write a post to begin with. Btw you phrase is as if you don't know how many civilisations there are precisely but that you're trying to claim that theres many so your point is true.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by momuuu »

Actually on topic: Imagine an unrestricted tournament where you can play whatever civilisation you want as many times as possible. I don't think a 1 civilization player could possibly beat a good player that'll have focussed on 5-7 civilisations including maybe one or two that counter yours.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Goodspeed »

gibson wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:
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A lot of this game's strategic depth is in understanding match ups and inter-civ balance. This is very different in SC2, so you can't compare the two in this context. For AoE3 it makes a lot of sense, in a competitive environment, to include civ variety, which we have done in tournaments.

Your point doesn't hold up by the way. AoE2 is a competitive game and in tournaments they, too, force players to play every civ. Players who only know how to lame Huns won't stand a chance, even though they may get to the top of the ladder by doing so.

I would agree that, for a competitive RTS, having fewer civs is better. Too many and you run into insurmountable balance issues. However in AoE (2 as well as 3) the civ variety is such an important game feature (case in pt: AoE expansions add civs, SC2 expansions add units) that you have to include it in competition too.
I wouldnt say aoe2 is a competitive game for the very reason that I don't think its probably balanced. I don't know very much about the game but between all the expansions theres gotta be what like over 20 civs? Games like overwatch and lol can get away with having more than just a few and being competitive because the heroes are much simpler and easy to balance.
Balanced or no, people play it on a much higher level and for a lot more money than AoE3. I won't call the game balanced, but it's definitely competitive. As someone mentioned, tournament games are often mostly mirrors so inter-civ balance isn't really an issue. Differences in balance between the civs are also much smaller than in this game, which makes it less of a problem.
What I'm saying is that yes, it does make sense for games like aoe2 and aoe3 to force civ variety in tournaments, reason being the games are so unbalanced that playing just one civ would end in the matchup being a bigger factor in who won a game than the skill of the players. Thats the reason why I dont consider the game competitive.
To me that's not the reason. The reason is that civ variety is a major game feature, and a player's skill at adapting their civ choice to maps or the opposing civ counts towards his overall level in my opinion.

Actually playing just one civ wouldn't be a balance issue at all. Most earlier AoE3 tournaments were 100% mirrors, typically with only one civ played. Spain in the early days, Dutch in WCG 2007, Japan in WCG 2008, Iro in ASFP 1.0, etc. These events were decided mostly by mechanics, not by intelligent play. The fact that Aizamk can win tournaments in their current form is a very positive thing to me.
My point is that considering the nature of the game, testing mechanics and basic ingame decision making is a worse way to decide who is better than the way we are currently doing things. The fact that SC2 is a better game to play competitively isn't relevant to that; civ variety isn't a thing in that game and therefore you can't compare the two the way you are.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by gibson »

fair enough
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by n0el »

@Goodspeed what about strategic depth in a bo5 given map diversity? Does aoe3 not offer enough choice to see different builds or does the current system devolve to a set of builds per civ. Sc2 offers a significant amount of diversity within a matchup, we donā€™t see that in aoe3.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

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Post by sergyou »

he has to be good in treaty
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Goodspeed »

n0el wrote:@Goodspeed what about strategic depth in a bo5 given map diversity? Does aoe3 not offer enough choice to see different builds or does the current system devolve to a set of builds per civ. Sc2 offers a significant amount of diversity within a matchup, we donā€™t see that in aoe3.
:hmm: That's not an easy question.

Within a match up there is indeed much less depth in AoE3. There are simply less choices, or less viable choices at least. SC2 made it a point to have a large unit selection, and all units have a specific scenario in which they are viable. In AoE3 you don't have this; you have to pick between at most 3 viable unit compositions that are available to your civ.
As for the build order, as far as that doesn't relate directly to unit comp, there is also much less variety in AoE3. The main reason is balance. Starcraft is carefully balanced around timings and they have tried their best to give every race aggressive as well as defensive options at every possible game time. In AoE3, for every match up there is one civ that outscales the other, so the latter has to go for a timing at minute X. The former often has no viable aggressive options at all. This obviously limits options significantly.
SC2 is also much more dynamic in nature due to the strength of harassment, which is not at all viable in AoE3. Also, in AoE3 you tech by aging up which means there aren't as many different tech paths.

AoE3 features more economic choices, but that's really all it has on Starcraft when it comes to build order variety. There are the cards of course, but because card balance is so poor your card order is effectively decided for you. As for economic options, most civs don't have all that many. Strategically interesting are the economic civs which have to make choices about when to boom and when not to, think Brit/Japan/India, etc. For most civs the options end with a villager card here and there, a market and a couple of TPs. Starcraft may have less economic options, but their expansion system is well-designed. The strength of your economy is directly related to how much of it you want to expose to harassment, which is a great way to balance it. It also allows them to directly influence the viability of expansions and boom/turtle styles using maps alone.

In short, SC is a much more well-designed RTS from the perspective of single match ups (and in general, really). So is AoE2. Looking at the way economic expansion works, you will see more similarities between SC2 and AoE2 than between AoE2 and AoE3. AoE2 doesn't need to insist on match-up variety, the games are plenty interesting with 100% mirrors.

But balance isn't everything. We have found that in AoE3 the skill cap is plenty high to make for interesting high level games. And, of course, there is a lot of strategic depth in understanding inter-civ balance and match ups, which is what makes this game so damn interesting to study. If you incorporate that in tournaments, which we have done, you can still have a competitively interesting game. Just in a different way.

It says a lot about this game that the meta is still evolving after all these years. That, I think, is a great way to recognize a good RTS.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Aykin Haraka »

the name
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Asateo »

Aykin Haraka wrote:the name


And I suppose, say, a three letter name is the best way to go. ^_^
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Garja »

Civ variety as a skill is like being creative and having a deep pool of strategies. But if you were able to beat everyone with just one perfect strategy would it mean you're not the best?
Honestly everything is subordinated to the primary condition that you're able to beat everyone (consistently ofc) no matter what.
Even in fight games there are lot of characters but it's not like there is any reward to play more than one in competitive tourneys. The variety is usually just a way to compensate the weaknesses of a civ or to upset the opponent. And that would be the case in AOE3 if there weren't couple of civs that are strictly better in the majority of situations. In fact I think that with the current EP balance a no rule environment would lead each player to use 2-3 favorite civs at most, while not necessarily making things boring.
And to make them both more competitive and more interesting there should be a one civ only rule.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by lordraphael »

Goodspeed wrote:
n0el wrote:@Goodspeed what about strategic depth in a bo5 given map diversity? Does aoe3 not offer enough choice to see different builds or does the current system devolve to a set of builds per civ. Sc2 offers a significant amount of diversity within a matchup, we donā€™t see that in aoe3.
:hmm: That's not an easy question.

Within a match up there is indeed much less depth in AoE3. There are simply less choices, or less viable choices at least. SC2 made it a point to have a large unit selection, and all units have a specific scenario in which they are viable. In AoE3 you don't have this; you have to pick between at most 3 viable unit compositions that are available to your civ.
As for the build order, as far as that doesn't relate directly to unit comp, there is also much less variety in AoE3. The main reason is balance. Starcraft is carefully balanced around timings and they have tried their best to give every race aggressive as well as defensive options at every possible game time. In AoE3, for every match up there is one civ that outscales the other, so the latter has to go for a timing at minute X. The former often has no viable aggressive options at all. This obviously limits options significantly.
SC2 is also much more dynamic in nature due to the strength of harassment, which is not at all viable in AoE3. Also, in AoE3 you tech by aging up which means there aren't as many different tech paths.

AoE3 features more economic choices, but that's really all it has on Starcraft when it comes to build order variety. There are the cards of course, but because card balance is so poor your card order is effectively decided for you. As for economic options, most civs don't have all that many. Strategically interesting are the economic civs which have to make choices about when to boom and when not to, think Brit/Japan/India, etc. For most civs the options end with a villager card here and there, a market and a couple of TPs. Starcraft may have less economic options, but their expansion system is well-designed. The strength of your economy is directly related to how much of it you want to expose to harassment, which is a great way to balance it. It also allows them to directly influence the viability of expansions and boom/turtle styles using maps alone.

In short, SC is a much more well-designed RTS from the perspective of single match ups (and in general, really). So is AoE2. Looking at the way economic expansion works, you will see more similarities between SC2 and AoE2 than between AoE2 and AoE3. AoE2 doesn't need to insist on match-up variety, the games are plenty interesting with 100% mirrors.

But balance isn't everything. We have found that in AoE3 the skill cap is plenty high to make for interesting high level games. And, of course, there is a lot of strategic depth in understanding inter-civ balance and match ups, which is what makes this game so damn interesting to study. If you incorporate that in tournaments, which we have done, you can still have a competitively interesting game. Just in a different way.

It says a lot about this game that the meta is still evolving after all these years. That, I think, is a great way to recognize a good RTS.

then sc2 is a bad rts because the meta only changes with major patches.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Aykin Haraka »

Asateo wrote:
Aykin Haraka wrote:the name


And I suppose, say, a three letter name is the best way to go. ^_^


of course
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Goodspeed »

lordraphael wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:
n0el wrote:@Goodspeed what about strategic depth in a bo5 given map diversity? Does aoe3 not offer enough choice to see different builds or does the current system devolve to a set of builds per civ. Sc2 offers a significant amount of diversity within a matchup, we donā€™t see that in aoe3.
:hmm: That's not an easy question.

Within a match up there is indeed much less depth in AoE3. There are simply less choices, or less viable choices at least. SC2 made it a point to have a large unit selection, and all units have a specific scenario in which they are viable. In AoE3 you don't have this; you have to pick between at most 3 viable unit compositions that are available to your civ.
As for the build order, as far as that doesn't relate directly to unit comp, there is also much less variety in AoE3. The main reason is balance. Starcraft is carefully balanced around timings and they have tried their best to give every race aggressive as well as defensive options at every possible game time. In AoE3, for every match up there is one civ that outscales the other, so the latter has to go for a timing at minute X. The former often has no viable aggressive options at all. This obviously limits options significantly.
SC2 is also much more dynamic in nature due to the strength of harassment, which is not at all viable in AoE3. Also, in AoE3 you tech by aging up which means there aren't as many different tech paths.

AoE3 features more economic choices, but that's really all it has on Starcraft when it comes to build order variety. There are the cards of course, but because card balance is so poor your card order is effectively decided for you. As for economic options, most civs don't have all that many. Strategically interesting are the economic civs which have to make choices about when to boom and when not to, think Brit/Japan/India, etc. For most civs the options end with a villager card here and there, a market and a couple of TPs. Starcraft may have less economic options, but their expansion system is well-designed. The strength of your economy is directly related to how much of it you want to expose to harassment, which is a great way to balance it. It also allows them to directly influence the viability of expansions and boom/turtle styles using maps alone.

In short, SC is a much more well-designed RTS from the perspective of single match ups (and in general, really). So is AoE2. Looking at the way economic expansion works, you will see more similarities between SC2 and AoE2 than between AoE2 and AoE3. AoE2 doesn't need to insist on match-up variety, the games are plenty interesting with 100% mirrors.

But balance isn't everything. We have found that in AoE3 the skill cap is plenty high to make for interesting high level games. And, of course, there is a lot of strategic depth in understanding inter-civ balance and match ups, which is what makes this game so damn interesting to study. If you incorporate that in tournaments, which we have done, you can still have a competitively interesting game. Just in a different way.

It says a lot about this game that the meta is still evolving after all these years. That, I think, is a great way to recognize a good RTS.

then sc2 is a bad rts because the meta only changes with major patches.
I would think it still changes, just in minor ways. There are constant major changes in that game so the meta never has time to properly settle. Anyway I do think AoE3 is strategically a more interesting game with its 105 unique match ups and civ variety. It just paid the price balance-wise, which is okay considering it's not played at the Korean level.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by JakeyBoyTH »

tedere12 wrote:
gibson wrote:
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it's really not. It's like comparing an apple to a car. Sc2 is a competitive balanced game. Aoe3 is none of those. The only similarities are they're both rts games, which is what the guy asked.

starcraft2 is hardly an rts


Whatchu talkin bout willis :hmm:
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Likansing »

ofc most versatile civ. This mode brings more fun when watching because the variation on the matches, BO, etc... Same civ will make it boring to see.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Garja »

There is still a lot of depth even in single MUs because of maps, because of starting conditions and because repeated interaction with the same player.
But because players have to change civ everytime we can't see those dynamics.

Jerom wrote:Actually on topic: Imagine an unrestricted tournament where you can play whatever civilisation you want as many times as possible. I don't think a 1 civilization player could possibly beat a good player that'll have focussed on 5-7 civilisations including maybe one or two that counter yours.

Well of course if he can pick the supposed counte in every game then he has an advantage. But what about 1 civ locked vs a different civ every game? I think that would be fair at the very least.
Also 1 locked civ vs one locked civ would also be more fair because different maps favor different civs.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by momuuu »

That would be a very useless thought experiment that completely and totally misses the point I made.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by noissance »

The best player can beat any civ with all civs.
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Re: What Makes the Best Player?

Post by Garja »

Jerom wrote:That would be a very useless thought experiment that completely and totally misses the point I made.

Well your point is can one civ win let's say a bo5 vs all others civs? My answer is "yes it is possible", more so if the opponent has to change civ every game.
Besides, the point is that having more civs at disposal in this case is a facilitation so the guy that competes with one civ only is likely to be the best of the two regardless.
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