Reign of Gaming

I might be alone here, but I never had the impression, that AD carry was "simple". Not even when I was new to the game. AP carries always seemed much simpler to me - get into position, use your spells and then survive, while surviving is easier, the better you positioned yourself and the better you used your spells to kill or lock down opponents.

The only "AD carry" I'd ever play was Kayle, because I had incredible utility, burst and was more or less a caster as well. Especially the optimal use of the ultimate is easy for me. Sometimes I even played Ashe, but besides throwing good ultimates I was really bad with her.. I don't know - I realize what an AD carry "should" and "has" to do, however I could never get into that mindset of actually executing it.

I think you hit the nail on the head - Pressure on the 'current' LCS teams and wealth of information are the strongest points. It is indeed easier to get to the top, than to stay there.

One more thing though - the teams that perform on top level since a longer time also clearly have an advantage. While they still have not been in such an incredible pressure-situation before , they at least had more experience in similar situations (Watch the CLG interview from Travis).. I guess that could be included in the the thing about the coming apart of the "seams" though.. So yes, you did include the 3 most important points.

I like the idea of choosing, sounds nice in theory. But how do you determine who is the higher seed in every situation? I imagine you'd have to make quite the extensive ruleset on what counts for what - time played, score, gold per minute, previous matchups.. a lot - which might be quite the headache for the competing teams

I don't agree with Sirlin on everything, but I do with his stance on how Tournament settings. Game design is not even a point of discussion right now, so let's leave it at that.

Intentionally losing in Double Elimination is inherently a dumb idea in my opinion. There may be some weird situation where it can be beneficial in the end, but those would have to be extraordinary circumstances where you could predict the outcome of at least 2 matches, and it still would be a gamble. Overall I do not claim Double Elimination to be the best of all things and nothing is greater or the solution to all problems - but from my knowledge it's the best thing we have by this point.

Also, just to clear up my idea - I do NOT think it's good as a spectator or player seeing one team intentionally lose, pretty much the opposite. However, I do understand the teams perfectly well and support their approach when they play to win the tournament instead of playing to win every single match.

Let me make another example on how it's bad for a Tournament, when there are some matches being played that "don't matter". In Esports as in Sports, playing matches on the top level is incredibly exhausting. In Sports it's mostly physical, in Esports it's mostly mental (which is not any easier to handle than physical btw.). So knowing that you can tone down, play it a bit more relaxed at the cost of not playing up to the standard is a chance you do not want to pass up.

Further - as a disclaimer, I didn't see the mentioned match with Curse - in a game such as LoL, when you can afford to lose, trying out new/untested things can yield really useful information for the future. Maybe CLG has a massive problem with a certain champion for some reason? Good information to know. I don't claim that's what happened there, but it may as well. Also maybe you don't want to show off more of your regular strategy that may expose weaknesses. Feed your future opponents useless information.

That's not specifically an answer to you anymore, but I felt like writing this ^^

My opinion on this is pretty clear: If the tournament setting allows you to basically "choose by losing" for the next matchups, then you do it.

David Sirlin has a great article on this:
http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2012/8/1/playing-to-win-in-badminton.html

In short, it's the task of the tournament organizers to prevent situations where losing is "good" option. That's why I'm a fan of double elimination. You never want to lose ever in that setting.

At the start I thought you'd be referring to one very popular game last season. Maybe you had it in mind, maybe you didn't. I don't bring it up anywhere quite simply because it's tedious to argue and people are too prone to misunderstand my stance.

Again: If losing a game helps you in the grand scheme of things, you lose it. No questions asked, it's the tournament organizers job to prevent such situations from occurring in first place.

I've stopped caring about casuals arguments since a long time when it's about higher level stuff they have no experienve with. I consider myself to be reasonsbly good and i'm mostly right when trying to predit who wins based on champ select or early game decisions. But Im still wrong often enough to not dare to make a public statement.

I don't have a specific style, but neither am I everything. It's more like - I mimic the style I need and adapt when required to another style. Basically filling in the gaps of what the team needs.

I'd say, the "concept of innovation" is not overrated, but misunderstood. You don't Innovate for the sake of innovating something. You innovate because it gives you an edge over your competition.

For a top competitive level it's important to be aware of all possibilities and how to handle them. Since LoL is always changing, a pro always has to stay on top of innovation - information-wise. They don't have to use it. What Scarra most likely referring to was the gimmick ideas.
A lot of "innovation" results in a gimmick that is very strong if not handled properly - but it requires the element of surprise as a core ingredient to work. It's much rarer, that you see some actual "innovation" stick around - that's usually the case when the Metagame is shifting (NOT changing, [slightly] shifting!)

On a top level game - Read: Pro-Scene - "innovating" is of little value. The competition there is so insanely quick in adapting, that most of the gimmicks that work perfectly fine in a non-pro-environment fall flat before they win a single game. So for the most part, they have to/want to rely on things that are ACTUALLY strong and work even when the opponents know about. Getting the element of surprise in addition to finding such things is a bonus.

TL;DR: Both "Gimmicks" and "Meta Shift-Tactics" are labeled as "Innovation". The "Gimmicks" are much more common and overrated in a top-level game, since they are, well, Gimmicks. As a pro you have to be prepared for them though. "Meta Shift-Tactics" will stick around and those are always worth being early to use them.

Quote from squee147 »

Do not plan to be a pro gamer. That's like planning to be a pitcher in the Majors. Plan to have a much more attainable career, keep playing because you

love LoL and maybe you will luck out get to play professionally. DO NOT give up the things that will support you in a happy healthy life (like school) to chase the dream of being a pro gamer. I almost guarantee that will end in disaster. If you want to hear some heart breaking stories about people chasing unrealistic goals read about baseball players in the minor leagues who spend decades and give up everything chasing the dream of playing in the Majors.

Secondly if you're only in Bronze you have a long way to go before you need to consider this question at all. Seriously put the possibility out of your head entirely until your at least platinum.

I absolutely agree on NOT giving up the things that will support you in happy healthy life. I mean - even IF you would get into the pro-scene and everything you wish for, what about afterwards? You won't be able to compete with the newcomers forever. You need some stable education to be able to support yourself in any case.

However: I do NOT agree on going for "smaller" goals. Keep going for the pro-status, keep trying and keep dreaming on getting there - that way you have a higher chance to actually reach that goal. But - always have a backup plan in case you can't reach your dream. 

If you wanna be pro, just grind the game over and over and over (insert over and over billion more times) again. 14 hours a day of Lol would be a solid starting goal.

After about two years of playing for 14 hours a day you should be able to compete at pro level.

Note: This is a common misconception. You do not become a "pro" just by investing a ton of time. It is not that simple. You have to actively try to become better - be efficient. (Relevant information: http://youtu.be/5MTO2a7ZFcc)

I have 3 pieces of advice for you

1) Only start streaming once you actually are confident that you can reach Diamond/Challenger Tier and it's only a matter of time to get there. The reason for this is simple - before you have that confidence in your own ability, you still have a lot to work to do on yourself - to improve yourself.

2) Ignore the League System, ignore your team mates' skill level, ignore trolling and negative attitude-talker. Only focus on improving yourself. Once you yourself are good enough, you will rise automatically without even trying.

3) If you really want to go to the top, it's a matter of mindset. I believe every person can get there, however only few are willing to sacrifice what it takes to reach the summit. It is work. The only difference between the people that are "naturally talented" and those who are not, is that the "naturally talented"-ones actually like doing that work.

The following two directions are good enough to go all the way, the rest comes by itself once you followed them:
- For a start, read up on "Playing to Win" by David Sirlin on http://www.sirlin.net/ptw/ (mini-Edit: If you understand everything from the get-go, that's crazy. It took me a while to understand everything - take your time)
- Further, you can look up on Youtube from gbay99. He has some great videos LoL-related that will help greatly, especially if you didn't quite understand everything from David Sirlin.

Edit: Wow, I write horrible when I don't proof-read...