Intellectual Dishonesty in StarCraft 2

[@robertovonschoettler]

FlaSh would have explained in 2 mins while defending a 4 pool

[@Turbovolver]

lmao

[@ChickenC3]

True

[@mclemonn]

LMAOOO

[@supaaznjigga]

LOL

[@johnornelas]

Why does this video look like an ISIS hostage video

[@chrisc7265]

Rogue is off camera pointing a gun at him

[@alfrebi9639]

Because it is

[@Icthi]

Yikes...

[@905JimRaynor]

it is worse than that man. He is living in Canada.

[@georgemiller4272]

😂

[@aaabatteries9948]

This feels like found footage after Arty was found dead with "SERRAL GOAT" carved into his forehead.

[@figwumberton1273]

That’s probably not good to say LOL

[@tannerlivingston8981]

The real GOAT is that TL article, generating months of content for us

[@AXharoth]

well thats unecessarily grim

[@Garviel_Loken.]

Serral's heresy has definitely affected some people's view of pro scene

[@ZC.Andrew]

Lol cuz he is in so much danger when Serral's Virgin Mafia reaches him 😂

[@EtaCarinaeSC]

Is he living inside a supply depot, you know with all these fans... ducts are needed

[@ultrasupermegakek2932]

Depot finally made

[@AXharoth]

yes and hes supply blocked anyway wth are those? is he living in korea?

[@meeeplo]

@@AXharoth He currently lives in Prince Edward Island, Canada. Im thinking those tubes are ventilation piping and has insulation over it

[@AXharoth]

@@meeeplo thanks for info good sir

[@sylvariatzaka]

His brain is supply blocked

[@GtrMmorpg]

Why isnt Serral's Rank Roulette win counted for the goat argument?

[@LesOubliesQuebec]

Shh Arty is still salty. He cant blame the race he play and someone know the game better than he do.

[@jensfredriksvensson]

yeah that one was impressive!

[@JimboMcBrostein]

Flash would have been intellectually honest in StarCraft 2

[@sylvariatzaka]

He sure wood have

[@BlackuKnighto]

He sure wood of

[@amai2307]

Intellectually honest would say it is impossible to say that zerg or terran is a goat, because of how biased is blizzard balance team toward this two races, especially toward zergs.

[@sylvariatzaka]

@@amai2307 Its a meme bro

[@amai2307]

@@sylvariatzaka sadly balance state of the game is not a meme.

[@Adam-nf5rl]

WhiteRa is the real GOAT. WhiteRa=Special tactics. Special tactics=GOAT. Easy.

[@iamLI3]

too true

[@rocksparadox]

''First you maek baes, then you defense it.'' That sounds like the recipe for a 12 Nexus cross spawn to me. ''It's okay, I use speshul tictacs, 12 gateway double arbiter, it's okay.''

[@ЮрийЛебединский-т2т]

❤

[@CaptainMyron]

This comment made me realise that I missed wings of liberty. Whitera, Idea, Taeja, MC, Innovation. Such great and unique players. The game felt that it wasn't solved back then.

[@iamLI3]

@@CaptainMyron yeah totally brony T^T and my fav spanishiwa!! XD.....

[@martinstephens4633]

Artosis delivering a vod from the moon. That foil clad piping is straight out of a lunar-base.

[@trailblazingfive]

Is that flexible air ducting?

[@MAD-DUKE]

@@trailblazingfive its a mini split system.

[@fredd3.14]

Artosis has to cover all visible pipes in his house with foil to protect against mario erotica entering his thoughts whenever he sees one

[@AXharoth]

from lunar module xD

[@marcelobayon435]

From mars Sara bunker

[@BaconHer0]

Arty is such a strategic genius. He knew to hide in his underground safehouse before dissing Serral's legacy

[@AXharoth]

ahaha

[@rocksparadox]

You have to appreciate that the level of tolerance for freedom of speech in general in the chat (apart from balance discussions) is the opposite of a safe space. ;D

[@Rebellions]

If you know the enemy is coming early, you build a bunker - its Terran 101.

[@svsv1191]

Artosis was only right about Macro focused players beeing better than Micro or gimick focused players, other than that the way he plays and talks about the game is pure garbage most of the time

[@KaitlynBurnellMath]

I don't have a horse in this race, I basically stopped watching SC2 once brood war casts came back in English, both Rogue and Serral are after my time, but I am a mathematician, and I've done math analysis for "who's the GOAT" in other games, so let me take a look... Looks like Rogue's peak is 2017-2022 based on the tournaments you are highlighting. So let's just take a look at tournaments that both Rogue and Serral entered in that 5 year period, see who places higher. I only care about tournaments they both attended for this comparison cause obviously they are in different regions. KoB3: Serral 2nd, Rogue 5th IEM Katowice 2022: Serral 1st, Rogue 3rd DHM Last Chance: Serral 9th, Rogue 13th TSL 8: Serral 2nd, Rogue 1st NeXT S2: Serral 1st, Rogue 13th KoB2: Serral 2nd, Rogue 5th DHM Winter: Serral 5th, Rogue 2nd IEM Katowice 2021: Serral 9th, Rogue 5th DHM Last Chance: Serral 2nd, Rogue 9th TSL 6: Serral 2nd, Rogue 9th KoB1: Serral 5th, Rogue 5th DHM Fall: Serral 5th, Rogue 5th Douyou Cup 2020: Serral 2nd, Rogue 13th IEM Katowice 2020: Serral 3rd, Rogue 1st 2019 WCS Global Finals: Serral 3rd, Rogue 5th IEM Katowice 2019: Serral 3rd, Rogue 17th HSC XVIII: Serral 1st, Rogue 17th 2018 WCS Global Finals: Serral 1st, Rogue 3rd GSL vs the World 2018: Serral 1st, Rogue 9th IEM Katowice 2018: Serral 3rd, Rogue 1st 2017 WCS Global Finals: Serral 9th, Rogue 1st Overall, Serral finished ahead of Rogue 13 times, Rogue finished ahead of Serral 6 times, and they tied twice. Again, this is sticking to when Rogue was both good and active, not counting the second half of 2022, or 2023, or early 2024 when Rogue went on military service. And there were other tournaments with plenty of Koreans that Serral also won where Rogue I guess wasn't invited (GSL vs the World in 2019 for instance). I dunno, Arty, at a glance it definitely looks like Serral was overall better than Rogue during this time period (a time period hand picked to be Rogue's good time period). 13-6 in terms of who is finishing higher very clearly favours Serral.

[@trombonemasta]

And Serral still dominates today.

[@AusTraLiaNPsyChO]

It all just boils down to Artosis demonstrating a fine ability for confirmation bias by twisting metrics in an attempt to prove that Serral isn't simply the best. MKP, MMA, ByuN and Maru are my favourite players, but I won't lie to myself that Serral isn't the best the game has seen so far. Life had the potential, but ... well, yeah.

[@Handle35667]

Math…you are a ‘mathematician’ and this is what you call “math’? That’s sad

[@La0bouchere]

This doesn't seem like a very useful metric given that pretty much all of these tournaments use elimination brackets, which means that there's a large amount of variance in how far any player will advance.

[@lt2064]

best comment here.

[@Aggnog]

Everyone knows poopfeast420 is the true GOAT.

[@nabraush]

What a ridiculous argument. We all know that only the creator of our universe NesTea can be considered the GOAT.

[@david7384]

this discussion would be over if NesTea would come out of retirement to erase rogue and serral from our dimension past present and future and we all wonder what the question was

[@GreatVomitto]

For me Artosis is the GOAT of StarCraft. He did so much for the community and keeps going.

[@alexsilaghi6747]

a goat cant get sonic pregnant

[@szebike]

He is the best given he can withstand all those *ncel donos while playing.

[@zhuzhong74]

In English that is.

[@SchemingGoldberg]

@@alexsilaghi6747 Not with that attitude he can't!

[@--Nabe-rius--]

Artosis, does Rogue have you held hostage somewhere? It's okay, you can let us know. All your fans are mature and intelligent adults with 6 figure jobs and we can fund your rescue mission.

[@heyimSkyee]

Speak for yourseld im a broke 24 yo xD

[@dew9103]

Yea that’s because all the guys in the chat play protoss

[@--Nabe-rius--]

@@dew9103 Protoss is clearly the white collar race.

[@MrLTiger]

hey guys did you know mario fcks luigi

[@DarthIke77]

Everyone knows a hardy domesticated ruminant animal that has backward curving horns and (in the male) a beard is the true goat. It is kept for its milk and meat and is noted for its lively and frisky behavior.

[@Schmitzelhaus]

😆👌

[@shenjooschannel9131]

Artosis, IEM Katowice 2020, which you listed under Rogue, was not the world championship of that year. The world championship for the previous circuit ended a few months earlier, with the 2019 Blizzcon in November won by Dark. The world championship for that year's circuit concluded with IEM Katowice 2021, which was won by Reynor. Rogue therefore has 2 premier Katowice victories, but he is not a 2-time world champ. The GOAT debate is between Serral and sOs. Serral accomplishments: 2018 Global Finals IEM Katowice 2022 2018 GSL vs the World 2019 GSL vs the World SC2 Masters 2023 Summer IEM Katowice 2024 sOs: 2013 Global Finals 2015 Global Finals IEM Season VII ($100,000) 2014 GSL Hot6 cup That one Proxy nexus DT build he did against Bunny. Please stop this foolishness and recognize sOs as the GOAT of SC2.

[@alfimatsson1836]

Also depends how you sed Katowice 2024 as world championship or not

[@joepkippensnuiver2969]

​@@alfimatsson1836That's a relatively easy one to answer, as all the world championships (blizzcon+IEM 2021-2023) had you qualify in through the circuit (points). Thus in 2024 it's not a world championship (Arabian world cup is).

[@halqthedarktemplar]

Artosis doesn't even know sc2's world championships lmao

[@justinlai2035]

TRUEEE

[@AFryingPan]

sOs baby

[@justsaying2181]

This debate in a nutshell: "How do you define GOAT"? > Is GOAT the person that has won the most "prestigious" tournaments? > or is the GOAT the most skilled / consistent player we have ever seen? If tournaments, then Rogue has been dominating for more years, so he's won more. If who's the more skilled player, then Serral is. His Aligulac rating dominance proves that statistically, he's the most skilled player to ever play Starcraft 2. Serral has also won significantly more money than Rogue in a shorter period of time. Arty spent a lot of time casting Rogue, so his bias is pretty incredible.

[@trombonemasta]

When was the last time Rogue dominated? Does he even play anymore? When was his last macro game?

[@momoaa]

@@trombonemasta He just came out of military service and bombed out of GSL in the first round (0-4 I think? maybe 1-4?). Too be expected for a returning military player but also more generally, its hard to ever say rouge was ever too dominant. I would compare him more to Dark, where he is almost always the favorite going in to a matchup but you also wouldnt be too suprised to see him bomb out randomly to a "much weaker" player, which imo is why its so hard to say rogue is the goat, cuz he was never dominant like that despite his long period of very high level performance. Serral on the other hand you dont ever expect to go into a matchup with a weaker player and just randomly lose, he plays at a much higher level of consistant dominance, as shown by his huge tourney winnings in a much smaller time frame than rogue.

[@trombonemasta]

@@momoaa I agree 100%. When I think of Rogue, I think of gambling all-in gimmicky play--all-ins, vicious cheeses, smart prepared builds. I rarely see him try to play strong macro games with solid fundamentals. His style seems to find a weakness and attack it, rather than Serral's approach, which lends itself to higher consistency. I just don't respect Rogue's style, one; I much prefer Serral's. However, solid defense is the higher percentage play in every sport.

[@binkibonko69]

best comment

[@peddazz2365]

The idea that Artosis often brings forth that Serral could have signed up for GSL is also such a moot point, expecting him to go to Korea for 2 months with 5000€ or so on the table If you go with Artosis method of not counting online cups, then you would also end up with a head to head of 11:5 map score and 4:1 series score, in favor of Serral....

[@raglock1433]

How can you be the greatest of all time while having a 75% loss rate against the other goat status contender?

[@ricksanchez1079]

Every goat has a hard counter?

[@grx3D]

@@ricksanchez1079 Is that tipping over?

[@Caipi2070]

how can rock be a good choice in rock paper scissors?! it always looses against paper! (direct record doesn’t mean much, imagine someone dominating for years then falling off while the other one peaks. is the new player the goat because he das a better head to head than the one who was dominant for years?! NO!

[@raglock1433]

@@Caipi2070 if you were a real sc2 fan, youd know that rock has no counter.

[@raglock1433]

@@Caipi2070 but to give you a real answer. This is not the only or even the main reason why I disagree with Artosis. Prize winnings, mrr records, winrates and even how they do in a 1v1 matter. I commented it because I didnt see anyone else say it. Artosis says that only lan tournaments matter and because Serral doesnt play GSL, hes not the goat. I think all of what you do in a game matters.

[@jensfredriksvensson]

You NEVER determine GOAT until the player is retired unless it is an obvious thing like Tom Brady in NFL for example. From other sports: you normally count in more things, besides the trophies, like head to head, overall win percentage, over how long time this is achieved, eye test, how dominating the player was under his period, disruptive game style (did the player change how to game was played with tactics, style etc), highest high level, opponent quality/level, popularity etc . Note that I dont know most of these things but normally it isnt that simple of determine just because of the amount of trophies.

[@masselfur]

Another Win this weekend for the Not-Goat Serral. If only Rogue would compete in the same tournament we would see the brilliance of Artosis Argument.....oh....wait...

[@catra195]

You forgot Serral also had 4 Dreamhack #1's which is def premier

[@0NBalfa0]

To arty anything that does not include Korean players and is offline doesn't count.

[@EB-bl6cc]

@@0NBalfa0 to be fair it's a reasonable argument. You can't exclude the vast majority of the best players and then consider it a huge victory. It rings hollow

[@0NBalfa0]

@@EB-bl6cc I do agree with that. Certainly the fact that Serral hasn't shown up in a GSL tournament or format does work against him. After all, Rogue is best known for being able to use this format well. Serral has also shown himself to be really good at preparing for his opponents. Many of his wins in Katowice were majorly wins on preparation. I do think that it is a shame we haven't seen him there, regardless, we will see how things will continue in the future. I won't bother further on the Goat evaluation argument as I think the choice of criteria tends to be heavily biased. That said, I don't think that it should be as simple as artosis likes to believe. You want to know the stories around the person, how much he disrupted the game, how his presence in tournaments affected other players. At the end of the day, this is all just a story we like to tell.

[@kathorsees]

​@@EB-bl6cc...by which logic modern GSLs without Serral, Reynor, Clem, MaxPax, Showtime, etc. do not count as premier tournaments.

[@ghosthunter0950]

It doesn't really matter. Atosis is just playing with definitions. Serral is the best player the starcraft scene has seen that's why people call him the GOAT. a "bonjwa" is just someone who was dominant for a period. best bonjwa = GOAT. I rest my case. Artosis's argument is like arguing magnus Carlsen isn't the GOAT because he wasn't the world champ for 15 years like Kasparov was. but everyone knows Magnus is playing at a higher level than everyone that existed. that's why he's the GOAT.

[@Frightning]

In terms of tournament wins, Serral has some competition at the highest levels, but if we look at what happens when Serral faces off against Rogue and many other candidates for GOAT or best player even just of their race. Serral's WR against them in tournaments is freaklishly high and not just a few them. He's winning more often than not against a lot of the other top players. That's a level of dominance against other top players of their day that only Life has been able to match back in the earlier days of pro SC2 before he made some poor life decisions that got him banned from competition (match fixing).

[@johndoe-rq1pu]

This is Fischer Kasparov.

[@RFGSwiss]

Fisher Carlsen. Kasparov lost to a dishwasher (after deepblue).

[@Icthi]

Nah Life is the Fischer analog

[@B1gLupu]

@@Icthi Fischer went mad. Life was just young and stupid.

[@Icthi]

@@B1gLupu for sure. Just meant about how far above the competition he was but for only a brief time. I felt like life controlled every one of his zerglings with a different brain in a hive mind.

[@pl2996]

I don't think anyone cares who is the GOAT in SC2. We're more interested in why Artosis is living in a supply depot.

[@kaiser2261]

"no one cares about online cups" when a big part of Serral's prime was during COVID is a bit unfair lol

[@mothrahlurker788]

"a bit" is a massive understatement. Or the selective removal of regional tournaments.

[@proofofpower]

I think the point is that regional tournaments don’t include as many Korean players, and that he might not have the same success if he competed in Korea-only tournaments. The point about COVID has some validity though - although part of me goes back to the fact that LeBron had one of his titles in the Bubble when considering the LeBron/MJ debate (and Jordan is still the goat between the two of them).

[@fjoiewafno]

​@@mothrahlurker788There is no question that during serrals initial dominance a large degree of it was heavy region locked and Europe was not as strong as it is now.

[@The_Independant_Pit]

Offline record of Serral is just as impressive...

[@jinxie1080]

A lot of people call out Artosis for disregarding online cups but in many of the famous competitive esports, online cups are just that: much MUCH lesser tournaments. LAN especially with a crowd is what holds weight for people in the industry. If you discussed greatest CS teams ever online tournaments would probably just be thrown out unless you're arguing eras. I'd imagine that's what he describes here as intellectual dishonesty and what's been a bit baffling to me so far: - people acting as if GSLs are just some silly tournament (you'd have be to a tourist or newcomer to argue that) - people taking online results into account so much (would be a travesty in other scenes) - people saying GSL is effectively region-locked (as Arty argued, a literal millionaire whose job it is to play SC2 could 100% get into GSL, however Serral himself said that he doesn't feel the need to, which SHOULD be the justification here. Tournaments Serral plays in meanwhile are quite literally region-locked). The problem right now with SC2 and the ceaseless GOAT debate is that there are waaaay too many variables and we aren't removed enough yet to judge things. This debate will probably look much clearer in 2 to 3 years

[@JJH777]

The argument for Maru is: 1. Maru's ridiculous proleague results (easily the SC2 proleague and overall team league goat) are worth the equivalent of a world championship. 2. Maru's OSL in 2013 and SSL in 2015 together are roughly worth a world championship. 3. WESG isn't worth a world championship but is worth more than any of the second tier premiers. Maru has 10 Korean Individual league wins at this point. His closest competition only has 4. I also think second places and top 4s in important events are still worth something. Obviously not as much as a victory but even if you only value a 2nd place as like 20% of a 1st place and top 4 as 10% that still adds a lot to Maru's resume. More than anyone else's.

[@PhilosophyForTheMops]

Amazed at how pasioned ppl can get over something that always is going to boil down to "thats just like your opinion, man"

[@Mangoes95]

The point of the discussion isn't about opinion though. You can quantify a "goat" (in this case for Starcraft) objectively using numbers, results, head to head, etc. Look at any sport, a guy may say that the player who played 40 games is a goat instead of the guy who had a 2000 game career, but that is just objectively false. Hockey is always my go to example; once you see Wayne Gretzky's career stats, then there is absolutely no argument to be made for anybody else ever being considered the goat.

[@sylvariatzaka]

@@Mangoes95 Classic nerd paragraph response to a simple 1 liner XD. Classic.

[@enterthedragon2689]

@@sylvariatzaka simple 1-liner puts a strawman argument. It being a 1-liner doesn't mean it has strong facts or background. Nerd paragraph shows the real understanding.

[@Mangoes95]

@@sylvariatzaka buddy, you're commenting on a video titled "intellectual dishonesty in starcraft 2", we are all nerds here

[@schwanimal]

@@Mangoes95 it's rare that it's so definite though, it's not definite in NBA, MLB, Soccer, SC2, but it is in SC1, Hockey

[@minimalgrammar1276]

I've thought of Maru as the GOAT of SCII in recent years, and just sort of assumed that FlaSh was the best BW player. I imagine they would both wipe the floor with each other in their respective games. Am I wrong?

[@hmmmm1324]

Let's check to see if Serral not competing in the GSL meant he was lax in competing. Rogue winrate in tournaments 59.87%. Serral winrate 71.6% Rogue total earnings from tournaments $1.03m USD. Serrial total earnings from tournaments $1.45m USD. Clearly, Serral not competing in the GSL is the primary reason for your case. If he lived in Korea and competed in them, who knows how many he'd have? But we can't live with counterfactuals. It doesn't reduce Serrals skill or dominance that he didn't compete in the GSL. He has proved himself in more than enough competitive tournaments, and outperforms Rogue on a match by match basis and by an earnings basis. And not by a small amount either. That's the GOAT. The only possible argument is that the GSL is the only game in town, and for a long time now, it hasn't been.

[@sylvariatzaka]

Hey now!!!!! You get that 'intellectual dishonesty' out of here! XD (but no really, you're spot on).

[@proofofpower]

… Except that Reynor has found a way to compete in GSL. If GSL is the most prestigious and well-known of the StarCraft 2 tournaments, why wouldn’t Serral? I liken it to the LeBron/MJ argument: LeBron is clearly the best player of his generation, and of the last 20 years, and earned way more money than Jordan from playing on the league, but Jordan still has more championships against better competition that he beat more soundly. Serral benefits from recency bias, because he’s the current best in the world.

[@hmmmm1324]

@@proofofpower Because you shouldn't have to move to and live in Korea to prove you're the best in the world. Reynor had to completely upend his life, Serral doesn't want or need to. If the GSL was something you could travel to and compete in a weekend like any other major tournament, maybe Serral would have a lot more of them, but it takes place over weeks and weeks, meaning to compete in it you have to live there. Serral chose not to, I don't blame him. It didn't affect his ability to improve or to beat essentially everyone that the GSL produced in online tournaments or tournaments you can travel to. Serral is still as good as he is without the GSL, he still crushes other pros @ over 70%, still has the top SC2 earnings ever, still winning world-class tournaments like the IEM this year.

[@matth1641]

Preparation tournaments like GSL are a different beast though. We don't know how well Serral would do in GSL. Reynor gets smashed in GSL but performs well outside South Korea... That being said, Rogue is definitely not the GOAT lol...

[@La0bouchere]

Judging code S more than any other tournament makes sense. Wins vs stronger opponents mean more than wins vs worse opponents. The GSL has a much higher average player ranking than pretty much all the tournaments Serral competes in. I still think Serral is the best (win rates vs other pros in tournaments is all you really need to look at) but trying to write off GSL's as not mattering is logically fallacious. Total earnings is also irrelevant since it depends on how much money the tournament organizers have and not how strong the competition is.

[@rhildor1]

You know what Arti, you made a super compelling point that I didn’t even think to considering but it can’t be ignored. Maru travels outside of Korea to go complete, but Serral isn’t traveling to Korea to compete. If Serral travelled to Korea to do GSL and just dominated everyone, I think everyone would give him the crown. I actually have a huge, huge amount of respect for Raynor for that reason. He doesn’t shy away from this challenge. GSL is a different beast and extremely preparation focused. Strong points! I think you have me convinced, before I was on the Serral train.

[@Serpico8900]

Serral did travel to Korea and won 2 GSL vs the world. He never competed in GSL long format because GSL has a relatively low prize pool compared to other big weekend tournaments, but requires you to stay for a very long time in the country, which is demanding and expensive. If there was a "GSL like" tournament in Europe, with the same prize pool, I bet almost no koreans would stay in Europe for 2 months to compete in it. I think the GOAT argument is not easy to solve, but not considering that GSL is almost as it was region locked (for the reasons discussed above) is a bit intellectually disonest

[@FlokiTech]

​@@Serpico8900 Imo I would only really weight in GSL results if the GOAT was a close tie between two Koreans and you could use their GSL results to make a clear winner. But comparing someone from EU that can't realistically compete in GSL to someone that lives in Korea is very biased. Specially when as you said they have won 2 GSL vs the world.

[@alfimatsson1836]

3:12 Five homestory cups* and Two stay at home story Cupx😅😅😅

[@paulogodinho3275]

Don't call out Arto on his cherry picking!!

[@catra195]

And 4 Dreamhacks

[@sgtduckduck]

Add another "weekend tournament" win to serral. While serving in the military lmao

[@EnderSword]

2 Main Objections 1. It feels like a total Handwave to say 'online doesn't count' when you know there is a pandemic in the middle of Serral's prime period. He's also listed 'Premier Weekend Tournaments' as 4 to 4. But Dreamhacks, WCS Spring/Fall , ESL are Premier Tournaments and they're just left off the list despite being classified as Premier including live LAN ones. 2. It's a head to head game, so we have other metrics, namely a direct rating of player's performances as a rating or elo score weighted by who they've played against. Serral has a direct winning record vs Rogue, but also just absolute domination against all other players. Serral does not have a losing record to ANY player since 2016, Rogue does. In his Prime period, Rogue loses consistently to both Innovation and TY So I'm more inclined to weight that more heavily. Like if you just got Every one in the Top 50 Chess players in the world to play each other 50 times each, Magnus Carlsen would win. Is there anyone who think that for any year between 2018 and 2024, the winner of that similar experiment would not be Serral?

[@gomensnana9169]

Pretty solid argument. The big flaw with the entire GOAT discussion with Starcraft is that the number of different events spanning the years is so broad that one could argue what exactly measures "success." Obviously Artosis is saying victories in tournaments he finds above a certain prestige level, but someone could argue other forms of success. First thought is money coming to mind, but that is for people who value money, and you would have to adjust for inflation. Second thing that comes to mind is that I don't solely consider first place finishes to be successes. SoO is a successful Starcraft player who has 6x2nd place GSL finishes, and I would consider those 6 to be more successful than 2 first place GSL finishes, but by Artosis' metric, only the the person who takes first place is counted for successes; which, is totally fine to do. My point is that this is not something that can be proven unless someone is superior in every possible metric, and so, because Starcraft 2 has been around so long with so many different tournaments across the globe, not to mention the requirement of online tournaments due to the pandemic that Artosis does not count, this means it is whoever it is in your heart

[@MrFancyGamer]

only sane opinion i’ve read so far

[@indnwkybrd]

Amen. It's not like there is one single objective definition of a GOAT out there officially engraved in stone somewhere. It's just a matter of consensus: if a large majority of people, each operating under their own (usually overlapping, but not 100% identical) definitions of what makes a player "the best", all still agree that it's the same person, then that person is widely considered the GOAT. If that consensus doesn't exist, then maybe there is no GOAT -- IMO this is true for most games & sports. By the time you take all those different criteria & combine them, it amounts to the consensus GOAT player being superior in _almost_ "every possible metric". But no player can possibly be superior in _literally_ every possible metric -- thus you can't "prove" that Rogue or Serral or whoever is the GOAT. Trying to "prove" it just based on one single person's (including Artosis's) arbitrary subjective criteria is honestly pretty dumb and pointless.

[@henafoo]

Questionable way to skip DHM 2020 Summer and Winter, 2021 DHM Fall. Sure those DHMs are online because of global pandemic but that was the case for everything outside of GSLs. But I do think that Serrals TSL9 should fit even the current list as that was offline in the end.

[@Waytheresawill]

bingo - Arty was intellectually dishonest here. No way he listed all of Serral's wins that were comparable to Rogue's accomplishments. The even bigger news is everyone jumping through hoops to not mention Life. Match fixing or not, he won 10 premier tournaments including a WCS and he would absolutely have competed for finals today if he still played.

[@LuisWinckelmann]

He even talks about 3 HSC's even though Serral has 7 of those :D But thats just Artosis spitting facts (in his own way Kappa)

[@rnf123]

This was kind of an unnecessarily tense video but I still really like this argument. When you lay it out clearly, that a "goat" is about premier tournament wins, as it is in all competitive sports, and a "bonjwa" is about untouchable dominance, it makes a lot of sense that Serral is the current bonjwa but not the goat. This is an internally consistent and fair argument, the conclusions result from the premises. You can argue that a different definition of "goat" should apply, such as making it about total earnings, but you can't deny that when you define it this way Rogue is the goat.

[@PatrickSmithPhD]

If it's about premier tournament wins, Serral is the massive winner here, so I guess that makes him the goat AND the bonjwa ;)

[@ulyssesdoroja2973]

Why is IEM katowice 2024 not counted as a world championship lol

[@kbobkpop]

lol yes, good point

[@TheSoia]

Lmao. Dude opens up the video complaining about intellectual dishonesty then proceeds to be intellectually dishonest in his argument. Serral is the only person with 3 world championships Edit: I stand corrected as this year's world cup (2024) wasn't Katowice

[@boredboyeddie1227]

Isnt the Saudi Cup the new World Championship with iem being a Tournament which gets you Points for it?

[@TheSoia]

Additionally, as someone correctly pointed out in another comment, IEM Katowice 2020 was NOT a world championship. Rogue is NOT a 2 time world champion

[@BestPrezz]

I think because this year, the WCS is this summer in Riad, Saudi Arabia. Hence, 2024 IEM katowice was "just" a big ass premier tournament.

[@NotSoSimple741]

Yeah, Serral is the greatest. All those GSLs from Maru and yet Serral crushed Maru in the ESL Spring 2024 Finals. 🐐🐐🐐

[@alastairlarwill6388]

The reason people prefer Serral to Rogue, because Rogue is the ultimate Heel of the sport. Even more of a heel than Has.

[@kamronandaya7619]

Artosis is definitely the caster/analyst goat. i absolutely love your thought process on topics like this and the game. Thank you so much for everything you do for the StarCraft community

[@iloveoofsc2694]

This 5 minute summary is better than all the 30 min GOAT videos we've had so far. Perfect summary

[@kaiser2261]

he couldve just made a 15 second video since the entire argument was " Rogue has more tournament wins within my personal definition of what a tournament that 'counts' is, and I'm arbitrarily going to label dominance as 'bonjwa' and pretend its not relevant to GOAT discussions".

[@theSato]

For my money the real GOAT discussion is between Byun's Reaper Micro , and Has' cheese. lmao. Realtalk tho, honestly I feel like you make a fair argument here, but calling it "intellectual dishonesty" seems like a stretch. There are factors beyond tournament wins that one could consider toward GOAT status -- there are a lot of things other than raw skill that can decide tournament outcomes (map pool, how the bracket is laid out, individual problems that happen to show up during matches, coinflips/risks, etc..) People could just be judging off raw prowess of micro/macro or decisionmaking and that's a fair (but more subjective) metric to consider as well.

[@Shoveltime198]

Recency bias in a nutshell.

[@trombonemasta]

Highest level of skill ever in the game is today, right now. Serral dominates consistently.

[@DZatheus]

@@trombonemasta DIsagree. StarCraft is almost casual in comparison with its past self.

[@trombonemasta]

@@DZatheus How do you figure? Players come back from the military and generally are unable to compete at the same level. Is that because the level of play is somehow lower than before? Please, dude.

[@DZatheus]

​@@trombonemasta no, it's because the level of competition is lower. There's certainly better optimization and cleaner execution. However, the scene is entirely different, there's a smaller player pool, practice hours are not the same, the death of gaming houses lessened the intensity of day to day grind, etc.

[@trombonemasta]

@@DZatheus Is that why Polt can't keep up? Inno? Soo? Stats is trying right now to come back. Where are these guys on the circuit? They leave and come back and can't compete anymore. Why is that? Where are the esports houses in Eu that props up everyone now?

[@floorshirts6402]

Dude, was like, “Babe, I need the closet”

[@lostmana]

It's the same with MJ vs Lebron James, people confuse "Greatest of ALL TIME" with whoever is currently the best player, probably a product of having never seen the older player actually play, feel majority of "Serral is Goat" camp haven't actually witnessed the entirety of the SC2 tournament history (like you have) whereas Serral is in their face 24/7 currently so they just naturally select him. Anyway, agree with you entirely Arty.

[@Mglunafh]

Alright Terrans during the early days of WoL were very good at being terran Zergs in the end of WoL were very good at broodlord-infestor comp Mvp was a beast in the WoL era but ultimately lost to a carpal tunnel syndrome too soon MC was a cornerstone for the game in its early days, but competition against Kespa teams in HotS was too fierce Protoss in the 2013-2014 were very good at 2base 7-gate blink-stalker all-ins Zerg during the end of HotS were super-good at having exactly zero answers for the late game against mech terran, which is whatever, and protoss, which definitely sucks Life was a prodigy, very talented guy but performed some fraudulent stunts and set his career in flames. You can be the best of the best, but match-fixing is an anti-sportsmanship and cannot be tolerated So looking at the history of SC2, the only people that are still top tier after all these years are probably Maru and Byun, with a handful of others lagging behind a bit There were a lot of players playing and winning for extended periods of time, like Mvp, Innovation, soO, sOs, but unfortunately their stars do not shine that bright anymore And don't forget that the game itself got more advanced and the players today accumulate a lot more knowledge about it compared to the early days bonjwas, thus inherently being more skillful

[@Icetemplar]

You're missing a major factor. The MJ and Lebron James debate is players of different times. Serral and Rogue both still play and I would bet Rogue considers himself a better player now than he was when he was a world champion. Serral has been more consitant and better in every aspect of the game then Rogue at his peak. I mean this very literally, Serral is faster, he scouts better, his micro is way better it's not even close. And Serral is better at mid game, at cheeses, late game and is easily the best supreme late zerg game player ever. It's not close, Rogue is not on Serrals level and I have been watching pro sc2 since 2013. Again... it's not close. And if you want the best break down. Watch Probes video on the goat.

[@PatrickSmithPhD]

I've been here since the beta, my friend. I've watched ever premier tournament ever in SC2. Serral has been the #1 feared SC2 player since 2019/2019 and has only gotten more dominant. How is that "current"? lol

[@ryanlutes9833]

Seems like people are using the term GOAT for two different things which is causing conflict; who is the most skilled vs. who has the most recognized accomplishments. It's important to note that these aren't necessarily the same. There are plenty of reasons players might not attend certain tournaments, or maybe have a string of bad luck when they do. I don't really have any opinion on Rogue vs. Serral, I only loosely follow competitive Starcraft. I have seen both play, but am not knowledgeable enough to judge who is better.

[@monkeyaround2066]

Being a GOAT isn't necessary only about the number of titles, but it is also how dominated it is for how long, and it should be an overall package. Sure that Rogue is not bad, but when he was winning, he was definitely not as dominating. In addition, Serral won the most tournament money but Rogue is 4th, not even top three. It would definitely help if you can present win rates against all three races vs time.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

Why is it that Jordan is being hailed as NBA GOAT when he only has 6 titles and dominated for 2 3year periods? People forget that Bill Russell has 11 and his team dominated in those years. Lebron has winning percentage over Kobe but Kobe has 5 rings to James' 4.

[@JJH777]

Non-Koreans have a huge advantage in terms of prize money. Look how high guys like special and neeb are. No way they are top 20 all time.

[@artfulnin]

@@Glass_Half_Fullwith team sports people commonly factor in how good their supporting cast is and the era they played in. It’s much more accurate to compare rogues status with individual competitions like tennis or chess

[@jurgenv466]

sounds fair, very logically explained

[@alcimir5]

According to Liquipedia : Serral wins in premier tournament : 25 Rogue wins in premier tournament : 11 Intellectual dishonesty is ignoring the real stats and inventing another system of determining who's the best. But yeah I agree that it's in fact a lot closer than this : manly because it's impossible for an european to play in Korea in good conditions and it's a lot harder for Koreans to win in Europe.

[@sceefo]

Let's make it this way. Rogue has gotten overwhelming advantage by training with more advanced ladder/tournament setting in Korea vs. the Finnish guy playing with his moms PC in the cabin in rural Finland. Anycase. Serral has won all these before age of 22 and Rogue has 8 years on him. If Serral stops winning and or playing your argument is valid, but I don't see that one coming (though Rogue can win also but in current situation Serral is favorite in every metric). We can look the winnings of Rogue when he was 22 and compare those while remembering the difference of the practice opponents and tournament quality locally and Serral is so much better in every metric. Calling Serral GOAT is valid cause he has dominated "Korean esport" winning more than anyone for his young age and keeps kicking those nerds to the nuts more often than not.

[@theancestor3531]

If you're gonna count domestic tournaments it's pretty insane to not include wcs wins for serral, if you're gonna say the level of competition there is lower because there weren't any Koreans there you can also say serral and Reynor weren't playing in gsl which reduces it's value considering they we're somewhere in the top 5 during all of those gsls

[@tigera6]

WCS was region locked, meaning KRs could not play in those tournament, so why should it be counted? GSL are opened to everyone, but Serral CHOSE not to play it. As for Reynor, well, I dont think hes doing well in GSL at all.

[@Firion2.0]

Reynor does play in GSL and he looks like a garbage player when he does. GSL is a different beast and I do wonder if Serral would even make it out of the round of 16.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

There's a world of difference between not being allowed to participate and choosing not to participate. And that is your only argument being thrown out the window.

[@ETBrooD]

@@Glass_Half_Full Serral stated he has no interest in participating in the GSL because it's inconvenient for him. He's not disallowed.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

@@ETBrooD yes, I've heard that before. Like I said, don't want to is different from not allowed to.

[@aaronpriestley1500]

i think when you get to the level any of those people play at they are all goats in their own respects.

[@ChannelPony]

Bonjwa sounds like french ''bon joueur'' which means ''good player''. Cool coincidence.

[@KorewaKosmo]

Sounds in your mind, it doesnt really

[@MrNinjaone1]

It also sounds like bon giovanni who is a good player, it cannot be a coincidence

[@gabriel_whitney]

I think you nailed it, Arty. Serral is the most consistent sc2 player. When he plays poorly he only plays a little worse than when he plays well. However, Rogue was highly inconsistent. There was a running joke that "ok, now that Rogue won a GSL tournament, that means he'll get knocked out early next tournament." You never knew what you were going to get with him. I think there's a reason that 4 of Maru's GSL wins have come after Rogue went to the military.

[@catalyzt9]

You can say Rogue has had the best career, and that makes him "the greatest" but we all know who the BEST player of all time is if we're just talking about straight up skill. . Serral has a higher peak of skill in the game of Starcraft than anyone has ever had before it. SC2 pros are better than they've ever been, and still, it's Serral they're all chasing, and what's crazy, they're not even close. The guy crushes every LAN, to see someone take more than 1 map off him in a series is sometimes a surprise in itself.

[@tigera6]

"The guy crushes every LAN", such lies. How did he dominate in IEM last year? Lost to DRG, Solar and eliminated by Ragnarok. What about Gamers8? Lost to Classic and eliminated by Solar 0-3. Like you acting like Serral ALWAYS win the LAN tournament for 6 years is ridiculous.

[@marlonchosky]

Yup, we all know who the goat is... rogue 😊

[@trombonemasta]

@@tigera6 Mostly zvzs, a very tricky, unpredictable matchup often won by a knife's edge. GOAT talk is not a discussion of inhuman robots who win without losing; that's inhuman. Besides, what you are arguing against is called a strawman. It should be embarrassing to you to do something like that.

[@tigera6]

@@trombonemasta No, I simply picked apart a dumb claim by one of Serral fanboy. Look, Serral is not the ONLY great SC2 player, he has weakness and has been known for it. But somehow when GOAT debate coming up, its the same old "oh Serral crush KR, he NEVER lost, he ALWAYS win" bullshit. If you want to argue, you have to be objective and bring up both sides of the equation. Why its embarrassing to point that out? Its not a strawman to say that the guy has moments (plural) where he didnt deliver.

[@trombonemasta]

​@@tigera6 But what does that prove? GOATs only ever deliver? I guess there's never been a GOAT yet in anything, then. Regarding weakness, everything has weakness, but are those weaknesses exploitable? His win/loss record suggests not very.

[@TomThompson]

lolololol People can argue for Serral or Maru or even SoS. But no one in their right mind should argue for Rogue. He has one World Championship and that was when Blizzard botched the Nydus change right before the global finals (RIP Neeb). Dan, I mean, come on now. You talk about honesty. It's time to take a hard look in the mirror and be honest with yourself.

[@speakertrees]

Artitini otano here. Internet busiest star craft nerd

[@srcocomad]

Imagine serral in his dms, and arty posting a completely different ones only for serral to post the originals and own himself

[@speakertrees]

@@srcocomad frigging I heard it was a cookie rec

[@vick7848]

Here after Serral won again. What did rogue place 🤭 Looks like Rogue is the bonjwa and Serral is the goat 🐐 :p

[@Piokkoko]

>no one cares about online cups So to combat intelectual dishonesty we are being intelectually dishonest?

[@paulogodinho3275]

The video title is a spoiler of what is Arto is about to do lol

[@Eatbutternow]

Do goats typically lose and drop out of major tournaments in the first round often like rogue does? Do they usually not have the highest win rate? I didn’t know cherry picking data that supports your opinion is the way to be intellectually honest lol

[@testng987]

serral goat, artosis room shiny unfinished pipes = opinion denied

[@JN_Sc2]

If we're going by definition then accomplishment is also defined as "a special skill or ability acquired by training or practice" or "an activity that a person can do well", which would mean we'd have to take into account actual skill in-game. Successful is also defined as "having achieved fame, wealth, or social status" which would mean we'd have to take total earnings into account as well, even if it seems a little ridiculous. So this would mean that GSL tournament achievements can't be the only deciding factor.

[@Taunt61]

You are discounting the biggest factor and I know this 2 minute into the video. No player has ever been as dominant (as the most dominant player) as Serral. Serral had borderline 80% winrate over Koreans for years. What did Rogue have when he was most dominant? 60%? Serral besides 1 or 2 tournaments over a 4 year period always landed in the finals of any tournament he joined. You are pitting against him a guy who sometimes performs, sometimes shits the bed. Who can choose builds well and likes to gamble. Nobody was ever surprised when Rogue couldn't get out of a group. When Serral can't, people are going wild, because it's weird as fuck. I mean you discard dominance, like, people fearing a certain player, people feeling like having no chance against him, for friggin years, and count tournaments - that you like and feel are relevant. You discard the most important metric: Who was the most dominant beast for longest? Who still is? Who 4-0'd the second best player in the world when 200k was on the line? Intellectual dishonesty my ass.

[@trombonemasta]

His argument is very convenient and "just so". I don't buy it at all.

[@DamnitMan88]

What are you talking about? Artosis literally said Serral is a Bonjwa.

[@trombonemasta]

@@DamnitMan88 He specifically denies Serral GOAT status. He does so by artificially narrowing the criteria to a list of accomplishments which very conveniently supports the conclusion he prefers.

[@DamnitMan88]

@@trombonemasta Ok, so you're saying Artosis's argument against Serral's GOAT status is biased and based on a limited and selectively chosen set of criteria that skew the results in their favor. So tell me, what specific criteria are you using to evaluate GOAT status in StarCraft II and what selective set of criteria are you talking about?

[@trombonemasta]

@@DamnitMan88 I mostly disagree with how Artosis includes GSL for Rogue, which I view as effectively region locked in practice, and excludes many other tournaments for Serral on the basis of their being literally region locked. That's my main complaint. Either, he excludes both or he includes both; or keeps GSL and excludes WCS, but includes Serral's list of accomplishments like online major tournaments, etc, which he also arbitrarily excludes. It doesn't seem consistent. And it is ultimately what he bases his entire conclusion on--four GLS wins as tiebreaker.

[@R0binah00d]

Rouge had an AMAZING story. He had the most amazing Butterfly Effect I've seen in Starcraft. He was down 0-2 in a best of 5 in the Super Tournament. Then had ONE LING on hold position. Which held off a ling flood single handedly just long enough for Rouge to make his own lings and hold. He then reverse swept that series. Which led to him winning the Super Tournament. Which also involved his Jin Air brother SOS needing to lose to his rival Hero so SOS didn't have enough points to go to the world finals. Rouge then went on to win the world finals. He had his biggest run that led to his Break Out performance. And it all Butter Fly Effected off of ONE hold position Ling. I'll NEVER forget that story as long as I'm alive.

[@housemana]

you're using the term butterfly effect wrong. that is only applicable to an event in a nonlinear system

[@djkaytv]

In my opinion its the Way Serral plays he is very diverse in every Way and almost never lost a Bo3+. Rogue on the other Hand just plays one way and that is just Meta Infestors OP : Rogue abuse it in everygame, now Lurker Seasons : Guess what

[@1mendark]

There are a few factors which imo should be considered when having a GOAT discussion: - Teamleague performance (eg. Innovation carrying Stx Soul and Axion Acer to their proleague and GSTL victories, Flash carrying KT, etc). - Consistency across all three SC2 expansions. - Success before vs after the fall of the Korean Teams and Teamhouses infrastructure. - Second place tournament finishes, as well as overall tournament performance.

[@standinonstilts]

I wish SC2 tournaments priorities prep matches over weekend tournies. Prep matches are the heart and soul of the game and have way more prestiege to them than weekend tournies.

[@sylvariatzaka]

I prefer non-prep to be honest. A simple test of skill in a game that can get messy and wild. Prep is like "I know this dude didn't scout here so I'm gonna proxy rax and come in at this angle... oh, gg." Don't get me wrong I love GSL but... Tournies like IEM Kato or Homestory are more fun to watch.

[@Blag_Cog]

I sort of agree with this. But also I don't. I think I prefer non-prep more in general. But prep tourneys are still immensely fun to watch once in a while to break up the pace. You get some of the most creative yet viable builds that way. Without prep the creative builds still exist but they aren't as intricate.

[@dustyodyssey]

Simple argument for Serral being the GOAT: Starcraft 2 is being played at a higher level now then it ever has been before, Serral is dominant during the time when the game is the most competitive, therefore he is the GOAT. Not to mention he outclasses Rogue in overall rating (Aligulac), prize winnings, etc. Also, online cups matter when they are the only thing happening (COVID). Finally though, GOAT is just an opinion at the end of the day. Nobody is being dishonest...

[@markoliimatainen2565]

Highest level? We dont even have idra.

[@olivergottig5972]

Why is Sonic double Pregnant?

[@ravp123]

That's a question for which we need answer for. Who the hell cares who is more sweaty player in some boomer RTS game

[@ScubaSteve6769]

Why are Serral's WCS wins not counted?

[@darchonyo]

Appreciate your thoughts on this! One thing I'd like to put forward is access to these big preparation tournaments (mainly GSL), which is the biggest differentiating factor between the two. Would Serral have more GSLs than Rogue if it was held in Finland? Love you 'tosis

[@Glass_Half_Full]

And who will be playing in "GSL" Finland? Clem, maybe. Reynor, probably. Heromarine, Lambo? 😂 How do these players compare with Kr players?

[@mgs85]

@@Glass_Half_Fullyeah that’s the thing, it wouldn’t be a GSL because there isn’t that depth.

[@CultOfMonika]

Serral is literally the Bobby Fisher of SC

[@turaln4858]

Couple points: First of all, there is a world of difference between being dominant in your region, trying to win a world championship on multiple occasions and falling short (Maru), and being favored and being able to win almost every tournament you choose to enter - you cannot equate Maru's failed attempts at WC with Serrals lack of attempts at GSL. Secondly, what is your definition of GOAT? It seems to be quite an arbitrary cut off - one person can say only world championships + premier weekend + dominance + head-to-head at peak record, then Serral wins. One can say WCs, Premier and all region-based tournaments + dominance + head-to-head at peak record, and then Serral wins. But you choose arbitrary cut off line at one of the region based tournaments (which noone denies is way harder than the other) to justify your decision. You didn't even count Masters tournaments with both foreign and Korean presence, like DH Masters 2021 Fall, 2020 Winter, 2020 Summer season finals. Some people may even consider the dominance (bonjwa) factor to be the sole factor for GOAT definition, and even though neither you or I will agree with that, that's also a completely valid arbitrary definition. If you don't want to count Serrals DH wins, and you don't want to extrapolate Serral's performance everywhere he _chooses_ to compete with his "could-have-been" performance at GSL, that's fine. In that case I would say compare the contestants at tournaments where they both competed and compare their performances - the raw count of 1st places maybe is the same (if we, for your sake, exclude DH Masters where Rogue did compete but didn't perform as well), but Serral was more consistent during his reign, with better head to head record against Rogue and the rest of the top field, more dominant performance with deeper runs in tournaments that he didn't outright win, and with more of the "bonjwa-dominance" factor than Rogue (which I think most reasonable observers for both periods would agree).

[@trombonemasta]

Why is everyone talking as if Serral's reign is in the past? Or that Serral is not in his "prime" anymore? He won the last major tournament and has been at or near the top for seven and a half straight years--2018 until his military service just a month ago. And even during this seven and a half years, it was extremely rare that he was knocked out of a tournament due to any matchup besides zvz.

[@brownbrewsommelier]

I have no comment other than thank you for your contagious passion and seemingly omniscient knowledge about the game we love. You are the GOAT starcraft historian. bich

[@halqthedarktemplar]

1. Serrral has the highest winrate overall, even against koreans 2. Tied with the first point, Serral is much more consistent in terms of result 3 Tied with the first 2 points, Serral on average reaches deaper in tournament, even if he doesn't win 3. Although not the value of GSL, Serral won many, many Dreamhacks and WCSs in Europe. Again, they can't be compared 1:1 with GSLs but it is disingenuous to not count them at all It would also help to know where you got that definition of GOAT from. It kinda seems cherry picked to make rogue win with that wording

[@starcraft2own]

Share your definition of GOAT and see if it's any different. I feel like the definition is in the name of the phrase.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

Is Jordan the GOAT? He has 6 rings after all. How about Bill Russell who has 11? Different eras, different number of teams. Lebron has winning rate over Kobe, and still 1 fewer ring. At this point james, unless he joins with another championship caliber team, will never win again.

[@halqthedarktemplar]

​@@starcraft2own see you would think that, but Artosis limited the definition of goat to wins of top tier tournaments only, and not length of period of dominance or other factors, which I personally would take into account.

[@stonecoat_art]

We need a category for the coolest player ever, TY, who managed to both cast and win the GSL. Legend

[@nHautamaki]

Ok I will ask two simple questions that imply an argument. 1) what is the head to head record of Rogue vs Serral in competitive play? 2) how do their total prize winnings compare? Seems to me like those are pretty objective questions with objective answers.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

What is the head to head serral vs Rogue in semis and finals play? Majority of serral's wins are in Eu locked tournaments. How's the level of competition in Eu only tournaments? What if you remove those prize winnings from the equation and get only the winnings where both players can compete? How much would it be?

[@nHautamaki]

@@Glass_Half_Full well considering that Serral usually beats GSL players when he meets them, including Rogue, it must be pretty fine. I think that you can possibly make up a definition that says Rogue is the GOAT, but if you make up such a definition, and it puts one player over another player that has won more money and more games directly against him and would be favored to win if they met at any point in their primes then the definition is a little tortured and arguably useless. Why call someone the GOAT while acknowledging that another player is better than them by any objective measure? At root this argument is just about blaming Blizzard for region locking Koreans out of EU/NA tournaments, but that's not Serral's fault. He went where the money was and he won against GSL players more often than not when he did face them.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

@@nHautamaki do you know why there was Eu locked online tournaments? Because koreans are winning that much back then. Also, serral did not go where the money is. He's already there and it so happen that he's the best in his region. Nobody is stopping serral from flying to korea and staying for 1 GSL season. Reynor did. Twice. And before you start on "the pay is not worth it", that is now. In 2018, when serral was said to be most dominant, the pay was better back then but he never tried. So there's that.

[@nHautamaki]

@@Glass_Half_Full I applaud Reynor for what he has done but objectively it's a financially worse decision to devote a couple months to playing 1 tournament with a prize pool lower than what you could make playing in a few weekends in your own continent. I think that the only coherent argument you can make is that either GOAT doesn't actually mean best player of all time, or that you really think Rogue would be favored to beat Serral in a head to head match under any circumstances. People make the 'preparation' argument. Ok. So you're saying that if Mr Beast or MBS or someone offered a million dollars to the winner of a head to head bo9 in 2 months time, Serral and Rogue have all that time to prepare in any way they like, that betting odds would favor Rogue over Serral? I personally don't think so.

[@abstractdaddy1384]

Explain how those 2 criteria prove that a person is a goat. Those seem like obviously faulty criteria to judge it on.

[@kicknitoldskool]

It's obviously Clem - he's French and is on the world stage for a Strategic War game, just incredible

[@Tungar111-mv2hw]

>Starcraft 2 >Intellectual Arty how many times do we need to explain this to you?

[@eistee1812]

Maru will be the Sc2 goat after winning the Esports World Cup

[@hullmees666]

Maru doesnt know how to play outside korea. Wont happen.

[@karlfechner9602]

ist serral just the best by winrate against all other players? thats the hardest thing to do right? + he has a very good winrate vs maru and rouge

[@chloesmith4065]

He crushes everyone. Last tournament he 4-0'd Maru in the finals. He only lost 1 map the entire tournament and it was a ZvZ.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

And all that win rate will not translate to a GSL ever. EVER. Did you not watch the video? So are we going winrates now instead of trophies? 😂

[@CombatLegacy]

I mean sure why not? People value different ​things differently. Some people think having better all of the h2h's is more of a sign of accomplishment and success as per goat definition and some think trophies are. At best or at worst there should be moee 'GOAT' subcategories that have their own strong points. Idk I think having only 1 goat doesnt make sense when the same player isn't the best vs everybody over a long period of time consinstently and both won most titles. Both are hallmarks of achievement and succes are they not? @@Glass_Half_Full

[@Glass_Half_Full]

@@CombatLegacy i agree with you in that regard there should be more than 1 GOAT. If you think serral is goat because of his merits, I wouldn't argue. Just as I am saying that in my mind Rogue is GOAT but in my heart it's Maru. My only argument is that win rates and "dominance" factor higher than actually showing up and winning all tournaments they are eligible to join. As if having a higher win rate over all korean players will automatically give him a GSL. It does not.

[@CombatLegacy]

@@Glass_Half_Full Yeah it's a weird and sticky situation at best. There clearly isn't an objective or absolute goat because then all the different types of stats of all sorts of things would point to the same player. It's more like that there are camps of people cheering their player with what they're best at. I didn't make up my mind who's the goat because I love starcraft and the scene, and find all these players incredible and each has strong unique stats on their side so I can't choose one. However one thing that I personally have found to value more than it is valued in 'mainstream' thinking is h2h record. I think it's worth more than most give it credit. Just theoretically, if you beat me say 7-8 out of 10 times but I win more trophies, there's no way in hell you are going to think i'm better than you lol. Sure I have more trophies but you know that before our next match even starts that you'll most likely win so how can I be better xd? But idunno how that applies to rogues and serrals h2h case for example, they seem what 50-50 roughly across different time spans if i'm seeing it correctly so that seems about even, but then Rogue has 60% lifetime w/l , while Serral has 70+ w/l ratio. I think a stat like that should by definition be accounted more towards the 'Goatness' than it usualy is however even with that, I still don't have a clear GOAT, but if the current trend continues the only reasonable answer is going to be Serral imo.

[@Nagassh]

Byun is clearly the GOAT because the greatest accomplishment is having a unit nerfed because of you and I want to protect his smile.

[@trombonemasta]

Serral seems to have gotten Zerg nerfed more than once.

[@sage4670]

​@trombonemasta examples? I don't remember a single time serral was the reason a zerg unit got nerfed. Note that this requires both serral *alone* got the unit nerfed and the unit was truly nerfed, i.e., no buffs at the same time. This is what byun did to the reapers.

[@Nagassh]

@@trombonemasta Artosis' favorite story is talking about how Byun was doing things with reapers that Maru / other top terran simply couldn't replicate when they tried. Serral is my favorite zerg player, but I don't think he's doing anything unique with a unit that Rogue or Dark can't that pushes it into nerfed territory. He "just" plays the whole package incredibly well and has great game sense. Zerg has inarguably been the strongest race and is played by the two (almost) inarguably best overall players. That's just a prime nerf target in general. Byun got reapers nerfed for something HE could do with them.

[@trombonemasta]

@@sage4670 Every nerf to Zerg in the last 5 years has been due to Serral's dominance. It’s not as clear as Byun and reapers, but it is nonetheless true.

[@trombonemasta]

@@Nagassh Zerg is quite literally harder to play at lower levels now, because no one can beat Serral, leading to nerfs.

[@Waytheresawill]

Name a more iconic duo than the Starcraft 2 community and not mentioning Life.

[@fredericbouchardwong4596]

I was thinking the same thing, but I think life was banned from history after the cheat scandal (I am not saying I agree with that, but I think that's the general MO on that)

[@chavonuevo]

And I have to add one thing about Savior, (despite his scandal): part of the reason he hooked me on Starcraft and on the Zerg race is that he was dominant at a time when Zergs were struggling. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember it as a time when the Korean leagues were dominated by Terran and Protoss, yet Rogue was able to win championships.

[@AreolaGrande94]

does one really think Serral could not have dominated GSL in his prime, likely winning more than 4 seasons? I'm no intense Serral stan, but he has a winning record against all other SC2 players in consideration for bonjwa at any point and/or GOAT. That is enough. He beats everyone else head to head more often than not. Rogue included.

[@trombonemasta]

Serral is still in his prime

[@AreolaGrande94]

@@trombonemasta serral is in military service.... so no

[@trombonemasta]

@@AreolaGrande94 My understanding is that he will be participating less in tournaments, but will still play the major tournaments. Finnish military rules aren’t Korean military rules.

[@AreolaGrande94]

@@trombonemasta I understand all this. The point is Serral is not a full-time SC2 pro at the present time. At that high level of competition in arguably the world's most challenging game, it is impossible for him to be simultaneously in the military and also in his prime. I wouldn't doubt he returns to 'prime' form when he's done, but you initially stated he is still in his prime right now, which is not true. It has nothing to do with how many tournaments or which kinds he will participate in. A massive chunk of time he normally spends practicing/training/honing builds and mechanics will be instead spent fiddling with rifles and other such.

[@trombonemasta]

@@AreolaGrande94 It's not apodictic. We don't know how much time he spends practicing for tournaments. We will see his results when the time comes. Until then, it's premature to assume he won't play just as well as he always does. As I understand it, Serral doesn't spend loads of time grinding for tournaments. I wouldn't be surprised if he plays quite well next time we see him.

[@masterkhais4479]

Maru is the GOAT. He’s been dominating for over a decade now. Serral only became dominant in the scene since 2018.

[@guardianvalor962]

This is essentially the Jordan vs LeBron argument. Jordan has won more championships.

[@EnderSword]

It's a bit different though, in a team sport you don't have direct control over championship wins, you need a whole team. In SC2 It's 100% you.

[@JJEMTT]

@@EnderSword Right, so Jordan 1v9'd and LeBron 5v5'd, glad we cleared that up. 😇

[@L3monsta]

I remember in the early days of SC2 everyone kept asking and arguing over who is the bonjwa of SC2 and over all the consensus was that there was no one truly worthy of the title at the time and as time passed the term became more and more revered to the point that it was virtually unobtainable due to the unrealistic expectations of the term. Since no one was granted the term in so long it simply fell out of use. I think it would be highly appropriate for the community to grant it to Serral. He's absolutely worthy of it imo.

[@gnoomlord]

serral won the most money, serral has the highest winrate, serral has the highest ladder rating and he did all of this while being a foreigner, he didn't have an entire country backing esports the whole time. "well rogue won more korean only tournaments!", lol, lmao even

[@Glass_Half_Full]

Wdym with korean only tournaments? Is there such a thing? How about Eu only tournaments? Is there such a thing?

[@gnoomlord]

@@Glass_Half_Full GSL code s is korean only. there are eu only tournaments yes but rt decided that he won't count those because the level of competition is lower.

[@Glass_Half_Full]

@@gnoomlord if GSL is korean only tournaments, then Reynor, Scarlett, Special, (and there are 2 others I forgot their names) are koreans? Since when????

[@parallel38]

gsl aint korean only, stop sc2 dishonesty ​@@gnoomlord

[@gnoomlord]

@@Glass_Half_Full you can play with 600 ping or move to korea for months, which is what special did.

[@Moeron86]

I feel like rogue is just offscreen with a gun

[@oldmanbanjo]

It wasn't less than five minutes :(

[@ArtosisTV]

the video covers 3 topics genius. the explanation about GOAT took about 2-3 minutes total.

[@oldmanbanjo]

@@ArtosisTV Dude too you're too easily trolled for a guy on social media :(

[@MrNinjaone1]

@@oldmanbanjo yea nice coverup merely trolling, maybe just face the facts and git gud if you can, which you cant 🤣🤣

[@UpATree]

This thumbnail is better than all the A.I. Thumbnails in the world.

[@Zeromarwins]

Serral has the highest Alligulac rating ever

[@Laiwinsh]

So, basically, if Serral continues in the same trajectory, he could still achieve GOAT status even according to Artosis.

[@inhoum4949]

I honestly think that part of the bias comes from the fact that people like to naturally root for their continent/origin. Many europeans/NA will, not surprisingly be a Serral fan over Rogue and therefore, their natural bias comes into play. Same thing for a player named Happy in Warcraft 3.

[@Icthi]

Yeah, it’s gross

[@parallel38]

are you blind? artosis is white lol

[@miza6]

Also could be a bias why Artois rates GSL so highly in his considerations…as someone so involved in GSLit makes sense (consciously or unconsciously) why he would value it so highly.

[@inhoum4949]

@@miza6 true and also there is like a bit of 'race that you play' bias where some people have their favourite player bias based the pros choice of race. At the same time, Artosis is someone who dedicated his life to Starcraft so he knows the reality of how tough some of these tournaments are to win.

[@La0bouchere]

Race is more of a factor. I'd be the biggest Serral fan ever if he played Terran, but since he plays zerg he's obviously and objectively overhyped and a bad person too.

[@Ashleymaul]

Participation awards and results where Serral was not a contestant don't make you the GOAT. To be the best you have to beat the best, and Serral is the hardest player to beat. He is so much better than everyone else he rolls over people who are just behind him. When I watch Rogue he is one dimensional, only does a few things well, Serral bends into every situation he is in.

[@ToTheNines87368]

I somewhat agree. My only objection is that the smaller tournament wins should count for something. Like do 10 count for 1 GSL? I have no idea, I’m just saying if skilled players participate (which they do) it’s difficult to win continuously, no matter how far below the GSL it is.

[@tuwumuch]

I guess it depends on who participated in it, and how much value the players put into those small tourneys.

[@PaleBlueCamelArchives]

The problem with comparing number of tournament wins: we are not factoring in the level of competition in each. I think talking about which specific years had the best players would be relevant to this discussion. One world championship does not equal another world championship, because the level of the competition differs.

[@stathismouratidis44]

I will take way less to say that Serral is the actual G.O.A.T because as we all can see any tournament he participates is most likely a win and him not travelling to korea doesnt mean rogue is better for winning there because when serral did actually go to korea he won and it would happen again imo if he decided to go to korea in the future

[@LandmarkRL]

This video did not age well past this weekend