Current Situation on Aoe4 and Aoe2

[sheeesh]

Egg like ball, isn't that rugby?

had to join to the discussion somehow

fact
rugby ball looks a lot more like an egg than that brown maltreated canary melon

 

[Cuth]

football is always being played with feet. Or are you refering to the us sport, where you carry a ball formed like an egg and call it also football?

You're taking about handegg.

 

[NesteaZen]

Well...yes obviously.
More tension, more preparation, more quality.

What changes to me? nothing, what changes to aoe2 community well, no viper... and many more experts milking aoe4 and stopping

More preparation lol.
Do you even listen to yourself?
Throwing money at your problem doesn't always work. No one will play games they dont enjoy playing. There are just too many of them.
All our pros are streamers first.

You think prize pool comes first then gameplay/the game?
You need an economy around skins and steady income to push $1m tourneys like counter-strike. You don't just dump money at your problem and hope. lol.
You sound like crypto shitcoin dudes. 'Yea ill create this awesome blockchain thing and it will have this and that. And yea, there's a game too. BUT MONEY IN GAMES'.

MS didn't keep aoe2 alive. It was Ensemble making a game for sim city autists. According to the documentaries, everyone was allowed to pitch ideas.
There was no arrogance like you have it these days, where devs think they're hot **** because they finished university and don't realize they are drones themselves. Owing nothing; creating at command; be frustrated on twitter and priding themselves how you don't need to play games to work on games.

I've been pushing for a monthly aoe2 sub for a while now, but it'll just turn out like Wow or similar. You get comfortable as studio and it'll fester a toxic environment. Skins seem to better for the health of the game.
See CSGO, dota and fortnite pool prizes.
Anyway, get real.

There's even room for NFTs to improve and fortify the gaming industry. And no not the way it's done now. I'm really surprised no one seems to see this. Unless it's technically not possible, the way I'm thinking about it, but it should be doable.

 

[oozkan]

All our pros are streamers first.

Success bring viewers also.

If Viper and you start a stream from scratch today, even if you have a perfect personality for streaming, he will start with more viewers.

 

[NesteaZen]

>Success bring viewers also.
Which you can have with $10k-30k prize pools too. Success is success. @oozkan

Anyway it's pointless talk. aoe2 has no steady income stream, so I'm surprised it has any tournaments at all tbh. Especially at the prize pools it is at.
The only way I see why this is happening, is that they can write it off as some sort of expense.

As for aoe4, it sure was a bit depressing for us late 2021 with still covid mandates, high GPU prices, streamers leaving/changing, and aoe4 releasing.
But the posters from above would still hang out here and would still play/watch aoe2. As would I.
At least we received one of the best tournament settings ever; aoezone.net is accessible; life is good.

 

[Giuseppe551]

More preparation lol.
Do you even listen to yourself?

https://www.econlib.org/library/Topics/College/incentives.html

It's ok, the President of the United States struggles with basic economic concepts as well

 

[MembTV]

Hala Madrid!!!!!

 

[lecracheursagacite]

The only thing I was super annoyed with is the then new crowd dunking on aoe2 maxis for speaking critically about aoe4.
Where are these people now.
I've actually made screen shots of these people from the various aoe4 twitch chat channels. Guess i should do some cross checking.

Who are the "then new crowd" and "aoe2 maxis"?

 

[Liamsmalley7]

Anyway it's pointless talk. aoe2 has no steady income stream, so I'm surprised it has any tournaments at all tbh. Especially at the prize pools it is at.

What do you mean by it has "no steady income stream"?

Also, in terms of tournament prize pools, AoE2's prize pool to viewership numbers ratio is notoriously low. At least, since the release of DE.

 

[MaSmOrRa]

What do you mean by it has "no steady income stream"?

Also, in terms of tournament prize pools, AoE2's prize pool to viewership numbers ratio is notoriously low. At least, since the release of DE.

You mean in a situation where the prize pool is the numerator and the viewership the denominator?
Then I 100% agree.
(I initially understood a "low ratio" to be something bad)

AoE2 has exceptionally good viewership numbers for the prize pools it gets.

It's not uncommon to see a StarCraft 2 tournament with a 100k prize pool pull maybe 10k-15k viewers.

You give AoE2 a 100k prize pool, you're getting 60k-70k viewers, as evidenced by Hidden Cup 4 and Red Bull 5.

 

[NesteaZen]

@Giuseppe551 @Liamsmalley7 omg

@lecracheursagacite "aoe2 maxis"
we are

 

[Giuseppe551]

@NesteaZen don't take my word for it, go watch the last minute of mbl's stream yesterday where he says he's already grinding to qualify for Red Bull. And that's a top 5-6 player in the world, imagine how motivated the players in the 12-24 range will be to qualify.

Also maxis is not a word. Saying "we are" does nothing to clarify what you are trying to say.

 

[Tendo]

mbl's stream yesterday where he says he's already grinding to qualify for Red Bull. And that's a top 5-6 player in the world

Is he though?
Nothing against MbL, but looking at Tournament Performances I wouldn't include him in top 10 currently.
Of course if he prepares, has the right mindset and reads the rules he can beat almost everyone, but he rly needs to prepare for that.

 

[Giuseppe551]

I could see that only if you're looking at it through a very short term lens (i.e. when he started working a 9-5 and had less time/motivation for aoe). But from 2018-2021 he was 5th, 4th, 6th, and 9th in terms of prize money. On open maps I'd take him over anyone not named Viper/Liereyy/Hera (and pretty even with Hera). He's insane in TGs. Him being top 10 (in terms of talent) is not even a discussion honestly.

 

[NesteaZen]

MY GUY!

It's ok, the President of the United States struggles with basic economic concepts as well

Oh I don't struggle.
Now remind me again. Where is our skin market, where is our season pass again? Mr. basic economic, where's the revenue for $1m tournaments without it turning into a charity for special ed kids.
They are supposed to invest just because? Wow great economic concept.
Oh you were talking about OUR incentive, that we even give a damn, that we play a game for our own enjoyment, for which we should be congratulated and rewarded?
@Liamsmalley7 @ no steady income stream"?
That's just prize pool, organizational costs not included.

It's not uncommon to see a StarCraft 2 tournament with a 100k prize pool pull maybe 10k-15k viewers.

(Not addressed at you masmorra, I'm just answering the potential sc2 question)
yea great warchests we have. Which blizzard abandoned probably because they got flak for it or no one was buying them or god knows why.
Because from a business perspective there's no reason to abandon 0 maintenance goods, but blizzard management has been a joke for a while now, and I'm not even referring to the office/party fiasco thing. This was the least of their problems tbh.

Be glad you, or in this case really the pros, are getting any free prize pool at all, even if MS favors their new favorite toy.
But hey, I'm gladly proven wrong by the tournament organizers we have here. Then again, we had one that was shilling aoe4 high on hopium, without having any basis for it or rather riding off of the back of us, with no basis of knowing if we will or how much we will be supporting aoe4.

You should be more disappointed by the performance of our pros in aoe4 instead of the prize pool.* I know I am. Clearly we've proven we're not the bee's knees with all our micro skills. At least nili was right with this prediction of his, sadly.
To be fair aoe4 UI/keyboard layout seems to be more similar to sc2 so maybe they had an easier time. They also had no tournaments while aoe4 was being rolled out with its beta phases. They also don't have to maintain a competitive knowledge of another game they compete in.
*(no thanks at all to most of aoe2 twitch chat) all of the ones yapping about competitive blood and incentive, but then have a meltdown when along trots a game where pros from all facets of RTS can compete because it's new, and aoe2 chat has a meltdown.

Also maxis is not a word. Saying "we are" does nothing to clarify what you are trying to say.

He asked me who not what.
maxi, maximalist
ttps://www.dictionary.com/browse/maximalist

• a person who favors a radical and immediate approach to the achievement of a set of goals or the completion of a program.
• a person who favours direct action to achieve all his goals and rejects compromise

 

[Liamsmalley7]

You mean in a situation where the prize pool is the numerator and the viewership the denominator?
Then I 100% agree.
(I initially understood a "low ratio" to be something bad)

AoE2 has exceptionally good viewership numbers for the prize pools it gets.

It's not uncommon to see a StarCraft 2 tournament with a 100k prize pool pull maybe 10k-15k viewers.

You give AoE2 a 100k prize pool, you're getting 60k-70k viewers, as evidenced by Hidden Cup 4 and Red Bull 5.

Indeed that is what I meant. Relative to viewership numbers, AoE2 prize pool levels are quite low. SC2 is a good comparison, as you mentioned.

But really you can compare it to just about any "esport" out there and you will see that they are pulling huge prize pools with a comparatively lower viewership count. CSGO being the only weird exception, where it seems to share AoE2's "smaller-than-should-be" prize pool levels

I don't know how accurate this site is, but it can give a decent indication

AoE Tournaments - Full List of Age of Empires Esports Events | Esports Charts

AoE esports ► Receive full information about Age of Empires tournaments 2022 - All AoE tournaments: Pro, Amatuer, Major competitions, recent and ongoing AoE esports events

escharts.com

SC2 Tournaments - Full List of StarCraft II Esports Events | Esports Charts

SC2 esports ► Receive full information about StarCraft II tournaments 2022 - All SC2 tournaments: Pro, Amatuer, Major competitions, recent and ongoing SC2 esports events

escharts.com

 

[Tendo]

I could see that only if you're looking at it through a very short term lens (i.e. when he started working a 9-5 and had less time/motivation for aoe). But from 2018-2021 he was 5th, 4th, 6th, and 9th in terms of prize money. On open maps I'd take him over anyone not named Viper/Liereyy/Hera (and pretty even with Hera). He's insane in TGs. Him being top 10 (in terms of talent) is not even a discussion honestly.

What does his earnings in 2018 have to do with his current shape?^^

You can actually look it up in the last Top 15 edition of Nili 2 months ago where Top Players made they're own top 15 lists where he ended up as #9.
That list is 2 months ago and I don't see why he should perform better compared to back then, also Hera was not included in that list and except for Nicov his Teammate who rated him as #6, evryone else saw him in 8-12.

Of course it depends on the settings but as you say his strength are open maps, but he "only" was 9-12 in the last Kotd.

So I don't think it's farfetched to say that (imo) he's not top 10 currently.

 

[Steeldust]

MBL will be in good shape til RB Wololo 6!
I have no doubt about it.

 

[Uselessaurus Rex]

So I don't think it's farfetched to say that (imo) he's not top 10 currently.

So your opinion is more valid than the lists of the top players in the world?

If MBL is grinding, then he's got to be odds on for another RBW semifinal

 

[Proctologist]

So your opinion is more valid than the lists of the top players in the world?

If MBL is grinding, then he's got to be odds on for another RBW semifinal

Hell yeah his opinion is way more valid then the lists of the top players in the world.

 

[oozkan]

Well, let's not forget that six months ago MBL was isolated from other players due to his comments against AOE4 while all other top tier players were enjoying prize money of it.

So I am not sure how healthy it could be to get feedback from other top players, people tend to vote highly for person with similar views (there was a very cool experiment done with Rasputin's life story, actually I can explain below). We will see where he stands when RBW starts, with proper grinding and preparation, never count him out.

About experiment.....

Two sets of people are created and a text that explains life of Rasputin is given to them. Rasputin is a controversial character, that's why he is chosen. There were only 1 difference in the given text, for one group, Rasputin's birthday changed to birthday of reader.

After reading, when people are asked how they feel about Rasputin's life with a survey, group with same birthday responded favourably with quite a bit margin compared to other group.

So as conclusion, we like people who are on same side with us, who believes in same thing etc. etc. similarities creates bond. MBL was a lone wolf for a while, it is normal he is perceived below than what he deserves for now, especially if you collect opinion with a survey, like Rasputin experiment.

Edit: For people interested paper should belong to (Finch and Cialdini, in 1989). I don't have access to it right now, it's been a while I left my phD...

 

[Tendo]

So your opinion is more valid than the lists of the top players in the world?

Trolling or not reading?

The Lists said he's around 8-12 (if we ignore his Teammate Nicov who said he's #6) and that was without Hera in the Top Lists and I wonder if anyone would dare to say that MbL > Hera.
So for Top Players it's questionable whether he is in Top 10 or not, how can it be farfetched then to have an Opinion which says that he isn't?

Compared to that it's way way more farfetched to say he's #5 or #6 currently.

 

[oozkan]

We are almost at the end of May, so I will continue to share twitchtracker numbers:

AOE4 is having its worst month since release, while AOE2 is having best month since AOE4 release. It is not a dramatic change though.

I wonder how steam players numbers will be.

 

[Uselessaurus Rex]

@Tendo You do a strange combination of looking at high level statistics, picking out bits of data that suit your narrative, then make bold extrapolations. All in a big, difficult to read muddle.

Yes, he didn't finish very high in KOTD4, but he was a finalist in KOTD3.

And yes, Hera can certainly beat MBL, maybe over half the time, but then MBL beat him on the stage in the RBWV QF.

When MBL is in training (which he wasn't at the time the pros were making the lists), you'd have to be pretty crazy to rule him out of the top 10.

 

[Tendo]

All in a big, difficult to read muddle.

2 Posts with each ~5 Sentences with one being just another explanation of what was written in the first Post is "a big, difficult ro read muddle" for you? 11

Also again, all I said is that he is in my opinion currently not in the top 10, which I supported by Facts (namely the recent Tournament results and the Lists made by Top Players).
You're completely free to have another opinion.