So i was very interested to know how David Kim (Rank 1 diamond) groups units, how he plays in game and micros and stuff and I went searching for his replays.
I got a few (about 5 of them) with him playing all the three races. It was hard finding it but here you go if anyone's interested.
Also if you have replays playing against him it'd be awesome to give them to me.
This guy is obviously amazing, whoever he is it's weird that I never see him in any tournaments given his skill level. You'd think being the #1 Random player in the world you would be all over the place taking names.
On September 06 2010 02:28 sircuddles wrote: This guy is obviously amazing, whoever he is it's weird that I never see him in any tournaments given his skill level. You'd think being the #1 Random player in the world you would be all over the place taking names.
He's a tester for Blizzard so he can't compete in tournaments. It'd be great to see him play against the top 16 for blizzcon though..
On September 06 2010 02:28 sircuddles wrote: This guy is obviously amazing, whoever he is it's weird that I never see him in any tournaments given his skill level. You'd think being the #1 Random player in the world you would be all over the place taking names.
He's a tester for Blizzard so he can't compete in tournaments. It'd be great to see him play against the top 16 for blizzcon though..
I don't think it's ever been 100% confirmed that he is actually David Kim. Him not entering any tournaments certainly sways the argument, but people are on both sides of the fence regarding his identity.
On September 06 2010 02:28 sircuddles wrote: This guy is obviously amazing, whoever he is it's weird that I never see him in any tournaments given his skill level. You'd think being the #1 Random player in the world you would be all over the place taking names.
He's a blizzard employee, perhaps they don't want him competing since he's balanced the game and knows it from scratch.
Although about his rank. He had higher score than players with more games won, more games played a while back So perhaps he's got a "special blizz account" which allows him to play on top levels to see the balance there
On September 06 2010 02:31 dcberkeley wrote: Well I'm watching the replay and it's not that impressive...
I've not seen the actual David Kim play but in the replay he says he's not, and he's not that good.
I'm pretty sure these belong to david kim, he's not the best player in the world but a good random player and i wanted to see how he grouped different races.
I'd like to see some dayvie replays that differ from this then if someone has it!
Ya I have seen this in the beta. These are replays that have been posted with people confirming it is David Kim. His record is not flawless or superb, but he's sitting at rank 1 with random so that's got to amount for something now.
He can't compete in tournaments because imagine a scenario where he loses to X strategy in the tournament, and coincidentally that same strategy gets nerfed in some way in the next patch. That would create a lot of bad rep for Blizzard/David.
Wasn't the player "Dayvie" confirmed to be David Kim in the beta?
On September 06 2010 02:28 sircuddles wrote: This guy is obviously amazing, whoever he is it's weird that I never see him in any tournaments given his skill level. You'd think being the #1 Random player in the world you would be all over the place taking names.
He's a blizzard employee, perhaps they don't want him competing since he's balanced the game and knows it from scratch.
Although about his rank. He had higher score than players with more games won, more games played a while back So perhaps he's got a "special blizz account" which allows him to play on top levels to see the balance there
No tournament organizer is going to stop him from competing in their tournament. His employer might, though.
yeah all the blizz employees cant participate in tournaments. AFAIK its becuase they could influence the game. Say they put in a really specific bug by hiding it in a patch, then exploit it to win a tournament...yeah
On September 06 2010 02:46 Kiante wrote: yeah all the blizz employees cant participate in tournaments. AFAIK its becuase they could influence the game. Say they put in a really specific bug by hiding it in a patch, then exploit it to win a tournament...yeah
doubt it's david kim. david was only good because he knew the game at a much more intimate level than anyone else in early beta, but now everyone has caught up with him.
On September 06 2010 02:53 Terranist wrote: doubt it's david kim. david was only good because he knew the game at a much more intimate level than anyone else in early beta, but now everyone has caught up with him.
You can argue its not david kim, but its very hard to argue the converse. There is someone other than david kim that is a top RANDOM player but has not entered a SINGLE tournament.
Really?
Remember, he has to have a ladder account somewhere and he has to play all 3 races to be a balance designer. He also was very good at sc:bw so it would be extremely unlikely he wasn't an amazing sc2 player.
On September 06 2010 03:34 Slayer91 wrote: You can argue its not david kim, but its very hard to argue the converse. There is someone other than david kim that is a top RANDOM player but has not entered a SINGLE tournament.
Ofc it's david kim, rofl at people who dont think it is...
On September 06 2010 03:34 Slayer91 wrote: You can argue its not david kim, but its very hard to argue the converse. There is someone other than david kim that is a top RANDOM player but has not entered a SINGLE tournament.
Really?
Remember, he has to have a ladder account somewhere and he has to play all 3 races to be a balance designer. He also was very good at sc:bw so it would be extremely unlikely he wasn't an amazing sc2 player.
On September 06 2010 02:46 Kiante wrote: yeah all the blizz employees cant participate in tournaments. AFAIK its becuase they could influence the game. Say they put in a really specific bug by hiding it in a patch, then exploit it to win a tournament...yeah
wtf? That doesnt make any sense. The balance testers are not coders. David Kim plays the game and suggests balance changes. He doesnt actually implement those changes.
On September 06 2010 02:46 Kiante wrote: yeah all the blizz employees cant participate in tournaments. AFAIK its becuase they could influence the game. Say they put in a really specific bug by hiding it in a patch, then exploit it to win a tournament...yeah
wtf? That doesnt make any sense. The balance testers are not coders. David Kim plays the game and suggests balance changes. He doesnt actually implement those changes.
Hence why he plays random. If he played protoss. It would be like.. "Hey one of the head balance testers of Starcraft 2 players protoss, must mean protoss will be getting the favored treatment, buffed, etc
On September 06 2010 02:46 Kiante wrote: yeah all the blizz employees cant participate in tournaments. AFAIK its becuase they could influence the game. Say they put in a really specific bug by hiding it in a patch, then exploit it to win a tournament...yeah
wtf? That doesnt make any sense. The balance testers are not coders. David Kim plays the game and suggests balance changes. He doesnt actually implement those changes.
In my completely unfounded and speculative opinion:
David Kim is by far the best player at Blizzard and if something is imbalanced at high level, it is most likely solely his fault since he's the only one who has any clue how the game plays at that skill level, and he has a neutral perspective (as opposed to actual top players) from playing Random and being a Blizzard employee. Just think about what happens when they test balance changes, you have David Kim pretty much dominate the other inferior Blizzard employees doing whatever he wants, how you can you even test the game in this manner when there is such a skill discrepancy between testers?
If anything he denies being David Kim so he won't be constantly bothered. In the game I played with him I knew it was him even though he said it wasn't at the start and I pretty much spent the entire game asking him how he could let Terran be developed so versatile and easy to play at a high level, he didn't budge. I have a feeling if David Kim feels the game is fine, the game's not going to change much despite what the masses say or statistics show.
On September 06 2010 05:12 Zerokaiser wrote: Is it comforting to anyone else to know that the lead Blizzard balance designer is on Battle.net playing every single day at a high level?
haha that was funny. What a slacker, playing games all day, doesn't he have like a race to fix now?
I think if anything that's a great thing that hes actually playing the game and not theorising about possible strategies and counters but getting live data.