Getting Back On My Feet... In Slippers

Returning to a competitive hobby and a content generation role after a period of inactivity can be overwhelming. But every journey starts with a step, and my first step this year has involved... a pair of slippers.

Reloading

Hi everyone! It's GosuDad :) And after a 3-month break from blogging, casting, and tweeting, (and frankly, playing) I am returning to the world of competitive SC2!

I took this screenshot on November 30th - I was originally going to "return" back then, and well, the ever-changing life of a parent of toddlers and a newborn has kept me on my toes :)

I won't go into detail in this post about what caused my SC2 life to suddenly go on pause at the beginning of November, or the events that prolonged or delayed that pause for three months, or the clarified perspective on being a "StarCraft dad" that has brought me back - those stories are for another time.

But for now, be reassured that I am indeed back!

There will be some changes, a bit less dreaming, a bit more doing - but as you can see from the "Current Ladder Standing" box on the right sidebar, I am returning to my roots of actually playing this game - bringing the "StarCraft" and the "Gosu" back into this blog.

That's it for now, so until my next post - see you on the ladder!

GLHF,
GosuDad

Catching Up

Lately, I've been doing a lot of YouTube uploading with no matching blog posts, so I thought this morning would be a good time for a status update, blog style!

But of course, no blog post would be complete without a few pretty pictures... and what better place to get some than a previous attempt at a status update!

In the days before our second baby boy was born, I was trying to record a video status update while playing a fast 1 vs. Hard AI game, shooting for around 5 minutes in real time.

After several failed attempts, I decided to take screenshots from one of the attempts with the thought I could start a draft post from a PC at the hotel and finish the status update on my iPhone later. I did start a draft and uploaded the pics, but the iPhone-authored post never became a reality, and as you know, much later, I actually did a video status update - using another replay.

But now those screenshots get a 2nd chance!

Game Time 9:03 - PvP on an old map I learned to play SC2 on, Agria Valley - my terrible attempt at a 4-gate. These zealots are actually my 2nd wave of attackers, trying to draw attention away from the probe that's building pylons elsewhere in the base.

Uploading Season 7 and 8

After being distracted by X-COM for more than a week, I have returned to this task and have uploaded the 3rd of these 5 games. I was quite pleased to upload my 1v1 qualifier for Season 7 - I had promised Morphius I would cast it, and it was great to be able to tell him in Battle.net that it was done (after 3 months of waiting!). I am also very excited to start playing again (as the Season 9 ladder locks next week!) and casting more recent games!

Game Time 9:27 - A pylon is finished and I warp in a set of 4 stalkers who start harassing the mineral line, drawing the attention of the forces who dealt with my zealots. I send the probe to the other side of the mineral line.

Ladder Aspirations

I have had some encouragement that I might actually make it out of Silver League! My Platinum League opponent during my 1v1 qualifier for Season 8 said I could get into Gold with a week of playing. And after watching the replay, if he's a typical Platinum player, then yes, with some more confidence in applying pressure and practice knowing when to build drones, I think it's possible - at this level, our mechanics are so inconsistent that careful decision-making could make the difference.

More recently, I was listening to an interview with Sasquatch, a player in the Complexity Academy (the B-team for the Complexity professional team), and he said that if you're in Bronze, if you play 2 hours a day, you'll make it to Masters. Really? Is that all it takes?

His general advice for lower league players - play a lot more and pick just one strategy per match-up. If you play infrequently and try to do something different each game, you'll never get better.

Surprisingly, I've been thinking along the same lines. My intention with mouse-only play with baby is to focus on a single build. I really want to work on my map awareness, and using only one build should allow me to focus more attention around the map instead of in my base!

Game Time 9:39 - My stalkers hold on just long enough for a second batch of fresh troops to get warped in and the scale tips in my favor.

A New Game, An Old Game & X-Split

After reading about "Let's Play" videos (videos of people playing through a game with commentary), I've decided to do a "blind" Let's Play of X-COM: Enemy Unknown. Since my intention is to capture my first impressions, it may not end up being a Let's Play in the strictest sense - in that I likely won't finish the game! But I thought playing as far as I can on a first try might be fun.

As part of this, I'm hoping to do a "context" video of the original X-COM, and since it doesn't use Direct3D, I'm going to use X-Split to capture the video and audio (Fraps only captures Direct3D video). Now the cool part is that X-Split is very popular with streamers and live casters - its main strength is live streaming - that it can record as well is a secondary feature.

So my diversion into XCOM may play a part in me using some more advanced tools for casting SC2 - and perhaps a step towards some low resolution streaming?

Game Time 9:44 - In the split-second chaos, the Hard AI focuses on the fresh stalkers, allowing my damaged ones to survive, giving me a numbers advantage. Soon after, his offensive forces return from attacking my base, but I warp in stalkers at another pylon in the base, and with some kiting, stave off the zealot portion of the force while sustaining minimal damage, and the Hard AI surrenders.

Bandwidth

With all these plans, I'm trying to keep aware of my limited bandwidth - both in regards to my free time and my Internet bandwidth!

With my current schedule, I typically get 1-2 hours of time in the early morning with baby and about 3-4 hours of uploading time - with my DSL connection, that results in being able to upload about 15-20 minutes of 1080p video.

At first glance, that length limit may seem terribly short, but I think it fits my current life stage well. I'm in no rush with any of this, and want to keep the balance on the fun side and away from the second job side...

My original premise with the blog and casting was that with just a bit more time, I could take something I already do (play games and watch replays) and turn it into content. And with my tendency to expand scope (as I've already done), it helps to remind myself of this original intention.

Speakimg of such, wow, this post sort of exploded size-wise! Perhaps I should focus on shorter, more frequent posting as well? ;-)

First Video Status Update!

As promised in my last post introducing baby Caleb, here is an update on where things are at on this blog and my YouTube channel and my plans for the next few months - especially given my new nighttime schedule!

And for those of you that would rather read than watch, here's the summary:

• I have cast both showmatches, Ethereal511's 2v2 submission, and all 10 games played in Season 6 of the Blizzard 1v1 Ladder (2012 Season 1). (Special blog note: I do plan on doing blog posts for each of these. If you can't wait, check out the YouTube channel - otherwise, be assured they will trickle in!)
• I have also cast all 4 games from Season 7 and my single game from Season 8. These games haven't been produced/encoded yet, but I hope to upload them in the next week.
• For the next 4-6 weeks, I'll be playing SC2 with baby Caleb in the very early morning with only the mouse - and will be trying 1v1 in addition to 4v4!
• I might do some videos of a game I just bought with the kids - X-COM Enemy Unknown!
• After Caleb starts sleeping longer and I get time in the evening to cast, I still hope to cast all of the games played by the Colorado School of Mines in Season 5 of the Collegiate StarLeague (CSL). (I'll actually cast less than the 66 mentioned in the video - not all the replays were available.)
• Season 6 of the CSL will start in November, but it's not clear yet what opportunities community casters like me will have... now that they have a big, international sponsor!

Well, it's past my bedtime - see you guys in the next blog post!

28 Tweets, 5 Videos, 1 Blog Post

Well it's been almost 3 weeks since my "I'm back!" post, and despite the lack of posting, I have produced some results - 28 tweets and 5 published casts!

I also qualified into Silver for Season 8 (2012 Season 3), though I must say that the game was quite the embarrassment... don't worry, you'll get to see it in all it's glory when I eventually cast it!

I've enjoyed tweeting on Twitter - it has done exactly what I hoped it would - provide an quick way for me to send updates and small thoughts, and keep some activity on the blog between posts.

Right now it's been a lot of tweets about my work casting, producing videos, and how I really need to catch up on the blog!

On the video side, it's been an adventure - I've been doing work of some sort on videos pretty much every day I think.

It took me around a week to produce Game 1 of that showmatch vs. RaZe, but the result was awesome. I think it rivals the Welcome Back video as far as production complexity and definitely in the hurdles to make it come together. You can see the entire showmatch on YouTube now, but I will also be doing a blog post for the showmatch - and some tricks I learned about uploading to YouTube!

Over a few days I finished casts of my showmatch with the QuailGang YouTube channel - and started a practice of trying to do the segments of a video (intro, game, closing) in one take - a crucial practice if I hope to cast with any regularity.

After that I cast Ethereal's 2v2 and then 2 ladder games, all in about an hour. The next night I cast another ladder game. But afterwards, felt in the rush to start a backlog of videos (so I could post from the backlog after my son is born), I missed the intent of the ladder casts - reflection on my play/strategy in preparation of playing Zerg in the current season.

So I'll be re-doing those casts, starting with my 1v1 qualifier tonight - I will be uploading it after this post!

So I'm a bit behind on the blog - but it's an exciting time - both on the SC2 side and at home, with a new baby coming in the VERY near future!

GosuDad is Back!

After a long break from posting, and an even longer break from casting videos, I am back!

For those that don't like watching videos, here's a summary of what's going on:

1. I am back to blogging and casting!
2. I have a bunch of casting coming up:
   • Two showmatches - one against RaZe, one against Aaron from the QuailGang casting trio.
   • My first 2v2 cast - sent by Ethereal511
   • 10 games from Season 6 of the online ladder - my final games as Terran!
   • 4 games from Season 7 - my first games as Zerg!
   • Games from Season 8 - continuing to play as Zerg
   • Games from Season 5 of the Collegiate StarLeague - capturing some Colorado e-Sports history!
3. Lots of shout-outs to my YouTube subscribers, blog readers, my wife and kids, and a random kid I met at Benihana's
4. I am now tweeting on Twitter as GosuDad!

So there you have it, I'm not dead - but rather getting back into grassroots e-Sports :)

And yes, this is the 2nd time that I have refuted rumors of my death - the guys at QuailGang were concerned about me earlier this spring!

Still Alive (And Causing A Ruckus!)

Don't believe the rumors - I am still alive, still crazy about SC2, and yes, still have grand intentions to publish more content - and play in Season 6 of the online ladder ;-)

However, these last three weeks have been filled with other activity, including hunting XBox360 Achievements in the Zombie mode of Call of Duty: Black Ops, go-karting, taking care of sick kids, chatting with my wife about all sorts of things, passing out on the floor (apparently loudly snoring), eBay-ing for the first Diablo game, finding a new favorite local GameStop, and most recently, hosting my first StarCraft 2 watching party at my house (which was a grand success!).

So be expecting some future posts chronicling those adventures (ok, maybe not the sick kids part).

Ruckus-wise, I apparently started one with my comment concerning web crawlers in my last post, 1000 Views.

Not only did that post generate the most comments (by far) - but it is very close to the most viewed post on the blog (views of that specific post, not including hits on the main page). For those of you that commented on that post, please check out the post again for my replies :)

As it turns out I have several followers in Spain and Mexico, and their comments (despite being offended by my web-crawler remark) I found greatly encouraging - and make me wonder if all those hits from Russia really are real-life readers...

So a BIG thank you (and apologies) to my international readers - and I look forward to your comments, as I duck behind the sofa ;-)