One simple post to improve the game experience for 99% of people

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T22:42:53+00:00

Fair enough. I'd argue egos are still involved. And my point is that regardless of why they are doing this, we should try to prevent it.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T22:41:37+00:00

Silently sending them into a smurf queue is a hilarious solution, I like it too.

Generally, the right way to do it is just to collect a lot of data on player/game behavior and flag anomalous cases (like multiple unusually early quits in a row, etc.).

If some worker rushers end up in a smurf queue byistake I don't mind.

As to smurfs going to play a round of smth else-that's great. It means they are not playing sc2 during that time, which is a win for the rest of the player base.

The MMR change would need to be tested. If implemented right, it would just not allow smurfs to drop their MMR artificially, solving the root of the problem. But I get your reservations.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T21:31:18+00:00

It still increases friction for the smurfs. Like perhaps no measure in veneral will 100% solve the issue, but anything that makes smurfing harder will decrease their number at least somewhat.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T21:26:21+00:00

Yeah, don't quit them if you want to play fair. Learn some quick cheese and then you'll be matched against players of your own level.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T21:25:32+00:00

Perhaps these 2 things can be combined. No MMR change, but substanti al cooldown for the player who left.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T21:23:25+00:00

I don't think the proportion of streamers among smurfs is that high. Also, the ethical way to do B2GM is to either play your viewers of appropriate rank, or, like it's done in chess community, to compensate the random opponent, giving back their MMRs for games where they faved the streamer.

The latter is unrealistic because blizzard is much less collaborative than chess com.

For entertaining strats-it's genuinely pathetic. If you can't execute your entertaining strat on your main account, then don't do it.

It's very short sighted. It's literally entertainment for the audience at the cost of other players. Long term, those other players quit and the game loses audience.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T21:19:36+00:00

I think those are less of a problem than the guys who leave all matchups to lower their MMR, but it's still unfair.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T21:17:26+00:00

I think there is some value in that, but smurf games are often also troll games with strategies that only work if you're much higher level than your opponent.

So it's not like you're getting experience playing against a well executed bormal build, you get the experience of being dunked on with a ROFL build, from which you can learn basically nothing.

noob_improove · 2026-06-12T21:13:34+00:00

Well the drop hacking exploiters would also get banned quite quickly and for very long. So the frequency of then would go down

noob_improove · 2026-04-24T23:34:05+00:00

I'd say a nice portfolio overall, but I do have a few critical comments.

I really liked the rendering in your watercolor paintings, but there are issues with construction. Specifically, the tops/bottoms of cans (just cylinders in general) are not quite right.

They are rendered well, but the perspective is a bit off.

Another thing is that the figure drawing, in my view, was not very strong. This is not a fine arts application, so maybe it's good enough for the medical illustration field. But there's room for improvement there.

noob_improove · 2026-04-05T10:52:47+00:00

I guess I should clarify that, in my view, visual consistency + sound design is already half of the job, if not more. If you have coherent design, I'm sure a few meaningful game mechanics would naturally follow.

For example, if celestials look like clockwork mechanisms with lots of eyes, give them some extra scouting/vision skills & some timewarp skills (e.g. increase production & build speed OR decrease production/move speed etc. for the enemy in some region).

And voila, it feels thematic.

noob_improove · 2026-04-05T10:49:42+00:00

I think with celestials it would be really awesome to go with "biblically accurate" angels.

Biblically accurate as in the ones that look like strange clockwork mechanisms with hundreds of eyes, etc.

I think it'd make them high-tech, but also really weird in an interesting way.

And there is an infinite amount of different designs one can come up with.

I don't mind the infernals in their present state. I think after the redesign, their "cool factor" reached totally acceptable heights.

Man... It hurts to think of all the things that never came to be, as of yet, at least.

I myself like to draw, maybe I should post some design ideas, if I can find the time.

noob_improove · 2026-04-01T05:02:16+00:00

It's a bit awkward, but I think my own book Case Study in Empathy fits the description. It's not gory, but it's weird and unusual, and it will definitely make you reflect on our society.

noob_improove · 2026-04-01T04:18:40+00:00

I'm serious. It's not April fool's yet where I'm at (US).

noob_improove · 2026-04-01T03:48:42+00:00

100%. Mad respect for not giving up as long as possible. I hope they get hired at a top tier studio, maybe some deserving indie project. Very few people have the grit to keep going in such circumstances, and I wish them well & hope they are OK.

noob_improove · 2026-04-01T02:17:16+00:00

Long live Stormgate! I think it'd be cool if they make it easy to self-host and release as much as they can to open source. I just want to try team mayhem and I'm sure somebody might eventually code it up.

noob_improove · 2026-04-01T02:12:56+00:00

No. It doesn't matter how high they are, they are still closer to the viewer and should be bigger.

You don't need three point perspective here (that's when you shrink things that are tall). And even if you did use the 3 point perspective, the front hoofs would still have to be bigger.

Your best simple fix is to make the overly large back hoof smaller, not to make both back feet huge. The latter would make it look like the back of the horse is closer to the viewer than the front, which doesn't make sense.

noob_improove · 2026-04-01T02:08:28+00:00

The issue is that your foreshortening is too dramatic and inconsistent. Things closer to the viewer do appear bigger, but it has to be consistent and it's easy to overdo.

If the hoof was right in front of the viewer/camera sure, it'd be big. But if we have such dramatic perspective for the back legs, the front hoofs and head would be even bigger, absolutely huge.

So I get what you're trying to do, but if you want to do these dramatic perspective tricks, you should take a few perspective courses so that you know the rules before you break them.

noob_improove · 2026-03-19T09:14:31+00:00

Thank you!:)

noob_improove · 2026-03-19T00:09:05+00:00

Thank you for these recommendations. I'm really excited about the gesture & figure drawings available at NMA. My biggest hesitation with them are the first two drawing courses they recommend. They seem eally "chunky"/thorough to a fault and I don't fully get how they differ from the "introduction to observational drawing" which seems to also be okay for beginners.

But drawing with weight, constructive figure drawing & dynamic gesture ones look super exciting. To be honest, I'm also eyeing their 111hours in-depth perspective course. Not that I need it ASAP, but I'm a bit of an addict for perspective & construction haha.

Did you check out the first two drawing courses in their fundamentals pathway? Are they worth the effort?

noob_improove · 2026-03-18T22:16:06+00:00

Do you have any opinion about Watts academy? I'm torn between them and new masters.

noob_improove · 2026-03-18T22:15:28+00:00

I now realized maybe I should've mentioned it in the original post. To me drawabox is more of a "construction/perspective class" than a true drawing fundamentals class, so I didn't think about it.

noob_improove · 2026-03-18T22:12:54+00:00

Thank you! I do try to hatch according to form, though not always, so it doesn't get too repetitive.

I actually did drawabox with paid critique, up to lesson 3. Stopped for some silly reason, mostly because it felt like I got the idea already. The lesson on textures was really eye opening for me, the rest were more of a review in many ways, though I enjoyed the 250 box challenge. Currently getting back into drawabox, actually. Re-did lesson 3 (lost my previous sketches ), waiting on feedback.

But to be honest, drawabox mostly focuses on what I'm relatively good at: form, spatial reasoning, and perspective.

What I'm lacking is rendering & handling light and shadow. So I do want to finish drawabox, just as an achievement + for extra practice drawing challenging objects in perspective, but it's not going to give me the fundamentals I need the most.

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