CXu wrote:

Yes because I'd want to do something someone making this thread tells me to do.

I think you are missing the point.

Telling cr1m that he can make it to the top after he spent so much time on the game without getting there is a very vile and mean-spirited thing. That's why you wouldn't do it. It'd be almost like an insult. A taunt.

Your response made it sound as if attitude is the only thing that prevents people from reaching the top, when that is not true at all. Attitude isn't everything. Talent does exist, and it is very, very important for this game.

I wasn't surprised that both low-ranked and high-ranked players react aggressively to this post, because it crushes the hopes of low players and undermines a source of self-credit for high players, but the amount of delusional people who even claim that talent doesn't exist, is beyond shocking.


Anyway, I never wanted for this thread to have this sort of backlash. Think what you want. I'd rather go with the things that reflect in the rankings: People improve at vastly different speeds, and the ones that don't improve fast won't make it far up. That is just common sense.

did you know peppy was the best osu-player once?

That's a poor answer not worthy of your standards Railey.

I think the argument about the data being faulty is very valid and massively reduces the validity of generalising players via playcount.

Rizzo is obviously one of osu!'s most famous SS-farmers and look, with the introduction of ppv2 he was suddenly #1 even though you claimed that SS farming doesn't do anything for your skill. That is apparently wrong and it is also my personal experience that going for the SS can be very valuable for your skill.
It also shows that the ranking metric has a major influence on what players with a competitive mindset actually play because very soon WWW, Rucker and all those other people passed Rizzo and now he's 2k which is not very pro. Many people consider Rizzo pro anyway.
The common metrics accessible for evaluation (playcount, hitcount, A/S/SS-count, weighted acc, pp) are just way too general to accurately assess a player's skill due to the ranking meta, its development over time and the specific histories of the players.
In order to show the actual difference between players just due to talent you would have to go into many more details, compare plays and set up your data in a way that makes the players well comparable(e.g. similar Total to Ranked Score ratio, similar playtime in months, no previous rhythm game experience, no experience in playing an instrument, ...).

Last but not least "play more" certainly remains the most significant factor in whether someone can become pro or not. A couple months ago some guy made some statistics that showed the correlation very clearly.

this whole thread is getting confused and befuddled with a slowly diverging argument. The initial argument is that talent makes the difference between the amazing and the very best. You are guys are now criticizing now that Railey used playcount as a unit of measurement in skill, when he has already indeed said (or implied) that it is not perfect method, and in a sense using that to combat the argument that talent isn't much of a factor, if it exists at all, despite the two being pretty much unrelated. Even if you are not, it is coming off like that. Same with SS-farming and the like, etc. Opinions are opinions, but I am on Railey's side here that talent is a very large factor. Argue that or let people have their own opinions, or else this thread is gonna become a shithole.

Think what you must, and play for whatever reason you want, it really doesn't matter to me. Perhaps Railey may have pushed a certain notion too far, but at the same time, the G&R community has a strong tendency to just shitface anything that just seems blatantly wrong to them, but in general it's with scrubs asking dumb questions. You may think this thread is cancer, but it's slightly more legitimate than the classic how to get better.

Yes, I won't deny that talent exists and that it makes the difference as you said winber but the method described in OP is arguably very meh

Talent is very elusive and hard to measure, but there is a simple way to do it.
Think of talent as the thing that caused the difference in skill between two players, that put the same amount of effort into the game. If we think of it like this, we can measure it just fine, because playcount is a decent approximation for effort (hitcount is even better, to be seen on peoples profiles), and pp is a decent approximation for skill. If someone gets more skilled with less effort, we can call them talented.



Green would be an example of a talented player (lower playcount than everyone around him).
Red is an example of an untalented player (higher playcount than everyone around him).

Keep in mind that "talented" is a relative term, which means that it only becomes meaningful in comparison. We call red untalented, because he is less talented than the reference group, other people around rank 5k.
If we went back in time and checked how red was doing when he only had 1k pp, we may have found that red was a relatively talented player.

This section should get some kind of rework if this thread should be used for informing people in the future because it simplifies stuff way too much.

Anyway, you got it entirely the wrong way around. This post was made to show people that playing to be at the top isn't for everyone, but that there are other ways to play the game. I concluded my post on a positive note even.

I am pretty good at this game. Exceptionally good, even, at least for my own standards. But I can never make it to the very top. It's not called being pessimistic, or giving up on your dreams, it's called being realistic.

I think getting peoples hopes up when there is no chance of them achieving their dreams is the biggest insult. It doesn't only insult their intelligence, it also makes them waste their time on a goal that is unobtainable.

This whole thread is just one - big - fuckin - bullshit.

Performance in this game is similar to performance in real world sports.
In every group of olympic team are people who are talented and hard working but also people who love this sport and working twice as hard to be the best.
If you decide to throw a lot of work into something what you love, hard work grow a talent which overcome just talented people who just hard work.

Will Smith, successfull actor:



I could find tons of speach like this one - where not talented people are proving that you can overcome "so talented" people by ridiculus amount of work.
More - i know this by myself - from real life, i am not a scientific smart person who i ended up my mid-grade school and university with higher scores than "so called talented people" just by working hard, learning hard, not sleeping but learning, spending most of my life time in books. Right now i consider myself as successfull and smart guy in term of Network Security and Software Engineering.
The same apply to almost everything.

Stop your ridiculus idiotic "if you are not talented, you don't reach top100" because it's pure bullshit.
Same as your statistics are bullshit.

Another video - if someone think Michael Jordan is talented - no, he worked extremely hard for what he achieved:



You may be talented in something and that just makes your work on this easier but 2 people - one talented, second not talented can end up on same point, it's just matter of determination, amount of work and effort put into this.

However, he said it to be a "decent" approximation, and both "decent" and "approximation" are both loose and non-conclusive ways to estimate something. In my opinion, the fact of the matter is that he isn't even using playcount as his argument to say talent exists, but more so uses it to try and exemplify the difference it makes. It's a slight difference, but I think it matters. Either way, there's so many lurking variables that nothing can be 100% correct, but some people are mixing the two up (mixing playcount and pp is not a good representation of skill with talent being a predominant factor in being good). I'm sure you can find "evidence" for whatever argument you have considering our sample size in the rankings as well as the innate subjectivity of "effort spent" and "skill" though.

I mean really at this point I think people are just about to go in circles, so I'm just more or less advising to watch out for that.

Edit:

[Taiga] wrote:

If you decide to throw a lot of work into something what you love, hard work grow a talent which overcome just talented people who just hard work.

Again, going off-topic again. Railey's argument is that for two people who worked just as hard, the one with more talent will come out on top. Your evidence says nothing, because they explain that you can surpass a so-called talented person if you work harder than them. If not explicitly said, that's the major selling point.

MICHAEL JORDAN ISN'T TALENTED
is that what you insinuate now?

holy shit man
If he wasn't talented, he wouldn't have made it. This is an insult to everyone who worked just as hard as him but didn't make it.


Will Smith is another topic, because acting is a job where success is much more random in a way. Unlike osu.
I swear the hole you are digging yourself with your arguments gets deeper and deeper.

Work may beat talent. But it can never beat work and talent. The people at the very top have both. Maybe Jordan wants to attribute his success to his insane work-ethic, and you know thats partially true. He wouldn't have gotten so far without work. But also not without talent. Admitting that to ourselves is painful, because it takes away some of the credit that we like to give ourselves. But it's still true. Poor Michael Jordan.



Thanks to winber1 for backing me on this.

I'll try to give Endaris a better response soon, give me some time.

I agree that "playcount", "play time", "total hits" etc. are not accurate enough statistics to measure whether some player is more talented than another. However, disregarding the existence of talent altogether is simply delusional.

It would be the equivalent of telling me "Yeah, Gigo, go to the basketball court and start driving that ball through the hoop, you'll be as good... hell, maybe even better... than MJ some day!" Uhmm, no, I won't be. I'll also NOT box like Tyson or run like Bolt or dance like Michael Jackson etc. etc. Some people just have "IT".

That being said, this topic is basically pointless. No one will convince the others in their point of view.

MICHAEL JORDAN ISN'T TALENTED
is that what you insinuate now?

holy shit man
If he wasn't talented, he wouldn't have made it. This is an insult to everyone who worked just as hard as him but didn't make it.

Ok, i am out, your are not only ridiculusly stupid with this topic but also need to learn search for informations and personal stories of people.
When you read about MJ very close, you notice that he himself call that he IS NOT talented, he growed it with hard work.

Keep dreaming kid, there is no place in top for you anyway, one less crying shitter.

If in real life you also cry over everything with "he is more talented" then maybe buy a rope? It may help, really, it will fix all your real life problems.

I swear the hole you are digging yourself with your arguments gets deeper and deeper.

Even if i pull out all "dual stylus" from forum, i still will have problem to catch up to you. Your talent o make holes is unbeatable lmao.
Sorry, i pass, cannot work hard on crying and assuming guy in front of me is "talented", i honestly get my pants out and shit on his talent, i prefer to work on my future and be sure it pays off with proper expected result.

Everything in this world have limits and can be achieved... except excessive stupidity of people who think that hard work cannot beat talent.
Everything have limit where talented person and hard working one will meet.

what the fuck is this lmao

Gigo wrote:

Yeah, Gigo, go to the basketball court and start driving that ball through the hoop, you'll be as good... hell, maybe even better... than MJ some day!" Uhmm, no, I won't be.

You what. Man if someone really wants to become someone, gain some specified skills or whatever, he will eventually become very good at it if he will put all of his effort to achieve that.

If you really would want to become better at throwing this brown ball with air inside than MJ and you would train hard for days and nights than it is really possible for you to surpass him. And the quality of practice matters aswell.

There are couple types of practice/training.
One that i like to call bullshit practice. Where the person that practices doesn't commit himself fully to it and don't search for mistakes he makes and how to fix them (I saw that a lot from people that draw. They say that they draw a lot and do that whole day but always think that they drawings are good and there isnt anything that can be improved there)

And there is a proper practise that is helping the person that really wants and commits himself to it. Such person sees his mistakes in the particular thing and spends days in trying to find a fix for these mistakes

MJ is a human and he trained a lot to achieve what he achieved.


This is my opinion on how to get good with training and will of heart

op makes a legitimate point

it's just unfortunate that those people who mindlessly shit on him are actually the people who need to consider his advice the most


Anyway, it's hard to pinpoint what exactly 'talent' is, but there does seem to be a correlation of some players improving at a much slower rate than others, whether it be due to work ethic, mindset, physical attributes, your bringing up as a child, or any other factors - which are all contributors to 'talent' or 'natural ability' in this game.

Neverthless, in the end you need hard work to be good at anything in life. i.e don't think talent is the determining factor to success. That bring me to the one point I don't agree on with OP:

Railey2 wrote:

There is a reason why people always say "play more", right? For sure you can become a pro if you really follow their advice. Well... no.
You are making a costly mistake. Improvement at osu is not only about work, and people who claim that they made it to the top only as a result of their hard work, are lying.

I'd argue work ethic is definitely more important than natural talent. People who played for only 2-3 years and reached the top- check how much they played every day, probably 5-6 hours or even more, with over 5000 playcount a month. The thing that defines these 'pro' osu players is that they constantly try to improve. There's no secret other than they played hours on end, day after day, year after year and constantly pushed themselves, looked for new ways to improve, changed their settings, thought about the game in their spare time, read threads, stayed healthy, kept playing and kept playing the game.

Some people (I hate to fire shots again but too bad) can't even begin to comprehend how much time a 'pro' player has spent trying to improve himself at this game. I might attribute this to ignorance. Next time you play, try playing the hardest maps you can play, maybe even with NF, trying to hit every single note the WHOLE MAP through, even if your arm is burning and your eyes are tired, and then repeat that for 5 hours. This is the work ethic that successful people have and if you can't match that, don't make excuses about talent because it's not the reason you're not improving.

On a side note: (off-topic rant xd)
I hope people realise that the reason 'pro' players constantly say 'play more' is because they are entitled to; they play they asses off every day to improve at the game and then they go onto G&R forums and see people looking for the 'quick fix' to improve it's really just funny. You can't just play 'for fun' and get better. It's fkn hard work and the way people say 'play more' is subtly mocking those who are naive and make excuses for not improving because in reality, they're just lazy. (considering they legitimately want to improve)

there's like a good quote i wanna finish on: "you can dedicate your body and soul to something, but it's no use if you're just more lazy than the person next to you"

tl;dr talent isn't the determining factor to success. It exists but isn't the reason why you're not improving and can't be 'pro' - that's because you don't work hard enough and hence "play more"

whether it be due to work ethic, mindset, physical attributes, your bringing up as a child, or any other factors - which are all contributors to 'talent' or 'natural ability' in this game.

Wrong - natural talent is born ability to perform certain activity with much easier learning curve than standard group of people. Nothing what you pointed out eg. ethic, mindset etc have nothing to do with natural talent. They affects your ability to improve at activity which you are talented. Solving your problems, eg - proper mindset, strict times of training / working on, determination improves your ability to perform task. Talented person require less strain in work to achieve let's say point A than person not naturaly dedicated to this task but that doesn't mean this one person cannot get to this point. For someone not naturally dedicated to this task it will take longer time and more work to reach point A but it's definitly possible.

taiga did u even read my entire post

or did u find the first thing u disagreed with and made a post about it

i agree with winber, theres nothing you can do about the quality of discussion on g&r i guess

taiga did u even read my entire post

or did u find the first thing u disagreed with and made a post about it

Yes, thats why i didn't speak about rest since i have nothing to add there.

thanks shortpotato for your long and detailed answer.

I think we agree on even the part you quoted, so let me highlight the most relevant part

Railey2 wrote:

There is a reason why people always say "play more", right? For sure you can become a pro if you really follow their advice. Well... no.
You are making a costly mistake. Improvement at osu is not only about work, and people who claim that they made it to the top only as a result of their hard work, are lying.

I agree that hard work is essential to become a pro. But talent is just as essential. To reach the very top, you need both, as you can't beat people that have both while having only one yourself.

The thing is, talent is much more subtle and harder to grasp, while hard work is the opposite. You can see very clearly when someone worked hard, which is why it is so often listed as the main reason (also, because you can feel good about it as it is something that comes from yourself - it's the opposite with talent, that comes from a place unknown to us).

But this is a logical fallacy. Only because it is more accessible, doesn't make it more important, or even equally important. This thread is a plea to not overlook that which only manifests in the obvious differences in improvement rates between people.


The method I gave to approximate this elusive thing is, as others correctly pointed out, flawed. But I say it's better than nothing, and I wouldn't know any other way to do it without going heavy into analyzing every single component of a persons playstyle and playhistory.


Thanks for taking your time to read my post, means a lot. Especially after all that flak I got.

Railey2 wrote:

I am pretty good at this game. Exceptionally good, even, at least for my own standards. But I can never make it to the very top. It's not called being pessimistic, or giving up on your dreams, it's called being realistic.

I used to say that. It's not that I wasn't admitting that I was pessimistic, it's that I didn't even realize it at the time. What does 'being realistic' even mean ? Nowadays I am optimistic as fuck, yet I am realistic, not because I think things are impossible, but because I think 'how to do this ?' 'what makes this possible and not this'.
In my opinion, being realistic means that you question your confidence, while still believing in your confidence. And if you happen to find a mistake in your confidence, you are pessimistic if you think that your confidence was wrong, but you are realistic if you think your confidence had a flaw (yet isn't wrong).

Let's take your phrase. You say that you are exceptionnaly good, which is true since you are judging it from your own standards. Yet, you throw all of it away by saying that you cannot make it to the top. That is, in my opinion, being pessimistic. If you were realistic, you would have said 'I won't make it to the top if I don't commit to it more'.
If the first case, what makes it pessimistic is the word 'never'. Like, you'll never be able to make it to the top. This is pessimistic.
While, what makes it realistic in the second case is the 'if'. It means that you won't (not that you'll never) unless you commit more.

Now, this is total interpretation from my part. I wouldn't be surprised to know that you made this thread purposely to get denied by people. Because your education/life taught you that you cannot do something great if you don't have the talent to. Yet, you don't want to believe this, you want to believe that the lack of talent does not mean that you cannot do it. You want to believe that hardwork can replace talent.

You said that hard work cannot beat both hardwork + talent, even though it can beat talent alone. BUT, you do not consider hardwork and talent as things that can be more or less 'bigger'. You can work very hard for one day, but that will mean much less than if you work without effort for an entire year.
Yep, half a year of hardwork + talent will have higher results than one year of hardwork without talent. But that doesn't mean that half a year of hardwork + talent will have higher results than two years of hardwork alone.

What I mean is that it's not because you have both hardwork and talent that you'll do better than someone with hardwork alone.

Also, thanks for appreciating my honest response earlier, a lot of people would have said 'you are wrong because of whatever' yet you said 'thanks'. I appreciate that, you earned my respect by saying that ! :3

Vayentha wrote:

Railey2 wrote:

I am pretty good at this game. Exceptionally good, even, at least for my own standards. But I can never make it to the very top. It's not called being pessimistic, or giving up on your dreams, it's called being realistic.

I used to say that. It's not that I wasn't admitting that I was pessimistic, it's that I didn't even realize it at the time. What does 'being realistic' even mean ? Nowadays I am optimistic as fuck, yet I am realistic, not because I think things are impossible, but because I think 'how to do this ?' 'what makes this possible and not this'.
In my opinion, being realistic means that you question your confidence, while still believing in your confidence. And if you happen to find a mistake in your confidence, you are pessimistic if you think that your confidence was wrong, but you are realistic if you think your confidence had a flaw (yet isn't wrong).

Let's take your phrase. You say that you are exceptionnaly good, which is true since you are judging it from your own standards. Yet, you throw all of it away by saying that you cannot make it to the top. That is, in my opinion, being pessimistic. If you were realistic, you would have said 'I won't make it to the top if I don't commit to it more'.
If the first case, what makes it pessimistic is the word 'never'. Like, you'll never be able to make it to the top. This is pessimistic.
While, what makes it realistic in the second case is the 'if'. It means that you won't (not that you'll never) unless you commit more.

Now, this is total interpretation from my part. I wouldn't be surprised to know that you made this thread purposely to get denied by people. Because your education/life taught you that you cannot do something great if you don't have the talent to. Yet, you don't want to believe this, you want to believe that the lack of talent does not mean that you cannot do it. You want to believe that hardwork can replace talent.

You said that hard work cannot beat both hardwork + talent, even though it can beat talent alone. BUT, you do not consider hardwork and talent as things that can be more or less 'bigger'. You can work very hard for one day, but that will mean much less than if you work without effort for an entire year.
Yep, half a year of hardwork + talent will have higher results than one year of hardwork without talent. But that doesn't mean that half a year of hardwork + talent will have higher results than two years of hardwork alone.

What I mean is that it's not because you have both hardwork and talent that you'll do better than someone with hardwork alone.

Also, thanks for appreciating my honest response earlier, a lot of people would have said 'you are wrong because of whatever' yet you said 'thanks'. I appreciate that, you earned my respect by saying that ! :3

I appreciate your words of encouragement, but really I am wholly content with where I am as a player. At the same time, I am aware of the reality that I will never make it to the very top. That is why I used the word never. It is a fact that I can not humanly make it to the very top, period. Don't see that as an unfounded pessimistic statement that is grounded in my insecurities, see it as a realistic estimate, based on experience and the analysis of players improvement rates.

I did what I mentioned in the opening post: settling for less and playing the game in a way that I can enjoy.

Your interpretation is quite off though. I was raised in a very positive and approving household, with lots of support from many sides.


half a year of hardwork + talent will have higher results than one year of hardwork without talent. But that doesn't mean that half a year of hardwork + talent will have higher results than two years of hardwork alone.
Well, I agree. Too bad that the top is literally all talent and 3 years of hard work. Hard to beat that.

actually it's 3 years of DT farm

Railey2 wrote:

Your interpretation is quite off though. I was raised in a very positive and approving household, with lots of support from many sides.

Owh, then I'm wrong :3

Railey2 wrote:

It is a fact that I can not humanly make it to the very top, period. Don't see that as an unfounded pessimistic statement that is grounded in my insecurities, see it as a realistic estimate, based on experience and the analysis of players improvement rates.

Hum, maybe your experience isn't totally right (yet not wrong either) on this one ! (Just like mine may be.)

I think while saying that "talent is essential" we get to the point where you have to ask what talent even is as there are many factors that play into a rapid improvement curve not called "play more". As the talent component might encompass things such as self-assessment, decision making on what to play and what to improve on, frustration tolerance and many other things not directly related to circle clicking it could be replaced by say a coach or gameplay & rankings(nice meme[tm]).
You might notice that these are all skills that are heavily connected to competitiveness which isn't everyone's thing anyway and certainly has nothing to do with circle clicking in particular but I believe that the effect of those is massive regarding the ranking curve of a player.

I think it is important to see hard work as the essential component (as elaborated by shortpotato) and greater talent as the thing that gives you the edge. I think most passionate circle clickers are already talented to play the game in some way because they're able to enjoy the game and show endurance in their progress. Talent always includes the tendency to have an interest in the area you're talented at and I think this is something everyone who plays this game for a long time has.
So even if someone may not have the sufficient talent to get to the very top I think players shouldn't be told that they are untalented. Those untalented never even begin to play this game - my grandma for example to give a really dumb one.

play more

Endaris wrote:

I think while saying that "talent is essential" we get to the point where you have to ask what talent even is as there are many factors that play into a rapid improvement curve not called "play more". As the talent component might encompass things such as self-assessment, decision making on what to play and what to improve on, frustration tolerance and many other things not directly related to circle clicking it could be replaced by say a coach or gameplay & rankings(nice meme[tm]).
You might notice that these are all skills that are heavily connected to competitiveness which isn't everyone's thing anyway and certainly has nothing to do with circle clicking in particular but I believe that the effect of those is massive regarding the ranking curve of a player.

I think it is important to see hard work as the essential component (as elaborated by shortpotato) and greater talent as the thing that gives you the edge. I think most passionate circle clickers are already talented to play the game in some way because they're able to enjoy the game and show endurance in their progress. Talent always includes the tendency to have an interest in the area you're talented at and I think this is something everyone who plays this game for a long time has.
So even if someone may not have the sufficient talent to get to the very top I think players shouldn't be told that they are untalented. Those untalented never even begin to play this game - my grandma for example to give a really dumb one.

I gave a definition of talent at the beginning of my post.


Hard work is important to progress through the rankings all the way.
Talent is important to progress faster and further through the rankings, which is essential to make it to the top.

Hard work will always be essential, but talent is essential too when you have big ambitions. This is why I am telling people, who lack this essential talent, to give up on their ambitions for the sake of avoiding late disappointment.

As to your grandma example, there are certainly different degrees of talentlessness. As I said before, in my opening post, talent is a relative term. Even we are talentless when compared to the likes of vaxei. Saying that untalented people never start playing the game is a statement that misunderstands the nature of how I used the term all along. Feel free to use the term the way you like, but we should make sure that we understand each other.

Talent is overrated af to be honest. 10% luck, 20% talent, 10% believe in your goal, 60% is pure hard work.
Everything has a price. If you got talent you have to trade it. People with talent usually lost their goal because they don't have the will to work as hard as other untalented person.
And yes, if you got talent and hard work you will reach the top, but even if you don't have talent, you can still be a pro, you just don't stand on top

there really arent enough talented people that play osu for it to be an issue towards reaching top100 with just hard work

Corim wrote:

actually it's 3 years of DT farm

no 5 minutes of hr farm 1v1 please i am 90 second acc meister

Muuki wrote:

there really arent enough talented people that play osu for it to be an issue towards reaching top100 with just hard work

ye true

you'd have to sacrifice a lot of your current commitments: i.e studying, work, social life, etc. in order to do so tho

I'd say most of us here are innately talented ENOUGH (think bell distribution) at least to reach the top 100 with consistent effort, but almost always it's not worth sacrificing your current commitments as mentioned above. It's also discouraging at times when people who play less than you (i.e the EXTREMELY TALENTED) are still better - and hence why people should consider spending their time elsewhere, maybe in an another area in which THEY might be talented or extremely talented in

But Railey's right I guess, the top of the top (top 5, 10 or 50 maybe) are just exponentially more insane with every rank and maybe only with talent can you break into it, i dunno though i haven't been there dx

w

edit: I don't think it's pessimistic to say this, it's just reality and tbh if ur life purpose is to be the best circle clicker maybe u need to reconsider ur priorities xd (no offence to any aspiring circle clickers)

This is a bit of a vitriolic discussion, but an interesting topic. I find it strange that people say 'talent is more important IN MY OPINION'. I feel that if you don't actually know which one is actually more important, then it's not really that useful to say. If you don't qualify your opinion with evidence (not anecdotes from famous people) then you are unlikely to convince anyone that you are correct.

I found this related article, anyway http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20121114-gladwells-10000-hour-rule-myth . TLDR; There is no clear agreement among experts about whether talent is just hard work or not.

I drew a couple of things from this article anyway:

1- The majority of those at the top of any discipline have put in a huge amount of time practicing, and often they had already put in a huge amount of time before the people against whom they are competing. So if these top players are still active (cookiezi, WWW, [Toy], Beafowl etc.) then they are still improving, so it makes catching up to them in terms of hours harder.

2- You don't know if you could be one of the best until you actually put in the hours required to reach the top (whether it is ~1000 hours for memory training, ~25,000 hours for concert level violin playing, ~XXX hours for osu!....). Yes some people can get there quicker (Vaxei, Rafis), but for you personally you just don't know what you might achieve until you have actually done all that practice.

Finally, I personally think that OP's attempt to find a measure for talent vs. effort is interesting, not pure cancer, but I personally think the biggest flaw is that it somehow assumes that people improve at a steady pace. In my experience with eg. language learning this is just not usually the case. Some people find the early stages of learning a skill particularly hard, others might struggle to maintain focus when practicing through a plateau where improvement comes slowly, and in any case you can't predict exactly when something might start to feel natural and easy to you. Yes you might practice for a long time and still suck, but maybe next week something will just click for you, and you'll make a huge leap in improvement.

Just my 2 cents

i like your 2 cents

My entire response to this post can basically be summed up by "so what?"

Obviously, I'd be crazy to think that I can somehow catch up to the likes of Cookiezi and Rafis because they're so far ahead of me and still working hard at improving every day. Obviously, I'm not talented, because there are people who played this game 1/3 as much as me and are higher rank.

But, seriously, who are you to tell me that I couldn't climb to the top if I pushed myself really hard? For the past year and a half, I've only gotten to play one or two days a week, and I'm still climbing (albeit slowly). I still have room to play 5x as much, and when my crazy 6 day workweek + graduate classes schedule ends, maybe that's what I'll do. Maybe I'll find something else I'd rather do, but I'm certainly not going to give up on it just because you told me to.

I dunno, you can be a quitter all you like, but don't go pushing that onto me.

rip me im not talented at anything at all might as well just quit

many of the response tells me that "I play for rank."

Floob wrote:

rip me im not talented at anything at all might as well just quit

Yeah you are right, everybody that is not talented should quit
Heck yeah ill quit today bcuz playing this game without talent makes no sense

Rip all the untalented players

Hiro-Senpai wrote:

Floob wrote:

rip me im not talented at anything at all might as well just quit

Yeah you are right, everybody that is not talented should quit
Heck yeah ill quit today bcuz playing this game without talent makes no sense

Rip all the untalented players

Rip, osu will be left with approx 100 players and peppy will shut down so amazing game. All thanks to OP being a mindless brick.

Did this thread offend you because you find yourself in the untalented-bracket?
That's fine, Taiga. You can play the game for other reasons than making it to the top. Just play for your own personal improvement, play for the music or play for fun. Wanting to quit is a pretty weird reaction to my post anyway. It's not like I was sharing new insights, it's just common sense for the most part.

"Oh no... According to what this post says, I'm untalented T_T" (Just a joke alright?)

*Flawed points incoming*

Anyway, I find what OP has said to be interesting or even controversial to what people have in mind when it comes to ranking, score, PP etc.

Yes, putting in hard work does make you improve and do better. But if your method of improving is not benefiting you then there isn't really a point to lash and hate on what defines "Talent" in this context. I do agree on hard working having an important role in ones rise to the top - be it 200k- 100k or 100th-50th placing in ranks.

Although what the replies to the post are...mixed, I do not believe that OP needs to get such flak. Valid arguments and feedback? No problem. But hating with hypocrisy and criticizing in such an absurd way is totally undeserving.

I'll use myself as a sad example, 13k plays and about 2 million hits. Bring in the haters to tell me I am untalented and I should quit this game. While I realize I can never make it to the top(the fact came long ago), it doesn't mean that I can't improve(even slightly) from my sorry state. Some improve faster, some take more time. That's all I can think of at the moment.


It's cool to see the post get so much attention, but saying things like "lol I should quit this game, screw OP" or even "If I'm untalented, so are you lol" kind of comments. I don't know it could offend people to such an extent :/



To OP, interesting post

Railey, I used to respect you but this is seriously fucking stupid

How immature do you have to be to type up this massive post just because you're not capable of improving

You're attempting to rationalize your own failures as some sort of act of god or pre-destined occurrence just because you can't stand the fact that you're just not good enough - this is literally the sort of thing you see children do.

Not only that but you're making an active effort to discourage other people from playing the game too. "If I can't have it, nobody can!" That's literally toddler logic.

This is seriously fucking stupid and probably tops my list of the stupidest threads on this forum (and I've seen a lot of fucking stupid threads)

Stop whining. If you don't want to play, quit. If you do want to play, shut the fuck up and have fun. Not improving? It's your own fucking fault, and focusing on the negatives like this shit is probably WHY you're not improving. Attitude is important.

Did this thread offend you because you find yourself in the untalented-bracket?
That's fine, Taiga. You can play the game for other reasons than making it to the top. Just play for your own personal improvement, play for the music or play for fun. Wanting to quit is a pretty weird reaction to my post anyway. It's not like I was sharing new insights, it's just common sense for the most part.

LMAO, pls.

Yes - i am in so you call it "untallented bracket" and personaly, i don't give a single fuck, i don't take into my mind such bullshit like "you are not talented" since it's pure demotivational emotion to mess you up at any point of activity - basic psychology knock-knock to your empty brain.

First emotion if something goes wrong for several hours should be - how can i improve this, analyze your own mistakes, spend even hours on analyzing your routine, change something, expect better results, if not - change something else, be fuckin positive that at some point you will overcome your barriers and do your job better - one more time - basic psychology knock-knock to your empty shitty head.

I play this game for several reasons, mainly to enjoy certain group of maps created by HW, fanzhen, RLC and more amazing mappers.
When i played for ranking, i was spending minimum 6 hours per day hard working my ass, not paying attention to pain in wrist, overcomming my barriers and pushing forward - i made "impossible" - possible by working on it.

Your post is pure "hey dude, you are untalented, just quit because there is no place in top100 for you".

If you are a failure in computer game, that's fine but don't fuckin dare to demoralize other players. It's mothefuckin stupid.
By this post you prove how big failure you are not only in computer game but also in term of mental strenght.