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| Interviewing Alan Feng
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Some weeks have passed in the course of Game Theory with Application to Starcraft at Berkeley University, USA. Many questions has come up since then, and we took some time to sit down with one of the two main lecturers and creators of the class; Alan Feng.
Tell us a little about yourself, I'm sure most people know your name, but what kind of a person decides and manages to pull something like this off?
- It started back when I was training to be a pro because I watched all the VODs, I watched the Koreans, I read their histories, I watched their TV ... but the problem is, none of that sets me apart, and to be the best, to be #1, I have to figure out my niche, something that can make me different from them to be better.
So, I studied what I knew: history and mathematics. With my fairly good mathematics background, I came up with all sorts of equations, tables and charts to give me the best result in every case. For instance, I once worked out using the binomial theorem that it is slightly more beneficial to send new workers to the *edge* of a mining line rather than the center. Over the course of maybe 3 minutes, this kind of movement will let you mine about 300-500 more minerals than you normally would.
Ultimately, I failed at my pro-gaming bid but, my year of study of StarCraft gave me something that I think no other SC player can offer the academic world: rigorous proof and analysis. And because of my calculations, my proofs, and most importantly, the way I can connect these calculations to real-life examples I was able to present it in a way that Haas Business School would accept as a topic for teaching.
And on a more personal note: how old are you, what are you studying right now and where are you from?
- I'm currently 20 years old; I was 18 when I dropped out of school for SC, and came back a year later as a Physics major. I was born in China, but I moved to the States when I was 3. And I honestly didn't know StarCraft even existed until the summer of 2006.
“For 1/2 a year, I played 60-80 hrs a week, with Sherwin Mahbod (Yosh) as my coach. - Alan the progamer I heard something about Progaming in your own SC history in the first lecture, care to elaborate that?
- First of all, I define pro-gaming to be: one who gets most of one's sustenance from gaming competitively. so, during the summer of 2007, I wanted to try my hand at being an SC pro in Korea. I started making plans, saving money to go to Korea, and stuff.
One day, online while practicing with one of my friends, we chatted about this possibility. We talked about the possibility of this actually succeeding and my friend was impressed at my dedication and passion for SC. Apparently, he wanted to play SC professionally too, but got caught up in life and stuff (wife, kids, real job) so he couldn't just abandon them for this dream but he said his company (which makes electronics of something like that) was willing to sponsor me to take on this challenge.
Eventually, after working out the details and stuff, we figured it would be cheaper for me to stay and train in the States until there a time when I could prove myself internationally, or otherwise get the attention of the Korean Pro scene. So, for 1/2 a year, I played 60-80 hours a week, with Sherwin Mahbod (Yosh) as my coach (when he wasn't busy with schoolwork).
At the end of that half-year, since I hadn't even gotten as good as Yosh, despite all my play, my sponsor and I both decided that it probably wasn't in the cards for me to continue to try to be a progamer so I went back to school. Luckily, I documented all my work, so that's where we are right now. :)
Do you still play? What would you say your skill level is right now?
- Ho ho ho ... I'd be lucky to hit C nowadays.
You say that Yosh coached you in your try to become a progamer, how did you find him, and what part did he have, and does he have, in the making of the class?
- We actually met at a tournament during the pre-game banter, we found out we were actually just down the street from each other. After that, we met the next day for some talk and some SC and we've played together since then.
As far as the class goes, it was Sherwin's idea to begin with. Last April or so, we were at our weekly LAN party, and we were all just joking around and hanging out when we brought up the possibility of a class on SC taught through Berkeley's DeCal program. However, we just left it as a joke for a while and we didn't get our materials ready for the May deadlines. But, I mulled it over a bit over the summer, and dug out my old stuff, and planned out a course outline, wrote notes for it, started gathering replays, organizing the logistics of everything, and stuff was really falling into place.
“We were all just joking around and hanging out when we brought up the possibility of a class on SC taught through Berkeley's DeCal program. - Alan explaining how the idea first came up The last and most significant hurdle was finding a professor who would sponsor us, and Yosh found us the Game Theory professor at Haas School of Business. Professor Morgan and I had a chat about where the class was going to go, what we were going to do, and how the class was to be run. I showed him some of my essays, calculations, analysis, simulations, and stuff and he was really into it, since he was a SimCity and Civ I, II, III, IV afficionado when he was younger. After we got the go-ahead, we really kicked it into high gear, planning out specific weeks, and writing homework assignments, designing quizzes and final projects and stuff.
I gotta say: I think Yosh and I disagreed on just about everything from conception till now. He prefers a much more game-based and situational analysis-based class, where we would analyze replays and stuff. I like to discuss much more pure theory and calculations and things in absolute terms, with room for the student to apply to their own game but we worked it out over time, and we have the lecture series planned out. I call on Yosh for help all the time (among other people) and he will be a significant influence on where the class goes.
Who else is involved with the project? And what do each and everyone of you do on the lectures?
- The core team is Sherwin Mahbod (Yosh), Anthony Chen (Phase) and me (Nimue). Yosh and I are the main lecturers, given our opposite natures. I present the theory and the calculations, he presents the practical replay analysis. I present the Protoss, he presents the Terran, etc. Anthony is very busy as an Engineering major here at Berkeley, but he helps out a lot too when we need someone to film the class, or to help us setting up scenarios or the play against in in-class demos and stuff.
Another friend of mine I like to call for help a lot is Tyler Chow (Lore). He actually taught me the game when I first started out and we always joke that I owe "half of all I know to him". :P He plays Zerg, and is even more practical than Yosh like, recently, he gave part of a lecture on Flux and surrounding the enemy after I presented the calculations on it. I also run my lectures past my roommates before giving them to the class, which is great because my roommates don't actually play SC, so if I can explain it to them, then I know my audience will understand and of course Helen, my moral support at home.
Back to the before work then, how did the school board react to this? Was it hard to make them put this on the list of classes for the semester?
- If it's one thing I love about Berkeley, is that they're accepting to all sorts of new ideas. I think if you went to a 400-yr-old Ivy League school or something they might be more resistant to a field so foreign and new but, as long as I convinced my professor that it was worthy, we got green lights after that. Though, I must say, the rest of the world reacted very strongly to this so, in comparison, the school board was a very supportive and friendly organization.
How did most people react? Have anyone approached you in class - or anywhere else for that matter - about your own skill level and ability to teach when you're not a top level player yourself?
- I got e-mails of a huge variety the most common was: Awesome, dude, keep up the good work. Some said exactly that: You n00b, you can't even play yourself, how can you teach?. Others were a little different, I guess: Stop wasting US education dollars on worthless topics .... I guess in the mainstream press (CNN, or whatever) seemed to marginalize the class saying it's "only" a class on games and stuff like that.
And of course they have their right to say it, since I do believe that is a reflection of how most non-gamers do feel: "It's "just" games" but I think our response from the gaming community has been overwhelmingly positive. Even one site, I forgot its name, gave us a very negative review and branded us as a hoax, later retracted its statements and gave a positive review later.
As far as China and Korea are concerned, I think they are fairly positive about this too. I must say, it was very interesting one day when I got an email from some kid's mother, who thanked me and said: Thanks to you, my son is putting more effort into learning English to understand what you lecture about. In Korea, I was told that the Joongangilbo (a major Korean newspaper) portrayed us in a fairly positive light. So ... I guess responses have been all over the board.
How does it feel to become such a big face not just on Berkeley, but around the world, both to gamers and non-gamers? What did you feel when you stood in front of the class the first lecture?
- Honestly, I expected my class to be like 20 people, I was utterly bewildered the first like 3 days of my newfound fame but since then, I've had to constantly remind myself what this is truly about: the StarCraft and the purity of thought contained therein. As long as I remember that everything I say and do is simply to pay homage to StarCraft, I think I'm doing the right thing. As far as public speaking goes and standing up in front of the class, I think I had no problem. I knew my notes backwards and forwards, since this is a topic I'm very familiar with.
“I think I'll have to observe each instructor on a case by case basis before I can give anyone else the definitive yes or no on whether or not they can use my materials. - Alan being protective about his reader. Du you think and wish for other Universities around the globe to take up a course like this one?
- It depends on the dedication and preparation of each school's players. I had about 10 or so requests at the beginning of the semester for me to release my notes so they could mirror the class at their school but what I told each of them was: ... Lets relax for a bit, and lemme do the test run first and then we can see who wants to mirror this class at their own school.
Of course, as with anyone with their creation, I'm fairly protective, so I think I'll have to observe each instructor on a case by case basis before I can give them the definitive yes or no on whether or not they can use my materials. And of course they'll have to come up with stuff on their own, since ... Yosh won't be there to guide them or they might not have such a cooperative school board. Or their class might want to go a different direction, the instructors will have to be flexible. But we'll see. :)
About Berkeley, are there a lot of SC players already? Any hidden gosus?
- Given the reception the class has gotten, I'd say at least 90% of males on campus have either played or heard of SC. I was studying in the library the other day, and one guy said: "Whoa! you're that guy in that video! I loved your lecture, man!". So, I think there's plenty of SC'ers here. As far as blossoming young gosus, college might not be the best breeding ground for them since we're at least 17 or 18 years old, a bit old. But someone from around this area, Superior Wolf (on TL.net) seems to be in great shape and improving. I'm interested where he will go.
You speak of your theory and calculations, how much math is actually included in the course?
- Quite a lot and quite difficult. Umm, we're still working on getting lectures 3 and 4 up online but you'll start to see in those lectures where the heavy math starts coming into play. On the syllabus, I've requested that everyone can do Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, Analytic Geometry, and other undergraduate math tools going over those concepts in class has been rather taxing on the students, but they are interested and try really hard to understand it.
How did people react to this? Did people think it would just be about the game, and playing, or did they expect the math and the theory around the game?
- I've tried to tell people ... repeatedly ... that it's gonna be difficult math, but I don't think anyone believed me but they're starting to get it now and understand what points I'm trying to get across. but yes, everyone in the world thought it was going to be some relaxed class where to go and play SC for 2 hours a week. Although, people seem to be liking the math and theory. Recently, I had the class fill out a survey, and the responses seemed pretty positive as far as theory went. Now math ... there aren't too many fans of math in that class but they definitely enjoy the pure theory side of it.
Are you quoting any Sun Tzu in the theory?
Yes, so far, we've done things regarding how to attack when outnumbering your opponent and stuff and I gotta say, Sun Tzu is still gold after 4k years.
How does the practical parts of the course work, and can you give an example to explain you can applicate that strategic thinking you keep talking about into practice in SC?
- Hmm practical parts, practical parts ... you gotta ask Yosh about that one. However, as a disclaimer for the class: If you want to get better at StarCraft in the shortest amount of time possible, go back to ICCup. The stuff that we discuss is purer theory, that can be applied to other RTS's, and real life too, but simply in the construct of the SC program but as far as practical is concerned we've proven mathematically that it's better to have your army together than separated through the whole map. We've proven the effectiveness of micro is nowhere near the effectiveness of macro but, micro can save your ass as a significant short-term gain and that ... you should use concussive damage vs small units. -.-
| We asked Yosh ... | Alan says you complement each other and that you're the more practical one of the two of you, how would you say you guys weigh up the practical and the theoretical parts of the course?
- I've always been better at explaining the practical rather than the theory. Even going back to 2000 when Hattan was coaching me, he would come up with the theory and I'd put it into practice. Alan spends time thinking about variations in the game, other ways to think about things, what might work what might not work etc. So I think we cover all angles. Basically it's good to understand both sides, otherwise you'd be doing something without understand why it works.
How is the practical practice worked out for the students?
- We spend a good chunk of class time during the week reviewing hand-picked replays and VODs that highlight the material we discuss. Then we try to spend 3-4hours on Saturday afternoons where a lot of students go to the library to LAN and others join us online so we can play practice games and review, critique, yell, insult, etc.
Can you give an example to explain it? Perhaps how have you done it in the classes this far?
- In week 2 we were discussing unit strengths/weaknesses and some army movement, so I researched some recent VODs to find good examples of Koreans initiating attacks with certain units. Then paused it at multiple points in the VOD to ask students to examine everything that was going on at the battle screen and in the players' minds. Think timing of attack, unit formation, using patrol vs attack for some units, area on map, the map itself, opponent's setup, amount of information at hand, what to do during battle, handing macro, mind games, etc.
I think the VOD I chose for the most in-depth analysis for this topic was Nada vs Stork on Andromeda. |
“I really, really hope that we'll be able to apply a lot of this stuff to SC2 since it would be a shame to have SC1 be such a perfect reflection of life - Alan about using SC2 for the class You say the theory can be put into context in other RTS games as well, why SC then, why is SC such a great tool for this?
- Because SC allows you to express the various aspects of theory. If we wanted to talk about the macro of WC3, we would conclude that macro is pretty useless. We could talk about economy and building placement in SimCity, but no micro. We could talk about animation frames and counters in Street Fighter or Soul Caliber. We could talk about any number of things in any number of games but SC has a "significant" representation of each. That you can choose to demonstrate the power of economy or the power of micro as you choose, that in this game, having good building placement is an expression of the theory, that you can observe. We can talk about "pure" game theory and choosing the do less than the optimal choice and Nash equilibrium. In SC, and it'll still be a valid discussion. So, the fact that it is so all-encompassing and it represents life so well is why it's perfect for discussion and application of theory in all respects.
So, turning the table entirely, have you played SC2 and how do you think this course to be applicable to the sequel?
- I have not played SC2 yet, but I hope to do so soon. I have, though, watched every SC video and Blizzard Q&A reports, and I do really really hope that we'll be able to apply a lot of this stuff to SC2 since it would be a shame to have SC1 be such a perfect reflection of life ... And then for SC2 to completely lose out on things like ... significant animation frames, or the lack of soft counters, or what not but whatever the RTS is going to be like, we'll be able to use the analysis tools we discuss on some parts of it to ultimately understand what is important and what is not important.
And what will the students actually get out of this? What will they be left with after the course besides a hopefully improved sc game?
- With any luck, I hope the students will gain a new perspective and way of thinking, that they'll understand in their day to day interactions. How "important" one action is over another and to have a scientific outlook on life. Of observation --> analysis --> understanding --> manipulation. So ... figuring out the exact economic curve for Protoss fast expo probably won't help anyone in life but understanding the thought that goes behind making such a curve and being able to apply it to the next topic in their lives will be paramount.
“Also I'd like to dedicate this class to Lore, Yosh, Helen, HongSam-Toss, and Restitute. - Alan Feng Do you have any plans to continue this course next year? What does it take for them to let you keep running it?
- Yes, most definitely. My sponsor is very happy with the progress of the class, and the students are exuberant. There will be new students and students we turned away this semester. There's no problem. With enthusiasm as high as it is right now, we should get it approved easily. Over the summer, I might have to make some changes to accommodate SC2, but that should be easy, just change some examples.
When will Berkeley be accepting transfers for the SC program? ;)
Ha ha, immediately oov
Is there anything you want to add, anything you want to tell our readers, or anyone who might come across this interview?
- That I look forward to the completed version of the textbook. I have the skeleton right now, and through the course of this class and over the summer, I'll have the full text ready for review. Also I'd like to dedicate this class to Lore, Yosh, Helen, HongSam-Toss, and Restitute. 
For those who want to know more, go visit the BerkeleyStarCraft home page.
Alan also expressed that he needs help to process the raw footage from one of the classes, if you want to help him, say so in the comments here.
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