Thread: Getting better at competitive games (links inside!)

tl;dr I respect his opinions, and he puts a lot of the thinking behind high level play into words where wall of texts are socially acceptable. I think he's wrong in many important parts of his gaming philosophy. Here's why.

Seems like another reiteration of age-old strategies for improvement in his own words. I clicked on his "What makes the Best Player?" to see if he knew his stuff. Alright... apparently this is in order of least important to most important.

• Familiarity with tournaments
• Deep knowledge of the game at hand
• Love of the game
• Mental Toughness
• Mental attitude toward winning, losing, improving
• Technical skill (usually dexterity)
• Adaptability
• Knowledge/ability in other games of that genre
• Yomi
• Appraisal

I'll put it in my order of importance. Most important to least important:

1) Deep knowledge of the game at hand
2) Adaptability
3) Technical skill (usually dexterity)
4) Communication
5) Yomi (intuition)
6) Mental attitude toward winning, losing, improving
7) Familiarity with tournaments
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• Love of the game & Mental Toughness
• Knowledge/ability in other games of that genre
• Appraisal (doesn't exist)

First of all, he's thought about this very poorly to put deep knowledge of the game at the bottom of his list. This is a necessary skill for anyone at the top to have. If you do not have a deep understanding about the game enough to formulate your own opinions and disagree with current ones then you're never going to be good at the game. Everyone at the top knows everything about their game. Take competitive Super Smash Brothers Melee. You can be the fastest learner who has unmatchably dextrous fingers, impeccable intuition, and the best attitude ever, but you'll be no match against someone who knows the game. Knowing every matchup on every stage with every character -- every advanced technique between waveshining to chaingrabs to wallteching to l-canceling -- you are just unmatched. You have to know what every classes cooldowns are in MMOs and MOBAs to be successful. You have to know every inch of Dust and nook in Train to win no matter how technical you are. Sorry David Sirlin, no matter what game you're playing, every player needs this. It is on the top of my list.

I can't believe he puts adaptability below knowledge about other games... which I touch upon later. Assuming you have your essential deep knowledge of the game, adaptation is the next biggest variable to deciding who is the best player / team. Think for a second: two players who know EVERYTHING about (insert any competitive game. Chess, for example) are playing each other for the first time. The player who can figure the opponent out first will be the better opponent. In Tf2, you can have two seasoned snipers going at it. After an hour, one sniper will generally consistently get 5 consecutive kills on the opponent. This player figured the other player out faster, aka, he was able to adapt quicker. This opponent will then be able to recognize changes in his gameplay in response to your changes, and with higher level adaptability, be able to always be on step ahead. It is interesting to see two players who are equally skilled at adapting play each other in games like Bloodline Champions. You can literally watch playstyles evolve based on habits... habits changing based on being punished... habits changing in response to the change. It's beautiful.

Technical skill is third because it is highly dependent on the game, whereas adaptability can be applied everywhere. Games like Super Smash Brothers Melee often require over 10 actions per second on the gamecube controller for very common techniques like l-cancelling a short-hopped arial --> waveshine, setting you up to tech chase. However, you will see this in several tournaments time and time again -- someone who can figure out the opponent in a set can have inferior techskill but is able to 3stock+ an enemy by simply playing smart. Games highly reliant on reflex like Counter-strike may be an exception and prioritize technical skill (reflex, accuracy, heightened senses, etc). Games like League require a certain amount of technical skill, but the best players who win games are those who have a deep understanding of the current situation long before a teamfight even happens. Aside from outliers, technical skill is very important, but under the first two listed.

He didn't even bring up communication lol. It is the reason people win MLGs. You can be an amazing player, but in team-heavy games like WoW, LoL, BLC, CS, and 6v6 Tf2, if you don't know how to communicate then you will either be forced to learn how or cut. Every player at the top of team games can do it, as it's an essential skill to have. You would be surprised how much drama there has been with the best Tf2 players cutting invite-level scouts simply because they could not synergyze with the team.

He spends 3 paragraphs trying to explain the phenomena Yomi which is just another way of saying Intuition. Intuition is important... which is actually subconsciously developed after gaining a deep understanding of the game and intricately involved with adaptability on a deeper level. In pro-SSBM, pretend you are edge-guarding an enemy who is about to recover back on the stage. You have to "cover the options", or as many options as you can. Say you have to choose one out of the four options in order to successfully take a life out of your opponent by preparing an attack to where you think he is going to go. Players at the top can make accurate, intuitive decisions in a split second based on knowledge and what they have learned from their opponent thus far. Harder to explain, but more situational. Certainly not the second most important variable to what makes the best player.

Mental Attitude towards winning, losing, improving is next on my list. Knowing how to get better is important.

Familiarity with tournaments has a very small part in what makes a best player. You have to know how picks/bans work whether it be maps in fighting games or champions in Dota or League. You have to know how much life default tournament is, what characters are not allowed in competitive play, and what gaming paraphernalia you can and cannot use. It's on the bottom of the list because no $#@!.

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The stuff below the line shouldn't be on the list.

Love of the game really has nothing to do with how well a player is besides opening doors to discoveries. In other words, if you love the game you have a greater opportunity to gain deep knowledge of the game. You have greater mental toughness, as you have an inherent motivation to play for long durations of time.

There is little correlation to being pro in one game and being pro in the entire genre. I believe there is cyber-athleticism just like there is athleticism in real life. Two of the best StarCraft players could have started at two completely different levels. One had natural RTS talent, but one got to the same level through meticulous practice. Look at a game like Basketball in real life. Someone who is athletic is generally assumed to be good at sports. Just because you're a pro basketball player does not mean you are good at every other sport. Some players are cyber-athletic and are simply good gamers, and others get to the same level through practice. This is not a good variable to look at when finding out traits for the best players.

His explanation and description of appraisal is just awful. He spent an entire wall of text explaining that elite players do not conform to the metagame. No $#@!. They are not baddies that follow mobafire guides for League builds and watch pro recorded Tf2 matches to copy what they do. They create new strategies, not copy successful ones. Being a gaming hipster is actually a great trait to have competitively. Like when CLG recognized the strength of wriggles and its passive, so they stacked 3 wriggles to do an early baron, allowing them to win the game. I hear almost all games below 1600 ELO still do Bruiser top, bruiser / tank jungle, ap carry mid, ad ranged & support bot. The metagame in 1600-1900 is countering the mainstream team composition -- you'll see double AD with Vayne top (anti-bruiser) or double AP with an AP top. The metagame in 1900+ is situational counter picking and adaptation in the moment with builds, skills, and spacing. tl;dr, appraisal is just a byproduct of having Deep Knowledge of the Game and Adaptation.

Don't even get me started on the excerpt about how gamers that play for fun are scrubs.
/record for longest freefrag post

.....tl;dr post aside, I like the way this guy phrases things as I think he hits it well on the head, and not to toot your horn (YOU'D LIKE THAT WOULDN'T YOU FUNK) but you do show his points when you play. Especially with the part you paraphrased in the post about "playing for fun." I like using that way of playing for fun, which involves self-improvement and finding ways to get better, but it's still fun. However it just ends up leading to the double-edged sword that is the rageharding and $#@!ishness of competitive teams, which is the part I'm wary of and why I don't get into this kind of stuff.

I'm going to have to pass this onto someone I know from high school who's getting into the MVC3 circuit. This will probably benefit him a lot.

Originally Posted by Funk

"Let’s consider two groups of players: a group of good players and a group of scrubs. The scrubs will play “for fun” and not explore the extremities of the game. They won’t find the most effective tactics and abuse them mercilessly. The good players will. The good players will find incredibly overpowering tactics and patterns. As they play the game more, they’ll be forced to find counters to those tactics. The vast majority of tactics that at first appear unbeatable end up having counters, though they are often quite subtle and difficult to discover. Knowing the counter tactic prevents the other player from using his tactic, but he can then use a counter to your counter. You are now afraid to use your counter and the opponent can go back to sneaking in the original overpowering tactic. This concept will be covered in much more detail later."

His definition of scrubs, or a group of players who play for fun, is off though. I think better organization of terms would be

- Players who play for fun = casual players.

- Players who are trying to get better to win, but are still bad or at a low level = bad players / scrubs.

- Players who are trying to get better to win, as a result, are good and play at high level = good players.

A scrub is a baddie. I don't believe it is fair to call someone who is just playing for fun a scrub. When you play some Pick-up basketball with your friends, I don't us as a bunch of $#@!ty players playing basketball. I view it as casual basketball players, with only intention of playing for fun, having a good time. If we all started joining basketball leagues and had a desire to go professional.... then yes, relative to the top we are scrubs / bad basketball players.

Good point.

The book could be a giant pep-talk from coach in order to inspire people to pursue competitive options correctly. Therefore, he can undermine everyone who does not fit into the targeted demographic as a scrub without anyone really focusing on anything but his description on "good players".