TheGooglePlex!

Points: 309, Level: 6

Activity: 60.6%

I host a couple teams on my mumble server, and I like when they do well. Unfortunately, they are not doing so well. I believe this is probably due to some naivety on their part.

I have noticed things wrong when I sub medic for them ("guys, I'm your medic. They have uber, we don't. I'm on batts, they're about to charge in. If you want to help me build uber and not get killed, come up here." "wait, How do you know they have uber?" facepalm) but I'm sure I'm missing something. What do you guys have to say?

BRN

Points: 382, Level: 7

Activity: 48.5%

Biggest things I notice is lack of confidence usually and to passive. Most new teams I see are scared of there opposition and tend to play to passive even though they could be a even match if they were aggressive and had more confidence. Second would have to be comms. Most of the time I hear nothing or just useless chatter, Need some blunt and to the point information without leaving important things out. Also the other thing would be getting greedy and over extending from their team. They will get a pick or something and then instead of going back and regrouping and taking advantage of one of their players down they rush into the whole team looking for more and end up causing themselves to die. Which causes them to lose that player advantage and made their pick play useless

oblivion

Points: 1,001, Level: 18

Activity: 33.3%

being new.

Kermit

Points: 2,823, Level: 34

Activity: 0%

One of the biggest mistakes I see in TF2 is just lack of teamplay or support (seen at all levels of TF2). Just like in real life, many people are selfish, and therefore only care about their frags and their death count. They'll see a teammate fighting and won't support them. They'll bait teammates so they can rack up a couple of kills, etc.
Therefore, when I look at the ESEA stats and see a soldier with amazing stats, 9/10 it's not because he's that good; but it's probably because he baits his team, or stays at 300 hp and cleans up. That's a big reason why Platinum's playstyle should be appreciated over all the other pockets. He's not the most flashy and definitely doesn't pull the best stats, but he positions the medic in ways that not only benefits him, but also his teammates. He supports his teammates like a pocket should, and doesn't bait them so he can get easy kills.

ymmud

Points: 1,791, Level: 25

Activity: 25.0%

i was helping a NA lobby team a while ago until i went away for vacation, half mentoring half helping (hopefully) them, and the thing i noticed was really only a lack of decisiveness. when i asked them if i could be the main caller for this map an"d they agreed, we tied the map from 3-0 to 3-3 (and that only because i crashed at 3-3 and us pushing last for 4-3). i made a lot of bad calling mistakes in that game im sure but we were decisive. really, the best advice i gave them was "shut the fuck up when your leader is calling, even if you think he is wrong follow the order, better to do shit rather than nothing. discuss it later, not MID MATCH" and "stay in your position until told to do else, do NOT follow that scout just because he is not that good"

Para Goomba

Points: 1,387, Level: 21

Activity: 8.3%

SIR YES SIR! These people aren't in the marines, that didn't sound like mentoring at all. Guess we all have to blow steam sometimes.

my contribution: I'd say biggest mistake for new medics is not staying behind the people they are healing.

MjrNuT

Points: 1,634, Level: 24

Activity: 0%

1. over extending, like the loner example resulting in suicide unnecessarily.

2. Poor comms. eg., calling a lit class and scouts go in, but find they are not lit at all, thus sending into certain death/wiping, and lack of common terms for locations on a map to say where the combo is (ours/theirs)

3. Not practicing enough for oneself or w/ their team (any number of them)

__________________
MjrNuT
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Sigma

Points: 7,327, Level: 59

Activity: 16.7%

Many new players seem to play like their goal is to make a frag video, not to win the game. Sure, there's a chance you'll win 1v2 against their scouts if they trip over their shoelaces while you're hitting solid 100's, and flinging your mouse up and clicking whenever someone jumps might get you a sweet airshot, but these actions are not conducive to your team's success.

They also play alone a lot. When attacking, everyone will just go as fast as they can and run in in some random order, rather than having multiple suicides hit at the same time, or letting your combo lead in by a second.

Another big mistake inexperienced teams is an over-reliance on standard positions. When they win mid, they will move towards the choke and hang out throwing spam, regardless of if the enemy went 4 down or 2. When they're caught at an uber disadvantage, they'll break line of sight with the enemy combo, but hold close to a choke anyways, and die to the charge.

ymmud

Points: 1,791, Level: 25

Activity: 25.0%

the swearing was added when they asked to tl;dr what i said plus not so much as here, para :d and it worked, call it mentoring or not they've been stably improving due to electing a main caller and being quick. they're not sissies either, none of 'em got angry over my choice of words =<
edit; i was also doing that for a couple of nights a week at 6 am due to having no life and lots of free time, so i've the right to be a bit grumpy :x

Fish #641

Points: 2,875, Level: 34

Activity: 0%

Zero aggression, usually. A lot of players get stuck in "pub loops," where a class will take a more or less designated path to maximize their kdr. This carries over a bit into comp, where they might not take the same path, but they mindlessly charge forward. This isn't true aggression, and if you were to ask me, it's a passive way to play. Yeah, you die by overextending, but you're not actively seeking out an objective. New players need to know that a lot of fights are won by simply having bigger balls than the opponent (see: badlands mid).

jiggawhat

Points: 1,641, Level: 24

Activity: 18.2%

1) Bad aim, plays with accel, unnecessarily high sens

2) Assumes the enemy is dumb. If I'm playing soldier and I see a scout run behind us I'm not going to forget about you.

3) Can't dodge effectively, too predictable

4) Tunnel vision. So many players I can just sneak up upon as scout and 2 shot them.

4.5) What kermit said about not helping teammates. When I'm a demoman and a scout is on me, and I'm right in front of a soldier who is occupied with someone else, FUCKING help me out. Whenever I see this happening to someone else I immediately drop what I'm doing and try to attract the attention of the scout on me.

4.6) One thing that I think many noobs don't try doing, along with 4.5, is using their body to block shots and things like that. e.g. if my demo is getting attacked, and I come in, I try to get in the way of the scout or soldier or whoever so that they can't get to the demo. I do the same thing for my medic.

4.7) As for dodging, it's hard to put this in words, but I think its actually pretty easy to dodge in a game like this which is far slower than QL. Notice the time that it takes an enemy demo/soldier/scout to aim. You can look at him and you will see him tracking you. It takes time but eventually you should be able to get it down and be able to move at the exact moment they are going to aim, i.e. a demo is trying to pipe me, what I do is strafe right until the moment I know he is going to shoot, then I switch directions. I can make people miss so much just by doing this very simple maneuver. You can fool a scout in the same way (it's harder though). Try to play mind games with the enemy because even good players can be fooled, just a random example, as a scout I would turn a corner wait a second and then double back because I know that 99% of players will take a second to stare at that corner to see if I'm coming back and then look at the alternate route to see if I come out from there - at that time i actually do come back out and then I can catch them off guard. Another example, if I'm a scout, and I'm attacking an enemy soldier who perhaps turns a corner, I will shoot him, and then he'll start spamming rockets at the corner. Depending on how smart he is he'll either empty the clip or he'll shoot two rockets and then I know he'll pause at that moment, that's when I finally turn the corner and shoot. At that point I know he's going to shoot in front of me so I stop and let him shoot that rocket, then I'll move forward again because he'll then try to shoot where I stopped at. I don't even know if any of yall can understand what I'm ranting about but the TLDR is that people are predictable and to play this game intelligently you have to predict the enemy without making yourself predictable.

4.8) There's a shitload of other intangibles like these that I dont see noob players doing. Use WASD and MOUSE1 and SPACE, this game requires more than just W and MOUSE1 so use your movement to position yourself better. Positioning is a huge thing that noobs can't get. If you're attacking, use rj's to get into a better position, or to leave. If you're defending, put yourself in a position so that the enemy has a tougher time getting to you. If you're being attacked, use the map so you can dodge and don't be predictable.

5) For demomen - tries to pipe too much. I love the feeling of piping players but if you don't have consistent aim and can't hit 3/4 pipes don't use it, cause if you miss, you'll die. Doesn't manage ammo well, reloads at bad times. Terrible at damage output - as a demoman you have to constantly do damage, stop wasting your time trying to pipe players across the map, just dish out those stickies, spam the pipes in tight areas, and DO DAMAGE. play aggressively when you can, and thats fairly often. doesn't use sticky traps often enough - when you can't do damage, put up some traps, put em up everywhere, anywhere and as much as you can.

6) For scouts - suicide on medic too much, takes obvious routes to enemy. Slowly approach the enemy if they leave some path open, make sure you have an escape route until you have to commit. Also, starts shooting at an unaware player outside of meatshot range.

7) Sniper - twitches too much. Line up your shots, take your time, track the players. Don't just zoom in and spazz out and expect to get a headshot. Also, pay attention to your surroundings so if you see a scout running somewhere you can be ready. Secondly, often tries to noscope scouts too much instead of using the SMG.

8) Soldier - Ironically while I find many noob scouts using high sens, i see many noob soldiers using low sens, so low that they have trouble turning around and reacting fast. You gotta be looking everywhere. Don't switch up to shotty immediately, only when you can finish the enemy fast. So many times I see a player shoot 1 rocket and then take out the shotty and proceed to empty the clip without killing anyone. Sometimes won't rocket jump enough. I rocket jump *so much* during games. Even if you're going 5 feet you can rocket jump to get there quicker, I also sticky jump short distances too, it helps build uber anyways. Will attempt unrealistic airshots that they know they cannot hit and waste ammo. Will overextend and fall for easy sticky traps. some roamers never prefire rockets and thus tends to walk right into the enemy or into a trap. doesn't spam rockets - you have 16 rockets (is it 20? can't remember havent played in so long) so spam spam spam spam spam spam and spam. Spam from long range too, this is important.

9) Medic - a lot of noobs play medic cause thats the easiest class so unfortunately there's a ton of bad medics. It takes a smart player to play this class and the smart players tend to play other classes. Usually gets screwed cause they don't trust their pocket and tend to play too forward, stand in a bad position, or just are clueless about enemies coming at them. Won't heal those who need the heals immediately and who are in the battle at that time. Will tend to overheal one person and just waste all the healing on that one person. Will try to ubersaw and fail at it - a good player can not be easily ubersawed, so take out your goddamn needle gun and needle - don't aim, aim for where the scout coming at you is going to come from. Will stay in the open against an enemy sniper.

Everything in this post is what I regularly seeing lobby players doing. In the end this kind of shit just takes hours and hours of playing the game to realize and understand.

RoboticRefrigeration

Points: 1,085, Level: 18

Activity: 0%

I often see people who dont regularly play roamer stick around the combo way too much, as if they're important or something, or that being a roamer is a glamorous job that only requires you to be more aggressive than the pocket.

Fish #641

Points: 2,875, Level: 34

Activity: 0%

fixed that one for you

jiggawhat

Points: 1,641, Level: 24

Activity: 18.2%

yes you're right

I meant to say "easiest class" [for noobs to start playing]

TheGooglePlex!

Points: 309, Level: 6

Activity: 60.6%

Thanks guys, these are all really helpful. I just wish I could play comp now! (Grrr schedules grumble grumble)

chipbuster

Points: 2,622, Level: 33

Activity: 9.1%

the biggest one for me is losing track of stuff. I'll push in on 2 and have my team slaughter them, then sit back and cap. What nobody realizes is that nobody picked the med and he's running for spawn with a 95% charge.

Or I'll lose track of charge timings. Like I do in 90% of my games while trying to dodge jumpers :(

SwimWithSharks

Points: 210, Level: 4

Activity: 6.1%

it's interesting that as a medic you get every action second guessed while the match is going on, either you uber too soon, or too late, or heal the wrong person, or heal the right person but in the wrong position, or be in the wrong position, etc. etc. etc.

As a 100%-of-the-time medic player (I have played enough dm-style games from quakeworld, to quake3, to ut99, to cs, that I honestly like playing something a bit different) I can't believe just how everybody feels entitled to complain about everything the medic does or doesn't do during the match: if you have suggestions, they are more than welcome AFTER the match is over, not DURING.

Maybe 'complaining about what the medic is doing' should be one of those 'biggest mistakes' in the thread, but usually it's not the 'new' players that do it the most...

Fish #641

Points: 2,875, Level: 34

Activity: 0%

The medic needs to be flexible, so there IS a fine line between complaining and asking for something. On-the-fly changes need to happen, and there's no way to do that without saying something. However if you're a conscious medic (that is to say, you actively make judgments, regardless of how good they are), you can backup what you were doing at the time when someone tries to call you out. Most people don't know how to play medic, so there isn't much that they can say after that. That's not to say that whatever they're asking for doesn't have truth to it, though.

khorma

Points: 2,008, Level: 28

Activity: 8.3%

its not a big deal imo

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Bikini

Points: 3,930, Level: 41

Activity: 8.3%

If you don't play the medic, don't complain about it. Either get a new one or go med yourself.

EDIT: If you feel that your not getting enough heals, get a pub medic... he'll stay on you like literally... FOREVER!

Sigma

Points: 7,327, Level: 59

Activity: 16.7%

It's easier for a medic to avoid making bad decisions than it is for other classes because that's all you have to focus on. At the same time, making a bad decision as a medic will screw your team over far more than a mistake from another class. Hence, players naturally criticize the medic, because there's really not much you can do to adapt to a medic who keeps dying (other than having the medic play better), while you can take a bad <other class> in stride.

It's up to you to use the criticism to improve rather than being annoyed by it.

(though I do understand that there are players who just don't know wtf they're talking about)

SwimWithSharks

Points: 210, Level: 4

Activity: 6.1%

what about when the medic dies because the pocket decides to go jumping with a scout close by, or the scouts decide to go for a pick without calling it rather than watching the flank, or when somebody decides to call a push when the medic is lit and everybody rushes forward and the medic (of course) dies to spam, or when I am lit and have to backtrack to get a health pack, I call it, and people push and die and then go "where is this medic, he's never here" etc. etc.

After everybody is dead it's always "dude, why do you keep dying" or "where were you" instead of "sorry, I wasn't watching the flank" or "sorry, didn't see that scout" or "sorry, I shouldn't have called a push" or "sorry I shouldn't have pushed without you there"?

Of course the medic is not perfect and can mess up, but ALWAYS the medic fault because the medic dies? Kinda goes like there's 4 people lit, spam incoming, try to get at least 2-3 healed, the other 1-2 will start going on on vent about what a sucky medic you are b/c you let them die...

And yes, as a medic you do need to make a judgement call every few seconds sometimes, it's like triage, sometimes you need to let somebody die to save others: and yes, if there were 10 minutes between rounds I could explain why certain calls were made, and so on, but there aren't 10 minutes to talk so is it so hard to expect a certain level of trust? I as a medic have to trust everybody to do their job, as I can't do any sort of damage, so some trust in return would be nice.

If you see I'm doing something wrong I am all ears, stay on AFTER the match is over and let's talk about it, throwing abuse my way while I am trying to keep another 3 people alive is not gonna help, and if I drop an uber you can bet I am already beating myself up over it and wondering if I could've done something different without you going on about it on mumble as well.

I do think my experiences are colored by the fact that I always play pug and not in a team (hard to find teams playing after 10 PST regularly), because I assume in teams, if you don't want your medic to leave, people probably are on their better behaviour, and I am sure that after important scrims you all watch the replay, analyze it and figure out what everybody could've done better. I am sure team medics here have an easier life, I guess most of my comments apply to pugs, where the abuse level is significantly higher.

SealClubber

Points: 2,301, Level: 31

Activity: 0%

Blaming all their failings on 1 person.

defiance

Points: 2,864, Level: 34

Activity: 8.3%

Unwilling or inability to adapt to what the other teams is doing

__________________
1:22 AM - caidh: fuck why am i still up
1:22 AM - defiance: lets pub
1:23 AM - caidh: shit no
1:23 AM - defiance: i was sleepy
1:23 AM - defiance: but i took a huge shit
1:23 AM - defiance: go try it

Panda

Points: 1,187, Level: 19

Activity: 5.9%

An inability to function as a member of a unit, I think is the biggest problem.

They think they want to play with a team and have fun, but have personality issues that prevent them from accepting the opinions of others. They don't pay attention to their own play, and don't accept advice towards repairing faults in their play.

Hawkeye

Points: 5,566, Level: 51

Activity: 8.3%

What I see mostly with newer teams is the the pieces of a teams imply aren't in-sync to what they should be doing, the combo may basically be broken and break apart due to lack of communications or both sollys want to roam. The scouts are trying to be very aggressive Carnage style and not keeping the flanks in check when in that role, demos playing way to passive with spam and not dealing damage. Soldiers afraid to jump away from the beam to take an opportunity. Not listening to or having a play caller/in-game captain.

Unfortunately a lot of it really is experience, the situation occurs again when one you can beat the low teams but get stomped by mid, you find out you need to re-think your entire concepts a few times.

Also, be as gay as you have to be, what separates teams is rounds won and rounds lost, not frags. Take the kills how you need to get them.

ymmud

Points: 1,791, Level: 25

Activity: 25.0%

whenever i medic I never have this problem; it's either stfu and get heals or not stfu and die
after a couple of rounds lost they learn :p
besides whenever i play in a team or a mix or even a pug I always try to ban anything unrelated; comms get cleaner, blah di blah
a NA team I was mentoring had the problem of not being united; scouts pushed too early or too late after the uber, etc. they also lack(ed) a solid, lead caller which's really important imo, a bad decision > no decision

density

Points: 1,250, Level: 20

Activity: 33.3%

They aren't comfortable. You can tell that players are new just by how they play, how they move, etc. It's not necessarily that they make the wrong decisions, it just looks like they are playing wrong.

I've seen this in multiple games, you can just tell how comfortable someone is just by watching them...then again being a little uncomfortable isn't a mistake because its almost unavoidable so idk :P

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8:05 tgbf: I'm the world's first anal-rapist. It's a combination of analysis and therapist.

Daystar

Points: 930, Level: 17

Activity: 75.0%

As a Medic and a sub-pocket Soldier (our team has 2 Medics amongst its number), I can safely say this in an absolutely un-biased manner:

The two equally most important mistakes people make are not putting the decisions made first (if there are any decisions; I make sure I call them when I play), and not playing with the Medic properly.

The latter involves everything from realising there's no enemies around, we're defending the final point, and only have 20% uber so build it! To storming/jumping into a mass of 4 enemies (with or without ubercharge, and without support ready), thinking you're invulnerable. Bad [pockets] will then chase after someone, probably the enemy Medic or Demoman, trying desperately to 'get the kill', not realising that the other 2 Soldiers and a Scout are following behind us, waiting for the uber to wear off in a couple of secs.

Admittedly, most of the above does indeed come from a lack of experience (and teaching, however informally suggested it is), and most players learn it as they play more.


ymmud I sympathise absolutely with you having a bit of a rant at your team when they don't listen to you calling "Push into yard, they only have two up!!", and just stand around on mid having a wank.

The difficult part is getting them to be quiet, calm down, and listen to you after the game so that it doesn't happen again.

roces9

Points: 1,431, Level: 22

Activity: 8.3%

As another full time (low/mid) Medic, nothing drive me more crazy than "Armchair Medics." Healthy criticism and advice are one thing, but constantly complaining that you're not getting buffed enough, that I *REFUSE* to flash you with Uber, or that "you really shouldn't run Kritz in a competitive game..." make me rage like nothing else.

New players: Please, please, please have some faith in your Medic. Odds are, he knows that he's doing.