Please may I have a little advice - awareness

Competitive Discussion
1

Hi there.

I am just checking in to see if I can grab a little advice. For too long now I have been an absolutely awful player, at around the bronze/silver entry point. In the past, I have tried to seek support through VODs, however I have never had success with those, as I have always been provided with advice that is too specific to a certain game (where the advice would only apply to that exact position on that exact team composition on that specific map). For instance, someone may say “you should have been standing there instead”, which is good advice for that specific time but can’t exactly be applied to most scenarios unless the exact same game was repeated.

It is for that reason I want to work on one thing at a time. I have just hit gold for support which is nice, but the main thing I seem to struggle with is spatial awareness. As DPS, I really want to start working on target priority, but one of the issues I struggle with is actually knowing where a specific hero is, and how they can be recognised.

Of course, if someone were to show me a hero, I can instantly tell them who they are, but in-game, when people are moving around, if someone says for instance “Ana low, Ana low!” I end up looking around in all directions for 2-3 seconds trying to find them, because they are camouflaged so well into the map environment with all the colours that I struggle to pick them out of the scene.

The same can be applied if playing support. Someone might be calling our for healing, but if the little [+] didn’t exist above their head then going by voice alone it would be impossible to even know where they are.

I feel that these slow reaction times in picking out heroes in a game is contributing to my lack of skill. I was diagnosed with dyspraxia a while back so I don’t know of that has anything to do with it, but ultimately I want to try and at least perform a little better. It is embarrassing when someone says “there’s a Reaper behind us” as I spend up to 5 or 6 seconds looking for them, by which time it’s too late.

Something else I’ve noticed is that I seem to perform better on some maps than others. For instance, King’s Row is easier for me, as it is mostly dark grey in parts, which means heroes are easily picked out by their red outlines, whereas the majority of other maps in game are reds/oranges/light browns/mixes which camouflages the heroes so well it’s hard to even see them.

Maybe my screen resolution has something to do with it also? (Game at 7680x4320, 60Hz but the render scale set to 50%) which makes the game itself 4k. It is a 32" monitor. Do you think reducing this down to 1080p would make it easier or harder?

I really have no idea where to go with this. My awareness is so bad it’s not even funny :joy:

Thank you so much for your help!

Jack

2

I have exactly the same problems as you do and I could climb to diamond by just accepting that it’s a game and there is absolutely nothing to be angry about. The key is to keep your calm. I’m not a coach and I don’t do vod reviews but if you play in na or asia we can play together sometimes and I’ll try to give you some tips.

3

Thank you!

I always pride myself on never ever tilting or getting angry with others in game, but I do take my own performance problems to heart - maybe I’m internally giving up? I am really not sure. I have noticed that by using the group finder my support SR climbed quite quickly (I try to make sure the people I play with are friendly) and this has worked out so well.

I think I really need to work on one thing at a time, as applying multiple pieces advice at once will be a very bad idea for me (I simply won’t be able to cope with that). I understand that I won’t exactly climb fast, but a gradual improvement is better than me trying and failing from the outset!

Edit: Oh something else I forgot to mention is that I am based in the EU but I play on Americas. My prior experience on EU is one of abuse and bullying, which gave me severe anxiety even logging on there. This means that on Americas, my latency is around 135 (east coast) and 180 (west coast). Maybe this has something to do with it also?

Jack :slightly_smiling_face:

4

First of all if you wanna improve just forget about your sr. You are right, you should focus on improving things one at a time and you can probably start with the simplest things like always being aware of where you are at that moment. Are you out in the open? If there is an enemy ult like soldier or dva bomb, is there a cover you can immediately use? Are you wasting too much time doing nothing while trying to flank? etc.

Btw 4k is just too much for this game lol

1 Like
5

I think it can really depend on the map and situation. For instance, I have been playing Lúcio a lot lately, so I tend to spend a lot of time with the team keeping them at as high health as possible. With DPS, again I think it varies with each hero that I play. Due to my latency I actively avoid sniper heroes such as Widowmaker, Hanzo, Genji, Ashe, Ana as well as others.

Of course everything you’ve said is part of survivability, and teamwork, and I understand exactly what you mean there. I am pretty sure there’s a whole variety of skeletons in my proverbial closet when it comes to the mistakes I make, so I am 99.9% sure you are right in that bad positioning and being in the wrong place at the wrong time is aiding my spiral downwards.

On your last point, I just tried setting my game to 1080p (and 1440), but it was so blurry that I even struggled to make some stuff out, so I had to turn it back up again :joy:

Jack

6

Haha there isn’t a rule or anything saying you can’t play at 4k. If your pc handles it then it’s great I guess.

You should just take your own advice and focus on one thing. If you get better at positioning yourself, other stuffs will follow naturally. When you die less, you’ll have more time to notice things in the fight. Oh and you might wanna get used to pressing tab whenever you are not shooting stuffs. That will give you pretty much all the info you need.

7

Ah so focus on positioning first? gotcha :slight_smile:

I’ll have to see what I can do with that, I just thought that not being able to pick out the individual heroes in moving game was more um… ‘tragic’ haha.

Thanks for the help!

8

You are just having difficulty with not being able to keep up with the pace and it’s really normal. I think positioning is the base of the base that’s why I suggested it but like I said, I’m not a pro or a coach so feel free to ignore me lol

9

Noo ofc Im not ignoring you haha! What you have said makes perfect sense to me, and I see where you are coming from :slight_smile:

Jack

10

People often talk about pro stuffs on forums and reddit like they are such easy things maybe that’s why you think you are so bad at it but trust me, none of those people saying things like “know where every character is on the map or track ults” etc can actually do it themselves. So just relax and play at your own pace.

1 Like
11

From what you’ve said, if there’s an hero that you don’t know the in-and-outs for, then you should figure that out.

Basically, at the start of the round, if a hero is not behind a tank shield, then they’re probably doing what THAT hero is best at doing. For example, you mentioned a Reaper, you’re best to assume that the Reaper is always going to try to come from behind or the side every time they advance. If Reaper really wanted to, and was successful at doing so, they could probably do it every thirty seconds or so. Snipers in the sniper spots, you can always expect that they’ll be there. Your dive tank or a dps SHOULD be dealing with it anyway, especially if they’re killing supports. Yadiyadayada.

Good Luck.

I’m not disagreeing with the guy above. I’m just saying it makes it easier to anticipate what someone will be doing on certain maps so you can be prepared for it.

12

It’s very hard for people to give the type of advice you want in the manner in which you want it. It’s much easier for people to point out specific things you could do differently in those very specific circumstances. However the way you learn from it and use it to improve is to thoroughly understand why the advice was “you should have been standing there instead”. Once you understand the reasoning behind the advice you can then take those more general concepts and try to apply them to new situations.

I’ll use mathematics as an analogy.

You can tell someone that 2 + 2 = 4. That’s great. But it’s very specific. What if the student is asked what 2 + 8 equals? You need the student to be able to work out that 1,462 + 5,273 = 6,735. It’s far more useful to teach the person how to add any two numbers together than to just tell them what specific numbers added together equal. I.e. giving answers isn’t as useful as teaching a method.

I haven’t seen your other threads but maybe the people giving advice weren’t giving the ‘why’. In those cases you should just ask why. What was their thinking? What’s their reasoning?

13

Biggest problem lower rank players have when looking at guides and been coached is they try to play like other players there really is only one way to improve and its to study the game yourself.

If you are told to kill zen on tracer for example then some tracers will just go after the zen all game even if the team hardpocket the zen but if you use your brain and think about when is the right time for YOU to go in thats when you go in you need to play around your own mechanical skill do you need to kill a brig that is 50% hp as genji? well you need to think if she has shield bash up and how much shield she has left where her teammates are is it better for you to just shoot at her shield and farm blade is my mechanical skill good enough to finish her off?

No advice you get will be used 100% of the time but if you learn the game yourself and know what you are capable of then you can decide what to do in that moment if you make a mistake you got to be hard on yourself and learn from it got to look for your own mistakes not have other people point them out.

14

Thank you for your help. What you said about knowing why and the logic behind it completely makes sense.

The main thing I wanted to work on initially, however, is the issue with not being able to track players due to them “blending in” to the environment making it hard to recognise them quickly (or at all). That is one thing that yeah frustrates me. That is one thing that I really feel bad about.

I completely understand what you mean about learning the game myself, so I apologise if asking here was the wrong thing to do. I didn’t want to come across like I was asking for easy wins, so I apologise if that is how it felt.

I am already very hard on myself if I know I have done some something wrong (and/or if others point it out). When I make a mistake it is usually a downward spiral. I panic, then eventually make even more mistakes where I end up taking a break from competitive for a while, I play again and the cycle continues.

It is difficult for me to look back at my own play. I know that I am too slow. I know that I pick the wrong heroes 99% of the time. I know that I don’t react far enough and I know that the majority of the time I try to play heroes I am not sure of because others demand it. I have tried looking at my own play in the past but I don’t understand why I am doing things wrong. All so see is a lot of dying a lot of the time because of being focused on, and I completely get that.

I would like to kindly point out that I am not the kind of player who assumes I am better than where I should be. I know I am bad, and I am ashamed of it, especially when people say things like “you have to be throwing to be in silver because I have to AFK to get there”.

I just want to gradually improve at one thing at a time but from what you have said the forums is probably the wrong place to ask for that advice, so I should just try and learn this myself I guess.

Thank you so much for your time on this. It’s appreciated.

Jack

15

I did not mean it in a bad way ^ was just pointing out that you should not take everything everyone here says to you serious focus on the game yourself and you will see big improvements just review your own gameplay and try to play smart its the best way to climb.

Also confidence is a big part of it if you think you are too slow you will be too slow you need confidence of yourself but not too much to the point that you start making mistakes and feeding just find a middle ground if you think the enemy widow is better than you and try playing safe 24/7 then she will beat you 99% of the time.

Also thinking you are better than where you should be is good to improve too as it builds confidence just dont take it over the top and say you are GM when you are in gold etc ^

16

if you do better on king’s row because of the colors being more easily distinguishable, you should maybe consider playing around with color blind settings. find colors for your enemy and allied outlines that you can easily keep track of and doesn’t camouflage too much into the maps for you-- it can be a bit disorienting at first, since it is so ingrained that Red Equals Shoot and bc things like barriers remain red, but i have found it very helpful even if the feature could use inprovements, and keep my enemy outlines on yellow and friendlies on neon blue

as for locating who needs help, it’s often an issue to attach “help me!” to a hero when you can’t check the top left corner as the person speaks to see the icon. let your team know from the beginning that it will be easier to help them if they refer to themselves as their hero and in the third person. ie. “help i need healing” becomes “your genji needs healing”

plus, one big tip for getting better at anything in the game is to say things out loud. not just callouts, but things your team doesn’t need to know (don’t say everything over mic though, this will likely confuse them and distract from crucial information). for example, to improve your positioning, play some games where you say out loud where you are going to and why. to improve awareness, state out loud what cooldowns/ults you see/hear the enemy use or where they ran off to, or even read off what is happening on the killfeed (“their reaper killed our rein. we are down a tank”) or keep track of what is happening/ who is threatening your allies and which of your allies has their ultimate. to improve cooldown management, say why you used your abilities every time you use them. etc. saying things out loud forces you to put more thought into it and consider if it was the right move. it makes you aware of what is happening and keeps you from entering a numb state of playing in which you don’t put thought in and aren’t playing your best or aren’t taking advantage of the information you are given

17

What is your frame rate?
If it’s below 60, it can look choppy (especially if hard FPS drops occur) and sometimes cause you to lose track of people in a team fight… or at least it does to me

and yeah I get what you’re saying about not knowing “where” people are if you can’t see them on your screen … I have the same problem

18

Thank you for the help so far, this is really appreciated.

My frame rate is usually around 80-110 but I have it locked at 60 to prevent screen tearing.

Also, it’s coincidental to mention the outline colours. I changed those a day or two ago and it has made the characters easier to see and “pop out” of the screen. It is still difficult to distinguish what hero is which when there is lots of fast movement but it’s certainly an improvement! I have enemy colours set to bright yellow and friendly colours set to a bright pinky purple. This has really helped me so far I feel!

Jack

19

It’ll be counter productive for your WR, but grind out some Sombra in QP.

Play more passive with your team, not going on crazy flanks. Any time you see someone glowing, don’t necessarily chase them, but make an effort to identify what character it is as fast as possible. Between the wall-hacks and the glow it’ll get you a ton of practice placing outlines to what character it is, very very quickly.

As a bonus you’ll learn every health pack location, spot what the characters you typically use tend to do wrong, and watch the difference between what ‘good timing’ vs feeding looks like repeatedly.

20

It sounds more like awareness problem than a sight one. It’s like the difference between looking and seeing. You probably tunnel vision and that’s why it takes so long to see something you are not actually looking at and that is perfectly normal. I’m willing to bet at least 90% of the playerbase has the same problem.

1 Like