WIP Competitive Team

After our last match, the comms heated up too much and prevented us from having a rational discussion about what went well/poorly about the match and how we could improve. Here's my unofficial analysis. Feel free to add in the comments.

What went well: this was our second time playing a 5cp map together (first with only GR members, I believe), and we stayed ahead most of the match and lost 5-4. It was a close game, the other team played well, and we earned most of our points.

The comms were great in the beginning. I heard lots of encouragement and useful information, and people all payed attention to snow in the pregame. Everyone on the team had a few highlight moments.

Besides the comms which I will address in a second, what didn't go well was our pushing from last. Whenever we fell back to our last, we were unable to push second. Because the flank routes are limited, our playmakers could do very little to break the stalemate, and we ended up building uber, popping it, and trying to push into 2nd with it, which inevitably failed because our uber would run out first and they were set up to defend against it. We could improve that a few ways. First, we can have a spy or soldier/scout hide out near mid when we're about to lose second. He can then come from behind and force the medic to pop early when we're about to push with our uber. This will either force them to push unexpectedly with their shortened uber (after which we will wipe and move on past 2nd) or let their uber run out as we push in to 2nd and take it. Another thing we can do is bait them to push onto our last since they were not very strong in the uber vs uber midfight. We could then get player advantage from a good hold and counter push to second.

I don't think individual mistakes played a significant role in our loss.

I'd like to take a moment to talk about constructive criticism. It's true that we all need to hear what was done poorly and how it could be done differently in order to improve. I think there's a healthy amount of that already circulating from some of us. However, there is a very clear line between constructive criticism and complaining, ranting, insulting, and trying to boost individual egos. Constructive criticism leaves the comms positive and the team motivated and having fun. The rest leave a very negative atmosphere and little if anything is specified that can be improved in.

Verde, there is a reason no one wants to listen to you. Very rarely do you give "feedback" that is actually actionable and is focused on improving. I've noticed only a few things you've said that the team can take action on, and they would only be aware of that if they persevered through the 99% of the rest of it that was bashing everyone whose name doesn't rhyme with "ring birdy". Example: when Shaz took a while to switch to kritz, you could have said "you should have a bind to switch to kritz so it doesn't take you so long and you can keep building". Very easy, no one is insulted, and everyone learns something. Instead, you said "...you are a terrible medic...if you'd even played a lobby...if you knew anything about what you are doing...you guys won't want to hear this...you should have a button." See the difference?

We welcome constructive criticism. We disapprove of raging under the guise of "feedback" because it only harms the team. I think we've all observed how quickly our comms can turn negative because of this.

We're here to have fun. We started out having fun last match. Let's keep the comms positive, control ourselves until we have something positive and helpful to say, and finish out the season having a good time.