Competitive Gameplay Analysis Thread I thought it'd be cool to have a thread dedicated to posting gameplay footage and getting feedback and advice on it. Whilst this is in MLG discussion, that doesn't mean you can only post MLG footage and the decision is more based around it being of a competitive nature and (hopefully) having more discussion than actual videos in here making Reach Media a less suitable place to post it. Hopefully the users that frequent this forum will be up for having some specific gameplay discussion and feedback. Guidelines for submitting gameplay Before you post a gameplay you should be aware of the purpose of this thread, and therefore be ready and willing to accept criticism. The film should either be rendered with Bungie Pro or captured and uploaded to Youtube/another video hosting site. People are unlikely to download and watch a film in game just to give feedback, plus it makes discussion between those giving feedback harder when there isn't an easily accessible reference point. If you are unable to capture or render the video yourself, you may want to consider asking someone else to do so for you. You may do so in this thread if you wish, though you may only post once and spammed requests will be reported. However, you may find better luck requesting via PM from someone who has offered up their services. I have a capture card and am willing to capture/upload footage, anyone else who would be willing to do the same please let me know and I'll add you to this post. Gameplay should be in a competitive setting (playlists such as Invasion/BTB/Infection etc. are advised against, and prime candidates will be things like Arena and MLG playlists). The purpose of this thread is to provide feedback and help you improve your gameplay, so submitting a game where you destroyed players who were significantly worse than you is not very helpful. You should look to submit games where you either had a close win/loss or found yourself against players better than yourself, basically games showing your perceived weaknesses are generally what you should be looking for. That is not to say, however, that you can't post a game where you did well. If you feel the players you beat were good and that there may well be advice that can be given on what you did right and should continue to focus on, as well as areas where you could improve further, then feel free to post that game. The things you should be most keen to avoid are Steaktaculars against randoms in Team Slayer and the like. Giving a short comment with your video detailing what you thought you did well, what you felt you had trouble with, and your overall impressions of the game is very helpful. Guidelines for those giving feedback The purpose of this thread is helpful criticism, therefore comments like 'you suck' are not wanted and will again be reported. Whilst praising someone's gameplay is not a bad thing, on it's own it is pretty much just as unhelpful as the above, and so please try to follow compliments with detailed reasoning as to why you think the gameplay was good, and if possible what could be done to improve in future. Try to be as detailed and objective as possible. If you criticise an action or decision, go in to detail as to why you disagree with it. If you point out something the player did right, again try to explain why in as much detail as possible. Examples and direct suggestions of what they should have done are useful as well. Suggesting specific ways to improve is a great idea, things like suggested strats, weaknesses to practice and possibly even what gametypes/playlists the player should focus on to improve on their weaknesses are all good directions for critical feedback. Above all, remember to be courteous. You can give helpful criticism without being rude or tearing someone apart. [br][/br]Edited by merge: I'll get the ball rolling with this Doubles Arena gameplay on Asylum: YouTube - Pegasi - Doubles Arena - Asylum This was with my friend and was our first game of the day. We realised straight away that we should have warmed up before going in to Arena and we got stomped on at the start. We had trouble pushing forward and being aggressive, as well as being out-coordinated by our opponents. He'd been staying at mine for the the past two days and we'd been destroying on split screen all weekend, this was our first game with him back in London and so we had to adjust back to not having each other's screens right in front of us. In terms of what I was happy with, my sniping started to heat up later in the game and we both started to coordinate a little better, though clearly not enough. Any feedback on this would be appreciated as it's specifically a map I want to try and improve on in a competitive setting.
Alright, just some opinions on what I've seen. First off, you and your teammate lacked a unity that is required in any type of competitive match, whether it be for fun or in a tournament. (As I am sure you know) but that is what seemed to kill you guys. The team pulled the lead early off because your teammate rushed into their spawn while you were back at your sniper and rocks, and had no way in covering him while he pushed. This made it easy for the team to sit in their spawn and snipe and pick him off 2v1, while your line of site only covered into their snipe. I personally think you should of moved with snipe up to your carbine, or their snipe street. Although this puts you up a little closer to the enemy which can cause some risk when you have the snipes, but when it is only 2 people you MUST be able to hold the other team down, which is usually achieved by setting up (on Asylum) with one player in their spawn and the other in their snipe street/carbine. This is of course depending on the situation. When you have set up, you are united and won't be having him getting double teamed every time. It was really the lack of unity and not setting up that crushed you guys. Also; when the team was playing aggressive and you guys were on the defense, that was the best time to try pushing them back together and taking their sniper when it spawned; simply because you would have their sniper, and once you ran back to your spawn, it would make it harder for the opposing members to cover their teammates.
Aaaaah, I like this thread. I should post a 1v1 on sequence where I'm getting destroyed by shad0w. That would be a fun one to have people critisize.
Lol, I would love to watch and criticize! I am thinking about posting some of my gameplay, but I'll need someone to render/record it for me.. I would like to see your opinions, can anyone render/record for me?
Thanks for the response . Yeah, it was our first game of the day and we realised we shouldn't have gone straight in to dubs are we're rarely coordinated off the bat. As for his playstyle, he admitted that he was off that game both shot and strategy wise, he didn't stick to our established strat off start and instead rushed like you said. However, I take your point about what I should have done to counter act that, since my main weakness in terms of playing with the couple of established partners I have is that our strats are generally coordinated by me. When it comes to me having to work around the actions of my partners, as opposed to the other way round. I often fall down as you saw, reverting back to my own desired approach and expecting them to follow suit. This is obviously a recipe for disaster and really something I need to work on, but if I'm blunt it often stems from a lack of faith, and tbh I really need to play with more people better than me on a regular basis to get better at trusting my team mates and working around them. Solid support was my main thing in H3 and that's really dropped off in Reach, partly because the people I played with regularly who were better than me and I felt comfortable taking the support role in have pretty much given up on Reach. My one question regarding your suggestions is the thing about having a guy in their spawns and a guy on car/snipe street: I'm always dubious about such a front heavy strat since (unless I'm mistaken) it leaves them open to spawn behind us at our bonfire, sometimes even our rocks unless I'm just imagining things. It's why I tend to run with an anchor strat which holds our base, snipe and sometimes car, with the front guy (generally my partner who you saw there since I'm a filthy snipe ***** ) working a top mid role, pushing on to their street and car when appropriate. I could do with a some more advice on how to run this more aggressive strat tbh, I've seen better players than myself make it work in dubs in particular, but every time I/we try it just seems to fall apart and we lose sniper and get decked in our base until we manage to push out again, if that even happens. Thanks again for the feedback, I'd all but given up on this thread. And RK, you totally should, though nothing will beat my 20 to -2 score (yes, that's no kills and 2 suicides...) vs. Shad0w on his and chrs's map for the 1v1 (can't even remember the name now, the low ceilinged one with the hole at bottom mid). By the end even he was saying it just wasn't fun anymore, it just made him feel bad. Thankfully I'm much better at Reach than I was at H3 XD.
I think that was penance. He wants to play me on that too... I'd be a bit too embarressed to post that one though. He beats me on Sequence as it is, and I would call it my best map. But wow, aha, 20 to -2. I think I can beat it.
Nah, I was OK at Penance, it was the map where I made rusty stress cause he just couldn't out-BR me, a rare and good feeling when playing against him. It was the one with the circular middle room with the death hole in the middle, maybe it wasn't Shad0w's map but I thought it was. EDIT: This map: YouTube- ND Jampy.mp4
Pegasi, put your video at about 7:30 and then watch the radar. As you run over to your snipe spawn, you can see the blip on your radar of the guy who beat you down twice, and if you turn the volume up just a bit you can hear him switch weapons twice and walk forward for a good three seconds before you die. The moral of this story is spacial awareness. I know you have some nice headphones that should have alerted you to him and given you time to turn around and show him whats for, had you been paying attention. I would just work on keeping half of an eye down on that radar most of the time, because it saves you from unnecessary deaths quite often. You play very similarly to how I do. You probably have a slightly better shot right now since I recently took a pretty long break from Reach, but there are definitely some things that we do the same. The way you moved around, the places you looked at, etc were all almost exactly what I anticipated myself doing, which was unbelievably freaky hahaha. In response to your comment about a lack of faith; is it a lack of faith that your teammate can pull the lead role, or a lack of faith in his abilities overall? For example, would you have little to no faith in your teammate playing the support role and backing you up to keep you alive?
Honestly, I saw that dot on my tracker the first time I watched the video and was gutted. I was so rage when he backsmacked me and couldn't work out how he got there. Keeping an eye on my tracker and being aware of enemies is actually one of my strongest points overall imo, that was a serious slip up and I was kicking myself for it since it enabled him to get a good position with a Sniper. And yeah, I wasn't wearing my Astros for that game, stupidly... It would have saved me, you're right, and I still look back on that death and rage just a little every time I watch this video lol. They're such an advantage and I don't play competitively without them now. Good to know . Honestly it's somewhat of a lack of faith overall, for example I'll trust myself to cover him more than I would trust him to cover me, which is obviously bad. And sometimes he'll completely surprise my by saving my ass, but at others I watch him (sometimes even his screen since we play split a lot) and think 'I would have been able to do that' with regards to him not making a kill/not stopping a cap. In retrospect I do get that, even if I'm right, that lack of faith is more damaging than any missed kill/stop, it's just hard to keep that attitude in the heat of the game. But specifically that more often takes the form of a lack of faith in the lead role, tbh I play Halo more than him and am definitely more competitive in nature, he isn't in to MLG really for example. So in the end I often have more to say in terms of strats etc., which isn't to say he has nothing to contribute at all (often we get in to pretty heated discussions about it lol), but I often take the lead in terms of coordination and I don't think that's totally down to me pushing him in to it, but more just how the dynamic works out from both ends.
Alright, so I got a game against Shad0w on Luca, NeXn's new map. It was an intense game, that barely ended with a tie. CnC Plox. [bungievid]15239754[/bungievid] Er... How do I embed this damn thing? Ion: I got it.
@ RK: I don't know the map unfortunately so I can't give too much, if any worthwhile feedback on map control and positioning in the more developed sense, but in terms of a few general comments: - Interesting choice in using the Pistol, you seem to have the hang of it quite nicely when you picked it up. However, when you use the DMR you seem to pace very heavily. This isn't necessarily a bad thing and pacing discipline is great, but at moments like when you're DMR'ing Shad0w at 1:40, and especially the closer range DMR'ing when you catch him near the tele at 2:05 you can definitely afford to spam a little more and still hit your shots. - Any reason you didn't pick up the Camo at 1:40 as well? Shad0w jumped down so you could have picked it barely even losing a second in your pursuit. Perhaps it wouldn't have been as useful as it could have otherwise been in a pursuit where you'll likely need to shoot, but better grab it then than risk him getting it when he comes back, which he then did when you came back through the tele and nailed you with the GL. - You have good situational awareness and that was made clear in that spree you got to make it 7-5. You caught him off guard and used the GL well to get a meaningful first shots rather than just getting one shot up with the DMR etc. - You could probably afford to be a little more aggressive with Camo. Crouching yields no real benefit (unless you're using an outdated gametype, idk) other than slimming your profile a bit and making the movement of the shimmer effect a little less noticeable. However, moving faster makes lining up a shot on that shimmer harder, and a valuable first shot or two can be gained and used to enable solid pacing and a closer to guaranteed kill. - Not really CnC, but damn Shad0w whores the GL lol. And fair enough tbh, he uses it really well. I'm not sure I would have been able to combat it as well as you did, your movement worked well in countering it generally, especially at closer range, and you timed your rushes pretty well in those same circumstances. In general it was a solid gameplay. You have a cool head which is key in 1v1, if you could work in a little more aggression, particularly replicating the speed with which you react on the defensive when it comes to offensive play then you could definitely turn that draw in to a solid win. Exploiting the times you catch him off guard, especially exiting teles etc. was a good deal of your score, and rightly so since you did it well, but a little more focused yet level headed aggression in a couple of head on encounters could have brought the win. I am, however, if anything too aggressive, so you may want to take that advice with a pinch of salt .
Shad0w didn't do that because hes good with the weapon, he did it out of necessity. I cannot play a game with Kuroda if there is a GL because he doesn't effing miss with that; I'm dead sure that if shad0w hadn't sat down with it the entire game Rorak would have won by at least 10 kills lol.
;D I definitely see your point about aggression, peg. The main thing I wanted to avoid was any DMR confrontation, because I would lose pretty easily that way. Plus, our headsets made map control difficult. The thing I loved about that game, was all the close calls. NeXn maps tend to yeild exciting results, even for players who know the map. I'd love to play you on it sometime, or any other map for that matter.
Yeah I see what you mean about headsets, I could gather a lot just from the sound on that video even through my speakers. And I'd love to get a game on it sometime, I'll be around most of tonight if you're free tbh.