keep playing and don't get an ego

good point.


you should make a list of your perceived weaknesses and when you're in-game, focus on them.

start to play meaningful games like online cups?

Don't bang anyone with more problems than yourself.

In your case: stop masturbating.

Don't Bangkok.

Keep playing to the point it becomes irresponsible, get a big ego, and complain when you lose that it's all netcode or hax. Then you will be a true intermediate player!

Ask mouse* for some lessons.

Try to play with better players than yourself. The ideal is better, but not unbeatable. A player who forces you to think and plan in advance, to time items, to set traps, to letting you know when you should retreat.
If possible, always try to do as much damage as you can at powerups.
Have a confidence in your play and have a comfortable setup, both in terms of hardware and *.cfg.

Sometimes, it can be also rewarding to play against lesser players to practice control and spawns. But don't do this too often, becuase you'll develop bad habits.

Learn item timing by heart, so you won't have to calculate during a match, the exact time will just pop up in you mind. First, try to time only one item. If you're getting efficient at it, the next step is two, and so on.

For movement training, Quake III Arena's DeFRaG-mod is excellent, because you are FORCED to learn to move at least properly. And it's very very fun - for me, at least.

Also try duel and TDM pickups, they are more elaborated than common public.
Some FFA might come in handy, because you can practice item control and aim too with a more "relaxed" attitude.

Last, but not least, like Fatális János (Fatal1ty) once said: practice, practice, practice.

And be a cool and helpful guy, who's not bitching people brainlessly. : )

Is low-intermediate the level where you start thinking about your enemy more?

1) There are usually 2-4 ways out of any room. Think about it when he is not in the same room as you are, but you know (or not) the exact room he is in. His stack and weapons usually directly determine what he is going to do and he probably wont play too many tricks trying to achieve his goals. What I mean is that if he is in desperate need of a LG then he probably will head to the doorway that is going to lead him to LG without thinking too much about you knowing he wants that LG.

One situation that I can think at the moment goes something like this: imagine you are at GL platform on ZTN and you hear him rushin to LG coming from RL side. If you have managed to establish yourself as a solid mid-map player then at low-intermediate and out of control he probably will go to upper YA as he is afraid of the damage he would receive going to middle. This means most of the time you can rjump and catch him there. Now if he was tricky player and could read you well then he would wait for your rjump and then go get the rail and shards and then turn back to lower YA. Something like this.

Basically an introduction to routing and reading. You just have to figure out what is the most appealing to him in any given room. You can think about it like this: on ZTN he is in plazma room -> he has 4 choices (go to lg, ra, 50 or just sit there) and since he wants lg he will go to lg -> at lg he has 4 main choices (go back, stay there, go to RL or go to rail) and we know he is impatient type which means the chances he will go back and wait for another YA or stay at lg are slim so this means he has 2 main options for him. Since you control mid there is higher chance of him going to RL and you can set a trap there. There are obviously a lot more different variables you have to include to your decision making (does he time? is he the type to double back? does he wait before he moves or will he rush around the map? which weapons of the main 3 does he have? etc) but this is reading your opponent in a nutshell.

2) Figure out your defense. Basically how to shoot at opponents who are chasing you or rushing at you.

3) Start making plans how to achieve long term goals. How will you attack that mega when you have gotten your 100 150 stack?

4) Learn the spawn points by heart

Maybe something like this. Not sure if I am over or underestimating the level.

As I began to read the 3rd paragraph ("Basically..."), before you mentioned the most probable options, I thought, that is if it looks clear and I'm out of control, I would go from lg to rail (without shards to avoid unnecessary noise) and back to upper YA via teleporter.
Of course it all depends on the actual situation, but it's fun to think about such things. : )

And no, I too guess this is low-intermediate level.


Another tip: practice your defensive rockets a lot. They can be REALLY disgusting, and can turn many fucked-up situations upside-down.
It's often enough to hit one good rocket and you are back in the game.

Self analysis is always good. Watch your own demos, learn from your mistakes.

You can make this learning process easier by playing one map per session (i.e. dm13 tuesdays, ztn wednesdays.) and then throughout the games try and use what actions were good and eliminate what actions were bad (to paraphrase twister).

To record demos enable cg_autoaction 1 (and even cl_demoRecordMessage 2 (small rec icon) if you find the message too obtrusive).

When I watched my demos I would often pause them and write stuff down in a notepad I have (still have it). It could be big or small, anything from not focusing enough on a specific powerup (mh or ra) to being too aggressive, or too passive. I remember I used to trade damage to my opponents for the death of myself, often. That stopped pretty quickly. I even had specific places where cooller would spam grenades on ztn at YA written down.

I would look through it every other day or so, to constantly remind myself of what I needed to improve on. I found that helped a lot.

I really like threads like this and advices from better players, but what to do when nothing of that helps?

Specifically, when you can't hit shit? When every player out there outaims you? When you need 200/200 stack for every frag, when you manage to take control of map, time like a boss, take everything and then opponent with 100/50 just shafts your ass to oblivion?

*googles QL aimbot* Not really, but I'm really pissed at my aim lately.

Play some 1v1 or 2v2 ca and concentrate on one thing at a time, eg. lg v lg dodging (it's better than warmup now because you have 100/200 so there is more time to correct yourself). Maybe watch some of your demos and think what you could have done better in terms of dodging and prediction.
Also being destroyed in duel by player out of control is usually due to being surprised.
Keep in mind that someone who has better aim will gain even more in technically challenging encounters (strange vertical angles etc.) so play safe and try to take more straightforward fights.
Also using items as a bait often works against opponents over confident of their aim.

Take a weeks break and stop using weapons which you already can hit with.

I would of said play more aim based gametypes (CA for example) but also warm up more before a duel, spend a few minutes before each game simply practising your aim.. Also If you find your opponent beating you in the warm up, think about a strategy (how your going to play your opponent) before you ready up.

Also, try and look at why you're missing shots, did you move your mouse too far? did you miss time the shot? do you like your mouse + mat setup? Change things and look again. Sometimes it can be as simply as changing your crosshair or enabling drawgun.

Yeah, it seems I will have to practice aim in CA which is boring as fuck.

Nothing wrong with mouse or pad, it's just that am shitty aimer and haven't played in a while. I was never good aimer and always needed shitload of practice to keep aim at barely decent level.

It's just frustrating knowing what I have to do and even succeeding at that (taking control of map) and then shooting 100 of LG ammo into nearest wall.

try lowering your sens for LG only

You really need to look at your demos to look at why you are missing shots..

RL) Are you predicting movements or shooting at where they are? Shooting at feet? Hitting more with cg_drawgun 1?
LG) Is it not registering when it should? are you simply not tracking well enough? Does changing cg_truelightning feel better/worse?
RG) Are you waiting for your enemy to move infront of your crosshair or flicking your mouse? I've always found strafe aiming to improve my hit percentage. (strafe aiming is keeping your mouse relatively still but strafe your crosshair over your enemy).

Do you have one weapon where your aims better than the rest? Practise the shit out of it so you always have a strong point in your game should you need it.

Also try different crosshairs for each weapon.

too bad CA isn't really aim based either :/

play moar CA to improve aim without worring about timing etc

Raw aim is overvalued, you need to memorize situations and realise that most of the time different players doing same things over and over again. So you could just muscle memory where you need to shoot at. Just look at Cypher, he doesn't raw aiming, he *knows* where to shoot from his experience. You can practice it even watching streams, pay more attention.

Advice? Take what you're good at now and deconstruct it. Now refine it. Do this forever.

1.) Don't change your conifg every week, find something that works and stick to it.

2.) Get a 120Hz monitor, regardless of what people say - it makes a big difference.

I actually aim better on 75 Hz due to an unidentified reason. : S

Its called placebo effect, 75hz is actually 60hz with 1 frame being repeated every 4th frame.

Placebo or not, I definitely feel the difference. It's much better for me at 75 Hz - even the movement too.

Get a partner to play with regularly, preferably the same set of maps. Don't focus on your aim or the result but rather on your ability to read his game. Exchanging your demos is also helpful.

Wouldn't it be counter-productive in the long-run to have the same duel partner? What I mean is, unless said partner is really versatile and changes his playstyle from day to day and tries out all kinds of traps on all maps, you won't really be very versatile yourself in the end, and get caught out easy.

Of course not play only versus him :)
The idea is that learning to read a game goes best if you keep variables as constant as possible. But you should of course keep playing other opponents too, to try out the things you've learned while playing your partner.

1) Don't be a cunt.
2) Don't treat the game too seriously.
3) Don't fuck sheep or any other animals, for that matter. Even ones with stockings and makeup.
4) Don't cheat.
5) Don't fuck around with your settings, pick something you feel comfortable with and leave it at that.
6) Don't forget about my sage advice when you become God of War Alvarez or some shit.
7) Don't eat yellow snow
8) Don't cross the street until the little man turns green.
9) Dress warm when it's cold.
10) Never, ever, go into a game thinking you're gonna win it and it's going to be easy.

THIS MAN SPEAKS THE TRUTH

The 1% does not accurately represent my lulz :D

"6) Don't forget about my sage advice when you become God of War Alvarez or some shit."

: DD

watch demos of cypher and rapha

You might grab some tricks that way but I doubt that you will learn much. If you don't understand why rapha is doing what he does you wont be able to integrate it into your own game.

That's why you should watch it with the almighty 2GD's shoutcast.

And there are also a few games, which are commentated by Rapha himself - and they are awesome too - not as funny though : D.

If it would be that easy we would have hundreds of raphas :)
Personally I would rather start with twisters duel analysis and try to get on his level, which is hard enough.

I just mentioned two good options with a great insight of the metagame.