A fantastic read

I found this on another game's forum in response to someone's rant about the game. Some of you may have already read it, I just came across and read it for the first time and really enjoyed it. Do not be alarmed the article is only 1/4 of the scroll length and the rest is comments. This is a must read for everyone who plays games like MNC

http://www.sirlin.net/articles/playing- ... art-1.html

Good read.. I don't think it will reach many people here. Even if people do see it I wonder if it will do any good.


I just watched gunked's rant, and I understood the message but I think he could have explained it better. If there was more players who felt the way we felt when we first started playing, it would be worth the time to "coach" players into learning how to adapt and think on the fly.

There was no better way to explain the assault than the quarterback example you use. I really don't see that now a days.. and I feel like the assault is played as well.. more of a safety or wide receiver for lack of better comparisons. Instead of creating the openings, they're passively waiting and or only strike at an opportunity that seems to benefit them as an individual. The best I could explain it was it was as if they're playing with tunnel vision.

In the end, playing to win ends up accomplishing much more than just winning. Playing to win is how one improves. Continuous self-improvement is what all of this is really about, anyway. I submit that ultimate goal of the "playing to win" mindset is ironically not just to win...but to improve. So practice, improve, play with discipline, and Play to Win.


I feel like this sums up what the vets have been trying to get across to the new PM players. Play against better competition, see what flaws you have in your game, improve them. I was dropped into privates playing aginst Kckzi, Shammas, Chron, Sigmar, and Zatchmo on sniper, this is how I was able to adapt and become the player I am today.

MNC is one of those games where a master of their class can change the entire landscape of a match. Why not strive to be one of those players? If you're already putting hours of playing time in a game why not try to be the best?

He has a bunch of great points about the SF series. I played that in arcades back in the day and it pretty much paid my way through high school. I played to win, because there was money on the line. When you played for money, you played Ken v Ryu (unless it was SF2T then top tier played Sagat as well, but it was usually Ryu v Ken\Ryu at the time since it was what people knew). Picking anyone else meant you didn't respect your opponent enough to play a real character or you just wanted to hand over your money.

Do I play with the same ferocity in MNC? Anyone who knows me knows the answer. Meh, I guess I'm a scrub now. I do the best that I can personally, and I honestly think that when it comes to making mid game adjustments, call outs, and giving the right kind of motivation to the right people, I am amongst the best. I just suck at execution myself :?

there's a lot more too it though too knives.

this game at top level boils down to a lot of chemistry and teamwork. Individuals need to be skilled but realize they need to use their skill to benefit the rest of the team. It seems really obvious, but for those who do understand it, they are able see it visually. That means it's obvious to see who does and doesn't share the mentality in game.

Hell even I've been playing passively lately because I feel like the openings I try to create aren't being taken advantage of by my teammates. It all boils down to experience, awareness, and the mentality you have when playing.

I'm constantly telling people to push up when the gunner takes map control. I'm constantly telling the assault to pressure the sniper/support to create room for a push. When I do create an opening on the assault, I'm constantly telling people what they should do. There's a point where you need to be aware of the players who die and make decisions based on the overall field. The reason why Droppin Knowledge ended up being a better team than what people expected is because we had good chemistry and our teamwork made up for lack of individual skill.

I think players need to start thinking about the bigger picture of the game rather than focusing only on whats in front of them. You should be weighing options and variables based on the positioning of your team as well as the enemy team. A tank who is under their bridge in the lane is an easy kill but it's not worth the focus if you know the gunner/support could be taking the jump pad to landing. You have to start playing more methodically trying to outsmart the other teams in terms of containment and harassment. You have to realize there are players who have been playing for long periods of time who have just about seen it all. If you stick to your usual moves and play style, you're going to be read like a book.

I just don't think the drive is there right now. I don't feel like anybody wants to actually be the best. You don't have to be cocky to want to be the best, or feel like you can be the best. When I first started playing I used to look for Xeno in lobbies because he was one of the best assaults in pubs and constantly dominated. Since he was very K/D oriented, it made finishing the kill hard, and he wouldn't give you much of an opportunity to get close. It pushed me to find new ways to counter his playstyle. I knew I could be better than him because this game gives you the tools to do so.

There's no complicated spawn system.. there's no weapon timing or extreme button glitches. There's really not any extreme depth to the game that requires a lot of knowledge to manipulate. All that's required is that you be a selfless, aware player who can adapt and change their style to keep the team guessing. Infact the individual is limited in this game at a top level, unlike other arena shooters. There's still a big visual skill gap, but despite how good you are, you're only as good as the weakest link.

I like this post, a lot. But the only thing that saddens me is that you can't save them(the scrubs) all. You will have the really good players who refuse to acknowledge their faults and choose to either blame the game or simply dodge other competent players (*cough*Korchanth*cough*). Those same players go on to provide a bad example for the newbies to follow and then we have a lot more scrubs. Soul Calibur is a good example of this.

Deleted my post because I misunderstood the previous. I agree with it now that I reread it lol

I also disagree with the notion of randomtoon thinking he is a scrub after reading the article. Toon may not be an elite player, but there are so many players worse, including a pretty fair amount in PMs. Toon also doesn't make excuses and does what he can within his power to improve. Fact is there is a such thing in video games just like anything with a competitive nature called "natural skill".

In anything in life some people just have a more natural understanding and execution on various challenges, jobs, sports, and games. While someone with low natural skill works extremely hard may surpass someone with a higher natural skill that doesn't work at all, if the player with a high natural skill practices and plays to learn and fine tune his skills just as hard, players with a low or just lower natural skill will never be able to be as good. Genres also apply differently. As listed in the example earlier toon seemed to be pretty good at arcade fighters. I know for a fact I'm bad at fighters. Not much natural skill and such a low interest and desire to improve, I accept it and move on. I could lose to toon 100 times in a row in street fighter and each time I would accept he is just flat out better.

A good example of understanding and feel for the game is jerry rice. In his prime rice was 6'2" 200lbs with 4.7 40yd speed. Above par physical attributes, but nothing outstanding and there have been hundreds of draft picks since jerry rice with a better physical skill set than him. Jerry rice however is most often referred to as the greatest NFL player of all time, only argued with Jim Brown and Lawrence Taylor, two athletes who's physical skill sets were absolutely freakish. How did rice do it? Well for one he played with two hall of game quarterbacks, but so have hundreds of other receivers. Two, his understanding and natural feel for the game: his route running and what to do with the ball (YAC or yards after catch) were amazing.

In a thin community like MNC however, even mediocre talent can reach a high level of performance, so many just refuse to acknowledge it and are afraid of competition and would rather exile the better players, avoid them, and make excuses. Those players are in fact, scrubs

Great article, Good find chron. I am a scrub fact

Teapot, DK was a good team because GP underestimated Deadpool and Hawkshade's bot control.

Reserved for when I have to poop and remember to read this.

--Not a real viewpoint, used for example----
The thing that I do find kind of funny is that if we translate the article to MNC it is pretty much saying "you should just juice chain as assault" and would probably not like all these artificial rules we have made for ourselves - no juice machine, one of each class, only starter turrets, etc.

By its suggestion, RustCLAN and his like are the good players and we are not because we don't use the obvious and effective tactic. Sure we can counter it and know it can be countered, but because it is not our go to strat even when we are able to abuse it freely, we are the scrubs.
-----Example Over-------------

I know that I am twisting the intent of the article, but I know some people use this argument to justify their play. The Akuma argument is dead on, SO many people complained when everyone said "no Akuma" because it was only way they could win (but would promptly lose if Akuma was the opponent, which would leave Akuma selected, which meant no one would play you except another Akuma...which perpetuated the problem). These Akuma players would also not tell anyone how to pick Akuma so as to protect their advantage.

Although it was about winning, it wasn't just win at any cost, there was SO MUCH ettiquite in the arcades back then, like the "let me see which buttons stick" test where you didn't attack each other but launched a couple of moves to get a feel for how much play each button and controller had. You might know that M kick sticks from time to time and you would tell them that so they could get a feel for it; because you respected the game, and your opponent. The kids who knew it was fucked up and didn't say anything were douche bags, because it was not about skill at that point it was about abusing a physical condition that you are not affected by.

I devolped the gaming mentality that I have because there was no internet. There were precious few online games when there was. You played in person. If you were too much of a ****, if you talked a little too much trash, if you dominated the game a little too much...well, you were standing next to the person you were offending and all their friends. At best they walk away and you can't keep taking their money. At worst they outnumber you and now know you have been taking peoples money...their money. Completely crushing someone in a way that makes them want to keep playing (or at least allows them to save face) is an artform that will serve you well in and out of the arcade. It is easy to be a **** when you are behind different screens half a continent away.

For the record, I was REALLY good at the Capcom and Midway fighters (I was OK at NBA Jam but only played it non-serious for fun). I played in tourneys back in the day, winning several and recently I played the hell out of MvC3, and was planning on hitting tournaments for it but I played so much I actually injured my hand. I clocked about 60-70 hours a week, while keeping a full time job. While at work, I would watch videos of play on my second screen and think up new combos. But, it is hard to type when you can't move your fingers so I decided it was just not worth it.

Your example toon is misguided though. Juice off and other house rules were set in place to force players in breaking bad habits that inhibited the game. Low skilled players would just camp for juice and hinder their teams performance, or more skilled players would juice chain for stats but not win the game or use it for proper pushing.

1. If there was a thicker more competitively skilled crowd default rules would work fine and players like RustCLAN would be the weak link of the team because while he is good with juice, the other 11 players in the room are good with and without it.

2. Saying default rules are better off competitively would be like saying standard matchmaking halo with assault rifles and radar, and call of duty team death match are the competitive standard and bench mark of true skill. Neither are the case and tweaks and balances have been put into shooters by the community for well over a decade to create a more competitive environment.

As much as people used to frown on the ways the "elite" players acted, the rules put in place such as juice buying off, bot buying off, home turrets only, and a more aggressive/vocal/strict criticism created the best competitive era of this game by FAR. What remains now compared to how it was then, and this current ubies thread is a joke by comparison

Edit: this previous statement isn't suggesting every new person is absolutely terrible and has no chance of ever becoming a solid player, its suggesting in the current PM environment it's incredibly unlikely. We turned so many pubbers and friends of friends into solid regulars from are bloodthirsty winning desires back then lol the game was simply more fun when it was competitive and not so soft. When a player doing poorly was told to step it the fvck up and what exactly to do. Now they get a pat on the back and a thumbs up no matter what lol

To add on to this, I think the main reason we made juice buying off was that Gunked was just bad and only did well with juice. Myself and many other players got annoyed that bad people could win the game with juice so we took it off. He was either the main reason we took it off or it was the final straw.

Look at Gunked now. He is sooo much better than he was before because he doesn't rely on juice anymore. To me he's a prime example of someone who got better because of the juice rules and now has to rely on teamwork and good decision making, instead of saving up for 500 and charging into the enemies base.

Normally a player wouldn't be able to turn the switch just because of juice but with an inconsistent lobby one class mismatch could make it possibly for anyone to juice chain no matter how good an opponent might be. I remember specifically (this game used to be on his youtube, might still be) he started 24-0 on steel peel but he made zero push progress because he would only juice the middle when the gunner and everyone came out so that he could get more kills. We pushed him back once without juice and it was over, he ended like 24-5 because there was zero skill set on what to do without juice or how to counter a push

I know it was misguided, that is what I explained in the next line after it;

"I know that I am twisting the intent of the article, but I know some people use this argument to justify their play."

Because people who are bad will use that excuse to convince themselves that they are actually good, and say that anyone who plays the way we play PM's is wrong. And they are wrong.

I suck at making my point sometimes. Thanks for letting me know to clarify

Right jon, it had nothing to do with chemistry.

Personally, although juice is a built in mechanic in the game open for everyone to use, I think it's a mechanic that breaks the flow of the game and becomes a crutch for players to rely on.

If there was a way to remove juice completely, you'd see some of the most competitive and team oriented games. I personally think it's the way the game is supposed to be played from a competitive standpoint. When you think about it, juice is random. Boxes drop randomly from waves of bots, different classes acquire juice easier than others, and the fact that you can punch waves of bots is a joke.

If juice was gone, you'd see teams play more methodically and organized.

Chemistry is for online dating. If you want to win, kill the robots.

GP had Sigmar, and therefore no chemistry, and they beat your eHarmony team.

I think the game still needs juice, but it needs to not be 4x damage and damage resist. If it gave you like 1.5x damage output and damage resist and then a small speed boost it could be more fair. It can be really difficult to break a turtle setup, especially with turrets. The key to any good competitive shooter is rewarding aggressive play. Juice really buffs the use of certain classes and does help the game a bit.

I think juicing should summon Chickey Cantor whom grabs your hand and teleports you into the enemy spawn room, bypassing all this awkward 'shoot your gun at the corner of a door' stuff.

I think this is my fault for expecting you to know what chemistry means in a team game. chemistry =/= teamwork