How to hammer down consistency?

[Angry_Ray 114]

Okay... So obviously per my stats below the ravishing Bruce Campbell photo, I am just barely bordering on unicum recent and a simple teal overall. I'm really trying to reach uni recent, as it's been on my goal list for a long time. Lately I've hit a huge bump in the road and progress has started to go in reverse (high point this week was at 62% and 2405). I think my main problem is the consistency of which I do things match to match. I'm really struggling to find that balance between aggressiveness and passiveness. I think another issue with me is being consistent in getting to key locations on the map and making something happen when I actually get there.

 

For example, when I'm playing my E5 I find myself getting too aggressive and not realizing it until I'm almost alone and then get derped. Or when I'm playing my 140 I'll either lead in without support hoping to get pubs to make a play, or play too passively when my team needs me. I value myself a TD-player born again into a medium player. I love flexing, flanking, and being on the move in general, but also love sniping when opportunity presents, both of which present problems when I play city maps.

 

I think some tips from guys that have broken this barrier either naturally or with a fight will help me push over it myself. I wanna become a better player and I really do believe my potential far exceeds 2300 wn8... I just seem to have hit a skill wall these past few days.

[Scout_in_da_house 447]

I've had a similar problem for a while. My problem was that I alt tabbed between games, looking up things on youtube or something else until the countdown is almost @ 5s, then quickly hop into battle and rush to a spot that 'usually works'.

 

Fixed it by simply using that time to analyze the team set-ups. Think where you'd go in their mediums and which directions they'll get supporting fire from. Adjust your initial positioning accordingly and you shouldn't die within the first couple of minutes unless you're taking a couple of reds with you.

[Llux03 5]

Two things i adjusted over the last 2 months making me go from 2000 to 2700-3000 per session:

 

1. what scout said already, adjusting to the enemy composition, not going to the typical "spot that just works" no matter what, for instance not going middle field in ruinberg when u have a clear heavy advantage but a lack of mediums, realizing that theres a high chance of being overwhelmed by their 3 batchats, but helping the heavies pushing the city.

 

2. knowing when to retreat, not trying to hold a flank on your own, falling back to a more advantageous position to stay alive and being in the match to be able to still win. cos if you're dead, u cant.

[Angry_Ray 114]

-snip-

The second I read that I though you might be psychic... I'll definitely have to use that time more wisely.

 

2. knowing when to retreat, not trying to hold a flank on your own, falling back to a more advantageous position to stay alive and being in the match to be able to still win. cos if you're dead, u cant.

I've been getting better at this, but I don't think I have it down yet. My main problem is either leaving to early and not getting in enough shots before bailing letting my allies fail more miserably, or leaving to late and being buttfucked by everything coming around.

[Mr_Yoshitome 0]

I have trouble with the same thing, been stuck around the 2.1k+ WN8 for a while.

 

Couple of things that have been helping me:

 

1 - Recognising own play style and natural tendencies - and picking tank to match.

 

For me, tendency to excessive aggression / desire to get stuck in and brawl = doing much better with fast + heavy armor Russian tanks e.g. IS7

 

2 - When I die, analyse exactly WHY I died, whether micro-fail in terms of bad angling or major-fail in terms of poor positioning / map awareness

 

At the blue / unicum level, I don't think there's a huge difference in player skill in tank management terms, ability on individual aiming and shots.. Bigger difference is in tactical / map awareness, and playing in a constant consistent manner, resisting taking excessive damage to get a kill, resisting temptation to take unnecessary risks etc.

[TrOplcThUnDeR 101]

Eh. I mean consistency has a few factors that you don't control nor can predict. That is why everyone has bad games. Your team can get murdered or you can go to a position where there is almost no chance of their being certain enemy tanks. That being said, in general, you need to predict what the enemy will do and where they will be. Something I have trouble with.

[Teslarod 558]

This seems to fit in here and i don't want to create a new topic so I'll just ask here if you don't mind.

 

The usual good spot is usually good. Analyzing the teamsetup is even better. So what do I do if my team behaves completely irrational?

For example my last 300 games have been at 2000+ Wn8 with below 45% winrate and I can't wrap my head around what happened. It can't be just RNG I refuse to fall back in those thinking habits.

 

I blame the following things on me:

1. I don't know what to do when my team goes YOLO and leaves one flank wide open, usually the "difficult" lane where I am usually to help out where it will be a close call.

2. I've been farming damage instead of killing things.Getting that 400 Alpha shot in instead of taking out a 100 HP target.

3. Mediums teached me nothing. There are quite a few times when I throw the thought of relocating or waiting out of the window - instead I try to force results (usually thinking some crap like "my DPM/Armor is better I should win this") not taking into account additional threats that mess up my calculations.

4. The minimap disappears from my mind. "Where did that tank behind me come from?", "Why am I alone here?", "How are they already capping?"

5. Driving in a slump makes me a tomato.

 

After taking this into account - what do I do if my team neglects one flank and camps with a 2:1 superiority on the other waiting to get flanked?

Especially recently this left me helpless without any idea what to do. Since it forced me to fight in unfamiliar spots from unexpected angles of engagement (got fragged a lot by invisible TDs and Arty while trying to hold the line).

[Ham_ 434]

I find the difference between going from 2000 to 3000 is the little things. You need to criticize yourself for everything. "Im going to xy." Why are you going to xy?Why is this place bad? What will xy do in the long run?Am I in a position to make mistakes? So on so forth. Getting past 4000? Not only do you need to be skilled, this is were YOU need to be prepared. I personaly can only hold 4000+ for a session im mentally prepared for and undistracted. Pushing past 3000 isn't a question of skill, its a state of mind. This also applies to you. Play when you feel good, not after working 8 hours straight or school, college whatever it is

[Iceddragon 1]

I find myself in the same boat as the OP, a born again medium/light tan k player thanks to mostly frenchy tanks. I do enjoy the playstyle a lot more, but I tend to stagnate a bit for consistency. I play typically around 20-30 games a day, with the first 15 running at 65% WR and 2800 wn8, then dropping to 55% and 2400 wn8 in the latter portions of my day. This is rarely one solid session, so I don't really think its a simple matter of being tired or burnt out on the game, but I can not understand why my performance drops so rapidly.

My personal solution to this is setting 7 day stat goals. For example, last few months I was averaging and holding 55%-54% WR with 1800 wn8,  since then I have inched those goals up to whatever they currently are. My current goal is to achieve and hold 2500 with 57%, but I feel like maybe I'm just getting ahead of myself. I read a post here a while back that said something like "you are trying to be purple before you have mastered being blue", maybe that's just where players like us are at the moment. 

[Dabba 35]

I find the difference between going from 2000 to 3000 is the little things. You need to criticize yourself for everything. "Im going to xy." Why are you going to xy?Why is this place bad? What will xy do in the long run?Am I in a position to make mistakes? So on so forth. Getting past 4000? Not only do you need to be skilled, this is were YOU need to be prepared. I personaly can only hold 4000+ for a session im mentally prepared for and undistracted. Pushing past 3000 isn't a question of skill, its a state of mind. This also applies to you. Play when you feel good, not after working 8 hours straight or school, college whatever it is

 

QFE

 

Just think about it. Everyone has bad games, even the best. The best just tend to do a little more with those bad games. 

 

Think of it this way. Go to targetdamage.com and pick your favorite tank. Look at the values. It doesn't matter if they're correct or not. Look at the differences between blue and purple. Often it's only one to two shots worth of damage difference. It seems small, but you need to be able to do that consistently. How do you squeak out that extra shot or two? The little things, being very critical of yourself, just as Ham_ stated.

 

I know I'm trying, but I'm not active enough about it to be that consistent, and sometimes I just don't grasp it. Knowing is half the battle, the other half is doing, which admittedly is the harder part.

[pwinky 4]

Sorry to necro this thread. Seems more relevant to post in this rather than creating a new one.

 

It seems that I have almost hit a plateau in terms of improvement and it feels like it's because I am playing extremely inconsistently. I have been grinding various tank lines recently such as the obj 704 from the ISU, the T57 from the T54e1 and the T110e5 line (now at T32). I have had mixed success in them lines with generally pretty good games in the T32 and T54e1 and mostly what I feel are potato games in the ISU. I have had pretty good

 

In between my good games I have had a substantial amount of epic fail games where I feel my teams just die too fast and don't really allow me to do anything much to influence the games. I am not sure if this is fail on my part but it could also be a server meta as I feel the Asia server just potatoes harder when it does.

 

My question is should I concentrate on playing a wider variety of tanks to teach me adaptability and be able to think my way out of trouble or would I be better off just sticking to a single tank/line and grind it out and then when I have plateaued at that, then switch to something else? I'm still a pretty new player with less than 10k games played although I have been playing for more than 2 years. The dilema is that I am starting to get more active in the (I know) dying clan wars scene so am also trying to build up my tank selection as well as get better stats to get into them more gold farming clans.

[Scout_in_da_house 447]

Whatever you feel best with. I'm an advocate of grinding multiple lines, not only because you'll learn more tank strengths and weaknesses from your own experience but it will also make your overall progress much faster (double xp etc), get you more free xp and you should have more play style options.

 

If your teams are dying the problem is likely

• You not being aggressive enough/taking hits in a top tier heavy
• Not putting enough pressure or being in the wrong place (in light tanks, for example)

Heavies are some sort of 'safe' option IMO in almost every map you can either use HP or armor, whereas TD's aren't as easy to adapt or improvise. So it's natural to have differences. If you die in your heavies, watch enemy TD's and maybe learn from them.

[LamaLeif 92]

How is your map awareness?, sounds like you put yourself in bad positions because you are not constantly evaluating both the enemy and your own teams positions. I suspect that if you work on having good map awareness you can eliminate these kind of bad situations from happening, you will automatically recognize a position on the map for what it is, where you can and cannot go.

 

Map awareness will lead to staying alive longer, which leads to more damage, which leads to more better tank.

[pwinky 4]

Well here's an update. I am now at the T57 heavy, obj 704 and T110E5. After playing more aware and being more deliberate in my actions, I have come to the conclusion that some games are just not winnable. There will be times where I am top tier and push a strong flank, take shots from my team and somehow they Yolo rush and still get obliterated anyway. In tanks like the T32 I just don't have the speed to get out. When it works however and I have a semi competent team the T32 just smashes everything it sees. I've got about 6 ace tanker badges in the past 3 days alone. The T110E5 feels like a much better blend of speed and maneuverability as well as firepower.

 

Am I wrong to assume that not all games are carryable? Do you guys also get into situations where you are in a slow tank and your team just melts around you? How would you even recover from that?

 

I know that in many situations where I think I may have done my best, I could have probably done something different. I think I may be over aggressive at times and too passive at others. How do you manage to strike a balance between them both when solo pubbing?

[stagnate 513]

Well here's an update. I am now at the T57 heavy, obj 704 and T110E5. After playing more aware and being more deliberate in my actions, I have come to the conclusion that some games are just not winnable. There will be times where I am top tier and push a strong flank, take shots from my team and somehow they Yolo rush and still get obliterated anyway. In tanks like the T32 I just don't have the speed to get out. When it works however and I have a semi competent team the T32 just smashes everything it sees. I've got about 6 ace tanker badges in the past 3 days alone. The T110E5 feels like a much better blend of speed and maneuverability as well as firepower.

 

Am I wrong to assume that not all games are carryable? Do you guys also get into situations where you are in a slow tank and your team just melts around you? How would you even recover from that?

 

I know that in many situations where I think I may have done my best, I could have probably done something different. I think I may be over aggressive at times and too passive at others. How do you manage to strike a balance between them both when solo pubbing?

 

Some games are not winnable, that is why no one has a 100% solo (or even 100% platoon) winrate with a significant number of games.

 

Max solo win rates are somewhere around 70%; if you figure "perfect" play maybe that has a slightly higher theoretical maximum but still more than 20% games cannot be won solo.

 

However, most players are still well below that and can improve the number of games that they carry by improving their play.

[cpraf104 268]

I want to ask something. I hear "map awareness" get thrown around a lot as being vital to unicum play. I'm starting to hit mid 2k ~ low 3k WN8 in sessions, but it's b no means reliable. 

 

I personally feel that map awareness is something that I'm unconsciously doing somewhat decently (otherwise I wouldn't be playing at the level I am recently), but I don't really know what it is. 

 

What is "map awareness"?

 

And yeah.. some matches are just... gone. Cut your losses, quit bitchin' about it, just move on. Nothing you can do. 

[monkey10120 217]

I want to ask something. I hear "map awareness" get thrown around a lot as being vital to unicum play. I'm starting to hit mid 2k ~ low 3k WN8 in sessions, but it's b no means reliable. 

 

I personally feel that map awareness is something that I'm unconsciously doing somewhat decently (otherwise I wouldn't be playing at the level I am recently), but I don't really know what it is. 

 

What is "map awareness"?

 

And yeah.. some matches are just... gone. Cut your losses, quit bitchin' about it, just move on. Nothing you can do. 

 

Map awareness is just reading the map BEFORE you make a move. 

 

Look at the map, see who has not been lit yet, see where you might be shot from, look at the damage your allies are taking, look at where to go to keep your enemy on one side of you. 

 

With all that info you can move around the map with safety because you know where you can go to get damage but not take it. 

 

A lot of people refer to map awareness as "the flank is gone, BTB". But thats just reading the map and reacting

[Scout_in_da_house 447]

Weird that nobody mentioned tier differences yet. In tier X you get yolo-chats, 183s and CGCs. In tier 8 matches you get what, a panther II or in the worst case ISU's?

 

I think most people have lower win rates when comparing X to VIII, because it's simply much easier to use heavies as actual heavies and carry/stomp things. In your

Wow I just realized you're finding tier X easier than 8, ok...

 

Other than map awareness, and even more important IMO is reading team set-ups. You can often know which flanks will be lost in how much time even before the battle started. Unless pubs do their things like valley rush etc... That's when the situational awareness comes in, and your last chance to seriously anticipate when playing heavies

[lt_lolcat 305]

After reading this thread, I took a detailed look at my games from yesterday to see what my particular problems with consistency were.  I played 19 matches yesterday and 11 of them were complete shit (<700 wn8).  My average for the day was 1184.  If I could have turned those shit games into 1000 pt games, I would have averaged 1660.   If I could have removed those shit games altogether, my average would have been a very nice 2569.  I can tell that my biggest problem is the large number of matches that I don't manage to do anything. 

 

So... how exactly do I sharply reduce my number of shit games?  I examined my battle history and looked for reasons for each one.  Out of the 11 bad games, 3 were caused simply because my tank was too slow (Tog, KV2, Chi Nu Kai) to get in good shots before the game ended.  Sometimes this is hard to avoid if your team is much better than the red team and steamrolls them.  I guess the only thing to do is follow the lemming train as fast as possible if your tank is a slow one. 

 

4 shit games were due to me yoloing into an entirely exposed position.  That's totally on me being impatient and trying to get damage/kills without regard to the danger.  I must stop doing this.

 

2 were because I was trying to grind my stock JPanther (that short 88 is shit in tier 7+ games and I keep trying to pen tanks frontally and I can't).  I need to not play a tank unless I have a usable gun on it first.  I just need to be patient and wait until I have the free xp before playing it again. 

 

2 games were due to me being in a bad position. In both, I didn't move fast enough from a flank that was collapsing and got zerged.  I need to watch the minimap closer and get moving at the first whiff of collapse.  And moving doesn't mean slowly back away - it means run like crazy to a better position with support from teammates. 

[Zezti 288]

Consistency is my big issue too. I'm working on the Borsig now (want that WTE100 before it gets removed) and some games I get 3k-5k damage and have a massive carry though sometimes I end up with just 1k-1.5k and have a really lackluster game.

I think its down to map knowledge - I'm still learning how to be a sneaky TD and how best to play the Borsig depending on what battletier but it just seems so hit and miss. 

 

What I am starting to learn is to notice when I need to fall back, rather than hold a flank against greater number of opponents. One game on Overlord it was me, an ISU-152 and a light tank who went east and met half the enemy team. The ISU tried to stay and fight, got one shot off and died while I fell back to base behind a house and did nearly 5k damage and carried the game. A few hundred games ago I would have died with the ISU.

 

But still, sometimes I go to a spot where I've seen TDs go before and be successful and go the whole game only getting to fire 1 or 2 shots. Just leaves me thinking "well, what else could I have done??". Paper TDs are so hard to play.

[thejeremyftw 9]

So... how exactly do I sharply reduce my number of shit games? I examined my battle history and looked for reasons for each one. Out of the 11 bad games, 3 were caused simply because my tank was too slow (Tog, KV2, Chi Nu Kai) to get in good shots before the game ended. Sometimes this is hard to avoid if your team is much better than the red team and steamrolls them. I guess the only thing to do is follow the lemming train as fast as possible if your tank is a slow one.

4 shit games were due to me yoloing into an entirely exposed position. That's totally on me being impatient and trying to get damage/kills without regard to the danger. I must stop doing this.

2 were because I was trying to grind my stock JPanther (that short 88 is shit in tier 7+ games and I keep trying to pen tanks frontally and I can't). I need to not play a tank unless I have a usable gun on it first. I just need to be patient and wait until I have the free xp before playing it again.

2 games were due to me being in a bad position. In both, I didn't move fast enough from a flank that was collapsing and got zerged. I need to watch the minimap closer and get moving at the first whiff of collapse. And moving doesn't mean slowly back away - it means run like crazy to a better position with support from teammates.

As far as the first statement, in my experience, reading the situation during the countdown is that much more critical in slow tanks. If I'm in my 140 I know I can go to one location for a couple early shots and then flex back to the other side of the map if need be. In my IS4 or T28 Prot, I make the decision on the most likely place I'll be useful and get there asap. Remember, map awareness also includes knowing good sidescrape, hard cover or hull down spots for your particularly vehicle.

The second statement is what you'd call the class "overextending" mistake. You should always be positioning yourself with an idea of how to make a tactical retreat. In the example of slow tanks, you can't retreat as well, unless you do it really early. Therefore, try to position yourself where they have limited options from where to come at you. If you have teammates alive, be inconvenient to engage with. Most pubbies will take the easy damage shots. Use those opportunities to hit the enemy back while he's reloading. Sometimes this just feels like farming damage, but sometimes amazing things happen and you pick up a Kolabanov's (sp?). Get out every shot you can.

Regarding the shit gun, I agree with your assessment. I never use free XP to unlock tanks. I use it to unlock modules on unlocked tanks. Every now and then you come across a tank that's playable stock. However, the majority of the time you need at least a couple of modules before you take it out there. Be smart about your free xp use. If you're 5k from unlocking a tank you're really excited about, just grind out that 5k and save that free xp to make that tank immediately better.

Your fourth statement has a lot to do with your second as far as tactical retreats are concerned. You have to have situational awareness. Where are their tanks? How many of them and how many of us? Are the numbers equal, but they're full hp and our guys are one shots? Are they pushing and advancing and it's a matter of seconds before their guns are pointed at you? Get out. Get out and go find a better defensive position, but one you can retreat from as well. Defending a flank alone or standing tall while the enemy circles you don't win you any points. That's just resigning yourself to death and defeat. Make them fight for every shot they get. Even if you die, it's entirely possible you'll damage them enough for a pubbie behind you to finish them off.

Lastly, always pay attention to the initial deployment of your team. If they're all going one way, follow and even lead the lemming train to help them push faster. If you're in a fast tank, maybe go to the uncovered flank just to spot and get a couple shots, then bail. It's often enough to at least slow down the enemy since they think you're still there.

It really is all the little things that separate greens from higher ratings. Just keep practicing and don't be in a rush. The WN8 and WR will both begin to rise.

But still, sometimes I go to a spot where I've seen TDs go before and be successful and go the whole game only getting to fire 1 or 2 shots. Just leaves me thinking "well, what else could I have done??". Paper TDs are so hard to play.

That last statement is part of the issue. It's fine to go to a favorite spot at the beginning, if it makes sense given the enemy and friendly team compositions. However, if there's just nothing lighting up in front of you, you need to get to where your gun is useful. Predicting enemy deployment is an educated guess based on experience and map/tank knowledge over a large number of games. However, in a single game any number of things could happen. You could have a red who has no idea what he's doing and therefore ends up driving into a spot no one in their right mind would expect him to be. He gets rewarded with side or rear shots and maybe even some kills. On the other hand you could have a blue/purple who sees a potential exploit based on the other team and therefore goes where he would not be expected to go. The difference here is that the blue/purple is aware of the danger and prepared to bail. He's trying to force a flank and will immediately capitalize if able. The red just got lucky and usually dies rather quickly after the initial surprise attack.
 

//I've merged your two posts into one -WW

Edited May 20, 2015 by WaterWar

[IdzIk 2]

I heared one gr8 advice lately:

 

"When your gun have nothing to shoot at, your wheels should twirl."

 

Its the most suitable for a fast tanks, but you can use this anytime.

[predavolk 283]

I heared one gr8 advice lately:

 

"When your gun have nothing to shoot at, your wheels should twirl."

 

Its the most suitable for a fast tanks, but you can use this anytime.

 

This.  I just have Zeven's voice in my head "OK, it's been 2 minutes and you haven't shot anything.  You need to move."

 

Honestly, I hit a plateau myself not long ago.  More focused play, different types (meds and lights), and probably a change in luck helped.  But consistency really is the key difference between good and bad players.  Kewei can get schooled in an individual game by a red (in theory at least).  The difference between the two is how consistently good their game play is and that's something that takes a lot of time and effort to obtain.

[hk93g3 2]

Consistency isn't always necessary. Sometimes finding positions that are high risk gambles can result in epic games that can average out bad maps.

[WaterWar 2,075]

Consistency isn't always necessary. Sometimes finding positions that are high risk gambles can result in epic games that can average out bad maps.

I highly disagree with you. That is not the way to go. Uou are at the mercy of enemy teams, RNG and what have you not. 

 

Consistency is still the key to breaking the 3k WN8 barrier. You want to consistenly perform well, instead of performing those high risk high reward games. They usually dont end up producing such amazing games anyway to offset the 5 shit games you had trying to have that monster game.

[CompeAnansi 8]

I have frequently read on this forum that one of the keys to consistency is conserving your HP for the end of the game, which often involves not being on the front line (while also not necessarily implying you should be CHAI sniping either). Zeven, however, has argued that since pubbies will often fail to create opportunities for themselves and are usually not brave enough to take advantage of those presented to them, so you need to be on the front line coaxing them into the correct positions even if you do so at the cost of your own life. There is an obvious contrast between these two approaches. Before anyone says it, I know that answer is probably "do both depending on the situation". But, if I were going to adopt one as the basic rule of thumb (that you only deviate from in certain situations), should it be that you are cautious on the backline conserving HP or that you are aggressively leading the pubbies?