hahahahaha

cp_foundry
cp_metalworks
koth_ashville
koth_granary
cp_standin
ctf_turbine_pro
cp_pro_dustbowl

I think it's just a matter of getting more experience by playing more scrims. Before I really started playing this game a lot with AG, I noticed that I could make good calls when I played medic, but I was relatively clueless when I played other classes. When I didn't need to focus on aim, I could spend brain cycles on analyzing the game and read the situation properly. Now, after having played a lot more, reading the game is just so second-nature to me that I can make good calls without taking focus away from my aim. In your case, rather than sacrificing your calls to aim, you sacrifice your aim to make calls.

Just throwing some arbitrary numbers out there as an example: right now, it may take you 1s to analyze a given situation, during which time your aim is worse because you're confused/not sure what's going on. After you experience that situation again and again, you recognize the situation in 0.1s and can move your focus back to DM immediately. Add in other stuff about being in the wrong position while you're thinking so you don't set yourself up for easy shots, blah blah. tl;dr -- more scrim experience makes this easier.

<3

I think one problem is the short duration and opaque nature of the map poll. If the options for replacement were released a week or two in advance, people would have time to try each map a few times and form their opinions. Instead, the vote-in poll is only revealed after the vote-out poll is done, which then lasts for only 2 or 3 days, meaning the only way to make an informed decision would be to have played the maps in advance (while the list was still unknown). I even played pugs on earlier versions of cp_ashville during s11/s12, and although it wasn't much different than it is now, the distance problems weren't apparent to me then (likely because I was messing around on scout). I scrimmed it with my team once in the offseason after it was voted in, and by the time I got to the first mid I was thinking "what have we done".

I don't think that any teams would have a problem scrimming new maps in the offseason if there was a list of 3-4 candidates to focus on for a few weeks. I think that this would also lead to more constructive feedback on new maps in an environment that isn't a low-level/offclassing pug -- rather than people approaching the map with the attitude "oh god, we have to play matches on this", they would come in thinking "let's see how this map goes". Even for maps that don't make the vote, this would give valuable feedback to the developer so he could revise his map for the next season, rather than have it buried under a pile of hate even after improving it (a la standin).

All that said, koth_gran s13.

I feel like this thread is closely related (a response to?) the other thread on here about speeding up the game. I have the same thoughts on both:

The game does not need to be sped up. Stalemates are the result of a team being unwilling to move on or unaware of their advantages and the options available to them. If you stand blindly in the middle of your last point and let a team suicide a player into you over and over, refusing to push off of the 1 kill, you're playing scared. If you're sitting on granary mid, occasionally peeking garage to spam out and backing up as you get crushed on the choke point, unwilling to force an uber exchange, run a suicide, or overload the left side, you're playing bad.

Parking the bus is a somewhat different story, but the NA rules relatively rarely lead to a situation where this becomes viable, and even in these cases, the team that is down can reasonably run one-man suicides and use their uber defensively to delay for a 6v6 fight after the spawn.

Inevitably, lower-level matches will have stalemates because people don't know what they're doing. Watching non-pro starcraft isn't much fun either as you watch resources pile up and the proper timings go out the window. While the game may slow down at times in high-level matches, there's always *something* going on along the lines of a suicide to force a play, the losing team poking out a bit to edge their way in, etc. I don't think an artificial solution needs to be imposed to change this (and I think lowering the timelimit between point caps would probably lead to *more* of people playing the clock).

:)

I played a version of this in a pug at one point -- it was basically a mix of a bunch of small halls which were impossible to watch and awkwardly long/large areas (particularly around 2). I think this makes sense for a pub map, but it didn't make sense for 6's.

Another good gpit strat: have your demo live with 1hp and sticky jump to kill 3 people.

clorg is wrong, Munch is right.

This is exactly what I'm talking about in the OP. If you're asking about the execution, the class lineup can be whatever, you just tend more towards the standard/more mobile classes than engy/sniper -- cookie cutter lineup works, dropping a soldier/scout for a heavy works. You can probably even do it with an engineer or sniper if you really want to; the idea remains the same in all cases: you fight with your combo at A before they cap to deny them the spawn advantage and punish suicide plays. More risk, more reward.

HUDs do make the game easier. However, a HUD is not "going outside of the game to change something in the game" any more so than writing a config file to set your viewmodels, or changing your sensitivity, or using an FPS config. All of these things are executed normally by the game code -- for something to constitute as cheating, it would need to be something that's not caused by normal execution of the game code (or have an explicit rule against it -- the old wallhack sticky particles, using the bug to break class limits, etc.). Basically, if you're running any process that's not hl2.exe and helps you with your game (aimbots, wallhacks, etc.), then you're cheating.

Huge airshots @ lan, coolest of cool dudes. Get him.

No long article this time, just a video -- this is one I made for MGE a while back that covers pretty much everything that I would write:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0CxvYXLbM0

The only thing that has really changed on gpit since I made this video is that there's been a bit more of a shift back towards plays to delay A caps. Since suicides to B are expected these days, teams can opt to take advantage of the situation and move quickly after blocking the suicide (or, just play off of the enemy medic possibly remaining in spawn) and go engage at A with the combo to slow the cap. Doing this is risky, but perhaps not so risky as I made it out to be in the video -- the attack doesn't yet have the A spawn advantage, so fighting at A is an even exchange if you get in without heavy classes spamming you from point. Basically, all that this means is that early suicides are riskier than they used to be -- you may want to not do it/only use the roamer/attempt spy/sniper plays early, or you may want to start the A cap, then suicide when it's approx. half done and it's not feasible for the defense to stop you anymore.

I get similar crashes intermittently with a black or frozen screen + sound loop while mumble continues to work. Sometimes I can kill the process before my computer completely locks up. I've heard of other people with this problem as well.

Unfortunately I'm in the same boat -- I have no idea what causes the problem, I only know that it's not just you.