Thread: What would you improve on?

I would like to improve my shot calling in a few ways:

- Say complex calls quicker and more concisely so that the entire team can understand. This widens our strategic options immensely.

- Remember a wider variety of calls (or parts of calls) and the situations in which to use/combine them. I actually thought about how cool it would be to have cheat sheets for each map with cool calls (and to write down the cool ones you randomly think up) but as of yet have not put anything together.

- Get a calm yet commanding vocal presence that makes people not just instinctively do the call, but believe in it wholeheartedly.

- Get a better understanding of how the enemy team is reacting when I am calling (i.e. how often are they predicting me, how often am I catching them off guard, what parts of their response can I exploit). So if you are pretty sure I'm calling and your team has my calls locked in then feel free to tell me at the end of the map so I can try to do better.

I'm on pretty frequently when Manno and Slikathanky are making calls and learn a lot from them, but I'd love to hear what vafa and scrum think as well (among others... always interested in hearing good players' thoughts on the game).

One of the easiest ways to formulate your thoughts on a call is to think about it prior the the round, and base it upon what the team was doing the round prior. By this, I mean to figure out who you want going where so that when the buy period starts you can immediately run off who is going where and doing what. I also recommend thinking of what you would do in that situation as a CT and plan for it if possible.(i.e. if you are splitting A without many problems on season, delaying mid with someone watching cat and having someone push through squeaky might not be a bad idea) Sometimes this gets difficult to do, especially if you yourself aren't dying alot. I'm sure that people have noticed before but generally when I'm calling a great game I'm not fragging as well of a game.

If you have trouble saying what you want people to do then they will have trouble understanding and doing what you want them to; for example I was trying to call on d2 last night after 2 full days of puking and shitting my brains out(god I hate the flu, thank god it's over). It didn't work, because I couldn't think straight. Luckily someone else came in and got some solid calls for us.

Also, tailor your calls to the team you are playing with. If I'm on a team full of regs, my calls will get more complex(as the people that I was calling w/ T on lost temple the other night can attest to) if I'm playing with alot of non-regs or people who are still very much learning the ropes, I will dumb it down(no offense). It doesn't do anyone good to have this really amazing strat if none of them understand what you want them to do.

One of the hardest things about calling is adjusting to your teams strengths. If you notice your team isn't doing so hot on rushing, slow it down, run a fake and see what happens. Don't just keep beating your head against the same wall and expect different results. If you have solid snipers, don't be afraid to use them. Spring, fajita, Duddy, just to name a few, are excellent to use on maps like cbble and fire to get a pick or two mid before rushing.

Another thing to think about when calling is HOW to use your top players. I know these servers are huge fans of "top 3 and bomb hide here while we fake". I've been using "Top 3 take B everyone else delay A by 20 seconds after they make first contact". Because people now look for the top 3 to start getting kills, this causes them to rotate out of A just because of WHO made a kill or got killed. Another good idea is splitting the top players. Direct one to go with the people long A and one to go short, so that both sides have a better shot of getting the initial pick and pushing into site. I also like to put a top fragger on rotator duty. Keeping people interested in the opposite direction, even if only for 15 seconds can make a HUGE difference in whether you take site or not. Then, once they have used their smokes and flashes and fired a couple of shots, they can position themselves to get picks as the people they were occupying try to go retake the site that was just taken by the rest of the team.

Another thing to consider is momentum. If your team is taking a site repeatedly without many problems, keep taking it. The old saying if it ain't broke don't fix it very much applies to calling. I know alot of people like to change it up and hit the other site but why bother if you keep taking it? That doesn't mean however to just run the same strat over and over again. Once you take a site a few times they will EXPECT you to try the other site to throw them off. So make them think that you are. Then go back to the same site you've been owning them at for awhile. This is especially useful on maps like season that have a long CT rotation.

You also need to remember that your team isn't the only smart team. Sometimes you will get shutdown simply because someone on their team had a feeling and decided to call for a stack. Or you have someone like me who likes to roam and play where instinct/intuition tells them you will be. Skill, instinct, and just plain luck are all very big factors in this game and sometimes the other team has one or more of those in heaps.

There are many other factors that go into calling but those are some of the ones that will help you understand WHY you aren't doing so hot as a caller sometimes. You can go way more in depth with calling than any of this but these are just a few pointers that should do anyone well while calling in a public server. It's a whole different ballgame than calling a scrim/match, and took me a bit to figure out the differences in it.

Originally Posted by RAWRKITTY

One of the easiest ways to formulate your thoughts on a call is to think about it prior the the round, and base it upon what the team was doing the round prior. By this, I mean to figure out who you want going where so that when the buy period starts you can immediately run off who is going where and doing what. I also recommend thinking of what you would do in that situation as a CT and plan for it if possible.(i.e. if you are splitting A without many problems on season, delaying mid with someone watching cat and having someone push through squeaky might not be a bad idea) Sometimes this gets difficult to do, especially if you yourself aren't dying alot. I'm sure that people have noticed before but generally when I'm calling a great game I'm not fragging as well of a game.

If you have trouble saying what you want people to do then they will have trouble understanding and doing what you want them to; for example I was trying to call on d2 last night after 2 full days of puking and shitting my brains out(god I hate the flu, thank god it's over). It didn't work, because I couldn't think straight. Luckily someone else came in and got some solid calls for us.

Also, tailor your calls to the team you are playing with. If I'm on a team full of regs, my calls will get more complex(as the people that I was calling w/ T on lost temple the other night can attest to) if I'm playing with alot of non-regs or people who are still very much learning the ropes, I will dumb it down(no offense). It doesn't do anyone good to have this really amazing strat if none of them understand what you want them to do.

One of the hardest things about calling is adjusting to your teams strengths. If you notice your team isn't doing so hot on rushing, slow it down, run a fake and see what happens. Don't just keep beating your head against the same wall and expect different results. If you have solid snipers, don't be afraid to use them. Spring, fajita, Duddy, just to name a few, are excellent to use on maps like cbble and fire to get a pick or two mid before rushing.

Another thing to think about when calling is HOW to use your top players. I know these servers are huge fans of "top 3 and bomb hide here while we fake". I've been using "Top 3 take B everyone else delay A by 20 seconds after they make first contact". Because people now look for the top 3 to start getting kills, this causes them to rotate out of A just because of WHO made a kill or got killed. Another good idea is splitting the top players. Direct one to go with the people long A and one to go short, so that both sides have a better shot of getting the initial pick and pushing into site. I also like to put a top fragger on rotator duty. Keeping people interested in the opposite direction, even if only for 15 seconds can make a HUGE difference in whether you take site or not. Then, once they have used their smokes and flashes and fired a couple of shots, they can position themselves to get picks as the people they were occupying try to go retake the site that was just taken by the rest of the team.

Another thing to consider is momentum. If your team is taking a site repeatedly without many problems, keep taking it. The old saying if it ain't broke don't fix it very much applies to calling. I know alot of people like to change it up and hit the other site but why bother if you keep taking it? That doesn't mean however to just run the same strat over and over again. Once you take a site a few times they will EXPECT you to try the other site to throw them off. So make them think that you are. Then go back to the same site you've been owning them at for awhile. This is especially useful on maps like season that have a long CT rotation.

You also need to remember that your team isn't the only smart team. Sometimes you will get shutdown simply because someone on their team had a feeling and decided to call for a stack. Or you have someone like me who likes to roam and play where instinct/intuition tells them you will be. Skill, instinct, and just plain luck are all very big factors in this game and sometimes the other team has one or more of those in heaps.

There are many other factors that go into calling but those are some of the ones that will help you understand WHY you aren't doing so hot as a caller sometimes. You can go way more in depth with calling than any of this but these are just a few pointers that should do anyone well while calling in a public server. It's a whole different ballgame than calling a scrim/match, and took me a bit to figure out the differences in it.

Nice post! Whats your in game name btw?

Originally Posted by vafaskillz

Nice post! Whats your in game name btw?

iLLusioN'. I should probably get it changed on here sometime. I've had a few people that were surprised to find out lol

my overriding factor when deciding what to call next is to simply try hitting them where they're not.

if they're not covering a particular area well, rush it.
if they're stacking where you want to go, fake them out of it and go later. ct's are more apt to over-rotate when there's 6 of them standing in the same site.
if they're rushing you, slow play.
if you've got all the aks and the guys that can use them. do a little working gambit.
and if they just play solidly, buy grenades, split sites well, and won't rotate... well, as space.cowboy said, nothing brings a team together better than running around in circles killing shit.