Source
r/DotA2•
ebbv

PSA: Offering advice is great, but don't nitpick.

We all can't help it, we see other players on our team make choices we don't agree with and we want to say something. But at some point this crosses a line and goes from friendly advice that maybe they will listen to to backseat playing that nobody will listen to and you're just going to cause frustration.

Examples of good advice:

"Nightstalker/Pudge/QoP is really our strongest mid, you should take mid."

"Ethereal Blade is not a particularly good item on Juggernaut."

"Their entire team is off the map be careful."

Examples of nitpicking:

"Lina how do you keep missing your LSAs?"

"Brood you should have your Orchid done by now."

"Why did you guys let him get so fed?!"

The difference between the two should be pretty obvious. One is at least attempting to be constructive, and the other is nothing but criticizing. We've all probably done it, I know I have. But that doesn't mean it's good.

Even though you might be right in 100% of cases (which you aren't), it's still not constructive and not doing anything to help your team win the game or have fun.

If you find yourself falling into the second category, try to cut it out. The more you make an effort the easier it gets, and the more enjoyable your games will be.

Also whenever you find yourself going "Oh my god these shitty teammates." remember that the MMR clearly thinks these people are on par with your skill level (or at least the skill level of someone you queued with.) So focus on doing what you can to convince the MMR that it's wrong and you're better, rather than bitching about everybody else in the game who you can't control.

Posted Jul 22, 2013, 1:23 PM UTC · edited

057
[deleted]•

PSA: Stop using PSA wrong.

22
ebbvOP•

Public Service Announcements can be about anything that's meant to better the public good. I take it you think it should only be about "Hey I discovered this thing you all should know." but that's not what it really means.

EDIT:

Also thanks for providing a perfect example of a non-constructive nitpick.

-5
[deleted]•

PSAs are generally accepted to be about information and/or relevant issues that need to be made aware to the general public. Now that's a pretty vague definition, but I think most will agree that what you've said here doesn't qualify.

Something PSA worthy would be along the lines of: "Game breaking bug that will crash your client," or "Certain matchmaking selections are not working as intended."

What you have here is more of a general statement on your opinion of the community.

11
barnufus•

I work in radio and can say you're pretty much wrong here. Maybe r/dota2 PSAs are usually about bugs, hacks, or bad streaming clients, but in general a PSA can range anywhere from general advice to purely informative specific data. Letting people know how to talk to others in certain situations (suicide, eating disorder, addiction, DotA, etc) is a pretty common one

edit: you can still make the argument that this is a pretty flimsy/irrelevant PSA. We have one at work about suntan safety

4
[deleted]•

Agreed. Yeah I don't think spouting off your personal opinion and then tagging it PSA as if it's some globally accepted rule is kosher and that's pretty much what this OP did.

3
[deleted]•

But suntan safety is actually important.

2
turkey45•

yay Radio!, are you on-air or behind the scenes. (i am in Sales at a radio station)

1
ebbvOP•

Real PSA's are like "Don't do drugs.", "Don't drive drunk.", "Wear your seatbelt."

I also think that my post qualifies even under your examples, too. You say it's just my opinion, but it's pretty fact based. You don't have to agree with my suggestion but there's clearly a difference between being helpful and just picking fights.

-3
[deleted]•

It's got nothing to do with whether I agree with your suggestion or not.

What you have here is not an announcement. It's a personal observation and a suggestion based on that observation, therefore it is not a public service announcement.

4
bjarkebjarke•

Will these shitty PSA's ever stop?

16
SylphStarcraft•

PSA: Last hitting gives you gold, you guys should try to last hit creeps!!

4
ebbvOP•

Right after shitty useless whiny comments do.

-15
bjarkebjarke•

Why don't you make a relevant PSA: about it?

4
ebbvOP•

PSA: Don't make shitty comments.

-4
bjarkebjarke•

You got me there. Good one.

3
LevitatingCactus•

What you'll find is that genuinely good people who like to give advice don't bother communicating with team mates after about 500 games in. It's far more effort than it is worth.

8
jayboosh•

yep, i dont even know why i have a mic anymore

using OPs example

"Nightstalker/Pudge/QoP is really our strongest mid, you should take mid." Fuck you noob, go back to Lol Fag

"Ethereal Blade is not a particularly good item on Juggernaut." Just shut up and play your game and let me play mine "dota doesnt really work that way, its a team game and it is designed with all 5 people playing in unision in mind" fuck just shut up ok? fucking who cares you try hard faggot piece of shit

"Their entire team is off the map be careful." no response, still gets ganked "we called mia and pinged, lets try to stick together, they are just 5 man dota'ing, we need to counter that" muted you piece of shit, stop bossing everyone around.

Sweet game.

1
Tsplodey•

"Ethereal Blade is not a particularly good item on Juggernaut."

If you Eblade while spinning do you stay non-ethereal? Could be fun for some extra burst. 8)

2
MajesticTowerOfHats•

I just tried it out.

If you run up to somebody and spin then cast etherial blade you can no longer move or use abilities however you do MASSIVE spin damage.

5
Cause_and_Effect•

Yeah but this nullifies the ability to right click people while spinning though. And there's so many more useful items for Jugg.

1
SeeminglyUseless•

You can't right click people while spinning. The only exception is if someone is magic immune. You can right click magic immune units while you're spinning, and they will take right click damage.

Anyone taking damage from your spin does not though.

2
Cause_and_Effect•

Yes you can right click. It does no damage to people being affected by Blade Fury, however any on-hit debuffs are still applied. Also the skill is capped out in damage at 400/500/600/700, so it makes E-blade useless.

Also, you're wrong. Magic Immune targets do not take right click damage either. Only invalid targets can be damaged by right-click attacks during Blade Fury (towers) because they are not being affected by Blade Fury, and therefore can be right clicked. Magic immune units are affected by Blade Fury, just the magic damage is blocked.

5
SeeminglyUseless•

Whenever I nitpick or try to offer advice, I preface it by saying "I'd have done XXXX" or "I think XXX might have been a better idea" or similar. I find people are more receptive to that because it becomes an opinion of mine, rather than an afrontation of theirs.

"Yeah, Gyro, I'd have gone BKB into Manta instead of BKB into Aganims. It's really not a good item for him."

"Rubick, I wouldn't be running off alone to ward if I were you. You're just gonna get picked off again."

etc.

2
xSmallDeadGuyx•

The problem is when you actually offer advice and they still take is as nitpicking.

E.G:

"You should max shuriken on bounty hunter over jinada as the damage potential early is much greater"

"Don't max backstab first on riki as he has little agility, get blink strike for damage and chasing potential"

"Silence is useful on drow, get at least one point in that before maxing her damage passive"

Looking at them it's mostly agi-carry players that get annoyed when you tell them not to build the late-game carry abilities before the useful early abilities

2
ebbvOP•

Well I think examples like you gave are kind of borderline and arguable either way.

For example the Jinada vs. Shuriken thing; Shuriken may give more DPS and more burst early on but it also costs a shitload more mana (whereas of course Jinada is free), so it necessitates a bottle. And if your mid is rune hungry, with the new bottle crow nerf offlane BH bottle isn't so viable.

An example that's NOT arguable; you should get at least ONE point in Shuriken to interrupt TP.

So, I would say those points aren't as clear cut as something like "Nightstalker is our strongest mid and should take it." might be (depending on team lineup.)

There's grey area with something like this and the key to me is to err on the side of friendliness. If someone's unresponsive to a suggestion I tend to just let it go and stop giving them any more.

4
ItsNotMineISwear•

Max Shuriken is the only way to play him nowadays. Like literally no good BH doesn't max Toss.

Also if you run out of mana you can always go back to base. If you're out of mana it probably means you unloaded a nuke or two and a couple windwalks and tracks so you got a few kills.

3
[deleted]•

Maxing Toss first is arguably the correct way to play Bounty Hunter now days, but it's probably important to clarify why.

There was a period of time after TI2 when Bounty Hunter became popular. Back when he was a fotm hero players didn't really know how to deal with him as an offlaner, and he would basically get free exp sitting in lane. This gave him a fast level 6, but more importantly it gave him a fast level 6 relative to the enemy supports and mid, which he could then go gank and deal respectable damage with his invis + jinada combo. This was back when track had minus armor too, and every bit helped.

And then track got nerfed, and Bounty Hunter suddenly slid down from sometimes even 2nd position to 4th position support whose main job went from helping gank heros to basically just track everyone and not die. Teams stopped empathizing helping BH deward his lane, and players started learning how to zone him out of exp range.

Now, BHs on average levels slower, so his Jinada damage is less noticeable because his targets will on average be higher level than before. Hence, why Toss first is the accepted go-to standard build. It does more reliable burst damage. It's also noteworthy that a secondary offlaner bottle is quickly becoming the standard, possibly as a result of the bottlecrow nerf. That helps elevate BH's mana problems, and also gives him another purpose in helping his mid rune control.

Personally, I feel that if you can get reliable exp in a solo offlane (which, in very-high skill bracket matches is admittedly rare), then leaving Toss for later and going semi carry with some combination of phase/medallion/drums/urn into deso/bkb/orchid is still a situationally viable way to play, especially your lineup calls for a secondary core hero.

2
Mystical_Engineer•

so it necessitates a bottle.

???

There are far more mana options for BH than desperately trying to keep a bottle filled.

0
ebbvOP•

To sustain the 150 mana cost of level 4 Shuriken early game there's not much that's going to do the job other than Bottle.

A Basi ring is great on BH but even with it at level 7 BH only has ~1.8 mana regen per sec so it's still going to take upwards of 80 seconds to regen one level 4 Shuirken cast, never mind the additional cost of Shadow Walk and Track.

Vlad's improves the situation only by 0.15 mana/s.

Mana boots are a terrible idea on BH obviously. Clarity's are great early on but by level 7 not so much.

Of course you can go the famous Battlefury BH build, but with BH's poor base mana regen (1.1 at level 7) that's not improving the situation that much more than Vlad's.

So, again. My point is not that max Shuriken first is BAD or anything but that it's arguable and situational. Max Shuriken first has its own problems, namely sustaining the mana cost early game.

2
Mystical_Engineer•

Get a drum, and urn instead of either selfishly taking rune from the mid, or fail bottlecrowing that will do nothing, but piss off your team. Also you shouldn't be maxing shuriken that early it's scaling is weird so it's not very efficient.

-1
[deleted]•

I find this 'PSA' to be utter nonsense. First of all, it's not a PSA, it's your opinion. Get off your high horse, your opinion is not the public good.

I would honestly mute you if you start complaining about my item decisions. I didn't sign up for therapy with a condescending, pompous, asshole so I don't really care if you don't like my e-blade jugger. In most games stuff like that doesn't determine the outcome of the game near so much as team feed, stupid positioning etc. and unless you've played decidedly better than me in that game, I don't want to hear shit from you.

This should be obvious, but before you criticize ANYONE's play you need to be doing well for your team. If you're some shit 0-6 feeder lane 6 minutes in the game or an axe with nothing but tranquil boots 19 minutes in, I don't fucking care if you have good suggestions, you haven't earned the right to bitch at other people for failing that game. Secondly, you need to actually know what the fuck you're talking about before you start doling out advice. This, in particular, is the thing that I encounter in pubs from self-important retards who read reddit or see a couple of pro games and all of a sudden think they have the world figured out. Double-fucking newsflash moron, you're still in MMR hell because you still suck until you can prove otherwise. Too many idiots complain about things like diffusal PL, or manta medusa or whatever and grin stupidly as they figuratively nudge their teammates with their elbows.

EDIT: http://dotabuff.com/players/11211736/matches?hero=juggernaut&game_mode=&match_type=real

deal with it.

-1
toomuchpopcornyoBullshit Is Good For Trees•

remember that the MMR clearly thinks these people are on par with your skill level

you have no proof of this claim. We know that even Valve thinks the MM system is currently not making fair games.

Its a very high fluctuating mmr difference, which is why we see all these threads of people getting put with people with hundreds of wins below themselves.

-4
[deleted]•

[deleted]

0
hyperben•

it was less than a week ago when they made adjustments to the matchmaking system. also, lately it looks like they've been taking a closer look into the matchmaking system - they've been frequently posting in mmr threads and communicating with the users on the dev forums, requesting match ID's and explaining the MMR system in more detail. maybe they didnt explicitly say that they think the MM system is currently unfair but they've definitely been giving it a lot of attention lately.]

here's some threads on it:

http://www.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/1imrnl/why_we_cant_see_our_matchmaking_rating_and_what/

http://www.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/1ilxoq/psa_theres_a_valve_dev_actively_participating_in/

1
ebbvOP•

The examples of people being matched up with folks with wildly varying MMR is due to people being in Party with someone with a wildly varying MMR.

If you solo (only) queue then you will be matched up with people who have an MMR near yours. If you don't solo only queue you COULD end up in a game with a party who have wildly varying MMRs from yours BUT yours should be near the average between the party members, so in addition to party members below your MMR there should be people above you as well.

If you think they are terrible, remember the MMR thinks you're as bad as they are. So work on yourself first and foremost.

-4
toomuchpopcornyoBullshit Is Good For Trees•

i wish i could discuss this with you, but you dont seem to have a firm grasp on how mmr fluctuates and how valves algorithm, which is elo, causes very unfair games because of this.

you seem to be under the ideology that the system is working as intended, but that is not the case, and valve has stated they will be changing it.

4
ebbvOP•

First stop being so condescending.

Second, I didn't say it was perfect, but I've been following the same threads that you have and saw the same posts from Valve.

And every example when there's people with wildly differing ELOs, Valve has said there was a Party that caused it. That's why I'm confident in saying what I said.

-2
toomuchpopcornyoBullshit Is Good For Trees•

First stop being so condescending.

Can you guide me to the part of my post that was?

And every example when there's people with wildly differing ELOs Valve has said there was a Party that caused it.

I doubt Valve would link all their faulty MM claims to one factor, as its not only caused by one factor (if Valve has said this, its very dishonest on their part, but of course I doubt it). It only confirms that you are not very experienced with MM systems, and dont know how one fluctuation can cause a very unbalanced game.

Thus all the mixed experienced players in one MM game, and posts about such mixing.

2
donkeey•

i'll nitpick all i fucking want

-13