keeping it at a fun level during competitive gameplay

Jump back to quoted post20 Dec 2015, 18:25 PMc0mpl3x1ty

To be fair, I wasn't always like this. It is actually really hard to strike a balance between "I want to be the best at this game" and "I actually don't care." Those two feelings are at odds with one another, because it takes a very conscious investment of time, energy, and thought to be great at something, while still not getting so invested you get angry at what's going on.

Company of Heroes at its very worst is extraordinarily frustrating in this regard. This most recent CoH tourney is actually a great example of that with BkModTest. I gave credit over and over again to Hulk for preparing and planning for that CoH tourney, but man did BkModTest just get totally boned when it came to his snipers in that match. BkModTest is an extraordinary wehrmacht player, probably the greatest. Losing in the way he did, it definitely affected him emotionally. Especially when people in chat were calling him BkSaltTest and all matter of dust-kicking that really would make anyone never want to come back to this game ever again. He was asking me to ban people, to kick them out, because well, his ego was seriously hurt.

I didn't kick those people, but I explained to him that he just needs to cool his head. This was a fun tournament which frankly had a small prizepool, and just because he lost doesn't mean he's any worse at the game. In fact, that's all any of this really is: it's just a game. There's no way your automatch rank, your tournament placement, whatever, can define what kind of player or person you are. You can't control the RNG in Company of Heroes, but much like EVERYTHING in life, you CAN control how you respond to it.

Sure, sometimes you can't, and I say this over and over again, we're only human and emotions run high. You get that out of your system, or better yet, you have a plan in place to deal with when it happens, and you move on. For me, it's really as simple as taking a deep breath, staring at the ceiling, and just putting it into perspective. It's just a game, and if I want to get better, I can't be crying to RNGesus just because an engagement didn't go my way, I need to change something to keep it from happening again. Finding what that change is can't come from an emotional place, it has to come from a logical and reasonable one in the context of getting better.

I have a lot of fun on my stream, and sometimes I don't consider playing against players better than me fun. Then again, if I keep avoiding it, I'll never get any better, so you've just gotta do what the british do: keep a stiff upper lip and crack on.