As players, we’ve been conditioned to “just get better” and from that to rely on skills and blame our mistakes on our execution. If you are familiar with MOBAs like League of Legends, Dota 2, or Heroes of the Storm, then you will commonly recognize this as your “mechanics” or how you press the Q, W, E, R keys. With FPS games such as Counter Strike, Rainbow Six Siege, or Valorant you’ll look at your aim and spray/recoil control. In RTS games like StarCraft 2 or Warcraft 3 you will look at your “micro” or “macro”; micro being how you command your units to get the most value out of them and macro being how you manage your economy to make said units. No matter the mechanics of your game, if you rely solely on them you can only get so far.
If I Just Did This…
How many times have you been in a position where if you just: timed casting a spell right, moved a certain way, did this, or did that differently, you would’ve won? Many times most likely. When something goes wrong it’s easy to look at the action leading up to that moment to ultimately be the reason why you lost. However what is most likely the case is that we were in the wrong position to begin with. Yes, in that one play maybe: you missed a shot, forgot to do something, or just plainly didn’t perform the best. That isn’t the reason why you lost though. You may have taken a bad path, coming toward the enemy head on instead of finding ways to flank them, or you decided to participate in a fight instead of making your character stronger beforehand, look at the overall picture rather than a small detail.
Everybody will make a mistake, whether they are professionals or casuals, mistakes will be made and they will be made often; as a coach of mine once said “Only all the time.” Lets not pretend that we can achieve a level where our gameplay will be void of any errors, because that is simply an impossibility. What is better and more consistent, is to approach things with humility; account for possible mistakes and make a plan to come out ahead no matter what unexpected things may happen.
No Such Thing As No Mistakes
I, as many others that will read this, have been obsessed with brute forcing my way up the ranks. Spending countless hours training, training my aim, multitasking, performing combos, exercising tactics, you name it, I’ve spent time on all of it. Yet despite my efforts I will meet moments of frustration when I make one mistake and it’s game over. You would probably think that if I just didn’t make that mistake, then I would’ve won. You are correct! The problem is that we are putting everything—the game—on the performance of that action. Nothing is guaranteed. When you rely on your mechanics, you are betting that you won’t make a mistake, gambling on perfection. And maybe you hit the jackpot, you may be perfect this time, but you won’t be every time.
That same coach I mentioned before said this, “Put yourself in a position to where even if you make a mistake, you’ll be okay.” This has stuck with me, and probably will for life. For once, I met a coach that acknowledges that mistakes are part of gameplay, and that was a breath of fresh air. Don’t mistake this as a form of cope or kind and comforting words. This isn’t merely just to say that it’s okay to make mistakes. What these words really mean are an encouragement for a form of thinking and strategizing. Plan your tactics, attacks, and defenses in a way that minimizes mistakes’ effects. Make it so that it doesn’t matter if you miss a skill shot, make it so that it doesn’t matter if you miss the first few bullets, make it so that it doesn’t matter if you didn’t dodge an attack, make it so that you’ll be okay even with a couple of mishaps, and if you don’t make any then even better!
We should apply this way of thinking in our everyday life, to account for the possibilities of the unexpected and create a game plan to overcome the errors we may make. The real pros don’t eliminate mistakes, only reduce their importance.