I'll put the "Skills" section in another post so people aren't scared off by the enormity of this post. The skills section will help you to understand and improve the skills a gamer uses and which proffesion/build you fit best in Guild Wars. Firstly I will introduce myself. My IRL name is Rohan, I go by the name ProRage in most games but for unknown reasons I use the name Phant in Guild Wars. I've become 'pro' in several competetive games, but I've always thought to myself... How did I get there? And so I spent some time thinking about how a gamer's mind actually works and what the skills required to become 'pro' are. Currently studying Sports Psychology, being a state 100m, 200m and hurdles sprinter and a descent tennis player I have experienced and learnt the psychological factors that help you to become a 'winner.' So, being the inner nerd that I am I figured that the psychology of an athlete in Sports is very similar to that of the psychology of a gamer in eSports. And thus is the point of my article.
I have written, or rather typed, articles about "The Skills of a Gamer" for many games such as Cod4, CS:S, Dawn Of War and even Jedi Knight. There is, however, one game that I have been playing for a number of years that I have not written this article for and that is Guild Wars!!
Not many people actually understand the immediate psychology and the incredible human skills/intelligence behind gaming (Yes that's right, if you are considered 'skilled' then you are considered intelligent. Even if you did flunk school). From writing these articles I hope to further develop the quality of our gaming community and inform the population about the little things they can develop/improve to make them better at gaming.
In this article I will list the psychological genres that are required to be a good gamer and the human skills used in gaming. Your 'skills' alone are no longer sufficient for the production of becoming the best. You must have a strong pshychological mind! You will be surprised how strong the human brain is and how much of a difference using it to its full potential makes.
First comes the Psychological genres, but before I get into that there is just one thing I would like to clear. Most people will read this article and think, "Yeah man, I'm the best at all of that stuff " or "I'm the most intelligent gamer there is." But here's the sad truth, you're not
. You have to remember that everyone is thinking the exact same thing, and you can't all be the best... I am only trying to help you so please be honest with yourself. You really need to be open-minded to make the best use of this article. I don't care if you lie to everyone else because that's a good confidence booster but to make the best use out of this article be as honest to yourself as possible. For the sake of this article let's just pretend that you are a complete and utter 'noob' at everything I list.
Psychological Genres:Mental Toughness: Mental toughness is the ability to think and feel strong and determined even in the face of setbacks, pain, failures and self-doubt. Confidence boosting, in my opinion, is the quickest way to scaling the mental toughness charts. You need to beleive, realisticaly, that you are unbeatable and you can overcome ANYTHING. You must never put yourself down and think ONLY "I can do it, I can do it, I can do it, I can do it." But don't get too carried away with confidence because you also need to accept criticism from your 'coaches' and always come back with the response "Yes, I will be the best next time." You might come to me and say "Oh but Phant, I tried to be mentally tough but no matter what I do I just keep failing." Well I would reply "GET TOUGHER!" You will know when have reached the pinackle of mental toughness because you will literally beleive you can accomplish anything through sheer determination, and because of your determination you WILL succeed. Never have doubt and always beleive you can make a comeback!
Motivation: This one is a biggy, and beleive it or not one of the hardest to overcome. Motivation is the psychological feature that arouses you act toward a desired goal. Without motivation you have no purpose and with no purpose you are gaining NOTHING. I have no problems with getting motivated for gaming practice because...well... it's games, they are fun. I doubt most of the gaming population has troubles getting motivated to do something they enjoy. However the issues where motivation comes in is doing practice or having to repeat something you no longer enjoy doing or as some gamers call it "grinding." You must always think to yourself "For the greater good!" I can pretty much gurauntee that no form of practice, no matter how little, is useless. All practicing or boring grinding will help you to acheive your goals in the end and thus you will be victoriouuuussssssssssssss!
Concentration and Focus: Focus is the complete attention to the excecution of a skill. When you are completely focused you will experience what is called a 'flow' which is basically just the immediate product of your focus e.g: completely focusing yourself as an infuse against a spike team. From complete focus you will be able to pick up on the spike as quick as possible enabling you to react as quick as possible. Many gamers experience what is called 'choking.' This is the result of someone incorrectly focusing on their task causing them to experience a state of shock. Choking actually happens because the player is letting massive amounts of negative thoughts infect their brain waves which deteriorates the quality of their skills. Another major issue with focus is 'tunnel vision.' This means that the player is so intensely focused on one minor sub-task that they are forgetting about their overall duty. For example, a ranger who should be interupting a mesmer or ele whenever they can who also needs to spike occasionally. The ranger will be so intent on getting their skills off at the right time that they will forget to unterrupt the midline, causing major problems for the team. Both of these issues happen mainly because the player is spending to much thought power on other things and not enough thought power on the task at hand. To overcome choking and tunnel vision you need to enter a state of Zen-like meditation in which mood, distractions and different stressors simply have no place in your consciousness. REMOVE THEM FROM YOUR MIND! But do not use up all your brain power trying to remove them
. With enough practice at the game you will eventually be able to do things smoothly and instinctively and without thinking about it. Thus gaining immunity from the foul diseases called choking and tunnel vision.
The qualities of concentration are as follows:
* All your attention is focused either:
- On the skills or routine being performed.
- Or on the input from your senses relevant to the activity.
* You are fully focused of the activities being performed, and are:
- Not aware of your own awareness or consciousness of yourself or ego
- Not evaluating the quality of execution of skills during performance.
- Not concerned with distractions such as results, judges, audiences or other people expectations
- Not making any conscious decisions in your mind (this comes with practice) or reasoning with words.
- You are trusting your body to follow the routines. Trusting yourself is crucial.
* You are in complete control of your actions and reactions.
Decision Making: Good decision making is an essential skill for success and effective leadership. Good decision making also removes that sense of confusion from your mind, giving you time to think about other things. If you can learn to make timely and well-considered decisions, then you can often lead your team to spectacular and well deserved victories. And of course as a prerequisite for good decision making you need to have an adept knowledge of the game you are playing which comes through practice. All of us have to make decisions every day. Some decisions are straightforward and simple such as: should I bring RC or LS on my bar? Others are quite complex such as: should I join the split team now or should I go back to the main team?
Simple decisions usually need a simple decision-making process. But difficult decisions typically involve issues like these:
* Uncertainty - Many facts may not be known.
* Complexity - You have to consider many interrelated factors which may result in clouded thoughts.
* High-risk consequences - The impact of the decision may cause damaging consequences.
* Alternatives - Is there a better or similar option to make.
* Interpersonal issues - It can be difficult to predict how the other team will react.
A logical and systematic decision making process will make all these issues easier to deal with which will result in a quality decision being made. By taking an organised approach your mind will be less cluttered and you will find that your process is much more smoother and rewarding.
There are six steps to making an effective decision:
1. Create a constructive environment in your head.
2. Generate good alternatives.
3. Explore these alternatives.
4. Choose the best alternative. (Experience will help majorly with this step.)
5. Check your decision.
6. Communicate your decision, and take action based on the feedback. (Sometimes it is best to communicate the alternatives and let other people have an opinion, but other times it is not.)
If you would like these steps in more detail just ask me to explain them. Problem Solving: Effecient problem solving will help you in many situations in Guild Wars. For example, you are monking in the main team in a GvG and there is a pblock mesmer sitting on your ass. Thus you have a problem and you must find out the best way to solve this problem. That of course would be to get your ranger, warrior or even mesmer to sit on his ass. As I said, effecient problem solving will lead to effecient results. Firstly you must never let yourself feel intimidated, if your guild is rank 2000 and you are versing a rank 2 guild then do not let yourself feel intimidated. Simply beleive that everyone on your team is just as good, if not better then everyone on their team and only then will you be able to confidentely solve problems without a cluttered mindframe. One technique I learnt in a most interesting lesson was called the '5 Whys' which I also learnt was developed by the good old Toyota Production Team. Basically the '5 Whys' will lead you to the root of the problem. By asking yourself a 'Why?' question you will get an answer which will prompt a another 'Why?' question and the answer to this 'Why?' will lead to another 'Why?' question etc. This technique usually gets to the root of the problem by 5 'Whys?' and by the 5th 'Why?' you will have a simple solution. You will need to extract all relevant and useful information from the situation to successfully solve a problem.
Stress Management: High pressure situations is a common thing for gaming. These high pressure situations usually lead to excessive stress. Learning to deal with stress will not only improve your quality of gaming but it will also reduce long term stress effects. The best way to deal with stress is to always feel confident with yourself and never let yourself enter a state of aggression. Aggression is the main problem with stress, you get angry with yourself and then become angry with everyone else. Remember DragonBall Z is just a cartoon and rage won't solve your problems. To overcome stress you need to be breathing deeply but not heavily and you need to have clear thoughts. Keep your mind working at a slow pace and know that YOU are in control of yourself. By managing stress you will find that you can control your inner rage much easier. The only difference with rage is that you are effected by internal emotions rather than external factors. Learning to control your emotions will also lead you to a stronger mind. It's quite simple really, just be devoid of your sub-conscious mind and beleive that you are too strong to be effected by emotions.
That's about all I can help with in the psychological department. If you have any more questions or want to know anything else about the psychology of gamers just PM me on here or send me an email at:
rohanthepro@gmail.comI'll put the "Skills" section in another post so people aren't scared off by the enormity of this post. The skills section will help you to understand and improve the skills a gamer uses and which proffesion/build you fit best in Guild Wars.
