Get out of that....uhoh

A bit of a lighter post after all the analysis, but definitely not a less important topic!

Boom! Uhm...didn't you hear us over vent?

Now...start counting the amount of times you have seen this happening in your raid.

Go ahead..I'll wait.

Ready?

Yes. Too often.

Movement is everything in the game. Don't stand in fire, don't stand in poison, do stand in the energy field Maly just threw down...Ulduar...do stand in --- don't stand in. Most fights require you to move a lot, regardless of the class you play.

So how do you get yourself to move fast enough while keeping up the dps/hps/tps? By forgetting about your dps/hps/tps for 2 moments. Yes you heard it right, I'm saying it. It is better to not focus on your primary role for a moment and get the hell out of whatever you need to get out off.

Dead player = 0 output

Got that? no dps/hps/tps at all anymore when you're dead.

Now that we got that said. Make sure that you know the fight. Every boss will be the same every time you fight him, and they will not suddenly get new abilities. (really? yes, really)

If you know when to expect effects that you need to get out off, you can build a rotation around it, cast your instants while you have to move, make sure to be prepared. (insert Illidan: You are not prepared!)

The next thing that is rather important is to not get your fingers tied up in a knot. Moving your buttons around every week may look pretty, but most of the times it's not helping you when you really need to find that one button in the heat of the moment. So know where your movement buttons are.

Also, there are several ways of moving in the game. I generally move by using a combination of my mouse and my wasd keys, but I have been getting reactions like 'what how you can not move with your mouse only?!" Make sure to find the right way for you, and get well acquainted with those buttons, you will need them a lot.

Finally, there are several class specific abilities in the game that are designed to help you get away from where you are (blink, disengage, demonic circle, sprint, etc).

Analyze, analyze, and to top it off some Analysis

Picture by: Júlio Reis

Everything you do can be regarded as a project. Some are big some are small, but from setting up a company to getting a burger at your favorite fast food restaurant can be seen as a project. For every project you need to know where you are and where you want to go, before you can look at how to get there.

If you go grab that burger you know that you are in the stage of hungry, and you want to go to the stage of satisfying that hunger with a burger. By the time you’ve settled upon a starting point and a goal, you can start thinking about how to travel the road.

To know where you are you need to analyze. Most analysis isn’t even conscious analysis, but analysis is nonetheless a integral part of decisions you make, and projects you undertake.

This is also true for improving your game play in World of Warcraft. To get an idea of where you can go, and how to get there you need to know where you are standing now.

During my education I have been stuffed with various methods of analyzing, but to me one has always remained the clearest and easiest to apply to most every situation. The SWOT analysis.

“SWOT Analysis is a strategic planning method used to evaluate the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats involved in a project or in a business venture. It involves specifying the objective of the business venture or project and identifying the internal and external factors that are favorable and unfavorable to achieving that objective.”

- Wikipedia

Within the World of Warcraft there are various ways of defining the strengths and weaknesses, but any SWOT analysis must start with defining a goal or target.

Once again don't go tell yourself that you should be doing 9K sustainable dps on your rogue by tomorrow, I've yet to discover the rogue who can keep up those numbers (Thaddius...maaaaaybe), but make sure that you set yourself an attainable goal, because nothing is more frustrating than trying to achieve something that is virtually impossible.

Once you've defined the goal, you can start sticking things in the SWOT grid.

• Strengths: What are you good at, what are the strong points of your class, your group, your guild, etc
  
• Weaknesses: What are you not so good at, what are the weak points of your class, group, guild, etc
  
• Opportunities: What are options open to you to overcome your weaknesses? Is there perhaps better gear? Do you need to move better, different addon, etc
  
• Threats:Are you using a wrong addon? Is your screen cluttered? Are you comparing with the right class/people? etc
  

Every SWOT analysis will be different depending on the situation, the class, and the person playing that character. Take also into account your personal situation, are you frequently free to play several hours or do you have a partner/family who cannot stand the game? What about your concentration? Do you get tired of playing one character too soon?

Try it at home, it will give you insight about not only your game play, but also into your character, class, and social environment.

Where?

Picture by: silviadinatale

Before I write anything about how to improve, targets, analysis, tools, and more of that sort of stuff I will speak about the starting point: Where are you now?

Every role has certain specific jobs to perform within a group environment, be it dungeons, raiding, or even pvp. Once you have it clear what your role is, you can ask yourself how you are doing at your core tasks.

Some questions to help you get going:

Healers:

• Are my assigned targets alive?
• Did I run out of mana?
• Was I capable of healing all my assigned targets?
  

Tanks:

• Are all the targets that I am supposed to tank indeed bopping me on the head? (or kneecap in the case of dranei perhaps)
• Did I do a good job in helping the healers keep me alive?
• Were there any moments that I was about to lose threat?
  

DPS:

• Did I use my supporting abilities when needed? (CC, redirecting threat, buffs, etc)
• Did I get out of places where I should get out off?
• How did I do on dps numbers (compared with others playing my class)?

Think of it as a travel planner, without knowing where you are, you can't really plan a route to get to your destination.

Which brings me to the next point. Where do you want to be?

Try to describe your goal(s) in a SMART way.

• Specific: describe your goal as precise as possible, use numbers, targets, anything that makes it very clear what your exact target is.
  
• Measurable: make sure that you have a way to measure if you're getting closer to your target, there are several tools available, but sometimes common sense helps as well
  
• Attainable: make sure that you the goal is within your control, there are simply things that you cannot possible control
  
• Releastic: your goal should be possible within the game technology
• Timebound: set a time-limit on your goal, don't set it too far out, you will get tired with it, but also allow yourself enough time to actually get to your target

Go try it, and then tomorrow I will give some guidance to tools that you can use for this.

6 Reasons why to improve your game play

In the previous post I spoke about improving. Lets have a look at why improving your gameplay is a good thing.

1. It will feel good.
If you have gotten to the point that you actually want to improve, than seeing result is one of the most gratifying things there is. It motivates you to keep going, and it makes you proud of your own achievements.

2. Your raid group will love you for it.
Let’s face it, bad players are a liability for the entire group. If you improve your gameplay, people in your group will notice and be very happy with it, because every person within the group enhancing their gameplay, increases the chances the group has for success.

3. You will be remembered.
Back in BC we had a hunter in our guild. She was one of the nicest people you have ever met (most of my guildies are pretty cool), but her game play was so bad that she was endangering the rest of the group. She got her game play up massively, and people are still talking about that, and taking her as an example to say, “See what you can do if you want to do it”. She still plays with us luckily =)

4. You will get more chances to see the spiffy content.
If you’re the best you will be asked more often to go to places. Going places allows you to see all that pretty design Blizzard has put in the game.

5. From annoyance to challenge.
When things are so hard that they seem to be constantly that little bit out of reach, it’s a challenge. When you’re nowhere near the target it’s just a pain in the *** Improving yourself often helps you to take that small step from annoyance to challenge.

6. You will get invited more often.
So, to be honest this is good as well as bad. You will have to learn how to say no, because invites can go sky-high, and if you’re not careful it burns you out as a player. But as a good player it’s you who chooses the groups you go with. And if you don’t feel like going you can just say no.

The Decision

a

“Man, I wish I could do that!”

Ever heard that phrase? It exists in many varieties, but it mostly means that someone is looking at somebody else who is obviously better at what he/she is doing than the person him/herself is.

In World of Warcraft you can hear this phrase all too often, because there is a often a clear line between the casual player and the player who has sacrificeda bit of the casual for the performance.

And there are many people in the game who have expressed the wish to be able to be better. Or I see them look at some of the top end dps and hear them sigh that they too wish they could be up there.

And they can, you can!, but most people haven't consciously decided to follow up on the wistful thinking. They have not yet made 'the decision'.

The Decision.

People all too often don’t seem to realize that being in the top of the lists takes a lot of time and dedication. And if with some rewards (gear or mounts for example) you can still say ‘it was luck’, with performance you can only depend on hard work and time investment.

There is, of course, nothing wrong with being the casual gamer who is happy with his blue and green gear items, and finds the game enjoyment in quests and the social aspect. But if you do want more, and you do want to raid and feel like you’re really pulling your weight you have to ask yourself:

“Do I want to improve?”

Consider the fact that you might not be going out with your friends tonight, but instead you will be reading up on some raid tactic, on gear choices, or on the next bossfight. You will not be going into that dungeon with your friends for the 100th time today, but you will actually stand there with the target dummy for an hour and figure out rotations.

Consider that even that hour of prodding the target dummy might not work you wonders, and that your performance might even get worse before it gets better after you're trying some tactic you read about.Of course not everybody wants to be 'the best' some just wish to be a little better, but even a little better takes a little time.

But if you can accept all that and If you can still answer the question with a ‘Yes’ then I will try to give you handles in how to improve. But although others can show you the way, you will still have to walk the distance yourself.

So, are you with me?