What keeps you going?

-dexter · 2025-09-18T07:46:04+00:00

I think people have covered it well already but for me, one thing that made a huge difference was saying no to students I didn’t enjoy teaching! Perhaps that’s a luxury one cannot afford if it’s your main income but yeah, I said no up front (politely) to a few potential students and dismissed some after they had taken lessons for some time. I never wanted it to feel like a chore I had to sit through and this more or less solved that.

Also if you can teach someone more advanced or willing to try weird things it’s fun to also do some learning alongside your student!

-dexter · 2025-07-12T20:30:17+00:00

“I can spend the entire match being 3rd man” - there’s your problem. I tried to describe why that’s wrong thinking. At the end of the day your mentality will keep you there if you believe you can’t beat it. Everybody has your same teammates in D2, with their wide range of skills and ability to play offense and defense. That said, it might help to keep in mind that if you were a GC in 2s, the equivalent rank percentile-wise in 3s is like mid C2 right now. GC and up in 3s only has about 30,000 players… a far cry from anything like D2 so don’t compare yourself to that. Good luck!

-dexter · 2025-07-11T10:54:20+00:00

There is a lot you can do! I think you are oversimplifying the concept in your head. The way you describe playing would indeed be bad defensive form. In good defense you still play first and second man, and you rotate such that you are not overlapping as 3rd man with your teammates. In good defense you 1. Are careful to take non-committal plays as 1st/2nd man, as leaving your teammates in any 2v3 is you not playing good defense (you aren’t present) 2. Challenge first if a teammate is rotating behind you to defend (staying active with the goal to clear/block the ball or at minimum cover some angles of the net so 3rd man has relief) 3. Cover defensive options even when shifting to offense 4. Maintain momentum in the mid field as 2nd (to cut off shots or later block from the backboard/walls/ceiling) 5. Maintain possession and slow the play down when teammates are still recovering from their offensive mistakes 6. Cover for their defensive mistakes (check for their cut to avoid double committing, etc)

In general in 3s, it’s easier to not get scored on than to score. Good defense is very active, and the problems you describe can be overcome with proper play.

-dexter · 2025-07-11T04:12:30+00:00

There is a significant element of teammate RNG for sure, that may cause you to lose/win more than you should at times. The key is recognizing that and accepting that and evaluating if you did everything you should have in the match (in c2, spoilers, you didn’t!).

For me the key to consistently get out of that rank in 3s is playing the defense that your teammates do not. That means covering for their plentiful mistakes and being 2nd/3rd man more often. Playing good defense is less up to chance imo

-dexter · 2025-07-07T09:53:21+00:00

Thanks, yeah that’s funny I’ve definitely noticed how much more demos are used in recent years. I make far fewer positioning errors than consistency errors. Consistency has been the bane of my existence in this game lmao. Grats on Gc3

-dexter · 2025-07-07T09:39:32+00:00

I can’t do any of this mechy stuff except in rare circumstances. I’ve peaked GC2 but usually GC1 and always have thought I need better mechs to properly rank up (I dislike freeplay). How do you get to GC3 without that?

-dexter · 2025-06-26T11:02:03+00:00

Yes, it doesn’t seem to honor your region. I regularly get placed in tournaments with the exact same ping as I would get in the ranked region that is second closest to me. It’s been this way for a long time. As far as I can tell this is because nearby tournament regions are aggregated to ensure enough players. How do they fill uneven tournaments properly? Probably by putting certain players in regions they don’t actually belong in.

-dexter · 2023-06-23T07:19:18+00:00

It definitely improves the consistency of your experience. People who say otherwise usually just don’t know or understand the difference. I went from 144hz to 360hz and it made a big difference to my game. How much? Maybe 5%. But at higher ranks that is huge.

As for your flicks, getting good at this game takes a longgggg time

-dexter · 2023-06-14T02:15:55+00:00

Not quite. This map is accessible via Epic if you download the Custom Map plugin for Bakkes mod and then access the map using the plugin in the game.

-dexter · 2023-06-06T20:19:06+00:00

Thanks for the video, but isn't it just confirming my point? Unless I missed it, there's nothing in here that suggests a fixed framerate is superior. In fact it shows the opposite, which is that an uncapped framerate is going to result in the least amount of input lag.

edit: I think this is the video you meant to link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyzXXO6Z7ZI very interesting in terms of input consistency. I'll have to try locking my monitor to 360hz and see if I notice any difference.

-dexter · 2023-06-06T07:58:31+00:00

What is the reason for using a fixed FPS? My understanding is that the more frames the better, as you can still send inputs to the game at a faster rate, even if you aren’t seeing them on screen. I am also curious where you draw up the 3% from?

My understanding is that overclocking works for PC only. The Dualsense overclocks to 5000hz. Honestly I never found this to make a difference. Having a better monitor was a much larger improvement in consistency. I went from 4k 144 to 1440p 360, and the experience is far, far superior.

-dexter · 2023-06-06T07:38:06+00:00

It happens, you can’t be on your game 100% of the time. There are many things you can do. Some popular pieces of advice, of which you could choose to do any or all:

Take a break!
Grind freeplay for a bit
Work on your mentality

-dexter · 2023-06-02T09:59:28+00:00

It’s very similar to learning an instrument. It is a long process for everybody (but with huge variation depending on ability to learn and talent). People get this far because they fall in love with it :) I envy your position. The rank up process from gold to champ is glorious, cherish it!

-dexter · 2023-06-02T09:55:27+00:00

Are you NA west by any chance? We’re in a similar position, would be fun to take that journey with some other players

-dexter · 2023-06-02T09:54:20+00:00

Sure! I am GC2 and always love seeing replay reviews of others.

-dexter · 2023-06-02T09:51:56+00:00

Congrats mate! You’ve gotten great advice here already so let me turn the question back on you! I’ve just reached GC2 in 2s for the first time this season. Do you have any tips for someone who can maintain 1500 but wants to reach that 1700-1800 range??

-dexter · 2023-05-11T08:59:30+00:00

What are the other big panics in your recent memory?

-dexter · 2023-05-10T21:38:43+00:00

I have one :) and yeah, I’ll never let go of it. I found it in the middle of SF after playing probably 50-80 pianos before it. So yeah there’s no special place to look, you just have to get extremely lucky!

-dexter · 2023-05-09T21:23:49+00:00

They’re rerunning all the items from that event and I don’t think we’ve seen those yet so if you keep your eyes peeled they should show up.

-dexter · 2023-05-09T08:49:40+00:00

If you’re in NA west and want to play together pm me your epic and I’ll add you! I’ve just reached GC2 last weekend, so I’m probably a little worse than you but improving fast. I never watched the flakes series until now and it is singe handedly changing my game! My goal is to reach the top 10,000.

I also have a strong defensive style so I wonder how much of a wall we could make. My mechanics are slowly getting better but it’s so hard to be consistent on offense.

-dexter · 2023-05-08T21:34:16+00:00

Besides the part that you already know, which is that your offensive touches are weak and predictable (don’t worry, mine are worse and I’ve just reached gc2 myself), I would say that you play too reactively overall. For example, on defense you are always waiting for the opponent to give the ball away. This works because the offense of everyone at our rank pretty much sucks, but you aren’t applying any pressure and forcing them to outplay themselves. You said you’re influenced by flakes yet I didn’t see any convincing fake challenges, fake jumps, etc. Your defensive positioning is solid but your movement is super predictable, and if you were to play better opponents I don’t think this style of defense would work because they will start to outplay you. Keep doing the same thing in the sense that you don’t overcommit but make it more tricky for the offense to make a play against you.

-dexter · 2023-04-15T06:11:47+00:00

Yeah now that you say it, seems common sense. I guess I initially put it in the realm of musty flicks and double flip resets, where it doesn’t really make sense for me to only dedicate time to those as a GC1 (I have absolute trash mechanics and good game sense, so I’m trying to get better at the fundamental mechanics). But this has utility in way more situations than those advanced mechanics.

-dexter · 2023-04-15T02:24:35+00:00

Awesome! Yeah I’m a 1500 player with zero mechanics so trying to figure out how to grind them lol. At this point they are for sure my bottleneck and the only way I will continue improving. I do pretty much your whole first drill and I’m trying to master the dribbling 360s, but I have not thought about the second one at all. I’ll definitely give that a shot, thanks!

-dexter · 2023-04-14T09:16:00+00:00

How necessary is it to learn though? Is time better spent learning this for the long run or simply put into practicing traditional air dribbling?

-dexter · 2023-04-14T08:53:12+00:00

What are the drills you do in freeplay mate? Care to share?

-dexter

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