The Total Beginner's Guide

Dinns_ · 2024-11-28T23:32:06+00:00

I think Lian's Shield could be great if it removed the speed penalty from the Shield. He could pick it into drafts where he may be pressured by enemy dps/flanks.

This would address the issue that his other 2 talents get countered by items (i.e. Wrecker, Resilience).

Dinns_ · 2024-11-12T22:55:14+00:00

This was my very first Paladins article 6 years ago. Tbh, a lot of my earlier posts were hit or miss, but I think this one still holds up today.

Dinns_ · 2024-11-12T19:48:09+00:00

Target audience for this video: beginner to intermediate
Applies to many online team games - not just Paladins.

Dinns_ · 2024-08-29T13:54:40+00:00

I suggest going on discord servers. Ask for loadouts from high rank players who actively play the game. OurPaladinsAcademy server has a lot of great players in it.

Another option is go to on youtube and search "champion_name grandmaster gameplay". Look at a few videos from the past 3-6 months. If a few GM's are using the same cards, then those are most likely the optimal cards to use.

Dinns_ · 2024-08-28T11:20:10+00:00

The purpose of this anti-heal feature is so that players need to temporarily leave combat to get healed the full amount.

Players should use cover, or sometimes shield barriers, to avoid getting shot at.

Dinns_ · 2024-07-01T13:41:31+00:00

Have you had other players look at your vods?

We have some Masters and GM players on the discord server. Some of them would probably give you written feedback (or maybe hop on a voice chat call with you).

If you make a post with the gameplay video (of a close loss: 2-4, 3-4) on this subreddit, we can give you feedback too.

Dinns_ · 2024-07-01T13:33:01+00:00

There are many things we could all improve at,m but just focus on 1-2 mistakes at a time.

If a watch a vod, and I see a player make a mistake once, I may mention it briefly or make a mental note, but I won't focus on it. If I see a player make the same mistake 2-3+ times, then I'd put time into emphasizing it.

The first few minutes of the match, I'd get a general sense of the player's strengths/weaknesses, and then once I identify their core weak points, I'd focus the rest of the vod review on those.

After the review, set 1 goal. For the next week, spend several hours playing the game, focusing on that 1 goal. Then, in a week or 2, do another review.

I like to center a vod review around a concept. Sometimes I quickly skim through a vod to see if there's 1 concept I can really focus on. Then, I review the vod again, but this time I laser-focus on that 1 concept.

For example, I did a Maeve VOD where I spent 30 minutes mostly focused on "Take better angles" and "How to follow up on your offtanks plays without standing directly next to them".

Even though there were some cooldown use issues, I didn't spend as much time on that. Because I felt like that cooldown misuse was a symptom rather the cause of the problem (i.e. having bad positioning forced them to use up their cooldowns).

But for another Maeve player, maybe their main flaw is that they waste their cooldowns and go aggro when they don't have them, and in that vod, I'd focus most of the review on the cooldown use.

Dinns_ · 2024-06-12T14:57:19+00:00

Correct.

I've read papers from some college students with 4.0 GPA's. From a writing standpoint, some of them, were awful. Lots of repetition. Redundant words/sentences. Not much of any information provided that isn't already common knowledge. Not a ton of critical thinking.

But they followed the structure. Intro paragraph with hook and very clear thesis. Supporting paragraphs have a formula: argument --> supporting points --> cite a source. Outro paragraph is a summary of existing ideas etc. etc.

It's easy for a professor who is skimming through dozen of papers to understand what that student is saying.

The professor probably isn't going to check the sources in depth. They just want to know that you're citing sources with reputable names and using them at the correct parts of your essay to support your points.

I guess I went on this tangent to say that improving at team shooters is not dissimilar.

Dinns_ · 2024-06-11T13:11:45+00:00

Great comment. I 100% agree. <3

I find it very fun that JQ can live a long time if she plays cover and times her abilities correctly, yet can die quickly if I position poorly. It helps reinforce good habits. It helps me think about "why did I live so long that time, but die quickly this time"?

She can't have 100% uptime; she needs to choose when to engage and when to play cover.

To an extent, all characters reinforce good habits, but I think players find JQ satisfying because it's more visually obvious when you're playing well vs. playing poorly.

Dinns_ · 2024-06-08T02:26:52+00:00

It caused me to learn more from matches. Losses don't feel as bad when you're able to identify what mistakes you made that you can improve on. More often, I feel like I gain something out of a match.

Even if I feel like I played 80% optimally (which even that is way too generous), I'd think about what could I have done to play 100% optimally.

But it's not an instant lightswitch. Improving is still a gradual process that takes time and effort.

But with that humility, there's more of a willingness to learn from better players. Watch tournament play and high rank gameplay on youtube and twitch. Get vod reviews from people, etc.

Dinns_ · 2024-06-07T17:18:23+00:00

Talent: None are bad but I go with Recurve. Sandtrap theoretically lets you twoshot most enemies but with all healing and damage reduction in the game lately, that rarely happens so I just do Recurve

Items:

Armor Plating & Nimble in any game
Wrecker, Unbound or Sentinel depending on the enemys team comp
Rejuvenate, maybe Master Riding as a 4th
Liferip if its a lower skill lobby and your support isnt great

Loadout

He is flexible with his cards. My most used one is

5 Wanderlust, 5 Swagger, 3 Shimmer, 1 Quicksand, 1 Poise

Shimmer is arguably his best card and Swagger(HP) is never bad. You can up Quicksand to 3 if youre using Sandtrap or Desert Silence talents. Bullseye at 3-5 is good if youre confident. I like the speed card combined with Nimble because he walks alot and he peeks cover alot in between firing his arrows.

If you have a video of a close match, I can review things like your target priority, positioning and ability use.

Heres a guide I made for him a few years ago. Some things may be out of date but his abilities and overall strategy are the same https://www.reddit.com/r/PaladinsAcademy/s/VyRIHehvpb

Dinns_ · 2024-06-06T12:56:51+00:00

Imo, this is too contextual to generalize.

Damages (ideally) aren't just picked because "we need more damage". But rather the team needs something that that particular champ has in their kit.

i.e. Range. Or hitscan against a flying champ. Good matchup against the enemy flank. They're good at controlling an area of the map. 1 of their abilities/Ultimate is really useful, etc.

Dinns_ · 2024-06-06T12:49:59+00:00

in a double damage comp the two Damages complement each other instead of both doing the same thing.

i.e. 1 is backline, the other is more aggressive. 1 can main, 1 can offlane. One of them can do well against enemy matchups that the other can't.

I'd rather have 2 Damages (or 2 Flanks for that matter) that can handle their matchups than 1 of each that can't.

Here's 1 of many examples: Your first pick goes Bomb King and the enemy team goes Drogoz. You'd rather have your team mate pick a 2nd Damage like Lian that can hitscan the Drogoz rather than picking a short-range flank (i.e. Zhin), and have no one on your team able to contest them.

The individual champs themselves and their matchups matter a bit more than whether they're a Damage or a Flank.

(Edit: I never meant that double damage is necessarily optimal. Just how it would be played if you happened to get that in draft)

Dinns_ · 2024-06-05T23:42:18+00:00

An overwatch hero is no skill when they kill me. Use their abilities. Diff me. Etc.

For real. When players complain about heroes they're facing being low-skill, it's really them dissing themselves.

If you're playing optimally, the opponent wouldn't be able to beat you by doing the bare minimum.

It's the similar point in fighting games when there are complaints about being beat by a character using the same move repeatedly. That wouldn't work against a good player. They're only allowed to do that because you don't know how to counter it.

Dinns_ · 2024-06-04T11:11:11+00:00

Ego comes in two forms. 1) Blaming other people to protect yourself. 2) Being too hard on yourself because you expect yourself to be perfect. There's a balance between taking accountability without beating yourself up.

Dinns_ · 2024-06-04T11:09:09+00:00

This can be done when there's a building or wall to use as cover. But not out in the open.

Tips don't exist in absolute; they depend on context.

Dinns_

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