AOE and The Importance of Reflection

I recently rediscovered Age of Empires after many years of not playing, and I discovered a fairly large, vibrant community of people who still play, and I've started playing online. This is actually the closest I've become to a "gamer", as I've also started watching recorded/commentated games online in addition to playing a good amount. [As an aside, I never used to understand what the appeal was in people like Sam Li watching recorded games, but now I understand].

I was listening to an interview of one of the top AOC players (I think it was FeAge) by ZeroEmpires, and he asked FeAge if he had any tips for getting better. FeAge gave the following two tips -

1) Play against people that are as good or better than you.
2) After every game, spend 5 minutes and think about why you won or why you lost the game. 

I've been practicing the second tip, and while it might not seem like such a big deal, it has actually helped my game tremendously. Thinking about the one or two things I did right or wrong and either applying or avoiding them in future games has helped me improve dramatically. I've improved from being a "Super Noob" with twice as many losses as wins to simply being a "Noob" with as many wins as losses (though I definitely had to win much more than I lost to get here). I didn't realize at first how much I was improving until I realized that I had jumped much higher in rating than I ever thought I would. At first I thought this was a fluke, and that I must have just gotten lucky a few times, but after a while of maintaining my rating and outplaying players of lower rating, I think I can say with confidence that my rating isn't a fluke.

I've always assumed that just playing the game a lot will somehow automatically make you better at it, and to some extent, that's true. Joshee once mentioned to me and he was frustrated with someone who had played LoL for a long time and still wasn't very good, and I remember wondering to myself if that guy was just incompetent and kind of stupid. But now I guess I've realized a bit more that to become a better player, there needs to be some intentionality behind it and improvement doesn't just come by "playing a lot". Either that, or I'm just stupid and not as talented as everyone else.

Obviously, this lesson on reflection can be applied to many different arenas in life, and this practice of reflection has also helped me specifically in my ultimate play. But whatever. This is an AOE post, so here are some of the random reminders and tips that I've picked up that have really helped my gameplay:

• You are going to need to transfer your villagers from one resource to another, so don't be afraid to do it. Start sending your lumberjacks to seed farms once you have your extra Town Centers up. Don't wait until you've saved up a ton of wood to do it. You'll end up with too much.
• Start trading before your gold runs out. When it runs out, it will already be too late.
• When playing Turks, don't forget that the Light Cavalry/Hussar upgrades are free. They make for a great meat shield for your Janisseries/Hand Cannoneers.
• Don't be afraid to ask for help from your teammates. If you need resources or military support, ask immediately.
• Do your military upgrades before you need them. Especially the upgrades to Champion. Those take a while.
• Don't forget to make siege. Good use of siege seems to actually be the difference between noobs and better players.
• Anticipate what your opponents are going to make, and make the hard counter to them. Don't forget about Hand Canoneers and how much they tear through infantry.
• Build an extra Blacksmith or two to get all your upgrades faster.

There was a time when I thought that any decent RTS player who decided to pick up AOE could still beat me because I simply wasn't very good at AOE, but not anymore. So if there are any of you people out there who still play AOE or want to get back into it or want to challenge me, hit me up so we can Wololo together.

Defensive Killer Instinct

I'm watching the Knicks-Heat game right now, and I just noticed that Ronnie Brewer is guarding Lebron James. I wonder what that feels like. I wonder what goes through his head when Lebron has the ball.

Thinking about it, the mental game is huge for playing defense. You need to really believe you can guard the person you are on to do an effective job of it. In sports, when we say that a player either has or lacks that "killer instinct" and the "ice in his veins", we mean that he truly believes that he's going to make the clutch shot, and that belief helps him make it. It isn't that if someone believes hard enough, they'll make the shot all the time, but believing it allows a player to more effectively use his skills and talents to make a play. We don't usually associate this mental strength with defense, as we do with offense, but I experienced how important this "defensive killer instinct" is first hand recently. I'm talking about the need for that reckless, over-confident belief that you're going to shut down whoever you guard and the eagerness to defend the best player on the other team

I experienced this last weekend playing in a small ultimate tournament here in Fort Wayne. Those of you who've played sports with me, you know that I take pride in playing good, hard defense. I always truly believe that I can shut down whoever I'm put up against, no matter how much better they are supposed to be. As I've played ultimate here over the last few months, I've noticed that I've transitioned from a more defensive player to a much more offensive player, as I was slowly reacquainted with the flow of the game and the movements of the game. Offense just became more fun for me to play, as I began to really believe that I was unguardable and was just faster than anyone guarding me. And maybe I still felt that way towards the people I was playing against, so I just got used to poaching more and helping on defense (translation: I played lazy defense).

So last weekend, we brought a group of people we play pickup with and played in a small 5-team tournament. In one of the games, we were playing another team who only had 6 players. One of their players is a kid who currently plays for the Indy Alleycats (the "pro" ultimate team - he's number 37). And I was scared of him. Luckily, I didn't need to guard him, and the super-stud on our team decided to guard him the entire game. I've never been good at guarding the give-and-go kind of handler guys, because I always feel like I'm a step behind, so I had a horrible feeling when we got switched up on defense and I was all of a sudden guarding this amazing player. This happened twice in total, each for probably around 30 seconds each time. And I did alright - I don't think he threw or caught a score in that minute that I was on him, but guarding him for that thirty seconds felt like forever, and I was totally spent after each time.

In reality, he's not that much faster than me, and I didn't run all that much when guarding him, but it really seems to me that the "This is not good" repeating in my head just made my body shut down. I really can't describe it. In my head, I really didn't want to be in that situation, and my body seemed to respond accordingly. I felt tired, probably more tired than I actually was or should have been. I think I was physically capable of playing him competitively, but my mind told my body after thirty seconds "I can't do this; I can't take it anymore", and so my energy just seemed to disappear with my morale.

So I wonder what it's like to defend Lebron. I wonder what it's like being put on Kobe in the last minute of the 4th. I think this is what really makes guys like Kobe and Lebron great defenders. They know and believe that they can take you. That's part of why guys like Shane Battier and Bruce Bowen were as good as they were, despite not necessarily matching up physically to they guys they were guarding.

But don't worry guys. I'll get that mental strength and defensive confidence back. I actually think I only lost it for ultimate, and not basketball. So next time we ball, expect good defense and hard fouls. No easies.

"All this is, it's fun to me. There's no pressure in it. There's no fear. A lot of guys, I think, when they match up with other great players, there's a fear of embarrassment, you know, to guard them, afraid that they might make you look bad. I really don't care. It's just fun going up against them. If you're playing a great player, of course he's gonna make you look bad at some times, but that's part of the game. It is what it is."

- Kobe Bryant in Kobe Doin Work

Check out my sweet 2-inch vertical. Oh by the way, we went undefeated in that tourney!