I was playing with my friend Marinka the other day and I thought it'd be fun to show her how PvP works. We queued for the baby lowbie bracket (level 10-29), so we would be up against other inexperienced players. Conrad joined as well. We went over our snipers' skills and I explained focus targeting. We barely had any skills at this low level but who cares, we were having fun.
Soon we bumped into this guy who was making a huge effort to enroll on my (until then nonexistent) kill-on-sight (KOS) list. I was really impressed with his pro skills to get my attention, so I thought we could all learn from him. Here's a quick tutorial.
1) Call everyone noobs when losing a match
It doesn't matter if you performed poorly yourself, as long as you're consistent. Make sure to repeat calling everyone noobs each match you lose. Bonus points for calling out the obvious when you're playing in baby bracket (where everyone is playing new low level characters and are therefore noobs by definition). More bonus points for making it more personal by calling the premade you are with in an arena noobs (after losing to a team with players of high level, but hey, that's irrelevant).
Unfortunately, many people deploy this practice, so I'm not easily impressed. I usually ignore people who do this, so I failed to acquire helpful visual examples. I'm sure you can do it, though. Consistency is the key. If you keep calling people noobs during several matches, I might start noticing you. I might even respond. Don't make the mistake to think it's a bit sad to call other people noobs in warzones: it's a vital step before proceeding to the next level.
2) Make it personal
If shouting in ops chat does not fill your needs, start whispering individuals after the warzone with helpful comments, such as "L2P" (learn to play) and "uninstall". Oh yeah, and don't forget the obligatory "noob". Bonus points for choosing to whisper the top damage dealers in your warzone.
Inspirational material
At this point I might hit the ignore button. But don't despair; there's a solution to everything.
3) Log an alt to start whispering again
I doesn't really matter what you say. Just accuse them of something. Like... they called you a noob! How dare they. You would never do something like that, right? It's alright if what you say doesn't make any sense. As long as it sounds vaguely threatening in some way or the other.
More inspirational material from the same guy
Unfortunately, I failed to capture all conversations. For instance, Conrad was brilliantly insulted with: "Your brains are the size of a peanut!" Ouch, that hurt.
4) Don't give them a chance to prove themselves
Do they keep ending up on top of the damage board and you stroll behind? You know better. They are the noobs; who believes in numbers anyway? Do not accept any duels. They might actually win are not worthy of being in your presence. Bonus points for accusing them of flaming you.
Conrad was trying to make the guy 1v1 him to let him prove we are noobs
5) Profit
You made it to my level 19 sniper's kill-on-sight (KOS) list. Congratulations!
What do you think: do you have what it takes to make it to my list?
Notes I usually hide character names in my chat screenshots because I think it's about what people say, not who they are. I tend to post them with a comment underneath why I disagree and I don't want this blog to become a place to flame and "show off how much better I feel than others" or any of the likes. I must admit I was very much tempted to make an exception for this blog post, because this guy obviously didn't mind calling us out publicly in ops chat and frankly didn't deserve the effort. Also, the chat is central to this post and is harder to read like this. But then I read Gamerlady's post Are we part of a mocktatorship and realized I would be doing exactly what she despises if I would show the character's name. I, too, don't like the current internet culture, which seems to revolve around mocking other people. I still feel conflicted about this post, but I guess I resisted the dark side at the end.
You gotta love to hate those "how dare you do stuff differently compared to what I'm expecting" mindsets, particularly when you yourself do nothing noticeably 'wrong'. It's a very childish view of the world, but then that does give us these occasional little moments of hilarity.
ReplyDeleteAs implied, picking on some of the highest damage dealers for "noob-calling" is incredibly bizarre. If what you do works - and, more importantly, aids in decimating the other team - why should it matter how differently you play your class compared to anyone else?
I'm happy I was in a group and was just having fun (hunting him down when it was Imp vs Imp certainly helped, too). I feel for people who have to deal with this kinda stuff when they're solo queueing; I can imagine it ruining someone's evening.
DeleteAhahaha...twink must mean something different in Germany. That was a funny screencap.
ReplyDeleteWow, you found yourself a real winner there...
ReplyDeleteAs an aside to Pixelkaffe's comment, Germans actually tend to use twink as synonymous to alt - fun fact. :P
Thanks for the German perspective. I was already a bit puzzled with the "twink" comment (among other things), because in normal English, (according to Wiki-Conrad,) a twink is "a low level character that you gear up with top-of-the-line gear for that level to stomp people in PvP. A twink typically leaves warzones so they don't level out of their bracket." If he would've meant "this is just a guy to stomp people in PvP", that would have made his comments even more out of place.
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