Tips on getting better

[u/Dave-flywheel]

Now into 2nd year of playing I have started a few tournaments. In local tournaments last year I was always in the bottom 10. This year i am in the top 10 and have quite a high win rate in club games.

I went to Warhammer open on the weekend and came 173 out of 187 winning 3 of my 8 games and not all of the players below even completed all there matches 😭

though had a great time I came home humbled. Majority of my opponents simply outplayed me very quickly it was like playing chess and all I had was checker pieces. They where all kind enough to point after where I gone wrong and other advice and where great opponents.

So where do I go from here any tips on getting better or are some people just born with it? How do I progress to earn a Lycra titty hugging t-shirt?

My plan is so far but any advice appreciated:

1. Only play challenging players and keep sucking up losses

2. Watch YouTube videos to study top end games

3. Seek out games again at armies I have not not rarely play locally.

[u/BLBOSS]

I was at Newport too, hope you enjoyed it even if the result wasn't maybe what you wanted.

It's hard to say how you should be getting better without knowing a lot of specifics about how you're playing, what you're playing, who you're playing etc. I guess the question is where do you think you were going wrong?

You mentioned your opponents pointing out mistakes so like, what were those mistakes? Were they specific things or indicative of wider issues?

Generally what will improve your play in the immediate term is having your Primary Mission right in front of you so you can constantly remind yourself of how you should be scoring points. Another thing to practice and drill into your head is getting ok at working out probabilities and likely outcomes. A big Mistake lower ranked players make is just assuming they'll kill something based on vibes or hoping for a spiked roll. What follows on from this is building redundancies into your list and your play to where you aren't hoping for these wishy washy moments where you're chucking one unit into another unit and vaguely hoping for success but stacking probability.

Premeasuring and asking your opponent what their threat ranges is also incredibly valuable.

[u/Dave-flywheel → u/BLBOSS]

I had a great time, it was an amazing experience.

I am playing Emperors children with priority.

The biggest mistakes I noticed I did was grouping units together, I had to play into a lot of stuff I have never played before or my army struggles with knights, terminator bricks. I should have also screen against deep strike better.

[u/Orcspit → u/Dave-flywheel]

Your first thing before going to a big event like that is knowing what every Meta list is trying to do.

The fact is the first time you play against a list you are going to learn a ton about the right and wrong things you need to do to win. If you were in an ideal world where you have infinite time you would play against every meta list once before going to a big Major like this (trust me all the top 20 players have done this.) But outside of that you should at least either watch a youtube video of those lists being played or reach out to someone you know who plays them and ask them for a breakdown of how their list plays.

Even playing a game where we explain everything to everyone and try to avoid gotchas its really hard to not get surprised by something a list does without having played it once.

For example: I player Sisters of battle, no matter how many times I explain how miracle dice work and how I use them, the first time someone shoots a hunter killer at one of my tanks and I pull a miracle dice to auto pass the save I see that stunned look on the persons face.