Just watch the demo thinking about why you acted in that particular way.
Then ask yourself if there is some better move you should have done

what if I can't find a reason why I acted that way? then what?

then analise its outcome.

if you dealt damage, got frag, shifted control etc etc - it was good move. if not - it was bad and dont repeat it.

better dont watch them

watch the demo with a wallhaack enabled so you know what the enemy was doing when you were doing whatever.

how do you know what your opponent is doing? I mean, even if I see what he's doing, I won't necessarily know exactly why he was doing whatever he did.

Well, i dont know how true that is for others...but if you see pros play you sometimes go like "hey, he cud've done that" or "why didnt he do that, what a n0b!" and so forth...just go for it like that...like mega comes up: oh damn, i didnt even contest this mega, neither the last 10 megas...i need to fix that...my enemy takes away my megas way too fast. hey dammit, i never pick up rail...hey dammit...i always ignore the YA...its quite simple (in my opinion)

I think there is as well a command where you can turn on the item timers which would help analyzing your demos...not sure tho. :(

do you use the very same thought process analyzing your own replay? because when you're watching pros, you kind of expect them to make logically good moves everytime.

i would, if i was watching my replays, i know from my former games that i dont need to analyze my demos to get good...i doubt much players do it either. i just see it like that...watch your demos for an hour...or play for an hour. what would get you better ? probably the playing. (just for example) yet its my opinion though

if i want to learn from watching demos, i watch pro demos...but not just one player, check different players, check the styles and stuff they do...it helps more in my opinion. Otherwise its just all - play play play.

Thats what all the pros did as well, they just played all day, someday they just became better than the average player, and after another while they got quite decent and started out to win one or another online tournament, while people did still doubt that these people would ever become big...i think (if im not completly wrong here) strenx is a good case for that.
I have a hard time believing this either, but just play and you will start noticing what you did wrong and whatsoever...i have a nice duel mate, i usually have a very hard time against him on Aerowalk, i played it first time against him like a month ago, i played Aero against him yesterday again and i didnt even had to try hard to win by like 15+ frags...and i didnt analyze anything, i didnt get any *supercrazyspecial* tips either...

just...play =)

but how do you know your mind is in the game when you're playing? that's the problem with me because while I'm playing, I'm thinking about other games, chess. etc. and I kind of draw connections from that game to this and I don't see huge improvement from doing so. or maybe I'm doing it wrong? Another problem with me is that I don't really ever enjoy the games I play, it's sort of like a chore. But I want to make this a fullfilling chore. How do you enjoy a chore?

don't analyse yourself at all.

Use the time to logically think through what you should do in a situation and why. While also logically thinking through what your opponent should do and why.

Those 2 things should lead to a new situation.

repeat.

If you can't seem to find any "why" then play a few times altering your choice in what you do in that situation... you should be able to find something after a while.

It might take a while though... some of the "omfg that's how it works" moments take years while others only take an hour or so ;p

this

also, alternate between watching your demos and pros' demos
play more
analyze more
eventually you'll get your mistakes

why consider what my opponents should do if they made a good move on me already?

you don't have to assume they made a good move on you?

Just take any situation and look at it from both players. What should player 1 do, what should player 2 do.

If you don't know the answer -> try to reason your way to an answer.
Then, next time you play, you try to use the answer you came up with when you're in that situation....

1) If something unexpected occurs then you try to reason as to how that could've happened. And you especially try to see if (whatever was unexpected) influences either player for the better.

2) If what you expected happens and it's negative for you... then try to do something which is less negative for you next time you're in that situation or don't ever get in that situation ever again :)
If what you expected happens and it's positive for you... then get in that situation more often ;)

so pro players have analyzed most situations there are in this game, therefore they play at top level? what can you surprise a top player with?

you'll find out if you think about it long enough :)

watch them back and constantly ask yourself, why am i doing that or if you see yourself get into a bad position rewind the demo to see what you should of done to avoid this. You'll start to notice in your game you have a lot of repetitive errors and hopefully you can begin to avoid them.

I think it was DDK who said that quake dueling is basically pattern recognition, if you can learn the patterns of situations you start to play better and do everything naturally without thinking.

A good idea is to watch a lot of streams and focus on where players move, angles they shoot and jumps they do in game.

Once you get good at watching demos back and learning from them, you'll start to do it mid game as well, and change your tactics mid game, This is partly what separates a pro from us =).

is quake chess? you've used 3 terms related to chess. But interesting take.

That's thinking backwards though.... the patterns emerge because you understand things.... And because you understand you're a better player and you don't have to think about it. It's not that learning patterns makes you a better player.

A lot of people try to "learn" quake by watching demos and then infering things from that.... But that's just fundamentally wrong.

You might improve to around 2k elo... or slightly above if you have tallent for aim / movement. But you'll never get higher unless you really understand how/why things work.

It doesn't matter which way you do it. All that matters is input for your brain. In the end, as you've said, it can take years to finally "understand" what you're doing.

this is hard to explain... but it certainly matters how you do it.

If you watch demos and take notes etc and go through a lot of trouble to understand why someone makes plays. You end up with a kind of decision tree.
Where you have one layer of "if this happens then" followed by the next layer.
So say you get "If map = ztn" -> "if I'm at nade" -> "if he's at ...." -> "if red is up" -> "I should do......."

While if you deeply understand the game you just..... know. Sure there are if's etc... but they are not bound to any specifics.

It's really hard to explain heheh :p

I'm kinda at a loss for words on how to describe it hehe....

But like if you take cypher and put him on any map... and let him run around for a few minutes.
He will know virtually every angle there is on that map and which weapons will work at which spots etc.
If you take rapha and put him on that he'll deduct almost all possible plays. As in "I can catch him here when he takes blabla", "I can catch him there if he does blabla2".

You don't need to play the map first..... like hmm when t7 came into ql... I walked over t7 for a couple of minutes before I played it. First game I played on it was vs someone who had around 20 duels played on it (and he was/is known).

He thought I had practised the map like mad :p
But he's one of the player who learned quake by analysing demos...

It's really hard to explain though :((

That's of course true. This is probably the goal you want to achieve.
But as you said, the whole thing is pretty much impossible to explain (real understanding of how stuff works).
All I wanted to say with my reply is that there are so many different approaches of how you can reach that goal, that in the end all you can say for certain is: you need input. Some kinds of input are more efficient than others of course, but that's up to you to find the input that works best for you.

although I do agree with you, as he's a new low rated player he needs to learn this way of playing first before he can think about moving onto the next step. He can't analyze a whole game and multiple options at all times right now, he needs to learn the simple style which isn't perfect but puts him in the right direction. just my opinion ;p

you always think about the next step.... no matter how shit or how good you are.
Playing is just inspiration of which steps are left to take. The better you get the harder it becomes to see other steps though.....

If you suck then just thinking about a few situations can already fix a ton of mistakes. Because "according to yourself" you'll make a right decision ingame by doing something -> you get destroyed -> hey I didn't expect that let's see why -> you think about it for a while -> realize why -> fix it in your playstyle -> become a better player.

When you're "good" but not "great" this also becomes kind of difficult as sometimes you're so good in the execution of a certain "wrong" thing that you actually become worse while you work on changing it (as your execution will be crappy at the start).
But if you start doing this while you're not so good... most of the realizations immediately help you to be better.

Noone's arsed about your opinion

wtf! next lan i see you at m8 i'm doing you over.

fu bitch :D

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CHUMBZ UR ALIVE

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COME SEE ME SOMETIME

what if there's a book that explains all situations that occur in this game like the quake encyclopedia? You would study it so then the next real measurement would be how good you recognize those situations right? so like the guy below, it's all about pattern recognition

then you'll definitely lose all games to people like me. :)
There are always counters to every move you make.... as long as I know for sure which move you're making --> you'll end up fragged.

But in order to understand that.... you'll need a shitload of thinking about why, what works :)

this. theres no absolute solutions, only relative ones

The problem is I don't know why there are reasons, logic, for moves in quakelive, what separates a lower rated player from a GM who is considered a genius? a person with a profound understanding of every aspect of the game? that's how he's so good? theres no chance or luck involved? I feel like there's fundamentals about learning that I don't understand.

this cant be real :|

what seperates a pro from a noob are the fundamental basics, which are aim, movement, items and weapon-selection. mind-games come naturally. psychology also plays a role in the sense that it can pull your game down if you have a bad temper

I once felt overwhelmed by duel and I think I know how you feel. For me watching streams helped a lot. Casters do a good job of explaining the basic logic all the time.
As for analyzing replays in my opinion its best to focus on a few (1-2) simple things on one watch. Did I play too aggressively when the enemy was in control? Did I rush rail and get killed many times from spawn. Did I show up to keep track of timing of items and/or deal damage? Maybe you got a kill but failed to capitalize on it, why? These are simple things that are easy to look for in a demo and then you can improve on them in the next game.

I'll be honest though I am seeing some very intelligent responses. I will put your ideas/methods into practice right away, not only in this game, in application for other life pursuits. It's funny how much analogy can be found in this game.

If not already doing so, /timescale option is useful in slowing the action right down.

I use it to take my time over the bits that draws me in the most, usually the situations where I thought I was sure for a kill but ended up dead or playing back the moments when I was impressed at the opponent.

Freecam mode can be also useful to better view the dynamics in positioning for yourself and others.

As of late, I find it very helpful in analysing the better players that I've come across, it seems to improve the games I then go on to play.

analyzing better players made you better? did you analyzse youself first?

nobody realized it's a troll thread yet

50€, saying it isn't

What if I systematically dissect a pro game play for every 10 seconds interval I will pause the demo and then analyze that 10 seconds using Weird's method to figure out what each player are doing or should be doing without a pro analysis. I will do this entirely on my own. I hope I can extract the pattern recognition benefit.

I wonder if this is something a low level player could do and really see gains after doing for a while.

I would not advise that... just play a lot and think about the game a lot (as I described).
You'll figure out how it works and how you learn from it as soon as you start trying it ;)

are you sure this approach works? i've been playing for like 4 months now and my duel is still crap

4 months is nothing. keep playing before you get all technical. I doubt you have any real gamesense yet

The problem now is that I am "playing" incorrectly and it might take a while before I can see any mistakes I make.

thats fine and normal. you wont get anywhere without going through the initial learning process figured out

you will need like 4 years mate..., just keep playing if you enjoy the game !

Figuring out how something works seem so one-dimensional though. What works doesn't mean it can work in any situation. Variables such big gap in rating/strengths.

I mean figure out how to learn. Not figuring out something that works / doesn't work.

And yes I'm sure it works just focus on what you expect to happen and see where that expectation fails.

At the start you'll mess up a LOT. But as soon as you understand the situation from your opponents pov you can start to understand why situations go a certain way.

what if I have good understanding about the situations I'm in but have poor mechanics? Would I still have a winning advantage against someone with no knowledge but has the mechanics?

You mean like having bad aim / movement?
Well if you understand the situations better than your opponent you can always catch him at a place where aim / movement doesn't matter too much. (on large maps this is easier to do than on small maps)

Good aim / movement does help though as they allow you for more good situations.
Say that you hit 30% lg and your opponent hits 45% then that means that you must have 1/2 more armor+hp than him. As for each 100 dmg you deal he'll deal 150.
So you just need to factor that in ;) But I've beaten many people who had better aim/movement than me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkED2PSrl1c

10 years too late on this questiion.......go back to call of duty on console kthx bye

You never fail to shitpost on every thread in this forum.

I look at the flag before I decide whether I'm going to take someone seriously.

Yeah, it's nice that he has a flag that's so easy to distinguish from the rest.

don't watch every game. play more, and when you feel bad after a game, feeling you lost because of a mistake or you feel like something went very wrong, watch it to figure it out. It helps to know what you're looking for.

So rely on this feeling to guide me

I don't think you'll have much success.
You can hardly follow the simple suggestions made in this thread.

I guess I'm trying to say.... you're a fucking idiot!

That's productive, One thing that I do have mastery over is not reacting to smart people.

yes of course, a flag would be a great indicator of intellect

memento should make a tutorial out of that quesiton :D

why memento?

cuz he is teh master guide

but was it a good movie aside from that?

what we see at lans is just his avatar, IRL he's green and shorter than ins

:p

do it like the pro's do: fap while watching

Judging by this thread, Cooller and the gang were lucky all these masterminds never attented ESWC/IEM/DH/QCON.

such masterminds, wow, much analyse

what do you mean by this? not sure about the relevance? But I'd like to meet Rapha and cooller or maybe even fatal1ty one day to talk about business merge.

i jus make sure i am hitting all the autofire rails

and if i am then i am happy

cus playing the game and thinken u hit autofire not mean when you view the demo you actually hit the autofire

but i always hit the autofire so it ok

I guess autofire kinda aims for you then

Is this scala's second account?

i asked a similar question a few weeks back... might help
http://www.esreality.com/post/2537014/analyzing-demos/