Comp tips (Destiny)

by CruelLEGACEY , Toronto, Wednesday, October 23, 2019, 12:19 (1641 days ago) @ CruelLEGACEY

While the comp playlist isn't all that different from any of the standard quickplay playlists, I've found that I did need to shuffle my priorities a bit. Here are a few of the important things I found, or key mistakes that I've witnessed in the past couple weeks:

* Controlling the heavy spawn is an absolute must.

With the current rules in the survival playlist, Heavy ammo spawns quite frequently. Almost without fail, round after round, game after game, the team that wins is the team that is able to hold and control the heavy ammo location. The first heavy ammo spawn happens quite early in the match (30 seconds in, I think?). Your team needs to be assertive in taking control of the spawn. All too often, I'll see 1 team take a hesitant or passive approach, while the other, more aggressive team will make a strong push and secure 1 quick kill. Now it's 3 vs 2, which usually leads to the weaker team retreating and simply handing over the heavy ammo, or contesting and maybe scoring 1 kill before the stronger team clears them all out, costing them 3 of their lives, and the heavy ammo. It's very rare that any team will come back from that.

* Don't play passively

Of course, you don't want to start the match by mindlessly rushing into enemy fire. You need a plan of attack. But even if that plan is "I'm going to use a sniper rifle and camp this lane", do it assertively. Pick a lane where you know the enemy will be coming, and you are fairly confident that you will be able to get the first kill, and get it quickly. The whole "I'm just going to hang back and see what they do" approach almost never works. Keep in mind that the sort of decisiveness I'm talking about can still include running away. I've pulled off many easy kills by getting an enemy to chase me to a point where I can turn around and get a clean shot with my fusion rifle as they come barreling at me from around a corner. The point is, whether you're the one attacking or retreating, you want to be the one setting the tone, forcing them to react to whatever it is that you are doing.

* Prioritize objectives

It's important to be familiar enough with the rules of the Survival game mode to know how to act around them without needing to stop and thing for too long. For example; there is a timer. If the timer reaches "0", and 1 team still has more lives remaining than the other, that team wins by default. So, if there are 15 seconds left in the round, your team has 1 life remaining and the other team has zero, it behooves your team to hang back and run out the clock (if you can do so safely without making yourselves into an easy group target for an enemy super). On the flip side, if your team is down in lives as time runs out, you need to push aggressively and try to score a kill to force the "sudden death" event. If both teams have equal numbers of lives when time runs out, a control point spawns. First team to capture the point wins. So, if my team has zero lives, and the other team has 1 with 15 seconds left, I'm going to make a push to try and score a quick kill. Even if I die and get knocked out in the process, the "lives remaining" score will be tied, meaning my 2 remaining teammates still have a chance to take on our 3 remaining opponents and possibly pull off a comeback.

Another example of prioritizing objectives is thinking about heavy ammo vs the sudden death capture point. I played a game a few days ago where all players were knocked out except for 1 guardian on each team. My living teammate had control of the heavy spawn location as the round timer was getting close to zero. Realizing that the capture point would soon be coming into play, my teammate decided to abandon the heavy ammo (which was due to spawn in about 5 seconds) and get into position to capture the control point. Bad idea. By abandoning the heavy ammo, he let our opponent claim it uncontested. And by running over to the control point and standing in it as it spawned, the enemy knew exactly where my teammate was, and shoved a rocket down his throat. These are the kinds of decisions that cost games on a regular basis.

* For god's sake, use your supers

I can't count the number of times over the past couple weeks that my team would win the first couple rounds to gain a healthy lead, then lose one round... and another... and another. All this time, I'm looking at my teammate with his full super meter, and wondering "what exactly is he/she waiting for?". They didn't use it early on to push our lead further, they didn't use it to shut down an enemy super when they started rolling out... Even as we're down 3-2, and they're the last player standing, and I'm watching them from my death cam and screaming at the TV, they just don't use it. Seriously, use your supers. Even if you just get 1 easy kill. Even if you just trade kills with the enemy. Use it. There's absolutely no excuse for taking your super to orbit with you. All it will do is cause you to lose games that you might otherwise have won.

* If you're not a 1-person army, pick 1 thing and do it well.

The thing about a 3v3 playlist is that each individual player is a very important part of their team. If you try to fight the entire enemy team at once, (I'm gonna out-snipe this guy and deal with this shotgun rusher and out-duel the guy flanking with Mida) then you'll probably get overwhelmed and lose. Even when the teams are even (3v3), a team of lone wolves will need a substantial skill advantage to overpower a team who have a cohesive approach. If you're playing in the "Freelance" playlist, this can be tough to work out. You have to spend the first round or two watching your teammates (along with some educated guesswork based on their loadouts) and then try to fit in accordingly. But if you are going in as a team, you really do want to work out a general plan of attack.

For example; When I made my final run up to 5500, my fireteam went on a fantastic win streak not because any of us are that great at the game, but because our playstyles complimented each other and covered each other's weaknesses. My one teammate was a good sniper. Not god-tier, but he could competently handle most enemy snipers that we came up against, winning more duels than he would lose. Meanwhile, I've gotten to be a bit of a specialist with my Erentil (I have a few disgustingly good rolls of that thing... it really is too good). So I can usually beat any shotgun rushers, as long as I don't have to worry about getting sniped in the process. I'd pick a tight lane where I was relatively safe from being flanked, and try to draw in a rusher. Our 3rd teammate would usually stay near our sniper to cover him, but push slightly forward with a scout or hand cannon. With this approach, we were able to secure the first kill in almost every single round we played together. With the first kill secured, we'd close in from our respective sides and pinch the enemies.

The key is that I put myself into positions where I could focus on close-range fighting without fear of being sniped, while my teammates covered the longer sight lines without risking a shot-gunner surprising them. Doing this properly requires some pretty good map knowledge, and even then things will go wrong from time to time. But the general approach of putting yourself in a position where you have a good chance of winning 1 specific kind of gunfight while your teammates cover the other approaches will be enough to get past most teams, short of running into those few god-tier players who can do everything perfectly and never miss a single shot.