When the "Best" teams are Gamblers

In the lecture "the game theory of ethics" Alan Watts talks about the Element of irreducible Rascality, the British philosopher describes a known facet of every person's character. Carl Jung called it the Shadow, Judaism calls it the Yetzer Hara, in Christianity it's "let him who is without sin cast the first stone" and in common English pop culture it's "nobody is perfect". It's not just because of the wordplay of the element of irreducible rascality that the topic fits the player Dong-Jun "Rascal" Kim but it's very much reflected in his career.  Reference video for those interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uI6bPH5H5NI Edited by Babyblu

The confirmation of another severe meta change late in the season gave rise to another round of fallacious arguments which build on a fundamental misunderstanding of what makes teams the best. The argument "The best teams should be able to adapt to every single meta" does not hold up.

Last weekend I was fortunate enough to attend the Atlantic Showdown in Krefeld, Germany. I share my experience with the event and what kind of niche for T2 presented itself for a more attractive future for Tier 2 Overwatch.

With the announcement of the powerful tool "workshop", Blizzard allows the community to creatively impact how and what is played within the framework of Overwatch. What are the benefits and is this a sign of more to come?

Mind map: https://coggle.it/diagram/W_05p8k8l8ao3fjx/t/the-overwatch-experience Two weeks ago I asked for people their feedback on Twitter on the things they liked about the game and the things that infuriated them. While the specific issues were very diverse, the underlying patterns were very similar. Here I will try to summarize the essence of the feedback and see if we can find an interesting alternative point of view to explain the experience we have.

Thanks to everyone who participated. I hope it was an enriching experience as it was for me. If you want to improve your ability consider clicking some of the below mentioned (re)sources and reiterate to make them part of your thought processes. ----------- Specific play bias The pull of the gimmick play https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iraaXJDt-rw --------- Timeframe bias https://twitter.com/YiskaOut/status/1043153322113417216 --------- Book recommendation: Nate Silver - The Signal and the Noise: The Art and Science of Prediction --------- Data set bias Specifically scrims but also mentions https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UC5DDfVLhrQ ----------------- #esportsfallacy https://twitter.com/YiskaOut/status/950622080738955265

This might very well not be your cup of tea. I will rework the content of this video in the usual approach tomorrow. Questions: Think of an offtank player that you think is top 3 in the World at the role. Got one? Okay. Give a percentage, how certain are you of your answer? If you can, remember the number. There are many legitimate reasons to hold your opinion. Let's peel away at the layers which brought you there and see how they hold up. Self-discovery --------------- 1.)Name the things that the player does very well. It could be something like having big D.Va bombs, being flexible, having great awareness etc. (ask about ONE specific thing) 2.)Can you name the three instances where you observed your player doing this specific thing? 3.)Did you observe your player doing these things in a timeframe you think is relevant? 4.)How important do you think these things are in the grand scope of the role? 5.)Did these instances occur against top competition? Outside influence ------------------ 1.)Do you hold your opinion that your offtank player is a top 3 player in the World in part because an expert, such as a player, a coach or an analyst shared it? 2.)On what basis are you considering the people experts and how possible is it that they are biased (for reasons such as playing on a team, being a fan etc.)? 3.)Have these experts given you reasons as to why your player is good and if so, which? 4.)Do yours and his reasons overlap or do you just share a conclusion? 5.)Do a majority of people you interacted with hold this opinion about your player? Ability -------------- 1.) How big is communication for the role of a flex tank in your opinion? 2.) Do you think you've been supplied with the necessary information in order to judge his level of communication? 3.)Do you think you've been supplied with the necessary tools to assess your player's level? 4.)Do you think you've put in the necessary work to have an opinion about him and other flex tanks? 5.) You chose a top 3 player in the flex tank role. Is he better than Meko, Fury, Poko or Space? Why? (the flex tanks for the top 4 finishers) Again, give a percentage, how certain are you of your answer? Write it down or remember it.

On November 15th, former pro player and streamer Seagull made the video "the state of Overwatch" which at the time of this recording has reached almost 700k views. It has rippled through the community and was the #1 post even on the main subreddit for several hours. It kickstarted a discussion about Overwatch as a game and as a competitive experience which I really welcomed. As I tend to do, I took a step back from the flaring emotions and observed it mostly as an outsider. I found there to be a great saturation of talking points and it seems to be one of those drumbeats that can cause change within communities.

For the last couple of months, both teams and the league itself have been working on improving the formula of the Overwatch League and as the result are now being revealed to us, I feel confident in saying that Overwatch League Season 2 will see an explosion of level of play on average across all teams.

Atlanta Reign is one of the first expansion teams that have given us a structure that could be a fully fledged expansion team, considering they have the minimum player amount of 8 and have a full coaching staff. They have set on a path of high-risk with potentially medium to high reward. The historic quality of their pickups range from very likely upper quartile to lottery tickets.