What makes a player a good captain in CS:GO?
Teams in CS:GO often suffer from a lack of good in-game leaders. We asked former professional player Matthew “Maniac” about how to become a good captain. You can read his speech below. The role of captain in CS:GO is one of the most discussed in our favorite game. While everyone agrees that it requires responsibility, investment and a lot of work, sometimes there are doubts that the CS:GO community correctly understands the qualities that a captain should have.
In this article we will try to describe some aspects of the captain’s game. Regardless of whether a tactician, a leader like a mentor, a quiet voice during a storm or a warrior, there are many qualities that are inherent to a leader. You can also further explore this CS GO case.
Preparing for the match
The main essence of the captain is to define strategic directions. Before the games, he must develop, study, prepare and show various strategies on the cards. This requires a deep understanding of the game. The leader must predict the movements and position of his opponents in order to create a successful strategy and provide for unexpected decisions of the opponent. A captain must be able not only to be creative, but also to anticipate the weaknesses and strengths of his tactics, and to improve them over time.
During the game, everything is different. The invented strategies should be used at the right moment as a logical response to the opponent’s plan and should be analyzed before or in the middle of the match. This is a complex task, which depends on the leader’s ability to solve the tactics of the opponent. Even though the analysts can provide the captain with all sorts of information, he must guide his team and give it an advantage through strategies.
Behavior during a match and the captain’s example
Even perfect preparation for a match is not a guarantee of victory. During official matches, things often do not go as expected. Mistakes happen, the opponent can be unexpectedly stronger – frustration from this will inevitably prevent communication in the team, worsen the decisions and reduce the overall performance of the team. It is extremely important that the leader always maintains a productive, motivating and decisive position. In our opinion, an in-game leader is a mood barometer that you expect from the team.
Captains should set an example to not only increase the team’s chances of winning, but also to reassure the team if they start to emit negative energy. The captain should have been the kind of person he would have liked to have seen as a team member. This mainly concerns official matches, where the performance depends heavily on the mood of the team, but it also applies to training.
Work for the future
Since practice is training, it is necessary to draw a parallel between the captain and the teacher. Although the whole team is responsible for improving and finding new solutions, we often look at the captain to understand why the team loses. Not only do captains have to be the main initiators of global change in a team, a good leader has to create the conditions for his players to train properly and find out which training process is more effective. This requires not only a lot of time, but also pedagogical skills.
There is a huge difference between knowing how to do something and explaining it to a team member. To be a good leader means to be understandable and therefore to be a good teacher. You also need to learn more about the best case to open in CSGO to get a better understanding of the game. Finally, going back to the roots of CS:GO, a good leader must also demonstrate the ability to play an important role in intense and important moments.
