META GAME PT II - BLIND GAMES

There is no recipe for perfect META game. It is not enough just to follow one pattern of playing and to expect to get positive result every single time. Not even if you are playing "perfectly" because small in-game factors that are often deciding the winner can create huge difference between opponents.

The biggest problem of good players who are doing everything by the book is that they mostly fail to adapt to their opponents play, or even worse, they adapt to their opponents most popular META game when their opponent is about to do something totally opposite from that. 

I was always "impressed" how some players tend to play these "blind games". Blind games happen when two good, but not very good, players meet on battlefield which offers them to play their most popular META strategies.

Most "impressive" type of blind games is Undead vs Night Elf matchup on Legends. Undead usually decides to "adapt" to Night Elf's most popular META game. That is Demon Hunter, Archers, taking middle and when hitting level 6 pushing the Undead's base with Meta. Undead "adapts" by going for Dreadlord and creeping side shops to gain experience, making Death Knight second and adding Garg's to his Ghoul army. There is no need to mention that they both ignore each other in the early game because they rush to get into the position when they feel safe and that is hitting the peak of their META game. For Night Elf, this is DH's level 6, item from the middle and few Dryads to dispel the Sleep. For Undead it is level 3 Sleep which costs no mana on level 3, several Ghouls to distract the army of opponent's range units from hitting few Garg's which were made with intention to focus Dryads that are waking up Demon Hunter. To get there usually takes them 7-8 minutes. The big battle in front of Undead's base comes. Demon Hunter versus Sleep spell. It doesn't matter who wins in these blind type of games, right? Sometimes it is Undead, sometimes it is the Night Elf, but almost always, the loser will whine either for imbalanced Sleep or imbalanced Meta. This whine comes from their non-understanding META game and their not accepting of their own mistakes. The very next game in the same match up on the same battlefield, they will do the same because that strategy and that gameplay is their limit. When it succeeds, they played great, when it fails their opponent's race is imbalanced.

Do you see the point in here? Playing by the book and expecting to get a result is not always possible. At least not if you plan on becoming better. And thank you for that Blizzard. Type of players who play blind games are not only unable to expand their META game and to improve their chances of winning, but they are not understanding why are they losing. Instead of finding a new way to play their early game which they totally ignore, they are trying to speed up their creeping order and believe that getting an extra mana potion of Dreadlord or having two more Garg's in their army can change the game outcome. And they will always be good but never very good or the best players because their understanding of META game is very poor and they have no intention or talent or imagination or something else to improve it. Of course, same goes for all players who stick to one strategy in certain match up and believe that if that strategy fails, they did nothing wrong because their opponent's race is imbalanced.

Expanding the META game is not an easy task. Not only that you have to control all aspects of the game perfectly but you need to think outside of the box. You can't just try something crazy in specific match up if you are not a good player. First you need to cover all game parts and that is micro game, timing, map awareness, push-back strategies, battle positioning and so on to be able to improvise and to give more attention to certain game aspect, or better, to give the most attention to the gaming aspect that does better for you than for your opponent.