Ways of Knowing regarding Gaming

Language
No one starts playing a game knowing the rules, how it works, what to do and when to do. Everyone needs to learn either from someone teaching him or her, or just having a read over a tutorial.
When it comes to learn how a game works, you should first acknowledge that among all the different types of games, there may be similarities, but they are usually going to be pretty much different to one another.
I have watched many videos and was taught by brazilian friends (who were in the highest levels).
I have studied the game through both visual and verbal language. I used to watch videos made by professional players who were either in the highest ranks or played competitively (They usually talk about what they are doing while they play). I also used to converse with some friends who were pretty close to that level (a few of them were even in that level). They showed me things, they told me things, they gave me tips, advices, they basically tried to convey to me their own personal knowledge in order to make me have either the same or most of their knowledge about the game.

Language is a good way to learn things. Even watching a match, you would still acquire knowledge out of it, through reflection on what is going on in the match.

Memory
To be at least a good player, you will need to remember the crucial things about it. Any information that would let you improve or get ahead of others (become better than them) is crucial for your development, especially when the game has millions of players all around the world.
The more you remember, the best you do at it. You need to remember everything you have learned throughout your journey playing that game. Every single detail counts. The one who remembers better all the situations he or she has been through, will struggle less when they get to be through a similar or the same situation. In addition, the one who remembers more things, will be better, they will have more knowledge than others, and thus will be able to exploit the lack of knowledge the others have got and end up benefiting out of it.

In the game League of Legends, there are about 140 characters. Each of them has its own different combos (Usage of different abilities (special powers) they got), and by watching many videos of professional players, I have learned some pretty useful combos for different characters, which I ended up using at sometimes or just once, and this helped me to get successfully out of bad situations in the game and turn them over into neutral or even pretty good situations.

Imagination
If you want to become one of the best players, you need to be always trying to think about a new possibility that could eventually happen during a next match you will play. If you are prepared to the unexpected, you are ready to deal with something new that no one else would know how to deal with. You could even invent a situation that you could create and set up within a match in order to do it yourself and get your opponents surprised, since they would never expect it to happen.

People usually reflect a lot to create new ‘’plays’’ and new combos. They do also reflect a lot to create new ‘’metas” (meta is what is currently worth or the best thing to do/use in the game).

The more you imagine random things that may be relevant, the better you may stand out with your new tactics, techniques, combos and metas.

Reason
There is a thing called game knowledge. Emotion, memory, intuition and reason can be applied to game knowledge.
Game knowledge is what a person has learned about the game, every single detail counts.
Usually, the players in the highest ranks use this to measure how good a person is at the game.
Many players are not mechanically good, they are not deft players, but they have still got game knowledge, which makes them being ahead of many other players.
Through the game knowledge, you will know when to do something, what you are able to do, what you can do, what is the best decision to take at a certain moment.
Through the knowledge you built up throughout your journey playing the game, you are able to recall things and take the smartest decisions.
There are times when you have enough time to think about what your next step should be, and this is where reason comes in, you will need to think about which is the most logical decision to be taken (and more likely to end up in a good way to you).
The most logical decision is going to be based on the facts you know about the game, so the most reasonable thing to do is what you will always want, but there will but times you will not have enough time to think, you will be required a quick reaction.

Emotion
A person who has played a game for quite a while will know better how the game works, and so, he or she will be able to predict certain things and know what might occur, since this very thing may have occurred before in a previous either similar or equal situation.
The person will be used to almost everything in the game, by having experienced a variety of situations. The new events will not be ‘’so new’’, since one can always find similarities even among situations which are not precisely equal.

When you get no time to think, and you need to react pretty quickly to a situation, all you have at this moment is your emotional part of game knowledge. Of course, if you are new to the game, you will not feel what is wrong or right. But when you have been through very similar situations many times, you will kind of feel ‘’this is what I should do’’, and you will not even think, you will react immediately based on how you are feeling at this very moment.

People tend to get very emotional when playing, and this may be either good or bad. Some people will be affected in negative ways, by taking the wrong decisions, since they cannot see someone in low health, for example, they will try to chase this opponent down and will find the entire enemy team on his way, getting beaten down. But sometimes, if you really know the game, you know all the risks you are taking, and you are not only doing this because you are a greedy person, you know all the measures that you should take under different situations you can potentially get into if you proceed with a risky try (has to do with imagination and memory as well), then you may experience the good taste of having challenged danger and effectively achieved what you wanted, because your emotional side of game knowledge told you that if you did some thing, you would be able to do it successfully.

Example : I was playing a character called Lucian. He is a pretty weak champion with regards to tanking damage (it means he can easily die due to low health). I have done a ‘’play’’ where I took a high risk because I felt it would go right. I had about 20 health, whereas the enemies had around 2000, and there were 3 enemies. I was on real low health and I just had one ally by my side at the moment. I still turned over on low health and killed the three enemies, since I knew from experience that I am strong enough (in terms of damage) to beat them down quickly and they had spent all their abilities on me previously, so they had nothing to deal damage on me still. But this all was in a frame of one second, I did not think, I just went in and engaged a fight which would be logically likely to be lost (in the few time one would have to think about which decision to take).

Intuition
Many times when I am playing, I suddenly think something is about to happen, but at the very moment, I do not have in mind the reason.
From experience, we learn in both our conscious and unconscious parts of the brain.
We are not always trying to think about the reasons, why we think in some way, but sometimes we just know something is pretty likely to happen.
Our unconscious part of the brain reminds you from previous experiences that a certain situation will end up in a certain way, and sometimes, it may have a pattern.
When your opponent is weaker than you, and he or she suddenly starts acting aggressively against you, you may suspect there is something going on.
This may be related to reason, but sometimes you do not think logically, you are not always going to analyze each situation with huge efficacy, thoroughly.
Of course there is a reason behind, but as days go on and you keep on playing, you will begin to know things will happen, and will not be remembering the specific reasons. (If you rewatch your match and get to think, you may surely find a reason, but we tend not to think, as we get used to things)

Sense Perception
There are games we can play by talking, but most games include the sight factor. We usually need to see things in order to play a game. Some games require more attention, others less.
League of Legends is a game which requires a lot of attention. The way one views the environment of the game may be the difference between being a good and a bad player.
There are lots of possibilities in the game when it comes to vision, you have a whole map, which is called Summoner’s Rift, where the matches take place. There is a division of this map between blue and red team, where one side of the whole area belongs to one team and the other half belongs to the other. The matches allow 10 players, 5 for each team. Each player from a team receives a lane (a route), they are called Bot Lane, Mid Lane, Top Lane and Jungle.
On Top Lane there will be one person from each team fighting, the same on midlane. On Bot Lane though, there will be two people from each team fighting. The players on Jungle will gank (go to any lane and try to help an ally to kill their enemy) the other lanes, since the two jungles are located in between each lane.
In order for the Jungler (player on jungle) to gank any lane, he or she needs to have a good map awareness, which means they need to have a good control over vision, they should know where the enemy jungler is at all moments, and where all the other laners are at all moments too. The better one hides itself and knows where the opponents are, the better the person tends to be when he or she tries to gank a laner. It may be good even just to play safely, not letting the opponents roam around to help their team.
When you have a good control over vision, you are able to protect your allies through knowing where your opponents are, so that you can easily get to their location and counter whatever they try to do.

Example : There is one person on the blue side of Top Lane, another on the red side (the enemy), and the jungler from the red team goes to Top Lane and attempts to kill the blue side's top laner. Since I have vision over the enemy’s jungle, I know he is going there, and so, I do also go there and do a counter-gank, trying to help my ally to stay alive, and maybe kill one or both enemies exploiting their mistakes.

There is a thing called mini-map, where you have the whole map (the environment where the match takes place) in a reduced version. The actual map is way too big, you cannot see the entire space at once, you need to roam around and see part by part. The mini-map allows you to view the most important details over the map, especially where the enemies are close to.

Not all parts of the map are visible. There are areas called ‘’fogs’’, where your team is not allowed to see unless they place a thing called ‘’ward’' around that area. Ward is a feature that provides you vision in a certain range. Fogs are usually located where there are walls or bushes, mainly within the jungle. Fogs may also be located where there are no allies.

The game provides us with a feature with which we can communicate with our team in an efficient way. We can ping on different parts of the map. There are different types of pings, signaling enemies are missing somewhere, signaling there is danger around a certain area, advising to take care and so on. The pings are both visual and auditory, so if you are not too attentive, you do not need be looking at the map the whole time, your allies may see something you have not seen and help you by pinging close to you to be careful. If you still do not see the ping, the sound will surely make you pay attention, since it is kind of catchy and loud.

There is a sort of connection between the player and the character, since you are moving the whole time, and you will get used to these movements. When you get so used to these movements, you may feel these movements by pressing the keys which make such movements occur.

The way you hold the mouse and press the keys is really important. If you hold your mouse in an uncomfortable position to you, you are not likely to have the best results. If you press the keys randomly you will have completely different results to if you feel your thingers working together with the keys and if they are positioned well and favorably to you. Everyone has its own set up, but the more comfortable it feels, the better it may suit you when you get to play.
The speed in which you press the keys may also be a crucial detail, if pressing the keys in a certain pace and order is not easy for you, and you decide doing it without accuracy, precision, the results may be catastrophical.

Faith
Everyone has its own play style. What may work to one person, may not work to another. Some people trust that they should follow what is nowadays considered the most efficient to do, the ''meta''.
Copying play styles from others, do work to some people, it helps them developing their own as time goes on.
The most important thing all players should know is that no matter what, they should always believe in themselves. If they do not, they are more likely to be defeated, to lose, to do bad.
They will not be likely to reach their maximal potential. Over all my career playing the game, when I saw a person who was completely confident he or she would accomplish something, it did happen.
Nothing can prove that if you believe in yourself you will accomplish great things, but it is something that has already happened, is happening, and will probably happen.




Why am I a reliable person ?

My mere opinion and knowledge about gaming may not be relevant, I am a normal random guy talking about something that is not even taken seriously by most people.

What makes my opinions and points of view relevant?

I have been both studying and playing the game since March, 2015, mostly every day. Even when I did not play, I tried to study it, through watching videos of professional players, talking to my friends who were in high levels and so on. I am expert in this area. I have not played many games in life, but through the few I did, I have learned important lessons, and how important they may be for us to acquire many different skills, and how we can gain from nice reflections on the experiences we have had while playing them.
League of Legends, the current most played game in world, has got 11 servers, for each region around the world. Each of these contain its own system of rank. I am part of the highest ranks.
In addition, not only are these things the way I see gaming, but they are facts I have experienced.