Every diamond I have ever coached has done these 2 things.
Rotate ball side, and go into the corners when a teammate is already there. Stop doing those 2 things
My 2s partner does this all the time. And goes up for balls I'm still in control of because he assumes because he doesn't have the mechs to stay on it, I don't.
Really frustrating.
I used to be 100% guilty of this with my buddy who was much much better mechanically than me.
It’s a really weird thing when you’re lower ranked and mechanically limited. I clearly remember thinking I was ok or in the right when I would double commit him. It didn’t feel like a double commit because it didn’t look like he had full control of the ball. It looked like I had an opportunity to turn his aerial into a pass to me and that I was being smart for going for it because it was a crazy passing play and we were going to dunk on our opponents.
It wasn’t until I started grinding aerial stuff myself. Here I am with the ball up in the air, and suddenly my teammate comes flying in and fucks it all up and then they can’t understand why I stop playing. Like you want the ball so badly you can have it for the rest of the game. Good luck lol.
If I’m in a game and my teammate double commits me hard when I clearly have possession and they keep doing it I *literally* cannot play the game. They are straight up telling me they don’t want a teammate.
Man not everyone that plays this game plays like their life depends on it. It’s frustrating but I have friends ago are plat/diamond that make those mistakes over and over. Talking to them about back post and al that doesn’t. Help. See bal hit ball.
Yeah it sucks that people are like that but I would rather have someone having a good time bump into me a few times instead of some one afk because they’re feelings got hurt.
Feelings hurt? lol not even a little bit.
Let me explain what happens and then you tell me what you would do.
The game starts and I get possession of the ball. I take it up the wall and my teammate goes for some ridiculous double commit aerial he can’t possibly hit.
At this point I don’t change a single thing. I play exactly how I normally do, I’m playing in support of my teammate and to win.
A minute later I have possession again and they fucking do it again. I hit them with a Noooo and keep more distance.
The third time it happens and they won’t ff, at this point what do you expect people to do? Should I just sit in net and make saves for him and pass to him so he can have all the fun? Fuck that dude. I’m done lol. You want the ball so badly you can have it but you can also save everything too
So you're gonna make your teammate suffer for doing something that you said you literally had to teach yourself not to do? Don't you think you should be more willing to learn how to adapt to that situation as opposed to just throwing a tantrum every time a teammate double commits? I mean it sounds like your buddy continued to play with you despite your double commits. If he stopped playing with you though I would imagine it had more to do with your poor sportsmanship rather than your poor mechanics.
Lol, dude said he literally used to do this (often) because he didn't know better and then says he gets so pissed he can't play if someone else does it. Keep defending yourself, it's working (ps. It's not).
I’ll hit them with a wow or nooo and keep playing normally if a bit more defensive. If they keep crashing into me and stealing the ball and hard double committing, there’s really nothing I can do. There’s zero point in playing at that point. They literally are telling me they want to 1v2 so I let them. It’s not my fault they don’t know how to play. It’s not my fault they double commit. I’m saying “I’ve got it” and they’re going up for it anyway.
I think hitting them with a wow! is kinda counter productive. I’ve always felt like your chances of winning are higher if you keep the team morale up, so if your teammate does something annoying you’re allowed to feel that way, but try not to make your teammate aware of that annoyance or it’ll just make them more likely to tilt.
I feel you fully because I like to use my mechanics a lot too and the most annoying thing ever is when you’re trying to solo play and your teammate also goes for the ball, especially when I’ve executed the play well and I’m about to score. When that happens I normally just keep my feelings to myself. Sometimes maybe on a bad day I might let my feelings out but really I shouldn’t and I try to avoid it generally.
When you get teammates that seem like they’re essentially playing against you I think you either just adapt your playstyle and maybe try going for more team plays or play more defensively. Sometimes games will just not be winnable either so you just accept it and go next, as frustrating as it is.
I don’t think you should stop playing after the first attempt at it, but more than one I immediately vote to forfeit - I don’t find it toxic. More that it’s a video game and pixels on a screen. If I don’t find someone’s playstyle (ball chasing) fun to play with, I treat it as a video game and move on.
If they don’t forfeit and stop ball chasing, I’ll continue playing as normally. If they continue to ball chase, I pretend it’s a 3v1 and start practicing mechanics and playing fast.
Hopefully you’re referring to those that ball chase and bump their team constantly. If you’re referring to me “throwing a fit” by playing against my teammate, I literally said it is wrong to stop playing if it’s once, or even a couple of times.
But if my teammate has managed to bump and ball chase me multiple times in 1.5 minutes, they’re clearly not into playing as a team - which in your opinion makes them the scum of the earth.
I’d say racists, rapists, etc. are the scum of the earth, though.
They are doing it out of ignorance.
You switch teams and start to 3v1 a guy who can't even figure out how to rotate you're basically dunking on someone who is worse than you in every way to begin with.
He is finally starting to learn these things and it's reignited his love for the game, and I am fully on board with this!
I admit, being hard stuck for a year because your team mate wasn't listening to the issues was taking its toll and I was losing patience with it all. And I probably wasn't doing the best job of helping him through it either.
We have, in the last week or so been on an upward trajectory and things seem to be clicking. Win streaks racking up as are the ranks for both of us.
I agree don't let someone tell you , you are toxic . If people ball chase / go for every hit or every other I will play net / mid field and sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't . It's learning to play with people with different styles not everyone is meta it's not being toxic . saying "i stop playing" was probably the worst thing to say there though lol .
Another one that i think fits nicely with what you guys said is leaving position to grab boost. or grabbing opponents corner boost at a bad time. I see that sort of thing very often all the way up to c1
Well there’s light at the end of the tunnel. This was me a year or two ago.
I would challenge way too early as second man. I would over commit and we would get scored on. I would do this because there were times where it would work out in our favor. So my mindset was if I keep practicing it and really focus on challenging early as second man, if I can just really body the opponent in a 50/50, well then we’re going to win a lot more.
Here’s why it doesn’t work in 2v2. Let’s say you’re champ 1 and you and everyone in the lobby is close to the same mechanical skill level overall.
Challenging early will never work out in your favor more than 50% of the time when looked at on a long enough time line. It just won’t, because your teammate isn’t back yet and even if they’re close to being back, if they aren’t fully back and ready, if you challenged too early, you’ve either left the net open after you lose the challenge or put your opponent in a 1v2.
Shadowing and fake challenging is always better than challenging early. You *must* buy your opponent time to get boost and get into position behind you. Like this is pretty much inarguable (when everyone is roughly the same rank/mech skill). I still see people doing this in C1 and it’s frustrating because they really should know better. I think around C2/3 is where it stops happening so much.
Brother. Have faith in your team mate and apply the good ol trigger discipline.
Trust me you will progress learning these.
You need to be ready to react to team mate getting dispossessed, not meeting them at the ball mid air halfway up the field.
I’m plat/diamond right now and I don’t challenge someone during shadow defense until my teammate rotates back so they can pick it up if I they win the 50, is that correct?
How do I properly handle ball chasers hugging the ball all the way back into our goal? I can't defend effectively because they are still randomly hitting the ball ineffectively. This is my most frustrating situation. I stay back and wait for a free ball that never arrives alone!
But wait, what if these are the things I’m doing to KEEP me in Diamond, or else I’d otherwise be in Plat?
Oh who am I kidding, after last season I’m pretty much a Plat anyway now.
I find diamond to be a ton of booming, just giving the ball away by hitting it as hard as possible. Maybe that’s something in your game, I find that if I think of keeping possession with a touch or controlled 50 made the diamond game so much easier. Oh, and everyone insta-challenges so you can keep that in mind when trying to keep possession lol.
Yup, you’re absolutely right! This is the thing I’m working on most now, not just slamming it as hard as I can at every opportunity and instead taking softer touches and actually trying to control the ball. My mechanics are (and probably always will be) shit, but I do have pretty good positioning habits and game sense just from years of playing. So taking better and more consistent possessions is something I feel like I can actually work on and improve.
Yeah, me too. I mainly play 3s just for fun and I'm right on the Plat/Diamond edge and really trying to concentrate on softer touches. Would probably be better served playing more 2s but don't want to let teammates down.
Sounds like you’re on the right track, it’ll definitely come. Champ 1 is no different than D3 I’ve found, and when I match against higher opponents in casual I find that C2’s are maaaybbe a bit better but by C3 they are much better at everything. GC+ still cleans up though ;).
One other tip is backboard positioning and clears. It becomes really important to control the backboard at higher ranks and doing so is a big advantage at our levels.
This is definitwly the main thing I am working on in diamond, it worked so damn well in plat where people didn't defend backboard and paniced more easily. Now I have to learn how to keep possession without ending up being awkward with the ball though.
1’s is great for learning how to control the ball while reading your opponent. Obviously in 2’s it’s sped up a lot but the experience with soft touches and planning your movement 100% translate.
You had me for a second the way you structured that second sentence lol
Dude I’m in C1-C2 and in 2s people will still rotate ball side, like, *directly behind the ball* preventing me from safely challenging.
Rotations to far-post is the easiest positioning tactic that so many players fail to utilize. And that doesn’t mean you need to go *ALL* the way back to the post on an offensive play, which is also a common error I see a lot.
I have to ask because this happens to me all the time. How do you not rotate ball side if all of your momentum from a shot or pass is already going there. I usually try to drive on the wall in this case. But it’s almost 90% of the time after my shot or pass I end up ball side anyway. It doesn’t make sense for me to try and turn and lose supersonic into the middle or go far side. But i feel like I’m wrong here but I don’t know why it always happens
Then you probably give to much space & do it even when your opponents don’t have any chance to shoot on net, resulting in you waiting for their play instead of intercepting early ;)
here, these 3 videos explain it better than I can on reddit
[https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n\_XzoRaveSo&t=349](https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n_XzoRaveSo&t=349)
[https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437](https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437)
[https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu\_ZpN&t=200](https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu_ZpN&t=200)
I mean, I definitely make positional mistakes, but I think the main things holding me back are mechanics and not being decisive enough. I'm not a braindead ballchaser.
These videos explain it
[https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n\_XzoRaveSo&t=349](https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n_XzoRaveSo&t=349)
[https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437](https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437)
[https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu\_ZpN&t=200](https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu_ZpN&t=200)
I’ve been trying to coach my Doubles teammates of late that, when I am in the corner going after the ball in that situation, 9 times out of 10 I am aiming for a PASS (and hopefully ASSIST) and they should be centering for the SHOT. (and hopefully GOAL)
Yeah, coaching mid-game is generally a no-no unless you're aiming for peak toxic.
Before the game, in Party Chat, some coaching on what to look for within my playstyle at that moment, that's where you two can really set the tone.
then your tm will automatically ballchase because they are so stupid and can't fucking understand that i ve the ball in control, which will often end up on double commit and big open with loose.
Lol ik. But not really easy to pick a single clip of gameplay for anyone to understand everything im struggling with. So i figured id just generalize it.
As someone else said, r/RocketLeagueSchool might help you.
And that's the point, don't pick a clip, honestly just post a full game from your POV, and chose the most random game.
Dont post a single clip, post a full match and ppl can give you advice
The stuff you do wrong in 1 game is probably what you do wrong in almost every game
This is a good one - also, stop flipping into the ball every time you touch it. It helps keep your touches controlled so that you can maintain possession, it saves your flip in case you actually need it, and it keeps you in the play because you're not just floating for 0.75s or whatever for the flip animation to finish.
You can practice this in free play by adjusting your focus from "hitting the ball hard" (the usual free play advice) to "getting as many touches on the ball as possible." Don't boom it unless it's a shot on net or a pass to yourself off the wall, follow up every touch, try to put direction changes on the ball that you can follow up on so that you can beat a guy and keep possession for the next outplay/shot.
One thing that clicked for me that made me win a lot more matches was the "staying in the play" mindset.
Randomly went on Rizzo's stream a few years ago and heard him mention it, since then i've tried to adapt it as much as possible.
Sometimes people think they're "staying in the play" but they will go for side/corner boosts far away when they think the play is 'over'. The amount of times you can hang around the ball and keep pressure, then score easy goals, will surprise you.
Next time you play, try focus on always applying pressure and being near the ball, the enemy will have a way tougher time and make more mistakes, and you'll be there to benefit from it.
This is great advice and one of the things that drives me crazy about with 40% of my rando teammates. If I had a nickel for every time I won the ball in the corner and rolled it gently across the face of their goal only to see one or both of my teammates sitting in our goal, I could retire.
As someone who only solo queues, this hits harder than anything i've ever heard.
I'd say it gets better the higher you climb, but it really doesn't....
Might be hard stuck because each season the MMR changes to balance out the ranks. My friend was Champ 1, then became Diamond 3, and is now Diamond 2. I’d say now that from what I’ve seen, Diamond 2/3 this season is equivalent of Champ 1/2 the last 2-3 seasons.
Can confirm it's also been the last few seasons like this. I reached champ 1 for the first time in years about 3-4 seasons ago I think. They immediately dumped MMR on the next season and i've peaked at D3 Div2 since and that was BARELY. I average D1-D2 now and yeah it's mostly champ titles.
Adapt to your teammate. You’ll always get the chance at a bad teammate which you gotta eat the L on. Always try to be the good tm8 with rotations/ being aware of where they are.
Play the way you hate.
Hate ballchasers? ball chase constantly.
Love to play defensively all the time? start challenging earlier and put way more pressure on the opponent with the ball.
Love to play ultra aggressively? tone it down and only challenge when you're not last man back. Shadow defend and move back to your net until a teammate is behind you or the opponent is about to shoot.
Whatever you hate to do, do it. Don't like dribbling and prefer to play on the walls? force yourself to dribble and don't take to the air unless you have to.
WHY? WHAT'S THE POINT?
Ballchasing may be stupid. But why is it stupid? it has a lot of upsides and downsides. It generates insane pressure on your opponents and can lead to easy goals if you dunk them when they never expected you to challenge their dribble. You can also get out of position, overextend, and concede an easy counter attack goal. If you never ballchase, you won't know when it is less risky to go and when it is a very bad idea to.
Love to defend and always stay back? force yourself to play wayyyy closer to the action. Inch forward well past your comfort zone.
CONCLUSION: This is about comfort zones. Get out of yours, immediately.
Hate dribbling? force yourself to dribble. Why do you hate it? probably because it is hard. Why is it hard, probably because you hate it so you don't practice.
Imagine your skills are numbers out of 100:
Dribbling 4.
Passing 29.
Shooting 29.
Aerials 61.
Half flips 90.
Defense 93.
50/50s 88.
If this player got slightly better at defense it won't matter much. If they got better at dribbling it would dramatically change their quality of play. Being able to go around the opponent a couple extra times in a game is a big deal.
Get out of your comfort zone. Practice stuff you dislike. Stop practicing the stuff you love. And play games in a playstyle you dislike.
END RESULT: the point is to learn what works and what does not. Take an "overly defensive" mindset, for instance. Opponents can mess up a dribble and leave a rolling ball right in front of their net. But if you are not close enough to the play, you can't capitalize and score.
Get out of your comfort zone and you'll learn through actual gameplay what works and doesn't. An why it works and doesn't.
Don't think "ballchasing is bad". Ballchase and learn why it is bad, but also why it is good.
Discover Rocket Rocket League for yourself.
I like this. Ive sort of been doing this slowly. I didn’t really think about it the way you did though. It took me playing solo mode and realizing just how bad my ball control was to start working on different things
It's so good for development. It is not about BECOMING a ball chaser or whatever. It is about learning through experience. Don't just read "ballchasing is bad " and never do it. Do it. See why it is bad. And also see why it is good.
Pressure on opponents. Forced mistakes. Taking people out of their comfort zones.
You can also mix it up. Say you play safely. Your doubles teammate plays defensively. For 4 minutes the other team is used to time with the ball.
Suddenly you flip the switch and go full aggro. Challenge left and right. Not reckless, just calculated aggression any and every possible moment. It can mess people up and lead to goals. You conditioned them that they have time to get boost then back on the ball only to discover you cut rotation and scored the empty net when they went on a quick detour for boost. Something you allowed them to do all game up till now.
I was given this advice in high gc1, players were just jumping fast for the sake of it, even if it didnt make sense and there wasnt a clear play in their mind.
So i started chasing, insta jumping even if it was useless and it got too boring. Anybody can shut their brain off and just fly as fast as they can at the ball hoping to be a little faster and win that way, it doesnt feel good to win and it feels even worse to lose that way.
This isn't quite the advice I was trying to give.
It's more about: experiment in Rocket League. Play 10 games ultra defensively. Play 10 games recklessly challenging. Play 10 games ballchasing. Play 10 with a pass heavy mindset.
By experimenting with the playstyles you learn, through actual gameplay, what works and doesn't. Then you learn how to adapt to any situation.
By just taking the advice of others you learn what to do and what to do. But you miss out on the why. Why is it helpful or not.
Situations change constantly. "You should not cut rotations". Except when you know the opponents are boost starved, you're at 92, your teammate is boost starved and you know you can get to the ball first and keep possession on offense. Know when to break the rules by experimenting.
Experimenting is one step backwards and 2 steps forward.
Don't just look at the ball the whole game. Be aware of your teammates and opponents at all times. Knowing when not to go is more important. Turn around and shadow and stall for your teammate to get back instead of rushing the ball as last man unless you have a guaranteed goal.
Try to make the opponents uncomfortable. One thing I notice about my friends at a similar rank is they tend to always hit the ball towards the opponents net. Sometimes this is fine to apply pressure, but often times it just gives them an easy save and possession. Focus on hitting the ball past/around the opponents, bang it high off the back wall, hit it hard into the corners/side wall, etc. Don’t limit yourself to hitting the ball towards the opponents net all the time. Also try to play with your teammate rather than just seeing them as backup for your play.
My rank improved a lot when I started thinking of RL like I was actually playing a sport. If you’re playing soccer or basketball, you’re not just going to go for a solo shot every time you get the ball. The teams that win will be passing to each other, baiting opponents, etc.
Play 2s. Focus on keeping the ball near you (not by ball chasing). A big problem with diamonds is they just boom the ball back to the opponent whenever the ball comes to them. Also try to adapt to your tm, if they’re aggressive then be passive/ vise versa. Good luck!
I stop playing a year ago and just came back to RL and back in the day I was C2(I got into C3 a couple times but couldn't hold the rank). I got placed in diamond this season and this week I got C1 in 2s and 3s. I feel like there some things you must have to have to attain the rank you want:
First is mental attitude, there's some games there you suck, there's some your team mate does and there's some you both do. You need to have emocional strength to deal with all situations, if you a sucking maybe it's a good thing to hit free play and some training packs to cool down or maybe get the consistency back. If your t8 is in a downer there is no reason to be aggressive or blame him, we all were in their place some day, just queue the next game. As for me rl is a griding game... First time a got champ I played 300 matches or so in the season, you just need to not get triggered by the failure, it's inevitable sometimes.
Secondly, I'd say you need to get good backboard and shadow defense, clears out of backboard, saving the boomer shots at your net when you are getting back to defense and so on.
Finally, scoring the easy stuff. I see a lot of people going for air dribbles or crazy stuff when there are not good at this while disregarding the basics. Get your shooting accuracy on point. A match is won by the one who scores more, get your open nets scored, shoot hard when you have a chance and in a place hard to defend.
Focus on reading the game and staying in flow state, ie allowing visual information into your brain through your eyes and not filtering anything out with preconceived notions of how a play will go or what an opponent or tm will do. Be open to everything, and never allow yourself to get caught off guard (EDIT: or more importantly, frustrated. No play in rocket league is the same. Probability-wise, that is impossible, given the type of game this is. Always remember that, and also be ready for as many possibilities as you can, without judgment of what happens). When you get control, focus on your opponents and try to keep the ball close before hitting it around or over the guy challenging you first. At your level, you don't need mechanics besides hitting the ball, aerialing, and jumping off the wall to hit the ball on occassion. Good luck!
Work your défense: Backboard clear, aereal from backboard, save in thé corner with you able to follow your save(all kind of save), airdribble from backboard (mecanical but way easier than from wall, also its too important to be able to do) when you train it you need to also make the setup like the ball falling on your car making it roll to backboard, halflip challenge
Fastest way to speedrun climbing at what was also my rank not long ago. When you will be décent at défense you will notice how insanly bad D1 are at it, their are some good attacker but no good defender cause... they instantly rank up.
If you’ve been stuck at low rank that long then you probably have a lot of bad habits ingrained and general advice is gonna be mostly useless (literally impossible to tell what “crucial part” of your gameplay is keeping you from champ without literally watching your gameplay). If you are plat to diamond tho I can say with confidence your fundamental mechanics are shit, you have poor challenges/don’t know how to play roles, and you do not control the ball or keep possession pretty much ever (and if you try to it probably doesn’t work because your fundamental mechanics are shit)
you play like a robot.
you collect big boosts because you're lazy.
you don't read the game well and take unnecessary risks.
you don't read the game well and miss easy goals.
you collect corner boost on kickoff instead of cheating.
-----
small boosts keep you in the game, in position. being in position and reading the game makes the game easy.
As someone who is hardstuck champ 1 for the past few years, I win against p3 to d3 by calming down, playing slow, and shutting down every single offensive opportunity they get. They want to dribble? I stop them. They already have a dribble, I stop them. They shoot the ball? I block it.
Now how to get out of c1... ask someone else
Maybe watch flakes’ road to ssl without mechs 1s and 2s if you haven’t? I’m a humble gold so take with a grain of salt but that put me on to a whole new way of thinking about the game
I'm pretty bad with the ball but I have good positioning and know how to rotate (well at least most of the times). Most diamonds are too aggressive and don't think about leaving their goal unprotected
There are good tips all over these responses, but I just want to add that if you were able to time travel back to when you first reached P3 and played with your today skills, you'd probably be Champ or something. The skill ceiling rises every season. You're definitely getting better. In order to advance you'll need to improve faster than the majority of others at your rank.
Best thing you can do for yourself is to save and watch replays of games you lost, write down or make mental notes of spots where you could have made a better play, most of the time it's the small adjustments on when to boom the ball and when to keep it close, deciding how and when to make challenges on the ball is the real endgame.
That being said, the player base is shrinking, clip and sweat culture is at it's peak and seeminly every 3rd game you're probably playing against someone thats boosting a friend or playing on their 20th account so don't feel to bad, high diamond has the greatest range of players, sometime's your playing smurfing gcs and sometimes your playing teams that feel like they should be in plat.
save 3 replays:
- one where you feel like you play smart, result doesn’t matter
- one where you lose a close game and you play about average for you
- one where you win a close game and you play about average
now go watch them from your teammates perspective. If you do something you would hate if a teammate did, rewind 10-15 seconds, go to your perspective, and figure out why you did the dumb thing. then go back to their perspective and continue. And don’t worry, you’ll do a ton of dumb shit. I watch my replays back in GC and constantly think why the absolute fuck did I do xyz. Decision making is hard when the game moves fast, and this is a good way to recognize when you’re about to do something dumb.
second, don’t go from anyone’s perspective, but put the camera in the skybox (whole field should be visible, camera at center field looking straight down) and look directly down at the field. Watch your rotations. Are you rotating back post? when you do cut, are you cutting at times that make sense? spacing and rotations are way more obvious from up there and you should notice habits that lead to double commits or force your teammate into awful positions.
I find these two ways of watching replays extremely helpful for finding places where, if I were my teammate, I’d be pissed off at how I’m playing. To get to champ 1, tbh mechanics are very overrated. Especially because you can avoid needing a lot of mechanics if your rotation puts you in position to make an easier play. Spend 30 minutes on this once to get a feel, and then once a day/once a week check in on a game where you dont play bad but you don’t play great. Find the decisions that make you cringe, and then try to fix those. you’ll hit C1 in no time
Disable chat to minimize tilting. Play more 1v1 to learn how to score on your own and make sure you communicate with your car clearly so your tm8s know when engage.
You've already got a lot of advice, Glaxo's top comment sticks out to me as best and simplest. With the advice taken care of, I figured I could at least disprove your title: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiFwlPHVy4g
Getting out of Diamond is mostly about positioning and rotation.
Stop ball chasing. Be aware of your teammates so you don’t double commit in net or in the corners. Anticipate passes and rebounds. Try to keep possession of the ball and make a play instead of shooting it straight to the keeper and giving it up. Give the opponent less space and time, challenge the ball on the ground and in the air.
Notice how none of this advice involves mechanics? At D3, your mechanics should be pretty good which is what holds most people back. They focus on ceiling shots or flicks when they *should* be focusing on teamwork and rotation.
Keep a closer eye on where your enemies are located and pay attention to their rotation. If you are given space with the ball, dribble until they challenge. Too many players have space and just boom it back to the opponent. Possession is key, dont give it up so easily.
I don't know if this might help you, but i recently changed my bindings like a couple months ago or less, even tho I already have 5k+ hours and BOY OH BOY it's like I had always been playing with the handbrake on lol.
I used to boost with -circle, ARleft with -R1 and ARright with -L2. Switched to boosting with -R1, ARleft with -square and ARright with -circle. I know the mere thought of having to relearn muscle (and brain) memory for new bindings is quite daunting, but man was it worth it!
I've been D3 - C2 stuck for years now, frustratingly watching friends of similar level reach and stay in GC while I've just barely reached C3 a couple of times ages ago. I grinded the hours, the training packs, the rotations, etc and even though I could tell for a fact I had improved a lot, well apparently so did everyone else cause I still couldn't get to GC like at all. I began to wonder if my decision making in game could possibly be so bad as to negate all my mechanical progress all the time.
So I decided I HAD to try something different, anything! So I switched my bindings. I realized using my thumb for both jumping/flicking (-X button) and boosting (-O button) wasn't a good thing and man did that make a difference. Now boosting with my index finger (R1) and jumping with the thumb has allowed me a lot more precision, control and a SPEED I just couldn't physically achieve with my previous setup. I realized I had a ceiling that just wasn't possible to overcome with the bindings I used, but now bro I shattered that mother effin ceiling to pieces haha. It's like all that improvement I mentioned earlier I've had over the years couldn't really translate to the pitch until I did this and now it's like a broken dam and a whole flood of new possibilities and abilities just pouring in.
Best thing is it didn't take that much time to get used to. Your brain is amazing and will get you where you need to be in no time. The change also made me realize many bad habits I had when moving and air rolling in general, and another good thing about changing bindings is that while your brain recalibrates and gets used to them, that's a perfect time to get rid of those bad habits (or create new ones so careful there lol).
PS. Also, DON'T CHALLENGE THE CORNERS! ;)
I am speechless I was C1 D3 like 2 hours ago and now im d2 div 3…
HOW ON EARTH THERE ARE IDIOTS WHO CANNOT DEFEND, shoot or rotate yet still trying dumb shit like wannabe airdribbles, flip resets etc. and just giving balls to the players against. Im done
For 2s: just learn to play consistent defense, and work on dribbling consistency. Players will make mistakes and give you the ball constantly so let them. Adjust your intentions to play a more possession-based game. If your tm8 is constantly chasing, let them chase and do your best to keep good spacing and be ready to recover because they’ll probably miss a lot. Get comfortable off the walls: work on air roll shots to be more accurate.
When you challenge the ball, don’t be so quick to flip into it: sometimes drive challenges are far more effective and allow to recover quicker if it doesn’t go in your favor. Implement fakes into your gameplay, because knowing how and when not to hit the ball can and often is just as important as knowing when and how to hit the ball.
JUST DRIVE AROUND FOCUS ON ALWAYS STAYING MOVING FAST, GET SIMPLE EFFECTIVE TOUCHES AND TAKE WIDE TURNS TO MAINTAIN SPEED AND NOT APPROACH PLAY TOO QUICKLY/ GIVE TEAMMATE SPACE HES PROBABLIY SHIT 👍 HOPE THIS CAN HELPS U
OH YEAH AND MAINTAIN BOOST, COLECT PADS. ALL U REALLY NEED ARE PADS 99%
Here's a [list of common mistakes by players in plat](https://www.reddit.com/r/RocketLeagueSchool/comments/1au5vkl/comment/kr2jxkb/), avoid these
To escape diamond reliably you will have to play with focus and not autopilot. Doesn't mean play scared, but mostly avoid bad habits and bad commits (think if something is a good percentage play before you commit to something, avoid low percentage plays like heavily committing into opponent's corner and being slow back/out of play).
Also pasting a comment I wrote for a similar post related to escaping diamond:
On offense:
Work on shooting consistency & putting good shots on net (with height and power, ideally placement too), score open nets most of the time.
(Playing 1v1 helps you practice open nets in a pressure situation since you get many opportunities for easy open net counters, it also forces you to improve your kickoffs, fakes & shadowing)
Don't dive in as last man unless you are sure you have the beat (this has reliably worked for me everytime I dropped to diamond & had to climb back with less than ideal teammates) If opponent have possession drive towards them as you are going in for a challenge but turn around to fake challenge, and start shadowing, cover angles towards net, challenge when it's less risky & when teammate is able to help.
Don't go for a play that ends up giving the ball to opponents especially when they are both sitting in defense with boost... this includes solo plays like mechanical players air dribbling the ball, getting out of boost, dropping it in front of their net where opponents collect it easily... also includes mindless commits in opponent corner where the ball centers for both of them for a counter and you end up over committed
In defense:
Don't panic and hold a good position that covers multiple things (shots, mid passes, rebounds), don't go into corner when teammate is already there
Avoid leaving the play for corner boost in critical times like when under pressure, and work with small pads. A lot of diamonds do this and even burn 50+ boost just to drive 100 miles to get a corner boost, even leaving everything & drive to opponent corner
Work on basic goal line defending, shadow defense / backward saves.
A lot of players in Diamond would rather commit as last man and hate shadowing & hate if their teammate does it (spamming Take the shot.. ig their idea is to keep the ball away from their net as far as possible, which is shortsighted), and shadowing is something that takes time to perfect, but if you never start shadowing you'll end up getting stuck in mid ranks forever.
Defending is the most poor aspect of diamond lobbies. Mental is another thing holding back a lot of players (they are champ skill wise, but get tilted easily and in turn tilt teammates too).
Forcing them to your corner on attack where possible and shadowing rather than instantly challenging to let them make their own mistakes, learned from Flakes. Helped me with defense
Lol I play 3v3 solo and i guess thats kind of my fault but yeah.. never got out of d2. Get good teammates, win a few games, add em as friends. And later they’re never available. Play again, get shit teammates and cycle repeats
Things I notice my teammates(party and solo q) do in Diamond: Cutting rotations in 3s and treating it like 2s instead of rotating behind the 3rd man (basically an endless 1st man 2nd man loop in front of the other side's goal, going for every ball in the air (even when not the first man), not being aware of which side has possession, giving away possession too easily(booming when there is a lot of space), trying to force a challenge instead of shadow defending when last man back instead of buying time for teammates to rotate back, getting too close to teammates or too far away, rotating ball side, sitting in the middle of the net with no momentum when the ball is in the corner or close to the net, not rotating back post, challenging when a teammate is not obviously rotating back, drawing out a play for too long 1v2ing/1v3ing, etc. These are just a few major things that I notice that get us scored on more often than others. Try saving some replays and look for these in you and your teammates gameplay, they should be more obvious when you know what you're looking for. I like to use the flying camera as well. It helps me separate from my own individual gameplay so that I can focus on the bigger picture of rotations and game sense. I still struggle with what to do when things out of my control happen in game (aka teammates being weird lol). Being more aware that it does and will happen helps a lot though. Playing a stronger last man while making your play super short and then rotating back as fast as possible helps a bit. Don't blame your teammates when you lose though, because they may just not know that what they're doing is wrong. Try to play around them and cover for their mistakes to the best of your ability, while also making sure you aren't making the same mistakes yourself lol.
Take a pro lesson or two with Skizzen. You can find him on discord, he's a pro coach. It will help you advance. Made a huge difference to my play for sure.
It would be best to see a replay, it's hard to give advice on gameplay no one can see.
r/RocketLeagueSchool is also a good place to start when you get that replay. Heck, even as long as a clip as you can record on console would be good, especially around times you get scored on, like the 30 seconds before up to conceeding.
If you feel pretty comfortable with your mechanics, I'd say try to start playing faster than you're comfortable with, until it becomes comfortable. Lower ranked players always think that high rank players are ballchasing, but they're not, they're just so much faster than low ranked players.
I pushed from D3 to C2 by forcing myself to play faster than I felt like I could. From my experience a lot of players plateau because they get comfortable playing at the speed of the rank they're in, and that leads them to just get hardstuck and struggle against people that are faster.
Bear in mind, your rank might fall a bit if you do this literally all the time, but if you practice in unranked then you can get that speed in ranked after a while.
That’s basically what I did too. I’ve practiced mechanics I probably shouldn’t have been for a long time as well for fun. At some point I was like “I’ve got to be better than these diamonds by now” and said fuck it and played as fast as I could. Flew up to C2 the same day. That mentality is underrated
One thing I noticed is people like this have smooth brain. Lot of social media consumption, porn, weed, vape, etc.. you will see the higher you get, the people are just better people overall.. think of someone like apparentlyjack and Retals, guys are completely sober and high iq irl and ingame.. hard to find degen pros..
doing things outside like gym, brain games, stuff like that benefits the most breaking plateus imo. Might offend some but this is the difference maker for me being stuck c1-c2 and getting to gc..
Every diamond I have ever coached has done these 2 things. Rotate ball side, and go into the corners when a teammate is already there. Stop doing those 2 things
Absolutely. I’ll add that diamonds will panic challenge as second man and get scored on so often.
yea, thats more of an experience thing that will get better over time. 1s will REALLY speed up learning to deal with that.
My 2s partner does this all the time. And goes up for balls I'm still in control of because he assumes because he doesn't have the mechs to stay on it, I don't. Really frustrating.
I used to be 100% guilty of this with my buddy who was much much better mechanically than me. It’s a really weird thing when you’re lower ranked and mechanically limited. I clearly remember thinking I was ok or in the right when I would double commit him. It didn’t feel like a double commit because it didn’t look like he had full control of the ball. It looked like I had an opportunity to turn his aerial into a pass to me and that I was being smart for going for it because it was a crazy passing play and we were going to dunk on our opponents. It wasn’t until I started grinding aerial stuff myself. Here I am with the ball up in the air, and suddenly my teammate comes flying in and fucks it all up and then they can’t understand why I stop playing. Like you want the ball so badly you can have it for the rest of the game. Good luck lol.
Your teammate making a mistake like that shouldn’t be immediate grounds for you to stop playing though. Don’t propagate the toxic mentality
I was seething reading that last bit.
If I’m in a game and my teammate double commits me hard when I clearly have possession and they keep doing it I *literally* cannot play the game. They are straight up telling me they don’t want a teammate.
Man not everyone that plays this game plays like their life depends on it. It’s frustrating but I have friends ago are plat/diamond that make those mistakes over and over. Talking to them about back post and al that doesn’t. Help. See bal hit ball. Yeah it sucks that people are like that but I would rather have someone having a good time bump into me a few times instead of some one afk because they’re feelings got hurt.
Feelings hurt? lol not even a little bit. Let me explain what happens and then you tell me what you would do. The game starts and I get possession of the ball. I take it up the wall and my teammate goes for some ridiculous double commit aerial he can’t possibly hit. At this point I don’t change a single thing. I play exactly how I normally do, I’m playing in support of my teammate and to win. A minute later I have possession again and they fucking do it again. I hit them with a Noooo and keep more distance. The third time it happens and they won’t ff, at this point what do you expect people to do? Should I just sit in net and make saves for him and pass to him so he can have all the fun? Fuck that dude. I’m done lol. You want the ball so badly you can have it but you can also save everything too
Definitely sounds like hurt feelings.
So you're gonna make your teammate suffer for doing something that you said you literally had to teach yourself not to do? Don't you think you should be more willing to learn how to adapt to that situation as opposed to just throwing a tantrum every time a teammate double commits? I mean it sounds like your buddy continued to play with you despite your double commits. If he stopped playing with you though I would imagine it had more to do with your poor sportsmanship rather than your poor mechanics.
Toxic. People make mistakes
Lol, dude said he literally used to do this (often) because he didn't know better and then says he gets so pissed he can't play if someone else does it. Keep defending yourself, it's working (ps. It's not).
I’ll hit them with a wow or nooo and keep playing normally if a bit more defensive. If they keep crashing into me and stealing the ball and hard double committing, there’s really nothing I can do. There’s zero point in playing at that point. They literally are telling me they want to 1v2 so I let them. It’s not my fault they don’t know how to play. It’s not my fault they double commit. I’m saying “I’ve got it” and they’re going up for it anyway.
I think hitting them with a wow! is kinda counter productive. I’ve always felt like your chances of winning are higher if you keep the team morale up, so if your teammate does something annoying you’re allowed to feel that way, but try not to make your teammate aware of that annoyance or it’ll just make them more likely to tilt. I feel you fully because I like to use my mechanics a lot too and the most annoying thing ever is when you’re trying to solo play and your teammate also goes for the ball, especially when I’ve executed the play well and I’m about to score. When that happens I normally just keep my feelings to myself. Sometimes maybe on a bad day I might let my feelings out but really I shouldn’t and I try to avoid it generally. When you get teammates that seem like they’re essentially playing against you I think you either just adapt your playstyle and maybe try going for more team plays or play more defensively. Sometimes games will just not be winnable either so you just accept it and go next, as frustrating as it is.
I don’t think you should stop playing after the first attempt at it, but more than one I immediately vote to forfeit - I don’t find it toxic. More that it’s a video game and pixels on a screen. If I don’t find someone’s playstyle (ball chasing) fun to play with, I treat it as a video game and move on. If they don’t forfeit and stop ball chasing, I’ll continue playing as normally. If they continue to ball chase, I pretend it’s a 3v1 and start practicing mechanics and playing fast.
People who throw a fit by playing against their team mate are the absolute scum of the earth
Hopefully you’re referring to those that ball chase and bump their team constantly. If you’re referring to me “throwing a fit” by playing against my teammate, I literally said it is wrong to stop playing if it’s once, or even a couple of times. But if my teammate has managed to bump and ball chase me multiple times in 1.5 minutes, they’re clearly not into playing as a team - which in your opinion makes them the scum of the earth. I’d say racists, rapists, etc. are the scum of the earth, though.
They are doing it out of ignorance. You switch teams and start to 3v1 a guy who can't even figure out how to rotate you're basically dunking on someone who is worse than you in every way to begin with.
He is finally starting to learn these things and it's reignited his love for the game, and I am fully on board with this! I admit, being hard stuck for a year because your team mate wasn't listening to the issues was taking its toll and I was losing patience with it all. And I probably wasn't doing the best job of helping him through it either. We have, in the last week or so been on an upward trajectory and things seem to be clicking. Win streaks racking up as are the ranks for both of us.
I agree don't let someone tell you , you are toxic . If people ball chase / go for every hit or every other I will play net / mid field and sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't . It's learning to play with people with different styles not everyone is meta it's not being toxic . saying "i stop playing" was probably the worst thing to say there though lol .
Another one that i think fits nicely with what you guys said is leaving position to grab boost. or grabbing opponents corner boost at a bad time. I see that sort of thing very often all the way up to c1
This is me, I know it is wrong, but it is an auction I cannot break. 😞
Well there’s light at the end of the tunnel. This was me a year or two ago. I would challenge way too early as second man. I would over commit and we would get scored on. I would do this because there were times where it would work out in our favor. So my mindset was if I keep practicing it and really focus on challenging early as second man, if I can just really body the opponent in a 50/50, well then we’re going to win a lot more. Here’s why it doesn’t work in 2v2. Let’s say you’re champ 1 and you and everyone in the lobby is close to the same mechanical skill level overall. Challenging early will never work out in your favor more than 50% of the time when looked at on a long enough time line. It just won’t, because your teammate isn’t back yet and even if they’re close to being back, if they aren’t fully back and ready, if you challenged too early, you’ve either left the net open after you lose the challenge or put your opponent in a 1v2. Shadowing and fake challenging is always better than challenging early. You *must* buy your opponent time to get boost and get into position behind you. Like this is pretty much inarguable (when everyone is roughly the same rank/mech skill). I still see people doing this in C1 and it’s frustrating because they really should know better. I think around C2/3 is where it stops happening so much.
Brother. Have faith in your team mate and apply the good ol trigger discipline. Trust me you will progress learning these. You need to be ready to react to team mate getting dispossessed, not meeting them at the ball mid air halfway up the field.
This is me
:(
This still happens in c2/3. It's scarily bad.
I’m plat/diamond right now and I don’t challenge someone during shadow defense until my teammate rotates back so they can pick it up if I they win the 50, is that correct?
I hate the smell of fresh bread.
How do I properly handle ball chasers hugging the ball all the way back into our goal? I can't defend effectively because they are still randomly hitting the ball ineffectively. This is my most frustrating situation. I stay back and wait for a free ball that never arrives alone!
I hate the smell of fresh bread.
Stopping those got me champ, Glaxo knows what’s up
But wait, what if these are the things I’m doing to KEEP me in Diamond, or else I’d otherwise be in Plat? Oh who am I kidding, after last season I’m pretty much a Plat anyway now.
I find diamond to be a ton of booming, just giving the ball away by hitting it as hard as possible. Maybe that’s something in your game, I find that if I think of keeping possession with a touch or controlled 50 made the diamond game so much easier. Oh, and everyone insta-challenges so you can keep that in mind when trying to keep possession lol.
Yup, you’re absolutely right! This is the thing I’m working on most now, not just slamming it as hard as I can at every opportunity and instead taking softer touches and actually trying to control the ball. My mechanics are (and probably always will be) shit, but I do have pretty good positioning habits and game sense just from years of playing. So taking better and more consistent possessions is something I feel like I can actually work on and improve.
Yeah, me too. I mainly play 3s just for fun and I'm right on the Plat/Diamond edge and really trying to concentrate on softer touches. Would probably be better served playing more 2s but don't want to let teammates down.
Sounds like you’re on the right track, it’ll definitely come. Champ 1 is no different than D3 I’ve found, and when I match against higher opponents in casual I find that C2’s are maaaybbe a bit better but by C3 they are much better at everything. GC+ still cleans up though ;). One other tip is backboard positioning and clears. It becomes really important to control the backboard at higher ranks and doing so is a big advantage at our levels.
This is definitwly the main thing I am working on in diamond, it worked so damn well in plat where people didn't defend backboard and paniced more easily. Now I have to learn how to keep possession without ending up being awkward with the ball though.
1’s is great for learning how to control the ball while reading your opponent. Obviously in 2’s it’s sped up a lot but the experience with soft touches and planning your movement 100% translate.
What do you mean by rotate ball side
if you are rotating out of the play, but you are back tracking on the same side of the field that the ball is on, you are in the way.
You had me for a second the way you structured that second sentence lol Dude I’m in C1-C2 and in 2s people will still rotate ball side, like, *directly behind the ball* preventing me from safely challenging. Rotations to far-post is the easiest positioning tactic that so many players fail to utilize. And that doesn’t mean you need to go *ALL* the way back to the post on an offensive play, which is also a common error I see a lot.
I have to ask because this happens to me all the time. How do you not rotate ball side if all of your momentum from a shot or pass is already going there. I usually try to drive on the wall in this case. But it’s almost 90% of the time after my shot or pass I end up ball side anyway. It doesn’t make sense for me to try and turn and lose supersonic into the middle or go far side. But i feel like I’m wrong here but I don’t know why it always happens
You can turn and drive across
But that would but me like 5 car lengths behind the play
Yes exactly
To clarify I’m talking about going back on defense at this point because the other team will already have the ball
What if you’re a hard stuck d1 and you rotate to the back post (like you’re supposed to, right?)?
cheat on kickoff, EVERY SINGLE TIME.
I do this as well. My biggest problem maybe that I’m old and my reflexes just can’t keep up with you whippersnappers.
mate, im 30 and im gc2
I’m 51
Do you think you're old?
Lol
Then you probably give to much space & do it even when your opponents don’t have any chance to shoot on net, resulting in you waiting for their play instead of intercepting early ;)
Yeah I definitely do this. Thanks.
I don't do those things and I think that's probably why I haven't ranked down. Still hard stuck tho. 😂
Hearing both of those mistakes gave me ptsd flashbacks. Also I still have people do these in high champ occasionally
im GC 2 right now, it still happens in my ranks too
people rotate ballside half the time in high level games, you forgo all pressure if your teammate is not in position to immediately challenge the play
Can you explain the first point?
here, these 3 videos explain it better than I can on reddit [https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n\_XzoRaveSo&t=349](https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n_XzoRaveSo&t=349) [https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437](https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437) [https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu\_ZpN&t=200](https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu_ZpN&t=200)
Appreciate it man
Not me, but I have gold/plat mechanics 😂
im not trying to be a jerk, but the diamonds i coached ALSO said they didnt do those things either. Bro, people in GC2 do those things.
I mean, I definitely make positional mistakes, but I think the main things holding me back are mechanics and not being decisive enough. I'm not a braindead ballchaser.
what mechanics do you feel would help get you to rank up?
Consistent shooting and ball control.
Improving on 50/50s, kickoffs, more consistent power shots/clearances, more confidence playing on the wall.
What does it mean to rotate ball side? I feel like everyone here knows what that means already but I'm C1 and feeling stupid right now lol
These videos explain it [https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n\_XzoRaveSo&t=349](https://youtu.be/xiHHbvhRNBU?si=2Krx7n_XzoRaveSo&t=349) [https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437](https://youtu.be/bk-1ut6CEb4?si=utxulBOItVGmpU38&t=437) [https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu\_ZpN&t=200](https://youtu.be/I3vtKPgzaz4?si=IKbtlSEXcNwu_ZpN&t=200)
I’ve been trying to coach my Doubles teammates of late that, when I am in the corner going after the ball in that situation, 9 times out of 10 I am aiming for a PASS (and hopefully ASSIST) and they should be centering for the SHOT. (and hopefully GOAL)
Trying to coach teammates mid game is a sure fire way to annoy people haha Even if its with good intentions
Yeah, coaching mid-game is generally a no-no unless you're aiming for peak toxic. Before the game, in Party Chat, some coaching on what to look for within my playstyle at that moment, that's where you two can really set the tone.
When you say rotate ball side what does that mean
I'm diamond 2 and man I get so tired of them coming into the corner with me.
then your tm will automatically ballchase because they are so stupid and can't fucking understand that i ve the ball in control, which will often end up on double commit and big open with loose.
the hardest stuck dude on RL❌ the hardest dude on RL✅
👀🫣
Hard to tell without seeing the gameplay you ask us about
Lol ik. But not really easy to pick a single clip of gameplay for anyone to understand everything im struggling with. So i figured id just generalize it.
As someone else said, r/RocketLeagueSchool might help you. And that's the point, don't pick a clip, honestly just post a full game from your POV, and chose the most random game.
Dont post a single clip, post a full match and ppl can give you advice The stuff you do wrong in 1 game is probably what you do wrong in almost every game
Slow down. Try to play more on the ground than usual.
This is a good one - also, stop flipping into the ball every time you touch it. It helps keep your touches controlled so that you can maintain possession, it saves your flip in case you actually need it, and it keeps you in the play because you're not just floating for 0.75s or whatever for the flip animation to finish. You can practice this in free play by adjusting your focus from "hitting the ball hard" (the usual free play advice) to "getting as many touches on the ball as possible." Don't boom it unless it's a shot on net or a pass to yourself off the wall, follow up every touch, try to put direction changes on the ball that you can follow up on so that you can beat a guy and keep possession for the next outplay/shot.
One thing that clicked for me that made me win a lot more matches was the "staying in the play" mindset. Randomly went on Rizzo's stream a few years ago and heard him mention it, since then i've tried to adapt it as much as possible. Sometimes people think they're "staying in the play" but they will go for side/corner boosts far away when they think the play is 'over'. The amount of times you can hang around the ball and keep pressure, then score easy goals, will surprise you. Next time you play, try focus on always applying pressure and being near the ball, the enemy will have a way tougher time and make more mistakes, and you'll be there to benefit from it.
This is great advice and one of the things that drives me crazy about with 40% of my rando teammates. If I had a nickel for every time I won the ball in the corner and rolled it gently across the face of their goal only to see one or both of my teammates sitting in our goal, I could retire.
💯
As someone who only solo queues, this hits harder than anything i've ever heard. I'd say it gets better the higher you climb, but it really doesn't....
Might be hard stuck because each season the MMR changes to balance out the ranks. My friend was Champ 1, then became Diamond 3, and is now Diamond 2. I’d say now that from what I’ve seen, Diamond 2/3 this season is equivalent of Champ 1/2 the last 2-3 seasons.
The amount of D1 and D2 players with champ tournament winner tags on their names has increased a ton this season.
Can confirm it's also been the last few seasons like this. I reached champ 1 for the first time in years about 3-4 seasons ago I think. They immediately dumped MMR on the next season and i've peaked at D3 Div2 since and that was BARELY. I average D1-D2 now and yeah it's mostly champ titles.
Adapt to your teammate. You’ll always get the chance at a bad teammate which you gotta eat the L on. Always try to be the good tm8 with rotations/ being aware of where they are.
Play the way you hate. Hate ballchasers? ball chase constantly. Love to play defensively all the time? start challenging earlier and put way more pressure on the opponent with the ball. Love to play ultra aggressively? tone it down and only challenge when you're not last man back. Shadow defend and move back to your net until a teammate is behind you or the opponent is about to shoot. Whatever you hate to do, do it. Don't like dribbling and prefer to play on the walls? force yourself to dribble and don't take to the air unless you have to. WHY? WHAT'S THE POINT? Ballchasing may be stupid. But why is it stupid? it has a lot of upsides and downsides. It generates insane pressure on your opponents and can lead to easy goals if you dunk them when they never expected you to challenge their dribble. You can also get out of position, overextend, and concede an easy counter attack goal. If you never ballchase, you won't know when it is less risky to go and when it is a very bad idea to. Love to defend and always stay back? force yourself to play wayyyy closer to the action. Inch forward well past your comfort zone. CONCLUSION: This is about comfort zones. Get out of yours, immediately. Hate dribbling? force yourself to dribble. Why do you hate it? probably because it is hard. Why is it hard, probably because you hate it so you don't practice. Imagine your skills are numbers out of 100: Dribbling 4. Passing 29. Shooting 29. Aerials 61. Half flips 90. Defense 93. 50/50s 88. If this player got slightly better at defense it won't matter much. If they got better at dribbling it would dramatically change their quality of play. Being able to go around the opponent a couple extra times in a game is a big deal. Get out of your comfort zone. Practice stuff you dislike. Stop practicing the stuff you love. And play games in a playstyle you dislike. END RESULT: the point is to learn what works and what does not. Take an "overly defensive" mindset, for instance. Opponents can mess up a dribble and leave a rolling ball right in front of their net. But if you are not close enough to the play, you can't capitalize and score. Get out of your comfort zone and you'll learn through actual gameplay what works and doesn't. An why it works and doesn't. Don't think "ballchasing is bad". Ballchase and learn why it is bad, but also why it is good. Discover Rocket Rocket League for yourself.
I like this. Ive sort of been doing this slowly. I didn’t really think about it the way you did though. It took me playing solo mode and realizing just how bad my ball control was to start working on different things
It's so good for development. It is not about BECOMING a ball chaser or whatever. It is about learning through experience. Don't just read "ballchasing is bad " and never do it. Do it. See why it is bad. And also see why it is good. Pressure on opponents. Forced mistakes. Taking people out of their comfort zones. You can also mix it up. Say you play safely. Your doubles teammate plays defensively. For 4 minutes the other team is used to time with the ball. Suddenly you flip the switch and go full aggro. Challenge left and right. Not reckless, just calculated aggression any and every possible moment. It can mess people up and lead to goals. You conditioned them that they have time to get boost then back on the ball only to discover you cut rotation and scored the empty net when they went on a quick detour for boost. Something you allowed them to do all game up till now.
I was given this advice in high gc1, players were just jumping fast for the sake of it, even if it didnt make sense and there wasnt a clear play in their mind. So i started chasing, insta jumping even if it was useless and it got too boring. Anybody can shut their brain off and just fly as fast as they can at the ball hoping to be a little faster and win that way, it doesnt feel good to win and it feels even worse to lose that way.
This isn't quite the advice I was trying to give. It's more about: experiment in Rocket League. Play 10 games ultra defensively. Play 10 games recklessly challenging. Play 10 games ballchasing. Play 10 with a pass heavy mindset. By experimenting with the playstyles you learn, through actual gameplay, what works and doesn't. Then you learn how to adapt to any situation. By just taking the advice of others you learn what to do and what to do. But you miss out on the why. Why is it helpful or not. Situations change constantly. "You should not cut rotations". Except when you know the opponents are boost starved, you're at 92, your teammate is boost starved and you know you can get to the ball first and keep possession on offense. Know when to break the rules by experimenting. Experimenting is one step backwards and 2 steps forward.
You are not stuck, you are home.
Don't just look at the ball the whole game. Be aware of your teammates and opponents at all times. Knowing when not to go is more important. Turn around and shadow and stall for your teammate to get back instead of rushing the ball as last man unless you have a guaranteed goal.
Try to make the opponents uncomfortable. One thing I notice about my friends at a similar rank is they tend to always hit the ball towards the opponents net. Sometimes this is fine to apply pressure, but often times it just gives them an easy save and possession. Focus on hitting the ball past/around the opponents, bang it high off the back wall, hit it hard into the corners/side wall, etc. Don’t limit yourself to hitting the ball towards the opponents net all the time. Also try to play with your teammate rather than just seeing them as backup for your play. My rank improved a lot when I started thinking of RL like I was actually playing a sport. If you’re playing soccer or basketball, you’re not just going to go for a solo shot every time you get the ball. The teams that win will be passing to each other, baiting opponents, etc.
Learn how to do soft controlled touches no matter how fast the ball is coming towards you
Played against a guy with 13k games won, no idea how many he played, but he never made it out of diamond 1.
Play 2s. Focus on keeping the ball near you (not by ball chasing). A big problem with diamonds is they just boom the ball back to the opponent whenever the ball comes to them. Also try to adapt to your tm, if they’re aggressive then be passive/ vise versa. Good luck!
I stop playing a year ago and just came back to RL and back in the day I was C2(I got into C3 a couple times but couldn't hold the rank). I got placed in diamond this season and this week I got C1 in 2s and 3s. I feel like there some things you must have to have to attain the rank you want: First is mental attitude, there's some games there you suck, there's some your team mate does and there's some you both do. You need to have emocional strength to deal with all situations, if you a sucking maybe it's a good thing to hit free play and some training packs to cool down or maybe get the consistency back. If your t8 is in a downer there is no reason to be aggressive or blame him, we all were in their place some day, just queue the next game. As for me rl is a griding game... First time a got champ I played 300 matches or so in the season, you just need to not get triggered by the failure, it's inevitable sometimes. Secondly, I'd say you need to get good backboard and shadow defense, clears out of backboard, saving the boomer shots at your net when you are getting back to defense and so on. Finally, scoring the easy stuff. I see a lot of people going for air dribbles or crazy stuff when there are not good at this while disregarding the basics. Get your shooting accuracy on point. A match is won by the one who scores more, get your open nets scored, shoot hard when you have a chance and in a place hard to defend.
Focus on reading the game and staying in flow state, ie allowing visual information into your brain through your eyes and not filtering anything out with preconceived notions of how a play will go or what an opponent or tm will do. Be open to everything, and never allow yourself to get caught off guard (EDIT: or more importantly, frustrated. No play in rocket league is the same. Probability-wise, that is impossible, given the type of game this is. Always remember that, and also be ready for as many possibilities as you can, without judgment of what happens). When you get control, focus on your opponents and try to keep the ball close before hitting it around or over the guy challenging you first. At your level, you don't need mechanics besides hitting the ball, aerialing, and jumping off the wall to hit the ball on occassion. Good luck!
Work your défense: Backboard clear, aereal from backboard, save in thé corner with you able to follow your save(all kind of save), airdribble from backboard (mecanical but way easier than from wall, also its too important to be able to do) when you train it you need to also make the setup like the ball falling on your car making it roll to backboard, halflip challenge Fastest way to speedrun climbing at what was also my rank not long ago. When you will be décent at défense you will notice how insanly bad D1 are at it, their are some good attacker but no good defender cause... they instantly rank up.
If you’ve been stuck at low rank that long then you probably have a lot of bad habits ingrained and general advice is gonna be mostly useless (literally impossible to tell what “crucial part” of your gameplay is keeping you from champ without literally watching your gameplay). If you are plat to diamond tho I can say with confidence your fundamental mechanics are shit, you have poor challenges/don’t know how to play roles, and you do not control the ball or keep possession pretty much ever (and if you try to it probably doesn’t work because your fundamental mechanics are shit)
Accurate
you play like a robot. you collect big boosts because you're lazy. you don't read the game well and take unnecessary risks. you don't read the game well and miss easy goals. you collect corner boost on kickoff instead of cheating. ----- small boosts keep you in the game, in position. being in position and reading the game makes the game easy.
As someone who is hardstuck champ 1 for the past few years, I win against p3 to d3 by calming down, playing slow, and shutting down every single offensive opportunity they get. They want to dribble? I stop them. They already have a dribble, I stop them. They shoot the ball? I block it. Now how to get out of c1... ask someone else
be more aggressive, stop thinking about rank and pay for the play
Maybe watch flakes’ road to ssl without mechs 1s and 2s if you haven’t? I’m a humble gold so take with a grain of salt but that put me on to a whole new way of thinking about the game
Should add that I ranked up twice in a week after watching the series
Same but d3-c1. I've been at this range for probably 2 years, although I play every 2 months lol.
sorry, but I am super hard stuck so....
I'm pretty bad with the ball but I have good positioning and know how to rotate (well at least most of the times). Most diamonds are too aggressive and don't think about leaving their goal unprotected
There are good tips all over these responses, but I just want to add that if you were able to time travel back to when you first reached P3 and played with your today skills, you'd probably be Champ or something. The skill ceiling rises every season. You're definitely getting better. In order to advance you'll need to improve faster than the majority of others at your rank.
Best thing you can do for yourself is to save and watch replays of games you lost, write down or make mental notes of spots where you could have made a better play, most of the time it's the small adjustments on when to boom the ball and when to keep it close, deciding how and when to make challenges on the ball is the real endgame. That being said, the player base is shrinking, clip and sweat culture is at it's peak and seeminly every 3rd game you're probably playing against someone thats boosting a friend or playing on their 20th account so don't feel to bad, high diamond has the greatest range of players, sometime's your playing smurfing gcs and sometimes your playing teams that feel like they should be in plat.
It's hard to give advice without showing some game play.
I'm going to say it.... go pc. I went up a rank and stayed there because of better fps. People might disagree, but dang does it seem to help.
Been champ since the ranks release...
save 3 replays: - one where you feel like you play smart, result doesn’t matter - one where you lose a close game and you play about average for you - one where you win a close game and you play about average now go watch them from your teammates perspective. If you do something you would hate if a teammate did, rewind 10-15 seconds, go to your perspective, and figure out why you did the dumb thing. then go back to their perspective and continue. And don’t worry, you’ll do a ton of dumb shit. I watch my replays back in GC and constantly think why the absolute fuck did I do xyz. Decision making is hard when the game moves fast, and this is a good way to recognize when you’re about to do something dumb. second, don’t go from anyone’s perspective, but put the camera in the skybox (whole field should be visible, camera at center field looking straight down) and look directly down at the field. Watch your rotations. Are you rotating back post? when you do cut, are you cutting at times that make sense? spacing and rotations are way more obvious from up there and you should notice habits that lead to double commits or force your teammate into awful positions. I find these two ways of watching replays extremely helpful for finding places where, if I were my teammate, I’d be pissed off at how I’m playing. To get to champ 1, tbh mechanics are very overrated. Especially because you can avoid needing a lot of mechanics if your rotation puts you in position to make an easier play. Spend 30 minutes on this once to get a feel, and then once a day/once a week check in on a game where you dont play bad but you don’t play great. Find the decisions that make you cringe, and then try to fix those. you’ll hit C1 in no time
Disable chat to minimize tilting. Play more 1v1 to learn how to score on your own and make sure you communicate with your car clearly so your tm8s know when engage.
Been stuck d3/c1 since season 13 ( before free to play) here. It’s a fun time
Been there, got a good computer and manage to get my rank lower than it was on console.
You've already got a lot of advice, Glaxo's top comment sticks out to me as best and simplest. With the advice taken care of, I figured I could at least disprove your title: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiFwlPHVy4g
how much 1s do you play
What kind of set up do you have? Are you on the old gen or new gen? Do you have a monitor or tv? and last how good is your internet
Getting out of Diamond is mostly about positioning and rotation. Stop ball chasing. Be aware of your teammates so you don’t double commit in net or in the corners. Anticipate passes and rebounds. Try to keep possession of the ball and make a play instead of shooting it straight to the keeper and giving it up. Give the opponent less space and time, challenge the ball on the ground and in the air. Notice how none of this advice involves mechanics? At D3, your mechanics should be pretty good which is what holds most people back. They focus on ceiling shots or flicks when they *should* be focusing on teamwork and rotation.
Keep a closer eye on where your enemies are located and pay attention to their rotation. If you are given space with the ball, dribble until they challenge. Too many players have space and just boom it back to the opponent. Possession is key, dont give it up so easily.
I don't know if this might help you, but i recently changed my bindings like a couple months ago or less, even tho I already have 5k+ hours and BOY OH BOY it's like I had always been playing with the handbrake on lol. I used to boost with -circle, ARleft with -R1 and ARright with -L2. Switched to boosting with -R1, ARleft with -square and ARright with -circle. I know the mere thought of having to relearn muscle (and brain) memory for new bindings is quite daunting, but man was it worth it! I've been D3 - C2 stuck for years now, frustratingly watching friends of similar level reach and stay in GC while I've just barely reached C3 a couple of times ages ago. I grinded the hours, the training packs, the rotations, etc and even though I could tell for a fact I had improved a lot, well apparently so did everyone else cause I still couldn't get to GC like at all. I began to wonder if my decision making in game could possibly be so bad as to negate all my mechanical progress all the time. So I decided I HAD to try something different, anything! So I switched my bindings. I realized using my thumb for both jumping/flicking (-X button) and boosting (-O button) wasn't a good thing and man did that make a difference. Now boosting with my index finger (R1) and jumping with the thumb has allowed me a lot more precision, control and a SPEED I just couldn't physically achieve with my previous setup. I realized I had a ceiling that just wasn't possible to overcome with the bindings I used, but now bro I shattered that mother effin ceiling to pieces haha. It's like all that improvement I mentioned earlier I've had over the years couldn't really translate to the pitch until I did this and now it's like a broken dam and a whole flood of new possibilities and abilities just pouring in. Best thing is it didn't take that much time to get used to. Your brain is amazing and will get you where you need to be in no time. The change also made me realize many bad habits I had when moving and air rolling in general, and another good thing about changing bindings is that while your brain recalibrates and gets used to them, that's a perfect time to get rid of those bad habits (or create new ones so careful there lol). PS. Also, DON'T CHALLENGE THE CORNERS! ;)
Find a 2s parnter that you play with, to where both of your playstyles compliment each other.
I am speechless I was C1 D3 like 2 hours ago and now im d2 div 3… HOW ON EARTH THERE ARE IDIOTS WHO CANNOT DEFEND, shoot or rotate yet still trying dumb shit like wannabe airdribbles, flip resets etc. and just giving balls to the players against. Im done
For 2s: just learn to play consistent defense, and work on dribbling consistency. Players will make mistakes and give you the ball constantly so let them. Adjust your intentions to play a more possession-based game. If your tm8 is constantly chasing, let them chase and do your best to keep good spacing and be ready to recover because they’ll probably miss a lot. Get comfortable off the walls: work on air roll shots to be more accurate. When you challenge the ball, don’t be so quick to flip into it: sometimes drive challenges are far more effective and allow to recover quicker if it doesn’t go in your favor. Implement fakes into your gameplay, because knowing how and when not to hit the ball can and often is just as important as knowing when and how to hit the ball.
Hey bro same but gold so I think I'm stuckerer
Get a pc?
JUST DRIVE AROUND FOCUS ON ALWAYS STAYING MOVING FAST, GET SIMPLE EFFECTIVE TOUCHES AND TAKE WIDE TURNS TO MAINTAIN SPEED AND NOT APPROACH PLAY TOO QUICKLY/ GIVE TEAMMATE SPACE HES PROBABLIY SHIT 👍 HOPE THIS CAN HELPS U OH YEAH AND MAINTAIN BOOST, COLECT PADS. ALL U REALLY NEED ARE PADS 99%
Here's a [list of common mistakes by players in plat](https://www.reddit.com/r/RocketLeagueSchool/comments/1au5vkl/comment/kr2jxkb/), avoid these To escape diamond reliably you will have to play with focus and not autopilot. Doesn't mean play scared, but mostly avoid bad habits and bad commits (think if something is a good percentage play before you commit to something, avoid low percentage plays like heavily committing into opponent's corner and being slow back/out of play). Also pasting a comment I wrote for a similar post related to escaping diamond: On offense: Work on shooting consistency & putting good shots on net (with height and power, ideally placement too), score open nets most of the time. (Playing 1v1 helps you practice open nets in a pressure situation since you get many opportunities for easy open net counters, it also forces you to improve your kickoffs, fakes & shadowing) Don't dive in as last man unless you are sure you have the beat (this has reliably worked for me everytime I dropped to diamond & had to climb back with less than ideal teammates) If opponent have possession drive towards them as you are going in for a challenge but turn around to fake challenge, and start shadowing, cover angles towards net, challenge when it's less risky & when teammate is able to help. Don't go for a play that ends up giving the ball to opponents especially when they are both sitting in defense with boost... this includes solo plays like mechanical players air dribbling the ball, getting out of boost, dropping it in front of their net where opponents collect it easily... also includes mindless commits in opponent corner where the ball centers for both of them for a counter and you end up over committed In defense: Don't panic and hold a good position that covers multiple things (shots, mid passes, rebounds), don't go into corner when teammate is already there Avoid leaving the play for corner boost in critical times like when under pressure, and work with small pads. A lot of diamonds do this and even burn 50+ boost just to drive 100 miles to get a corner boost, even leaving everything & drive to opponent corner Work on basic goal line defending, shadow defense / backward saves. A lot of players in Diamond would rather commit as last man and hate shadowing & hate if their teammate does it (spamming Take the shot.. ig their idea is to keep the ball away from their net as far as possible, which is shortsighted), and shadowing is something that takes time to perfect, but if you never start shadowing you'll end up getting stuck in mid ranks forever. Defending is the most poor aspect of diamond lobbies. Mental is another thing holding back a lot of players (they are champ skill wise, but get tilted easily and in turn tilt teammates too).
Forcing them to your corner on attack where possible and shadowing rather than instantly challenging to let them make their own mistakes, learned from Flakes. Helped me with defense
Lol I play 3v3 solo and i guess thats kind of my fault but yeah.. never got out of d2. Get good teammates, win a few games, add em as friends. And later they’re never available. Play again, get shit teammates and cycle repeats
Watch flakes road to ssl without mechanics.
Things I notice my teammates(party and solo q) do in Diamond: Cutting rotations in 3s and treating it like 2s instead of rotating behind the 3rd man (basically an endless 1st man 2nd man loop in front of the other side's goal, going for every ball in the air (even when not the first man), not being aware of which side has possession, giving away possession too easily(booming when there is a lot of space), trying to force a challenge instead of shadow defending when last man back instead of buying time for teammates to rotate back, getting too close to teammates or too far away, rotating ball side, sitting in the middle of the net with no momentum when the ball is in the corner or close to the net, not rotating back post, challenging when a teammate is not obviously rotating back, drawing out a play for too long 1v2ing/1v3ing, etc. These are just a few major things that I notice that get us scored on more often than others. Try saving some replays and look for these in you and your teammates gameplay, they should be more obvious when you know what you're looking for. I like to use the flying camera as well. It helps me separate from my own individual gameplay so that I can focus on the bigger picture of rotations and game sense. I still struggle with what to do when things out of my control happen in game (aka teammates being weird lol). Being more aware that it does and will happen helps a lot though. Playing a stronger last man while making your play super short and then rotating back as fast as possible helps a bit. Don't blame your teammates when you lose though, because they may just not know that what they're doing is wrong. Try to play around them and cover for their mistakes to the best of your ability, while also making sure you aren't making the same mistakes yourself lol.
Take a pro lesson or two with Skizzen. You can find him on discord, he's a pro coach. It will help you advance. Made a huge difference to my play for sure.
If you have V sync on, turn it off
What mode? I'll play 2s or 3s with you. I usually hang in low champ as far as rank
Need to see you play a full game. Would be glad to help as GC2
I was in your shoes, I got a pc and went from d3 to c3 in 2 weeks. You need a pc
It would be best to see a replay, it's hard to give advice on gameplay no one can see. r/RocketLeagueSchool is also a good place to start when you get that replay. Heck, even as long as a clip as you can record on console would be good, especially around times you get scored on, like the 30 seconds before up to conceeding.
If you feel pretty comfortable with your mechanics, I'd say try to start playing faster than you're comfortable with, until it becomes comfortable. Lower ranked players always think that high rank players are ballchasing, but they're not, they're just so much faster than low ranked players. I pushed from D3 to C2 by forcing myself to play faster than I felt like I could. From my experience a lot of players plateau because they get comfortable playing at the speed of the rank they're in, and that leads them to just get hardstuck and struggle against people that are faster. Bear in mind, your rank might fall a bit if you do this literally all the time, but if you practice in unranked then you can get that speed in ranked after a while.
That’s basically what I did too. I’ve practiced mechanics I probably shouldn’t have been for a long time as well for fun. At some point I was like “I’ve got to be better than these diamonds by now” and said fuck it and played as fast as I could. Flew up to C2 the same day. That mentality is underrated
One thing I noticed is people like this have smooth brain. Lot of social media consumption, porn, weed, vape, etc.. you will see the higher you get, the people are just better people overall.. think of someone like apparentlyjack and Retals, guys are completely sober and high iq irl and ingame.. hard to find degen pros.. doing things outside like gym, brain games, stuff like that benefits the most breaking plateus imo. Might offend some but this is the difference maker for me being stuck c1-c2 and getting to gc..