In-Game Leading: An Introduction and Beginner's Guide

We hope that this video will help nurture and cultivate aspiring leaders in the community who may or may not have competitive experience in leading a team. These principles don’t have wait to be applied at Dreamhack finals. We think these rules and ideas can be applied in any 5v5 mode in CS:GO, whether you are playing with a five man queue in matchmaking, on your first competitive team, or even solo queue into a random pug.

Written and created by Dakati and Affinity at Lo3tv. Check out our burgeoning channel at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCN8-LHGdFMPT4h8rHEqXakA

Introduction

Some of the greatest players in Counter-Strike aren’t known for their amazing shooting skill or clutch ability. Instead, some of the most famous CS players of all time are known for one thing: in-game leading. In-game leaders (or IGLs) fill one of the most, if not the most, crucial role in Counter-Strike. In-game leaders set the tone of a match for professional and amateur teams alike. The IGL can single handedly change the outcome of a round and even a whole game.

IGL’s are an integral part of any team in CS, but what exactly does an IGL do? What are his responsibilities and goals? How does he fulfill those responsibilities and reach those goals? In this guide, we at Lo3 will explain and break down the in-game leader’s goals and responsibilities and answer these questions.

We hope that this video will help nurture and cultivate aspiring leaders in the community who may or may not have competitive experience in leading a team. These principles don’t have wait to be applied at Dreamhack finals. We think these rules and ideas can be applied in any 5v5 mode in CS:GO, whether you are playing with a five man queue in matchmaking, on your first competitive team, or even solo queue into a random pug.

Anybody can call a tactic for a team to execute. Any player can put two and two together and identify a weakness. What makes the best IGL is the L-- leading. Below is a CS-relevant guide pertaining to leading a team in 5v5 CS games.

Taking Charge and Setting the Tone

Taking charge and setting the tone:

- Be the first to initiate comms

- Establish rapport with your team

- Set the tone

Before you can call anything for your teammates they have to know you want to call. Obviously, in a competitive setting with your team you are already the de facto IGL. This may also be true for your set of friends you match make with. If you are a solo queue, this step becomes more precarious and requires a certain finesse to lead people. Oftentimes, players will not want to listen to you until your are either leading the scoreboard or your team is down a substantial amount of rounds.

There are hundreds of thousands of different players in CSGO, so we can’t create a guide on how to deal with all of the different personalities. Some people just aren’t going to listen. Still, it’s always best to try.

The first step is initiating communications within your team. Be the first guy on your team to ask how everyone is doing. Get people talking. A silent team is an ineffective one, and by taking the initiative, being friendly, and taking the lead you are already increasing your chances of winning even if people don’t listen to your calls.

The next step is to establish a rapport with your team. You want your teammates to respond to your calls. Obviously, developing rapport with unfamiliar people is always finicky. Fleshing out an idea over voice comms will increase the likelihood of people following your lead. It often helps to be friendly if you want to be the catalyst that gets your team comfortably working together. Remember, you want people to be comfortable with you in a leadership role-- more often than not this requires you to be friendly, engaging, and energetic.

There are a lot of different ways to set the tone for your team. Without delving into a lesson on leadership, let’s just say there are many different styles of leadership. Are you the gung-ho lead-from-the-front type leader that sends commands rather than requests? Or are you a more reserved, calculating personality that wants everyone to stay cool and collected so you can make the right choice for your team?

There is no right or wrong answer, and some people will respond to some styles more than others. Some people don’t want to be commanded to do anything, while others will ignore you if you are not assertive enough.

Either way, you need your teammates on board to lead them. Try asking around if it is okay to call, and if there is hesitation try to explain your logic for a particular call.

*** Conclusion: Your goal in setting the tone is to get people talking, familiarizing themselves with your style, and encourage team work-- all before the game has started. ***

Keeping Your Team Focused and Managing Emotions

Keeping Your Team Focused and Managing Emotions

- This is a round-by-round game

- You always have a chance to change the momentum

- Know your players

- Give your cold players specific tasks, let your hot players loose

- Encourage the big plays, minimize the bad ones

How many games have you won when you were down 2-13; 3-12; 4-11 at half? Maybe not the majority, but if you’ve been playing for a significant amount of time then you know that this game can turn around at any moment-- and that goes BOTH ways. Your team can just as easily throw a huge lead as you can come back from a titanic deficit. What does this mean? *This is a round-by-round game. *

The start of your once in a lifetime comeback or the beginning of your terrible downfall all begins with a single round. CS has always had a momentum element to the game, but you always have a chance to change the momentum. As the IGL it is your responsibility to keep your team focused on the round at hand. Are your teammates pushing and dying in a 5v2 situation while you are on CT side? Remind them that you have the advantage, and pushing for frags is only decreasing your chances of winning. Reign in your teammates when they are getting reckless.

Are people still thinking about that round one of your players lost from a stupid move? That round is over. Done. It doesn’t matter anymore as far as this particular match is concerned. If you want to fix a problem then do it after the game, and remind everyone you still have rounds left to play. People get lost in the heat of the moment, and they should be, because it’s your job as the IGL to think long-term, and all the other players have different roles.

Managing player emotions is by far the most difficult responsibility of an IGL. It is an aspect of in-game leading that is often overlooked by teams not participating in mid and high tier leagues. The first step to managing your players’ emotions is to know your players. Some people will respond to strong, pointed criticism while others will completely shut down. Some players require consistent “emotional maintenance” throughout a match where they are performing badly.

You need all five players on your team to be performing. It is your job to squeeze that performance out of them. By getting to know your teammates you learn what makes them tick, what pisses them off, and what they will and will not respond to in terms of encouragement. You are, essentially, a manager of a five man department and your project is win the match. Everytime you play.

As soon as someone rages, clocks out mentally, or loses focus you have already lost some percentage of winning. Giving discouraged or raged players a specific task will distract them from their overall performance. Often times, bringing a discouraged player with you on an aggressive mission, or risky play, can pay off ten fold for their spirit. Anything that can be considered a small victory, even if it is a simple trade where you sacrificed yourself, will help bring that player into the game.

It depends on the type of player, but often times if a player is hot it is wise to let him make decisions for himself. It will build his confidence, and utilizing him as an impact player in the match will results in early picks or entries.

The last piece of advice for managing your teams emotions has to do with specific plays. Remember, it’s your job to keep your team focused. This means encouraging the big plays, and minimizing the bad ones. It is okay to critique people you are familiar with when they make mistakes, but do not assume a stranger will take your constructive criticism for what it is. In general, you want to build morale after big plays, and minimize the damage done by a poor loss.

** CONCLUSION: Managing your teams emotions is an important task for the IGL that requires knowledge of personality, but there are simple rules: like encouraging big plays, giving discouraged players tasks, and building morale that can apply to all sorts of 5 man mixes. ***

Assisting your IGL: Good followers make good leaders

Assisting your in-game leader: Good followers make good leaders

- Comms, comms, comms

- Identify patterns

- Encourage your IGL

While IGL’s fulfill a lot of important roles in the game they are nothing without their teammates. Anyone who has played competitively knows one thing: good teammates are hard to find. In fact, it’s almost rare to find someone that does everything they should as a player. Everybody has faults; whether it be in personality or otherwise. Regardless, it doesn’t matter how good of a player you are, there are some key things that all good teammates have.

The first is the biggest, most important, monumental facet of Counter-Strike: communication. A team is nothing without good communication. Without calls you are essentially playing a 30 round 5v5 death match. Different teams take different approaches to comms. Some teams like to spit out as much information as possible, while others prefer a more minimalist strategy. Communication is the number one, absolute, most important thing to an IGL.

- Call via voice:

- Enemy positions and rotations (“One is behind X-box. He’s jumping cat now.”)

- Enemy numbers (“I hear 3 on cat!” “I’m dead. 2 coming B. 3. 4. ALL 5 B!”

- Any kind of execution set-up(smokes and flashes) (“Smoke CT spawn for mid-B!”)

- Your nades (“Push cat I’m flashing you in!” “Hey I’m smoking right side, let’s go left!”

- Changes in your movement and positioning (“I left upper B open, rotating to lower.”)

Now, what do communications have to do with IGL’s? Everything. In order to make educated decisions for your team, your IGL needs to know what is going on in the map. Your role as an AWPer, entry fragger, support player, lurker all includes feeding information to your IGL. He will do his best to make sense out of all the information.

The plus side of good comms is that not just the IGL uses the information. Your whole team does. Your IGL isn’t the only player making decisions in the game. Your communication might save your teammates life, or it might open up a bombsite to a teammate who otherwise would not have pushed in.

This goes hand-in-hand with our last key of assisting your IGL. Identify patterns for your IGL. The best tacticians in the game are generally very good at spotting patterns. Through experience, logic, and gut feeling they can make so-called “reads” on the enemy based on your information. Identifying patterns of enemy rotations, tendencies, executions, and fakes to relay to your IGL will help him make a decision on how to best counter it. Once you find yourself identifying patterns consistently in the game, and creating counters to them, then you know you have become an IGL.

[Krystal]

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Как получить бесплатные скины?
Заходим на pvpro .com(убираем пробел)
Регистрируемся
Используем Refcode: KrySTaL100
Получаем 10000 монет и покупаем скины

[Loyd]

This was amazing ! Thank you !

[roy]

I'm just going to fucking spinbot

[Peach]

thanks for the amaizing gude took a realy good spin on it from a diffrent perspective

[Stickan]

Thanks alot for the guide, as a depressed teen in high elo playing cs to think of else than bullshit I usually find teams who don't have an IGL, which means they are searching for one. Which often means I get to tryouts and stuff like that, and usually fail, since I've been bullied basically since first grade (Just finished 9th grade) I'm not a very talkactive person. You can probably guess why. So yeah, again, thanks alot for the guide and will remember the things you wrote.

[kilu]

In Soviet Russia, the team leads you

[cubozoa ⋅˚₊‧ ଳ ‧₊˚]

another thing is, control your own temper, noboby will listen to an angry 12 year old yelling out commands even if they are good

[Papa-Rolf]

bad comments, nice guide.... i do alot of team leading myself, make people from silver come to dobbel ak
but this you guys talk about is specific and very simular to what i teach people in matches, its a very good reminder for me....
its all very good, nice guide

[Samer Sultan]

Learn Russian?

[coco]

how can you lead the russian spirit

the russian spirit cannot be tamed