One thing I thought about recently was looking at the player base as employees, and leaders as the HR team who will train their employees.
My goal is to have leaders guide, coach and train because if we ramp up the community's skills, our opponents will be better, the matches will be more frequent, and we will achieve better communication skills for quality posts. In the recruiting world, it is also about retention, so that we don't lose players to rivals (other metagames), similar to how companies improve engagement so they don't see employees resign for a different company.
We, as a community, should steer towards attracting new activity, and improve others so then they can equally contribute once they tap into their potential.
Overall, the more skillful players we have, the more meaningful contributions each person can make. This, ultimately, benefits the community and the metagame as a whole.
In my mind, I feel like it is best to list the rankings of what I feel are player base experience / activity levels:
Level 1 - Novice / Newbie - entry point of a first time player thru a "learning the ropes" player.
*Diving into the metagame.
Level 2 - Wins occasionally - Intermediate / Casual player - knows what it takes to play *but not what it takes to win. (I.e., they will use a Sample team based on what it should do, but struggle to comfortably adjust to their opponent's strategies both in the match, and in general).
**Going with the flow, and hoping for the best.
Level 3 - Average / Standard player - Wins as much as they lose - aware of the important strategies and key Pokemon *but fail to connect the dots of "why a team works". (I.e., good at using Sample Teams, struggles to build their own).
*Treading water, and enduring the learning curve.
Level 4 - Advanced / Skilled player - Wins about 2/3 of the time - aware of why a team works *but not how it can be improved (i.e., can build an effective Sample Team, struggles to identify its key weaknesses and keep it up to date in order to build an optimal team).
*Learning to swim, searching for the shore.
Level 5 - Expert / Can truly teach others - Wins 4/5 of the time - aware of what changes can be applied to their teams,
and know why they won / lost. (They recognize their real opponent is "keeping up with the metagame itself", and their strategy has evolved to keep up with the shifts, and trends, because it is the moving target they successfully aim towards).
*Rides the wave itself, can now see the shore, and heads towards it.
Level 6 - Master / Can shift the metagame - wins 9/10 of the time - these are the players that make the metagame tick. (They know the usage stats, and probably influenced those metagame shifts that other players are trying to keep up with. They don't just build Sample Teams to keep up, their Sample Teams cause those shifts as more and more players use, counter, or find alternatives).
*Arrived on shore, setting the example of what it takes to get there.
Level 7 - Grandmaster / Oversees and outsmarted the metagame - Beyond impacting trends in the metagame, they plant expectations of what it means to be a solid player. They have long since finished the goal of mastering the metagame, they are setting the standards of what is even considered good / bad for other players to live by, and establish what should be suspected / banned or at least have the reasoning for others who decide to consider their points. They are focused on what improves the community.
*Built the community that lives on the shore.
As a starting point: How do you see yourself in this? What level do you feel applies to you?
Personally, I feel like Level 5. I routinely teach others, both in this thread and even against my opponents during our battle, and guide them to improve their own teams, and if needed, I at least ensure they understand my team so they know how to better face it or potentially use it. In doing so, I see their growth as I end up facing them in a battle later on, where they perform better than last time.
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I know this post may seem long-winded, but we have a strong opportunity to guide people away from entry level to at least average level, so they are more aware of what it means to make it further. I am wondering if there is any feedback / strategies we can implement, so that players have more resources for improvement.
Tournaments can be a nice incentive for players to get better, as an example. They typically require replays as well, so that allows those players to get feedback on what caused a match to tilt in a certain player's advantage, if they took that opportunity, or if the other player was able to reverse that direction and take the win / why.
Tournaments also ramp up interest, and attract new players.