When to fight, when to reset
Picking your fights: too reckless at low ranks, too passive higher up. Stage with your team, push when ahead, and regroup instead of trickling in.
At every rank
Fight when you're strong
Fights are won as much by when you take them as by how you play them. Take them when you have the numbers, the cooldowns or the ultimates, and avoid fights when you don't.
- Go when any of these is true and your team can follow: they're down a player, their key ability or ultimate is gone, or they're badly placed.
- Reset: you're a player down with nothing to trade, your key abilities are gone, or your team is spread out.
Stage with your team
Staging is where you wait, together, just before a fight. Stand about as far from the enemy as your team does. Closer and you're the first target, cleared before your team can help. Further and you arrive late to a fight that's already four against five.
Regroup, then go together
After a lost fight, don't walk back in one at a time: each of you dies alone to a full enemy team. Wait for the respawn, meet up out of their sight, and go back in together. Skipping this is where most avoidable team deaths come from.
Mistakes flip as you climb
At low ranks the usual mistake is going in too early and too deep. From Platinum up it turns around: players wait too long, back off from spots that were safe and let the enemy reset for free. The fix isn't more or less aggression; it's timing it with your team.
At your rank
What matters changes as you climb. Pick your rank to open that section. We'll remember it next time.
Bronze and Silver2 tips
Don't go in alone
- Wait for your tank to go first, then go with them. Diving before anyone else has drawn attention gets you killed for nothing.
- Flank once the enemy is busy with your team. Before that, they're all free to turn and shoot you.
- When your team is winning without you, you don't need to make a play: just stay alive.
Fight on your cooldowns
Go in when your abilities are ready, and keep the last one to get out. With them all spent, back off and wait the few seconds they take to come back.
Gold and Platinum2 tips
Go when your team can follow
Time your engage for when your team can follow within a second or so. A little late is better than early: early, you fight alone and they arrive to find you dead. Don't spend health or abilities poking before your team is in position.
Don't chase
- Chasing an enemy who's hard to catch pulls you off your spot and burns your abilities.
- Chase only a kill you're sure of; otherwise let them go and keep your position.
- Pick your plan before the fight and commit to it. Changing it halfway costs more than either plan.
Emerald and Diamond2 tips
Push the advantage
When they're down a player or a cooldown, walk forward instead of waiting. A safe-looking wait lets them reset, re-heal and take back the space you won. Poking before the fight counts too: sitting far back gives them the map for free.
Commit, then reset
- Half-committing (staging aggressively, then not fighting) is the worst of both plans. Pick one and do it.
- After a failed engage, go back, reset your abilities and start again, rather than waiting on the same spot.
- When something is working, keep doing it.
Master to Champion2 tips
Patience and confidence
At this level you need both: stop playing scared, and slow down. Know your triggers for going in (attention off you, cooldowns used, a target low, the enemy badly placed), go hard when they're there, and be comfortable doing nothing when they're not.
Don't skip steps
- Stage, clear your angle, then push. Chasing one enemy across the map pulls you out of position with your team.
- Hold your space first: it costs little and gives you time to plan, as long as you go when your triggers are there.
- Match your team's tempo: if they're waiting, wait with them; when they go, go all in. Going halfway is the worst of both.
Find the habit in your own games
After every match, Hardstuck's match review points out fights your team lost the first player in and your team's deaths against theirs, and links each one to this guide in the app, opened at your rank.