CHAPTER 3: AVOIDING CC MISTAKES

AVOIDING CC MISTAKES INTRO

Welcome to our course on avoiding the most common CC mistakes. We have one mission here in this course, to be smarter with our crowd control.

To do this, we're going to show you gameplay from three rating brackets, pointing out unique mistakes from different players, and that way you're going to know exactly what to avoid in your next queue session.

GAME LOSING MISTAKES: STOP FAILING YOUR CC - SKILL TEST

Did you know that rank 1 players are actually playing a different game than you? I'm sure you've seen clips of tournament players getting perfect CC chains all the time, but then you try and CC and it seems like everything fails.

But why? It's because you're playing the game on hard mode.

You see, the best players in the world do things to make the game easier for themselves, and CCing properly is a huge part of this. So to make the game easier for you, we have 5 rules that you should be following when going for CC.

It doesn't matter what class you play, because today's guide has something for everyone. CC seems simple enough, right?

All you need to do is target the healer and cast your spell, right? No!

Unless you're using your CC on a boar in Elwynn Forest, chances are it's going to be hard to land your cast. There are an infinite number of things that can go wrong while going for CC.

The first are immunities, like greater fade, grounding totem, and obviously divine shield. There are also a number of interrupts and positional requirements that can make CC difficult to land on its own.

And as you start playing higher rated players, enemy teams will be much better at throwing their stops into your CC spells. So what do you do?

DO YOU CC LIKE A CHALLENGER OR A RANK 1? - SKILL TEST

So you found yourself playing LFG again with a backpedaling demon hunter who's going to pop metamorphosis on the first global and try to solo the enemy team like he's Illidan Stormrage or something.

We've all been there and we know how frustrating it is to see your partner play so uncoordinated that you instantly lose every game. Fortunately there are a few things you can be doing to turn any game in your favor and today we're going to be focusing on control.

We're going to be showing clips from 1400, 1600, and 1800 rated players and comparing them to the pros but this time these pro players will have a distinct disadvantage. Two of these pros will be playing with partners fresh out of LFG and the last one will be playing with a freshly geared healer.

They will be showing you how despite these disadvantages they have mastered their control in order to win games and how you too can use your control to win games against all odds. We quickly have a question for you though.

What do you think is the highest rating possible to get through LFG? A player named GrindTime recently posted that he managed to get Gladiator after finding both of his partners at 1700 rating in LFG.

Do you think this was pure luck or just a fluke? Do you think that there's hidden talent in LFG?

Let us know in the comments below. Let's start by looking at the most important type of control which is using coordinated CC with your team for setups.

Here we will see how an 1800 rated mage rogue uses cross CC against a priest rogue team so we can diagnose some common mistakes. The 1800 team opens with a sap on the priest followed by some spell steals as while this might seem like a good strategy to do, it's not.

So let's get started. The first strategy on the surface, especially since they are opening with greater pyro blasts, it creates one huge problem.

The priest is now on the sap and poly DR and without these DRs for the next 18 seconds, it will be much more difficult to cross CC the priest and set up on the rogue, which is generally a safer strategy in this matchup.

Before we see what happens in the rest of this game, we have a game knowledge question for you, but this one is really easy. Of all the spells you see on screen, which one does not share DRs with the other?

If you get this one wrong, you have a bit of studying to do. If you answered dragon's breath, you are right.

The rest of the abilities here are on incapacitate DR. If you need a refresher on DRs and how they work, check out our video about not failing your crowd control.

Back to our game, we already have a huge blunder. The greater pyro blast gets silenced and kidney shot gets immediately used on the enemy rogue while our 1800 rogue mage pushes for a kill on the priest.

One huge problem with this setup is that kidney shot was wasted on the rogue. At this point, the priest is forced to be the kill target, so instead of using their long stun on the rogue for a polymorph, they should have used cheap shot on the rogue with a kidney shot on the priest.

To their credit, this aggressive opener on priest forces the rogue's trinket, meaning the rogue is a good kill target. With combustion used and the kill denied, our 1800 rogue mage still has a setup option for the rogue who used their trinket to peel the opener.

The problem for the meantime is that now both the priest and rogue are on both stun and polymorph DR. The early sap and stun on the priest combined with the kidney shot and polymorph on the rogue have now created a situation where to both our setups and our CC.

To make matters worse, our 1800 mage will reset the DRs on both the rogue and the priest with a ring of frost. Now both targets are almost on DR immunity to any setup.

This will make cross CC impossible, which will be game losing now that our rogue is under pressure from vendetta. Now let's see how a rank 1 player handles the opener, bearing in mind that they are playing with an LFG rogue without voice communication.

The comp isn't exactly the same, but with dagger in the dark building on our rank 1 mage, it is quite clear that we are dealing with a one shot rogue. In any case, the goal will be to stun the rogue at the same time we polymorph the healer.

Neither the mage or the rogue use sap or polymorph on the healer. Instead, they are saving it for when the rogue opens in order to cross CC with stuns and polys.

In this opener, we can see our rogue open with a kidney shot on the priest. This is an optimal use of kidney as it gives our mage the most time to land a polymorph.

And here you will see the threat of cross CC, as both enemy players have already burned through their trinkets within seconds of the game starting.

If we skip ahead, we will see the efforts of our cross CC pay off, as now we have both the rogue and priest without trinket, and since we didn't waste poly or sap DR during our reset, we will have an easy path to victory from this point on.

And with a dragon's breath sheep secured in the enemy priest, all our LFG rogue needs to do is land a stun on the rogue. The enemy rogue pops evasion, but it will not be enough, as our rogue eventually reconnects with a shadow dance.

With combustion popped, the game will easily be won. As you can see, by not wasting DRs, we are able to set up clean kill setups later in the game.

As a setup based comp, you always want to make sure you have a CC DRs ready for when you stun the kill target. If we take a look at another game against a different priest rogue team, you will see how overpowered cross CC is for a comp like rogue mage.

Despite not even using combustion in the opener, a rank 1 mage is able to win a game almost instantly by simply cross CCing polymorph on the healer with stun on the kill target. I know what you're saying by now, not every comp can CC like rogue mage, how does this apply to me?

Well, virtually every comp in the game has multiple CCs, so it's not a problem. But if you're playing against a mage that's not a mage, you're probably going to have to think about what you're doing.

Think about it for a second, can you name one comp that doesn't have cross CC potential? You can't.

Even a comp like turbo cleave can cross CC with hexes, stuns, and fears, and by focusing on cross CCing effectively with your partners, you will become more effective at forcing enemy defenses and in turn, winning more games. Now let's look at another important type of CC which involves peeling for you or your partners.

Here we will see how a 1600 team utilizes their slows and fears to peel for themselves. Now the challenge here is that they will be doing this against an arms warrior who has a fear breaker and multiple gap closers.

Let's see how our 1600 warlock handles themselves. Our 1600 team actually gets a pretty solid opener, managing to get all their dots on the warrior, but the shadow priest made a minor mistake.

Just like mage rogue, you also need to be utilizing cross CC as a shadow priest, which you have access to by yourself with psychic horror and silence. A better holy paladin in this situation would have instantly dispelled the coil and the full row of dots on their warrior.

Before we see what happens after this opener, we have a quick game knowledge question for you. What DR category is mortal coil?

Is it a stun, incapacitate, or disorient? If you said incapacitate, you are right.

This means it won't DR with fear or psychic horror. With the warrior now feared, berserker rage gets used, giving them a temporary immunity to fear.

One thing most players forget is that the cooldown of berserker rage is much longer than the DR of fear. What this means is that once berserker rage is over, the warrior can easily be peeled with fears for almost a minute.

Until berserker rage comes off cooldown. Here the warlock makes the correct play of porting away from the warrior on their warbreaker, though it might have been better to use trinket of stormbolt to port away sooner since they took a huge hit during the stun.

Once the warrior reconnects, the warlock makes the correct play of trying to gate away, but unfortunately their priest grips at the same time, which is likely a communication error. If we skip forward a bit, the warrior's berserker rage is still on cooldown and DRs are over, meaning they can be put into a full fear.

Unfortunately, our 1600 team doesn't realize this, and to make matters worse, the game is nearly a minute in and our 1600 warlock finally uses their offensive cooldowns, though they are quickly running out of time. The option that could be used in this moment is mind control.

On a map like Tol Voron, where the warlock has plenty of room to kite, mind control should be used in moments like this to peel enemy warriors. The only counterplay is spell reflection, since the paladin cannot dispel the mind control buff it would put on his warrior.

So without fear DRs being utilized when berserker rage is down, and without the priests spamming mind control while their warlock is under pressure, the 1600 team falls too far behind in the game.

Now let's see how a rank 1 warlock uses their peels against a warrior team, bearing in mind that they are playing with a freshly geared priest into other rank 1 players. This game starts off almost identical to the 1600 match earlier, with the warrior immediately storm bolting our warlock.

Our priest instantly reacts to this with a chastise on the warrior, denying a lot of their early damage. And now the goal will be kiting the enemy warrior away, using curse of exhaustion to keep the warrior snared and unable to connect on any target.

If we skip ahead a bit, the warrior heroic leaps back to the priest. Our priest recognizes this and uses gateway to instantly get away.

Now with the enemy team separated from us, we have a perfect time to get some damage rolling. Using our stuns we prevent both the priest and the warrior from connecting while also establishing pressure.

And here our warlock is about to make an intelligent play. With the enemy warrior closing the gap, our warlock uses fear.

This will force berserker rage, allowing us to peel later on once the warrior is off DR again. And if we skip forward again, you will see this pay off.

With our undergeared priest under pressure, our warlock fears the warrior. This is a very good way to get the warlock to get away from the enemy.

Now with no berserker rage, the fear lasts for its full duration, allowing our priest to get away and letting us pump out huge damage. As you can see, even against a warrior team with fear breakers, you can still use your fear DR as a way to peel for your partners and put out damage.

Finally, let's see how CC has managed to lock down kill targets and spread AOE pressure by comparing a 1400 and rank 1 assassination rogue.

Assassin rogues are meant to be played much different than sub, and instead of doing a lot of upfront damage, you usually set up your kills by getting rot pressure on multiple targets while using full kidney shots on the kill target. So let's see how well our 1400 team manages this.

The rogue runs in for a sap on the priest, while our paladin immediately uses hammer of justice. Unfortunately, our 1400 paladin instantly breaks the sap on the priest the moment our rogue shadow steps to the enemy monk.

Now with the monk on stunned DR, we should look to establish rot pressure and use our kidney shot on the priest since the monk is now on stunned DR. Unfortunately, our 1400 rogue uses kidney shot on the monk, resetting DRs and lasting half its duration.

To make matters worse, our rogue was late in responding to weapons of order and serenity, causing them to take huge pressure really early. Not only have stunned DRs been wasted up to this point, but we have not really established rot pressure on both targets, which will make the game much more difficult.

Now let's see how a rank 1 rogue is able to spread AOE pressure with bleeds while using stuns properly on a kill target. Bear in mind that this rogue is playing with an LFG healer against other high rated teams.

Once again, the goal of assassination is to apply as much AOE damage as possible to the target as possible, and that's when you can use kidney shots on the kill target. This is achieved by playing very slow in the opener, gradually applying your bleeds on multiple targets before stunning the kill target.

In this case, it's best to apply most of your pressure on the enemy healer because they will be under massive stress trying to keep their team topped while a rogue rots them and their partner. And here we will see how effective it is to apply rot pressure while using kidney shot on the healer.

Notice the health of both the demon hunter and the priest when this kidney shot starts, and now you will see that during the kidney shot, the rogue is able to drop the priest incredibly low, forcing major CDs, and during all of this, the demon hunter's health continues to rot in the background.

We now have a situation where we have two targets low and vulnerable, simply by using our stuns while we had established rot pressure. By not wasting stun DRs, our rank 1 rogue is now in a really good position to win the game.

And there you have it! Those are the key differences between challenger level and rank 1 level players.

As you can see, rank 1 players are highly effective at using their cross CC for setups, CCing for peels, and using their CC on kill targets to create pressure. Once again, we want to know what you think is the highest rating possible in LFG, so let us know in the comments below what you think.

Thanks for watching and have a great rest of your day!