Not feeding your opponents

It shouldn’t be taken that K/D isn’t important, of course. Shooting opponents is one of the two defining features of a first-person shooter (I am sure you can guess what the other defining feature is). It’s just that it’s perhaps not as important as, say, not feeding deaths to your opponents.

More damaging than an overly cautious player protecting their K/D is the one that has little regard for self-preservation, throwing themselves into impossible positions and getting killed. Not only does this reckless behavior take away from the assistance the player should be providing their team, it also feeds the Ultimate abilities of their opponents in the process, which could be the difference between your team capturing a point and getting wiped by a Pulse Bomb.

Killing your opponents is important, but it’s more important that they aren’t killing you. Minimizing careless deaths has much greater bearing on one’s value as a player and a teammate than maximizing their kills.