My Time On Dante



Dante was a bittersweet experience for me in a scene where I learned that coaching staff matters and structure matters a lot. Going into Elo Hell Dante tryouts, I was scared of my competition and convinced that I would not get the spot. Going up against 2 OWWC tanks and 4.5,4.6k MT's. The fact that I got accepted over those tanks was the biggest confidence boost I have had in my year of playing Overwatch Professionally. Also, the promise of growing with a team in the long term where every player I am with is trying to be the best like me was an absolute dream come true.



The team was amazing, and every player stayed hours after scrims talking about strategies, positioning, and drills, etc. Something that I always wanted from a team was everyone to put in time into becoming the best and growing a family that has the same passions as me. To this day, I believe that any team would be blessed to have the teammates I had on Dante. I truly cared for everyone and wanted to become the best, not just for Elo Hell but for them as well. Any team that I have ever been apart of knows how much I put into getting to know everyone — and becoming a part of that family.



The four weeks I have been with Dante showed me that the team was not on building players up but just another team wanting the best talent as fast as possible and as soon as possible and to get into contenders as quickly as possible. I know every team wants, of course, although I thought this team would be guiding and building the players on the path to pro and helping them out to achieve success in the long run. This was apparent when three weeks later after the team was together, we were informed that we were replacing our hitscan player. Now to me, this was insane since in scrims, he was a beast and was meshing well with the team. We were getting better by the showing of our scrim results on teams that used to beat us. I reached out to my teammate who got kicked. Talking to him and what he said about the amount of stuff he sacrificed to get on Dante and stay on Dante is more than enough to show any coach; this would be the type of player that is willing to go through it all to be the best. This made me wonder how can someone show so much passion for the game and the team as a whole and still get dropped because "You're not improving as fast as we hoped." Now from what I was told, he only had two one on 1's with the coaches in the time he was there, and those were when he asked for help. The coaches offered nothing.

I tilted twice, here is an example of me tilting, I'm sorry to my teammates, this barely happened.

-https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/629570977411629066/638556098269282305/gnja.mp4



Now If you were to tell me "What is Dante's Goal" "What are you improving on" "what is your coaching structure like." I would say we want to make contenders. That's about all I know. I know one coach on Dante that I genuinely respect and love with all my heart, but unfortunately, he is not the head of Dante. The sad fact of the matter is the coaches never did more than two full team VOD review, And one of an OWL match and one in contenders. Nor did the coaching staff make goals for the week, goals for the players, goals in general. It was always we scrim; then, coaches say what sucks about our play then release us. After a week or two, they would not even say what we are doing wrong; it was "nothing we haven't told you before." Just saying that and not explaining in depth what we are doing to cause this made me wonder if they even wanted to coach us. It made me wonder if I was just not pro material at all.



So I went to other coaches in the scene that I trusted in T3, T2. And yet they were telling me that Dante is not being led correctly. That we lack a necessary foundation of learning. Now I had a real Coach that was a big role model to me before going into Pro Overwatch. And That was my football coach Thompson (Coach T) Coach T is who I base almost every coach off of today. Throughout high-school, He demonstrated to me what all coaches should strive to be. Before and After school, he would always be in the cafeteria talking with students about what they were doing and what he could do to help them. When football season started, and the team was made, he made it clear to take the time to go through every player and make sure what kind of learner they were. Kinetic, auditory, visual learners were noted by him, and he would coach each group of kids differently to make sure everyone was on the same page, so no one was left out after he would answer any questions or concerns about what he said and what we were going to do in our plays. This man was why I am so passionate about what coaches do and how they go about coaching.



Now in everything I said, my football team did that in high school was not done for Dante. The necessary foundations were not even there. The coaches never checked the best way the players could learn or how they could implement a structure where we would focus on one thing at a time was. Nor would they establish any connection with the players. If you were to ask me what I know about my coaches, I would say. I genuinely don't know. And when I tried to reach out to IoStux and try to implement some way to help my progress. Or a way to set up a structure where we could focus on one thing at a time. His response was, "We shouldn't have to tell you those things are common sense." Now, what many other coaches agreed on were that his justification for me being bad was my fault and mine alone. And yes, players have control of how much they practice, although what is common sense to most people is not to others sometimes. And when someone thinks they are missing something about there play, it is usually a coach to fill in that space and guide the players. Coaching is supposed to establish a foundation to build on its players on and then build on it. At least that was what I was hoping Dante would do.



But in my entire time,I got one 1 on 1 session and 2 team VOD reviews. 2 TEAM VOD REVIEWS. I want to highlight that in my four weeks with the team, we as a team only took the time to rewatch a 2 of our own scrim VOD as a team with our coaches to highlight what we could do better. Now coaches usually set a foundation for there players looking at what they know and what they need to learn and go off that list. The coaching staff gave us none of that. The criticism we got was, "you have to engage first," "Your pull doom ult is embarrassing," "Just don't feed, and you will win."



There was so much emptiness in the coaching scene where all of the work felt like it was falling onto me. I spend countless hours VOD reviewing myself, and making my solutions to my problems even though some days I would play worse than others because of those fixes. The amount of time I spent working on my gameplay was the most I have ever done. And still, I would ask almost after every scrim for a list of what I'm doing wrong or if we could do a 1 on 1 because I always wanted to show I could improve for the team. But all IoStux told me was its common sense you need to fix this we cant do it for you. I felt like I had no support from my coaches. I asked IoStux for help, but after I messaged him, all I felt was like I was being abandoned and discarded.

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https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/599017789411426315/640433996588908554/unknown.png

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https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/599017789411426315/640434151455064065/unknown.png



With this being released, I hope Elo Hell knows what is actually going on in Dante and not just assume because since we have an Ex T2 coach, everything will be fine. I want Dante and Elo Hell to realize that what they have are the best and most dedicated players in Overwatch right now. I love every player on that team and have no grudge on anyone. Hell, I hope IoStux reads this and realizes where I am coming from and fixes Dante and the coaching environment. I want that team to succeed i really do, more than anything. Because if this stuff is fixed, then they can be an excellent team, the best in fact. If they decide to keep and work on building the players, they promised to develop and grow with. Of course, this is coming from a T3 player that has only been in the scene for a bit, but this is not just my two sense but others as well. In all honesty, I am happy I was let go. The experience I have gotten is invaluable and will only progress me forward in my path to pro. My biggest take away is mostly stand up for yourself, know your self worth and always believe in your goal — no matter who thinks less of you or who doubts you. Always look to better not just yourself but your team as well, have a goal set, and push yourself as hard as you can towards it. That is when you will see how amazing things you can do. Thank you, Jayne, for always being an inspiration, and thank you, everyone, at Dante for your time.

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