Training with drills

Playing matches is the most complete way to improve, but also the slowest for any single skill. In a match you do many different things: aim, movement, decisions, communication, economy. Each one gets a little attention, none gets all of it.

A drill does the opposite: it picks one thing and gives it all your attention for a limited time. That is why it works: what you repeat with attention for a few weeks becomes automatic, and once it is automatic it no longer costs you effort in a match.

Every Academy drill has three parts:

• the goal: what you are training and why it matters;
• the how: where it is done, how long it takes, what to do step by step;
• the how you know it works: a concrete sign that tells you whether you are improving.

The last part is the most important. A drill with no check becomes a practice habit, not an improvement: you do it, you feel good, but you do not know whether it helps.

The drills are split into eight areas. Each one matches a part of the game that can be trained on its own:

• minimap: checking it often and reading it fast, so you always know how many enemies you have located;
• aim: crosshair at head height and on the right angles, accurate shots after a stop;
• sound: recognizing footsteps, reloads and abilities, and turning them into calls;
• decisions: timing, trades, reading opponents and the economy;
• utility: using abilities for a reason, with the right timing and a reliable throw;
• communication: short calls, the fixed sentence when you die, the plan in the buy phase;
• movement: stopping before you shoot, knowing rotation timings;
• review: going back over your rounds with precise questions, following a player in your role.

Not every area weighs the same at every tier. In Base, aim, movement and the minimap matter most; in Growth, communication and simple decisions; in Advanced, utility and reading; in Expert, review and reading opponents.

Every drill says where it is done. There are six places, and each has different strengths:

• in a match: most decision, communication and minimap drills are done playing normally, with a single goal in mind. It is the most realistic way, but the noisiest: lots of things distract you;
• in a custom game: perfect for learning a map, a lineup, rotation timings or post-plant positions, with no pressure;
• in the range: for aim and movement mechanics, repeated hundreds of times;
• in deathmatch: for aim against real opponents, without the consequences of a match;
• in review: watching a recording or reading your notes, with a cool head;
• anywhere: some drills, like the session goal, take five minutes and do not need the game open.

A good week mixes places: some range or deathmatch for your hand, one in-match drill for your head, a short review to understand what is happening.

The most common mistake is picking the drill you like or the one that sounds most useful in general. It works better to start from you:

• from your recurring mistake: the ten questions on five lost rounds almost always show it. If you often die alone, the trade-distance drill; if you are late to retakes, the rotation-timing one;
• from a problem you feel: the problems list starts from the symptom and leads you to causes and chapters. Pick the drill from there;
• from your tier: the typical mistakes of each tier tell you what players at your level usually work on;
• from your role: a controller gets a lot out of the six-questions smoke drill, an initiator from the information-before-entry one.

Once you have picked it, write it down: it is the goal for your next sessions.

Here is an example of how to organize a month, for a player who wants to improve with about an hour a day:

• every day: ten to fifteen minutes of warm-up before playing, then matches with a session goal;
• weeks 1 and 2: one in-match drill tied to your recurring mistake, always the same one. Once a week, a short review of lost rounds;
• week 3: if your scores have gone up, add a second drill from another area, perhaps in a custom game (a map, a lineup);
• week 4: redo the five-lost-rounds review. Does the original mistake still show up? If not, pick a new one; if it does, keep going with the same drill.

The plan is deliberately simple. The hard part is not finding drills, but sticking with the same one long enough for it to become a habit.

A drill is only worth something if it changes how you play matches. That is why many Academy drills are done directly inside a match: they do not take extra time, they take attention.

A few tips to keep the thread:

• one goal per match. Two goals at once are both forgotten;
• remind yourself at the start of every round, in the buy phase: one word is enough ("trade", "minimap", "timer");
• do not judge the drill by the match result. You can do the drill perfectly and lose: it still counts;
• if a drill makes you play much worse, try it in an unranked mode first until it feels more natural.

After a few weeks the drill disappears: you no longer think about it, you just do it. That is the moment to pick another one.

Without a measure you do not know whether a drill works. Measures do not need to be precise: they need to be the same over time. Three simple ways:

• a score from one to five at the end of each session, on the goal alone. It is the method of the "session goal" drill;
• a count: how many times you died with no teammate nearby, how many lineups out of twenty landed right, how many predictions about the enemy economy were correct;
• a before and after: the same review of five lost rounds, repeated after a month.

Look at the trend over two or three weeks, not a single evening. Bad evenings happen to everyone and mean nothing.

Practice has its own typical mistakes too:

• only training aim, because it is the easiest thing to measure and see improve. At many tiers, though, rounds are mostly lost to decisions and positioning;
• changing drills every day, looking for the "right" one. Almost any drill works if you do it long enough;
• practicing tired. A drill done without attention trains distraction;
• skipping the check. Without knowing whether it works, you keep going out of inertia or stop too early;
• comparing yourself to others. The only useful comparison is with yourself a month ago.

If you recognize yourself in one of these, there is no need to start over: fix that one and carry on.