Hi @Felipe ,
I’ve been randomly running into quite a few players lately, it seems the game has been enjoying quite the renaissance. I only started watching games a few months ago but have been really enjoying it!
I’m down to play sometime, my elo is probably like 500 haha. Maybe a team game! I actually just got a PC set up so I can reliably play without lag.
Competitiveness has been a big big part of my wiring for a long time and it has been an interesting process unwinding it! I’ve found that the best antidote is a sensuous enjoyment & appreciation of the game itself rather than an enjoyment dependent on winning (eg a certain narrative playing out). It’s very instructive to note the two sides of how people enjoy domination or they side with the underdog (and hope for the underdog to dominate!).
A key realization for me has been recognizing that the competitive ‘pecking order’ is very very large so most people fall roughly in the middle. I just looked it up and the peak aoe2 pop in the last 30 days was ~30,000, so you can assume there are 50,000+ that play reasonably often. That means that you and I fall somewhere within that 50,000 pecking order, with thousands above and below us. Any particular matchup we could create a narrative that we’re so amazing at the game, or so shit at the game (with the corresponding spiral into depression). Even if you’re on the top of the food chain, some young gun could come up at any time and unseat you (as the Viper found!). Awareness of the silliness of worrying about where I fall in that competitive hierarchy has allowed me to turn my attention elsewhere, specifically toward that sensuous enjoyment & appreciation.
And in that realm there’s no ceiling to what there is to experience! It continues to expand, and pleasingly I keep getting better at the game, and within that increasing skill ceiling is ever-more enjoyment & sensuousness to be found. I’ve found the exact same to be true in several other domains I play in. It’s a very different orientation than the normal competitive mindset, though I do find that especially after I do some winning that I start to get seduced back to ‘being a winner…’ Ultimately, though, it is rotten. I haven’t even mentioned how every winner needs a loser! And of course if you subscribe to the narratives, any ‘loser’ must spiral into depression, that’s why in the past I sympathized with the underdog - I identified with them and wanted to protect them from that depression, which I empathetically felt as well.
Much better to skip the whole thing 