Spaceswitchmars
Inkling Fleet Admiral
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I forget which of the top teams were saying it, but a week or two ago, someone from a really popular team was calling out other teams for just following the meta instead of playing what they’re best on. This guy was saying what you kind of are — that if you are awesome on a non-meta weapon, you can form the meta... which is a reason not to succumb to the meta in the first place.I think it's more of a self fulfilling prophecy. Those tournament players are simply really good. And they're going to be capable of learning to use the strengths of any weapon unless it's a weapon with an actual flaw. Tournament players happen to pick weapon X, and it works for them, and people see it dominating, and a popular top player like Dude tells everyone it works well and everyone follows it. If tournament players started dominating with other weapons those weapons would become the meta. Using Dude as the example, look at how expertly he can use most any weapon. There's not many weapons I'd want to go up against if he's using them :p Same is true for most top players. The fact that when a patch drops everyone starts trying to quantify "what's the new meta" "what's the best weapon" and the perennial "what's the tier list".....the bulk of players are looking for a quantified, numeric "best" weapon to play. Most would believe any weapon is that weapon if someone expert enough told them it is.
The tourney looks like it does precisely because of this. IF you know everyone else has one of 3 weapons all of similar range and speed class, and can count on any team comp looking similar, then similar weapons are your best counter. So everyone uses nzap and pro because everyone uses nzap and pro. The problem builds the resulting problem. Not just in Splatoon....all games suffer the same thing.
We're actually mostly agreeing here. It's not JUST dude alone that would make that happen (though the "Dude said" meme should give us a hint) but also if we start talking about the fake "meta" here, reddit, include someone like dude, you'll see people trying it.....and that trial will trickle down to the masses just as you describe. Then articles will pop up defending that new meta and why you need to think differently to understand it.
People really underestimate just how much social influence and "promoters" combined shape public thinking entirely. Actually it would be a fun social experiment. This is precisely what corporate PR firms, governments, and media do to the tune of trillions of dollars on a daily basis.
It’s kind of circular thinking, but it makes sense once you really think about it. What he was calling for wasn’t for new weapons to replace the current meta. He was calling for an expanded meta.
