Coaches and the HGC

Part 1: Those Mythical Creatures

Written by: Kozanrov

After almost two years of HGC, we’ve come to love the players—those heroes and villains that fight in the Nexus for our delight. We’ve come to love the teams, to feel their colors when we root for them. But what about the people behind the scenes, those mythical creatures pulling the strings, greasing the gears, and fueling the success of the champions? What about the coaches?
It’s time to discover these unsung heroes’ world through the eyes of different people from the competitive scene.

A Look Back in Time

In the beginning, there were managers. In 2016, coaches were almost non-existent, but since then more and more have appeared. To find the first coach—or one of the first ones—we can look back before HGC era, to BlizzCon 2016 where Ballistix was crowned as world champion under the leadership of Minwoo. On that team, there was also a player who would eventually become the most successful coach so far and carry on that legacy: Noblesse. After becoming KSV Black’s coach in October 2017, Noblesse has led the team to victory through every title available.

In the 2018 Phase 2, in the North American and European HGC, ten out of sixteen teams had coaches, some of which were were also the managers for the teams. But teams are beginning to split the two roles and hire on a dedicated coach. For example, Fnatic has Careion (formerly coach and manager) as a manager and Blumbi (former Team Liquid player) as a coach. To understand why so many teams have hired coaches for this 2018 HGC, we talked to Team Method about their coach, Elàhzul:

”Elazhul takes both the coach and manager position. When it comes to coaching, we mainly depend on the opinion of the players. If we get the feedback from the players of our team that they deem it to be helpful to have a coach, then we usually get a coach. In general, MOBAs seem to be very coach-friendly for many reasons. So we did not spend much time with analysing whether a coach was necessary or not.”

The Coach Role

But what do coaches do? That depends on the person, the players, and the organization. Some coaches are almost the same thing as managers, others have a skillset more psychologically-oriented, and some are more focused on game knowledge. Nintorii from Scythe Esports, the North America Open Division winners, sheds some light on the different coach types:

”I think for most teams, the usefulness of a coach is going to depend upon their needs. I think “coach” is a broad term which can be broken down into finer roles: the analyst (who typically provides scouting reports, draft suggestions, or improvements to micro/macro play) and the life coach type (who tends to resolve personal issues within the team, as well as maintain the physical and mental health of the players).

For Open Division teams, I think an analyst with a comprehensive understanding of the game and the ability to scout other OD teams will help far more than a life coach. However, as players’ understanding of the game improves, I think the need for a life coach arises. At the highest level of gameplay, nearly all players are mechanically proficient and knowledgeable, meaning that the only way to get an edge is to make sure players’ physical health, mental health, and relationships with teammates are at their peak.”

Team Dignitas coach, nabby, belongs to the latter type. He tells us that in his case the idea of getting a coach came from Bakery in 2017—then still a player—after Phase 2 Western Clash.

When questioned, he points to the importance of his players and his organization for accomplishing all the good results they have been getting since then. This is how he describes his way into the life coach role Nintorii described:

”A lot of my focus tries to go into making sure that discussions, even heated ones, are healthy and meaningful. Making sure the team is sharing their thought process and ideas, often asking questions to engage those conversations. And of course, trying to create a work culture that can really cultivate the team and each individual's continued growth. But I'm still finding my footing, still trying to carve out my identity in my role and hopefully improving throughout the year. So shoutouts to the lads and management for giving me the opportunity to also grow and learn.“

Getting to Know Them

Coaches are important for teams: they can help the players to improve vastly and allow them to perform at their highest level. But this isn’t the most rewarding job in the Heroes competitive scene. The coach role isn’t completely defined, but despite being in the early stages it is becoming ever more valuable, as can be seen by the results.

Teams and players are beginning to understand the role better and committing to it. However, there remains a significant obstacle. Tsty, coach for the European OD team SFD-Gaming, points out that the online format of HGC circuit makes it difficult for the viewer to notice the coach presence. Coaches can only be seen at offline events with their teams, and only the best teams get to go.

Once the coach role becomes assimilated by the teams, it may be time to involve them more in the HGC broadcasts. They could talk to the casters before the matches, giving some insight on how their team has adapted to a new hero or patch or how they’ve prepared for their opponent that week. Perhaps they could even join the post-match interviews. There are many options to make coaches become visible. Perhaps they shouldn't be mythical creatures that few have seen but instead just another member of the team.

We’ve covered the basics on HGC coaches, but many more aspects are still to be told. If you want to know more, keep track of this HGC Coaches series, with more guests and more topics. Big thanks to all the people involved, don’t forget to give them some love on social media.