I've been working on a video series explaining MMR fully for the last week on and off since that coaching session. Here is my breakdown of what slacks does and why it works.
Disclaimer this is mostly a letter to the people who are confused and letting that confusion channel into flame targeted towards slacks, but if you can look past that part you should be able to better understand what slacks does that works.
1: Ultra morale boost. There are lots of whiny dota players out there(me included). Most of them are prone to tilting, rage, or abandoning. Slacks helps ensure those players tilt and rage less. Because those players naturally tilt and rage when they play by themselves, their MMR is lower than it should be because they play worse those games they tilt and lose games sometimes because of that, so by him ensuring they don't tilt, Slacks(by being in the game) raises their effective MMR for the match by a few hundred points. Based on predictive analysis of + - MMR trends due to team advantage in this
thread here, assuming each player is perfectly ranked and it's an average performance for all, a 150 average MMR advantage(aka all 5 players on your team are 150 mmr higher than your opponents) gives that team a 70% chance to win their dota game. Affecting other's performances for the better is a HUGE advantage to raising MMR. 300 avg MMR advantage is 90% win chance.
2: Slacks rallys the team around a goal. We're gonna call this teamwork, even if the plan isn't the ideal way to play dota and can fail sometimes. He does direct his team and they generally listen cause morale. 5 people on the same page is >>>> than 5 solo players.
3: His developed playstyle. Most people say 'he picks omni it's clear why he's 4.7k, it's because anyone who spams Omni will rank up cause Omni is 60% winrate!'. If you believe this you're an idiot. Picking an OP hero will adjust your current MMR by a %, but it doesn't double it or whatever. At some point you'll hit a plateau and stop increasing(as you'll hit that balance with any hero). 4.7 is slacks plateau with his previous playstyle and game outlook. He didn't get there just because he picks Omni.
The reason Omni and Undying and Kotl are likely slacks' favorite heroes, is a mix of them fitting the playstyle that he developed(which by the way, is impressive that he found something that worked and he stuck too it since most people just try to copy the pros exactly and frankly do it poorly). Couple correlations between these 3 heroes. They have heals and they can end the game at the mid game through heals, sustain and strong teamfight.
heals are OP because there are few in dota and people don't expect them, so when enemies do aggressive things then die because of heals; instead of a 1 for 1 from an offensive support, slack's team gets a 1 for 0. So heals massively impact the course of a game's tempo due to gold swings. The key here is you have to have decent map awareness and be places. Slacks pretty much only goes places and does shit, with some occasional pushing of lanes, the only other thing(partial sarcasm here) he knew how to do before I coached him. Pushing lanes is good, 90% of you could learn something rom slacks with this point since it creates tower pressure which forces TP's/reactions and then those people can't gank/rosh/take towers. Just cause he doesn't know why he does stuff doesn't mean it's not good. He literally learned from playing enough games and remembering stuff. That's one learning path you can take to be be 'good' at video games.
So Slacks creates pressure on the map and his opponents don't know what to do. Go watch SexyBamboe play, esp 2-3 years ago when few/no one roamed. People didn't know how to react so they'd chase him through the jungle with 3 heroes for 30 secs and he'd suicide to neuts creating space/wasting time. It's that sorta idea. Put them out of their comfort zone and they'll get flustered and make mistakes.
Slacks also uses his skills very effectively, and he has very good map awareness. His teamfight awareness and general decision making in fights is above average to his MMR I feel. 99% of players don't move their camera enough during a fight to take info. Slacks does well with this and it's one of the things that allows him to make better teamfight decisions.
So with heals, you get swings, and you also get teamfights. If no one on your team ever dies, and you have sustain for your team, then the game ends because all of the idiots(no offense!) from 3k-4.7k have no idea how to split push against this playstyle and nullify its advantages. They see people grouping on the map so they show up. They don't know why but they show up. Then slacks beats you because his hero is good at early engagements and you didn't understand the power curve of your hero like he does. You didn't have a good reason to go there when you could defend a push with 2 heroes and split/farm with 3.
And that's what slacks does. Kotl + aghs, Undying+mek, and omni+mek ends games at the 30-40 min mark. Slacks knows that if the games go much longer than that he loses, because he often loses when that happens. So that learning has taught him how to play the game, and it works for him. Those 3 reasons are why he's 4.7k, and has lots more potential.
Other reasons he shouldn't go late game or why he loses there often: He doesn't know how to ward aggressively, pressure the map effectively(but he's trying early-mid), and play late game omni because he eventually stops having good impact due to weak farm leading to weak items(late game impact).
But he figured this all out and adapted his playstyle to it.
It's really beautiful in a way. Once I put the pieces together it made sense. I'm sure morale/leading the team makes up for 500-1000 MMR, but he easily presses his buttons better than any 3k player. He knows what skills/heroes counter his skills. He has great team fight awareness for the most part.
And he sticks to his strategy. It's a little cheesy or whatever, if you guys want to use the word 'cheese' to flame him in the future that's probably the best shot you can take, but that's really all it is. Slack's playstyle is cheesy and his in game dota skills don't really look like the average 4.7k player, whatever the fuck that means since all players have vastly different strengths as weaknesses, evidenced by Slacks.
Slacks developed, by himself, a cheesy sorta way to win dota games. He likes playing that way and it works for him because very few players under 5k have any idea how to counter it, because most you guys leading up to that MMR don't understand strategy options.
Like the way most people play dota is just reading 1 hero guide and playing the hero that way, but there is so much more to it that than.
