Is this a terrible mentality to have whilst learning FGs?

[Rhiya]

There's a whole lot of stuff going on at once in all these posts, so I'm going to try and give you a short and simple process that should help a lot.

1. Save your replays. I cannot stress how important this is.

2. Watch your replays. Find exact, precise things you can work on and fix. Are you uncomfortable with certain gatlings in pressure? Are you lacking mixup in your pressure? Do you not know the range of a move as well as you'd like? Do you not know the answer to something your opponent is doing? All of these, plus the vast majority of other possible problems, can be fixed in training. This thread explains how to do these things.

3. Go to training, and fix the problems you found above. Ideally, I recommend finding one problem, and solving it in a shortish session (15 to 30 minutes). This way, you don't get too burned out on training.

4. Go play matches, save those replays, repeat.

You will not get better unless you know what to fix.

[Nemesis]

I seriously feel like a wisdom buff has been applied to me after reading all this... Different points of view and even stuff I don't agree with... But still - you've received quite a bit of attention and golden advice from many active or notable players. All of it can assist you in your efforts to advance, I wish I had such a reception back in the day heh.

I'd say you've heard more than enough and a few things more than once from different voices...

I think it's time to enact just what's been given

... Seriously the jewels in the pages have given me a few things to think about as well

[Renvalt]

@Nemesis - I agree with you. Having all of what's been said here enabled me to really think and try to get more precise answers to some of the questions that I've been asking myself for a while. While there are some I just can't answer (yet, at least), at least it's gotten me thinking about things in the long run.

@DuskThanatos - I'm usually afraid of saving replays as I don't know how many I can save before I max out and have to start overwriting older replays - and those might be useful even in the distant future. Also, I'm terrible at keeping track of time, but I'm sure that perhaps my execution problem might get better with daily amounts of 15-minute sessions (particularly my DP moves - always been my bane in FGs).

@Solless - I believe it was a match not too long ago against two scrubs and a guy who didn't talk but was plenty powerful. Losing against him didn't feel as bad as having to hear that outright annoying pessimism coming from the two other guys who were in the room with me (and they had mics - so I PERSONALLY had to hear it). It reminded me of a low I didn't want to sink to. I was very tame about the whole thing, but I noticed I was acting a lot like you guys do in regards to me.

@DerQ - That's what I've tried to do. I've had people tell me I'm thinking too much about it, people who say I'm not doing it heavily enough, and people who flat out say "u suk lrn2play nub" (the amount of people in the third category is as close to none as possible, though I saw them more in SF4 than I have anywhere else).

With that said, I think some of the biggest issues I've had are: a lack of blocking, crouch-blocking more than standing-blocks when I DO block, and not really applying pressure when I have it. The first and second kinda go hand-in-hand, but with the third I've found the issue stemming from the fear of dropping whatever combo I have and instantly losing any and all pressure that I gained, effectively resetting the field to neutral (and most of my opponents figure out to do something about it before I can get my advantage back). So while I'll try and attack afterwards, it's the lack of knowing what to do and being afraid that what I am doing might get me sent back into the corner that prevents me from capitalizing on what momentum I have.

Also, one of my biggest issues: a huge lack of character loyalty. Each character has pros and cons to them, but a lot of times I tend to focus on what I don't like about characters rather than what I do like. Playing every character hasn't really fixed this, but it's helped me figure out which characters I absolutely HATE playing (Rachel and Arakune being the two biggest offenders here - Arakune is 1st Place Big Fail for me).

In the end, all of this wisdom is good, if not for the fact that I'm thinking about stuff again.

P.S. I thought mics added to netplay lag? I've had a couple peeps here say that to me when they played against me, which is why I don't use my mic all that often, as I don't want to be singled out as the guy making everyone else lag.

[Airk]

@DuskThanatos - I'm usually afraid of saving replays as I don't know how many I can save before I max out and have to start overwriting older replays - and those might be useful even in the distant future.

Purge your mind of THIS bad idea ASAP. Old replays (as in, from more than maybe, a month ago) are basically useless except in the "Gee, I was terrible back in June!" way. Watch your replays, take a few notes, delete them. Don't leave them around. They're not doing you any good. It's FAR better to save new replays and review them than it is to have some crazy old ones lying around as "reference".

crouch-blocking more than standing-blocks when I DO block

This is NOT a problem. You SHOULD be crouchblocking by default, and ONLY change to stand block when you are expecting an overhead or (ideally) reacting to one. Low attacks are pretty much universally faster than high ones, so your odds of being able to block them on reaction is basically nil.

P.S. I thought mics added to netplay lag? I've had a couple peeps here say that to me when they played against me, which is why I don't use my mic all that often, as I don't want to be singled out as the guy making everyone else lag.

Dunno. Doesn't happen on XBL, but PSN might (does) have crappy infrastructure. :P

[Celerity]

Dunno. Doesn't happen on XBL, but PSN might (does) have crappy infrastructure. :P

PSN has worse infrastructure than XBL? What world are you living in?

[mAc Chaos]

the real world

[Renvalt]

Purge your mind of THIS bad idea ASAP. Old replays (as in, from more than maybe, a month ago) are basically useless except in the "Gee, I was terrible back in June!" way. Watch your replays, take a few notes, delete them. Don't leave them around. They're not doing you any good. It's FAR better to save new replays and review them than it is to have some crazy old ones lying around as "reference".

I'd always thought it'd help bring me back down to earth, in the event I got complacent and arrogant (or y'know, started being an elitist jerk who thinks he'll always win because of his skill). Also, I have to ask: should I write stuff down too or do you essentially want me to see what I did wrong and memorize it? Because I do have terrible memory issues (especially when I'm depressed).

This is NOT a problem. You SHOULD be crouchblocking by default, and ONLY change to stand block when you are expecting an overhead or (ideally) reacting to one. Low attacks are pretty much universally faster than high ones, so your odds of being able to block them on reaction is basically nil.

Okay, so based on this I can think of a number of reasons why I've been failing at blocking: Either the game isn't registering 4 along with 2 and is just seeing 2 (despite me thinking I hit 4 with 2 to make 1) or my opponent is switching to high attacks and somehow I don't notice it (this is far more plausible as I still have no idea which attacks hit high and which hit low - then again I didn't pay all that much attention to it before).

Dunno. Doesn't happen on XBL, but PSN might (does) have crappy infrastructure. :P

No wonder. We play on two different consoles.

... Which gets me thinking: Why the hell did I think I lost to you when you're XBL and I'm PSN (thus, we couldn't have played because of that)? Mind-boggling, that.

[Rhiya]

Try blocking stuff offline too, and see if you're okay. Specifically, record Ragna doing dash 5B>2C>6B in slot 1, dash 5B>2C>6C in slot 2, dash 5B>2C>2D in slot 3, and dash 5B>2C>5C>214D in slot four, then set it to random playback and try to play block-the-overhead.

[Airk]

PSN has worse infrastructure than XBL? What world are you living in?

Apparently the world in which people routinely discuss mics causing lag on PSN, but no one even considers that a possibility on XBL? Seriously. I thought it was pretty obvious. :P

Try blocking stuff offline too, and see if you're okay. Specifically, record Ragna doing dash 5B>2C>6B in slot 1, dash 5B>2C>6C in slot 2, dash 5B>2C>2D in slot 3, and dash 5B>2C>5C>214D in slot four, then set it to random playback and try to play block-the-overhead.

This is a great idea, but it's actually harder to do than it sounds; I have a GREAT deal of difficulty keeping the dash at the beginning a consistent duration, which means that my brain magically picks up on "Okay, that time he dashed for 3/4ths of a second, overhead, incoming." and makes the whole exercise ineffective. =/ Still looking for suggestions on how to compensate for that.

Also, I have to ask: should I write stuff down too or do you essentially want me to see what I did wrong and memorize it? Because I do have terrible memory issues (especially when I'm depressed).

I suggest writing things down; It doesn't have to be paragraphs of text or anything, but I keep small pad of paper handy when I review my replays, and jot down basically two lists: "Do this more" and "Do this less". right now my "Do this more" list is:

5B > Charge cancel

Jab Pressure

Neutral 5C

Barrier Block

2B > Stuff

My "Do this less" list is:

236C

Air approach

Jumping on opponent's wakeup

5BB Whiff. -_-

Before any given match, I look at the list, pick one or at most two items, and try to hold them in my brain for the match. (You're NOT going to hold onto more than one or two) And if you can hold onto them, and you're really interested in learning, you try to make the match "about" those things - they're your goal for the match. It's a "win" if you remember to do/not do them. If I go through a match and I did 5B > Charge Cancel like, 6 times, that's GOOD. I don't care if it was in the wrong places, or I got smacked for it sometimes, the point is to beat it into my head that this is a thing I should do.

[mAc Chaos]

> Still looking for suggestions on how to compensate for that.

Why does he need to dash. Just make yourself closer to the training dummy.

[dioxideUniversa]

new replays are way more useful than old replays. it's possible that you can look at an old replay and something that maybe you've improved upon but not eliminated is more obvious and it makes you think "hey, i still do that," but that does not outweigh the benefits of assessing current performance vs. old. one improvement vs. many (tl;dr delete your old replays for new ones)

threads like this are also useful for getting insight on what you're doing, but nobody is going to want to listen to whining in response to critique. (also it requires some form of video capture, which doesn't have to be anything stellar. point your smart phone at a replay)

all characters have flaws and if you fixate on only those flaws, you are only going to have a handful of characters you don't like and none that you do

supposedly you are trying hakumen, and i will tell you up front that hakumen has plenty of drawbacks that most other characters don't have in terms of ease of use

also while it's good to be motivated, frankly it's hard to not grin at the idea that you want to beat everyone who has given you advice in this thread, given your approach/mentality. assuredly this is the sort of thing you are beating yourself up over, as well, so i would think it would seem to be a rather inefficient goal to focus on. i want to beat everybody too, but that does not mean i am going to be able to work to produce a result to that end in like, ever

the point is you need attainable goals and not ones that will take years of blood and sweat before you finally get a return on it

re: "anything less than my best," what defines this? do you never allow yourself to screw around? sometimes a hakumen just got to superjump spam j.2a at neutral.

chill the fuck outtttt

Edited August 11, 2013 by dioxideUniversa

[mAc Chaos]

Oh, if you are trying Hakumen, check out Haku videos and look at what they do. You can get the idea for what to do in certain situations by seeing what other people do.

[Rhiya]

> Still looking for suggestions on how to compensate for that.

Why does he need to dash. Just make yourself closer to the training dummy.

If he doesn't dash at the beginning of the string, you can't just sit there and block them: you have to move yourself back into position every time. It's really inconvenient, though it still works.