Grmo
Smash Champion
This is a guide that I wrote today (Sunday), and I believe everyone who is having trouble improving, or is otherwise not where they would like to be in terms of skill, should read or listen to. I'll have a link to an audio later on, but here's the thing anyway.
Also, I'd like to get some feedback on this from people who might have different opinions. This is something I think we can all contribute to in order to get the best possible explanation on how people can stop being noobs. Noobs with bad attitudes hurt the community because it spreads around. I just would like to ask you to help me make people better
Here we go:
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There is one very important thing that I wish to address to the smash community. It is something that I believe is a huge impediment to our progression. It just happens to be attitude. I see this as a problem because everywhere I look, smashers are getting caught up in this delusional world where improvement is simply a case of seeking the advice of better players. I don't frown upon asking for advice, but I do frown upon relying on it. I have a strong opinion that many players need to fix this, and I have a guide as to how to do so.
I will try to isolate the problem, the details of the problem, then the same for the solution. Take note that what I'm about to tell you is based off of years of tournament experience and many hours of thought and hard work. It's something that took me a long time to realize, and I am about to share this with you willingly, so listen up.
The problem: The majority of low-level smashers believe that they can improve by getting others to tell them how to play.
A detailed analysis: They most likely do not realize this, but based on what people like to post about with their silly threads in the character-specific forums, this is the undeniable truth. Quite often, I come across threads that look like this:
I'm quite sure you've all had people john nonstop about stuff like this. These are huge problems that prevent people from going anywhere in terms of skill and tournament performance. The following three things are generally people's biggest hindrances:
1) You can not improve solely using other people's answers.
2) You can not improve if you look for easy tricks to make you better.
3) You can not improve if you make excuses for why you are losing.
So, what does all this have to do with you? Well, unless you have already passed this phase of your career...everything.
The solution: Learn how to improve yourself.
Specifically: First and foremost, if you have not already heard them, take the time to listen to these audios.
Video 1 - Gimpyfish's "Playing with the proper mindset"
Video 2 - Gimpyfish's "Accept your character's weaknesses"
In Video 1, Gimpyfish clearly explains the importance of having a good attitude. You most likely will not be able to get anywhere if you think you're losing for any other reason other than "they are out-playing me". If you accept that, then you can move on to the next stage: getting better than your opponent. Just recently, I have been confronted with players whom I thought I was better than, but was not necessarily winning as much as I thought I should be. Rather than trying to convince myself that I was actually better, I decided to try and figure out why I was losing and figure out a strategy to combat this unfamiliar play style. I worked on it for a while, but after a decent amount of time, I started to win, more and more, until I was winning every match with stocks to count. So, you no doubt wonder, how do you do this? Let's look back at Scrub #1's post:
Step 1: Watch videos of yourself versus your opponent. Tear that video apart and figure out why it is that you are losing. Look for details, such as:
Of course, the list should be MUCH longer than this, but you should get the idea by now. The second step is to come up with answers to these questions. I shouldn't have to get in to specifics, lest I defeat the purpose of this, which is to get you to think for yourself. Even if you don't have any videos, you can do this simply by thinking and reacting during a match. It's not as easy, but in the long run it is actually more effective. However, I suggest you start off with videos just to get your learning abilities started. Once you build these skills up, you can apply them in tournaments to figure out your opponents.
Step 2: Apply what you have learned in a match. Remember that you are playing friendlies, and do not need to worry about winning. Friendlies are for learning! Don't resort to something just because it makes you do better. That just demonstrates poor sportsmanship. Try things out, and practice them until you can find smart ways to make them work. By doing this, you will become a better player. Don't make that sound easy to you, however. There are not many shortcuts in this game, and you shouldn't use those that are there much anyway. The key is practice.
There are a number of other things that you can do, such as learning your opponent's character. Be creative, and just have fun. Enjoying yourself is NOT underrated. It is truly the key to becoming great at anything.
Let's have a look at another post:
So, what does this mean? It means that you have to think about why you're getting hit by all these things that you don't think you should be. The simple truth, as I have said to many people, is that hard work is everything here. You are probably losing simply because your opponent is better at landing these hits than you are at avoiding them. In other words, they are likely a better player than you. While it's true that Fox-Falcon is a good matchup for Fox, you have to take the same approach to it that you should be taking while fighting low tiers, which is that a good matchup does not mean an auto-win. I've already explained how you can improve in this area.
Finally, let's look at the post about tech skill and mistakes:
1) Watch yourself, and figure out what techniques you are having problems with. For example, are you missing L cancels? Are you messing up your shield pressure with Falco? (in which case you can practice that against star-toting human opponents on your own, since it has the same lag as hitting a shield). Are your edgeguarding tactics difficult to execute for you? Whatever they may be, you need to isolate them and practice them over and over until they're perfect.
2) Watch videos of pros, and look out for what kinds of tricks/approaches they do that might be better than yours. They won't usually be easy to pull off, but if you practice them, not only will you be making technical progress, but you'll be putting to use some much better tricks.
Finally, I want to refer back to the list of problems I mentioned earlier:
1) Things can stick in your head if you memorize them, but the only way to gain a true understanding of something is to gain the knowledge through understanding in the first place. This mostly applies to things related intimately to your game, because, for instance, KirbyKaze's thread about Smash DIing Fox's Uair is something you can read and understand that way. I'm just talking about things specific to you.
2) There are no shortcuts. Work hard and you will meet your goals.
3) No one likes Johners anyway. I mean, we all john sometimes, but it's dumb and we should all stop. If you're losing, it's because you're being outplayed, unless it's like Mewtwo-Marth or something dumb like that but you should know where to draw the line with my statement.
In conclusion: Practice. Don't john, don't look for shortcuts, be independant, and most importantly, partake in your community! Go to the character specific boards and talk about stuff with people. Give your advice, get advice from others, and discuss things. This is a good way to learn about the game and become acquainted with other members of the community. In the end, it all boils down to how hard you're willing to work to become the best. If you can't overcome the obstacles I have listed, you will forever be a scrub.
Now you know the truth about not being a scrub. Remember, just because you know doesn't mean you're going to be good. This is just the beginning. Whether you choose to walk the path of the Amazingness is up to you.
Also, I'd like to get some feedback on this from people who might have different opinions. This is something I think we can all contribute to in order to get the best possible explanation on how people can stop being noobs. Noobs with bad attitudes hurt the community because it spreads around. I just would like to ask you to help me make people better
Here we go:
-----------
There is one very important thing that I wish to address to the smash community. It is something that I believe is a huge impediment to our progression. It just happens to be attitude. I see this as a problem because everywhere I look, smashers are getting caught up in this delusional world where improvement is simply a case of seeking the advice of better players. I don't frown upon asking for advice, but I do frown upon relying on it. I have a strong opinion that many players need to fix this, and I have a guide as to how to do so.
I will try to isolate the problem, the details of the problem, then the same for the solution. Take note that what I'm about to tell you is based off of years of tournament experience and many hours of thought and hard work. It's something that took me a long time to realize, and I am about to share this with you willingly, so listen up.
The problem: The majority of low-level smashers believe that they can improve by getting others to tell them how to play.
A detailed analysis: They most likely do not realize this, but based on what people like to post about with their silly threads in the character-specific forums, this is the undeniable truth. Quite often, I come across threads that look like this:
or,Anonymous Scrub said:
or finallyRandom Nubface said:
(I've exaggerated these, of course, to make it clear how silly these types of posts are)Anonymous said:
I'm quite sure you've all had people john nonstop about stuff like this. These are huge problems that prevent people from going anywhere in terms of skill and tournament performance. The following three things are generally people's biggest hindrances:
1) You can not improve solely using other people's answers.
2) You can not improve if you look for easy tricks to make you better.
3) You can not improve if you make excuses for why you are losing.
So, what does all this have to do with you? Well, unless you have already passed this phase of your career...everything.
The solution: Learn how to improve yourself.
Specifically: First and foremost, if you have not already heard them, take the time to listen to these audios.
Video 1 - Gimpyfish's "Playing with the proper mindset"
Video 2 - Gimpyfish's "Accept your character's weaknesses"
In Video 1, Gimpyfish clearly explains the importance of having a good attitude. You most likely will not be able to get anywhere if you think you're losing for any other reason other than "they are out-playing me". If you accept that, then you can move on to the next stage: getting better than your opponent. Just recently, I have been confronted with players whom I thought I was better than, but was not necessarily winning as much as I thought I should be. Rather than trying to convince myself that I was actually better, I decided to try and figure out why I was losing and figure out a strategy to combat this unfamiliar play style. I worked on it for a while, but after a decent amount of time, I started to win, more and more, until I was winning every match with stocks to count. So, you no doubt wonder, how do you do this? Let's look back at Scrub #1's post:
Well, I have to tell you that it's not going to do you much good to get other people to tell you what you're doing wrong. Here is what you should be doing:Anonymous Scrub said:
Step 1: Watch videos of yourself versus your opponent. Tear that video apart and figure out why it is that you are losing. Look for details, such as:
- How am I approaching?
- How am I being punished for it?
- How can I improve on this?
- How are they approaching?
- What are they doing that I can punish?
- What tricks am I commonly falling for?
Of course, the list should be MUCH longer than this, but you should get the idea by now. The second step is to come up with answers to these questions. I shouldn't have to get in to specifics, lest I defeat the purpose of this, which is to get you to think for yourself. Even if you don't have any videos, you can do this simply by thinking and reacting during a match. It's not as easy, but in the long run it is actually more effective. However, I suggest you start off with videos just to get your learning abilities started. Once you build these skills up, you can apply them in tournaments to figure out your opponents.
Step 2: Apply what you have learned in a match. Remember that you are playing friendlies, and do not need to worry about winning. Friendlies are for learning! Don't resort to something just because it makes you do better. That just demonstrates poor sportsmanship. Try things out, and practice them until you can find smart ways to make them work. By doing this, you will become a better player. Don't make that sound easy to you, however. There are not many shortcuts in this game, and you shouldn't use those that are there much anyway. The key is practice.
There are a number of other things that you can do, such as learning your opponent's character. Be creative, and just have fun. Enjoying yourself is NOT underrated. It is truly the key to becoming great at anything.
Let's have a look at another post:
Back in video 2, Gimpyfish talks about adapting your playing style to suit your character, and shifting it around so that you can make what may otherwise have been your disadvantage, theirs instead. For example, look at a pro Falcon player (I have one in mind but I don't want to put names here). He knows that Fox's priority is far greater than his character's, and knows especially that Fox's Nair is a great tool for fighting Falcon. Because of this, he can expect Fox players to approach with Nair, and he has learned how to beat Fox's Nair with Falcon's, which really hurts Fox's approach. Not only that, but he has exceptional comboing and tech chasing abilities, meaning the Fox actually has to think of a way around this while dealing with the onslaught. In this way, he has made what was once his disadvantage become his advantage.Anonymous said:
So, what does this mean? It means that you have to think about why you're getting hit by all these things that you don't think you should be. The simple truth, as I have said to many people, is that hard work is everything here. You are probably losing simply because your opponent is better at landing these hits than you are at avoiding them. In other words, they are likely a better player than you. While it's true that Fox-Falcon is a good matchup for Fox, you have to take the same approach to it that you should be taking while fighting low tiers, which is that a good matchup does not mean an auto-win. I've already explained how you can improve in this area.
Finally, let's look at the post about tech skill and mistakes:
There are no easy answers here, I'm afraid. It's just practice, practice, practice, and more practice. Sure, it's hard, but there are no shortcuts here. However, I can tell you what kind of practice you need to do:Random Nubface said:
1) Watch yourself, and figure out what techniques you are having problems with. For example, are you missing L cancels? Are you messing up your shield pressure with Falco? (in which case you can practice that against star-toting human opponents on your own, since it has the same lag as hitting a shield). Are your edgeguarding tactics difficult to execute for you? Whatever they may be, you need to isolate them and practice them over and over until they're perfect.
2) Watch videos of pros, and look out for what kinds of tricks/approaches they do that might be better than yours. They won't usually be easy to pull off, but if you practice them, not only will you be making technical progress, but you'll be putting to use some much better tricks.
Finally, I want to refer back to the list of problems I mentioned earlier:
If you have been reading this, and have watched Gimpyfish's videos that I linked to, then you should know the answers to these three. Let's review.Grmzo of the Amazingness said:
1) Things can stick in your head if you memorize them, but the only way to gain a true understanding of something is to gain the knowledge through understanding in the first place. This mostly applies to things related intimately to your game, because, for instance, KirbyKaze's thread about Smash DIing Fox's Uair is something you can read and understand that way. I'm just talking about things specific to you.
2) There are no shortcuts. Work hard and you will meet your goals.
3) No one likes Johners anyway. I mean, we all john sometimes, but it's dumb and we should all stop. If you're losing, it's because you're being outplayed, unless it's like Mewtwo-Marth or something dumb like that but you should know where to draw the line with my statement.
In conclusion: Practice. Don't john, don't look for shortcuts, be independant, and most importantly, partake in your community! Go to the character specific boards and talk about stuff with people. Give your advice, get advice from others, and discuss things. This is a good way to learn about the game and become acquainted with other members of the community. In the end, it all boils down to how hard you're willing to work to become the best. If you can't overcome the obstacles I have listed, you will forever be a scrub.
Now you know the truth about not being a scrub. Remember, just because you know doesn't mean you're going to be good. This is just the beginning. Whether you choose to walk the path of the Amazingness is up to you.
