Reached another plateau. Halp.

It's come to the point where I'm not improving anymore. If anything I'm starting to play progressively worse as I fall into bad habits.

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=249224

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=249225

Current videos of myself. A pretty good gauge of how I fair against better players. Watch how I get savagely outplayed no matter what approach I take.

I've tried everything I've thought of. I've picked up a plethora of new characters, ranging from low tier, to top tier. I've spent periods of time playing only one character. I've spent other periods of time using a multitude of characters just to attempt to break old habits. I also took about a 2 week break from the game to refresh myself.

I've been told countless times to work on my movement, but I just can't do this. I play perfectly fine on my own, but when it comes to actually playing the game, I freeze up. My hands feel like 100 tons of lead. It's especially bad in tournament environments. The adrenaline just makes me melt down, and I struggle to do the most basic of things.

I'm not sure what to do any more. I've talked to a lot of people about this, and I've posted in the character-specific boards, but it seems like I just get advice about things that I've either already figured out on my own, or just find it impossible to do.

The game is very personal to me. I've never been very good at anything practical, and nothing in my life has been interesting enough to me to put as much time, and effort into as I do the game, and it breaks my heart not being at the level I imagine I believe I should be at.

I started the game roughly at the same time as Axe, and Mango did. I also had a plethora of very talented players to train with on a frequent basis, but after a few months of rapid improvement, everything stagnated. Players who started around the same time as me because amazing. Prodigies, if you will. Mango quickly became the best player in the world within a year of playing. Axe began placing well amongst players like Wobbles, Taj, and Forward within the year he began to play, whilst I struggled to do well against players of a much lower level.

There have been brief periods of time where something clicked and I was able to improve significantly within a short amount of time, but the last three months or so, I've felt like there's an impassible mountain in my way

So I ask everyone, how should I climb the mountain, and become slightly less mediocre than I already am?

This could all have to do with your state of mind. You may need mental preperation before going to a tournement.

I experience something like this. I play horrible in a competetive atmosphere, but near perfect when I'm laid back (but still focused, which is key). Maybe you have anxiety and it presents itself when you get excited or overly stimulated, which can happen in a competetive atmosphere.

Only the strong survive, let natural selection take its place.






Lol jay kay. If you're just relaxed but focused you'll do much better. Don't let your emotions get in the way of playing well. You need to lose to get better.

jetfour said:

Only the strong survive, let natural selection take its place.






Lol jay kay. If you're just relaxed but focused you'll do much better. Don't let your emotions get in the way of playing well. You need to lose to get better.

Click to expand...

I always do better in friendlies than I do in tournament sets, or in money matches. There's no pressure involved, so I'm not overcome by anxiety.

Though there are some exceptions. I often play better against Sean and Jeff in tournament than I do in friendlies. The games are low-pressure since I've already resigned that I will never beat either of them. I can therefore focus for small moral victories, such as making sure to get at least a stock off each game, or to land a specific combo. Plus I know that they will take the game more seriously than if they were playing friendlies, since money is on the line.

There is actually an Overcominganxiety.org

I don't understand how to navigate the website.

Strong_Bad said:

umm lighten up and have fun, you're not going to be able to play well if you're stressing about playing well in a tournament. try to have a good time & learn as you play rather than focusing specifically on how you play

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Your reading comprehension does not exceed that of a 5th grader.

I have nothing but malice for people who can't comprehend things at a basic level.

Strong_Bad said:

umm lighten up and have fun, you're not going to be able to play well if you're stressing about playing well in a tournament. try to have a good time & learn as you play rather than focusing specifically on how you play

Click to expand...

pretty much this.

lordvaati said:

pretty much this.

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You should seriously consider revisiting 5th grade.

uh maybe you should stop typin like a *****

Ruby you can really be an ***hole for someone that's not very good at this game. Quit cutting people down because you're mad at yourself. If you're repeatedly doing something wrong, you or one of the great players in AZ (there are quite a few as you know) should be able to spot it and help you overcome it.

Look at your DI. Could it use improvement? If so, how?

Look at your techs. Do you have habits? LOOK AT YOUR OWN VIDS. You can learn quite a bit from doing so.

How is your spacing?

I didn't click on any of your links in the OP but from what I know (I watch a LOT of vids) you play spacies and some Falcon. If I were you I'd have a talk with Forward and Axe sometime soon and go over your game. Have a discussion about melee and several aspects of your gameplay. Listen carefully to what they have to say and I guarantee you will see improvement.

Um...Ruby...the only I advice I would give, which I really hope you wouldn't find offensive is:

1. Don't get angry when you lose.
2. Fight more often than fighting better people.

Rubyiris said:

stuff

Click to expand...

Alot of people say Axe started playing in like, early 07, but he really was playing for like, half a year before that before he went to AZOne (or T5, i dunno)

-ACE- said:

Ruby you can really be an ***hole for someone that's not very good at this game. Quit cutting people down because you're mad at yourself. If you're repeatedly doing something wrong, you or one of the great players in AZ (there are quite a few as you know) should be able to spot it and help you overcome it.

Look at your DI. Could it use improvement? If so, how?

Look at your techs. Do you have habits? LOOK AT YOUR OWN VIDS. You can learn quite a bit from doing so.

How is your spacing?

I didn't click on any of your links in the OP but from what I know (I watch a LOT of vids) you play spacies and some Falcon. If I were you I'd have a talk with Forward and Axe sometime soon and go over your game. Have a discussion about melee and several aspects of your gameplay. Listen carefully to what they have to say and I guarantee you will see improvement.

Click to expand...

You misinterpret why I'm acting like an ******* to certain people. The two people in question completely misinterpreted everything about the thread. First of all they both obviously don't understand that the competitive aspect about the game is what makes the game fun for me, and they obviously failed to read that I have problems with anxiety, and adrenaline, or even the bit about how the game is rather personal to me.

What they had to say was basically the worst of insults to me, and deserve nothing but malice from me.

I'm glad that despite my acting like an ******* to them, you still bothered to post valid options. It's just a matter of getting Forward or Axe in a one on one situation to really sit down and figure out what I need to work on.

I'm getting the vibe that you're feeling a little angry or sad, and you're probably thinking I should revisit 5th grade English for appearing to not have read enough of your original post. I think you're just taking this game too seriously. There's a reason why video games were invented: Fun.

If that advice doesn't help you, maybe a quote from second placer at Genesis might.

"Stick to one character and practice until you really master that character. It's better to be good with one character than not-so-good with several. Try to play against different people, and against all characters so you learn how to play in a certain matchup." -ARmada

Epsilon, sweet *** avatar.

EPsilon933 said:

There's a reason why video games were invented: Fun.

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If he wants to get better, I'd assume he's in the competitive aspect of Melee

Competition isn't exactly fun and games

EPsilon933 said:

I'm getting the vibe that you're feeling a little angry or sad, and you're probably thinking I should revisit 5th grade English for appearing to not have read enough of your original post. I think you're just taking this game too seriously. There's a reason why video games were invented: Fun.

If that advice doesn't help you, maybe a quote from second placer at Genesis might.

"Stick to one character and practice until you really master that character. It's better to be good with one character than not-so-good with several. Try to play against different people, and against all characters so you learn how to play in a certain matchup." -ARmada

Click to expand...

Let's use our common sense for a moment. If the game wasn't fun to me, why would I endure so much frustration, and irritation whilst attempting to improve?

Maybe this thought didn't enter your brain?

Or maybe I'm just one of the few people on this forum who not only possesses reading comprehension above the 5th grade level, but also COMMON SENSE?

L__ said:

If he wants to get better, I'd assume he's in the competitive aspect of Melee

Competition isn't exactly fun and games

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You're completely wrong about this. Fun is subjective. Some players may find playing casually to be fun, but I enjoy the competitive aspects of this game.

I'm not in it for the money, like many of the professional smashers are. I play the game because I enjoy every aspect of the game. ESPECIALLY the community.

I've met just about every one of my friends through this game. All of the best experiences in my life have been with these friends that I've met through this game.'

I have every right to take the game to a personal level. This is what I enjoy.

Did I blow your mind?

Rubyiris said:

You're completely wrong about this. Fun is subjective. Some players may find playing casually to be fun, but I enjoy the competitive aspects of this game.

I'm not in it for the money, like many of the professional smashers are. I play the game because I enjoy every aspect of the game. ESPECIALLY the community.

I've met just about every one of my friends through this game. All of the best experiences in my life have been with these friends that I've met through this game.'

I have every right to take the game to a personal level. This is what I enjoy.

Did I blow your mind?

Click to expand...

Not really...

The fact that fun is subjective slipped my mind.

Lol @ all this.

On a serious note, Ruby, look at your vids and analyze points where either you died or your opponent hit you, beat your approach, read your decision like a pop-up book, etc. I know that you're not oblivious to how melee works. Just calm the **** down and take the time to analyze things, recognize bad habits, and replace them with good ones. That's all I'm going to say.

-ACE- said:

Lol @ all this.

On a serious note, Ruby, look at your vids and analyze points where either you died or your opponent hit you, beat your approach, read your decision like a pop-up book, etc. I know that you're not oblivious to how melee works. Just calm the **** down and take the time to analyze things, recognize bad habits, and replace them with good ones. That's all I'm going to say.

Click to expand...

If I knew what I was doing wrong, I'd fix it.

Rubyiris said:

If I knew what I was doing wrong, I'd fix it.

Click to expand...

Fair enough, but that is exactly why I suggested a heavy smash discussion with Forward and Axe, along with many friendlies. I know it's not like you can just go play them tomorrow, but get up with them when you can. In the meantime, watch your vids and at least TRY to recognize mistakes so you will have something to talk to them about once you get a chance.

Try nairing more.


Really. See if you can incorporate one simple addition to your gameplay. If you can, then that's one small step. Just work on using that one attack more.

One other thing I recommend is something me and a friend named "Playing Consciously". This is a style of play most people use occasionally, but rarely through a whole match. Most of the time when you play, you're just playing. When you're playing consciously, you are thinking through each and every one of your decisions. You are considering every option you are provided with, and choosing the one most suitable for the stage, matchup, and player. This allows you to pick up on you and your opponents habits quicker, reevaluate situations at a faster rate, and make smarter, less predictable decisions mid match. Try it out.

You seem like the kind of person who over-analysis every little thing. While this may be good in retrospect and coming to understand what you did wrong PREVIOUSLY in a match when actually playing its a terrible quality to have. It makes you second guess yourself and you'll always be a half step behind someone who just follows their gut instincts.

Your looking for some kind of quick fix but really all your asking is "How do I get better?" and there is no obvious answer for this. You can attempt to listen to everyone with easy answers or you can bite the bullet and just accept the fact that there is no easy way out.

This is an omen, Ruby. Look at the Brightside.

Lol.

-ACE- said:

Fair enough, but that is exactly why I suggested a heavy smash discussion with Forward and Axe, along with many friendlies. I know it's not like you can just go play them tomorrow, but get up with them when you can. In the meantime, watch your vids and at least TRY to recognize mistakes so you will have something to talk to them about once you get a chance.

Click to expand...

I've been watching through my old videos whenever I can, but I just can't find any large mistakes.

The problem here is that the person I'm playing with me is so significantly better than I am, I'm simply just being savagely outplayed. There are minor spacing errors, technical blunders, or the occasional wrong decision, but this will fix itself with experience.

I make incorrect reads on what he's going to do, and get hit. He makes correct reads on my move, or tech pattern and I get hit. I misjudge how he plans on recovering, and allow him back onto the stage. He calls my double jump when tossed off the stage and get knee'd.

@The Irish Mafia:

This is actually really bad advice. Falcon's Nair will always beat out Fox's nair.

Brightside6382 said:

You seem like the kind of person who over-analysis every little thing. While this may be good in retrospect and coming to understand what you did wrong PREVIOUSLY in a match when actually playing its a terrible quality to have. It makes you second guess yourself and you'll always be a half step behind someone who just follows their gut instincts.

Your looking for some kind of quick fix but really all your asking is "How do I get better?" and there is no obvious answer for this. You can attempt to listen to everyone with easy answers or you can bite the bullet and just accept the fact that there is no easy way out.

Click to expand...

There's never an easy way out, and I've come to accept this.

Ruby, practice movement on the stages until its drilled into your hands, seriously I know you say.. "people tell me to practice moving and it doesn't help"

But then you say that you freeze up in tournament and you can't do that stuff.

Therefore work on your movement game until you can navigate the stage at any time without fear of making a mistake.

And I don't mean just simple movements, make your wavelands your platform game, all of that smooth and perfect.

That will let you just concentrate on the mental aspects of the game. Because that stuff will be memorized.


Also, one other thing you need to actually think in your matches. You seem to be doing just what "should work" but in reality you need to look at it more, you would nair at people miss the nair and then just shine anyways. Why not nair and then run away or run through them, or just cross them up with the nair.

Things like that are what make you improve.

I analyzed some of your vids pretty **** deeply and you didn't even respond, lol.

Hell I even made another post about how you didn't respond and you still didn't respond.

Listen to what people are saying to you. Don't get angry when someone offers you REAL advice.

You have everything you need available to you. You've got videos and you've got great players to play with and you've got dedication. Just tie it all together. What ACE said a few posts up is exactly what you need: analyze yourself. No one can ever make you better at Smash. We also have nothing to give you, as you have it all available. In the end, the only thing we can do is tell you to play more.

"I always do better in friendlies than I do in tournament sets, or in money matches. There's no pressure involved, so I'm not overcome by anxiety."

This happens to every new player. The easy solution is, play more tourneys. The difficult solution is to realize that, no matter how much this game has infiltrated your life, this game is just a game. When you go to a tournament, you had better be having fun. There better be adrenaline being pumped instead of blood and you better enjoy the rush. It sounds to me like you just get nervous. You have way too much of a mental block to get better. If you don't keep telling yourself that this is what you do, and you wanna get better, and you WILL get better, then you won't.

If you want help on specific smash questions or even if you wanna talk about this subject more then hit me up on MSN or AIM (preferably MSN). But if you're gonna ask for help then at least don't flip out on people. Even if what they're saying doesn't apply to you in your eyes, you asked for help and they genuinely want to help you. No need to be mean to them over that.

I have a problem also. I can do like 95% of all of the technical stuff in Melee...its just that I cant do it consistently.

Like its impossible for me to shffl nairs across FD with Fox because it feels like my hand/wrist/arm is turning to stone or something like that. (Waveshining across FD is easy for me though). This same thing happens to me when I try to play a fast song on DDR with my feet. My legs turn to stone and I cant do anything about it. So Im basically limited to only 8 footers on DDR.

Any solution besides constantly trying to do so?

KevinM said:

Ruby, practice movement on the stages until its drilled into your hands, seriously I know you say.. "people tell me to practice moving and it doesn't help"

But then you say that you freeze up in tournament and you can't do that stuff.

Therefore work on your movement game until you can navigate the stage at any time without fear of making a mistake.

And I don't mean just simple movements, make your wavelands your platform game, all of that smooth and perfect.

That will let you just concentrate on the mental aspects of the game. Because that stuff will be memorized.


Also, one other thing you need to actually think in your matches. You seem to be doing just what "should work" but in reality you need to look at it more, you would nair at people miss the nair and then just shine anyways. Why not nair and then run away or run through them, or just cross them up with the nair.

Things like that are what make you improve.

Click to expand...

I'm trying to improve my mental game, but it's very hard for me. Not much I can say about that.

Ruby try recording yourself vs. people and going back over and looking at every time you took a hit
and why you got hit
and fix it

If a lot of the hits come from when you messed up something tech skill related
then you know what you need to work on

And often times I've found that taking a 3 or 4 day break from melee and coming back can clear your head a bit if it's jumbled with a bunch of wrong information


@Tichinde925

Errrr...practice for a bit till you start getting frustrated
Take a break for like 2 hours or more
then practice more


This seems to always work for me
I've never been able to steadily improve whatever I was trying when I was frustrated at the time

But I dont get frustrated, I am never angry. I can double fair with marth and reverse double fair with marth across FD with no problems at all.

Its just the speed of fox gets to me. Like there is no stopping the "turned to stone" feeling in my wrist/arm. I cant stop that feeling either when I play DDR.

Its the reason why I have stopped improving technically since 2007. I have been trying though, but still it turns to stone. And I would have been able to do 9+ footers at DDR.

Rubyiris said:

Your reading comprehension does not exceed that of a 5th grader.

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Dood...what's that one game...umm...oh yeh: Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?

11 year-olds are pretty smart, that game is hard.

Rubyiris said:

Let's use our common sense for a moment. If the game wasn't fun to me, why would I endure so much frustration, and irritation whilst attempting to improve?

Maybe this thought didn't enter your brain?

Or maybe I'm just one of the few people on this forum who not only possesses reading comprehension above the 5th grade level, but also COMMON SENSE?

Click to expand...

problem isolated. It's not the fun aspect motivating you. it's the determination aspect. You aren't constantly playing for the "fun" aspect- you play because your mind tells you you MUST do blah blah blah because your blood and will refuse to stop you. in order to improve, you must balance out equal amounts of seriousness and mirthfulness. the reason why you feel you are declining is you are letting the seriousness take over the fun aspect. you say you are having fun, but by the way you have displayed your attitude during this whole thread states otherwise. I can understand if you took what I and Strong Bad a little offensive y, but the extremely negative comments you gave us and your noticeably angry response over fun(which was essentially "What the **** do you mean?!? of course I'm having fun, you *******es!!! the frustration drive is my fun!" suggests the opposite. you said your problem yourself is your anxiety and adrenaline, and what causes that most? unecessary anger/frustration. the reason why you are feeling your skills are declining is because you are literally going through a **** 5 steps of regret in Melee. you need to cool down, think , and isolate the problem without getting pissed so easy. and the whole "5th grade" analogy, once again, is pointless, biased, and disrepectful, since you were just lashong out at someone like a woman going through her period. that was entirely uncalled for.

@Treschikon

yeah, some of those questions seriously are not 5th grader level.

lordvaati said:

problem isolated. It's not the fun aspect motivating you. it's the determination aspect. You aren't constantly playing for the "fun" aspect- you play because your mind tells you you MUST do blah blah blah because your blood and will refuse to stop you. in order to improve, you must balance out equal amounts of seriousness and mirthfulness. the reason why you feel you are declining is you are letting the seriousness take over the fun aspect. you say you are having fun, but by the way you have displayed your attitude during this whole thread states otherwise. I can understand if you took what I and Strong Bad a little offensive y, but the extremely negative comments you gave us and your noticeably angry response over fun(which was essentially "What the **** do you mean?!? of course I'm having fun, you *******es!!! the frustration drive is my fun!" suggests the opposite. you said your problem yourself is your anxiety and adrenaline, and what causes that most? unecessary anger/frustration. the reason why you are feeling your skills are declining is because you are literally going through a **** 5 steps of regret in Melee. you need to cool down, think , and isolate the problem without getting pissed so easy. and the whole "5th grade" analogy, once again, is pointless, biased, and disrepectful, since you were just lashong out at someone like a woman going through her period. that was entirely uncalled for.

@Treschikon

yeah, some of those questions seriously are not 5th grader level.

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You're attempting to read into this too deeply. I think you're just upset because I called you out on your poor reading comprehension skills.

Anger and frustration definitely aren't what cause my anxiety and adrenaline rushes. It's being in a tournament against another player. Happens to everyone. I'm just not able to cope with it like everyone else. Any sort of pressure during competitive play triggers my anxiety and causes adrenaline rushes.

I have every right to criticize someone for being wrong. Especially someone who's being wrong also offends me, intentional or not, and finally, I just absolutely hate anyone who lacks common sense, and at least an average level of reading comprehension.