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How to Improve - a compilation
- Thread starter Binx
- Start date
omnicloud7strife
Smash Apprentice
This is really... useful. REALLY useful. It makes me think about my entire play style completely different. Nice work. ^_^
Bizzarro Flame
Smash Lord
This article is really helpful. It helps me reflect on what I've been doing the past 3-4 years of serious melee. Now, it's time to take this game more seriously and critically instead of mindlessly playing however I please.
snowaxe
Smash Apprentice
Awesome guide, I will be looking through this alot. Seems that it will help alot.
GetInTheSoup!
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Jan 3, 2009
- Messages
- 13
So how do you feel the current metagame has evolved? Can we create a guide that aims at understanding the current game of smash. Obviously, all of these guides are the basis for the game and thus its growth, but has it branched out beyond these guides and how?
mlgc4
Smash Apprentice
lol justin
I recently started a blog and my most recent post is related to improving your game 
It's at:
http://eskimosister.blogspot.com/2009/08/subtractive-playstyles-part-1-theory.html
Or you can just read it right here and now.
* * *
First, a Shaolin proverb, slightly paraphrased:
"I do not fear the ten thousand kicks you have practiced once. I fear the one kick you have practiced ten thousand times." The meaning behind the proverb is simple: a bunch of awkwardly performed kicks are no match for a single one done with utter mastery.
Second, an interesting article on game design courtesy of David Sirlin: http://www.sirlin.net/articles/subtractive-design.html
I recommend you read it, but if you don't want to, this is the main point some of the most powerful and interesting games have, at their core, very few elements to them. This is because the developers took time to deeply explore those few elements, polish them, and ensure that they were perfect (or near to it). Anything that detracted from those elements was then removed or changed to complement them. He mentions two of my favorite games, Portal and Braid, and I felt gratified because I previously thought--in significantly less concise and enlightening terms--the same thing about them. At their heart they are simple games, but the gameplay they deliver is top-notch; their simple components can be twisted and shaped in countless ways because they are well-developed. That is why those games are deep, entertaining, and acclaimed.
I've learned a lot of lessons about competition and life from playing Smash: consistent performance is key, find ways to turn disadvantages into advantages (and when you can't do that, play in a way that keeps those disadvantages from becoming an issue), honing the basics is an absolute must if you want to be a top pro, and so on. In light of Sirlin's article, I thought about a theory behind how any player can practice, improve, and become high level players. I feel that many people get discouraged when they hit a wall, and the reason most give up is because they do not know how to push past it. They don't have a method for improving, so they practice and train haphazardly, go nowhere, and eventually quit from frustration.
In other sports, there are countless coaches and teaching methods designed to make players improve. For instance, if you don't know why your golf swing is bad, hire a coach and he'll (hopefully) be able to tell you what you need to do to change it. This kind of resource is significantly harder to find for competitive gamers. I really like Melee and I don't want people to quit; playing it seriously against a skilled opponent can be a lot of fun and it sucks when players stop for the wrong reasons. You decide the game isn't for you, fine; you have other life issues that take higher priority, no problem; you really want to get better but don't know how and the game stops being fun, that's bad.
It's really hard to find a concrete method that says "here is how you get better," because every player is at a different point in their development. So all I can really do is offer basic recommendations; hopefully it helps.
Let's go back to the proverb and the article by Sirlin. The most terrifying kick to a Shaolin monk is one that its user has practiced ten-thousand times. The deepest and most entertaining games are ones that have a few elements that are explored and polished as much as possible. I believe that the reason the best players are as good as they are is because they have mastered a few key areas of their respective characters. Then, they try to make the match take focus on those areas as frequently as possible, and stay away from situations outside their mastery.
That said, the method for improvement is simply put: pick a single, important aspect of your chosen character, and train it exclusively until it becomes as flawless as possible. Once you have done that, choose another aspect of that character, and train *that* until it is flawless. Keep doing this, and your game will expand. When you play important games (tournaments and money matches), do your best to keep the game within your areas of mastery.
Think of it another way. When you play a match, a bunch of different situations crop up. You and your opponent will both be on the ground, making it a ground game. Then, one of you will be in the air, turning it into air versus ground, then vice versa. There will be aerial combat where you are directly above the opponent at 12 o'clock. There will be combat when you'll be beneath him, above him and in front, above and behind. There are times when you edgeguard and the opponent is high, times when he is low, times when he is even with the stage; likewise, you will be edgeguarded in those circumstances as well. There are a lot of different situations in any given match, and if you want to be good, it makes sense you need to be good at controlling those situations.
Now let's make up a number and say there are 10 skills you need to master to have a good Fox (it's probably higher but that's not important at the moment). Let's also say that you get... 400 points to split among those skills, and they max out at one hundred. Most players would then have about 40 in every skill. That's below average at each of the skilsl you need to be good at Fox. That makes you a below average Fox. With training you get more points, but right now, you're crummy everywhere.
Now imagine a player who has 100 in two of his skills, then 25 in the other eight. Same 400 points, but he's an absolute master of two of the necessary Fox skills. Any time he is using one of his two good skills, he's a champ. When he isn't, he's garbage.
If you were that player, you would try to make sure that when it counted, you were applying those skills and not using your others. Your game would only have two components, but they would be perfect. As long as you could keep the game going at your pace, you'd be untouchable.
Let's say that player gets more skill points; say he gets... eighty. He could evenly distribute them (100, 100, and eight 35's), or he could invest them in a single skill (100, 100, 100, a 30, and six 25's.) Which is the better choice? He could have another skill that he can always perfectly rely on, and then try to make the game revolve around his three skills. Or, he could continue to have eight below average skills, and keep trying to stick with his two mastered abilities when he plays seriously.
I would argue that the first option is far superior. When you have a useful skill perfected, it becomes a reliable tool that wins you games. The more reliable tools you have, the higher your odds of victory. If you take your unreliable tools and only make them slightly more useful, you guarantee nothing. Even more than that, when you have a skill heavily ingrained into you, it takes very little energy to use it. That leaves you with the energy to concentrate on other parts of the match. If you are constantly expending energy to use skills that may not even work, you weaken your own mind.
The conclusion: focus your training. Pick an important part of your game that needs work and focus on THAT AND ONLY THAT. Once it is mastered to the point where you can rely on it safely and comfortably, select a new part of your game to train.
In part 2, I'm going to talk about some of the problems and issues that arise from this style, as well as ways to deal with them. Part three will be case studies, examples of these playstyles in the Smash community
It's at:
http://eskimosister.blogspot.com/2009/08/subtractive-playstyles-part-1-theory.html
Or you can just read it right here and now.
* * *
First, a Shaolin proverb, slightly paraphrased:
"I do not fear the ten thousand kicks you have practiced once. I fear the one kick you have practiced ten thousand times." The meaning behind the proverb is simple: a bunch of awkwardly performed kicks are no match for a single one done with utter mastery.
Second, an interesting article on game design courtesy of David Sirlin: http://www.sirlin.net/articles/subtractive-design.html
I recommend you read it, but if you don't want to, this is the main point some of the most powerful and interesting games have, at their core, very few elements to them. This is because the developers took time to deeply explore those few elements, polish them, and ensure that they were perfect (or near to it). Anything that detracted from those elements was then removed or changed to complement them. He mentions two of my favorite games, Portal and Braid, and I felt gratified because I previously thought--in significantly less concise and enlightening terms--the same thing about them. At their heart they are simple games, but the gameplay they deliver is top-notch; their simple components can be twisted and shaped in countless ways because they are well-developed. That is why those games are deep, entertaining, and acclaimed.
I've learned a lot of lessons about competition and life from playing Smash: consistent performance is key, find ways to turn disadvantages into advantages (and when you can't do that, play in a way that keeps those disadvantages from becoming an issue), honing the basics is an absolute must if you want to be a top pro, and so on. In light of Sirlin's article, I thought about a theory behind how any player can practice, improve, and become high level players. I feel that many people get discouraged when they hit a wall, and the reason most give up is because they do not know how to push past it. They don't have a method for improving, so they practice and train haphazardly, go nowhere, and eventually quit from frustration.
In other sports, there are countless coaches and teaching methods designed to make players improve. For instance, if you don't know why your golf swing is bad, hire a coach and he'll (hopefully) be able to tell you what you need to do to change it. This kind of resource is significantly harder to find for competitive gamers. I really like Melee and I don't want people to quit; playing it seriously against a skilled opponent can be a lot of fun and it sucks when players stop for the wrong reasons. You decide the game isn't for you, fine; you have other life issues that take higher priority, no problem; you really want to get better but don't know how and the game stops being fun, that's bad.
It's really hard to find a concrete method that says "here is how you get better," because every player is at a different point in their development. So all I can really do is offer basic recommendations; hopefully it helps.
Let's go back to the proverb and the article by Sirlin. The most terrifying kick to a Shaolin monk is one that its user has practiced ten-thousand times. The deepest and most entertaining games are ones that have a few elements that are explored and polished as much as possible. I believe that the reason the best players are as good as they are is because they have mastered a few key areas of their respective characters. Then, they try to make the match take focus on those areas as frequently as possible, and stay away from situations outside their mastery.
That said, the method for improvement is simply put: pick a single, important aspect of your chosen character, and train it exclusively until it becomes as flawless as possible. Once you have done that, choose another aspect of that character, and train *that* until it is flawless. Keep doing this, and your game will expand. When you play important games (tournaments and money matches), do your best to keep the game within your areas of mastery.
Think of it another way. When you play a match, a bunch of different situations crop up. You and your opponent will both be on the ground, making it a ground game. Then, one of you will be in the air, turning it into air versus ground, then vice versa. There will be aerial combat where you are directly above the opponent at 12 o'clock. There will be combat when you'll be beneath him, above him and in front, above and behind. There are times when you edgeguard and the opponent is high, times when he is low, times when he is even with the stage; likewise, you will be edgeguarded in those circumstances as well. There are a lot of different situations in any given match, and if you want to be good, it makes sense you need to be good at controlling those situations.
Now let's make up a number and say there are 10 skills you need to master to have a good Fox (it's probably higher but that's not important at the moment). Let's also say that you get... 400 points to split among those skills, and they max out at one hundred. Most players would then have about 40 in every skill. That's below average at each of the skilsl you need to be good at Fox. That makes you a below average Fox. With training you get more points, but right now, you're crummy everywhere.
Now imagine a player who has 100 in two of his skills, then 25 in the other eight. Same 400 points, but he's an absolute master of two of the necessary Fox skills. Any time he is using one of his two good skills, he's a champ. When he isn't, he's garbage.
If you were that player, you would try to make sure that when it counted, you were applying those skills and not using your others. Your game would only have two components, but they would be perfect. As long as you could keep the game going at your pace, you'd be untouchable.
Let's say that player gets more skill points; say he gets... eighty. He could evenly distribute them (100, 100, and eight 35's), or he could invest them in a single skill (100, 100, 100, a 30, and six 25's.) Which is the better choice? He could have another skill that he can always perfectly rely on, and then try to make the game revolve around his three skills. Or, he could continue to have eight below average skills, and keep trying to stick with his two mastered abilities when he plays seriously.
I would argue that the first option is far superior. When you have a useful skill perfected, it becomes a reliable tool that wins you games. The more reliable tools you have, the higher your odds of victory. If you take your unreliable tools and only make them slightly more useful, you guarantee nothing. Even more than that, when you have a skill heavily ingrained into you, it takes very little energy to use it. That leaves you with the energy to concentrate on other parts of the match. If you are constantly expending energy to use skills that may not even work, you weaken your own mind.
The conclusion: focus your training. Pick an important part of your game that needs work and focus on THAT AND ONLY THAT. Once it is mastered to the point where you can rely on it safely and comfortably, select a new part of your game to train.
In part 2, I'm going to talk about some of the problems and issues that arise from this style, as well as ways to deal with them. Part three will be case studies, examples of these playstyles in the Smash community
sputter
Smash Rookie
eskimosister 
I like it
I like it
Yunho: ABSOLUTELY CORRECT I COULD NOT HAVE PUT IT BETTER MYSELF WHAT A GOOD THING.
Also, part 2 of my article thing is up:
http://eskimosister.blogspot.com/2009/08/subtractive-playstyles-part-2-problems.html
I'll be adding to it as people comment, ask questions, and raise interesting points, so please leave some kind of response ^_^
Also, part 2 of my article thing is up:
http://eskimosister.blogspot.com/2009/08/subtractive-playstyles-part-2-problems.html
I'll be adding to it as people comment, ask questions, and raise interesting points, so please leave some kind of response ^_^
And part 3 is up now
http://eskimosister.blogspot.com/2009/08/subtractive-playstyles-part-3-case.html
That's all, folks. Please do leave comments on the blog, I'd like to know if people are actually reading the thing.
http://eskimosister.blogspot.com/2009/08/subtractive-playstyles-part-3-case.html
That's all, folks. Please do leave comments on the blog, I'd like to know if people are actually reading the thing.
dudutsai
Smash Lord
I think there should be a section here about how to improve by watching Youtube videos.
Because I honestly think if you do it right, watching videos can make you improve drastically more every time you play.
Because I honestly think if you do it right, watching videos can make you improve drastically more every time you play.
ranmaru
Smash Legend
- Joined
- Feb 10, 2008
- Messages
- 13,296
- Switch FC
- SW-0654 7794 0698
I do that as well, to practice all I can, and then sometimes a 7 or 9. Also, I try playing against 3 lvl 7's, teams, and friendly fire OFF, that way I'd have to kill each computer 4 times. It may help me with reaction time, but I wonder if there is any negative to it? I haven't done it much, though.
But I will try that, nice blog man. ;p
kaio-ken
Smash Cadet
Some nice info ya' got there
kaio-ken
Smash Cadet
Test* sorry my severs down a bit. but again, this is some LOOONG info @_@
Very nice! Even if some (or even most of it..) of that info is like common sense, these posts have given me a huge hand in working on the mental part of my game. (Reading the opponent, being unpredictable, learning what works against each opponent etc..) There's still a few parts I didn't read yet, but I'm planning of reading all of it. *_*
Mushinronsha
Smash Cadet
This is great. We're doing a Smash club at my college, and this should be a great guide to refer people to read.
brawlpro
Smash Master
I just went to a mid sized tourney and did pretty well because I memorized SOME of the things in this thread. Thank you.
Binx
Smash Master
glad I could help, I know im not super active anymore but I am killing some time between classes and decided to make a bunch of posts today.
Anyhow, try and learn as many different types of approaches as you can and try to spot your opponent's approach patterns, if they only use a handful you can just keep running around them until they use 1 thats easier to punish and destroy them. Some players camp in a certain pattern and approach on a specific set of visual cues, if you discover what these are you can force their hand and cover the majority of their options pretty easily.
Anyhow, try and learn as many different types of approaches as you can and try to spot your opponent's approach patterns, if they only use a handful you can just keep running around them until they use 1 thats easier to punish and destroy them. Some players camp in a certain pattern and approach on a specific set of visual cues, if you discover what these are you can force their hand and cover the majority of their options pretty easily.
Zombie Bob
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Sep 2, 2009
- Messages
- 12
Great thread! I'm pretty new to the competitive scene, so I'm still working on getting my skils up there with the good players.
The essays about Observation, as well as the four aspects of Melee are definitely food for thought.
I wasn't Isai the next time I played after reading all of this, but as you play, you start to slowly but surely internalize these things.
Apart from improving my technical skill (L-cancelling, when to wavedash, etc.), spacing, observation, and mindgames (i.e, not playing off of impulse) are a few things I've been catching myself on in matches against players better than me.
Awesome read.
The essays about Observation, as well as the four aspects of Melee are definitely food for thought.
I wasn't Isai the next time I played after reading all of this, but as you play, you start to slowly but surely internalize these things.
Apart from improving my technical skill (L-cancelling, when to wavedash, etc.), spacing, observation, and mindgames (i.e, not playing off of impulse) are a few things I've been catching myself on in matches against players better than me.
Awesome read.
-PM-
Smash Ace
best thread ever.
Sho_Satori
Smash Rookie
- Joined
- Nov 10, 2009
- Messages
- 1
This guide is beneficial to newer players
I have to agree with this one.
soulgrinder
Smash Rookie
You deserve a Nobel prize or something for this thread
Taylor-Corn
Smash Cadet
- Joined
- Dec 26, 2009
- Messages
- 65
yeah the attention thing i need to work on....patience is a virtue. intresting article tho
Rian
Smash Cadet
You have to work on it yourself. Maybe you did not fully get the article. No offence though.
I believe that confidence once u obtain decent tech skills and tourney exp. Is what is truly needed to play at a competetive lv and do well. I didn't go to pound for different reasons but I can see more than half the ppl in pools saying crap m2k is in her or ss is in here I bet I ain't making it out.....u can't say crap like that....when I went to RoM2 I played thomas tipman and didn't even no it was him and I almost beat him last stock hi damage.....if I knew who he was I would had played all nervous and instead of examing my opponent and lookin for openings basicallyy playing smart I would be saying awwww **** its tip imma get wrecked by tip. Don't defeat urself at the door. If u wanna win u gotta say I got this in the bag....like really who goes to a tourney expectin to lose y waste ur money....and I'm talking to myself to I did it versus jman but I won't make that mistake again
zifn15
Smash Cadet
- Joined
- Feb 18, 2008
- Messages
- 45
I know I'm not the only one to say this but wow this thread explained so much and much of it has applications outside of smash. I am duly impressed.
Big thanks to all who contributed.
PS. I don't know if I'm the first to point this out but, I think the link to "Teaching Tech," by Overswarm, is broken.
Big thanks to all who contributed.
PS. I don't know if I'm the first to point this out but, I think the link to "Teaching Tech," by Overswarm, is broken.
B0x
Smash Apprentice
I agree. this is what always happens to me.
Hero 13
Smash Apprentice
I agree with mah ni99a Twebb; confidence is key u'll play way better when ur confident. Even when you're down always think positive and keep pushing yourself. If you're down a couple stocks just think to you're self, "Alright, lemme just take a couple stocks so its not that bad",.. and then u find yourself making this huge comeback and you're there...neva be negative
Xianglian
Smash Journeyman
Of course you have to have the skills in order to make the comeback in the first place, or else you're gonna get 4 stocked by m2k XD
BrandonOwnageking
Smash Journeyman
Amazing guide. I think i got better just from reading it. I cant wait to apply all of it.
ranmaru
Smash Legend
- Joined
- Feb 10, 2008
- Messages
- 13,296
- Switch FC
- SW-0654 7794 0698
At least try to get ONE stock off in that case. But its M2k, so that might be hard. xD To feel better, play him in a 5 stock match. That way, you could get 4 stocked and MAYBE get a stock off. Hahaha. That prolly won't work either. ****.