Important Carefully Ask PPMD about the Tiara Guy

[quixotic]

What’s the best way to punish tournament winner drifting forwards in the marth ditto? I usually stand at a range to dtilt vs ledgedash and usually only get a weak fair with backwards momentum.

 

[net1234]

Is there a low % pika flowchart off grab? Or is it to obscure for anyone to have created yet haha

 

[Dr Peepee]

What’s the best way to punish tournament winner drifting forwards in the marth ditto? I usually stand at a range to dtilt vs ledgedash and usually only get a weak fair with backwards momentum.

If you Fair them back off that's fine because it sets up an edgeguard, which Marth does well to himself. If there's some tipper setup or some mixup potential there, then I don't know it. Off the Fair I'm sure there are many micro situations you can set up kill mixups from but I wouldn't remember all of that.

Is there a low % pika flowchart off grab? Or is it to obscure for anyone to have created yet haha

Check out delayssb's post in here on it.

 

[Kopaka]

Shroomed in general is a pretty sloppy player, so I wouldn't take much from him if I were you, but some of his neutral you could maybe take.

I haven't watched the Shroomed Wizzy set linked above, but there's been other times where you've talked about sets that lead me to believe your standard of clean play is pretty high. I don't think many of us here could take a game off Wizzy anytime soon. What are some ways that consistent and clean play can be developed? I have to be in the right frame of mind for me to do this, but I've started to play against people in practice in a way where I think "I'm going to work through these situations with the least amount of button presses possible to cut out excess and get to the point of what could be done in this situation" because even against players considered worse than I am, I win but its often times very sloppy. Better to me shouldn't just mean you're winning, but you're winning cleanly and you actually look like you know what you're doing. But wow, even at the level of Shroomed/Wizzy one could still see sloppiness? I guess it depends on who's looking at the set and what they're looking for.

It's really difficult to execute clean and beautiful play under pressure as well so there's probably some important mental aspects to it too.

 

[Dr Peepee]

My standard of clean play is very high, but it's something that in various forms people at all levels can achieve. That aside, Shroomed is an archetypal sloppy player for many of the upper level people watching him.

If you want to play more cleanly, then you just do what I talk about here all the time. Stop wasting inputs(no excessive swings or dashes unless necessary). Give your inputs meaning that you do use(Fair because you believe your opponent will jump or you confirm it). Abuse positional advantage and use your tools well and in good combination(Dtilt next major interaction after Fair if they seem discouraged from jumping).

If you'd like, you can get a couple situations of Shroomed and ask about them, or I can look at a couple from the linked set very quickly to demonstrate this sloppiness.

 

[quixotic]

I’m kind of struggling to understand threatening range in the marth ditto. In other matchups I find that there is a range where I can threaten my opponent without being threatened. If my opponent doesn’t commit to jumping in neutral, how can I find advantageous situations? I feel like marth needs to make a big commitment and move into run to get a reaction from the opponent.

 

[Kotastic]

Hey PP, got a question regarding conditioning and deepening my understanding of each interactions.

So for a really simple scenario, let's say I f-smash Falcon at like center stage. Falcon keeps note of that and he shields the next time. I read that from the f-smash conditioning and grab. Then after that, it gets hazy and becomes a guessing game, and I don't believe that it's the way. There has to be tools Marth can take advantage of to condition them in my favor despite previous neutral exchanges being similar.

When I see your Marth in play, there's just so much complexity and intention with each of your dash, and I can only understand it at a surface level, let alone breaking down each meaning and threats you bring to the table with each dash and zoning tools. I recall awhile ago that you said you feinted Leffen in order to get a d-tilt, which set the tone of how the rest of the stock would play out (cited here: https://youtu.be/Gv74JXJBFwk?t=18m57s ). I would guess that Leffen responded with your short dash back animation with lasers and instead you charged with d-tilt.

I think at the moment, I have a decent handling with my zoning tools. For example, I often do the Zain which is fair d-tilt in the Fox mu and see how my opponent responds to this, which creates a deep pool of options in my disposal that's enough to beat many people. However at the end of the day, I do feel I handle them in a simplistic manner. There's some smarter Foxes that I fight that can see right through what I'm intending for and don't get conditioned to fear my zoning tools. Like I fair d-tilt a lot to get them to respect my space so later I can get a better reward with fair dash back pivot grab, but they know that and overshoot after my fair. My fair d-tilt setup might work for the first couple times, but after that I might as well be gambling that they will fall for it again, which I'm pondering how to not make that the case. While I think zoning offers a lot of tools to influence my opponent, I think by itself I'm starting to see the shortcomings of it. That, or I am not properly utilizing them which is a possibility.

I think with my understanding of my zoning tools deepened, this is where I think dashing is what takes my zoning tools to the next level. If I were to postulate, in that clip of you vs. Leffen, I have a feeling that with the zoning threats dash carry, your dashes take great effect to Leffen in order to get that d-tilt and probably dozens of other scenarios too. I suppose with my end question being, how can I use dashes with my zoning tools clearly represented? There many times where I feel like I dash and my opponent doesn't exactly respond appropriately within my range. Additionally, how do I not fall into the trap into thinking neutral is a guessing game?

 

[Dr Peepee]

I’m kind of struggling to understand threatening range in the marth ditto. In other matchups I find that there is a range where I can threaten my opponent without being threatened. If my opponent doesn’t commit to jumping in neutral, how can I find advantageous situations? I feel like marth needs to make a big commitment and move into run to get a reaction from the opponent.

You do similar things to other matchups by discouraging their options but keeping your own relevant. So vs Sheik I often tell people to discourage DA/BG when you get closer and then you can abuse Fair and Dtilt more. It's similar vs Marth, where at a given inner spacing you want to discourage moving forward with moves with Dtilt in place or some Fairs as well. If you just want advantage, then yeah force them to jump or to run in or to shield. Dtilt or even moving in can solve a lot of this for you. You can also just wait for them to attack or jump. I'll also JC grab their deep approaches to help discourage these types of things if the spacing/conditioning works.

But yeah in general it's a ditto so you don't have the obvious mobility/range advantage you normally do. You'll have to engineer advantages now. Let me know if that makes sense.

Hey PP, got a question regarding conditioning and deepening my understanding of each interactions.

So for a really simple scenario, let's say I f-smash Falcon at like center stage. Falcon keeps note of that and he shields the next time. I read that from the f-smash conditioning and grab. Then after that, it gets hazy and becomes a guessing game, and I don't believe that it's the way. There has to be tools Marth can take advantage of to condition them in my favor despite previous neutral exchanges being similar.

When I see your Marth in play, there's just so much complexity and intention with each of your dash, and I can only understand it at a surface level, let alone breaking down each meaning and threats you bring to the table with each dash and zoning tools. I recall awhile ago that you said you feinted Leffen in order to get a d-tilt, which set the tone of how the rest of the stock would play out (cited here: https://youtu.be/Gv74JXJBFwk?t=18m57s ). I would guess that Leffen responded with your short dash back animation with lasers and instead you charged with d-tilt.

I think at the moment, I have a decent handling with my zoning tools. For example, I often do the Zain which is fair d-tilt in the Fox mu and see how my opponent responds to this, which creates a deep pool of options in my disposal that's enough to beat many people. However at the end of the day, I do feel I handle them in a simplistic manner. There's some smarter Foxes that I fight that can see right through what I'm intending for and don't get conditioned to fear my zoning tools. Like I fair d-tilt a lot to get them to respect my space so later I can get a better reward with fair dash back pivot grab, but they know that and overshoot after my fair. My fair d-tilt setup might work for the first couple times, but after that I might as well be gambling that they will fall for it again, which I'm pondering how to not make that the case. While I think zoning offers a lot of tools to influence my opponent, I think by itself I'm starting to see the shortcomings of it. That, or I am not properly utilizing them which is a possibility.

I think with my understanding of my zoning tools deepened, this is where I think dashing is what takes my zoning tools to the next level. If I were to postulate, in that clip of you vs. Leffen, I have a feeling that with the zoning threats dash carry, your dashes take great effect to Leffen in order to get that d-tilt and probably dozens of other scenarios too. I suppose with my end question being, how can I use dashes with my zoning tools clearly represented? There many times where I feel like I dash and my opponent doesn't exactly respond appropriately within my range. Additionally, how do I not fall into the trap into thinking neutral is a guessing game?

Neutral is a guessing game until you understand it. This is why many people just wait and occasionally yolo.

If you ALWAYS dash forward a little then Fair in place, you've lost conditioning on your dash. Yes your Fair mixup might be decent, but the opponent does know it's coming. So either empty hop with no aerial, don't jump at all out of dash, stand in place after Fair or move in. These branching options all help make your Fair and dash more useful. For the Fair itself, if they're just overshooting why doesn't Dtilt hit them? Why aren't you reacting to their dash in and grabbing them(or grabbing in place), or Fair'ing again, or jabbing after landing, or WD'ing back instead of dashing back? That will deepen your Fair mixup in itself. You have time to confirm what's going on during your SH and also the space the Fair threat range allows, so be sure to use that.

 

[Kotastic]

So I know to some extent neutral is a guessing game at first, but what about the part where I sort of guess after the second interaction? Are zoning tools enough to properly influence the opponent skewed to my favor?

 

[Dr Peepee]

After the second interaction, if you're not sure, just gain data. Eventually you'll find trends that occur around that second interaction as well and won't need to gain data so often.

 

[AirFair]

wassup ridley boards

I've been reflecting a bit about my thinking this weekend since I came back from a local I attended on Friday. I finished third and upset a couple of PR'd players in my city to get there. I felt great about pulling through and winning those sets, but there was a feeling I had once all of the energy wore off that I feel like I should ask you, pp, about in particular.

Although I won the sets that I did, I feel like I wasn't showing all of the knowledge I had and wasn't really executing those things I had learned about as well as I could have (ex. somewhat excessive movement and odd swings that were very high risk/high reward where I could have gained more information or stood still even lol). To put it simply, I felt like I had gotten away with those wins, no disrespect to my opponents obviously.

While this feeling is very present, it is seemingly conflicting with my desire to win and overcome challenges in tournament. I want to win in tournament, and that is what got me through those sets, but I also want to play the best that I can, which means playing more with my learning and appreciation for the character in mind, playing more "clean", etc. I can't say that I saw a lot of that during the tournament. Granted, I have been working more on accepting loss/mistakes and accepting that I may mess things up but my play for the most part was not what I had envisioned in practice, and so I will keep working as well as try and examine my thinking.

I believe you have remarked on a very similar feeling in the past, and the question that I wanted to ask you, is how can I balance this feeling of wanting to play my very best with wanting to win? Is there one that you weigh more over the other? I want to play much better and express more of my learning but I do very much want to win in tournament, and I feel like I let one overpower the other, so I can't say I'm very satisfied with my performance in that regard.

That being said, I'll try and post here about those sets once I've had time to analyze them somewhat and talk to some others about them.

 

[Biggles]

Been lurking in this thread a long time. It's really informative. I'm still not good at Marth. My background is in CS and I think about the game (and everything else) in pretty formal terms. Recently, I've come to some conclusions about frame data, reactions, and position in neutral which I posted over on reddit here: https://www.reddit.com/r/SSBM/comments/88nolc/reaction_time_and_space_looking_at_position_in/ Sorry for linking offsite to something I wrote, but I figure it's better than reposting the whole thing.

I was wondering if you get time if PP or some of the other analytical players who make up the infinite marthmind in here could take a look and tell me if what I'm talking about makes sense to you, or if I've neglected something etc. My idea is to use what I've figured out to get things to practice from match analysis / transcription, and break down characters' options more clearly by having a way to enumerate the different kinds of situations in neutral.

 

[Dr Peepee]

wassup ridley boards

I've been reflecting a bit about my thinking this weekend since I came back from a local I attended on Friday. I finished third and upset a couple of PR'd players in my city to get there. I felt great about pulling through and winning those sets, but there was a feeling I had once all of the energy wore off that I feel like I should ask you, pp, about in particular.

Although I won the sets that I did, I feel like I wasn't showing all of the knowledge I had and wasn't really executing those things I had learned about as well as I could have (ex. somewhat excessive movement and odd swings that were very high risk/high reward where I could have gained more information or stood still even lol). To put it simply, I felt like I had gotten away with those wins, no disrespect to my opponents obviously.

While this feeling is very present, it is seemingly conflicting with my desire to win and overcome challenges in tournament. I want to win in tournament, and that is what got me through those sets, but I also want to play the best that I can, which means playing more with my learning and appreciation for the character in mind, playing more "clean", etc. I can't say that I saw a lot of that during the tournament. Granted, I have been working more on accepting loss/mistakes and accepting that I may mess things up but my play for the most part was not what I had envisioned in practice, and so I will keep working as well as try and examine my thinking.

I believe you have remarked on a very similar feeling in the past, and the question that I wanted to ask you, is how can I balance this feeling of wanting to play my very best with wanting to win? Is there one that you weigh more over the other? I want to play much better and express more of my learning but I do very much want to win in tournament, and I feel like I let one overpower the other, so I can't say I'm very satisfied with my performance in that regard.

That being said, I'll try and post here about those sets once I've had time to analyze them somewhat and talk to some others about them.

In tournament, all that you can do is focus on the winning and the deep engagement with the opponent. As a competitor there you need to be in the moment. When in training, which is most of the time, you should be focusing on playing as cleanly as possible. However, it's still a journey. Playing high risk/high reward has its moments, and in heated exchanges we can let ourselves shine through beyond our training or in ways that break rules healthily if done right.

That said, it's great you want to strive to play more cleanly. It takes a lot of work to get there, and if you're seeing results toward that end in terms of wins and cleanER play, then that's something to be proud of. You just don't want to be satisfied and keep striving for a deeper understanding. To me, if you're ever 100% satisfied with a performance and don't see a way to go deeper after some time for celebration/reflection, then you need to re-evaluate yourself. I've always found a way to go deeper and that has kept me honest while still enjoying the grind and the interaction with opponents.

Been lurking in this thread a long time. It's really informative. I'm still not good at Marth. My background is in CS and I think about the game (and everything else) in pretty formal terms. Recently, I've come to some conclusions about frame data, reactions, and position in neutral which I posted over on reddit here: https://www.reddit.com/r/SSBM/comments/88nolc/reaction_time_and_space_looking_at_position_in/ Sorry for linking offsite to something I wrote, but I figure it's better than reposting the whole thing.

I was wondering if you get time if PP or some of the other analytical players who make up the infinite marthmind in here could take a look and tell me if what I'm talking about makes sense to you, or if I've neglected something etc. My idea is to use what I've figured out to get things to practice from match analysis / transcription, and break down characters' options more clearly by having a way to enumerate the different kinds of situations in neutral.

My main concern when reading this is I don't know where you get your numbers from. I'm always pretty wary of hard numbers for reaction time since you can practice these reactions specifically(choice reaction training in scientific literature) and also generally train reaction time(like what Bruce Lee did). I also have heard lag can vary a little between GCs and CRTs but did not see this mentioned either.

All that said, it was kind of hard to understand without specifics. Your main point you built to about "pairs of situations" and frame advantages over them was hard for me to personally understand without knowing where the pairs came from or how exactly the frame advantage could be reached. Basically, I'm uncertain of the practicality of your ideas as they are and they feel nebulous to me. It seems like it has some potential to be fleshed out more though, and I'm sure you can clarify more with me right now.



RIDLEY REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

 

[Biggles]

kraaaaw im no longer a mechapterodactyl

For the reaction time data, I was going off a millitary paper on simple reaction times which I seem to have lost somehow... Haha ^^; My idea was that average trained and untrained simple reaction times should give us a suggestion as to the bounds of reliable trained choice reactions. I was going off this thread https://www.reddit.com/r/SSBM/comments/4pcfei/melee_on_console_how_much_input_lag_is_there_and/ for input lag, but I think I messed up and was 1 frame more optimistic about it than I should have been. Looking at this thread https://www.reddit.com/r/smashbros/comments/6qu6r2/my_first_quality_post_reaction_time_quantified/ 250ms might be a reasonable lower bound for choice reactions? I know there's a whole lot of literature out there on the subject though, and my specific numbers could do with a lot of refining. For the GC and CRT variations I'm trying to be as optimistic as possible. What would be really ideal is to devise a 20XX based test of reaction times to melee phenomena (e.g. how fast can you shield a randomly timed bowser fsmash) on a Wii, and get people to collect data at tournaments, since the specificity of the test to what we want to know is a lot higher. I might try to design a decent experiment and put out a call for people to conduct it if there's interest. To start with, I was mostly thinking about putting together a table that expresses the different things we can react to and their rough layout in time, but I can see how presenting that without any qualification could be a bit misleading.

The frame advantage in pairs of positions idea is like this:
Marth and Sheik are engaged in the middle of battlefield (neither clearly threatens the other, but they're both within an unreactable distance of making a threat.) That's the pair of positions: Marth's position and Fox's position. Because the game is so dang fast, in neutral, either player can't be said to know the other's exact position and state. So if they're in neutral and neither has committed, can one player reasonably be said to have frame advantage over the other? This is the question I picked up from druggedfox's post since I really liked his idea that there's always some kind of frame advantage or disadvantage. I think that each of them has frame advantage over different places in the stage. When we see the game, we've already made out inputs for the next bit, but as a neutral spectator, we don't know what either players inputs are yet. So since shine comes out before everything, we can definitely consider fox to have frame advantage over shine at his current observed position. Nothing Marth can do can reasonably put a hitbox there before next frame. But if Marth is far enough from Fox, he probably has frame advantage in his closest dtilt hitbox. Basically it's kind of like an overlap between two of those heatmaps on ikneedata, one for each character, and it changes really fast, and narrows really substantially when someone commits. So since it's so complicated, so do any kind of spacing analysis that can fit in my brain, I have to come up with names for relative positions (which is what this post is I guess, I try to derive them from the reaction time data) and names for places on the stages that aren't just coordinates (not done yet.) My idea is that each short sequence we use in such a position has to be learned as a different mental action and we can take stock of which ones our opponents know (at least below top level we can probs , there might be too much overlap between actions, like them knowing 20 different things out of wavedash in the same situation, to do it quickly enough at top level.)

 

[Dr Peepee]

Looking through that reaction time thread, it seems that the main response comment and the author of the post agrees that more work should be done as anecdotally they go beyond a typical lower bound reaction time and they're just some dudes lol. That's basically what you said though. I also think that this would be hard to use as reaction time could change under pressure or after getting outplayed or comboed hard etc, but you gotta start somewhere.

What do you make of the idea that one player can influence another with faking frame disadvantage, or going into a frame neutral state with the opponent but leading him to a heavily frame disadvantageous state?

 

[Biggles]

That definitely makes sense. I guess that the use of empty jump on a conditioned opponent might be an example. They expect a further commitment which will cost you frames (like an aerial or something) but they can't react to it, so you can retain your frame advantage and possibly even react to their defensive option. But it does require knowledge of your opponent's approach to the game. I can't think of how to conceptualize it for further spacings (like when players are on the opposite side of the stage) but going off druggedfox's original idea, the overall goal of some play-styles could be exactly that; to mix up and condition your opponent in the game of frame advantage in neutral (which I'd say is the same thing as taking stage control.)

Against an extremely conservative player with human reactions but superhuman option randomization and complete knowledge of the possible moves, they should be able to play a strategy where no matter which good options you do in what pattern, the average frame advantage gained over a large number of interactions is the same (the Nash equilibrium of the frame advantage game). The more practical version of that is very disciplined and knowledgeable players who play conservatively and focus on the situation rather than the player. In theory they should be a lot harder to influence so it's stronger to take inventory of what they can do, and search for situations you know better than them or they can't execute well and force them if possible. (I don't know if such players really exist.) On the upside, any guess at their patterns can't really be punished if they play this way because the mix means that unless you read them into oblivion, the payoffs are always the same in the long term. But I do think that tactically inserting random optimal conservative noise into people's strategy if possible is a potential defense against read and conditioning based play by similarly skilled players. (Doing it all the time in a really advanced meta would make it pretty difficult to make any consistent progress in tournament as seen in http://www.rpscontest.com/.)

So basically according to my current theory about the game it's definitely possible, probably ubiquitous already although maybe not as developed as it could be, and will probably persist forever, but there are counter strategies to mitigate it in the distant future meta. How to do it (in theory) is mostly what I'm trying to figure out. Like what patterns are embedded in most people's play because of how the game is or how humans are.

 

[Kotastic]

Against non-fastfallers and you throw near the corner at like mid to high percents, and the opponent DI's specifically to snap towards ledge for f/d-throw, would you still opt for that or up-throw? Against Peach I can see why you would still opt for throwing towards corner, but what about characters like Sheik?

 

[StarEmblem]

Hey Kevin! Quick Question! How do I fight Puff? Been struggling to prepare against a friend who mains puff and I'm wondering how you fight her.

 

[Kopaka]

I know you did this with Falco / recommend people practice without lasers but did you ever practice with Marth with "No X"? Like no dash back, no dtiilt, etc?

 

[Dr Peepee]

That definitely makes sense. I guess that the use of empty jump on a conditioned opponent might be an example. They expect a further commitment which will cost you frames (like an aerial or something) but they can't react to it, so you can retain your frame advantage and possibly even react to their defensive option. But it does require knowledge of your opponent's approach to the game. I can't think of how to conceptualize it for further spacings (like when players are on the opposite side of the stage) but going off druggedfox's original idea, the overall goal of some play-styles could be exactly that; to mix up and condition your opponent in the game of frame advantage in neutral (which I'd say is the same thing as taking stage control.)

Against an extremely conservative player with human reactions but superhuman option randomization and complete knowledge of the possible moves, they should be able to play a strategy where no matter which good options you do in what pattern, the average frame advantage gained over a large number of interactions is the same (the Nash equilibrium of the frame advantage game). The more practical version of that is very disciplined and knowledgeable players who play conservatively and focus on the situation rather than the player. In theory they should be a lot harder to influence so it's stronger to take inventory of what they can do, and search for situations you know better than them or they can't execute well and force them if possible. (I don't know if such players really exist.) On the upside, any guess at their patterns can't really be punished if they play this way because the mix means that unless you read them into oblivion, the payoffs are always the same in the long term. But I do think that tactically inserting random optimal conservative noise into people's strategy if possible is a potential defense against read and conditioning based play by similarly skilled players. (Doing it all the time in a really advanced meta would make it pretty difficult to make any consistent progress in tournament as seen in http://www.rpscontest.com/.)

So basically according to my current theory about the game it's definitely possible, probably ubiquitous already although maybe not as developed as it could be, and will probably persist forever, but there are counter strategies to mitigate it in the distant future meta. How to do it (in theory) is mostly what I'm trying to figure out. Like what patterns are embedded in most people's play because of how the game is or how humans are.

I would not think complete knowledge of possible moves is a true possibility, but I understand why you used that extreme.

Do you think only conservative players can use this thinking effectively? I don't.

Also, if you have any more specifics about your main point(s) here that would probably be helpful.

Against non-fastfallers and you throw near the corner at like mid to high percents, and the opponent DI's specifically to snap towards ledge for f/d-throw, would you still opt for that or up-throw? Against Peach I can see why you would still opt for throwing towards corner, but what about characters like Sheik?

Sometimes I'd do it and sometimes I'd uthrow. Since they would tunnel on the edge snap I could get some good DI mixups on them. I'd always throw Peach to the edge(sometimes you can DA first anyway), I'd never throw Puff up, but for say Sheik or Marth I'd definitely mix the two.

Hey Kevin! Quick Question! How do I fight Puff? Been struggling to prepare against a friend who mains puff and I'm wondering how you fight her.

Pivot grab her SH Bairs(won't work on full drift away) or some of her drift in aerials, Fair her if she does two or more jumps in the air, Dtilt or running grab her when she's on the ground(Fair/Nair can sometimes work too), don't rush and play for position, don't let her go over your head, count her jumps(she has 5), do fthrow/dthrow mixup at low percents and learn Fthrow kill setups at mid and high percent, don't let her grab edge or get off of it for free(come back in after dash back to avoid aerials near edge).

I know you did this with Falco / recommend people practice without lasers but did you ever practice with Marth with "No X"? Like no dash back, no dtiilt, etc?

No I have not, but quickly thinking about it those ideas are good. I'd especially like to recommend no Nair in neutral and no dash back so people break some really bad habits quickly thinking about it.

 

[quixotic]

Im having trouble dash dance grabbing fox nair in scramble situations(dont have the space to dash dance to stay safe and cover spotdodge or time to aerial), any advice? Only mixup I can think of is using shield stop to read spotdodge. The first link the situation occurs off of my dtilt so I feel like I need a consistent answer to that specific nair.

https://youtu.be/jYP9hngKdqE?t=14m30s
https://youtu.be/jYP9hngKdqE?t=15m48s

 

[Dr Peepee]

These do not seem like scramble situations to me. Why are you classifying them this way?

The first example, you actually give yourself a perfect grab setup on the Nair as you long dash back twice, but then instead of waiting and grabbing, you dash in for a frame or two and then out again, giving him time to spotdodge. The second example is similar as you could have grabbed, or at least Dtilted, out of WD back.

I'm wondering if you have muscle memory that means you must not only wait for them to be in lag to try and grab, but then once they are you must then dash back then dash in to grab. That happened in both clips. You back up perfectly in both cases, but instead of confirming during the backing up time you feel the need to back up again, OR you back up again as you confirm their approach when you're already safe.

I'd also recommend not dashing back after Dtilt hits all the time, as that may be a possible issue I'm seeing from the first clip.

Let me know if this makes sense.

 

[quixotic]

These do not seem like scramble situations to me. Why are you classifying them this way?

The first example, you actually give yourself a perfect grab setup on the Nair as you long dash back twice, but then instead of waiting and grabbing, you dash in for a frame or two and then out again, giving him time to spotdodge. The second example is similar as you could have grabbed, or at least Dtilted, out of WD back.

I'm wondering if you have muscle memory that means you must not only wait for them to be in lag to try and grab, but then once they are you must then dash back then dash in to grab. That happened in both clips. You back up perfectly in both cases, but instead of confirming during the backing up time you feel the need to back up again, OR you back up again as you confirm their approach when you're already safe.

I'd also recommend not dashing back after Dtilt hits all the time, as that may be a possible issue I'm seeing from the first clip.

Let me know if this makes sense.

To clarify, for the first situation do you mean that after the 2nd dash back, I should have grabbed on the dash in, or that I should have pivot grabbed from that dash back? I'm having trouble visualizing the grab.

I think my issue might be that I am trying to space around the fox/falco doing a no fastfall latest possible nair which has more horizontal range? I'm not completely sure.

Tangentially, do you think I could have punished this drill directly w/out waiting for the spotdodge/shine?
https://youtu.be/jYP9hngKdqE?t=8m19s

 

[Dr Peepee]

It would've been easier to dash in grab here, but you probably could have timed a pivot grab if the dashes were slightly different.

You may be, but in either case you should be able to punish with ASDI down grab or pivot/dash in JC grab. I'd practice the confirm if I were you, it's quite important.

Yes, that's definitely a dash in grab and/or pivot grab on the drill. Full drift in means grab is so easy at closer spacings.

 

[Kotastic]

https://clips.twitch.tv/WiseDignifiedFinchCorgiDerp

Can anyone explain how that fair was possible? I have trouble against Falcos that spam lasers when I'm in the corner/ledge and this seems like a decent answer.

 

[maclo4]

Marth is so sick

 

[maclo4]

https://clips.twitch.tv/WiseDignifiedFinchCorgiDerp

Can anyone explain how that fair was possible? I have trouble against Falcos that spam lasers when I'm in the corner/ledge and this seems like a decent answer.

That was sick. Pretty sure this is just zain jumping into a laser then fairing right after tho. Are you asking how he did it so low though? Cause fairing after you get lasered in the air is pretty common but this one is just really low. As far as I can tell he didnt use any crazy techniques. Its possible that he SDI'd the laser up, but to me it looks like he just took the laser normally then faired frame perfect after hitstun

Definitely gonna steal the backthrow trap on platforms though. Idk how I never thought to do that but whenever I try to backthrow techchase they slide off

 

[Biggles]

I would not think complete knowledge of possible moves is a true possibility, but I understand why you used that extreme.

Do you think only conservative players can use this thinking effectively? I don't.

Also, if you have any more specifics about your main point(s) here that would probably be helpful.

I think aggressive players could use it in shield pressure situations or to mix up their approach timings too.
Is that the kind of thing you mean?
Although actually playing a situation to the equilibrium is pretty hard because human RNG is not good, the payoff to approximating it probably increases a lot as you get higher up in skill level since other stuff is already really clean. I think overall players who go for reads (not inherently hard reads) are advantaged because players who don't will break even at best.

Hmm, specifics specifics. I think the best way for me to get more specific about the ideas in general is to sit down and do some matchup analysis of videos using my ideas and then come back. (The push to write up my ideas in the reddit post was I wanted to try and analyze Marth-Puff since I heard blur say everyone plays it wrong at present, but I didn't have a concrete enough way of thinking about spacing to look at it the way I wanted to, plus I had the hypothesis that people's habits are probably arranged into reaction time length chunks since it's hard to mentally combine shorter bits of play and execute them on the fly.) Sorry that I can't be a lot more specific right off the bat; if there's anything about the theory I can go into more then I can probably do that immediately. At the moment I'm basically just suggesting that spacing and the way people learn movements in the game are structured by reaction time, as well as that frame advantage is spatial. Now that I've written it down and bugged a bunch of people about it, I should be able to get way more specific by applying it. ^^;

https://clips.twitch.tv/WiseDignifiedFinchCorgiDerp

Can anyone explain how that fair was possible? I have trouble against Falcos that spam lasers when I'm in the corner/ledge and this seems like a decent answer.

I wonder if it's specific to Yoshi's because of the edges.

 

[Dr Peepee]

https://clips.twitch.tv/WiseDignifiedFinchCorgiDerp

Can anyone explain how that fair was possible? I have trouble against Falcos that spam lasers when I'm in the corner/ledge and this seems like a decent answer.

Yeah I've wondered about jumping into lasers and Fair'ing as Marth but never been too deep into looking at it. I'd say it's worth playing with though since lasers are pretty reactable and these low Fairs aren't likely to be easily punished.

I think aggressive players could use it in shield pressure situations or to mix up their approach timings too.
Is that the kind of thing you mean?
Although actually playing a situation to the equilibrium is pretty hard because human RNG is not good, the payoff to approximating it probably increases a lot as you get higher up in skill level since other stuff is already really clean. I think overall players who go for reads (not inherently hard reads) are advantaged because players who don't will break even at best.

Hmm, specifics specifics. I think the best way for me to get more specific about the ideas in general is to sit down and do some matchup analysis of videos using my ideas and then come back. (The push to write up my ideas in the reddit post was I wanted to try and analyze Marth-Puff since I heard blur say everyone plays it wrong at present, but I didn't have a concrete enough way of thinking about spacing to look at it the way I wanted to, plus I had the hypothesis that people's habits are probably arranged into reaction time length chunks since it's hard to mentally combine shorter bits of play and execute them on the fly.) Sorry that I can't be a lot more specific right off the bat; if there's anything about the theory I can go into more then I can probably do that immediately. At the moment I'm basically just suggesting that spacing and the way people learn movements in the game are structured by reaction time, as well as that frame advantage is spatial. Now that I've written it down and bugged a bunch of people about it, I should be able to get way more specific by applying it. ^^;

Lol alright man sounds good, I look forward to your updated analysis =)

 

[Zorcey]

For Dr Peepee or anyone who can help: I'm working out knockdown and CC percents for each matchup so I can understand my combos, tech chases, and kill setups better, but some things are unclear to me:
- How do I account for staling when testing knockdowns? Does it change when the move knocks down or only the damage it does? (So like, is knockdown determined by the percent before the opponent is hit, or the percent they're at after?) Am I able to have a hard percent here, or does it have to be a range to account for staling?
- Does staling change the percent threshold for CCs? (Same ultimate question as the above, I think.)

 

[Dr Peepee]

I think ikneedata handles all of that already. Every time I ask someone questions like that they say the website knows it anyway.

 

[Zorcey]

I think ikneedata handles all of that already. Every time I ask someone questions like that they say the website knows it anyway.

Omg I’m dumb ikneedata never even occurred to me. Thanks, I’ll check that out.

 

[SnailManBigHitta]

I've seen you say that marths tend to dash dance too much, and that you should usually only do a few dashes before making a decision. I've tried using this in my play and I notice that it works well against pretty much everyone, but I don't really understand why. Can you explain a little why doing fewer dashes is better?

 

[Dr Peepee]

Sure.

Basically, there are a couple main reasons. Let's look at practice. When most people practice, it's aimless and just about being FAST without knowing exactly how or why they should do it. They just move. This is fine enough, but it doesn't translate to real matches where you need to stop and start and respond to an opponent. If you try to play the same way, you'll get thrown off by them putting you into positions where your movements must be more precise or sophisticated than what you practiced. In other words, your practice and application are at odds, which throws you off.

The second, and in my opinion main reason for this though is about inputs. Doing a high volume of inputs is inherently taxing on the brain. Every time you do an input, you must think to yourself to do it(especially true if it's not a well-practiced one, but true regardless). So if you keep on stringing inputs together, you keep on occupying your mind. This keeps you from being able to observe what your opponent does, as well as consider the consequences of your actions. With fewer actions, you're forced to observe and also have time to think about what you've just done and new positions that arise as a result of the inputs.

As a final note, you can be fast and aware, but it takes tons of patience and good practice in which you start slowly and build speed on specific action routes.

Less is more.

 

[Kotastic]

I've been having a lot of trouble dealing with Falco's falling laser from like BF's top platform or just in general when they're falling out of tumble. This is especially troublesome when I'm not at like rising fair range because I'm looking out for dair as well. What are best ways to deal with this?

 

[Kopaka]

Sure.

Basically, there are a couple main reasons. Let's look at practice. When most people practice, it's aimless and just about being FAST without knowing exactly how or why they should do it. They just move. This is fine enough, but it doesn't translate to real matches where you need to stop and start and respond to an opponent. If you try to play the same way, you'll get thrown off by them putting you into positions where your movements must be more precise or sophisticated than what you practiced. In other words, your practice and application are at odds, which throws you off.

The second, and in my opinion main reason for this though is about inputs. Doing a high volume of inputs is inherently taxing on the brain. Every time you do an input, you must think to yourself to do it(especially true if it's not a well-practiced one, but true regardless). So if you keep on stringing inputs together, you keep on occupying your mind. This keeps you from being able to observe what your opponent does, as well as consider the consequences of your actions. With fewer actions, you're forced to observe and also have time to think about what you've just done and new positions that arise as a result of the inputs.

As a final note, you can be fast and aware, but it takes tons of patience and good practice in which you start slowly and build speed on specific action routes.

Less is more.

What do you think are some reasons why people would aim to be FAST? Where does the speed in execution in a real match come from? Is it from the understanding of situations and tools at ones disposal, repeated exposure to situations? Do you think that people might often misinterpret certain plays of yours, imitating a dash dance heavy style and then get rolled over? Following your vods closely there's not too many times where you've dash danced quite far away from your opponent (which is usually the case for dash dance heavily players I've personally come across) and you usually stay pretty close to them.

What are some criticisms of your play that you've heard?

 

[Dr Peepee]

I've been having a lot of trouble dealing with Falco's falling laser from like BF's top platform or just in general when they're falling out of tumble. This is especially troublesome when I'm not at like rising fair range because I'm looking out for dair as well. What are best ways to deal with this?

Wait so when Falco is in tumble falling out of a combo and lasers out, as well as mixing Dair and laser from the top platform, or are those two somehow related? I'm confused.

What do you think are some reasons why people would aim to be FAST? Where does the speed in execution in a real match come from? Is it from the understanding of situations and tools at ones disposal, repeated exposure to situations? Do you think that people might often misinterpret certain plays of yours, imitating a dash dance heavy style and then get rolled over? Following your vods closely there's not too many times where you've dash danced quite far away from your opponent (which is usually the case for dash dance heavily players I've personally come across) and you usually stay pretty close to them.

What are some criticisms of your play that you've heard?

People aim to be fast because, I think:

-ADHD symptoms are increased more by technology and bad lifestyle

-Melee is billed as a fast game now to get people into it

-emphasis throughout community isn't placed on good practice or intelligent(positional, etc) play unless you play a character forced to play slower, and even then it isn't a guarantee


Speed comes from building brain connections slowly, and from understanding built through study and good training. Study of the tools available to you and your opponent, and situations are what also build speed.

I don't think anyone understands my play very well, and even Cactus surprises me when he talks about it sometimes. So I'm kind of used to it at this point. I used to be a very easy to understand player when I was more robotic, but now I'm probably more confusing than Mango. I don't particularly like this. Add in the poor decisions I made when my mind and body weren't doing well and I just figure my intentions in matches won't be well-understood even if people did try very hard.

So yes, I do think people DD as a single idea and not as a series of individual dashes and/or groups of dashes and this means they have to be farther away in order to react since they're doing so many untrained inputs. I can DD closer because I have trained the threats well.

Criticisms of my play range from more specific correct things like my bad Falco Nairs or not using zoning vs ICs as Marth, to completely incorrect broad things like I'm a hyper defensive player who only knows how to DD. I see this type of stuff at every level of play and do not believe it to be very informed.

 

[Kopaka]

so do u think the Amish would make good melee players? :3

jk thank you for taking your time to answer those!

 

[Kotastic]

Oh no, neither are related, just two different scenarios with the same concept. The top platform where the falco camps there a bit is where I struggle to fight the mixup between falling dair or falling laser when I threaten the top platform below, and the same applies where Falco is being thrown up in the air and he breaks his tumble animation by dairing or falling laser. I feel like there should at least be some form of mixup, but I lose to falling lasers like all the time somehow.

 

[Dr Peepee]

Okay so vs the top platform, it's pretty different on BF compared to other levels since it has the highest top platform and you can't easily fall past the side platforms by running off. So this means Falco is most likely to fall somewhere in the middle of the platform and you have more time than on other levels. If you're threatening below then you should be fairly close to him. Falco's laser takes a bit to come out, and usually Falco Dairs early. This all means it should be a pretty easy reaction to either dash back grab/Fair his Dair or Fair/whatever his laser. You might need to spend more time standing still since Falco can't really easily hit you if he falls from that height quickly. You can also side B the laser if your reactions are late, which gives you a way to dash if you see him start to come down(and then you can chase after him if he DJs back to the top platform). I could say a little more about Dair vs laser but I'd see if playing around with this helps. It may also help with the tumble situation, but if not then I'd suggest trying to rise with him and Fair him if he DJs away, and failing that stick closer to where he can land so you can do a similar mixup as when he's on the top platform.

Let me know if that helps.