Don't you hate it when you just can't _____ in a tourney situation?

[3xSwords]

Well hello tactical discussion. I am mainly making this thread because just yesterday I went through a very traumatizing experience. For one whole day I just could not dash dance. Try as I might I just couldn't do a dash dance on command and consistently. This wasn't one of those "my hands are cold" or "I'm too sleepy." I played for hours and I still couldn't do it.

Now you may be wondering what why this isn't in general discussions or something. The reason is "what if this happened to you in the beginning of a tourney"? You just started your first round of friendlies when you realize you can't dash dance, fox trot, hug, angle your smashes, dash attack cancel up smash, etc on command and consistently.

In my case, I just gave it a day and I'm fine today (thankfully), but when you are in the middle of a tourney you can't "wait a day" time moves on. So do you guys keep playing a lot of friendlies and hope this condition wears off as you play? Do you not play at all and maybe even take a nap? Do you eat? Do you not sign up at all? But even then it seems like you just wasted a bunch of time and money to get to the tourney and basically wasted your time.

So please share some experiences, how you dealt with them, and advice for future victims. Please don't start any arguments this is meant to be one of the more casual threads in tactical discussion.

 

[Brinzy]

I hate it when I miss easy recoveries for whatever stupid failure on my part.

 

[3xSwords]

^Well did you read the OP? I said how you deal with it in a tourney situation. ^_^;

 

[Crow!]

I usually change the batteries in the Wiimote when shake smash starts being glitchy and I can't DAC or Wavebounce consistently. 9 times out of 10, that fixes things.

 

[3xSwords]

Yeah I see, but I'm what I'm saying is how do you deal with it when its you, the player, who just can't seem to do it right. I'll describe my situation a bit more. Like when I was dash dancing, I was just putting too much force or I wasn't tilting fast enough because well... I just couldn't. So like how would deal with it when you just can't do something, because you just can't do it? (Hope you get what I mean)

Edit: Thanks for sharing

 

[Brinzy]

^Well did you read the OP? I said how you deal with it in a tourney situation. ^_^;

You can't deal with an error like that in a tournament.

 

[3xSwords]

Are you talking about your error where you just can't recover in easy situations? Well yeah I guess I understand what you're talking about. When that happens I can only just say "****!" or something and hope I can comeback. Is it the pressure that causes you to fail or is it just your usual tendency?

 

[fkacyan]

You're getting psyched out pretty hard. Really, all that solves that is experience. Eventually you'll get used to tourney pressure and you'll be able to play it like friendlies in the sense that you won't get nervous.

 

[Brinzy]

Well I use Ness, who has a fairly unreliable recovery in the first place. I also use Zelda, and I make a lot of stupid mistakes. Usually it costs me the match.

 

[3xSwords]

@Thiocyanide I hope you're just referring to Successor of Raphael's experience. What I'm referring to is something else. Its not caused by being nervous but its basically the "my hands are cold" condition except you've been playing for quite a while. Like the time when I couldn't dash dance was in my own house just practicing, no pressure of any sort. Yet my hands just kept stiffening up or something which prevented me from dash dancing.

So how would you deal with that quickly and efficiently in a tourney situation where you don't have a lot of time to just wait for it to heal itself?

And Karen's uber 7-hit combo on Suzaku was just too good. <3 it

 

[fkacyan]

Believe it or not, you not being able to move your hands properly is almost certainly nerves =)

It's just experience; trust me. This happened to me all the time when I first got into the competitive scene and now it never happens at all.

 

[Foxy]

Sometimes your own personal rhythm from day-to-day can screw you up, just as in any other sport.

Sometimes I'll be playing friendlies at home and I'll be at the top of my game, with smooth perfect waveshines, all of my combos leading me where I envisioned them, all of my edge tactics succeeding, etc. Everybody has times like those where they just feel more in control of their character/hands than usual.

Then, sometimes, I'll be at a tourney or playing seriously against people I don't see often, and I'll be splotching chaingrabs, getting my recovery punished, going for stupid approaches, and so on.

However, I wouldn't attribute it to stress or nerves, because even players who've never been to a competition before and are suffering mentally at their first one seem to hold up technically. The first tourneys I went to I was surprised at how solid I felt. I didn't have time to even consider if my fingers were up to par, and luckily they were great. It isn't unusual at all to perform well under stress.

Basically, sometimes you have off-days and you've gotta deal with it. The best on-the-spot remedy for it that I've found is to slow up, take a few deep breaths, keep yourself from getting distracted, and try to play a strong mental game. If your muscle memory is coming up short, then your mind will have to fill in for it. Usually players just dig the off-day hole deeper into the ground by becoming frustrated at their inability and distracted by thinking about their performance last game or last stock and ignoring the current battle.

Just clear your head and look at the bigger picture. Watch your opponent and notice how many times you attempt something that in normal conditions you would avoid, or how many times you fall into their traps. Realize these things and correct the as best you can. When you've done that, you'll feel calm, focused, at peace with your off-day curse, and you'll probably end up playing better than usual, rather than having a ****ty day/tourney.

 

[3xSwords]

Believe it or not, you not being able to move your hands properly is almost certainly nerves =)

It's just experience; trust me. This happened to me all the time when I first got into the competitive scene and now it never happens at all.

But my mommy told me to never trust strangers.

Hmmmm... Maybe it was nerves, it didn't really seem like it. But if so I really need to chill because that means I'm getting too stressed in a casual environment by myself which is pretty sad. Although FoxySigma got it right when he said you only make it worse by becoming really angry.

I totally started to lose my cool. But even when I tried to calm down it didn't work, because I became too tense in my anger. This is some good advice. Thanks peoples.

 

[Gangsta_inc]

When I intend to footstool....
and get footstooled.

Probably the most horrid feeling I experience if it costs me big time. It's like someone stamped "***" on my head, and watched me plummet to my doom.

 

[Sosuke]

My friend couldn't use C-stick and just switched his controller mid-match. =P

 

[popsofctown]

i went to a tournament saturday, and after teching the downthrow perfectly in practice, i couldn't do it at all. G&W's downthrow that is, pah, if you can tech anyothers i'd like to know.

I just tried to tell myself, I can win without teching the downthrow, and tried to stay calm and focused.

 

[Mike B]

I always grats my opponent when they own and note my stupidity in a tourney match.

The more real it is, the less tension I deal with

 

[P a i n]

I hate it when I just can't win in a tourney situation.

 

[Rauzaruke]

I hate it when I just can't win in a tourney situation.

This.

You literally stole the words from my quick reply >:O

 

[smashking06]

Its all in your head. all u have to do is relax and dont really treat it as a tournament. this often works for me, because the more i am relaxed the more fun i have and the better i play.

 

[ftl]

I hate it when I just can't win in a tourney situation.

Yeah, I hate it when that happens. I mean, I can do it perfectly fine in practice, I always beat the level 1 cpu!

 

[Rejjae]

I hate facing unfamiliar matchups, but after fighting them enough they'll eventually become familiar.

 

[-Gambit-]

Listen to some calm music on my Ipod to calm my nerves down and refocus.

 

[J-Money]

practice more to understand the mechanics of every technique.

 

[DanGR]

I remember my first tourney and I completely forgot how to hug. ;_; I couldn't edgehog quickly, so I missed a bunch of edgehogs. I even suicided a couple times. What I did to get rid of it was to just time it a little differently and jump onto the ledge instead of messing up the edgehog. I had to tether-guard as well.( I use Olimar. You do it by dropping>upb>up very quickly to regain your invincibility frames)

Not much, but I just thought I'd share my experience.