How Do You Plan to Get Good?

[STiCKYBULL3TZ]

Smash 4 has been out almost a month now and has brought in many players. Some brand new to Smash, some returning to Smash, and some just continuing with the next game in the series. With this rise in players also comes a rise in those making the transition to competitive Smash. It's a long, tough, stressful, but fun road to the top. My question to you is this...how do you plan to get there? How do you plan to train to be able to make it to the top of your city, state, region, or even country?

I've been a part of the Melee scene for only a few months but I plan to be competitive long-term in Smash 4. I finally collected all custom moves and I'm now ready to make that journey to the top. I would love to be able to place high in national tournaments but my main goal is to be known as one of the best with my character (Little Mac as of now). My plan is this...

Every week I plan to go into a character board and challenge those who are pretty active there. This will help me learn match ups against everyone. Each week I will go into a different board and challenge people there. I also am becoming active in my state's facebook group so I plan to play against them a lot. I also have a close few friends who are interested in getting really good so that'll help us push each other. Of course the last method will be going to tournaments. There I can play against some really good people so I can get the experience and the stress of a tournament level match. It'll be a tough road but I'm ready.

How will you improve?

 

[Darkzephr]

Step 1) find a practice partner
Step 2) analyze replays and grind out weaknesses
Step 3) plan out multiple strategies to vary my play style
Step 4) ???
Step 5) Profit!

 

[SwoodGrommet]

I doubt I'll ever come close to making it to competitive level, but I guess for now I should just focus on getting better in general. I'm really just spending a lot of time on For Glory, and I think I'm improving. It's my first Smash game, so I'm used to getting trashed online. So until I feel confident enough to battle people on Smashboards, I'll stick to For Glory.

I have a main, so that's half the battle I guess. I watch some youtubers who are pretty good at Smash, and there's also some streamers I find very enjoyable to watch. Ah, and the "Who WAS that" thread is also a useful place to attempt to find people who bodied me online; if I ever find them, that is

If I do find myself getting trashed, I don't leave the room until they do. I hope it's helping me learn quicker; it sure ain't helping my win ratio though

 

[STiCKYBULL3TZ]

Yeah I used to look to worry about my ratio when getting bodied by the same person over and over. But then I realized that there's no leaderboards or ranking system so there's not much to prove. Plus I realized that if I rely on my ratio too much then I'll be stuck playing with one character because I'll be scared to try someone else and lose. The chance to learn far outweighs some win/loss record that no one will see

 

[Darkzephr]

Just remember, grinding games in for glory without a focusing on a specific area to improve is the slowest way to get better. Save every replay, analyze them heavily, and use them to get better.

 

[SwoodGrommet]

Just remember, grinding games in for glory without a focusing on a specific area to improve is the slowest way to get better. Save every replay, analyze them heavily, and use them to get better.

Yeah I've finally started to remember to save my replays
Every time I look over them, my mistakes seem so obvious and I can't figure why I'd do something like that in the game. I find myself making the same mistakes in my replays, so I guess that's good in the sense that I'm aware of what I'm doing wrong, and I just need to catch myself doing it next time I'm online.

 

[Darkzephr]

You gotta build up muscle memory for reactions. Send me a PM if you want to spar. I'm totally up for putting on 99 stocks and throwing the same thing at you until you can reliably fix it.

Certain things you need another player to practice, but I found that to improve my bouncing fish accuracy I played vs a level 9 computer with the restriction that the only offensive move I could use was bouncing fish. It was annoying as hell, but my accuracy with it improved a lot. Certain things you do need a real person to practice though. Especially defensive techniques.

 

[SwoodGrommet]

You gotta build up muscle memory for reactions. Send me a PM if you want to spar. I'm totally up for putting on 99 stocks and throwing the same thing at you until you can reliably fix it.

Certain things you need another player to practice, but I found that to improve my bouncing fish accuracy I played vs a level 9 computer with the restriction that the only offensive move I could use was bouncing fish. It was annoying as hell, but my accuracy with it improved a lot. Certain things you do need a real person to practice though. Especially defensive techniques.

Sheik is definitely one of the harder match-ups, so I might like to spar with you sometime. I may drop you a pm tomorrow, getting kind of late on my end. That sounds like a pretty good technique you set up with the level 9 cpu, I should try something like that sometime. Thanks for the advice!

 

[soru]

Playing. A lot.

 

[SuaveChaser]

Playing with friends.
Learning and asking questions.
Playing online and attending any tourneys i can.

 

[sweq32]

Just finding a player that is better than you and picking up on your mistakes as you play is how I usually improve. I'm still not a good player in my eyes, but I never really cared about being the very best, anyway.

 

[Darkzephr]

Just finding a player that is better than you and picking up on your mistakes as you play is how I usually improve. I'm still not a good player in my eyes, but I never really cared about being the very best, anyway.

I dunno man, I wanna be the very best, like no one ever was.

 

[Tyril132]

My technical skills are virtually non-existent, so I think a lot of the uphill struggle for me is simply going to be maintaining the discipline needed to practice specific tech skills over and over and over again until they replace the bad habits I inherited from casual play in earlier Smash games.

Really, I'm just stoked to finally have a viable alternative to local play to start learning the game more seriously. I just wish the replay and training functions were more robust.

 

[Zero Suit Wario]

Beat up my friends and learn nothing

 

[Darkzephr]

My technical skills are virtually non-existent, so I think a lot of the uphill struggle for me is simply going to be maintaining the discipline needed to practice specific tech skills over and over and over again until they replace the bad habits I inherited from casual play in earlier Smash games.

Really, I'm just stoked to finally have a viable alternative to local play to start learning the game more seriously. I just wish the replay and training functions were more robust.

I'm pretty okay with the training options so far. but I 100% agree with the replay system. I wish there was even a time elapsed feature, or even bookmarks. And the biggest issue is the inability to rewind in replays.

 

[RespawningJesus]

I have been playing as the characters that give me the most trouble. Trying to learn them in an attempt to understand them bettter, which allows me to know the instructions and outs, and what to expect from certain characters.

When the Wii U version comes out, that is when I will play online against others from around Smashboards.

 

[Dreamy Luigi]

Simple answer but, practice.