Just Curious, how long did it took you to get "good"?

[GIJojo]

what I mean by "good" is by being good to a point that you can play against other people without getting 4 stocked in a regular basis.

Mainly because I have been trying to get into melee for about a month and its been quite a journey, I can be able to do all of the usual stuff (L canceling/short hopping/wavedash/dance dashing) in training mode but whenever I go to friendlies I find myself freezing and being unable to perform the things I have learned which results me in getting shine'd to death by foxes and falcos alike.

and that is another thing, everything feels too fast for me to react, the amount of pressure a fox player can apply to me just feels insane and I often roll away out of pure fear (which of course I get punished for it).

I understand that a month is hardly enough time given that this game is fairly old but it feels really discouraging knowing that I will always be years behind against other players in terms of experience.


I'm just not sure if I can handle a full year of getting bodied just to get "good"

 

[Gいたん]

Stay dedicated. Its a very hard game. It sounds like you worry too much about being good instead of having fun. Just enjoy the game and your time spent with it and in no time you will get better, as long as youre practicing efficient techniques. I got 4 stocked just like you for months before i started making local upsets. Mindset is important.

It took me about 5-6 months of staying on the regular grind, practicing the basics and getting my movement and tech chasing as fast as possible before i started upsetting local pr players in tournament. The more you play, the more you get accustomed to the speed of the game and how fast you have to think about things while playing. Playing against people definitely accelerates your rate of growth, too. You could get better faster than that, honestly, everyone's different.

When it comes to feeling extremely pressured, learn your character's out of shield options and master them, and the moments to use them. Like for example i play Sheik, and when fox does his shine dair/nair pressure on my shield i can do my own Nair out of shield after the shine, because there's a window where fox has to short hop again to throw out another arial and is vulnerable. Watch videos, study a lot, and ask a lot of questions if there are people around you that are better than you. There's a ton to learn, but the more you learn, practice, and apply, the better you get.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

also, just stay with the basics.

 

[FINNTHEGREAT]

I play Smash 4, but with any game you want to master, it will take a while. For example, Armada, Hbox, M2K, Mang0, and PPMD were never gods to start with, but with hard work and dedication, they became the most powerful players in the modern metagame. Plus some of the technical stuff like wave dashing don't have to be necessities, as Ken Hoang in the old days was dominating the MLG melee circuit with an aggressive play style and did not know a lot of technical things. In order to become a smarter and better player, practice a lot at home with the CPU's, watch videos on combos/technical play. and study the matchups. When practicing, find a main that suits you, as there are plenty of characters that have an even matchup to fox or falco. It may seem like a lot but when I did this method in Smash 4, I became a solid Zero Suit Samus and Captain Falcon player after 2 years of practice. I hope that my advice will help you! Just remember to have fun and work hard!

PS: For further inspiration, watch this indie documentary about competitive melee.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jX9hbbA-WP4

 

[tsmfoxmaster]

It took me 6 months to get down basic movement and L cancelling with Fox I’m actually decent but I’m not “Good” at Melee yet. Got a long way to go before I win a Major tournament! But everyone can do it man. Just keep grinding and analyze your own play. Watch Top players play your character. I main Fox so I watch a lot of Leffen and Armada cause they are so good with Fox!

 

[Deleted member]

Well, I am a 56-year-old female smasher who has been playing Melee since 2005 but I'm never entering competitive play. I just aim to sequester myself from the casual crowd. It wasn't until Brawl came out that I started getting into advanced tech and have worked on them ever since. For example, s are my secondary fighters and their grab game is what caught my attention. I've had to practice wobbling/chain-grabs with them with the time slowed down.

To be honest, I play Brawl and Smash 4 more than Melee nowadays due to their slower pacing I've gotten used to.

Now, y'all can peruse guides and watch as many matchup videos as you want but it's your determination and attitude that is the leading factor to improvement. So long as you don't give a damn at all about losing often competitive play is for you.

Sayonara

 

[iAmMatt]

It took me roughly 10 months to get good, but I've seen people do it in two. One player in my local scene joined a couple months ago, and he wasn't good at all. He constantly got 0-2'd in bracket. He disappeared for about a month and came back with a slew of techniques and a thorough understanding of neutral, but he still wasn't good. He came to tournaments every chance he got for the next month, learned his opponents' habits and now he's easily one of the best players at our local. I can't say exactly what he did for that one month hiatus, but I'm guessing he just grinded (ground?) for hours a day until he thought he was ready to return. I played for roughly three hours a day five days a week for 10 months, and I was able to get good. He must've invested a lot more hours in a much shorter time frame than I did, because he's way better than me now. The only way to get good is to grind and play against real people. It doesn't matter if you play against 20XX bots, they're still bots and are easily exploitable. Find someone who you can adapt to and vice versa. Do what Cobra did, spend a month of your time grinding your ass off, then once you have a good handle on tech skill and neutral, begin going to tournaments and adapting to the people there. Recognize habits and learn to exploit them and you'll have no problems

 

[R3D3MON]

Analyze your own and other people's gameplay. Learn to go in-depth on specific situations and analyze every player's options in any given match. This will slow down Melee's gameplay to the point you can understand what is happening.

Afterwards try to recreate the situation with 20xx or with a human sparring partner (like iAmMatt said).

Melee is a hard game but it is very rewarding game also. Improvement will take time but keep persevering and you will surely see improvement. Good Luck and HAVE FUN!

 

[KirinKQP]

It took me 3 months to get a good understanding of the neutral game and to get comfortable with moving how I want to around stages. Because Jigglypuff doesn't have too much tech skill that I need to practice, I grinded movement on all stages, combos against level 1 CPUs, L-cancel timings with and without hitlag, etc. daily. Unlike someone like Fox, I didn't have to master much tech in order to start learning what to do at the right time. At my first couple of tournaments, I was always, always playing. If I completed my pools matches early, I would go find someone and play friendlies until the bracket was made. If I lost in pools I wouldn't stick around, I'd just go play friendlies with someone who also lost and mess around with them while the brackets go on; I rarely watch the grand finalists play.

I'm not too far from winning my first local tournament (I think). I consistently make it into bracket and am improving fast. I also take a lot of notes from guides for Jigglypuff on Discord and Alex's Puff Stuff. I have this small black notebook that I carry around to events and write Jigglypuff's frame data on and percents which certain moves knockdown on all the high and top tiers.

You get used to getting your a** handed to you at first. After a decent portion of grinding out movement, you start to cut off bad habits that get you heavily punished which results in you keeping more stocks and have a better understanding as to what moves you should not use. Over time, you learn combos work against the different weight classes and have an idea as to what you have to do to win.

 

[Bones0]

I think Melee's at the point where newer players should start to think of it more like traditional sports in terms of rate of improvement. No kid playing tee ball ever gets discouraged that the pros would destroy him in a pick up game. They've been playing for decades and have put in the hours, of course the kid doesn't stand a chance (even if we ignore the physical limitations). The only difference between Melee and baseball in this regard is that Melee players are all lumped into the same competition. While tournaments may not feel "fair" if you're going up against experienced players, I think you should just take away what you can from playing better players, and base your improvement on the people around your level right now. It doesn't matter if you're top 2 in the world or going 2 and out at your local. There's always going to be someone you can consider a rival to push you to improve.

Studies have shown that humans are able to enter a flow state when they are taking on a challenge that is difficult, but within reach. This flow state is typically what most people would consider the fun/exhilarating part about competing and playing Melee, so it's what you should aim for. If your opponent is 3-4 stocking you every time, the challenge becomes too much to enter a proper flow state, so you won't have fun, will get discouraged, and won't learn anything anyway. If you are 3-4 stocking your opponent every time, you'll get bored and won't learn anything. I think the experience of getting bodied by pros can be very valuable in small sample sizes, especially if you have a player that's willing to give you general advice about what to focus on improving.

In general, I'd say about 70-80% of your play time should be against someone within ~1 stock of your skill range. Seek out these people to practice against, and focus on one-upping each other so you both improve. When you get the mental fortitude to play someone much better or worse, take what you can out of the experience without being too hard on yourself or letting your ego inflate. If you notice yourself being frustrated/emo, seek out those weaker players who can put things into perspective for you. Similarly, if you start feeling yourself and getting cocky, play a better player for a few games to get a reality check; that will keep you grinding and improving instead of getting lazy just because you had your friend's number the past few sessions.

 

[Milky2Milk]

I never did get good



JK
Just practise techskill, reads, the neutral game and the punish game.
I am sure you will get good.