Reflexes and memory, the puzzle

[Binx]

I was thinking about why certain people are just plain better at the game than I am and I came to the conclusion that there are a few main factors other than just tech skill and mind games that make a player stand out and become better.

1) and I beleive the most important is patience, in smash you have to know what doesnt work more than you have to know what works. You dont see Isai throwing elbows or Aniki throwing a sword plant or ken throwing a forward smash into someone who is going to hit the ground and be able to tech and retaliate.

2) Reactions not to be mistaken with reflexes. There were studies done in Korea on pro starcraft players vs amateur starcraft players studying brain waves as they both played a match against one another. In the end it was shown that the pro used a different part of his brain when playing, when certain situations came up he reacted the correct way instinctively where as the amateur player used more of the right side or creative side of his brain to fumble through solutions to his problems only to figure the right thing out seconds to late and lose the advantage and eventually the games in a horribly devistating manner.

3) Reflexes, Now I here it told that there is a max point where reflexes can get to for most people and that this "limit" is something that a person is born with. I absolutely refuse to accept this but then again I dont have slow reflexes, so it remains unproven, I do however have experience playing some Heavy DDR and I can tell you first hand that it is not memorizing the song or moving my fingers that was hardest, it was seeing the arrows and reacting correctly, however now I dont have any trouble except on select songs where I simply cannot move my fingers as fast as the arrows are going, such as max unlimited and to a lesser extent 300. I know for sure though that with practice and forcing myself to move my fingers faster I could probably beat the song repeatedly by next week or so, but I would rather devote this time towards smash.

4) Memory and tactics, now maybe these shouldnt be grouped together but I feel that they are very closely related since memory and reactions dictate tactics. In smash not being predictable is more important than making the "best move" because sooner or later they are going to catch on, in a high level smash game this will be much sooner, probably after the first maybe second time. This is where memory comes in, you need to know what you have done during the whole match if you can (i can't) and what your opponent has done for the entire match (once again, I can't) so that you can truly predict and outplay your opponent.

I think thats about enough from me for now, if anyone has anything to add to this, or qualms with my oppinion I only ask that you back it up, I expect to learn a great deal from everyones thoughts on this subject. Also I would really appreciate it if anyone has any good training advice for improving short term memory and finger speed.

Edit: For spelling and anti-4-in-the-morning-***********

 

[Hylian]

DDR isn't so much about reactions as it is about being able to recognize patterns >_>.

 

[Aiko]

I certainly agree with this. As you say the "best" move is very predictable, more so in a pro game, but then because it is predicted, it is no longer the best move. I think it would be better to say the "correct" move, since the best move is a very dynamic term and is subject to the game in hand. The correct move is the move with the higher probability of success and this is usually highly related to the risk-reward factor. Higher risk gives higher rewards but only at key moments in a game.

As for DDR, it sounds like you play on stepmania because you mentioned fingers DDR on feet is, like hylian says, all about recognising patterns and knowing which way to move your feet/body.

 

[Binx]

I meant both, but I play DDR on the playstation sometimes with a controller where you use your fingers as well (at arcades I do use my feet). I don't think that its all pattern recognition as I can usually do fairly well on songs i've never played before, but yeah I was just refferencing how hard it is to get your fingers to move faster and thats just the game that I played before smash that would force me to get quick fingers, my thumbs unfortunately arent nearly fast enough for smash in some rare cases, like if I want to SHDL with fox or something, I just cant do it, or doing jump cancled shines, with falco I can do one into a jump cancled one then full jump, I cant short hop the jump cause Im always too frantic, with fox I cant do it at all, 4 frames isnt enough time for me yet.

Thank you for the clarification aiko, you worded my thoughts very well and devled a little deeper into success rate vs reward which I think someone should right an article about, because its very very important. In higher leveled play you will often see better players use very simple cautious moves and beat their more technical opponent just because in that kind of game one mistake can cost you a stock.