The real reason Japan is better than America

[infiniteV115]

If 'learning to win' and 'learning to be good' are 2 different things, and practicing the latter results in you winning more often than practicing the former, then you haven't practiced the former properly.

 

[Zankoku]

Well, to be fair, the successful forms of "learning to win" are much more varied at lower levels, several of which can involve absolutely discarding fundamentals of play.

 

[infiniteV115]

By making the distinction between 'learning to win' and 'learning to be good', he makes it sound as if learning to be good doesn't affect your win/loss ratio. He also makes it sound like being good is more important than winning, when winning is the point of being good.

So I really have no idea what he was trying to say.

 

[SmashChu]

Watching the games, I can easily see how Ocean won. I think the first game hilights why the Japanese did so well.

You can tell ROB played very safe. He never tried to just go at M2K unless he knew he could hit. A lot of the time, he was able to counter Meta-Knight tornado. In the first game, he won because M2K tried to "cheese," him with a tornado at the top of the stage. All he had to do was hit him and won. The tornado left him open afterwards. The Japanese win by playing solid, not doing tricks (which is probably why a lot of people love Meta-Knight, He's good at the latter).

I used to play SC2 heavily so I got everything you said, and it's completely true. You can learn how to win, or how to be good. But, sadly, stage gimmicks come into play for "learning to win", not "learning to be good". When, in the case of Brinsar as to not pick on FO only, 97% of the stage becomes inaccessible due to the lava/acid rising, that's interfering int he gameplay itself, and it can turn around the outcome. That should not happen at a competitive level. I'm not saying the stage list should be cut down to just 2 or 3, but it needs to be revised because right now, due to stage gimmicks, a lot of people learnt how to win, not how to get good.

Also, again, cultural differences, differences in mindset, you cannot outrule them all and claim it was only because of the stages. Did it factor in, most surely, but it was definitively not the only factor.

Finally, the japanese are good, but not miles ahead. You guys just got outplayed, not wrecked.

Changing the stages will not solve that and leaving them the same in of itself doesn't cause a problem. It's the mindset. The US players have the mind set of doing gimmicky things. Some based on the stage and other not so much (planking). It's about leaning how to play solid, and you can do that on the other stages. Changing them will mean people will do different gimmicks.

 

[Zankoku]

The gist of it is that "learning to be good" will show much more gradual results than "learning to win" because there aren't really any shortcuts to becoming generally good at playing the game, while there are many shortcuts to winning specific situations in the game.

 

[Elessar]

If 'learning to win' and 'learning to be good' are 2 different things, and practicing the latter results in you winning more often than practicing the former, then you haven't practiced the former properly.

Not really, since by "learning to win" means you learnt how to exploit one facet of the game to win more, while "learning to be good" means you learned how to adapt mid match. So, if you learnt how to win, and try to exploit a mechanic to score more wins, yet face someone who knows how to counter that one strategy...what do you do? You didn't learn to adapt, or other strategies, just this one broken one.

Edit: Being good affects your winning ratio, just as learning to win does. The difference appears in what you can resort to, or how you react when your strategy is countered. The person who learnt to win might not have solid basics, while the one who learned the game, a.k.a., to be good, has an array of backup strategies to rest to if countered.

 

[DMG]

Wario doesn't have the power to win a national by himself (at least at this point in the metagame). Especially if you cut down the stage list, he won't have the ability to beat Dedede/Marth with CP's. Soon as your bracket looks like Atomsk, Mikehaze, etc it's basically over lol.

Also, if we instill a higher timer and a ground time rule, then yeah there's no way he's gonna win vs certain bad MU's.

SOOOOO, nope. Unless things stay the way they are, there shouldn't even be a realistic shot at it happening. He's a solid character as a second or a main backed up with secondaries, but solo Wario is rough to pull off and most Wario mains have come up with secondaries to use as well (even Fiction looked into IC's during his tenure)

 

[Dark.Pch]

Wario doesn't have the power to win a national by himself (at least at this point in the metagame). Especially if you cut down the stage list, he won't have the ability to beat Dedede/Marth with CP's. Soon as your bracket looks like Atomsk, Mikehaze, etc it's basically over lol.

Also, if we instill a higher timer and a ground time rule, then yeah there's no way he's gonna win vs certain bad MU's.

Why not stop worrying so much about weakness and what you can't do and work on what you can do. This is one of the reasons USA meta game is flawed and boring as hell.

 

[infiniteV115]

I guess it was just awkward wording that threw me off, but I see what you mean. However, you haven't really said anything that shows that certain stages are only suitable for 'learning to win' and not 'learning to be good'.

In fact I haven't really heard any good arguments about why we should shrink our stagelist except for, in a nutshell, "Japan is better and they have a smaller stagelist, therefore the smaller stagelist makes them better. So we should make our stagelist smaller so we can be better"

 

[Elessar]

Why not stop worrying so much about weakness and what you can't do and work on what you can do. This is one of the reasons USA meta game is flawed and boring as hell.

/agree

Honestly, until 2 weeks ago, according to US metagame ROB could not beat MK...yet look at Ocean.

I think that that's actually what has to change, the mentality of "nope, not possible".

Edit: Well, my reason for changing some stages, not all, would be that they affect gameplay TOO much. Point in case, Brinstar.

 

[Zankoku]

I also disagree with radically altering rules and stages to "get better fast". If you want to get better at the game, then stop worrying so much about what ruleset supposedly makes you improve faster and just get better at the game.

 

[DMG]

I mean what's a better strategy vs Dedede than getting the lead and running circles?

YOU WANT ME TO APPROACH THAT CHARACTER WITH STUB AND FLUB?

Hell that MU could be fun if he didn't get ****ed over for getting grabbed, and if Dedede didn't have a grab range the size of a Beluga Whale.

Lol blah blah blah. Just telling you the truth. Wario's a hard character to solo with, and will get harder to do so if the stage list shrinks and something like a ground time rule/additional timer gets added. That's just how it will be.

 

[infiniteV115]

What bugs me is that people think it's fine to get rid of RC and Brinstar, 2 stages that very well fit the playstyle of characters like G&W, Wario and MK and are arguably the best stages for them, but they're okay with narrowing the stagelist down to just FD BF SV which are arguably the best stages for Falco, ICs, Diddy and (to a lesser extent) Snake.

 

[Elessar]

There is no 100% neutral stage, true, but the idea is not (at least not my idea) to ban those stages due to advantages they offer character X or Y, but because they're are gimmicky and meddle into the gameplay in a considerable manner.

For instance, RC, while fun and all, turns Brawl from a fighting game into a platformer hybrid. You can say that that's what gives Smash over all it's unique flavour, and it's true, but so does Pictochat and it's banned.

 

[Dark.Pch]

I mean what's a better strategy vs Dedede than getting the lead and running circles?

YOU WANT ME TO APPROACH THAT CHARACTER WITH STUB AND FLUB?

Hell that MU could be fun if he didn't get ****ed over for getting grabbed, and if Dedede didn't have a grab range the size of a Beluga Whale.

Lol blah blah blah. Just telling you the truth. Wario's a hard character to solo with, and will get harder to do so if the stage list shrinks and something like a ground time rule/additional timer gets added. That's just how it will be.

That same thing applied to ocean vs M2K. You really think this dude was here worring "oh ****, I am off stage, I am **** since I have lil to no options making it back." No worry about that is not gonna get you the win or make the match easier. When you orry to much about things your mind is not focus, you won't play your best. You will not focus alot on your strengths. That is what gets you through tuff match ups. Not saying that you can't do this and that. You already completed step one on knowing your flaws. Now why not focus on your strengths to deal with hard match ups. That was ocean did.

His mind was just focus on being creative with ROB and playing out the box, cause that was the only way he was gonna win. Not sitting there going on about how he can't do this and that against m2k. All this time people do bring stuff like this up can be used on actually doing something about it. Remember the easy rode does not always make you the better player or make you better.

Japan mentality is another thing that makes them better then the USA.

 

[Elessar]

Dark Peach is correct. Maybe rather than focusing all the time over what you cannot do, you should be focusing on what you can do. Again, up to two weeks ago, a ROB beating an MK was unthinkable, no matter the skill of the player (even more so M2K). Ocean rolled in and showed it is possible, not because he's on another level, but simply because the was he (or they) see and focus on the game is different and that gives them a certain edge.

 

[kailo34ce]

not to mention those fine *** little japanese girls

but seriously guys do you know what a fluke is?

 

[sneakytako]

It feels like a fundametal difference of what the US and Japan defines competitve smash is affecting people's opinion on this matter.

In Japan, they have a resolute attitude toward stages that the stage should affect gameplay as little as possible. Any advantages a character can have on a specific stage is attributed toward the character, not the stage. An example would be IC's and their easy MU on FD vs BF/SV. They would attribute any MU being difficult on FD as a game balance issue with IC's chaingrab rather than FD's lack of platforms.

In the US, not only is it acceptable for the stage to affect the MU, it seems that the stages are preceived as essential balancing agents to affect gameplay. In the above example, people would argue that moving stages are not only acceptable but necessary to balance IC's chaingrab.

I would love to see more people move toward that Japanese mindset because it feels more competitive, but it's probably a battle where you can't convince everyone imo.

 

[Elessar]

I would love to see more people move toward that Japanese mindset because it feels more competitive, but it's probably a battle where you can't convince everyone imo.

Amen to both points.

Edit: Also, you can't call it a fluke out of a 1 set sample, even more so considering that m2k won the second match only due to timing ocean out. And even then, not for stack difference, but dmg%. To call it a fluke you would need more convincing evidence than that.

 

[Ruuku]

It's gonna be interesting when people realize that this isn't a mindset that only defines Japanese Brawl. Also these days people seem to talk about match ups like they're all 10-0 or 5-5 and accordingly switch characters.

 

[sneakytako]

It's gonna be interesting when people realize that this isn't a mindset that only defines Japanese Brawl. Also these days people seem to talk about match ups like they're all 10-0 or 5-5 and accordingly switch characters.

I would love to hear what you define as Japanese brawl.

 

[Dr. Tuen]

I also disagree with radically altering rules and stages to "get better fast". If you want to get better at the game, then stop worrying so much about what ruleset supposedly makes you improve faster and just get better at the game.

The rule change would be good for convincing people to host events in this fashion. People can dedicate time to practicing on the big 3, but that doesn't necessarily mean that people will continue that line of though in tournament. There need to be points at which you're forced to experienced a reduced stage list in an event environment, to help us deal with nerves.

Technically, there don't need to be any wide sweeping rule changes for any of this to occur. It would just help a lot. A lot of players won't understand WHY it helps, much like students don't fully understand why teachers structure the classes the way they do. But if we guide the community through these decision, we could help the everybody get better.

 

[Browny]

Disregard stages, acquire skill. It all makes sense.

Nothing changes the fact that for almost 4 years, you guys were 100% dead certain that your ruleset was the best out there. Then in the space of 3 sets, suddenly its been wrong.

Tell me, what would have happened, if nairo clutched and took 1st with japan 2nd and 3rd? Bet my *** you guys would be sticking with your current ruleset. THEY BEAT YOU BECAUSE THEY ARE BETTER THAN YOU. Theres no other reason. How they got to that point, is because they play the game, instead of spending ungodly amounts of time bickering about crap like tier lists, matchups and trash talking other states.

 

[Elessar]

Browny, you won the thread and a cookie. Please take it along with the blue ribbon and the golden star.

 

[JTsm]

I didn't troll/play with him. Either no practice or it's how my mind wanted to play Snake.

Play more Snake!!

 

[Cassio]

Nothing changes the fact that for almost 4 years, you guys were 100% dead certain that your ruleset was the best out there. Then in the space of 3 sets, suddenly its been wrong.

This is incorrect. The ruleset is a compromise where no one got what they wanted.

The reason people are so quick to jump ship is because many regions, most of them the stronger ones, have wanted a conservative stagelist all along.

 

[Browny]

I was referring to the ruleset in general compared to other nations. No one would have ever adopted Japan's ruleset like... EVER. I've hanged around here a fair bit, I dont think I've ever seen one person advocate a 3-stage ruleset.

And of course, USA never cares what Europe says about pretty much anything lol.

 

[DMG]

Most regions were in favor of more stages actually. EC was the only region that solidly wanted a more conservative list. Year ago if you asked every region to play on only 3-6 stages, they would have been the only ones to take that up besides maybe Cali.

Even then as Browny pointed out, not many people said to go super conservative mode or truly thought we should go FD BF SV only. Getting rid of Brinstar and RC, THAT was a universally accepted idea. But going much further was not.


Midwest: Super liberal in some areas, more "central" in others

EC: Most conservative region

West Coast: Cali had a mix, other regions were a bit more liberal (if you count Northwest in all of that)

Texas + Friends: Mix

 

[AllyKnight]

ugh that kinda makes my body cringe. I like u Ally as a smasher but that shows alot of weakness. Why would u not train for the biggest tourney of the year in the world.

That is either alot of cockyness or foolishness.
Unless u had some health issues and couldn't then I would understand.

In anything in life you should always prepare.
I'm salty about dubs cuz I tried to train with Fow but he refused. Even friday he wouldn't practice and look what happened. Was so frustrating. I wanted to teach him team spacing but he acted like he knew everything but when it came time to play his was off.

Anyways always do yer best to prepare for everything in life.

I couldn't, was at my gf's with no brawl.

 

[Xubble]

^ Legit reason to not practice.

Honestly, I think we should be going back to basics in order to better ourselves. It's not like we play solely on gimmicks and tricks, but (correct me if I'm wrong) if Ocean beat M2K just through patience and safety, we must not have a very good understanding of risks vs. reward.

 

[Steam]

Ocean beat m2k because m2k kept getting naired

 

[Xubble]

So either M2K wasn't playing as safely as he could have been, or Ocean WAS playing safely. Either way, Ocean got more opportune moments to reap the rewards of nair with very little risks. I'd chalk that up as playing safely.

 

[theunabletable]

I just found this post now, and I agree with it completely, Seibrik.

I made a post about this recently on facebook actually.

They play on stages with no gimmicks, they're forced to get good at the things that apply to EVERY aspect of the game. We play on stages where gimmicks that are exclusive to a SINGLE stage are important to having a chance at winning, so our skill at the general aspects that apply everywhere is diluted, because we have to learn all these skills that apply in just one place.

It's simple evolution/natural selection.

literally if they had any random excuse for why japan won, they would find it, even something like how they have less stages, even tho like 80% of matches happen on bf or sv

this is a misconception, though.

Yeah, most matches happen on BF or SV, even when we play against them. But how much skill do we lose by HAVING to learn gimmicks that apply in a single situation, on a single stage, just to be prepared in 1/3rd of the games when we get counterpicked?

Naturally, we'll end up worse on BF, or SV, (and all around worse, since the skills you learn on those stages apply more directly to every other facet of the game than any other stages).

it's all our fault


Actually it's kinda cool to see this happening, 'cause Apex was a direct example of what I'd been posting about constantly in the stage forums a few months ago haha

Disregard stages, acquire skill. It all makes sense.

Nothing changes the fact that for almost 4 years, you guys were 100% dead certain that your ruleset was the best out there. Then in the space of 3 sets, suddenly its been wrong.

Tell me, what would have happened, if nairo clutched and took 1st with japan 2nd and 3rd? Bet my *** you guys would be sticking with your current ruleset. THEY BEAT YOU BECAUSE THEY ARE BETTER THAN YOU. Theres no other reason. How they got to that point, is because they play the game, instead of spending ungodly amounts of time bickering about crap like tier lists, matchups and trash talking other states.

this toooooo

we gain practically nothing by arguing about tier lists or matchups or make matchup charts, they do almost nothing to help our gameplay, but they can do a lot to distract us and be a detriment to our gameplay.

 

[Steam]

So either M2K wasn't playing as safely as he could have been, or Ocean WAS playing safely. Either way, Ocean got more opportune moments to reap the rewards of nair with very little risks. I'd chalk that up as playing safely.

A lot of the time m2k was being dumb. Mk pretty much has no excuse to ever get hit by rob's Nair.

 

[DMG]

You can get put into spots where Nair is reasonable to hit with, but that's usually after ROB knocks MK upwards. If MK knocks ROB upwards himself like shuttle loop or grab or whatever, and ROB Nairs as he falls since that's the best move to cover him, that's a "please don't get hit by Nair" moment.

 

[Elessar]

I know what you mean, but I'm not trying to comfort people by saying "just give it your best and you'll win!" because it's a lie. What I mean is that people quitting the game or switching mains stagnates the metagame and thus, it just reinforces the OPness of MK. Again, he can be beaten (possibly not by the entire cast), but for that you need to be a great player, and that takes a lot more dedication and commitment to the game than most people are willing or capable of giving it.

Plus, Verm mains freaking ganon and he hasn't given up, but keeps on going and has done amazing things with the character, just like San. They stuck to their character even though people said it's impossible and they now lead the metagame. That's what the entire cast needs, passion and commitment, and that's probably the only thing the Japanese have on top of the US, hence why they haven't banned MK.

But in the US? It is necessary imho.

I appreciate the mention, and I wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment.

Japan won because of passion for their characters. Ocean is passionate about ROB--he plays nothing but, and look where it got him as opposed to other ROBs who defect in hard MUs. You have to be passionate about your character. In my opinion, you've got to want to prove something to yourself more than others, and I think Japan has that mentality in a much larger way than the US does. The US has an all-or-nothing mentality, and we see where that's landed us on the shoulders of giants. If someone defects from their character, they're doing themselves a disservice in the grand scope of things. If someone defects from their character and isn't placing top 3, then they're doing nothing but needlessly dividing their focus for the sake of validation.

This was said in another thread and, again, I think it's the real factor at play.

 

[Yikarur]

USA is so weak :/

dark pchs Posts are exceptional really good.

 

[Dark.Pch]

I still can't seem to understand this " They play on stages with no gimmicks, they're forced to get good at the things that apply to EVERY aspect of the game. We play on stages where gimmicks that are exclusive to a SINGLE stage are important to having a chance at winning, so our skill at the general aspects that apply everywhere is diluted, because we have to learn all these skills that apply in just one place." Post.

Isnt learning other stages and counterpicking an important strat in the game? it's something one must learn to do to have options and pull off tuff match up wins. Been this was since melee. So people are blaming an important tactic in smash as the reason they lost?

If you really think about it, the USA actually had the advantage over the japanese. Why?

- Japanese really don't focus on the counterpick stages
- USA plays on them alot.
- USA are just as use to starters as the japanese, it is the first stage we start on. And half the time the last stage we finish in a set.
- Japanese don't play as foul as the USA in terms of camping all day and timing people out. (which according to you guys, is legit and gets the job done)

So if you really think about it, We actually have the advantage. Yet we lost to them at their game, brought it to ours and still lost. So people think if we get rid of these stages, we would be better off and learn to get better? News flash, you been had that option. You just choose not to give a damm cause you just focuos at getting the win at all cost. You took the easy road out. There was no excuse to actually explore other possibilities and take your game to another level. You cause have learned to be more versitale and still you your counter stages and do some serious damage with what you learned/discovered.

With counters on or not, you could have learned to push yourself and think outside the box. But choose not to, cause you relyed on cheap tatics to win and thought that is all you needed. Then when it all fails, you blame it on something as silly as stages. Take responsibility for your actions. Quit making excuses. Thats all the USA does. It never gets old.

- The stages is the reason we lost
- M2k kept getting naired when Meta knight should not be getting hit with that move at all lololololol.
- I did not practice
- I did not camp hard enough

Does the USA actually listen to themselves? I put my life on the line that if the USA was to win, I not hear this. USA would think they are hawt ****. And would never think of actually stepping their game up. Now that they got whooped, USA wants to step their game up and have a legit discussion? Should all this have not been done with the BBR years before? Should metagames not been worked on and advancing? What has been going on this whole time. worrying about one character when there are more important issues to be dealt with?

I have said many times before that this game is not worth playing for moneny. And what I have read and posted in this thread is excatly why. Don't blame stages, don't make johns. Admit you got outplayed. Thats what a true player is and how one gets better. Instead I am hearing excuses and live in a salty country.

 

[Juushichi]

Get **** on my Dark Peach. Holy ****ing ****.

 

[PMC66]

I just think M2K lost because he wasn't comfortable in the matchup i mean he lost after a down throw then tried to go for an inapropreite read and got N-aired that end of the game, is not what someone who knows the ROB matchup would do an empty short hop in N-air range. That and he fought Ocean exactly like how he fought Brood only difference is the battles were on FD and smashville. Though Nietono beating almost everyone I can't really say anything other than he just purely and simply out played everyone, I mean it's not like US lost to last in Japan the guys at least 3rd and Otori's in top 10 as well i think from what i've heard he's Japan's best MK. So why's everyone so shocked to Loose to good players?