I don't even understand why people still argue about this, at all. If you play against 10 people online over the course of 2 hours, chances are you will have at LEAST 5 different timings to compensate for, not to mention battle frame skipping, and inconsistent lag which random and unpredictable. If there's a person who likes to play offline and have a person randomly slap their hands while they play, or give a controller with buttons coated with soda, I'd like you to introduce them to me. Some of them may in fact be 95% the quality of offline play, which, fine, you can practice combos in that but I can also practice combos vs the CPU offline and to some extent the more simple tactics. I will learn NOTHING against an opponent online if they are only good for combo practice. If they are any more of a challenge than that, and if the netplay quality is less than acceptable, you still can't learn because you cannot apply the concepts to an acceptable level. You will more often see players use and exploit tactics that worked over a decade ago when the average player reaction time and experience was much lower.
This is why you see online players constantly claiming they invent strats and tactics, because they do work online when the other players have a disadvantage. Remember, it's rare that netplaying field is totally even. Chances are if you are feeling a solid connection, the other person is not. The only time you're going to experience a double solid connection is when you're within 30ms ping and it's played late at night with low net traffic. If you have a 1/4 second delay, and a 1/4 second to react to something, well, do the math, play someone else.
Netplay is not entirely good for overall experience, but it's good for some experience and may in fact enhance your guessing ability, but that is just guessing, and you're guessing against someone else who is also impaired. You can only learn so much from it until you must venture out into the open, or find someone locally who is willing to learn the game. When you can say "Well not always" in reference to a playing platform there's still a problem there, and granted yes, even playing offline there can be issues but that's because we are more often forced to play emulated versions of the games, and you have to take in account for controller types, bad parts, the type of TV and video signal, BUT, BUT, this also applies to online play as well. So on top of the standard issues that apply to ANY video game, anywhere, you have to take into account you aren't playing the games in absolute real time, or at least, as close to real time as they were intended to be played.
Here's my favorite example. The fact that I have lost 100% of the time to people I have played online and beaten them 100% of the time offline should be a huge red flag. Many netplayers are so use to netplay that they think it's standard. Even in the best conditions online, it can still be better.
Now, after this debate is settled in terms of math, the online players will undoubtedly pout and claim offline players are saying that online players aren't good players. Well, here's a news flash, yes, some of the online players who win lots of matches are still not good players, however, there are more than plenty who are good, and would be much better if they got to play against reasonable competition in person with no internet bridging the gap. A number of players who preached about netplay being the true source of competition changed their tunes when they started losing to poor tactics that just work better online. You guys know you've seen videos of primarily online players show up at tournaments and get smacked down because they try to use online tactics, and you know you've seen online players shine as well, so take your pick.
As someone who has enormous offline and online experience in various fighting games, I respect online players who have logged thousands of hours on fighting games and suffer through it, and persist to play, even though in the long run it's just a bad idea, because they enjoy playing and will take whatever they can get. I can't tell you how many times I've met players who told me "I can't believe how different it is to play people in person, my timing is so off." Well think about this, anybody who plays primarily offline is going to say the same thing to you about netplay, but for whatever reason, it's not cool for offline players to complain to online players about netplay. Deal with it, it's the reason why some of you win, but offline standard play is not the reason why offline players win, it's because some of those players are just fricken bad and never knew it.
In the end, yes, netplay sucks. It sucks a lot, and it's gonna suck for a long time. Don't let it get to your head if you beat a respected player a few matches, or break even because that's a format that lends its hand to no one in particular, you could be the next victim. If someone complains to you about netplay, say "I understand, Shock already explained it to me." because they aren't complaining for no reason.
