Reinventing My Game Plan...

[GamerBlake90]

But before I do, I have to actually decide on the approach I'm taking. This thread is based on an enlightening talk I had with somebody not too long ago.

I don't know how many people actually follow what I do, but if you're familiar with my exploits, you know that I'm the type of player who uses many characters. But have you ever wondered about my reasons for doing so?

At first, it was for a bit of soul-searching to discover who my best character would be. For months now, it has been known that Sonya is my best character, followed closely by Raiden. And still, I continued to learn and play multiple characters...because I felt that by using the characters, I could achieve a better understanding of how they work and feel out their holes for when I fought against those characters.

Another reason is to cover match-ups of all varieties. Or if I'm just feeling out of it with a character, I can whip out another one and suddenly do much better. Of course, once the opponent develops an understanding of my tactics with the new character, it starts to become an uphill battle for victory and I find myself switching again.

Of all the characters in the game, the one to achieve the greatest amount of my effort and dedication is Sonya. I want to be known as a legend among the Sonya legends, and not just through online conquests. As we all know, the offline tournaments are where it's all at. To that end, I've considered holding off on playing other characters so as to concentrate solely on Sonya, while perhaps devoting effort to Raiden as a secondary for match-ups where Sonya falls short.

As a player who uses many characters, I realize how difficult it is to play them all at a high level. As you're forced to readjust your familiarity and synergy with the controls of each character, you can start to lose that with other characters when you don't play them for a while. This can hurt even your performance level with your best character. It's why many have recommended that you stick with one, two, or maybe three characters if you intend on being serious about your chances at winning.

Yet at the same time...part of the reason many people enjoy seeing me play so much is because of the ability to play with many characters. I guess this trend comes from me being a combo artist, plus I love to entertain the public however I can and not bore them with seeing the same character over and over (although I never get bored playing only as Sonya, but I'm talking about the viewpoints of other people).

Not that I don't enjoy doing what I do, because I absolutely love anything that supports Mortal Kombat...but I'm the kind of player who plays to win, and this means exploiting my best options. There are upsides and downsides about how many characters a player can use. You get an understanding of the roster if you use so many of them, but using only a few makes it so you don't lose synergy with the characters you main.

Additionally, I guess I have the fear of being labeled as a player who can only win because of one character, or because that said character is broken. Obviously Sonya and Raiden are among those who received this unwarranted scrutiny. People never seem to acknowledge the skill of the players; it's all about the characters and how "broken" they are. But let's not get into that here...it's not what this thread is about and I don't want it getting derailed with debates.

I guess the questions I'm trying to ask are...

Does simply using the characters help you to understand them better, or does the knowledge come from actually battling against them?

Is it better to concentrate on one or two characters, or does it help to learn a large amount of the roster?

If faced with a bad match-up for your character, should you try to learn the options you have for that match-up, or cast aside your faith and resort to counter-picking?

I want to hear your reasoning, guys. Let me know what your advice is.

 

[Red X]

If I am very good on every character I would main Shang Tsung

Main what you favor the most and enjoy. To me counter picking is a sign of weakness and disloyal to a character xD. Learn her bad match up then patch it up and show the world what a legend is capable of...

Sorry being random now

 

[xenogorgeous]

Fact : gameplay wise, it's impossible to enjoy and like, at the same level, every single character in the game ... and regarding "muscle memory" , you will always give preference for some commands inputs than others.

 

[Espio]

You can learn a character from either playing them, fighting them or both.

Yes it is better to concentrate on 1 or 2 characters, I got immediately better with both of my mains when I did that, you can focus on the little things you miss when you play 13 characters as I used to do.

Everyone's obsessed with counterpicking nowadays...if a match up isn't even or in your favor, there's the strange notion that it MUST be counterpicked (and people sometimes counterpick even matches).

You should learn match ups, figure out ways to make them winnable instead of refusing to grind out matches, it will make you a better player and get you to dig deep in exploration of your character. Also, think of it this way, if your main is your best character, why would you go to your second or third best option instead of figuring out what needs to be done to outplay your opponent?

 

[SunnyD]

You learn matchups better by playing as them, but dont go full out and main them. Just learn their Bnb's and basic tactics. Then you have some idea of what the opponent is looking for in a match combo wise...

But yes, you should narrow down the characters you play to a maximum of three.

Im also going to agree with Espio872 that its a pain in the ass to get counterpicked... even in casuals people are doing it. Casuals are WHERE you learn bad matchups for christ's sake, where its okay to lose in a hard matchup so that you can learn to a become a better player overall.

 

[GamerBlake90]

I wouldn't exactly call counter-picking a sign of weakness. If you're in a tourney fight and you're faced with an unfamiliar match-up for your character, wouldn't you have a choice but to switch? You shouldn't ever walk into a match-up blind.

The MLG event from two months ago involved a lot of counter-picking because...well, in tournaments like that, it's just how it goes, right? The whole "play to win it all" thing? In casuals, though, yes...it becomes annoying.

 

[CamRac]

I wouldn't exactly call counter-picking a sign of weakness. If you're in a tourney fight and you're faced with an unfamiliar match-up for your character, wouldn't you have a choice but to switch? You shouldn't ever walk into a match-up blind.

The MLG event from two months ago involved a lot of counter-picking because...well, in tournaments like that, it's just how it goes, right? The whole "play to win it all" thing? In casuals, though, yes...it becomes annoying.

That's not entirely true. Typically, the older a game gets, the less counter-picky it becomes. Even when a game is a broken piece of shit, the loyalists will eventually all migrate to usable characters/teams and stick to them, much to the dismay of a longtime spectator.

Super Turbo is probably the best example of what effect time has on the metagame of a fairly balanced game. Does it have whack ass shenanigans? YES. However, people became character loyalists over time. On top of that, new developments are made to the metagame all the time. For instance, O.Hawk is now viable at the absolute highest level of play. It's cray, dawg.

Point is, MK9 is a baby, relatively speaking. Let it mature and learn your favorite 1-2 characters inside and out, bringing new tech to the table as often as you can. If the game is truly deep enough and balanced well enough, then who knows? We might see Sheeva as top tier 5 years from now.

EDIT: I do realize I just compared MK9 to a proven classic, but bear with me. My point is that we don't really know the full potential of the game yet, and counterpicking does not happen in the frequency it does for MK9 at tournaments for other games. Sure, there are counterpicks going on Street Fighter, but it isn't nearly as rampant as MK9. Hopefully this trend will die down soon.

 

[Espio]

You learn matchups better by playing as them, but dont go full out and main them. Just learn their Bnb's and basic tactics. Then you have some idea of what the opponent is looking for in a match combo wise...

But yes, you should narrow down the characters you play to a maximum of three.

Im also going to agree with Espio that its a counterpicking is a pain in the ass to geet counterpicked, even in casuals people are doing it. Casuals are WHERE you learn bad matchups for christ's sake, where its okay to lose in a hard matchup so that you can learn to a become a better player overall.

The funny thing is people have been doing this to me lately and it really makes me not want to play these people..I love grinding out bad matches and figuring them out, but when it gets to the point that people are waiting on me to pick so that they can counter it's just sad and I don't honestly wish to play them anymore.

It's casuals, if it was a tournament it would make sense, but counterpicking in casuals is absolutely stupid.

I wouldn't exactly call counter-picking a sign of weakness. If you're in a tourney fight and you're faced with an unfamiliar match-up for your character, wouldn't you have a choice but to switch? You shouldn't ever walk into a match-up blind.

The MLG event from two months ago involved a lot of counter-picking because...well, in tournaments like that, it's just how it goes, right? The whole "play to win it all" thing? In casuals, though, yes...it becomes annoying.

We've also seen an evolution since those two months though Blake. CD jr's going all Jax, REO going all Kabal, Tom going all Sub-Zero, 16Bit has always gone all Kitana, Slips going all Scorpion.

All of these people perform well using one character, I mean of course play to win and all that jazz, but it's not a necessity to win at high level as many of these players have shown.

 

[Squeaker101]

Just main Liu. He's around B+ or A tier.


Joking aside, I agree with Espio, SunnyD, and CamRac. Learn the character to a certain extent. I think the thing that would help most people out is knowing their opponents options (I myself need to do this) As for counterpicking, I agree with CamRac strongly.

I think I just stated my opinion mostly, but I just woke up, I'll see if I can think of anything else. I just came here cause it was Blake's post, and Espio was the last guy who commented. SunnyD was a bonus.

 

[Grolarbears]

I'm glad you mentioned this, and I'm glad it has been bumped to see it, because CamRac and I talk about this stuff all the time. We're being into the philosophy to it all.

Firstly, I know you're set in a different position than me because you stream so much, so you feel like you should use other characters to entertain people, which is understandable. That is your stream and it is your choice whether your stream is intended more for the entertainment of others or more for leveling up your mains. As for me personally, if I had a stream I may very occasionally play other characters, but most people know I would play Noob almost all of the time.

Secondly, playing other characters will help you understand the mentality of their gameplan and what their strings look like, but you can find that out just by going in the lab, working those strings and reading frame data/strings gaps in the forums, so you can understand where holes are. At the end of the day, playing your main against those match ups is going to give you the most significant match up experience because that is SPECIFICALLY match up experience between your main and the said character. You see the tools you can use efficiently against that character with your main.

Thirdly, about the counterpicking, my ideology is that if everyone counterpicks certain match ups, we'll never discover if certain match ups will change over time. One day when Noob is play at the highest level against a Kabal, we might see that is not a 7-3 (or an 8-2 as REO has said), but if no one pushes through that match up and tries to understand it at its highest level, Noob stays "bottom 2". Just trying to relate it to my situation. Same thing with Smoke, you've seen me suggest it may be a 5-5, and people may look at me funny, but I don't give a shit. No one plays the match up like I do.

In that same context, I feel in a tournament setting, Blake, that if you were given the option to counterpick, you would still feel less comfortable with Raiden than you would Sonya, and Sonya would still be your best chance at winning it, even if the numbers are significantly different. I'll cut it short so you don't have a novel to read, but frankly I feel quite adamant about this. You may disagree, which is fair, but I think you shouldn't worry about what other people think of you playing one character only or that character itself. I've heard people who are ignorant call Noob ridiculous to me. You think just because we are closer and closer to the highest level that there still aren't ignorant people? Kenshi got the same outcries at one point. So did several characters in this game.

You're here to play the game and have fun. You are here to compete at your best with your main character. Those two things go hand in hand for competitive players like several of us here.

P.S. Don't worry so much.

 

[NKZero]

Well what I do is similar to what PL used to do. I get familiar with much of the cast and try to learn them inside out so that I know how to fight them. Plus it's fun taking a break from familiar practice. However some characters are too boring for me to even try to attempt to understand so...

For actual play you are right. 2 or 3 max. I play with 5 so that is a bit of a problem. Sometimes I find myself trying to input something for another character . I just love too many though. That is my ultimate weakness. I guess in tourney play though I would only feel comfortable whipping out 3 at max, maybe Nightwolf if I am desperate and need to shock opponents since it is unlikely they will know Sektor as well as Sub, Cage or Sektor. Plus I'm playing Raiden coz I love him .