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Guide Tips on becoming a better player: Part 1 - How losing helps you get better

SPECTRELIGHT

SPECTRELIGHT

F, D, F + HP
chessmaster said:
imo that is a bunch of nonsense. losing only hurts your confidence and turns you off from the game. what you need to say is try to find someone on your skill level. that way you and your friend/xbox live buddy are both learning and you're not just losing nonstop. and another thing, imo when you're facing someone clearly better than you i find it hard to learn anything at all because i rush my inputs because i start to get nervous and lose focus.
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Controlling your emotions is what prevents you from losing confidence when you lose a match as well as turning you off from a game. What happens when you lose a situation or someone in life? Does it turn you off from life itself?
Finding someone on your skill level is a good way to learn, though there will come a point when you are at a stalemate, stagnant and cannot improve, for your limits won't be pushed, your further weakness will not be exposed and therefore will cost you more losses in the future perhaps in a critical match.
Rushed inputs, loss of focus and nervousness are all factors that the Highest Level players experienced and possibly still experience. How does one learn to overcome these weaknesses if one is not consistently in the situations that cause them? Learning to relax and having flawless execution under pressure is critical to the tournament player.

Suggestion: You could obtain a recording of a tournament's background sound and replay it to simulate the noisy environment of a tournament (possibly adding to it by recording yourself as a heckler that is heckling you) so you can learn to tune it out (if you're not listing to tunes =oP ) and focus on the match at hand.

EDIT: Excellent Stuff Juggs & Tim!!! Definitely something every player seriously looking to improve (and even those who aren't) should read and absorb.
 
B

Badboy Takuma

Noob
AK Juggs said:
On my journey to evolving into a high level player, one of the most essential lessons I learned was learning how to lose.
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good read! very interesting! :)
i have some questions since i did not knew you are a "high level" player, in which games exactly? which tournaments did you win and in which games? where can i find some tournament footage from you? i cant find it. can you provide some links?
thank you for your answer!
 
Cat

Cat

This guy looks kind of tuff...
AK Juggs said:
Well, it depends on your definition. Based on my definition, a "high level" player is one with a high level mind set, who plays other high level players, and performs at a high level. So, in that regard I would say I am a "high level player" in UMK3, CoD and Halo. However, my "high level" mind set is the same for every game, which is what this article is giving advice on.
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You even play injustice bro?

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk 2
 
Juggs

Juggs

Lose without excuses
Lead Moderator
Premium Supporter
Cat said:
You even play injustice bro?

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk 2
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Yeah just been waiting for MMH!


MAPUSA said:
good read! very interesting! :)
i have some questions since i did not knew you are a "high level" player, in which games exactly? which tournaments did you win and in which games? where can i find some tournament footage from you? i cant find it. can you provide some links?
thank you for your answer!
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Juggs

Juggs

Lose without excuses
Lead Moderator
Premium Supporter
MAPUSA said:
ok real talk, since when umk3 is considered a legit tournament game? did i miss something? you can educate me?
the only thing i knew is that umk3 is considered a fun classic fighting game.
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UMK3 has always been a legit tournament game. Before MK9 dropped, UMK3 was THE tournament MK game. The problem with UMK3 is that it takes way too long to get into and start doing well. That wouldn't be as big of a problem if a lot of people played it, which unfortunately, not many people still play it competitively. Before MK9 dropped, it was still pretty active though, and the videos I linked from NECXI were before MK9 was out. UMK3 is pretty much dead these days, and I only play it every once in awhile online when friends invite me. UMK3 has never and probably will never get the respect it deserves, because people judge it based on ignorance.

None of this really matters though in regards to the topic. You don't have to win tournaments or even perform well in tournaments to understand or to have a high level mentality. Being a high level player is about much more than winning, in fact, this very topic is about completely the opposite.
 
Icebaby

Icebaby

Ice Queen
MAPUSA said:
ok real talk, since when umk3 is considered a legit tournament game? did i miss something? you can educate me?
the only thing i knew is that umk3 is considered a fun classic fighting game.
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UMK3 has been the most played MK game for over a decade (10+ years) in the US with the most tournaments and life span a MK game has ever had.

MK9 foundation and scene was built off of what UMK3 started and preserved.

It's also the most entertaining MK game to watch at a high level for me. :)
 
B

Badboy Takuma

Noob
Icebaby said:
UMK3 has been the most played MK game for over a decade (10+ years) in the US with the most tournaments and life span a MK game has ever had.

MK9 foundation and scene was built off of what UMK3 started and preserved.

It's also the most entertaining MK game to watch at a high level for me. :)
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which tournaments you mean?
 
FGC-Oni

FGC-Oni

Ascended One
Y'know lately I've been feeling like I may never be able to place well in a tourney or even if its worth going. Especially considering the characters I play, I go online and good players rush me down so hard I can't even do anything on wake-up. It almost like the instant I move I get punished in vortexes and insane combos.
 
Shadowkuma

Shadowkuma

Ronin of NYC
FGC-Oni said:
Y'know lately I've been feeling like I may never be able to place well in a tourney or even if its worth going. Especially considering the characters I play, I go online and good players rush me down so hard I can't even do anything on wake-up. It almost like the instant I move I get punished in vortexes and insane combos.
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Don't feel to bad dude we all go through at some point. Just keep practicing and you will have victories soon.
 
Juggs

Juggs

Lose without excuses
Lead Moderator
Premium Supporter
FGC-Oni said:
Y'know lately I've been feeling like I may never be able to place well in a tourney or even if its worth going. Especially considering the characters I play, I go online and good players rush me down so hard I can't even do anything on wake-up. It almost like the instant I move I get punished in vortexes and insane combos.
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You're focusing too much on winning. Focus more on beating the tactics instead of beating the player. When learning and improving, winning is not very helpful, but why you're winning is, or why your opponent is winning. Analyze why you lost, make an effort to actually think about it.
 
Gurpwnder

Gurpwnder

Saikyo Student
Just remember:

You can't spell LeSSOn without LOSS.

I think I may have said this before (somebody else may have too), but I think that the most important thing to becoming a good player is your attitude. When you lose a match, getting frustrated and salty will not help you become a better player. It is important to learn from your losses and better yourself as a player.

An important tip is to find competition around your skill level, so you both can learn from each other. If you challenge a player that is leagues above you, neither of you will learn anything from each other, since the better player will savagely destroy you, and you may not have any idea what they did to win.
 
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That__John__Guy

That__John__Guy

Patzer
Something for people to keep in mind too is that for a lot of these really good players, this is what they do. This is their primary hobby. And I don't just mean videogames, but fighting games. In particular, NRS games. I've seen some really good players on PSN and *every* time they are on it is either Injustice or MK9. They don't really play Grant Theft Auto and Call of Duty and Assassin's Creed and all the other games out there: this is their primary focus. Alright, maybe they have one game on the side or something, but 98% of the time it is going to be a NRS game they are on. Spending time in the lab, learning match-ups, etc. It is true dedication. Thinking you can mess around with a whole bunch of other hobbies and then waltz into play someone who is that dedicated to one game, well, it is pretty arrogant to think that you can just refute all the time they put into it. There are dozens of people who didn't make top 20 at EVO that are like that: they played virtually nothing but Injustice and NRS games for over a year straight. So, if you get MKX and play nothing, absolutely nothing else for months and months on end, you are going to get a lot better at it than someone who doesn't. If you play nothing but fighting games for years on end you are going to be better at fighting games than someone who also plays first person shooters, MMOs, sandbox games, etc. I personally like other games, but if you play other games you can't really complain that you aren't as good as someone totally focused on one game company's games in one genre. That isn't realistic.
 
B

BLACKRENEGADE

Salt.exe
So in accordance with controlling your emotions, does anyone have advice on learning how to hone in and control your anxiety during a match? Say the opponent is rushing you really hard forcing you to go into crouch position. And then the opponent continues to do crossups without letting you move from your position. Meanwhile the opponents attacks are causing major chip damage. Or a different scenario, when you're in a corner with very little life left, but you still have some meter. Where does one reach inside to find the calm within the storm?
 
That__John__Guy

That__John__Guy

Patzer
A lot of it is going to be experience. Most top players who win have already had their share of losses and nerves. Winning a Major the first time you go is a lot less realistic goal than just trying not to get bodied 0-2 twice.

Experience will also tell you what works for you in personal preparation. Are you better with a good night's sleep or if you've spent most of the night getting worked up? Are you someone who should skip breakfast or have a hearty six course meal? Headphones or no headphones? And so on....

In accord with Tom Brady's excellent "Know Thyself" post, finding the right mix of what works for you can really help. I played a different genre competitively, but the principle was the same: I had a lot of different loadouts and classes to choose from. Finding what worked best for me with my own strengths and weaknesses helped me to gain more confidence and comfort and that made things better in clutch situations. So, if you know that dealing with rushdown pressure is not a strong suit, then maybe pick a character that has better GTFO options.

There's also a lot to be said for hardcore, in-depth match-up knowledge. Realize that most of these top players know pretty much everything there is to know in the game. They might main one character, but they know every other character's moves and strings, and where there are gaps in the strings. They keep pressure off by knowing those string gaps. Like, if character X is pressuring character Y, character X might as a midscreen BnB do 223 cancelling into down 1,4, to get extended pressure, but the player of character Y knows that there is a slight gap in between the down 1 and 4 that their forward 2 is fast enough to poke through, if timed perfectly. So, they can recognize on sight the 223 going into the down 1, 4 and make their poke. You really have to know the strings to play at the top competitive level, since you can't just turtle crouch or you'll get hit by an overhead, right? You can see on stream someone blocking 10 hits in a row with a mix of standing blocks, crouch blocks, standing block, crouch block, back to standing.

Finally, with a dedicated block button, cross-ups won't be nearly the issue in MKX they were in IGAU.
 
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