What does it take

JELLY

JELLY

[09] Warrior
to be good at this game?

Know all the terms? Know how many frames each move has? Or just kinda kick their ass? Just spam everything?

Okay so I was kind of lurking and saw all this talk on frames and-- yes okay I'm one of those people that dont even consider frames when playing (should i gtfo now?) and then saw all these terms I didnt know and all this stuff on "wake up moves" and all that. Alright, I know some stuff like the layout, eg 3BB, 6AAA and all but that's about it.

Any way, I love this game, I've played it since Soul Edge but only started getting into the gameplay a while after SCII came out and when SCIV came out (let's skip SCIII...). I want to be better but I'm starting to get the feeling that that's not going to happen unless I seriously drop everything and dedicate all my time into this game, researching the moves so I know if I'll get the hit advantage, build up machine-like reactions so I can instantly jump or crouch everything instead of block it, play every day etc etc. And alright, you can beat the computer without most of that stuff, but against the real people with real skills like most of you out there, do I need to? Because that's what it looks like and honestly... honestly now

It looks like too much effort.


Does that mean I'm a "casual" and will always be one? Am I sooking too much? Am I just lazy? Or is it like one of those things that without that time and effort and skill, you will seriously fail at it? Like pole vaulting or being a professional soccer player? :D Tell me if I am sooking, and tell me if there's a thread like this already because if there is, it makes me a bad lurker doesnt it?

PS. I play mostly online, with the 6 or so people in my country. Hardly any offline for me. Crap please don't yell at me.

[/crisis][/rant][/whateveryouwanttocallit]
 
Unsurprisingly; it takes effort and intricate applied knowledge of the game to become good.
If your not willing to WORK your not gonna be good. Yes, work. For a game. Sports do it all the time.

-Idle
 
Yeah I couldn't have worded it better. Just like sports it requires practise and knowledge. But hey people get good at sports by playing a couple times a week. Only professionnal athletes spend all their time on it.

Here is my point of view : you can play without the frames, but if you don't learn the moves and what is safe/unsafe/blockstun, any knowledgeable player WILL kick your ass easily just by using them. frames just put numbers on how safe / how unsafe a move is.
 
With frames you only really need to look at a few key things.

Fastest Moves - Find the quickest move and relate it to it's distance and level it hits at, also spec it's safety.
Find all your unsafe moves - make a note of them
Find your SG moves - To help beat turtles
Find your frame traps - Know what puts you at advantage

Just find the biggest ones in these categories, no need to memorize them all exactly. Just have an idea so you can quick reference in your mind. I know all of Ivy's !12s and !14s...but couldn't tell you any other moves !15+.

You'll gradually discover other characters as well simply by playing them. Speed things up by playing casual alts and seeing their weakness and strengths first hand.

Every character also has their own kind of difficulty curve. Where one may have easy moves, they have hard application that takes precise timing and scenario assessment. or maybe the character is constantly changing stance and is hard to keep track of or know when to switch, or maybe they're just really dexterous to use (Setsuka!). I can play Ivy very well, but all my efforts to play any other character competitively are failed simply because I can't grasp how to use them well and none really tap into the skills needed to use Ivy.
 
One of the best things you can do is find a group of people offline who also want to improve and are willing to put in the same amount of work as you do. You'll find that your standard of play will increase much more quickly than it ever could if you were trying to learn alone.
 
Hey another Talim player!! That's always good ^^.

But to answer your question:
As you know there are 2 sides of this game. The theory/frame game side and the mind/mental game side.

And I am in no way a pro or even a good player (I play mostly online due to lack of competition here and too lazy to go outside I guess) but I believe that a good mind-game player can beat a theorygamer anytime. I have seen people win with always punishing correctly and jumping and ducking and hitting the just frame everytime, but I also have seen people winning with only AA's and BB's and throws and other basic stuff. A bit of both is the best I guess but you can't just learn mind-games. You have to experience it. I do think that if you are theory fighting alot that your mind-game will come by as you fight.

As a Talim player I can say that Talim doesn't have much different inputs and punishing abilities. So the way I win mostly is screwing with people's heads and forcing them to defend a 50/50 mix-up. Maybe I am cheap or a bad player but if I win by that then I win and that's it. You can theory-fight as long as you want but if you guess wrong all the time you WILL lose.

But to finially answer your question: It takes a lot of time reading this site (theory) and reading the player (mind). But in my opinion the experience you get while fighting is progressing you more then practicing on being able to duck that certain string and then punish with your best punisher for that situation. It works both ofcourse! But every SC4 player has his own unique style of fighting, if everyone would theory-fight all the time then we would see exact copies of everyone playing, and that isn't very fun now is it?

Again I am not a pro and don't consider myself a good player.
 
I guess I kind of know what's safe and what's not. My definition of safe is pretty much an attack that wont leave you open on block right?

Well yeah I guess the theory part is pretty daunting (the tech traps, the frame counting, etc.), almost puts you off wanting to play and improve. But I guess nothing much'll happen without the effort. =] I'll stick to what I'm doing now: which is just playing online. Where I live, there arent many people who play this game, or at least at that level nor are there many tourneys or meets. I also stick to this game for its characters and plot (not much of it left though, hopefully BD has something) though so even if I'm crummy at this, I'll still play it.


And yeah I main Talim, she's been my favourite since II. I kind of skipped III because she was so different and wasnt going to bother adjusting which is stupid, seeing as she changed even more in IV. She's fun to play though. I like her stances and you can really play tricks with people... until they work them out, which is what I'm stuck with now. =S It'd be great to play against you, Prymo, Talim players are so hard to find if you can find players here at all but you don't have PSN. ): (and I'm guessing you're in the US?)
 
I am actually from Europe. The Netherlands ( yeah that small little country next to the great almighty Germans :P).

I'd love to play versus you but yeah I don't have PSN :(. But I can see already that you are going to be a great player if you keep this mentality up. Asking for help is the best way to improve in my opinion. I wish you good luck with whatever you are trying to do.

About BD, I don't have a PSP so that sucks. Just give me DLC dammit! Or SC5 ;(
 
You disgust me... nah XP

To answer the topic, practice with all the characters in the game in training mode and review the frames of your characters with everyone else. Other than that, sprinkle a little mindgames and garnish with a light "grapple break practice" and you'll be a better formidable opponent in no time.
 
After all that was already said about understanding safe/unsafe moves(btw...what is blockstun exactly? I'm not sure about this one myself) I can't add too much more, but it doesn't stop at knowing all the set ups and moves and combos for your character, then you have to know your matchups, which takes alot of knowledge on every other character in the game.
 
To be good it takes either
1) Having many players who are gathering and playing regulary in your area.
2) Having a number of high level players (that usually happens in a community degreaded from #1 through the years)

This is the main factor. If you dont have either you will never be good and wont succeed at a competetive level.
Stuff like working for the game et cetera is important too, of course.
 
Safe is if a move can't be punished on block.
Punish means to attack after blocking or when a person whiffs with a guaranteed hit.
Blockstun is the animation after blocking a hit when you cannot do anything besides blocking further.

Learn the game in phases. DO NOT try to take it all in. Get a base style just by learning the moves and combos and applying them. When something isn't working, look up that case. Maybe the opponent is frame trapping you. Maybe they have a move that can punish a usually safe move. Maybe that character has hit box issues and can escape for free (sisters*cough*).

You're working with Talim and she's known for being hard to use and hard to win with, so be patient.
 
I think that if you don't look at frame data, tech traps, etc. You will eventually, by mere chance and conditioning, find it out yourself. You'll find frame traps, simply by trying to attack ater a move is blocked, you'll find combos by slip of the hand or just experimenting, you'll find what you can interrupt stuff with, by accident.

It'll simple take a lot longer.
 
Personally I got good by playing other peoples. Especially when someone use your main. When this happen, I usually don't mirror it, because peoples are not gonna play the same on a mirror fight. So if the guy/girl using your main character is good, you can learn a few more combo, that you can try to copy later. And if he is lame... just kick his ass =D

Plus : doesnt takes 300 hours D= I just played 150 hours and I'm pretty good. (20 hours in character creation, 40 hours without XBox live)
 
It really depends on how "good" you want to be. There's no set time of hours to reach that will suddenly put you at a high level of play. The more time you spend on it the better you will be. It only takes playing numerous people and watching high level players, learning every characters attacks and openings, anticipating your opponents moves based on his play style and move history. And probably most of all learning to play a high level of defense. Defense isn't commonly talked about because it's not as impressive looking as offense. And not everyone has the timing and reflexes to be able to play it well. I know players that have great offense, but can't pull off a guard impact or break a grab to save their lives. Thus, they lose to players they shouldn't lose to. Or get pummeled by someone like me who will exploit that weakness. You have to be able to take it as well as give it. Find your niche. Anyone can do offensive moves, but your D alone can put you above your opponent.
 
to win in this game you need 4-8 moves, good mind games, and a good understanding of other characters along with your character.
 
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