tossles' training thread

[tossle]

because calling it a diary wouldn't have been an alliteration

quick introduction - heya! I'm tossle. completely new to fighting games, been playing SG for roughly 1-2 months now. early on I spent a lot of time just messing around casually with also new-player friends, however now i'm more interested in actually improving my game. despite my overall game time, i still have very little experience fighting other players

I play val (H bypass), double (M bomber), and big band (L beat extend). big band's a new addition to the team and thus I'm not really comfortable with him yet, though I like him so far, however his position isn't concrete: still willing to play around with other characters/assists and see what might come of it

my biggest concerns lie with my defense and neutral. below is a video of some recent fights from a ft20 with a friend, and you'll see plentiful examples of those issues, and probably some other things I don't see myself.

Spoiler

 

[tossle]

Spoiler

Bunch of recent fights. I believe my defense has improved a bit, though I feel I need to make better use of pushblocking / PBGC. Neutral still feels eh, but I'm learning.

 

[mcpeanuts]

Some suggestions after watching those matches:

You gotta work on converting off your assists. When Double M Bomber or Big Band L Beat Extend assists hit, you don't usually get a combo off them. I'd practice that more and get more comfortable doing it in matches. You're taking a risk every time you call an assist, so you want to make sure you can get a big enough reward to make the risk worth it.

When your characters are low on life you don't prioritize getting them out enough, and when you do, you do it in an unsafe way that puts you in an even worse situation. Game 3 Valentine is low on life and you want to get her out, so from full screen you tag to Double. omg don't do this. You have better options to get the next character in safely. You're full screen so throw some scalpels then DHC to monster. This isn't really punishable by Parasoul in this situation. The worst thing she can do is Sniper on reaction to the scalpels, but as long as you wait until she's actually in blockstun from scalpels before you DHC, you're fine. If you DHC after she blocks, she can't sniper. If she tries to sniper before blocking the scalpels, you can DHC to car to counter her sniper. The other good option you have to change team order with this team is hard knockdown with either Valentine s.HK or Double s.HP, then tag cancel to Big Band (won't work with your other characters because they have awful tags but it'll work with Big Band).

You do Giant Step at the end of Big Band blockstrings 100% of the time. Try doing other things. If you get people scared of the threat of Giant Step, you can end your blockstring with Emergency Brake > throw. This is negative but if people are respecting your other options they might not react to it. You could also try ending with L A Train or M A Train; you don't get anything off this other than a hard knockdown, but it's better than having your Giant Step blocked and dying.

You need to recognize when you're hitting their assist and not their point. If the point character isn't being hit they can do anything they want to you while you're hitting their assist. If you notice you're only hitting the assist, try chaining into your launcher and jump backwards and block. This can keep you safe.

If Valentine dies and Double comes in, you stop calling assists completely. Why? You still have L Beat Extend, it's the same assist, it's still good.

 

[tossle]

Thank you for the reply, I'll try and keep all those points in mind next I play, lots of stuff to work on.

If Valentine dies and Double comes in, you stop calling assists completely. Why? You still have L Beat Extend, it's the same assist, it's still good.

...I'm honestly not that certain why calling my assists gets mentally turned off once val dies, guess I never got myself into the habit, which seems obviously bad now. Better that got pointed out sooner rather than later, will definitely start working on that asap.

 

[Fedora_Ninja]

Aside from what peanuts said, which is all really good, I'm just nitpicking on some shit:

-You have a tendency to not try and cover your blocked heavies with Val with assists or dead cross. Dead Cross is still punishable with jabs at point blank, but not everyone knows and it's not as punishable as a blocked c.hp or s.hp.
-You don't call bomber assist when you have Val out. It's great for extended block strings and good to call in neutral. Just throw it out sometimes to get in, as long as you cover it right.
-Val combo. Get good with it. You dropped it at some points and you don't vary up your resets. Throw more cuz Val's throw is really good.
-You had situations where you poked, hit a happy birthday and didn't hit confirm.
-Practice recognizing situations where you can score a double snap.

 

[tossle]

Gonna throw up some tips I've been given recently as well as general notes, will probably update this with another video after I get some sleep. Believe I've taken in the majority of previous advice (still gotta learn to end BB blockstrings with something other than giant step, though. I'll get around to it eventually) and have definitely improved my game.

-if team order allows, EKG / SSJ reversals from corner can be DHCed into monster for full, corner keeping combos
-More PBGC practice. Failing it waaaaay too often
-Should probably stop ending most of my val blockstrings with L bypass. works sometimes, but dead cross would probably be a better general solution
-An aggressive Eliza can ruin my day very quickly; backing off with j.HK (as val) doesn't seem to be working to counter their jumpins. Lab out a solution?
-Every time I try and pushblock a single jab or other quick move I usually end up eating hits for it. For now I should try avoiding this, though later on it might be worthwhile to train a fast enough reaction speed
-Running in and getting hit after throwing out an assist is bad. Glad to know I have faith in my assists to hit, but I really need to work on recognizing the situation first before hitting dash
-Find more reset points in the H luger combos I do with double. Does fine damage, but I haven't explored it nearly enough
-Need better answers to situations where I'm directly below someone. c.MP with val seems appealing, but haven't put it to practice yet. Dunno what to do with double, H luger? Angle doesn't always work out. Beat extend seems like a fine answer with band
-Said before, end Band blockstrings with something other than giant step 100% of the time. L A-train or e-brake into throw, whatever to keep it different

If for some reason my replays bug out again and I can't get a video up, I should be playing some sets with players around my skill level (or better) soon-ish. Recording manually'll have to do

 

[Fedora_Ninja]

-Should probably stop ending most of my val blockstrings with L bypass. works sometimes, but dead cross would probably be a better general solution

Dead cross isn't safe point blank, but the pushback from s.hk(x2) makes it safe. Still, ending blockstrings with bypass isn't bad if you call bomber assist to keep the pressure.

 

[Dagwood]

I think your team is really good for Val so you're off to a good start.

All i can say is, From when i played you, it seemed like you didn't really finish a combo. I'd say work on landing all your combos.
Learn combos using M bomber assist that allow you to load vial mid-combo and continue (in the corner), It's really helpful, it gives you obviously more damage off the vials, but also more reset/burst bait opportunities.

 

[tossle]

Yeah, I have a pretty bad habit of never finishing combos, especially so with valentine. I DO know how to do corner stuff (old video, mostly just proof of concept) I just don't corner carry as much as I should, too reset hungry for my own good.

 

[tossle]

Kinda late, between recording issues and Warframe catching my attention again this got a bit delayed. It's not a set, but it'll do

Spoiler

Things I noticed:

-I can see a handful of instances where I have plenty of meter available to kill and don't, this seems to happen a lot with double. Guess I need to lab out ways to cut combos short, like going fridge into lvl3 during barrel loops or the like. This happens with valentine too, though not nearly as much
-Calling assists in the corner is bad, and while I seem to get lucky with it a handful of times, I really should be wary about making it a habit
-Feel like the amount of upbacking or jumping in general I do is concerning, I've had it highlighted in a set before and occasionally I'll try and jump to do a thing in situations where I probably shouldn't. something to keep in mind

Overall I think I'm improving. Still tons to learn and bad habits to be careful about developing, but improving all the same

 

[Fedora_Ninja]

-Instead of EKG>dhc car, dhc cat heads. More damage and more reset opportunities.
-Noticing a lack of air grabs
-Practice picking up after Beat Extend assist with c.mk, or s.mk to save the otg. You're scaling the hell outta the damage with s.mp.
-Learn to counter call assists. like when they call copter from a useless distance, always have bomber ready to punish, and toss dead crosses to cover your assist. Or just hit the assist with dead cross or whatever just to lock out the assist.
-Punish squigs full screen lvl3 with car if it can kill.
-Same thing with Bella lvl3 where the first hit whiffs. Car punish.
-Reset characters that have no air reversals in the air. (Parasoul, Wulf, Bella, Double, Robo, Squigs, Fukua, peacock...)
-Don't call Val assist after all the resources spent to get her out of there
-ALWAYS pushblock bella
-16:34 if you have the chance to make Val NOT achor, do it.
-16:40 any one of those j.lks coulda been an air grab into combo.
-as soon as you snag 2 characters in the corner, snap them out. Don't risk air combos and having one of them drop out.
-Stop throwing out A Trains when you're not even in range.
-31:00 why.
-You need to ground tech every time you get swatted by parasoul's j.hp. You're just giving the other guy a free combo otherwise. The only time Parasoul can get a guaranteed OTG off her j.hp is when she chains into it.
-Round start Parasoul vs Val, just hold back. If the Parasoul dashes in or jump in at you, s.HP > call bomber > HCH combo. The step back Val takes during start up beats all of her rushdown options at that range.
-You also have a hard time reacting to really punishable things and capitalizing on it with a combo.

Ultimately I'd say your Val isn't doing any damage. S.mp scales the crap out of her combos, you're not doing any air bypass combos, and you're not landing any resets cuz your timing and/or execution is off. Or if you do land a reset, you drop your combo.

 

[tossle]

All good stuff, thanks! In defense of the silly things that happened around 16:30 I was making a joke w/ the other guy, but even still I'll try and keep the idea of swapping to val in mind more often when appropriate.