yeah it was definitely a good idea to do this. Sucks me and kris wont be able to stay the whole time but i still was able to play around a good amount in two hours, and i’m pretty sure me and kris will come every week if you’re okay with us leaving pretty early (10ish).
I thought that it was a good session last night, I could actually see and realize what I needed to work on. Kudos to Professor Salem. Some people may have gotten more out of it than others, but all in all, im pretty sure everyone got something good out of it.
I hate TV 5. feels like sweaty balls in that corner
Tell her to release you from your dungeon on wednesdays.
last night was pretty fun and it showed me that i could hang with the top dogs better than i thought i could. my execution still needs lots of work and there were several matches where if i just landed one combo i would have definitely won instead of scrubbing it out.
now i have more inspiration to actually practice at home which is a good thing i suppose. good stuff to everyone who came out as well!
First and foremost I would like to thank Professor Nemo for making this happen. For someone to take the initiative to ensure that San Diego improves there gameplay deserves much gratitude. From all the people that I spoke to last night, most said it was a great idea and had tons fun. In the beginning some people including myself had to really understand the mechanics of the win lose chart. This was definitely a wake up call for me. To get scrub out in station 2, then sweep in station 3, and to make out alive in station 2 made me stop mashing and take my time. Hopefully I can truly learn some skill on the big dogg station next week. Now that I know how the player rotation works, I can record some video for everyone to go over.
Thanks Again Nemo For Holding It Down & Christine for the Bread Bowls - Shit Was Bomb!!!
where was my bread bowl? =[
ya class was sick. n3mo i want to give you a golden arch because i’m lovin’ it.
remember to play and DISCUSS! it is a great skill to be able to identify and analyze your strengths as well as your weaknesses with people. understanding others’ games is essential in improving your own. big ups to SD. we movin’ on up… well i’m only on station 4 but i can feel it, i’ll be movin’ on up… hopefully 
Good session all around yesterday, yeb with some new tricks is nice but not when your on the receiving end
good shit everyone last night. it was a lot of fun.
i think this kind of session is better because everyone gets an even amount matches and nobody has to be shy about calling next and shit.
also it makes everyone play with other people at their level and helps build consistency.
my only suggestion is more conversation. right after two people play a match, they should start discussing aspects about it. why did that person lose? what could they have done differently? try to incorporate what people said into your rematch the next round. other people in that pool should definitely get in on this discussion. not only do extra set of eyes that aren’t playing see things that you might miss in the heat of the action, in this way people learn match up info for all characters instead of just their own. you would be surprised at how much this overall game knowledge will help you in the long run.
also, if people are curious about something in a match up or have a question, you should feel free to come to pool A and ask the top players about it. there may be a really simple solution that shady or someone can give you that you just never thought about before.
finally i would suggest to everyone that they really try to remember exactly what situations were giving you the most problems in match ups. write this stuff down after the match if you have to. then when you get home, record that dummy and simulate those situations so you can figure out what you can do about them. you want to always know what your best options in every situation is and even when someone else tells you what to do, you should try it in training mode to make sure they are right and to learn the execution and timing.
anyway last night was great. especially since it was a trial run.
good shit nemo for putting it together.
thanks box for having us. you guys and cody make this community work.
and no thanks to shady for beasting on us all night with his stupidly good reaction speed. :arazz:
shit was nice. id def roll through again for this
Here are videos taken from the Top Dogg Stage. Eventually I’ll figure out how to capture matches from the other stations.
Box Arena Class Is Now In Session - Vids
Player Match-Ups
Pimpbot
Yeb
Shady K
Deci
GC Supra
Fernando’s Nuts
Patmonsta
Nemo
i apologize for not discussing or talking with people after the matches. i was still kind of discombublated by the format not in a bad way but just getting up after one game was weird to me and i didn’t even think to talk about how the match went just because i felt like everyone who wanted to get their games in was just ready to get up and play.
also too, if i lose to you i get a pretty clear picture of what happened and know that its the fault of my execution or bad habits more than anything gimmicky with abel so if i don’t approach you for advice don’t be offended because after playing everyone for so long with the same character i usually have a clear idea as to why or what caused the loss. and i’d rather watch videos of the match than try to remember little things unless it was something huge.
feel free to talk to me on aim as well as im probably more articulate typing than fumbling over my words sometimes!
Jason, I’m in the same boat as you. I didn’t discuss anything with anyone that Wednesday. Well, I did talk to sloth on how to defeat me…
Next week I promise not to talk trash and focus on leveling everyone up.
After thinking about it for a while, I’m kind of mixed. I’ll try to be constructive.
I do like the idea of more structured casuals. However, my one problem with the format is the idea of discussing a match with someone but potentially never playing that person again.
For example, after my match with GC Supra I had tons of advice for him, but he never had a chance to try any of it. That just happened to be in the 3rd run of the round robin, but it could happen in the first too depending on how many matches people win/lose. The people that need the most advice happen to be the people most likely to move down, and the people on the lower stations that could probably give the most advice to their opponents also happen to be the ones most likely to move up.
So, what I think I’d like to see is a system that allows for smaller groups to play each other multiple times. With an 8 man round robin, there’s going to be 28 matches, so rematches are almost out of the question with a group that large. One other way to do it though would be like this:
-Each station gets split into two separate 4 man groups.
-Group 1A plays a match.
-Group 1A discusses the match while group 1B plays.
-The SAME group 1A players now immediately fight a rematch to try whatever they discussed, while group 1B discusses their match.
-Group 1B players have their rematch, then different group 1A players fight, and so on.
-After each full run is completed, players could move up/down and groups could be scrambled.
Each 4 man round robin would be just 6 games, so two groups fighting twice would be 24 games, still faster than an 8 man group. You might even be able to expand it to best of 5 rounds. I think longer games have an advantage in a casual setting like this, because there’s less time watching victory screens, switching characters, switching controllers, etc.
That’s just one way to do it though. You could have three subgroups of 3 players at each station allowing for even more rematches at the expense of variety. Another fun thing you could try would be to turn each station into a sort of team round robin, with everyone from group 1A playing everyone from group 1B - I think that would be 16 games per run, so it would still be reasonable to have rematches, and players would have some motivation to give advice to their teammates.
These are all just random ideas though. Does anyone else think changing the format to allow for more rematches but less variety would be worthwhile?
People know their bad matchups, why can’t they just play their bad matchups?
I like your idea Brad. Making everyone study and critique matches is what should have happened last Wednesday. I’m not saying it didn’t happen at all, but I think everyone would dramatically level up if everyone gave their opinions on each match.
Honestly, I was talking to frank or mr. certified during other matches. I need to focus on leveling up a little more than socializing when I’m at the box. haha
I was giving out alot of info and advice last night. Many were quiet… Lack of discussion doesnt really help me in learning my matchup. Honestly, the only matchup I know how to play somewhat is sagat, and gief. Thats it… If there was discussion groups or critiquing and advice on the side, It would make people know what to do in certain situations. I was telling people to punish me if your character can duck the 2nd hit of standing HK for Akuma. I tell them, they punished me. I think more input from others also to them with certain situations and point out bad habits can make them learn and level up faster.
I like Yeb’s idea of 2 groups of 4 battling it out in a team fight. Doing it this way means everyone pays attention for the benefit of the group and not just themselves. In the long run it translates to better helping themselves in terms of being able to analyze situations and getting over them quicker, which in my opinion is what makes a good fighter. Godly reactions are overrated.
Pics are up from Yesterday’s 1st Box Arena Class is now in Session
i agree with you on the rematch thing.
i wonder how well doing 2 different groups of 4 would work though. how would we decide how to split those groups?
i don’t think i like the team idea. team format always turns into best players play the most and we want everyone to play vs everyone and for the number of games to be even. otherwise how do you decide who moves up or down?
i disagree. i think people need to play vs all the characters not just vs ones that they think are their bad match ups.
for example i would never say that ryu is one of my bad match ups as i play vs a million different ryus and i almost never lose. however… playing shady k’s ryu makes me realize that i really don’t know that match up very well at all and that all those other ryus had no idea what they were doing.
so now i think high level ryu is actually one of my bad match ups but i never knew that before.
i don’t think people should need to be on a team in order for them to pay attention to matches other than their own. the whole pool should be offering input on all matches regardless. being on a team should not a necessity for wanting to analyze other matches and help others imo.
i cannot stress how wrong this statement is. if anything, godly reactions are highly UNDERRATED.
one of the biggest things that people at box need to work on is becoming more reaction based. you should always be basing your game around reactions and forcing your opponent into situations where they have to guess and you can just react.
when i asked shady k what the number one thing he thought people should work on yesterday he quickly said:
people need to work on their reactions. there’s too many jump ins and other situations that are getting un-punished.
a huge reason why shady can rape my honda whereas most ryus cannot give me much trouble is that his reaction speed is so good i can’t get away with anything.
seriously, try to react more and have a reason for everything you do are the two first things new players should concentrate on.