I agree, there’s nothing better than playing endless with someone who is better than you. If he is any good, you will know and you will be motivated to learn from them. Its like an old school Kung fu movie; the teacher keeps beating the student and it seems impossible to win until the student lands his first punch and realizes that he’s gotten better. I went on a 22 loss streak with a guy who was way better than me and on the 23th match it was a draw. I went on to win every other match eventually ending with a 5 win streak. It was all worth it in the end.
This story is from MvC3, but the principle applies here as well:
I seek opponents who can beat me. When I find a player I can body in a player match/lobby, I will keep playing them for as long as they want to play. Am I learning from this? Not really, but it does let me try more obscure set-ups, difficult combos, etc. They, however, are learning, and I don’t mind leveling up the scene as a whole if I can help do that. However, if I find an opponent who is bodying me, I’ll stay in that room for as long as possible so I can learn as much as I can about the matchup and my weaknesses. I played against a guy who went 10-0 on me. Afterwards he took off, but sent me a message and said “You really made me work for those. It was 10-0, but it felt a lot closer than that.”
Am I a bad player? I like to think I’m not, and would put myself in at least the upper 33% of players for any given fighter. However, if you check my stats, I will often have a worse record than that. Why? Because when people lose to me, they run. When I lose to someone, I stick around and play until I win or they leave. Too many players care about their stats too much. Play to learn.
Sometimes I wish games would only keep stats for rank & none for player matches. I see way too many players that care about their stats rather than just playing someone of equal or greater skill level.
One guy joined my room(4 bar connection) He had a record of 480 wins to 80 losses. You would think, “Damn this guy must be pretty good.” But then I beat him two times without him ever taking me to my 3rd char. He leaves and makes his own room, probably hoping to get easier wins. I don’t want to be a bully so I don’t bother entering any rooms he makes now.
Occasionally he would join a room I make and play 1 or 2 matches then leave. I really don’t get whats the deal with his mentality. He’s not even a bad player either… we have 4 bar connections, so it’s probably the best online experience he can get.
Another dude we used to go even back and forth but he would leave anytime he feels that I’m picking up on his play style. Now since I’ve been vs people who are better than me, I leveled up much quicker than him, and he doesn’t want to vs me anymore. Though his win / lose ratio is much higher than mine with about twice the amount of matches played.
On a lighter note, I met one dude who was a UMVC3 player and wanted to learn kof. He played me 30 games and lost them all with me picking random. But hell he didn’t care and I was giving him advice over the mic while we were playing. I hope he sticks with the game cause he has potential, but he picked up many bad habits from Umvc3 lol.
I’m still trying to learn KoF13, so I pretty much just try and add anyone that I have a good connection with to my friends list, particularly if they are good though…not really sure how to get better other than to play people better than me, lol…I would think more other people would feel the same way.
I like to alternate between learning from people better than me, and then using my newfound knowledge to whup people worse than me. Variety is the spice of life.
Sure enough, the first time I played this online tonight (3 connection, but still too much lag for anything other than the basics), I got kicked after winning two matches in a row against the host. Those were the only matches I had a chance to play against him, too.
This isnt just kof players, its all fighting games. Players today cant handle a lost. Im constantly being kicked out of rooms in AE cause they know im a solid player. Normally, when i come across a better player i try and play 10 matches vs them and learn from it. My goal is to at least take one match and give more comp as the matches progress.
If the game is laggy, I usually just play 2 matches. Now, If the connection is good. I’ll keep playing regardless until my opponent leaves. I played one player who beat me 2 games and the connection was 4 bars. Was getting a good understanding of his play style after those games. Then he left and made another room. 
I just want to get better but the people online are sore. I’ve been kicked so many times its funny. I don’t even consider myself a good player at this game.
This seems like a friendlier place than the comments on the SRK front page would have me believe.
I’ve never been big into 2D, but I’m really liking everything about KoFXIII. I’ve been afraid to bring the game online though. Learning SCIV online was a pretty terrible experience. I’m willing to lose 100 times if I’m learning something, but I feel like online would be the most hostile and nonconstructive environment someone could play in. Where else in here do I drop my 360 gamer tag (Lasercakes) to play SRKers?
Yeah, just a few nights ago I played player matches - I got kicked from every single one of them as soon as I won a match.
I think it would be a lot better if, like Max said, we just get rid of the whole win/loss ratio thing and just do a points system where you only gain points and never lose them. Would prevent a lot of this childish behavior if people had nothing to lose.
It’s bad enough getting kicked by salty players - it’s much worse having to find new matches that aren’t shitty connections.
People just want to win. Some people would rather an empty win then a loss where they learn something
Played this guy on PSN called G30Kidd (something like that) last night. Guy literally mashed on wakeup every single time. If you knocked him down he was going to do SRK, EX, Super, or Neomax every single time on wakeup. What sucks about online is that meaties don’t seem to interrupt regular wakeup specials that lack priority (like Terry’s Rising Taco which is free as shit on wakeup). So I just block and punish. I whoop his monkey ass and I politely send him a message saying ‘stop mashing on wakeup’ and he replies in the usual 'lol I’m not serious, lol." and I played the guy before and he played the exact same way.
I go a step further and suggest he trade the game in. He then replies ‘wtf I’m not bad I just need a joystick’
The joystick argument is so prevalent among scrubs.
If you find a Mexican dude online, add him as a friend. 99.9% of the time they actually know how to play.
Got blown up by a Mexican dude that was hopping around like a madman and throwing me a lot. He seemed to have incredible reactions too because he was supering/neomaxing at just the right times. Either that or he was just random. Didn’t seem to like doing combos either.
I was reading the posts made here and I thought I’d add my two cents to the conversation. The way I see it is when I’ve left (which is scarce, but I admit I’ve done it), I wasn’t learning anything. Sometimes I need to play people on a similar level or below just to grasp what’s happening in a match. For instance, I was playing a guy in KoF13 online and I stuck around for 8-9 matches. He beat me up quite a bit, but I thought “hey, if I stick around, I could learn a few things.” Problem was that everything he did was too quick for me to comprehend and me being a newcomer, I felt like a helpless training dummy, lol. I didn’t know what I was doing wrong or what I could have done, but I’ve practiced enough to be comfortable with a team of 3. Don’t get me wrong, I know where you all come from with this matter, but sometimes it’s more of a negative to stick to a lobby with a veteran-player who basically wipes the floor with you. I feel like I learn more if l play with someone on the same level as me or slightly (not drastically) higher.
I would 100% agree with you on that. I think it would actually encourage more people to learn.
They did that for 3SOE. People still raged and the leaderboards were filled with Scrubs.
Vs a guy named ChanChan who rage quited once… rejoined my room and then rage quit again right before I neomaxed his kula lol(the match was really laggy compared to our first encounter and he picked keep away chars this time). I’m guessing he wanted to win then leave going, “haha.”
Sent me a message saying I suck and to play him in SF4. sigh
I’ve had a pretty good experience playing online in ranked mode in XIII until last night. All the matches I’ve had so far have been against opponents of varying skill and even if I’m losing I don’t rage quit. Last night, though, I faced two players that rage quit. One was from France and we went several games before he rage quit on about the 4th match after losing his first character. The second player was from Cali, he picked a completely Shoto-esque team and then rage quit when my Kim had him in the corner and stuffed his wake up with cr. B. He shot me a message afterwards saying that he doesn’t “like to play with people that just press low kick.”
Immaturity? Lag? Win ratios? Credentials? Being defeated by someone with a lower rank? Unfair advantage?
There are so many factors to consider when somebody quits the match suddenly.
I get that a lot and it pisses off to no end. I hate losing too, but that is not going to stop me from trying to defeat the opponent, even if I am not as good. For all I know, the opponent could be using the same character as I am but he/she does something differently than I do and it wins him/her the match! That is the nature of competitive fighting games. A chess game. Find the pieces, find out their abilities, develop a strategy, compete against opponent. If you lose, practice and try again sometime later. Knowledge, observation, communication, and skill are the only way out for real fighting games, especially sense KOF XIII happens to fit into that category despite the rage quitters.
There should be some sort of punishment - if the player rage quits at a certain time frame, they will automatically lose the match. Period. If there is lag that freezes the screen for a long period of time, the game itself will return BOTH players to the rank match menu. Both of the players will not benefit or have any negative affects. The game still authorizes both players to cancel the game before the match starts.
The patch under supervision from ATLUS might rectify this situation. If not, then you can always walk away knowing that you have kicked the other players ass - whether it be single-handedly or fighting a hard match.
getting bodied can be one of the best ways to learn. the problem is that getting bodied stirs up anger and so forth, making it nearly impossible to perceive the learning, thus the frustration. every time we properly meet a challenges, we learn something from them, regardless of the outcome. most challenges come in the form of loss, and the more difficult the the challenge, the more difficult it is to understand the reason for losing. this is probably due to the gap in skill and experience that makes it a challenge in the first place…
but if the emotions that hinder skill can be set aside and shits can stop being given about defeat, that skill gap can be recognized. what can be seen can be made a target at which to take aim, and instead of leveling up an inch at a time by trading wins with people of equal skill, quantum leaps can be made by having one’s ass whooped repeatedly.