Posts Tagged ‘dorion’

Execution Woes, Frantic Play

admin Posted in Blog，Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,
01 February 2010
0

Went to Dorion’s again tonight.  I’ll keep this short (You know you play SF too much when you see/type the word short and an image of Ryu doing a c.lk pops in your head).

Started out playing against a Ken player who really wasn’t very good, but neither was I.  I don’t know if it was because I was using Reece’s stick and not my own (His is much looser, even for a TE), but none of my shit was working.  This wasn’t like I couldn’t do my normal SJC FADCs, it was more like I couldn’t even do my burning kicks, or I couldn’t get my Fierce Punch to come out after a jump in.  My fingers were overly frantic, I suppose.  Maybe it also has to do with the game being played on a non laggy TV, whereas mine is pretty bad.

So anyway, it took a couple hours and me running through training mode to get going for real.  I didn’t really spend a lot of time learning new shit tonight, more just playing for the sake of playing.  This doesn’t necessarily help me grow as a strategic player, but it does improve my reaction time.  I played Zaine (He was fooling around with Dan, though), then Shane’s Boxer (Got wrecked), then Reece’s Akuma (Did okay), then Juicebox’s Akuma (Got wrecked), then Juicebox’s Ken (Got wrecked), then Louie’s Guile (Wrecked him!), then Reece’s Blanka and Bison (Got wrecked), then Louie’s Blanka (Got wrecked).  A couple of major points resonated with me tonight, though.

  • I deal with rushdown very poorly.  When Juicebox was rushing me down, he could tell I was mashing throw tech.  To summarize his advice, I should make a conscious decision on whether or not to just block or to throw tech, not try to guess on the fly.  Also got a quick lesson in footsies from him.
  • I can punish Blanka balls better now.  It’s all about paying utmost attention.
  • Louie says I’m hesitant while I play.  I don’t know exactly what that means, maybe I’ve been playing too cautious like Zaine lately.  I’ll need to watch Zaine play more so I can understand how exactly I should be playing.

Another Dorion Level-Up Session

admin Posted in Blog, C. Viper, Matchups, Techniques，Tags: , , , , , , , ,
28 January 2010
1

Been addicted to this song lately: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uZWArSOmCc

Man, what a night.  I think I may have grown a bit more as a player, my playstyle has changed so drastically in the past month.  This evening I got some games in with Reece, Stefan (Dictator player who I haven’t seen in awhile), Zaine, and Louie.  Reece kicked my shit in with Gen, and I received a ton of advice from a bunch of different people.

I tried my “Bring a notebook!” thing tonight to hopefully make my blog posting a little easier to type, but to be honest it didn’t help very much.  All I did, after looking at it, was write down random tips that flew at me.  So I’m just gonna write most of this down from memory.

***

Mr. SNK

I didn’t get any specific information from SNK like the other folks I talked to, but moreso advice on how to play fighting games in general.  There’s a sense of fundamentals, such as fireball zoning and normals and the correct spacing for all of that, that I’m lacking.  This is simply because I’ve never played a fighting game at this level before.  Ultimately, SNK recommended that I drop Viper for a couple weeks and work with a Shoto (Ryu) to learn the game.  It’s kinda funny because this is pretty much what I did but on a lower level.  Whereas I learned the basics of SFIV like how to do FA’s and SRKs and correctly inputting Ultra Combos from using Ryu and then moving on to Viper, I should have stuck with Ryu and learned more about the 2D fighting genre in general.  At the moment it pains me to even think about dropping Viper (My blog is called Crimson Temptress, for crying out loud), and so I’m undecided on how exactly to move forward from here.  Perhaps I’ll end up playing Ryu more often.  Bah.

Another major tip that SNK had for me was in regards to my notetaking.  “Don’t take notes on specific people, take notes on specific matchups,” he said.  By knowing the characters and their matchups inside out, I’ll be able to know what I can and can’t do in the match.  And only then should I be able to implement mindgames effectively.  He punctuated his advice with words of encouragement and implored me to keep asking questions.  I find that to be a huge motivator.

Zaine

Zaine was a bit under the weather this evening, but he still was pretty sharp.  I chilled out with him for a bit and talked a lot about specifics for the character.  A couple of quick notes:

  • After conditioning the opponent to block with TKs, only then can you jump in with little risk.  Otherwise, you’re limited to crossups after untechable knockdowns.
  • j.HK is good for crossups, but it isn’t the be-all end-all air to ground attack.  j.HP is really good too, to the point where a well timed one will stuff an uppercut.
  • j.MP xx h.BK is possible.
  • After landing a TK, another option in the flowchart is to dash up and throw.

Those fast tips aside, I was able to pick Zaine’s brain about more of the finer intricacies of Viper play.  For one thing, after playing Reece and getting burned over and over, I noticed that I was having a hard time getting in to attack with the TK mixups.  This made me wonder about how a burning kick would work in a mixup, since it would knock them away and I’d have to get in again.  Another thing is that I can’t just go balls-to-the-wall (Zaine’s phrase) all the time, especially with TK strings because I’ll get SRK’d out of them.  Zaine plays very carefully and tries to frustrate his opponent with TKs and his ground game.  I tried to mimic this, in that rather than pressing an advantage over and over and over again until I get reversaled out of it, I poke holes in my strings and momentum deliberately to bait things.  Zaine played Akuma and Sagat against me to prove this, where he SRK’d me when I got too feint happy (I did a lot of c.MP xx TK Feints) but in return I did my fair bit of baiting Tiger Uppercuts and SRK’s.  In doing so I heightened my alertness while playing the game and did my best to look for patterns.  Another big point that Zaine made was for the Sagat matchup, where once I get a large enough lead I should make Sagat come to me.  The most he can do is Tiger Shot me from full screen and my seismos will trade/beat them repeatedly if needed.  “Sagat has no offense,” he said.  Furthermore, at full screen, DON’T FUCKING JUMP AT HIM.  Zaine’s voice saying “Don’t do it,” will forever resonate in my mind while I play that match.

Louie

Whereas Zaine’s been the technical coach for me lately, Louie’s been the mental coach.  I mentioned to him my problem with going into trance-mode while playing, where I don’t really pay attention and zone in too much.  Louie gave me some pointers to heighten my alertness further, such as making a remark (“Good shit”) every time I get hit by something to make a mental note to watch out for it.  I played with him shortly after my session with Zaine and he really did try to keep me talking, listening, and from getting too zoned in to pay attention to the match as a whole.  This was basic stuff like manipulating me in some ways and openly putting me in scenarios to get me thinking and how to keep on my toes.  As such, he definitely didn’t play his all and the matches went much slower than his usual RTSD style, but after playing with both him and Zaine I really felt a heightened sense of awareness while playing.   Afterwards we played around a little bit with some Blanka-Viper matches, here’s some fast tips:

  • Punishing a blocked Ultra – TIMING, TIMING, TIMING.  I’ve got several options to punish it, all with varying degrees of specific timing.  The first  way to punish is a plain Ultra.  However, this must be timed so Blanka is about at her torso’s height, otherwise it’ll whiff.  Another option is to light Seismo, which can then go into burning kick or SJC FADC sweep.  Timing is less strict on there but still needs to be done.  Then there’s the b.HK, or the “Sit the fuck down” kick.  Probably the easiest to time, and since it’s more than likely that they won’t tech, I get a free mixup.  Finally, the hardest way is to FFF, where I need to time the Fierce to hit EXACTLY as he’s landing on the ground.  Furthermore, I need to walk up prior to the Fierce so the second Fierce won’t whiff.
  • Viper Elbow is still awesome, but try using it as a crossup/repositioner after a knockdown.  It won’t combo, it might not even hit, but it’ll screw with their mind.
  • I can jab out of hop shenanigans.  Here’s hoping ConQueso doesn’t pull that shit on me again.
  • Rainbow ball can be FA’d, but it’s not necessarily the best option if Blanka purposefully whiffs it, lands in front of me, and throws me out of my dash.  I’ll reserve this trick for beginner Blankas who go for the confusing ass crossups, but I really do need to just learn how to block that stuff.
  • Watch that fucking meter.  If he’s got Ultra, either bait it or don’t stick out limbs while he’s waking up.  Same with EX Upball, but that’s a lot less risky.

***

Getting this much advice from people is really quite awesome.  I’ve learned a lot, and as I mentioned earlier I’m beginning to feel a heightened sense of awareness while I play.  However, the more people I get advice from, the more conflicting advice I get.  I’d like to close out this entry with a listing of these.  Hopefully as time goes on I’ll be able to make my own, informed decision about who to listen to, but for now I’m neutral.

Points of contention

  • Switching from Viper to Ryu to learn fundamentals.  SNK says do it, Louie (and maybe Zaine?) says no.
  • Neutral jumping.  Zaine says to do it to bait a throw tech, Louie says don’t do it (Might just be for Blanka matchup)

Oh, and my stick’s 360 support is busted.  So I left it at Dorion’s house for Mike to fix for me.  So no SF tomorrow morning, but boot camp tomorrow night!  Whoo!

Dorion Level-Up Session

admin Posted in Blog, C. Viper, Techniques，Tags: , , , , ,
15 January 2010
0

Dorion had a level-up session at his house tonight, aimed towards preparing a “Team AZ” consisting  of him, Mr. SNK, and Juicebox for the House of Cicada tournament in California pretty soon.  It was kind of cool to overhear bits of their conversation, about Combofiend’s playstyle or Alex Valle’s or how Sabre played Justin Wong while he was just a Marvel player.  As I am currently, I’m simply an SRK member who watches streams, so these players are borderline celebrities to me, and to hear them talked about in such a casual fashion shows how distanced I am from the community.

The mentality of the AZ Scene, however, is exactly the opposite of what SRK is.  Everyone here is really welcoming as well as extremely supportive of my recent revelation and new desire to improve, and to quote Louie, “If someone’s going to show the initiative, it’s worth helping them out.”

Anyway, I spent a good deal of time playing with Reece (Dictator), Louie (Blanka), and Alan (Guile) tonight.  Mostly Louie, who was kind enough to really just walk through my game style and watch my games with Alan and pick apart the many imperfections.  Afterwards I played several other games, but I also had a talk with Zaine prior to leaving about more of the Viper-specific stuff that I can do.

Louie

  • Don’t jump so much, especially neutral jumping.  While it may work against online people whose reactions are delayed due to inexperience or lag, I’ll be punished fairly often for jumping straight up like a moron.
  • Don’t be afraid to backdash on wakeup.  It breaks a lot of Louie’s okizeme options.
  • Additionally, don’t be afraid to use a backdash as a BAIT.  This really helped me in a fight against Alan where I saw the flash kick coming.  It’s a much more efficient bait rather than just walking up and crouch-blocking, which puts me at risk of getting thrown.
  • Moving around a lot can be good for instilling a sense of random in your opponent, but in reality it’s in your control.  Doing random shit for no reason gets your opponent to do a double-take and gives me that split second to capitalize on it.
  • Momentum is key.  I shouldn’t get flustered when I miss a combo and flail around in hopes of compensating for it somehow.  Have a contingency plan for when my shit breaks and move forward from there.
  • Momentum, when against me, should not fluster me either.  Learn how to both defend properly and keep an eye out for punishing opportunities.  I missed punishing a Blanka ball with a reversal EX Seismo too many times because I was too busy getting mindfucked into defending.
  • More on momentum, a rushdown is always helpful if you vary your mixups.  I get in bad habits with playing sometimes where I follow a set string rather than varying it.  Take notice of how they defend and use it accordingly, a mixup isn’t limited to a single hit or combo.
  • Performing uppercuts and the like need to be reacted to or predicted, never guessed.  There is a large difference.
  • Louie loves to bait things with focus attacks.  This basically serves the same purpose as walking forward and baiting an attack.  Baiting an attempt to shift the momentum (i.e., reversal) can be applied to a rushdown.
  • Be wary of baiting things out too close to the opponent on wakeup, you might get thrown instead.
  • Corner pressure…ugh.  Stay calm, don’t be afraid to backdash, but don’t reversal blindly or hit buttons unnecessarily.
  • You can tell when an opponent is mashing with Blanka when their jab strings are imperfect.  As such, don’t be afraid to bait out the electricity and punish it with either a max ranged c.MK or a Viper elbow.
  • There is more to a mixup than just on wakeup.  Performing a mixup on a standing/crouching opponent causes them to have to react faster rather than having the leisure time of their wakeup animation to gather their thoughts.
  • Them feints…use them.  Quote from Louie: “Zaine once got me in a corner and did a fucking dance with Viper, I had no clue what he was doing.”
  • DON’T JUMP SO DAMN MUCH.
  • My meaty c.LK, s.LK, c.MP xx m.TK is not a good combo to do on an opponent who is waking up.  I ate several Ultras and up-balls because of this.  Try using it after a blocked jump in or during TK pressure.
  • “If someone’s going to show the initiative, it’s worth helping them out.”

Zaine

  • Supporting the jumping too much = bad theme, focus on the ground game using TKs.  They’re semi-safe and frustrating enough to train your opponent to counter them.
  • Using TKs enough in a match will cause the opponent to focus more on countering them and thus make them become purely reactionary after you do it enough.
  • In doing so, you increase your chances of a successful jump in.  So rather than going right for the mad jump-in combos that I love and adore, train my opponent to let me jump in.  You know when they have reached this point when they are simply crouch blocking and waiting for the TK.  Then you can jump in.
  • More on TKs, there are plenty of options after each of the two ground TKs.
  • For the light TK, while it’s slower, it basically keeps you safe on block.   Conversely, a medium TK will put you right in the opponent’s face and basically put you in a mixup.  Will they throw?  Will they jab?  Shoryu?  So many options for the opponent to counter anything that I can do.  Light TK also  puts you at a frame advantage on block, and so following it up with a c.HP will either cause a counter hit or a block.  It’s probably a good idea to continue on to Seismo SJC FADC, which will either be a beefy combo or a WTF DO I BLOCK moment for the opponent and allow a throw.  An additional follow up for a light TK is a crossup burning kick.  Zaine likes to also dash forward, which makes the opponent think OMG THROW and basically baits that whiffed throw tech with a burning kick.
  • For the medium TK, while it has the disadvantages stated above, if you’re feeling risky you can continue with some options from there.  Many Viper players, including Zaine, like to go c.MP xx m.TK and then follow it up with another c.MP xx m.TK.  Another gutsy option is a throw.  One of Zaine’s neat tricks is to follow up a c.MP xx m.TK with a simple normal jump over and then a burning kick when they try to grab what they perceive as a missed crossup.  Zaine even mimed out the animation of a whiffed throw eating a burning kick to the face for me, haha.
  • “You need to come over more often.”

I’m actually pretty confident that I left some stuff out, but my brain was so full of Street Fighter that I couldn’t hold anymore.  Add that to the fact that I did another all-nighter in a failed attempt to reset my sleep cycle, as well as the fact that it took me a half hour to write and remember this on said lack of sleep.

I ended each section from Louie and Zaine with a quote of theirs that I found particularly inspirational.  While it sounds overly mushy and gay, I really feel like it’s worth noting that they are going this far to help me, and therefore I should not waste their time.  Maybe I’ll bring a notebook with me next time I go and I’ll get more notes down.

False Plateau

admin Posted in Blog，Tags: ,
09 January 2010
0

I posted this in the AZ thread of SRK just now.

Just got back from a gaming session at Dorion’s. I think in general I haven’t been the biggest participant in local/live play, especially since Ranbats ended. Basically, between Barfights and now, all I’ve been doing is staying at home in training mode or playing online. Training mode yielded some results; When I’m comfortable (as in relaxed, using my stick, and sitting on my couch in front of my laggy HDTV) I can execute some combos I’ve been practicing for the past month. The moment I leave my comfort zone (Using a stick with a looser spring, for example), however, my performance drops greatly. I miss my SJC FADC combos, I miss SJC seismos, I miss CANCELS. And I’m in no way blaming technology for this, but my own failure to adjust. Even when I’m able to correctly emulate this “comfort zone” that I think is so golden, I still screw stuff up. I think Reece put it best when he says that was the jitters. I think the only solution is just to play more with people rather than in my own house alone beating up on online folks, or at Gameworks where I can play Ken and rack up the wins.

That said, multiple games with Eric, Zaine, Reece, and Dorion have really got me convinced that, on a mental level, I’ve been playing the game wrong for the past year. I feel like I enter this trance when I play, where I’m constantly hedging bets with what moves to use next based on the matchup, with random sprinkled everywhere that serves as a series of shortcuts in what is basically a flowchart. Because of this, I lose the mental tug of war that Street Fighter or even fighting games are all about. Rather than catering my style, my attacks, and even my movements to my opponent, I categorize them instead and get my shit kicked in when they do something outside of my flowchart. So, disregarding all that comfort zone crap I was talking about earlier, I still can’t land my combos because I don’t read my opponent well enough to start them. There was an instance where I was playing Juicebox and he walked towards me and correctly predicted that I was going to jump towards him with an attack. He explained to me that his walking forward was actually a way to get me to attack, which is basically a whole ‘nother layer of game that I missed out on. My mind just went “Oh look, he walked forward, I should attack,” rather than thinking why he walked forward. Because of this whole extra layer of play that I’m completely missing out on, I’m a little worried at how exactly I’m supposed to get better at the game. Is this a problem really just solved by playing the game more?

I don’t even feel like this problem is even worthy of being called a plateau. It feels like I was on a certain, fake level of play, and I need to start over at the base of the mountain and get the basics down. To me, the basics were always c.mk xx fireball, but the basics really are just walking backward and walking forward.

That said, I really have no intention of giving up. I’m a little demoralized at the moment, but the reason for this novella of a post is really just to ask for some advice. How should I go about tackling this problem, when the problem is that I flat-out don’t think enough while I play? Does it have to do with not knowing the game well enough, or more to do with the fact that I’ve been practicing alone and online too much? And where should I go from there?

My Friends and Barfights

admin Posted in Blog，Tags: , , , , , ,
13 December 2009
1

The Ranbat season officially ended awhile back, but yesterday (technically 2 days ago) the tournament organizer, Dorion, ran another tournament creatively titled “Barfights.”  It was *surprise* at a bar/restaurant, at My Big Fat Greek Restaurant Express.  I kinda put this entry off all day today, but I might as well get it out of the way before the memory slips from my mind.

Leading up to the event, I had successfully roped Francis, Eric, and Andrew into competing that evening.  They all came over about 3 hours prior to the tournament, and while we had a brief Rock Band distraction with my little sister, we started running some games to practice.  I’ll take a moment to address the person with the best record for that session, Eric.

Eric’s been improving a lot lately, and while I would love to take credit for it and be happy that I taught him how to cancel and do basic combos, those techniques were completely thrown out the window.  To be honest, the same applies to Andrew as well.  I worked towards having them master the art of quarter-circle cancelling, but then they both went and switched to charge characters.  Cancelling into special moves is still indeed possible with charge characters, but I have yet to see a lp xx Blanka Ball or a mp xx Kikouken.  It’s a little bit depressing, but I’m starting to think that it’s better to let them learn on their own rather than force something into their styles.  One thing I’ve found is that their mixups are actually pretty solid against me.  Specifically me, however.  And since at the moment they seem to do pretty well fighting me, that’s sufficient and not enough to drive them any deeper into the game.

That’s where competitions come in, I suppose.  As this was Andrew’s second time, I imagine he knew what to expect, but what I wanted for Francis and Eric was that sense of inspiration that I got after playing living, breathing people who really know what the hell they’re doing.  And, with that inspiration comes the notion that their mixup games tailored for my fighting style simply become easily-broken shenanigans when facing other, more refined  styles.  Then comes the drive to change one’s style to more of a one-size-fits-all kind of thing, which ultimately comes full circle to learning the necessary combos to optimize damage output.  And all of this comes from simply exposing them to other players, and what better way to do that than during a competition?

Francis is a little bit different of a case, as I’ve noticed that he’s quite simply the polar opposite of Andrew and Eric.  His execution is pristine, to say the least.  Nailing jab-sweep links several times in a row during his first tournament match, getting shoutouts for such great looking combos by some of the best players in AZ/the nation.  When it comes to playing in the rest of the match, however, he’s pretty Pringles.  I attribute this to the fact that he just doesn’t play other people enough.  While training mode is definitely a great way to get your combos down to perfection, like he has, you can’t set the training dummy to “Unpredictable, momentum-capitalizing human.”  In particular, I find that his crossup blocking game is weak, as is mine.  I think that this will come with just playing more and learning more of the character matchups and the hitboxes of each move.  However, at the moment, his low defense makes it possible for him to be tricked and outplayed, which hurts him in matches with the other two.

Now that I got all of the dickish comments out of the way, I’ll go back to my original idea of talking about Eric.  Besides the combo problem, his game has improved so much more than I could have ever expected.  I would definitely say that he’s achieved an awareness in the game that I nor any of the others have, where he’s able to read us and make correct, educated decisions while still keeping a heavy defense.  I feel that the moment he decides to start optimizing his offense and really working in combos, he’ll be a very large threat.  It’s incredibly amusing too, after all of this praise, to reveal that he is incredibly apathetic to this whole situation, though.  I’ve learned that his main motivation, unlike mine, is not to get better for himself and to accomplish a win in a competitive environment, but to just stay one step ahead of Andrew.  I believe Andrew considered me his “nemesis” for awhile, but I honestly think that Eric is definitely a much better rival than I am, and if they can keep pushing each other, they’ll probably improve exponentially faster than I will.  Still, the problem with that is that Eric really only desires to stay ONE step ahead, and so he’ll never chase anything on his own unless Andrew raises the bar for him.  It’s almost a symbiotic relationship, really.

Anyway, Barfights.  We arrived a little bit early, got food, and then started to witness some neat casuals.  I met up with another new player named Shane who looked to be in middle school.  He had questions about the tournament format, asked me which one was Sabre, basically all the newbie stuff while holding his 360 pad.

Then I saw him play.

Tick throws, FADCs into Ultra, Super cancels.  He knew what he was doing!  I was so caught off guard that I realized how arrogant I could really be.  Using a stick doesn’t make someone superior automatically.  There are pad players out there who can beat me.  And age!  Age doesn’t really make a difference, at least on that end of the spectrum.

Got to talk to Dorion again and renewed my endless invitation to go over and practice.  While school has kept me and will likely continue to keep me from going over regularly, it’s nice to know that I’m still welcome there after all this time.  Anyway, tournament.

First fight of the night was, sadly, two of my friends against each other.  So, you know what I said earlier about getting them motivated by taking them to tournaments and letting them play different styles?  Nuh-uh.  I went and talked to Dorion about the bracket setup, and while he was happy to oblige, there was a miscommunication and Eric and Andrew started playing against each other anyway.

Then came their match and the button configuration problem that left all four of us (Francis included) with bad tastes in our mouths.  I really wish I had been more thorough in describing them how exactly the button checking process worked, but boy was it a problem for poor Eric.  I got to see the ruthless competitive side of Andrew as he initially denied the idea of stopping the match so Eric could get things sorted, and I got to see a frustrated Eric fighting a match I believe he would have won via wakeup Ultra.  I think the blame can be placed on both parties here, Andrew for misunderstanding what exactly our competitions are like, and Eric for not being able to perform a button check correctly.  I feel responsible for it as well for not explaining either of these points to them as diligently as I should have, relying on whoever their opponent was to do the job for me.  Then, whoops, they get paired up.  And Francis felt responsible too because it was his stick that had the “mystery configuration.”

So Eric got knocked into Losers, Andrew advanced.  I received a bye for the first round.  Francis went up next and fought Eat Paste, who I actually had played in a Gameworks tournament when the game had just come out.  I think it’s safe to say that both Mike (Paste) and I have improved a shit ton since then, but I didn’t get a chance to play him.  Francis did, however, and while he got burned by his crossup problem, he was able to talk to Mike afterwards and get some pointers.  Which he wrote down on a napkin!  That’s what you get when you drop an engineer into a fighting game tournament, how awesome.

While Francis was playing I got called up for my match against ARod-T, who I later learned (again) is named Alan.  He’s a Guile player who I’ve played twice before at Ranbats.  The first time I played him I eliminated him, the second time he eliminated me.  So we had a bit of a friendly rivalry going into our match, haha.  The details of the match kind of escape me, but I know I did some pretty unsafe shit due to me not being accustomed to the matchup.  Crossup burning kicks ate EX Flash Kicks, c.HPs, and worse, Ultras.  I was able to catch him off guard with a wakeup EX Seismo into Ultra, getting a big OOOH from the crowd.  I have to say, our match really received a lot of hype that I was really happy to have a part in.  The first match came down to the wire and I ended up losing it due to a wakeup Ultra and me being an idiot going for a jumping attack.  The next match I don’t remember too well, but I do remember lots of shouting and me winning it.  Then came the last match, where I dominated the first round and got a dizzy, but his stick died right at the end of that round.  So we had to redo some of the match, and he came back and got me for the second round.  Things were looking bad for me in the third round too, until I said “Fuck it” and did a wakeup Ultra.  Which connected.  And then I went for a deep crossup and evaded his own wakeup Ultra, which I was able to punish and win the set and the match.  While that last round was clearly sloppy for both of us, the sheer amount of yelling and hype that the match got really made the night for me, and I was happy with that for the rest of the night.

I’m not really sure which of the four of us played next, but I know my next match was with none other than Dorion himself.  This matchup was not unfamiliar to me, I had played him before and gotten raped.  So I went in with a lot of fear, but in my exasperation at my disadvantage in the character matchup and as a player, I found that I was able to relax easier and just go for broke without worrying about the consequences.  So with that, I played the first set and surprisingly won it with an incredibly lucky EX TK crumple into Ultra, and then a well-placed Seismo for the third round.  This really inspired me, maybe I had gotten better!  …And then I got raped 4-0.  All of my normal Gief tactics went down the drain, such as baiting the Lariat with a neutral jump HK into my SJC FADC combo (He just delayed the lariat to beat my kick) and my Seismo SJC Seismo strings, which were easily dodged.  I talked to Louie and Zaine about the match afterwards, and they flat out told me that I was doing majorly unsafe stuff.  Louie suggested that I do a better job zoning with the Seismos, and Zaine offered the opposite advice saying Dorion’s Gief in particular is too jumpy and to go for anti-airs instead.  So I think I’ve picked up a lot about that matchup, and stealing one set from Dorion really upped my confidence.

Francis and Eric had to play against each other next, to my chagrin.  The match was actually incredible to watch, but it was a shame that not too many were paying attention.  Eric, with a correct button configuration this time, mauled Francis for a good majority of the match, but Francis had a pretty badass comeback culminating in a near perfect round, with jab-sweep combos (Mr. SNK shouted out “NICE LINKS!”) and a Super combo punish.  Eric ended up taking it in the end, however, so Francis was eliminated.  Simultaneously, Andrew was fighting the other Viper player, Zaine, and while I didn’t catch all of the match, I was able to notice Andrew having some difficulties adjusting to a different Viper.  It’s quite an uphill battle when his only experience with the matchup is me and my unsafe tactics, and Viper’s already a tricky character to fight to begin with.

Then came my next fight, against Mr. SNK.  I pretty much got owned at the character select screen.  The only thing that consoled me for my beating on this was a compliment for sticking to my guns and not defaulting to Ryu.  My name’s Jon, my tag’s Tsumuji, and I’m a fucking Viper player.  …Who also gets raped by Hondas, Giefs, and Dictators.

So I was eliminated.  I don’t know who eliminated Andrew, exactly, but I know that Eric lost to a really good Guile player later on.  So our tournament ended, and I feel pretty happy with the results despite netting only one, really hyped win.  I played my best, and the odds were just not stacked in my favor for the last two matches.  I’ll rationalize my losses with the following facts:

  • Viper’s worst matchups are, in this order: Honda, Gief, and Dictator.
  • Dorion is the best Gief in at least Tempe (Probably in AZ, but I haven’t seen Chickenboo lately)
  • Mr. SNK is the best Honda in AZ.
  • Mr. SNK went on to win 2nd place in the tournament, Dorion won 3rd

That said, I’m actually proud that I was able to take away some experience fighting those two, and if I was to get my shit kicked in, I’m glad it’s to such great players.  And the hyped match with Alan had me satisfied, too.

Anyway.  Long post.  Holy shit, it’s nearly 2500 words.  I’ll call it a night here.