The Replay and Analysis Thread

I don’t remember where they said that, but if they did say that somewhere, then yes they were mistaken.

Keits, I’m certain, on stream - as others have said.

Thank you. Without posting any of my replays, I will take this to heart as it’s basically my problem (Aria / Mira player)

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@declimax My problem isn’t not blocking, but letting it go. I clearly blocked, but unknowingly pressed buttons that canceled it. My reflexes work against me. I need to retrain them.

What you’re describing is what people that play fighting games refer to as “not blocking.” I.E. doing something other than blocking.

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Fine, if you want to be that way, then I held the input for a block and it got cancelled due to a press of another button, which constituted an errant attack, so the block never occurred during the opponent’s counter-attack. Mind you, this doesn’t change the fact that I had a good read and TRIED to block.

Watching the clip, the inputs show a throw, but I get hit so early, there was never any other sign of a throw, so you must at least see where I’m coming from in the moment while I was confused as to what’s happening.

I proclaim often what I observe mid-match, much to others’ chagrin, but that doesn’t mean that I can possibly observe everything or that what I observe is even correct. I know what I know and that’s what I share. It’s up to you guys to take it from there.

Waking up pressing buttons is not blocking. You can’t say you had the read when you clearly were doing common wakeup defensive options (mashing light and throw tech.) If you want to wake up blocking you just hold down back, those inputs are not accidents. I think that in your mind, “my read was a mistake” becomes “my execution was a mistake.” If you can’t own your mistakes and learn from them you will never progress as a player.

I have more to say but I’ll save it for after you play that set with storm. Will it be streamed?

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OMG. I wasn’t attacking on wake-up. I was blocking, and THEN cancelled it with a reflexive button press that I had no control over as he attacked, so I got punished!

I intended to do 1 thing, tried to do it, was successful for a fraction of a second, then due to an input error from reflexive conditioning the block failed. The inputs clearly show the direction of a block right before the throw.

You keep trying to tell me what happened when I already know. I, on the other hand am not denying that I messed up - I’m only trying to explain it to you.

Geek, how often have you held down-back for 5 seconds with no intention of ever pressing a button or trying to tech a throw on wakeup?

I think what the others are trying to say is that you need to do this more often. You “accidentally” pressed a button which “canceled your attempt to block” because you very rarely plan to block for 2 or 3 full seconds after wakeup.

You say you need to “retrain your reflexes” but I think it’s more of a mental thing than a reflex thing.

Well, for starters, most good players hold block on wakeup regardless of whether they actually intend to block or not. So your inputs showing down or down-back don’t really indicate intention to me, they indicate normal behavior for someone playing a fighting game. I think if you look at my last 10,000 wakeups, I will be inputting block all the way up to the decision point on 9,995 of them.

And yeah, you’re right that you press a button reflexively, but I think you need to try to analyze the source of this reflex, which is that mentally you want to take control back with buttons rather than defense. If you want to cure the reflex, I think you need to think more about what successful blocking looks and feels like, and why a player wants to do it.

For example, you say you are miffed when someone blocks your light payload / overhead ND mixup thing, but… really, this isn’t difficult at all (it’s not a strong mixup). It comes easily to someone who is focused on blocking and has his fingers off the attack buttons, with no intention of pressing them. It’s a person who is satisfied playing defensively and is willing to study what his opponent does on offense, without trying to wrestle control back yet.

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While I understand that my blocking on wake-up has room for improvement, I am proficient at doing so. You even see it once during the match! Granted this match is a bad example to show my point, but that only upsets me more because the 2nd match that was corrupted really did go much better, block on wake-up and all. Besides, most of his wake-up attacks were with CotE, so blocking in this instance wouldn’t have helped anyways.

Okay. I wish you luck, friend.

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My friends who have played with me can verify that I am a proficient blocker. I don’t need your approval.

Also the very idea of “having the fingers away from the attack buttons” is entirely foreign to me, as that’s where my fingers naturally rest on the controller - and it’s what allows me to go on the offensive at a moment’s notice, which is the whole point of FGs. I can’t defend my opponent to death!

*looks back at the last 15 non-Geek posts * Indeed, I see this verification clearly.

And, like clockwork, my attempts to give sincere advice and philosophical food for thought have turned into you turning antagonistic. So, until we do this again in a few days Geek, have a good night.

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You have clearly demonstrated that you aren’t. Geek, if you’re not going to take feedback to heart I have to question why you’re even posting your replays.

Vs many online players, you can. If you just wait and block, most people will do something stupid and punishable, like full screen natural disaster.

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Many of the people on these forums are not friends. I count few here as actual friends. Most of you are associates at best. I can count my actual friends in this community on less than 1 hand. Some of them have even given up this site due to how they’ve been treated by many of you. It’s a miracle I haven’t yet.

(one last comment quick) I was speaking somewhat metaphorically, of course. I don’t expect you to take your right hand off the controller, nor to move your thumb so they are not resting on the buttons. What I mean is, mentally, you have no intention of pressing the buttons, so it’s like they don’t exist in your head for about 2 or 3 seconds. Your “I can’t defend my opponent to death” and “I want to go on the offensive, which is the point of FGs” says a lot to me about why you reflexively press buttons when you are being pressured.

Ahh, always the charmer.

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@DEClimax I am listening. I specifically used the word proficient, because it doesn’t mean great, just good enough. Besides, do you really think anyone here who shares a losing match looking for advice is going to really be great in any real sense of the word? If so, you’re kidding yourself.

Most matches, my blocking is fine. I’m sorry you guys don’t believe me, but it’s not your confidence that I need.

Yeah, light AD’s are reactable (particularly if you’re looking for them). It’s light linkers where you know someone is guessing.

Per your request and looking mostly at Hologram (who is a very good player), I can honestly say that I don’t think he did anything special. If anything, some of his oki choices (those meaty sweeps especially) are fantastically punishable if you’d just decided to block. He basically just won the neutral repeatedly by being more patient than you, and then mauled you into oblivion with resets once he got in close. The latter is fine, because command grab characters are super dangerous in KI if someone is inclined towards resets. The former is where you really lose fights for the most part though.

The command grabs after your instinct were basically just good reads. People like to do things after their instinct activation, and Aganos players with a club really like to represent that grab. So Hologram did nothing because he knew you were jumpy and would activate defensively, and then raw command grabbed and shadow command grabbed you respectively. Raw Thunder grab takes forever and a day and so stomps all over every other command grab in the game (and yours isn’t throw invincible, just so you know), and shadow COTE is so fast and so far that at that range he was basically guaranteed to hit unless you backdashed (lol) or jumped immediately after activation. I do something similar with Sako sometimes. It’s a good way to negate someone’s instinct activation.

But yeah, for the most part, he didn’t actually do anything special, and a lot of his oki is actually punishable to someone who’s focused on blocking as they get up.

I expect people posting replays here to do so with the intention of improving their play. You are rejecting feedback on the core flaws in your ability to play, which tells me that you aren’t posting with that intention.

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Peacemaker grab is regular throw invulnerable, but can be beaten by other command throws. If a regular throw appears to tech with Aganos’ peacemaker grab (which is a CG), it’s because it’s the golem teching their throw and not the other way around. This has been said by the devs.