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Drill

The Losing Streak Mentality

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And hopefully some tips on how to overcome it.

Part of the problem with fighting games is that the players who aren't quite as good get discouraged and end up giving up on a game. I'm sure everyone can agree. But sometimes there's a less severe but still important mentality that ends up rearing it's head to many players time and time again, especially casual.

The mentality of a losing streak.

Everyone has a different limit but pretty much everyone DOES indeed have that limit where after so many losses, they just can't muster the will to try or go on. Let's be honest, most human beings are not The Determinator. I think I can explain what I mean if I talk from personal experience.

I really enjoy Blazblue as a game. The setting and characters are wonderful and no matter how much I suck I'll still enjoy Blazblue. However, I'll go online and my mood will always turn sour.

I've hit level 40 without really maining anyone, something I truly hate because it means I'm always fighting level 50s and such. While I have a match here and there I feel on even terms with the guy, and even rarer a match I win, the majority of the time I lose.

Now losing once is no big deal. I can shrug it off and keep on truckin' so to speak. But when you run into loss after loss after loss, some of which where you are nothing but combo'd to the point you can't move, sometimes losing to a Perfect Match, it begins to build up.

I begin to go into fights expecting everyone to be able to massively combo my ass into paste and expecting defeat. But as time goes on, the defeats just pile up to the point I feel helpless and have little choice but to simply stop playing for awhile.

I think what I'm trying to ask here is that mentality that happens when you hit a losing streak (Expecting to lose, not even feeling like trying, not feeling like you are getting any better) how can you get over that and improve? I love Blazblue and want to keep playing it. I just don't want it to be a chain of overwhelming losing streaks that end up making the game not feel fun.

(BTW: I will admit it feels good to put the occasional Jin 'Ice Car Scrub' in it's place but getting BEATEN by one of them during a losing streak only makes the mood worsen.)

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Warm up in Arcade or Score Attack before going online. Make sure you're on the top of your game before you try to compete against other players. If you're losing and getting frustrated fighting the AI, then don't bother going online - it's only going to frustrate you more. The wins against the AI will help to counteract your losses online as well. Wait until you're in a decent mood to even start playing online.

In terms of how to deal with the losing streaks, everyone finds a different way to handle it. Simply quitting for the night (or even a few hours) once frustration sets in is a good idea. A better idea for you, especially since you consider yourself a casual player, would be to spend more time in Player Matches than Ranked. Plug in a mic, and just have a conversation with the people beating you. The conversation will relax your mind about the game, and most players will give you tips on how to improve.

If you really want to stop losing...pick a main, and practice. Stay calm in your matches, and avoid players with poor connections to yourself; nothing is worse than losing to a poor player because heavy lag causes you to drop the game.

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I find it amazing you only have 5 posts but this one is more productive than half of what some people on DL seem to say XD. As for the main thing, I can't really find the motivation right now. Ragna is basically my placeholder but with CS around the corner, learning someone in CT seems rather unproductive when the game is about to change everything up.

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how can you get over that and improve?

It sounds like you're real new to the genre.

I'm going to copy&paste what I posted for someone on SRK

http://shoryuken.com/f322/best-way-getting-better-241359/

fight other people

Preferably you want a sparing partner, or a group of players you can practice with on a regular basis. Fighting random players online is fine and all, better then fighting no one, but that's too much noise. Especially if you're just starting out. Too many styles, too many players of varying skill levels, not enough chances to experiment against a particular type of opponent. What you want to do with your sparring partner, or sparring group, is to learn how to learn to beat a person. Once you learn how to beat a person consistently, you can use that as a foundation to learning how to beat new people. Once you learn to beat enough people, you'll begin to recognize styles and such and begin to group people, etc, etc, etc

To elaborate more: When you're fresh, you got a million things you could improve on, but you don't want to try to improve everything all at once. You probably don't even know what 2/3's of your problems are. Don't worry about winning or losing. Just worry about improving. Look over your matches and figure out situations you can't beat, or points that could be done better. Pick out one or two things to improve on, and just focus on improving those things. One step at a time. Don't worry about the end result. Worry about righting your mistakes. As you improve, success will follow with it.

Also, what character do you play? (BBCT has some severe matchups.)

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I'm currently playing Ragna. And I know of Rachel and Ara and Nu being top tier. Don't worry, I may be rather new to the genre but I'm not new to BB. It was a day 1 purchase for me. I'm just not too used to 2D fighters like this. Closest thing I've played to a fighter is the Smash Bros Series where I'm a pretty good Marth. I think the issue is I don't have anyone I can LOCALLY play against, basically none of my friends have the game and aren't exactly interested in it. I've played with this one guy on another forum I go to before but sadly not that often.

As for the first person saying I should go in warmed up, if it's anything I went into a long online losing streak where that mentality hit me AFTER, being able to soundly beat said friend in a bunch of Player's Matches.

I feel like I'm in this strange spot. I'm better than a 'noob' as some might be called. I can punish most of those every now and then. However, I'm below most players. Sorta in a strange limbo. Those I can beat are normally not good enough to really improve from fighting. But everyone about me is too powerful for me to last long enough to even try improving.

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You play out of entertainment. Don't play to win. If you want to play to win. Don't play online because many factors do happen to get in the way then what an Arcade atmosphere provide. If your losing to multiple people. Time for a new approach. Learn from someone or start to fix your flaws. If the character is not for you just go ahead and move onto someone else.

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I only get bothered by losing when it is in a game I don't understand. As long as I can tell what happened, frame data helps and so do the character boards. I'll play Tager vs carl/nu allll day no problem...Wait that's a lie. I give up really fast if the rotation is long. Losing is fine it's the Waiting that kills me. I think I was conditioned because I can't remain standing very long, so irl I never really wait for a turn at a machine, I just look for another one so I can sit down.

But yeah your losses should be educational. Just stay calm and keep thinking about what happened and what to do with that knowledge.

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When I was pretty new to blazblue (and probably others) I would always get my ass kicked. If I lost I would just see it as I need to get better ( I'm not a great player). I'm kinda opposed to what KCM said as I believe the only way to get better is to fight actual people online not a CPU or whatever. Learn what people do, learn from your mistakes. Even save some replays of your wins and loses to see what you did right or wrong (even though it may be boring.) Sorry if I wasn't much help.

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Starting out on Blazblue was quite intimidating, as I had hardly played any fighters before it. It took me a few days to even try out online, then after using a free 2 day for Xbox live my brother had lying around, I took a week or so break since I was only winning while playing drive-spam Noel. Hell, I bought the game on Black Friday, practiced for like 8 hours that day, and the next day I had friends come over since I was heading back to school on Sunday, and they were beating my Litchi with Jin and only one of them plays other fighters. None of them had ever touched Blazblue. It was quite frustrating and I almost considered dropping Litchi.

I took a week just practicing combos from the DVD videos and looking at what my high and low at and playing arcade on hell mode. When I was eating a combo I would think about what happened before it. After I had a few combos down, I started playing with my roommate a school a bit. By that point I could beat him easily, so I'd play overly defensive against him to practice blocking. After a while, more of my games online were wins then losses.

Then I went to a tournament and got knocked out in 2 rounds. Good times.

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I think starting when the game was first released help me "level up" skill-wise with the community. Of course there were those worse or better than me, but there were also a lot of new players.

Now, the online community has died down, a lot of folks are playing/waiting for CS and it just isn't as lively as before. The majority of people you find online are seasoned vets at the game.

My first step of advice would be to pick a main character. Look at how pros play in videos, see what they do, see how they react, etc. Learn the most optimal BnB combos you can do. After this you can move on to more advanced combos (counter hit combos, character specifics, etc.)

If you need help with certain matchups you can read the threads here on DL for some advice.

Taking a break now and then is good, there's no point to get overly frustrated with the game. You can save your replays and see WHY you lost - that can be an important step. Watching yourself play again, you can look at the match critically - "Why did I use Hells Fang? Why did I continue the blockstring when I was getting punished for it? Could have RC'd to save myself " etc. Things like that. Learning to block properly, when to IB, barrier, and how to get out of pressure is also important, but that comes with experience.

Taking an extended break from the game can be detrimental to your skill. I didn't play in a few months and now I can barely pull off a TK mixup, CH hit confirm, or DP on the 1p side. So yeah, keep at it regularly, practice your combos in training mode a little if you feel rusty.

Just remember that CS comes out soon, and you may have to re-learn a lot of stuff when it does :) However, experience with the game itself will carry over.

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The first thing you have to do is pick a main. I understand feeling the need to try everybody but you really need to find someone that plays the way you feel most comfortable in. Try everyone at first, even characters you don't find aesthetically pleasing. You may find that Rachel is the character you're best with despite a disdain for loli for example.

As for the losing streak mentality it's simple. Never go into a match thinking there's a 100% chance you're gonna win. Play your best and consider every match a learning experience. If you lose, ask yourself why. Seeing your mistakes and doing your best to fix them will get you started on the road to improvement. Watch some pro videos in your free time and try and practice some techniques you see in training mode. As a Ragna player like yourself I try to watch and learn from Kaqn. What is he doing? What's effective against this opponent? Learn these techniques and learn to apply them. Practice in Training and Arcade to get these moves down then try taking them online in Player Matches. Usually your opponents are helpful and try their best to help you improve instead of the whole "Lol scrub," environment Ranked Games have. The fact that the game isn't ranked will usually lessen your losing rage as well.

The fact that you play Ragna is great because there isn't a lot that's changing about him in CS. Learn him and you'll profit in CS, trust me.

And finally, practice, practice, practice. I can't even begin to tell you how many times I've seen someone's skill suffer because they haven't touched the game in forever. Try and fit in even a single match vs the computer a day. You'll keep chalking up wins, feel better about your skill at the game and feel ready for when you take the fight to a competitive field.

We all have gotten loss rage, that's true. The trick is honestly learning to learn. Learn from your losses, don't let them bring you down. Consider every loss a chance to improve and you'll enjoy the game regardless of your situation.

Edited for clarification.

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A wise man said "If you don't expect to win, you won't win." :psyduck:

It's good to consider every match a learning experience, I've been there. But I honestly think you must have some confidence as well. :kitty:

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@Drillkid31

Dont worry, your not alone. Im in the same boat. Maining Ragna until CS too:psyduck:

Great thread guys. Im still having trouble picking a main in CT. But I think I will find a true main in CS. Damn, I got like, seven potentional mains in CS.

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Alzarath here:

"Never go into a match expecting to win."

Wtf, that's the dumbest shit I've ever fucking heard. GTFO.

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Alzarath here:

"Never go into a match expecting to win."

Wtf, that's the dumbest shit I've ever fucking heard. GTFO.

beat me to it >:O

Seriously though, all these people who rise above to win regionals and majors because they're hungry for the win, not just for "the learning experience"

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I think I sort of experienced the same thing but I don't in my case it's the "I'm gonna lose mentality." I found myself having an odd losing streak of 14 in ranked that made me nuts. But I'm near 50/50 on the norm. Basically, I have multiple people online, mostly in my playing circle (specifically lufenia, miss korgon, and dxmds) telling me I play way too safe, timid, and defensive. I'm new to 2d fighting when it comes to playing somewhat seriously. But they were telling me that I have no killer instinct (no pun intended). Funny thing is since release, they're still telling me the same. Maybe I don't have it in me. I'm one of those lv. 59s with only a 43.2 win ptc. (28.3% in player matches). To me, I'm trying to poke with litchi, setup a CH, establish a medium range game with her, or rush with rag, hit confirm then combo (both), and then mixup on my opponents wakeup. But, I can't find out what I'm not doing.

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beat me to it >:O

Seriously though, all these people who rise above to win regionals and majors because they're hungry for the win, not just for "the learning experience"

You have to be willing to do what it takes to win though. If you don't want to do what it takes and still have an undue expectation of winning then that's just conceit and needlessly enraging yourself.

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Step 1:If you're losing a lot just calm down and relax and go back to training mode and train with friends while blaring this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLuOl36vamI

Step 2: After that get into some real matches while blaring this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fWvub_WBho

Step 4: ?????????????????????

Step 5: PROFIT.

Arisato-kun is right though and so is Genowhirl. You just need to balance the two. Go into a match with the most positive attitude you can. If you feel like you're gonna win your chances of winning are higher. If you feel like you're gonna lose your chances of losing are higher. Although if you get too cocky about winning you will let yourself be sloppy or try showing off too much which can often result in a lose for you. Also if you're so obsessed with winning and if it is constantly going through you're head it will cloud your head somewhat more for what to do in the moment.

And if you lose, just learn from it. Don't moan about it (Have fun about it! act like a drama queen yelling NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! in a funny way etc.) and take it as a positive lesson for next time. In a big tournament this can be harder to take, but the similar applies.

Really, all of this is different for different people. Although in general I think most of this can apply.

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Alzarath here:

"Never go into a match expecting to win."

Wtf, that's the dumbest shit I've ever fucking heard. GTFO.

It's good to have confidence man but I've seen overconfidence lead to many more fuck ups. You should play your hardest regardless of the match and not let overconfidence be your downfall. That's what I meant by that. :/

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stop playing online...seriously I literally stopped taking it seriously online.

get friends play offline, online is for scrubs real talk.

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Online is only for desperate people, who, like me, have literary no one to play against offline. And if you want to be good at BB it sux major balls. Learn not to take it seriously or not to play it at all. And trust me, 80% of rage induced by losing streak is solely the fault of online mode. When I played against people ofline in GG I could have as much as loosing streak of 50 matches and never lost motivation to play, while online in BB I get angry after 5 loosees or so.

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I used to be good at this game, but I've given up all hope on ranked matches. I do better in player than ranked now. I don't feel motivated anymore.

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