Learning how to play against the player, and not the character

[stickystaines]

To start with, i wouldn't really call myself a beginner and this is probably not a beginner oriented subject, but i feel it represents a significant stepping stone in improving yourself as a player once you get passed learning the game and your character. Also this applies to pretty much any game so i don't see the use of sticking it in a specific sub forum, but i'm hoping for people to provide specific examples from different games to try and emphasize how this concept takes place in different games and what kind of things change when you play other games.

 

I think you can get pretty far in fighting games with just learning how the game works, learning what your character can do (combos, tools, move properties, movement etc) and learning matchups against your specific character. This is especially extenuated in air dasher games at a mid level, since usually you are given the freedom to just play your characters game a lot of the time, whether that game style be a zoning one, a mixup heavy one, one that relies on oki and set play scenarios etc. Eventually, as you play better and better players, you are going to have to break out of a lot of the auto pilot tendencies that players tend to pick up since a lot of the time, the standard play works against most people you fight. Now if you play a friend, or someone else that you play a lot with, you might - consciously or subconsciously - build up a mental map on how this person likes to play this character. This results in what seems like a lot of hard call outs against them that you otherwise wouldn't really do against someone that you haven't played before.

 

With this thread I would like to try and abstract what goes on in the process of learning to play against a specific player and try to learn some techniques for exploiting player tendencies and generally how to adjust your style to match your opponent - and how to do this as quickly as possible since you may only play the opponent once, or if you are in a tournament setting, possibly only 2/3 games; so learning how to adjust as quickly as possible becomes crucially important. I feel like this topic is talked about a lot when describing efforts to improving your game, but never goes into any real depth. "Adapting to your opponent" seems like a common phrase, but how to systematically approach how to do such a thing is rarely explored. I'm hoping some high level players could provide some insight into their attitude when they fight someone new.

 

The easiest place to start with this i feel is, funnily enough, the start of the round. The reason because:

1) You are both in a fixed position every time this occurs

2) Generally limited options at the start of the round, making analysis easier

3) You have a lot of time to think about what your opponent is going to do. Before the hectic nature of being in a middle of a match, you can focus in on what exactly your opponent is doing and store it away for future rounds.

 

However since it's limited to the start of the round, it doesn't come around too often, but if you play larger sets against people then this is a common hole to exploit.

 

What's more interesting i think though (and much harder) is to start analysing and adjusting mid match. I would like to know what kind of things top players do when playing their character to try to draw some information out of their opponent. So a simple example for me might be with Jin: you could dash about and do 2AA and see how he reacts. Whether he will try to up back out of pressure, or try for a pre-emptive throw since 2AA is a common tick, or will try to press a button to start some counter pressure, or try to dp/backdash through gaps. Simple example but illustrates how to try to go about getting some info out of your opponent. Are there other techniques that people like to use in a similar fashion? That Jin example was about your opponents defensive tendencies, but what about their offensive tendencies? Rather than tailor to a specific opponent, is it easier to assume that groups of player traits naturally occur together? i.e. if a player likes to dp on wakeup, they are more likely to X, or if a player likes to barrier jump out of pressure, they are more likely to Y and then try to fit players into groups that way?

 

It's a rather open discussion, but concrete examples from people's most comfortable game is welcome.

[Kikirin]

A few (lengthy) potentially-useful videos.

 

Ultradavid / James Chen:

Adaptation - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAFRXSuMEjI

Reading your opponent - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpGmHgGPJSM

 

LordKnight:

Reading opponents - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZwO3XLg-FA

[Sashi]

Round start dp.

[TD]

Besides knowing the system mechanics, your character, and matchups, the simplest thing one can do is keep track of every meter on the screen. It will allow you to deduce why you should be able to do this, or why you think the foe will do that.

Always believe your decision will work and always ask why if it doesn't doesn't pan out as expected. If you have confidence in your decisions, it will be easier to justify the reasoning behind your stance. Sucessfully figuring out why many of your attacks connected, or why you got hit will lead to accurate reads later. Even if one cannot think of a correct answer, the key is to simply think about what went wrong in a cold, calculating way. Thinking and trying is training. The wrong answer, basically, is saying, "I don't know". Every scenario in every game has a solution. Whether said scenario can be prevented before it happens or during, can vary greatly depending in the characters, players, and resources.

Knowing matchups is key, you don't really want to be confused in the neutral game because this is where all pain begins. The same concept can be said about system mechanics, which I think go hand in hand with everything. System mechanics can basically he referred to as fundamentals, the very atoms in the body of fighting game knowledge. Manipulating the atoms correctly results in the body walking fluently or what have you. Undocumented system mechanics would include spacing, timing, and good reads.

So I've explained a bit on why I think having a great overall knowledge of both the game and characters is paramount to comprehending and predicting the foe. There are plenty of small lessons and learnings that need to happen before one gets to this stage of reading the foe, and these skills do indeed tend to carry over to other fighting games, because the theory is the same: use the mechanics, knowledge of the character and resources to reduce the opponents health to 0.

So if one is already at this point, what then?

Be tricky. Sort of vague yes, but it varies by character. Someone who has played the game a long time will know what each character's autopilot strings are and be able to sniff it out. Even games with complete Gatling freedom like unib has autopilot strings. But this is not a mistake of the game. Humans have tendencies to fall into patterns. It's just that an experienced player has seen more patterns as well as has answers to them, and they block your mixup that has been working on scrub#4873 all day, or getting dp'd out of an airtight string - oh, you didnt know that string had a hole with instant block, did you?

Humans also play off of emotions. I like to put myself in the foes shoes often. "So I won a game, and his life is low, and he has been playing intensely this whole match. But he is about to lose. Would he burst? Would I burst of I were in his shoes? How would I be feeling?" Or, "he can't seem to play his oki correctly, I keep escaping. Would I be frustrated in this situation? How easy is this character's oki? Did I just guess right or did he just screw up? Should I bait his burst?" (Emotions are tied heavily with bursts in games that have them, I feel. One shot to make it count is nothing to scoff at.)

I have a million more things to say on a subject like this. It's one I could talk about for hours. But this is enough. Just remember that humans are highly intelligent beings even when not playing right, at their best, or whatever. One can always learn on the fly. What separates top players in a game from lower skilled players is simply knowledge and execution, as well as a bit of strategic dabbling into the human psyche.