GetTheTables

I will say something that I have found fairly refreshing is the variety of skill levels out there. Playing such an established game I sort of expected it to be nothing but killers - and I definitely run into way more people who have a lot more experience than me than not - however there is a decent spread. Guess that is a nod to how much the updates they are putting in are paying off. And potentially what the general thirst level looks like for Strive.

Yeah that was a great change. They're basically ironing out all of the things that slow down getting matches in so you can just machine gun those motherfuckers. Feels good. Unfortunately looks like today isn't going to be a good day for matches. Schedule is funkier than I hoped. Shoot for Weds, bout the same time?

I feel as if my points are being slightly misrepresented. 🙂

That has been the track I've been taking. Not that it is new info but it really clicked with me watching a bunch of vids on Sajam's channel of him trying out new games. He really emphasized learning some basics in training mode then getting out there and actually play games. I found that to be a really helpful approach for two big reasons that have always dogged me with FGs: 1) You don't actually know what you don't know. When you are legit new to a game you aren't going to know what you really should be practicing, and you don't have a lot of questions to answer aside from basic stuff like "what are my movement options?", "what are my special commands?", "what is a basic BnB?" But (and I'm just repeating what I've heard a million times) training mode is for answering questions and refining stuff. Without having played matches you don't really know what questions you even have and although you can refine stuff, that can lead to.... 2) Training Nirvana Paralysis. One thing that I am working to overcome is the temptation to spend the time I have that I can dedicate to FGs grinding away on the same stuff over and over. Waiting until I'm really "ready" before I play matches. This always fails because not only am I just building up the anticipation of success or some version of it when I do go online (making it inevitably more stressful), but playing matches against real people and trying to apply anything is such a different beast that (again stealing a Sajam vid topic) you can look at online matches as just another training mode. Its the actual application step that it feels like you are doing in training mode by practicing something over and over, but its sort of like practicing curling weights on empty air and then expecting that to translate into curling 50 lbs. Not saying training mode isn't useful or important. But like I keep telling myself to shake that nirvana syndrome: you can't get better at playing the game without actually playing the game. Nowadays I try to limit extended training mode sessions to either when I have specific stuff I want to lab or days when I'm just not going to get enough time to play matches the way I'd want to. Or when I'm fucking exhausted. 😄

"Interesting" alright. 👀 I respect the implementation of her lime green on what little costume was available.

Yeah we could definitely give it a go. East Coast US so about the best you can hope for with a connection. Weekends are vastly more open. During the week I'm trying to set aside time from around 4pm EST to 5ish depending on the day and circumstances to play. Just to stay consistent. Upside is that +R is a really fast game in every aspect so even in a smaller time window its possible to play a lot. Also if you didn't check it out, the new lobby set up they beta'd this weekend was pretty rad. I am a huge fan of how Player Quick Match plays with that set up. Basically just non-stop +R matches until you leave the room (though I was maybe on at an ideal time).

Never too late for +R. 😉 The game is intense and its a fucking shark tank out there but it is a lot of fun and thanks to it being old it loads fast as hell. In the beta they ran this weekend they basically took the Player Quick Match and turned it into a gigantic endless lobby which was amazing. I played pretty much non-stop for almost 2 hours. I can't wait until they roll out a full version of that and if Strive didn't have it's goofy avatar based system I'd hope for the same thing there (though the parks are kinda sorta the same thing but slower). It is hard to emphasize how much better a FG is when you can go from match to match in like 20 seconds. I totally get what you mean about not wanting to lab something because you know another thing that will demand your time is coming. Honestly that is what got me to fire up +R in the first place: I wanted to actually get some GG legs and it has working rollback. I will say that while it is a motherfucker of a game a lot of the time I feel like it is going to help a lot when Strive drops. +R is lightning fast, absolutely filthy, and has negative no buffer on the controls so if you can hack it in that game you can hack it anywhere. All that said, if playing on the PC is a pain in the ass, totally understand just giving it a pass. We aren't that far off from Strive after all. But if you ever want to give it a go just lemme know.

I hear ya man. I think you hit the nail on the head with the assessment though: if the game isn't fun to play and compelling it is really hard to justify spending the time it takes to build up skill in it. Compound that with real life stressors and it is legit a better life choice to lean into something else. Like you I don't particularly enjoy playing SFV against random people. Its fun with the folks here but that is a given. Pretty much the whole time I played outside of that I was kind of forcing myself to which isn't a good thing for sustainability. Contrast that with when we've played Xrd or when I've been playing +R recently. I end those sessions wanting to lab stuff or hop right back in, even after getting smashed (I think I went like 1-29 today or something that bad). Not saying that +R or Strive will do it for ya. More that, yeah if you aren't feeling it definitely just do something else. Maybe you'll cycle back "on" or even if not there are a ton of MP games we can engage with.

NGL "I-No Who I Am" is pretty strong. Also @Laughingmanmy schedule is kinda funky but I'm trying to play a bunch of +R before Strive drops so if you ever want to get games in we can definitely try to set that up. That goes for anyone on here really.

Yeah one of the nicest things about +R being the way it is (and them continuing to work on it) is that it's just...there. If Strive doesn't jive, the servers are down, or you just miss the feel of that game you can really easily go back to it and it's very playable in the current environment (i.e. functional rollback). Not a lot of series have that luxury with subsequent retail releases (not immediately subsequent since Xrd is still sorta left hanging). I'm very interested in seeing how I-No turns out in Strive. I'm kinda side eyeing her as a choice due to her lore of all things (also dig her redesign and hey tiddies). Speaking of lore vol 4 is up:

Yeah I've been very pleasantly surprised at how often people are around in +R. There hasn't been a time yet where I haven't been able to find people to play. Though yeah you definitely run into some killers out there. At least when I see someone who has played 5000 matches I don't have an illusions about how the match is going to go. 😆 I went the opposite route: although broadly Strive is similar +R is enough of its own beast that I wanted to pick a character that I was interested in specifically for that game. Went with HoS since he hasn't (and won't) be in another game and it's a good way to get me to engage in the aggressive side of the game.

Good problem to have. 😉 That's a fun cross section of play styles too. Nice way to keep it fresh.

Give em hell and heels Skort. Skullgirls (Panty Mahvel) is on sale for $10 on Steam for anyone interested. I'll probably grab it to fuck around with it.

May have been s3 yeah. I remember a patch coming out with a lot of Cammy teeth gnashing but a lot of the specifics are starting to get fuzzy. Like you I just kinda remember the online Cammy % dropped a bunch and I think right around then Karin went up. That was the trendy switch. Smash cut to Doctrine Dark blowing people up with Cammy for another 2 years.

Aside from regular 'ol player jitters I think that is thanks to when VTs come online. Having to eat her basic mix up is scarier when you're in a one touch/throw situation (or risking corner throw into snowball death which admittedly used to be a lot worse). Not unique to her or like its anything crazy but that has a tilt factor. There also is usually a Cammy Renaissance every season so maybe its just people realizing/remembering that she can be a dick even if she is a boring dick. Freely admit I'm out of touch with the match up. Last time I fought Cammy was probably S4 which I think was her patch review low point.

I'd say she is actually one of the ur-VT characters. VT1 dive kick gets you in and if you don't use it for that it adds solid damage. Its a 2 bar so even on a low health char you can probably see two of them with CCs (and its really easy to burn through the first one so you can build the second one faster). And she has the golden pair of 3f normal + EX DP so she doesn't have to lean on V gauge for outs if she doesn't want to. She doesn't hit the high-highs of Urien Twitter clips - actually her VT1 is pretty boring in terms of flash and everyone has seen it so much they can clap the rhythm of VT1 DP by memory - but don't let her buttcheeks distract from how beefy her VT1 is, was, and always will be. Like Sonero said in a lot of ways she is the ideal SFV character.

Yeah I remember the convos from real early on about Cammy and it has all held true for however many years. She's like a footsies trilobyte. Came out pretty much perfect in S1 and has stayed aggravatingly consistent the whole time. I think what is tilting people more than anything else is having to deal with VT1 activated for the 9 millionth time.

Others have covered it but regarding Cammy: if she's carrying people then someone like Bison must need back surgery. Maybe that is why he walks so slow in this game?

So close (SoR4 online) yet so far (2P only online). 😭 At least Mystara is 4P? Ideally if we could get ahold of AvP that'd be perfect: it is 3P and it is also if not the GOAT definitely arm wrestling all competition for the title.

I hear ya man. This group is the only reason I've been fucking around with the PC version of SFV. If anything will get me to boot that up again it is the opportunity to play with people here. You know I own pretty much everything so whenever you get time, hit me up.

Shows you how much I actually use discord. 😄 I would have figured it out eventually...

Which discord 🙃 Thanks man, probably won't have time to mess with it until closer to the weekend but when it looks like I'll have time I'll let you know.

Thanks all. Just to clarify: the stick works just fine for the most part. Haven't had any issues with it in +R and the little bit I've tried in SFV, feels fine. My issue is, again, little and dumb: I don't have a button that maps to "Enter" so once I get into training mode I don't have a way to bring up the menu without leaning over and hitting the keyboard like some kind of Neanderthal. 😉 Ran into the same thing with +R but that game lets you remap the "menu" button so I had an easy workaround. For SFV, not an option in-game. I think I can do it in the Steam controller config but then I noticed that the Share/Option buttons don't seem to work (PS4 or PC mode) so I can't use those as I'd like. Worse comes to worse I'll stick it on R3 or something like that. Just wanted to see if I was missing something. Edit: Also for the record it is an Obsidian.

Since SFV is on sale for $8 I wanted to try to get it running on my PC. For whatever reason, this time I was able to get it up and running at 60 with minimal fuss. So that is neat. Would still need to buy the CE upgrade to really be able to play but at least the base client is cooperating now. Also it is kinda funny seeing so many goddamn shopping carts during stage/char select. One question to any PC players here: does anyone use a PS4 stick to play on PC? I'm running into a tiny bit of configuration jank that I was wondering if there is a legit work around for, or if I'll just have to live with it.

@KingTubb @MattatsuSo I didn't know that the Chronicles of Mystara collection is available on Steam. $5 right now with the sale. If anyone buys in we can run some classic beat 'em up shenanigans to stay fresh until the SoR4 update drops. I'm buying that shit tomorrow, thought that was forever locked to my Xbox (RIP).