Getting Better?

[SoggyWaffulz]

This isn't me looking for guidance on how to get better as much as it is me looking for confirmation about my inner struggle with FFR / SM.

So over the course of my time on this site, I went from being completely horrible as a one handed player to a... decent I guess... 4-finger spread player at both games.

I recently picked FFR back up, and I was worse than I was when I left off, obviously. But I was starting to feel like I was getting better over the course of the past week. I was able to sight-read FC a few 40ish songs, which isn't impressive by any means, but it's a good personal goal I guess.

Problem is, I just downloaded some song packs for SM and MOST of the songs seem way out of my league. Like I'll miss maybe 5-10 on Quasar, which when I was younger I thought that was a difficult song. But in comparison to everything I see on here and everything in these song packs, I'm still super bad.

Question: In order to get better, should I be playing songs that kick my ass, or should I be playing songs that are within my FC range, and playing them until I can FC them constantly? I've been taking the second approach because I hate getting my ass kicked in a song.

I appreciate anyone's input on this. :P

[MikeShinoda12345]

I'd probably recommend you just play the game for fun. It's cliche, but if you focus solely on the goal of improving by avoiding the songs you enjoy playing, you'll burn out and lose interest in the game.

[Hakulyte]

What do you want to get better at?

[SoggyWaffulz]

Originally Posted by Hakulyte

What do you want to get better at?

Y'know, I'm not entirely sure to be honest.

I can read at a fairly decent speed, I play FFR on a 1.825x, SM on C600-C700.
I can read streams pretty well, even with sixteenth notes as long as the BPM isn't ridiculous.

I guess my weak point would be jumpstreaming and jacks / trills. Jumpstreaming because I have a tough time picking those apart from the stream, and jacks / trills because my hand speed isn't quite up to par.

Originally Posted by MikeShinoda12345

I'd probably recommend you just play the game for fun. It's cliche, but if you focus solely on the goal of improving by avoiding the songs you enjoy playing, you'll burn out and lose interest in the game.

This would be true, except I've always been this way about everything I do. Rofl.
Besides, I've been a member for over seven years, if I got too frustrated with getting pooped on I would have retired already.

[foxfire667]

Originally Posted by SoggyWaffulz

Question: In order to get better, should I be playing songs that kick my ass, or should I be playing songs that are within my FC range, and playing them until I can FC them constantly? I've been taking the second approach because I hate getting my ass kicked in a song.

For the most skill gain in a short period of time, you should focus your efforts on StepMania, and play songs that you can typically get an A grade on.

Playing songs at this level will allow for you to get a fairly decent grasp of harder patterns, while still giving you the ability to (for the most part) keep up with the songs you are playing. Of course you will have to play SM files to know their actual difficulty relative to your skill, but the ones you are able to A you should keep a mental note of and try to use them for skill honing. As you start to AA these files, you can look for harder files that were giving you trouble in the past and note your improvement.

That is how I essentially managed my skill-boosting on SM (well, along with playing longer files that drain stamina).

[Xx{Midnight}xX]

To start with you need to train how to read charts first and foremost, if you can't read it the chances of a maggot luck run are really frickin' slim.

Most people here will tell you to download stepmania and play songs that are considered good solid charts. (Pretty much something that's not out of a dump pack)

My advice is to honestly train your reading skills. THEN work on execution. If you train your execution with shitty reading skills, you're gonna teach your brain the wrong way and then you'll have to retrain it to execute properly. Which is a pain.

Also this should stop you from splitting jumpstream like an idiot like myself.

There's a good batch of JS practice courtesy of Icyworld, I just cannot remember the name of it.

[Tristana]

play only midare 1-5
and red fraction + mina megapack 1-3

profit !!!

[DossarLX ODI]

Going to what foxfire said, if you're getting less than an A on stepmania files you decide to play (of course Bs are fine too) you're trying to push yourself to play files more extreme, but start a little easier first.

When I play stepmania I usually play on rates that I can see myself AA'ing on a file. Of course there are other situations where I'm simply looking to get an A or pass. Just keep a healthy balance/mix.

Also -- AVOID AWKWARD BURST CRAP. Play files with patterns more doable than awkward crapgluts.

[SoggyWaffulz]

Thanks for the input guys.

After reading your responses I feel like I've been expecting too much of myself. I feel like there are plenty of times where I can barely read certain sections of a pattern correctly, yet I still rack up repeats on that specific song in an attempt to get the FC. Maybe I should be content with A's for now. :P

Midnight, would the pack you're referring to be the IcyWorld MiniPack?

Final thought - how can I be certain I'm reading the charts correctly? I believe I'm reading them correctly for the most part. I can identify quite a few unique patterns at a fast rate. I just seem to stumble over the transitions. Normal?

Edit: On FFR, no matter the difficulty, I usually have a damn good PA count assuming I don't have to mash the song like an idiot (70+). Like 10 to 1 PA/Good on songs I would consider decently challenging . SM, my FA isn't nearly as good as my PA on FFR though. Just something I thought might be helpful to anyone who knows if there's any correlation between PA & chart-reading.

[xVaLoRx]

Originally Posted by SoggyWaffulz

Midnight, would the pack you're referring to be the IcyWorld MiniPack?

He's talking about Icyworld's Nuclear Blast JS packs

[foxfire667]

Originally Posted by SoggyWaffulz

Edit: On FFR, no matter the difficulty, I usually have a damn good PA count assuming I don't have to mash the song like an idiot (70+). Like 10 to 1 PA/Good. SM, my FA isn't nearly as good as my PA on FFR though. Just something I thought might be helpful to anyone who knows if there's any correlation between PA & chart-reading.

Well the perfect window on FFR translates to 3 frames, or about 1/10th of a second, where as SM's Fantastic / Marvelous window is 0.0225 seconds on it's default (judge 4) timing difficulty. So getting better at FA/MA at StepMania will yield a significant improvement in how well you can hit the arrows in FFR.

Also, FC's don't matter in StepMania, instead accuracy is the major factor of the scoring system. FFR currently uses a system focused around obtaining a full combo to get the most points (which is pretty silly) but for now is how you get the best ranks.

EDIT:

Originally Posted by xVaLoRx

He's talking about Icyworld's Nuclear Blast JS packs

I hope not. Those files are very difficult, and probably wouldn't help him skill boost because of the sheer speed of the JS files (he's talking about FC'ing 40ish files on FFR, the jump would be pretty drastic).

[Tristana]

ffr is a really bad tool to use to improve

you can get 6 years worth of ffr in 6 months of proper stepmania training

[Xx{Midnight}xX]

Originally Posted by xVaLoRx

He's talking about Icyworld's Nuclear Blast JS packs

Yeah that's it

Originally Posted by foxfire667

I hope not. Those files are very difficult, and probably wouldn't help him skill boost because of the sheer speed of the JS files (he's talking about FC'ing 40ish files on FFR, the jump would be pretty drastic).

Yeah and midair packs aren't

The idea is that he's trying to read it, and not score on it. His score is actually really irrelevant

Like he needs to sit down and watch it be played, then he needs to try it and slowly work at passing.

But I also was assuming he was a bit better than his level ranks reflect. The issue is that there aren't any "quality" charts to train on. Like sure there's a million and a half charts made to force mistakes at high speeds ect

But there's not much to learn on that's actually worth playing and won't send you into fits of frustration

We need a training pack guaiz

Originally Posted by Tristana

ffr is a really bad tool to use to improve

you can get 6 years worth of ffr in 6 months of proper stepmania training

Just because it takes longer does not make it a "bad tool" in fact being one judge lower than SM it's actually a fairly good one. The charts are denser in teaching good habits like reading and not splitting and over hitting. You don't get that kind of practice in SM.

Thinking someone cannot become good in a short period of time on ffr vs sm is just something that hasn't been done yet

and not because it isn't doable or sm is "better"

You also run the risk more of dling an off-sync chart or an overwhelmingly bad one on SM than you do playing FFR assuming you know anything about what "legacy" means.

And we're not getting into FFR Charts VS SM ones but sadly, FFR at least has a pretty set in stone set of standards and a very good way of determining what gets in game (Unless you're Jae and put trash in the game)

FFR is just as good a tool as SM in a different skill set

[DossarLX ODI]

Don't use the "1/10th second" statement for FFR because in reality you're mostly aiming in the middle perfect frame, so you really only have 1 frame of leeway outside of it to not get a good or something else.

Also, frame discrepancies, notes are not evenly rounded in a file. Reality for instance has gross frame placements. The 3 perfect frames try to make up for this imperfection in placement.

[Hakulyte]

Do you have any lag? Is there something stopping you to AAA middle range files? I think it would be easier to fix these kind of issues than telling you how to play.

[SoggyWaffulz]

Originally Posted by Xx{Midnight}xX

Yeah that's it
But there's not much to learn on that's actually worth playing and won't send you into fits of frustration

We need a training pack guaiz

I think this is my major concern here.

I can stumble through 300 songs that are all rated 11-12 like an idiot and learn nothing from them. The value in FFR, in my opinion, is that you can start at Dance 2, for example, and then work your way through the pages. MOST songs will be accurately placed difficulty-wise, and so as you're working your way through the pages, you are almost guaranteed to improve.

SM, on the other hand, is like a shot in the dark. Unless someone were to sit down and say, "Play this song, then this song, then this song, then this song, then this song" or refer me to a pack in particular, I'd be wasting a lot of time getting destroyed on songs like SNOW (As far as JS goes).

In my mind, I think "Okay, AA Quasar. Let's try Snow. Nope, just got shit on HARD."

Y'know what I mean?

Edit:

Originally Posted by Hakulyte

Do you have any lag? Is there something stopping you to AAA middle range files? I think it would be easier to fix these kind of issues than telling you how to play.

No, not really any lag. If my high range is in the low 50's and I can comfortably FC songs from 40+, the only reason I can't AAA songs <40 is because I miss the PA here and there. For an FFR example, I can AA Daybreak with nearly all perfects up to the end bit where it includes jumps in the stream. There, I can't read it properly and I'm either forced to mash or break my combo.

[Tristana]

ffr can offer 1/10000th of the variety of files because judging and getting files in is a very strict process

stepmania encourages FreeDomOfExpresSION

just hsmp1-2 have files that are beyond the imagination of FFR standards



ex) one person plays Club and J'ai Envie to practice jacks and such
one person plays Aci-L oni and edit to practice

aci-l oni / edit will crush anything on ffr thats related to jacks

[SoggyWaffulz]

So last night I did a comparison between my playing with and without jumps.

I first played Lovely Lovely Lovely with NoJumps: AA.
Afterward, with jumps: B

Anyone have an opinion on practicing with NoJumps first? Do you think that'd be good for getting up to speed with a song before incorporating the jumps, or would it just set me back in the long run?

Also, clap seems to help my FA count A LOT. I figure that's just preference, though.

[Xx{Midnight}xX]

Originally Posted by Tristana

ffr can offer 1/10000th of the variety of files because judging and getting files in is a very strict process

stepmania encourages FreeDomOfExpresSION

just hsmp1-2 have files that are beyond the imagination of FFR standards

Spoilered due to having little relevance to the op

FFR in it's own right is expression within "defined" standards. SM charts tend to have less notes, but compensate for that via holds. FFR is straight up just hitting as many of the notes as you can sure, but in a roundabout way, that to is an expression for the song. You ca do this in SM, but how often do you see it? It's very very rare, and then on top of that you're having to ignore all the lesser quality charts. But on FFR you also have to ignore songs we cannot get permission for for legal reasons, not because people aren't willing to step the material. ect. This could keep going.

So if you asked me, both of them are equal in "expressiveness." In terms of the charts.

Also getting a chart into FFR is a lot harder than a SM sure. That's honestly a good thing. Despite what I think of the in game charts, FFR has by all technicalities the "highest standards" for charting, so you could say ffr has the best quality charts.

Also: A few charts that I would argue are harder from their HSMP1 counterparts, Reality and Almost There, are in game, so that statement to a degree is wrong outright.

Anyways

Originally Posted by SoggyWaffulz

So last night I did a comparison between my playing with and without jumps.

I first played Lovely Lovely Lovely with NoJumps: AA.
Afterward, with jumps: B

Anyone have an opinion on practicing with NoJumps first? Do you think that'd be good for getting up to speed with a song before incorporating the jumps, or would it just set me back in the long run?

Also, clap seems to help my FA count A LOT. I figure that's just preference, though.

You're using it to train and not to score so playing with jumps off to get a feel of the chart is fine. But if you ever plan on trying to post your scores and strive for the best improvements, you're best off leaving the jumps on. I hate densely jumped charts, but even I force myself to leave them on. Charts play very weirdly without it.

Some people prefer the clap, others don't. It's all preference on that. It's very much like note skins. I've been training lately with using Halvednote noteskin. (Which lives to it's name and makes 8th notes appear as quarters ect.) So I honestly see no issue here.

[Tristana]

lol midnite wat

a ton of sm charts just have straight up notes

ex. shind bad heavy, mswgo, pleasant farmer

but all im sayin is if a person wants to reach the upper echelons of ffr/sm skill, stepmania is usually the fastest way to go lol

ffr files are too easy compared to sm
and the hard ffr files are not too fun because they are hard to AAA thanks to 30 fps flash system (revo, almost there and sht like that)