#I am drowning in every match I play, severely need help

78 messages · Page 1 of 1 (latest)

jagged hollow
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If you're reading this, hi. My profile name in Rivals 1 is Pza and I'm a very stubborn Elliana main.

I began playing both Rivals 1 and 2 over a month ago in December '24 and I've been really trying to put in an effort to play the game well, especially Rivals 1 since I want to wait until 2 gets more updates. As somebody who has committed myself to games like Smash Melee for years on end, I was always curious about Rivals ever since first seeing trailers for it in 2015. I never actually got around to playing it though until recently. I wanted to pick up a new fighting game that isn't Smash or Tekken, so here I am.

Since last month, I've been playing frequently and there are things I do enjoy. Getting the advantage in a neutral trade is rewarding, juggling opponents is fun, and I like how the hitfall mechanic works. Gamemodes like endless abyss and tetherball are also fun to replay if I just feel like screwing around. I only have about 43 hours in by now, but most of my recent playtime has been spent doing online casual matches (since ranked seems to take forever to match with somebody).

As a new player, I understand that there is inevitably going to be a struggle. I just began playing a game that's been out for almost a decade now, so of course the players I'm matching with are going to be experienced. Even with that said, I've been feeling very frustrated with this game due to the sheer number of times I've lost. I feel like I can't do anything whenever I take control of my character. Case in point, my current winrate is around 7%.

Aside from consistently playing matches online, prioritizing using certain moves like Elli's missile and mine more often, switching between zoning and rushdown, timing hover into overheat strongs, switching up my neutral game movement and DI, and studying my character's frame data, I've also watched high level matches in my free time (shoutouts to Sparx21, excellent Elli player). Otherwise, I feel lost. What the hell do I do?

gray cairn
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@jagged hollow My first question is HOW do you pronounce your tag?

proper glen
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Play the game with the intent to learn rather than to win

jagged hollow
jagged hollow
proper glen
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That's what I did

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And still do

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What are some things you struggle with?

proper glen
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But either way trying to focus on individual elements of a gameplan is a good way to learn

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Might not work for everyone though

jagged hollow
# proper glen What are some things you struggle with?

Heya @proper glen, I wanted to say thanks for the feedback earlier. I know you were mentioning it'd be better not to focus on too many things at once, but I honestly feel like there's a plethora of different things that I'm struggling with. My movement feels slow, I lose a lot of trades in neutral even when I feel like I'm spacing myself properly with moves like nair bair or dtilt, and when I do get a juggle going I get uno reverse card'd by the opponent and they start comboing me instead. Also anytime I create an offstage situation I feel like my punish tools don't work (even connecting a sweetspot n special or getting an overheat f strong doesn't kill).

jagged hollow
proper glen
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Willow is our resident Elli player, he could probably help

jagged hollow
jagged hollow
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Since I made this post earlier today, I've decided to try focusing on one thing at a time. Right now I'm finding ways to mix more airdodges into my neutral as it gives a good burst of movement. Having played Melee for so long, I've been naturally avoiding using airdodge since in Melee it just leaves you helpless in the air. The fact that you can do all of your air options out of airdodge in Rivals is something I underestimated.

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What I noticed I was struggling with in my recent sessions today is trying to parry things. I believe that parry in Rivals 1 is active between frames 3 to 10 and isn't instantaneous, but there's times where I swear I pushed the button before intercepting an attack and it just didn't work, even though my character's sprite was mid-flash. Rollback issues maybe? (I play with default rollback settings so I dunno) This is just me complaining, but the fact that parry is designed not to work the moment you push the dodge button on the ground just feels weird. I prefer how Rivals 2 also gives you a regular shield button so I can just throw something out by default to defend without needing to guess while in footsies range.

exotic finch
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Especially for a character like Elli that can have a lot of presence on stage without it

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the other thing is that getting hit in the air after having used airdodge doesn't let you get it back until you hit back the stage

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Which, as elli, can mean basically death

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If you really want a burst of movement in the air to approach your opponent, I recommend you learn how to play around platforms with your character

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Get used to your platdrop aerials(aerials out of dropping from a platform), platboosting(running off a platform a ledge lets you keep some more momentum then you usually would), wavelanding and waveland cancels(cancelling your waveland by dropping of the platform in the middle of it), ect.

exotic finch
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Parry acts a bit more like a defensive option in that game since you'll mostly use it out of shield on people mashing on your shield(cough cough, zetter)

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On the other side... there's rivals 1

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Rivals 1, doesn't have shields, and parry being fast makes it a great option to react to projectile throws and as a read for people pressing a button in some spot(and other different usage not related that much to defense lol)

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So it leaves you with your one/best option to get away from your opponents or to create opportunities to approach: Movement.
Being in movement in this game is very important because of the lack of shield, and because of how important whiff punishing is.
No shields means that you can use it to call unsafe/reckless approaches, nor that you have anything to protect yourself in the corner or in threatening situations

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Which means that making sure that you don't play in those situations is usually a big part of how well you'll do

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The other important part is whiff punishing,
Whifflag existing as a mechanic(whiffing causes you more lag(still lets you autocancel some moves) but on hit gives you less) means that whiffing in this game is a lot more costing then in other games
That doesn't mean people can't whiff or throw out moves, but it does make it easier for when someone is moving around well to punish those options

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Which is why it's important

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Now, that is kinda just the tip of the iceberg, but that is a pretty important part to understand to get to do well in this game

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Obviously, now you have to incorporate this, to how your character plays

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And then you have to know how other characters play around the game, and how that affects how they will play you

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But, again the whole point is to take it slowly but surely

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You can go at one thing at a time but eventually you'll have other questions and other situations that'll come rise up
So people say "take one thing at a time" but really they're saying: "You will start with one thing on your mind and that thing will become 5 different other things kinda related to it"

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Which is not a bad thing, it's by asking yourself those questions, and trying to find answers that you develop your knowledge

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And knowledge in any competitive game, is power

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Damn that's a lot of words.

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Have fun with that

jagged hollow
proper glen
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Wavelands and wavedashes are very important and very fast, good for a lot of things

jagged hollow
jagged hollow
exotic finch
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Yeah.

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pretty much that

exotic finch
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Your character is more of a zoner tho, so the whiff punishing part plays a tad bit less of a role
But that department is a bit of my zone since I'm very familiar with Elli

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So @wheat jackal would probably know more about that then I do

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The important part is to remind yourself that the gameplay of each character is different, the way use movement, plats, and what their tools allows them to do is different, so some things working for other characters might not work as well for Elli, even if they're basic part of gameplay for most

jagged hollow
exotic finch
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I think you should just show it here

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There might be some things people can pick around that aren't just related to Elli

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or are just very common knowledge stuff that could help

jagged hollow
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Understood, thanks for the feedback!

wheat jackal
exotic finch
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TLDR:
unrelated yap you don't care about for 20mins

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And then like me asking for you to help them with how elli works on whiff punishing, if she does any

foggy parrot
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if you want feedback about the games we played earlier i can probably give you some general direction to work on

wheat jackal
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Short hop missile is kinda slow though, so you often either have to do it preemptively or cover their movement after the whiff

foggy parrot
# foggy parrot if you want feedback about the games we played earlier i can probably give you s...

I'll just say it while it's fresh in my memory, this is a thread anyway so it's easier to go back and scroll through people's messages

When we played it looked to me like you were entirely focused on your own gameplan & character, and not on anything i was doing at all

We played around like, 25 or 30 games I think. I was drastically changing my playstyle throughout the session once I started thinking you weren't really looking at my character, to see how you'd respond to it, but there was no adaptation made.

I think it's fine to have your own like, "layer 1" gameplan that you get good at, and consistently execute when you get the hits you're looking for. But you need to be able to look at your opponent, see and react to what they are doing.

I noticed you kept fishing for parries as well so I kept adjusting my timings to throw you off, that might be why you felt weird about it.

Though we were East to WC, and there were a couple times my own parries got rolled back, so that might have happened to you a couple times.

Tl;Dr though, I think probably focusing harder on your opponent will help you out.

jagged hollow
# foggy parrot I'll just say it while it's fresh in my memory, this is a thread anyway so it's ...

Yeah, I know I need to focus on my opponent’s side of the screen, not just my own. I did pick up on how you were using way less projectiles with Mollo later on and I was trying to go for more parries, even if I didn’t really connect them the way I was planning. I don’t really have any matchup knowledge or knowledge about each character’s strengths and weaknesses right now, so I’ll focus on that more. Thanks again for the games last night and for the constructive feedback too!

jagged hollow
foggy parrot
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The best way to think about parries is if it's not to reflect a projectile, it's to call someone out on a habit

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or you've got a pretty solid read on them.

wheat jackal
rough sedgeBOT
jagged hollow
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I want to post a match replay here but I'm unsure about where to locate the video files on my cpu

wheat jackal
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There are no video files

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Replay files are text of inputs to save space

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You record them youself (ideal) or find the .roa files here

rough sedgeBOT
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How to Access Your Replays
Method 1:
  1. Press Win + R
  2. Put in the following: %LocalAppData%\RivalsOfAether\replays
Method 2:
  1. Make sure "Hidden items" are shown in File Explorer
  2. Go to: C:\Users\yourname\AppData\Local\RivalsofAether\replays
hybrid talon
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Data is not stored on your cpu...

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.......

jagged hollow
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Thank for advice again