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Because I intend to in a few days write a summary of what we currently know vs. what appears to be true, if only to help organize my own thoughts. But right now I'm not really working on it. Josh has a neat idea that he hasn't told me the details of yet, and right now... right, not writing about integer complexity right now.
Actually, I'll write one thing about the class I, uh, am no longer teaching. The curriculum says that we're supposed to talk about linear regression on the last day; however, there's no homework on this and they're not tested on it, so Yvonne gave us permission to ignore that and do, say, a review session instead. Which is what I did. But strangely, even though this was review for the final, unlike the other two times, people just didn't have that many questions. And so I took the remaining 40 minutes to talk about the symmetry properties of some of the functions we've studied, and the relations between them, as well as a brief note about logs to other bases[0]. I think a few of them probably appreciated it. :)
So: Kongai. Another thing that occurs to me about my Anex deck is that it's lacking in defense. I guess you really don't want to end up on defense in the first place in Kongai, but, y'know, it frequently happens. I suppose you probably could play Kongai with little attempt at defense, but honestly it just doesn't seem like a good idea. Pure beatdown strategies are something I have trouble with executing in general, even though I understand them abstractly; but honestly here it really just seems like a bad idea.
Which leads me to speak of Guilty Gear (of course). I've been practicing with Slayer more. Still not remotely "good", I'm sure. I've finally got down the whole Dandy-Step-after-knockdown-thing, though I think I'm way too predictable with it. In any case, practicing against the computer, still on Very Hard, Potemkin still gives me lots of trouble. As Axl I could do it, because he can play keep-away, but Slayer can't do that. Well, I think Eric told me, the way to fight Potemkin is to just keep up the pressure - don't let him attack at all. I tried to, of course, but I don't think I quite grasped the full extent of it - like I said, pure beatdown strategies feel unnatural to me; when my attacks fail, my immediate response is to try to prepare for a counterattack, not to keep rushing in. But Potemkin is just too damn good at breaking through defenses, and I constantly did shitty against him. So finally I managed to learn to do just that, and after playing against the computer for hours, I finally manged to win... a round. Yes, just one round. Well, still an improvement. Will have to attempt again.
Still, this is against the computer, and playing Potemkin. As good a beatdown character as Slayer might be, I don't think I'm going to try to play like that in general - a real player could probably punish my failed attacks way more effectively, and unless they're playing Potemkin, I don't see why I have to play like that... so I don't think I will.
Funny thing, someone was here yesterday and was playing as I-No, and I realized I'd never actually played against I-No before - nobody here plays her, and I hadn't played against her in arcade mode because she's the boss (and even had I managed to get up to her, it would have been the special boss version of I-No).
Back to Kongai. I tried out that Ubuntu deck idea. I must say I'd forgotten how - whether he's good or not - playing as Ubuntu just makes me smile in the same way that playing against him makes me groan. I was playing an Ubuntu vs. MLM endgame, which of course came down to energy, and I was trying to compute who had enough energy to do what in how many turns - and then suddenly realize, oh wait, his attacks cost 10 more than usual and I smiled. Playing against Ubuntu seriously throws off your usual combat math; but playing as him throws it off, in your favor. Not something I'm used to. (Right now the plan is that his innate is going to get nerfed when the expansion hits, actually - reduced to +5. Oh well.) How you actually go about making effective use of Ubuntu is still pretty unclear to me - the drawback to that game-changing innate is that he doesn't actually, you know, deal much damage (well, not at close range, anyway), but this is at least worth trying, I think.
I played Dominion (BGG link) for the first time the other day. There's a copy in the other first-year office; Ari brought it, I think. Evidently this is where I should be keeping my games, then! Except that for various reasons I haven't actually been spending much time in the office, and much of the time I have spent there has been actually working, so I only got to play Dominion for the first time back on Wednesday. Neat game. It's definitely, uh, subtle. ("A chapel lets you... trash your own cards? Why would you want to do that?") And considerably harder than it looks; I played for the first time against Nic and Ari, that had huge combos going every turn, I had none of that. (I think the number one lesson from my first game was, take chapels early!)
Magic analogies came up a lot talking about the game, even though in most ways it's entirely different. But a lot of the concepts regarding how to manage your deck still apply, since so much of the game is about deck-building, except of course you do so during the game. I am going to have to play this more. And bring my own games to the math offices, like I said.
On a meta note, it occurs to me that the topics I've written about here have drifted so heavily towards just math and gaming that, though I was going to write about how I might well have Evan as a roommate next semester, I've given so little background that this statement is essentially meaningless to most people eading this. (I must admit a large part of this is that I find Truth House a lot more boring than Tufts House; but I think to a large extent this was already the case back at Chicago. Hm.)
So I'll just end this miscellany with some links:
The TV Show - a neat video I saw on Zompist's rant page. You may have to watch this a number of times to get much of it.
Some highlights of Na'vi - I have not seen this movie "Avatar", and have heard little about it, but apparently they hired a linguist to actually come up with a language for the aliens, and here he describes a bunch of the phonetics and phonology, and begins describing some of the morphology and syntax.
-Harry
[0]Seriously, the class doesn't cover that. What the hell. I think I've mentioned this before.
Actually, I'll write one thing about the class I, uh, am no longer teaching. The curriculum says that we're supposed to talk about linear regression on the last day; however, there's no homework on this and they're not tested on it, so Yvonne gave us permission to ignore that and do, say, a review session instead. Which is what I did. But strangely, even though this was review for the final, unlike the other two times, people just didn't have that many questions. And so I took the remaining 40 minutes to talk about the symmetry properties of some of the functions we've studied, and the relations between them, as well as a brief note about logs to other bases[0]. I think a few of them probably appreciated it. :)
So: Kongai. Another thing that occurs to me about my Anex deck is that it's lacking in defense. I guess you really don't want to end up on defense in the first place in Kongai, but, y'know, it frequently happens. I suppose you probably could play Kongai with little attempt at defense, but honestly it just doesn't seem like a good idea. Pure beatdown strategies are something I have trouble with executing in general, even though I understand them abstractly; but honestly here it really just seems like a bad idea.
Which leads me to speak of Guilty Gear (of course). I've been practicing with Slayer more. Still not remotely "good", I'm sure. I've finally got down the whole Dandy-Step-after-knockdown-thing, though I think I'm way too predictable with it. In any case, practicing against the computer, still on Very Hard, Potemkin still gives me lots of trouble. As Axl I could do it, because he can play keep-away, but Slayer can't do that. Well, I think Eric told me, the way to fight Potemkin is to just keep up the pressure - don't let him attack at all. I tried to, of course, but I don't think I quite grasped the full extent of it - like I said, pure beatdown strategies feel unnatural to me; when my attacks fail, my immediate response is to try to prepare for a counterattack, not to keep rushing in. But Potemkin is just too damn good at breaking through defenses, and I constantly did shitty against him. So finally I managed to learn to do just that, and after playing against the computer for hours, I finally manged to win... a round. Yes, just one round. Well, still an improvement. Will have to attempt again.
Still, this is against the computer, and playing Potemkin. As good a beatdown character as Slayer might be, I don't think I'm going to try to play like that in general - a real player could probably punish my failed attacks way more effectively, and unless they're playing Potemkin, I don't see why I have to play like that... so I don't think I will.
Funny thing, someone was here yesterday and was playing as I-No, and I realized I'd never actually played against I-No before - nobody here plays her, and I hadn't played against her in arcade mode because she's the boss (and even had I managed to get up to her, it would have been the special boss version of I-No).
Back to Kongai. I tried out that Ubuntu deck idea. I must say I'd forgotten how - whether he's good or not - playing as Ubuntu just makes me smile in the same way that playing against him makes me groan. I was playing an Ubuntu vs. MLM endgame, which of course came down to energy, and I was trying to compute who had enough energy to do what in how many turns - and then suddenly realize, oh wait, his attacks cost 10 more than usual and I smiled. Playing against Ubuntu seriously throws off your usual combat math; but playing as him throws it off, in your favor. Not something I'm used to. (Right now the plan is that his innate is going to get nerfed when the expansion hits, actually - reduced to +5. Oh well.) How you actually go about making effective use of Ubuntu is still pretty unclear to me - the drawback to that game-changing innate is that he doesn't actually, you know, deal much damage (well, not at close range, anyway), but this is at least worth trying, I think.
I played Dominion (BGG link) for the first time the other day. There's a copy in the other first-year office; Ari brought it, I think. Evidently this is where I should be keeping my games, then! Except that for various reasons I haven't actually been spending much time in the office, and much of the time I have spent there has been actually working, so I only got to play Dominion for the first time back on Wednesday. Neat game. It's definitely, uh, subtle. ("A chapel lets you... trash your own cards? Why would you want to do that?") And considerably harder than it looks; I played for the first time against Nic and Ari, that had huge combos going every turn, I had none of that. (I think the number one lesson from my first game was, take chapels early!)
Magic analogies came up a lot talking about the game, even though in most ways it's entirely different. But a lot of the concepts regarding how to manage your deck still apply, since so much of the game is about deck-building, except of course you do so during the game. I am going to have to play this more. And bring my own games to the math offices, like I said.
On a meta note, it occurs to me that the topics I've written about here have drifted so heavily towards just math and gaming that, though I was going to write about how I might well have Evan as a roommate next semester, I've given so little background that this statement is essentially meaningless to most people eading this. (I must admit a large part of this is that I find Truth House a lot more boring than Tufts House; but I think to a large extent this was already the case back at Chicago. Hm.)
So I'll just end this miscellany with some links:
The TV Show - a neat video I saw on Zompist's rant page. You may have to watch this a number of times to get much of it.
Some highlights of Na'vi - I have not seen this movie "Avatar", and have heard little about it, but apparently they hired a linguist to actually come up with a language for the aliens, and here he describes a bunch of the phonetics and phonology, and begins describing some of the morphology and syntax.
-Harry
[0]Seriously, the class doesn't cover that. What the hell. I think I've mentioned this before.
I think I'm going to try Ubuntu (with Death Mask, of course) in place of Rumiko in my Anex deck. Very different, obviously, but I think it might work. I'm also thinking I'll put him in the lead instead of Anex. Leading off with Ubuntu seems a good way to annoy people. :)
-Harry
-Harry
I may have misremembered that win quote, they only appear in arcade mode...
So it turns out the good players have been taking it easy on us newbies. That's... disappointing. I have to say I feel kind of sheepish about what I said earlier, then... though apparently my Axl is honestly pretty good against Doug's Bridget, which is his secondary (Ky is his main, and of course utterly destroys me). Still, I have trouble against Dan's Faust and he was often just button-mashing until recently!
Various other thoughts on GGXXAC:
Apparently Slayer's F+HS is rather better than I gave it credit for.
Also, I now finally know what's up with Slayer's F+K and QCF+P/K moves that appeared to do nothing; apparently that strange symbol in the command list means the button has to be released quickly. Whatever his "release dust quickly" move might be, though, I haven't been able to do it, perhaps because of the physical situation of dust being assigned to R. Either that, or it doesn't look obviously different from his ordinary dust...
Axl seems to have a charge back, then F+K move that I don't see on the command list or in the manual... it's not really a special move, just a normal, long-range, anti-air move - the sort of thing the manual usually lists under "Personal move" (an additional normal move this character has). Hm.
Tried practicing a bit with Ky, he seems neat (lots of stun moves!), but holding 2 characters in my head in this game is hard enough. I think I'm going to have to forget Slayer to make room for him, or something. :P (Or just practice a lot more.) Ky must jump higher than Axl and Slayer, I have an easier time doing his aerial special moves. ADDENDUM hours later: And I have no idea why I thought this game had no Shoryuken motions, Ky seems to have the Ken/Ryu style QCF for projectiles, Shoryuken motion for, uh, Shoryuken-like move...
I've actually begun incorporating air-dashing into my game. Yay. Still haven't got down the whole "when they're knocked down do a Dandy Step" thing with Slayer yet.
Dead-angle attacks seem to be a lot less useful than they sound.
If Axl is English, why do all his moves have Japanese names?
Can anyone tell me what the hell "Type EX" refers to? Each character, you can select "AC mode", "GG mode", and "GGX mode" - the latter two meaning you're playing the character approximately as he was in Guilty Gear and Guilty Gear X, respectively - but there's also the distinction of "Normal" vs "Type EX". I have no idea what the latter actually means (OK, so I haven't actually tried it), aside from that it causes music from older games to play in some cases. :P
Unrelatedly:
My Anex deck in Kongai, I'm starting to wonder if having both Rumiko and Anex in it is a good idea. They seem to largely serve the same function in that deck. So quite possibly Rumiko should be replaced. Haven't started thinking about who with, though.
-Harry
So it turns out the good players have been taking it easy on us newbies. That's... disappointing. I have to say I feel kind of sheepish about what I said earlier, then... though apparently my Axl is honestly pretty good against Doug's Bridget, which is his secondary (Ky is his main, and of course utterly destroys me). Still, I have trouble against Dan's Faust and he was often just button-mashing until recently!
Various other thoughts on GGXXAC:
Apparently Slayer's F+HS is rather better than I gave it credit for.
Also, I now finally know what's up with Slayer's F+K and QCF+P/K moves that appeared to do nothing; apparently that strange symbol in the command list means the button has to be released quickly. Whatever his "release dust quickly" move might be, though, I haven't been able to do it, perhaps because of the physical situation of dust being assigned to R. Either that, or it doesn't look obviously different from his ordinary dust...
Axl seems to have a charge back, then F+K move that I don't see on the command list or in the manual... it's not really a special move, just a normal, long-range, anti-air move - the sort of thing the manual usually lists under "Personal move" (an additional normal move this character has). Hm.
Tried practicing a bit with Ky, he seems neat (lots of stun moves!), but holding 2 characters in my head in this game is hard enough. I think I'm going to have to forget Slayer to make room for him, or something. :P (Or just practice a lot more.) Ky must jump higher than Axl and Slayer, I have an easier time doing his aerial special moves. ADDENDUM hours later: And I have no idea why I thought this game had no Shoryuken motions, Ky seems to have the Ken/Ryu style QCF for projectiles, Shoryuken motion for, uh, Shoryuken-like move...
I've actually begun incorporating air-dashing into my game. Yay. Still haven't got down the whole "when they're knocked down do a Dandy Step" thing with Slayer yet.
Dead-angle attacks seem to be a lot less useful than they sound.
If Axl is English, why do all his moves have Japanese names?
Can anyone tell me what the hell "Type EX" refers to? Each character, you can select "AC mode", "GG mode", and "GGX mode" - the latter two meaning you're playing the character approximately as he was in Guilty Gear and Guilty Gear X, respectively - but there's also the distinction of "Normal" vs "Type EX". I have no idea what the latter actually means (OK, so I haven't actually tried it), aside from that it causes music from older games to play in some cases. :P
Unrelatedly:
My Anex deck in Kongai, I'm starting to wonder if having both Rumiko and Anex in it is a good idea. They seem to largely serve the same function in that deck. So quite possibly Rumiko should be replaced. Haven't started thinking about who with, though.
-Harry
So, Guilty Gear returns!
It's odd, because some people here are good at this game - OK, probably not actually good, but good within the house - and some people here are bad at this game, but the difference isn't huge. Like, the good players can *often* completely destroy me, but I wouldn't say they *consistently* do so; compare this to, say, how dominant Winston's Vega was vs. my Bison. And as for the ones who *aren't* really good, I seem to have *already* pretty much achieved parity with them. That's... kind of disappointing.
Eric DeVries seems to be the only one who's *really* studied the game, and he's easily the best here. Doug and Eric Gamble are pretty good too; it's interesting to note that they seem to have learned largely just through playing and not comprehensive practicing, which (ISTM) is hard to do in a fighting game.
I'm definitely lacking in the whole fundamentals of range and movement, though. I haven't learned to incorporate dashing or air-dashing yet. (Actually, I have trouble *doing* them - double-tapping is annoying - have I mentioned I don't like fighting game control schemes?) Yesterday when I finally got a chance to try my Slayer against the others, people commented on how defensive I was playing - not really fitting for Slayer. So now I'm learning Axl as well, and am thinking about Ky. (Note to self: Need to remember to use Axl's countermoves.)
It seems I was wrong when I said there were no charge characters - well, no, actually, that's still right; what's incorrect is that there are no charge *moves*. It also seems I was wrong when I said that there were no Shoryuken motions - Axl has both. Fortunately, he doesn't seem to have Shoryuken-motion moves overlapping with quarter-circle moves, so I can do his Shoryuken-motion moves without too much trouble, though I haven't really incorporated them into my game as yet. Notably, unlike in Street Fighter, you cannot charge a move before the round actually starts. Aw.
Techniques I've just learned and need to remember: When you've knocked someone down with Slayer, follow it up with one of his Dandy Step moves! (I do still have trouble executing these, unfortunately.) Also, use Crosswise Heel vs. air.
Things I know but fail to do: Crouch block more! Block more/green block with Axl. (Despite starting to learn Axl because I tended to play defensive, I seem to block less with him...) And use more normal attacks with Axl.
Things I haven't really incorporated at all: Use Axl's counters! Dash/air-dash! Probably also, use that half-circle-back+slash move that he has, for closing... Raiei Sageki, it's apparently called.
-Harry
It's odd, because some people here are good at this game - OK, probably not actually good, but good within the house - and some people here are bad at this game, but the difference isn't huge. Like, the good players can *often* completely destroy me, but I wouldn't say they *consistently* do so; compare this to, say, how dominant Winston's Vega was vs. my Bison. And as for the ones who *aren't* really good, I seem to have *already* pretty much achieved parity with them. That's... kind of disappointing.
Eric DeVries seems to be the only one who's *really* studied the game, and he's easily the best here. Doug and Eric Gamble are pretty good too; it's interesting to note that they seem to have learned largely just through playing and not comprehensive practicing, which (ISTM) is hard to do in a fighting game.
I'm definitely lacking in the whole fundamentals of range and movement, though. I haven't learned to incorporate dashing or air-dashing yet. (Actually, I have trouble *doing* them - double-tapping is annoying - have I mentioned I don't like fighting game control schemes?) Yesterday when I finally got a chance to try my Slayer against the others, people commented on how defensive I was playing - not really fitting for Slayer. So now I'm learning Axl as well, and am thinking about Ky. (Note to self: Need to remember to use Axl's countermoves.)
It seems I was wrong when I said there were no charge characters - well, no, actually, that's still right; what's incorrect is that there are no charge *moves*. It also seems I was wrong when I said that there were no Shoryuken motions - Axl has both. Fortunately, he doesn't seem to have Shoryuken-motion moves overlapping with quarter-circle moves, so I can do his Shoryuken-motion moves without too much trouble, though I haven't really incorporated them into my game as yet. Notably, unlike in Street Fighter, you cannot charge a move before the round actually starts. Aw.
Techniques I've just learned and need to remember: When you've knocked someone down with Slayer, follow it up with one of his Dandy Step moves! (I do still have trouble executing these, unfortunately.) Also, use Crosswise Heel vs. air.
Things I know but fail to do: Crouch block more! Block more/green block with Axl. (Despite starting to learn Axl because I tended to play defensive, I seem to block less with him...) And use more normal attacks with Axl.
Things I haven't really incorporated at all: Use Axl's counters! Dash/air-dash! Probably also, use that half-circle-back+slash move that he has, for closing... Raiei Sageki, it's apparently called.
-Harry