It's sometimes easier said than done..

I've played quite a few 1v1's with SPB since the day I came back to war2. At first I was rusty and lost the majority of our games.. Over a little bit of time I realized I was winning most of them... Well other than when I had taken long breaks and was rusty, I always felt pretty confident that I could beat SPB in any series.

Up until a few months ago I maintained a pretty steady 2:1 win/loss ratio with SPB, but something changed. He started gaining the advantage in our series. I wasn't sure If he had gotten better or if I had gotten worse. I didnt feel like I had gotten any worse so the only thing that made sense to me was that he had gotten better.... and to a certain degree, I still think there is some truth to that.

SPB has always been good at taking expansions and doing a good job of holding them with not a lot more than some walled in towers, a DK or two, and maybe a small group of ogres here or there.

Lately i've found myself trying to out-macro him without putting enough pressure on him. Our games typically go to late game, and I find myself running all over the map with mass ogres (which get dk'd) and a few DK's to try to take out his expansions.. I felt like as soon as I took one expansion out He got 2 more up AND managed to DK one of my expansions.

Whatever I was doing wasn't working... So i started paying closer attention to his play style. SPB really enjoys multiple halls... as long as there isn't an enormous amount of pressure on him , he can dual with towers and a couple grunts, and find the resources to make cats/more towers to defend against any offensive towering/catting I bring to the table, typically survives and then out tech's me.

So finally I told myself I was going to abandon my typical style against spb and repair the shit out of my raxes, find him, attack him, and keep an enormous amount of pressure on him as early as possible . The idea being "the sooner I get to him, the harder it will be for him to defend against my attack"

So far it's been working fantastically. I just went 4-0 with him using those tactics. He does not do well against early HEAVY pressure.

The point is.. there is more than 1 way to play war2, and identifying how someone plays, and being able to adapt to it is an extremely valuable lesson in winning.

Most of you probably already know this, and even to me it wasn't some foreign concept, but sometimes stubbornness gets the best of players and we get in this mode where we feel like we have to beat someone at their own game to be better, which i dont think is true. You just have to be able to adapt.
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Long story short. I might go even vs x player. x player kicks y player's butt and Y player kicks my butt.

It has very much to do with play styles.

Also, you just raised a point. Adaptability. If I'm playing someone in a series, the first game I try to make a 'map' of his game style and adapt accordingly.
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So you can beat spbwar now?
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i zero bagged your mother

quote:

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Originally posted by Fast Luck
hassan-i-asher: majorin in takin pictures
dreamin bout wayne from catalina wine mixers
listen little friend stay outta the deep end
cuz you're less street than vampire weekend

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Funny how Spb is a constant, everyone bases on.
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quote:

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Originally posted by Swift
blid wasn't caught using hacks, he admitted that he was testing hacks to learn about them for administrative purposes

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quote:

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Originally posted by Andrzej
Funny how Spb is a constant, everyone bases on.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Fast Luck
So you can beat spbwar now?

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i went 6-1 vs spb, not 4-1. and i won the first game vs you and then got increasingly drunk and started slipping, imo. speaking of which, andrzej, i dont think spb is that much a constant. he plays better or worse depending on how much he's imbibed as well
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i zero bagged your mother

quote:

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Originally posted by Fast Luck
hassan-i-asher: majorin in takin pictures
dreamin bout wayne from catalina wine mixers
listen little friend stay outta the deep end
cuz you're less street than vampire weekend

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you use that excuse every time you lose a series vs me.
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<----------- WAR2 TRAINING VIDEOS ----------->

http://www.youtube.com/ClanAbsoluteSynergy

and?
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i zero bagged your mother

quote:

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Originally posted by Fast Luck
hassan-i-asher: majorin in takin pictures
dreamin bout wayne from catalina wine mixers
listen little friend stay outta the deep end
cuz you're less street than vampire weekend

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k. well i was afk cleaning my house most of the time we were playing.
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<----------- WAR2 TRAINING VIDEOS ----------->

http://www.youtube.com/ClanAbsoluteSynergy

and your enemy hacked
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Broken bones will heal and mend, but words will hurt until the end.
Sticks and stones will break my bones, but words will never hurt me.

quote:

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Originally posted by terror-kahn
k. well i was afk cleaning my house most of the time we were playing.

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You bring up a good point TK, I believe in most cases the biggest difference between a great player and a good player, is the great player's ability to adapt to different strategies and styles. This point often gets overlooked I think, and people seem to most often equate the reason behind skills gaps to be due to uc, speed, attack/defense tactics, types of strats etc.

Another good difference would be the ability to see the enemy and all of his movements. You have mastered this ability.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-r6F120K20Y
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"If we are the only mammals that cannot take care of ourselves out of the womb, how are we here?" - GoldHP