Smash tournament at FAD 3/10

      Today was another local weekly smash tournament at Fire and Dice located in Woodland Hills. Some of my friends from Simi Valley showed up today. It was cool to see DJDemon play S2H. I felt like DJ (Captain Falcon) could've taken S2H (Metaknight) but there was some highly intricate edge guarding that took DJ off guard. It would've been great to see him beat a PR player (SoCal power ranked player, players ranked by how many tournaments they go to and how high they place). I didn't play too well today but I did beat a super good player named HLB (Jiggly Puff) in one close, exciting game. I spaced super well and had a great neutral in that game with Bayonetta. I was very proud of beating him but I didn't win any other games. He plays an aggressive style jumping around a lot with Puff, and when you least expect it he jumps up and hits you. It forces you to play super patient even if that's not your thing. I also met this super cool Cloud player that gave me some great advice after I was feeling salty after losing my matches. K9SBruce also gave me some great advice when I was feeling down. It's not that I was seriously feeling upset about losing but at the moment I was super salty. It's great to know that great players have my back and will take the time to talk to me about my playing, and more importantly my mindset going in and out of the game. Thanks guys!
     My first set was against Dipper, a Fox main. As soon as I knew I was going up against him I knew it was going to be super difficult for me because he's a part of Zork's crew. Zork is probably the best Bowser in SoCal. Anyways, I started out okay but then I started to fall behind. The up-airs were nonstop (so hard to deal with as Bayonetta) and after a while I just couldn't finish his first stock. He plays a campy Fox (defensive, runs away, forces you to approach). When I wouldn't approach him right away he would just blaster fire me and then when I approached he would punish hard. He's definitely a great player. In the past he once played me as Ike and I beat him with my Veria Suit Samus. Possibly a counter-pick character in the future? But I wouldn't pick Samus versus his Fox. That would be reckless. My other option would've been Zero Suit but I'm the type of guy who sticks with his main character by any means necessary. He played a super clean set with very few mistakes and whiffs.
     My second set was against Jiggly Wiggly, who oddly enough used Diddy Kong. I went in with a lot of confidence against him because I have beaten him in the past with my Zero Suit Samus in friendlies, just not consistently. Regardless, I still went in feeling like a million bucks. I started out the set amazingly well, going toe to toe with him. But then again, just like in the first set the opponent got the first KO and I wasn't able to finish out their stock in time before they were able to take me out. It was very frustrating to deal with and I guess you could say that nerves got to me during both sets because I started going in more recklessly and getting punished for it. If I had played more patiently and wasn't fiending for the kill I would've stood a much better chance. Wiggly's grab combo game with Diddy is really good. He noticed that I was going for a lot of defensive options a lot and he started going for a lot of grabs into some cool custom Diddy combos. I definitely learned a lot from that set.
     Lastly, I ended up leaving after my sets. I had agreed earlier in the day to meet up with my friend after my matches so we ended up hanging out for a bit. We played some racquetball in his apartment racquetball court. It was the first real exercise I've gotten in months. Needless to say we were tired after forty-five minutes. After that we played some of the Overwatch beta on PC, taking turns playing. I've become really fond of Overwatch and although the game seems jank (broken mechanics and heroes) I like the idea of an arena shooter made by Blizzard. Although I didn't do well in the tournament I'm gonna keep my head up and keep trying to compete. If I really want to improve it might take me a year or even two before I start taking out some of the best of SoCal.

 “We shall heal our wounds, collect our dead and continue fighting.” – Mao Tse-Tung