Blade Symphony News — February 16, 2015
Aggregated from Steam, cross-tracked with Battle.net coverage on GamePatchNote.
Welcome to part two of our Mastering Blade Symphony diary. In case you missed it, here's part one.
This diary series was written for the UK magazine last summer: issues 268 and 269, to be precise. The game has been updated several times since then, so long-term Blade Symphony players may notice a few discrepancies.
Previously: Having crashed my Blade Symphony rating, I picked up my rapier and began my attempt to reach the Master rank—occupied by the top 1% of players. After a few initial defeats, I climbed out of Steel and gained a place in the Diamond league.
Two other Phalanx foilists are duelling in The Street, a rainy stretch of road in some unnamed Far East city. One is Diamond league, the other Steel—but the lower-ranked player is dominant. I duel him once, and lose both rounds. He simply makes far fewer mistakes than me. I overreach with each of my combos, trying to land one more hit than I need to and get punished for it with aggressive balanced lunges and sideways heavy sweeps.
Then I duel his previous opponent, the Diamond league foilist. I m 653rd in the world, he s 691st. It s as closely matched a fight as I ve ever had, and it ll determine whether or not I climb any higher.
I go aggressive, landing a few forward jabs before receiving the same in return. Then I overextend, leaving myself open for a heavy lunge that hits me right in the chest. He follows up with a full fast string and the first round is over.
I m cagier at the beginning of the second match. I evade his lunge but fail to connect with a sideways parry and run right into his washing machine —the twirling blade attack that can follow a balanced lunge. There s a window to counter so I take it, landing a full fast string of attacks.
He comes back with the lunge, and I walk into it again. Then he leaps into an aerial attack that I don t expect, right back into fast stance, and it s over. I ve been soundly beaten by somebody on my own level.
It s a huge blow to my confidence. I consider blaming the time of day, the amount of coffee and practice I ve had. I consider quitting the server and going to find another Diamond to fight. For whatever reason, I stay in the duel queue.
I find myself facing him again after he defeats the Steel-ranked foilist, who subsequently switches out for Judgement and a longsword.
Round one. He lands the second part of his fast string and I do the same. We re each playing sloppily: going only for the fast hits, taking as much damage as we deal. Spamming like this isn t exactly the hallmark of players in the top 6%, but we re each too wary of the other s heavier attacks to commit to anything else. Eventually the parries—and the round—go his way.
I think about this diary, and how it would be a pretty terrible story if I lost my Diamond rank as soon as I d gained it—if the moral of the story is actually, you belong in Steel after all . Losing this match, I think, would be enough to put me there.
My lunge connects at the beginning of round two. I roll sideways instead of immediately following up and then land a charged, jump-cancelled thrust. I follow up with fast strikes, then another lunge, and then a parry and more blows. He drops and I ve lost no health. OK, I think. I remember how to do this.
Another lunge connects with my sternum at the beginning of round three but I manage to land my entire combo—lunge into fast, parrying him to the side and jump-cancelling another fast strike. He hits me again but we re both low on health, and neither of us wants to overextend. I feint forward then roll back, charging up a lunge that he fails to anticipate this time. I take the game, and restore some of my rating.
A new Diamond joins the server while I m holding the duelling ground—a longsword-wielding Ryoku. I m able to keep my distance and needle him in the first round, evading his attempt to land a heavy reverse sweep that I d have a hard time blocking. He walks into a sideways heavy attack that opens him up for another combo, and it s enough for me to take the first round. I m feeling good.
I am wrong. He utterly destroys me in the second round, landing a grab that does a huge amount of damage and casts me to the ground. I roll sideways and come up into what should be a devastating lunge—the game shows my sword travelling entirely through his body—but no damage is registered, and I take his full heavy string of attacks after that, and again after that. It s over quickly.
He nimbly evades my initial attempt at an interrupt and lands his heavy string at the beginning of round three. My own heavy attacks are too slow to parry them, and the rapier doesn t have the block power that a longsword does. I m out of my depth. I try throwing a knife at him—something I usually don t like to do, as it feels cheap—but he parries it and closes the distance again. Another heavy combo and it s over. I m defeated by a Diamond again, and my rating drops. I m 840th.
I take a break for 20 minutes, and when I return the only Diamond player available is that same Ryoku. I decide to take the risk and duel him anyway.
I go in heavy at the start and manage to block that heavy string I hate so much. It gives me space to land some damage, and although he gets his backwards sweep off, I ve got the momentum. I land another fast string, and then deflect an attempted grab and nail him with the lunge. Round one goes my way.
Round two begins with a heavy sweep into a fast string, but he blocks the last attack and successfully grabs me. He dodges the counter attack and lands his heavy combo, taking the round.
Round three is a complete disaster. He lands his heavy string, then dodges as I try to counter and hits me from the side, then again with the string. I block two grab attempts but eat the reverse sweep, and then he grabs me again—I believe I see the beginning of the counter-grab animation, but for whatever reason it doesn t connect. The grab kills me, and I lose my second match against him. I nervously check my ranking. My heart sinks. I ve lost almost 9%. I m 1,721st in the world. I m back in Steel.
God damn it. I m not going down, not like this. This isn t how this diary ends. I quit the game, load Spotify, and create a new playlist called montage . Danger Zone by Kenny Loggins. The Touch by Stan Bush. Eye of the Tiger. Spandau Ballet s Gold. I am getting back into Diamond, and I m doing it right now.
I load onto a server using a simple duelling map. I defeat an Oak league Ryoku during the solo in Danger Zone and finish off another Phalanx during The Touch. Eye of the Tiger kicks in as I fight my first Steel of the session, a Phalanx armed with a longsword. I recognise his name from the chat channel—he s been trying to talk down a very vocal, very irritating player who won t stop accusing other players of being cheap. He is trying to restore order, and seems like a good guy. I want to destroy him.
A heavy right sweep interrupts his lunge. Fast forward hits, hits again. He lands his own heavy but he s too slow—fast parry, roll, foil meets flank. I intercept an attempted aerial attack with a jumpcancelled thrust and finish him off on the ground. Round one to me.
I charge him as round two begins. I hit him. So many times. It happens too fast. I m trading passion for glory. I ve kept my grip on the dreams of the past, and I m fighting to keep them aliiiive.
We exchange fast blows and then I land a lunge that I cancel into a sideways balanced parry. Rapiers recover faster from parries than longswords do, and he doesn t account for that. A few fast thrusts and I ve won. We re into Spandau Ballet territory by now, but I m not gold. I m Diamond. Rank 691. So we re back where we started.
I beat a Diamond league Judgement after that, then another Phalanx, then a Pure. The latter two are a few hundred places ahead of me and scrapping for Master. I drop the next two games, win one, and then drop the next. My rating hovers around 700, and the elation of reclaiming that place fades as I realise what a task climbing any higher is going to be. I either need to find and beat Diamonds that I m already comfortably better than—in which case, my time in Master is likely to be short-lived—or I need to improve dramatically.
I m worried that I m just not good enough to climb any higher. I read back on what I ve written about my fights and start to see the patterns: I win when my lunges land and lose when I don t. I feel like I ve graduated from the kind of cheesy play that defines beginner rapier players, but I ve not really replaced it with anything that matches what I ve seen top-level players do. Am I stuck in limbo? Am I too afraid of losing my rating again to ditch the rapier, even though that s what I need to do?
Competitive players can t afford to be choosy about how they win. I ve defended that argument in the past—particularly as it applies to Dota 2—and I worry that perhaps I ve let my imagination get in the way of my Blade Symphony play.
My next duelling session turns out to be providential. I log in the next day and the only Diamond players on the server are struggling to dislodge a talented Master, rank 60, who is defeating them with an untouchable Ryoku. I face him and he destroys me so quickly that it doesn t really bear describing.
Rapier sucks, by the way, he says. I know, I respond. I should probably ditch it, but I m stubborn.
"Here, I ll switch to Phalanx and show you, he says.
He shifts character and destroys me again. Then, on the second round, he pauses. Side parry after the first fast attacks. He demonstrates the move, and waits for me to replicate it. Okay, go.
I land a few more hits this time but he wins the game because he s landing moves I ve never seen—air-cancelled blade twirls, multi-hitting diving lunges that the rapier can t do. He s confirmed it: I need to switch my weapon. If I lose my rating, so be it. It s time to start learning properly. To hell with Rule 2.
I try longsword, and he destroys me with three different characters. Other Diamond players join, and he sees them off too. I change to scimitar and take one round off him, but he takes the second without breaking a sweat. The other players drift off. He s held the duelling ground for 44 consecutive wins.
Then it clicks. The scimitar charges faster and lands faster multi-hits than the other weapons, making it great for rushing somebody down. I charge him and land two fast hits followed by lateral swipes, as per his advice. He lands Judgement s balanced forward strikes but I block them, skidding backwards in a shower of sparks. I counter with air, then light, then an air-cancelled washing machine that ends the round in my favour. It s like the game has opened up: these strikes don t feel cheap or chancy. I sense how much more reactive my play has become in only an hour—and how much better it could be.
He blocks my fast assault but I grab him, which he doesn t expect. I land two fast hits as he rises then block and withdraw. He parries a lunge and lands a vertical blow but I parry to the side and needle him again. I start to charge up a fast forward and air-cancel it so it strikes him as he raises his blade. I hit him in the air and then keep hitting him as I fall. He s expecting the second hit to come as I land, so I jump instead and sweep my blade behind me. It catches his blind spot as I land on his far side, spinning to block his next move. None arrives. He s down.
WTF just happened? I type.
You just beat me 2-0.