So I'm sure everyone has had an online match. I'd like for you guys to tell any stories that you can remember that you have fond memories of or any memories that you would like to forget but can't.

Chapter 1

When I first appeared in front of the online community, I wasn't very enthusiastic. I wasn't such a skilled player so I figured a few matches to test the waters and I'd be done. Last thing I needed was to embarrass myself in front of a community that was surely better than I was.

As a Tails player I figured I'd see a unique cast of opponents. My 1st day of online was all Marths. I had about 20-30 matches. All were Marth except maybe 3-5. I figured this was going to be the trend from this point forward. It was kinda fun though. I was winning more than I anticipated. Tomorrow I was determined to give it another shot.

Over the next couple of days I got used to the experience. I began recording videos as reference. I was winning, but I was very passive. I spammed rhythm badge and sloppily went from spindash to jab attack. I had no concept of kill moves, I could not dash, I could not string any attacks together with any semblance of creativity, I could not (and would not) edgeguard, and all my fights were taking 6 and a half minutes to complete. My 1st time timing out was against a player named stm walsh. He used ZSS. His rules were 5 stocks at 7 minutes. I lost by 10%. Matches would continue to run this way, with me being lazy, kind, and passive. I didn't want anyone to get mad, so I gave my opponents lots of breathing room. Eventually I happened upon a name: DescendedSun. Nice name, must be a very coherent player.

The battle took place on Dreamland. He chose Marth. I expected a specific performance from him. As I saw with most Marths up to that point...He got me up to 60-80% before I hit him. Then I "woke up". I'm going to hit him with everything I have. I'm going to show him what I'm really capable of. I began to throw out attacks as quickly as I could. I did not give him any space, wherever he went, I was going to chase him down. He was no slouch, he valiantly defended himself. I just kept throwing out attack after attack, not really knowing what I was doing. Upon my 3rd stock he was defeated. Surely he was not expecting what came to him. But I foresaw something else. I will meet him again, and when I do, he will be merciless.

From that moment on, I resolved myself to Be just as powerful as I saw him. I would improve my craft. I would aggressively attack every player I came across. I was gonna show this community something I had not brought forth since I was a child: a competitor to be feared...

Chapter 2

After my escapade with DescendedSun, I continued to search for opponents. Previous fears of player retaliation for my relentless attacks were shielded by a computer screen. My win rate was strong, but I felt unchallenged after meeting DescendedSun. At the same time I felt inadequate. "I can't seem to really move around. I'm using rhythm badge and spindash just to get from one placed to another." I didn't really know what to do about it, so I just kept going.

I happened upon a forum post on McCleodgaming. "YaDad's stream is live". What's a livestream? I kinda figured, but I've never been to one. I decided to take a look. The stream had just started. YaDad was taking the opportunity to feel out the online mode and the community involved. He was also taking up challenges on his stream. I volunteered, but I figured he would not see me. "Ziki Prower, it's your turn." He mispronounced my name for the rest of the night, but I didn't care, he called my name. I was so excited. I couldn't wait to show him what I had in store.

After 3 fights He commended me on what he declared was a "great Tails", but his critique went on to declare something to me at the end of our last match. He said that I ruined what could have been a perfect Tails by dragging him with rhythm badge to the end of the stage. Was I...spamming? I reviewed my videos. I really was spamming a single move to rack up damage. But I needed the attack to move around, what could I do?

I was at a loss until his next stream (which would ironically be his last). What could I do to improve. I did not ask him. I was acting as his secretary, helping him organize his matchups, player names and associated twitch names, and their connection strength. At some point during the night he said something. "The dash button is a great function. People don't use it enough, I encourage people to use it. What makes the dash button so great? I passed by it in the button configuration, but I didn't think it was important. I decided to give it a shot.

I needed to find a key on my controller to see if I could make the dash button a practical maneuver. I settled on my R1 and R2 keys. At first I was entertained, but not overly impressed. It's a nice button, but how will this help me? By the time the night was over, two things happened: one lessoned I learned, another lesson I was going to learn later that would be the beginning of a radical transformation of my skill level.

The lesson I learned that day was I could practice aggression with etiquette. I wanted to be one of those players that was admired, not scorned for getting wins based on what was considered a "cheap" playstyle.

The later lesson...helped me realize the value of creating something truly unique that would be the basis of my evolution as a player from that time forward.

Edited for redundancy.

Chapter 3

My 1st online tournament! I was so excited...How the hell did I get here?

It happened so quickly. By now I got used to what livestreaming was, so I happened upon another. It was a stream hosted by a player named SoldierSunday. His stream was fast and hard to follow. So many people wanted to battle him. I don't think I got a spot at the time. Sometime within the night he called for a tournament. A tournament? How was he going to corral all this chaos. He used something called "Challonge" to organize it. "What's this thing? How do I use it?" I went ahead and called upon the stream for guidance as to what to do. They told me to make an account to sign up. I rushed to make one, but I wanted to be careful. I didn't wanna choose a name I'd regret. I settled on "RemPrower" as my name.

The tournament was called "Closed Casket". There were 6 competitors. A very small tournament, but who cared? I was in it~. It was...awkward for me. It all happened so quickly. My 1st round was against SoldierSunday, the tournament organizer. I was summarily defeated 2-0. I said to myself that that was it, but I was about to be hit with a surprise. "Rem, are you ready for your next fight?" What do you mean next fight? I was already eliminated. "This is double elimination. You get another shot. I was deeply confused. I was trying to get answers, but everyone was busy with their own fights. My next opponent, Tac3, helped me along with what was going on. He guided me to our battle. I was going to try harder this time. We only had one battle before he had to leave, but I won that battle anyways, so I moved on to my next challenge. This time I was going to battle my next opponent, electriccrash. He was difficult, but I won our set 2-1. Was I coming back? I could actually come all the way back. I had no idea what was coming.

Noghrilla was my opponent in losers finals. I got myself set. I could tell he was going to be hard, but I had no clue he would be THAT hard. I stood no chance. I threw out attack after attack, but he just knew when to approach and when to hang back, He flew by with patience and precision. There was no sugar coating it. I got my a** kicked by a player that was just plain better than I was. I was prepared to pack up and go, since it was late. Before I left, Noghrilla called my attention. He told me something that I will never, ever forget: "You aren't even trying to aim. You keep throwing out hitboxes hoping people will run into them. You won't beat pros like me if that's all you can do." I was shocked at what he told me. Throwing out hitboxes? I can hardly move, what am I supposed to do? But he was right, I depended on my attacks to move me across the field, and I was using them as hybrid approaches hoping that my opponent would throw themselves at me and die, like everyone else had been doing up to that point. But what was I supposed to do about it? I slept on it.

What could I do? I had no clue. I need to move, but I can't keep myself open. Is this as good as I'm gonna get? Then I remembered from that stream YaDad held previously: The dash button. I experimented with it again. I funmbled through what seemed to be no improvement. I just kept casting dash attacks. Then something happened almost by accident. I didn't know at the time that it was called a "crouch cancel" I rolled my thumb over the down button on the dpad of my controller and proceeded to do not a dash attack, but a downtilt attack. "...What just happened?" I asked myself. I tried it again, same result. I proceeded to crounch cancel all over the training map like a fox darting from one spot to another as if chasing after live prey. "We could use this. Let's see what We could come up with."

This marked the second of major lessons and the 3rd person online to teach me something that shaped what would be a continual, personal evolution as a player from that point onward. Creativity began to happen. I started making new attacks, new combinations to fit my style. I wasn't winning anymore, I was dominating. Every new fight I learned something. I began to be unstoppable. Little did I know I would suffer a loss that would deject me more than I could have possibly imagined...

Chapter 4

This thread is a topic that calls for fond memories of experiences online. This chapter is not one of those. This chapter actually tells a story of something that would tear me apart for a long time. To this day I still feel cold when I look upon the listed records.

As time went on I saw myself as absolutely invincible. I didn't win every fight, but I won almost all of them. I saw myself as the best Tails player behind Jellybean412. "My playstyle is flawless. I rack up damage and kill with relative ease. I am elite once again, just like when I was as a child." I was not pompous about it, for I learned a hard lesson about arrogance a few years back and resolved to keep such thoughts under control. Nevertheless, I felt it was true. I could not lose...then he showed up...

I met Kyoz once before on SoldierSunday's stream. He was a Zerosuit Samus user. This was back when I was still throwing out hitboxes. Both of us, in retrospect, sucked. We couldn't aim, couldn't kill, and exclusive to him in my eyes, couldn't recover. I didn't expect him to be a challenge. In "Entertain The Stream I" I eliminated him in losers finals 3-0 (I proceeded to lose to SoldierSunday 0-3 again). Due to other engagements and work, I saw very little of Kyoz after that. All I knew was he kept battling on SoldierSunday's stream over and over. Another tournament was coming. I was going to be there...and so was he.

"Entertain the Stream 3" was set to begin soon. This time SoldierSunday was not going to participate. "This one is mine." I said to myself.

-To set up the scene, I felt like I had it made at this time. I was powerful, respected, acquired moderator status on SoldierSunday's stream (which meant worlds to me at the time), everything was going my way. A ,ink to the bracket will be placed at the end of the chapter.

There was another Tails player participating this time. His name was Bomono3. He was set to battle Kyoz in the 1st round. My 1st round was WrxJoey. I won my set without trouble. Bomono won his as well 2-1. Kyoz was complaining about Bomono's playstyle at the time. "Score one for Tails players." I thought to myself. If it was Tails, I wanted it to win. This would come back to haunt me later.

I remained on the winners side, defeating Hilda 2-0. I reached Bomono in the winners finals. He was a tough one, but I maintained the upper hand. The series ended 3-1 in my favor. I was in the grand finals. "I could do it this time. For the 1st time, I will be a champion" I wish I could have seen Kyoz's matches up to that point. He was dominating his competition and I had no idea. This was the grand finals though. He was mad, and I was ready for him...or so I thought.

As most of you know double elimination rules, the player on the winners side only needs to win a set best of 5 once to claim the championship. The player on the losers side has to win two sets of 5. I picked Tails as usual. Kyoz picked Marth. I had not met his Marth yet, but I fought hundred's of those and all of them, save DescendedSun, were easy. By this time I was a much better player. I would slaughter him.

"Coming all the way from losers finals to best Rem, Here is your "Entertain the Stream 3" champion, Kyoz. "HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN? HOW THE HELL COULD THIS HAPPEN!? I had it all figured out, he was eliminated in the first round. I had the advantage? Why, why did I lose? I was so close...". What happened after that tore me apart. Upon my suggestion, the winner of the tournament was to gain mod status. And also upon suggestion, it was going to be MY position. Not only did I lose to someone whom I'd eliminated in our previous encounter, but It was given to my competitor. I don't know if I was blind with rage or he was taunting me, but all I could see was people laughing at how I lost what could have been mine.

The stream had since ended. It was late, and I had to go to sleep, but I couldn't sleep. In fact, I cried. "How could this happen?" I repeated it over and over. "This was my chance, and I failed." All I could see was him making fun of me for losing. Was he making fun of me? Or was my psychosis attacking me again? It didn't matter, all that mattered was how I felt about it. "I hate you, Kyoz." I cried as I drifted away into a bitter respite. "I had everything, and you stole it from me. I hate you...I hate you."

It would be a week before I got over what had happened, I could not stop thinking about losing. I thought I was the best, but I wasn't. This tournament showing proved that to me. This was the 4th person to teach me something important about myself and my Tails. I was not the best, not yet. But how could I possibly get better? I crafted what I thought was perfect, and it wasn't. I had no answers. I continued to fight, but I avoided Kyoz. I was afraid of him. I just couldn't bring myself to challenge him again. It was just too painful.

Yet I did meet him again, only in tournament settings. He proceeded to eliminate me in the next 5 tournaments I met him in, one of them was once again in grand finals. I have placed 2nd in 5 SSF2 tournaments up to this point. I have yet to claim a championship.

I've since gotten over my bitterness about back then, but the lesson remained. I am not the best...but I must not give up. "I need to analyze him. What is he doing that's besting me? The next time I meet him, I'll approach him differently...carefully. Make the 1st move, I'll strike you with the speed of a true fox once you find that all you've struck was air. Hah! As if! How was I going to do that? My movements were fast and complicated. leaving me open to counterattack. Hell, in one match he eliminated me from counterattacks alone. But I was too aggressive. It was my nature, I couldn't slow down. Was this the best I was going to be?

It wasn't just him, SoldierSunday was also dominating me. I was too busy being distracted by One persona that I failed to pay attention to the others that were already better than me from day one. Little did I figure that SoldierSunday, a person whom I had met early on in my time upon Super Smash Flash 2, would be the 5th and final person to teach me an important lesson that would help me evolve to what I am now.

-to be continued cuz I have to leave-

Nice story man. Chapter 4 really got me. As a person that wants to be good at this game but doesn't have the time I really do love stories like these.

There are only 5 chapters. So I'll finish it when I get back. Which will prolly be in 3-4 hours.

For future reference, please edit your post instead of double posting.

I was intending on doing that, but I was worried that making this whole piece one great big post would also be an infraction. Duely noted, when I return I will edit the chapter 4 post to be combined with chapter 5 to avoid another stacked post.

I can't wait for part 5! And remember, we get 60000 characters!

I played a Naruto as Peach on lunar core with 5 stocks. That was the single worst match I have ever played in online.

But something more lighthearted! I was streaming locals, and a guy comes into the chat asking if I'll play him in online. I don't play online, but I decided to accept his request. When I played him, he chose captain falcon and only used his specials, even trying to do side-b into up-b XD. I deftly beat him, his lack of a punish game (or a neutral game for that matter) were no match for even my bad online Marth. He seemed to be surprised that I beat him, which surprised me since his own playstyle was so simple and if he had been watching my stream he should have easily realized he was no match lol.

Since the post streak is broken, I am now free of a double post penalty, which is good, since it will allow me to keep the chapters on separate listings.

Chapter 5

After a while I lost my bitterness, but the fear remained. I avoided Kyoz. And not just him. I avoided others I was afraid of, new and old. I was at a loss, unsure of how to go about improving. I continued to battle anyways, ignoring what had already transpired up to that point. But I knew that if I kept avoiding the players I was afraid of, I would never truly improve. I concealed my fear and returned to the place that had brought me to high and low places up to that point.

SoldierSunday's stream was packed as usual. His organization was as messy as usual too, but he liked it that way. He enjoyed the spontaneity of it. It made him hard to track, but it made the stream more easygoing and simple to watch. It could brighten up your day or wreck it. Anything went in SoldierSunday's stream. Outside of tournament battles I fought very little of SoldierSunday. Like Kyoz, I was afraid of him. I was so attached to my Tails at this point that I did not want to see him lose. This time I shut that feeling out. It was time for rotations. I pushed my way into the room. I was going to battle him the same way I've been battling Kyoz. I was determined to get an answer from him. It was on his and YaDad's stream I learned the most important things that built up my craft. I wanted more, and YaDad was gone. SoldierSunday was the only one left I could turn to. As the commercials at the time were saying: I was going to "settle it in smash."

I've had pretty much no other player to look at to learn what I've created. Everything my Tails is was either created by me, or told to me how to do as far as his general mechanics and the existence of advanced techniques. All practical applications I had to teach myself. I hoped that he could teach me something anyways. With reckless abandon I attacked him.

I got bodied. I just didn't get it. What am I missing? I was half distracted because I was listening to his reactions to my fighting him on stream. Most of which was him predicting what I was going to do with general accuracy, but he said two things that I did hear

The less important one to me was he critiqued my high risk / low reward attack style, on occasion I'd do an advanced tech approach, but use it to perform a risky, punishable offensive skill that would leave me open. As dumb as it sounds, I did that by design, I wanted my Tails to be so peculiar, so confusing that you had no idea why I was doing what I was doing, in hopes that you would not know how to defend yourself against me. Is he going to wavedash jab or wavedash smash? Is he going to do a spindash fakie or is he going to hit me with the spindash itself? Is he going to charge it this time? Should I shield it? I could continue to give examples, but you get the point.

The second thing he told me had more of an impact. He told me that I was pushing too many buttons....................what? Pushing to many buttons? I'M TAILS ON CRACK! ILL PUSH 20 BUTTONS AT ONCE JUST TO DO 1 ATTACK! OF COURSE I PUSH TOO MANY BUTTONS!!11!!1

I was not offended but this was the most confusing advice I'd received up to this point. What did that have to do with anything? How was I supposed to fix that? It's not in my nature to be patient. I did not believe in baiting targets, nor running away, save to set up an attack. I watched some of my replays. By this time I had 800 online replays saved so I had plenty of material to study...and I began to see what he meant. Many times where I could have killed a target, I was too busy foxtrotting back and forth 3 times, then jumping to the right to do a turn around cannon so I could land on the ground at accent my kill with a backair........all I needed to do was walk up and do an upsmash. Although I was indeed pushing too many buttons, an underlying thing he was telling me (whether he actually was or not) was that I was overcomplicating my attacks. If they are at 110%, kill them, don't try to get fancy and get them to 180% just so you can do a cannon to backair simply because it's how you feel like killing them. I understood it now. I was overcomplicating my control scheme by adding in fluff and rainbows, which entertained me yes, but was causing me to throw fights I should have won.

Time passed and I worked to fix things. I changed my button layout and proceeded to adopt new attacks. I practiced new combos and practice new techs that were not natural for me to use, I worked on psychout moves and practiced aiming. I added in more kill moves to my arsenal and got used to knowing when to guard the edge and when to simply pretend I was guarding the ledge. Most importantly of all, I practiced something I never thought I'd experiment with: baiting. You make the 1st move and I'll hit you while you're open. There's a time to flail and there's a time to bide. The fox beckons you to strike. If you miss, you'll regret it. But this time, I did not dwell on any single technique, I incorporated all of them.

When all is said and done, these 5 people and these lessons learned have built me from the infant that I was offline to what some have kindly declared as the best active Tails player at this point in time (which is actually a fairly shallow field of competition right now). What you see today is a craft that began 1 year and 4 months ago when I was at a friend's house and spontaneously thought to myself: "Y'know I wonder if anyone made a fan made iteration of Super Smash Bros." To a recorded legacy of something that I will cherish for years to come. A project made by a handful of visionary young adults for a love of gaming and creation built in a way that brought me a greater joy and sorrow than I've experienced in years. And the best part of it all? (or possibly the worst part) It's not even out of beta yet. The best has yet to come. This is not the end for Tails and me, this is only the beginning...

- The end...for now -

This is my online story. Thank you for viewing it. Thank you to the thread viewer for creating it. And I apologize to the devs for mistaking the rules of double posting. I used the screenshot section as my reference for posting separate threads the way I did, so I assumed it was ok if it was not the intent to simply inflate my post count. What is your story? I bet Kyoz has a story that would entertain us all to no end.

This is following the rules though right? another user broke the post streak so I can post as a new post without it counting as double posting right?

Interesting lol

ayyy Rem, luff your storytelling; write novels imo, but ctrl + f 'Gosick' 0 results found, smh

Talking about how you went on a vicious losing streak after failing to best me on SS's stream is a story that has to be told by you. I can't tell that one for you. I could have also mentioned that a minor decision in adding upsmash was because bomono used it, but leads to the same answer. Mentioning him and the fact that I simply saw him use an attack ad I added it months after seeing it did not make me feel like I should bring him up as a life changing online opponent, because that did not contain a story to tell, nor would he, if he came to tell his own online story, be able to connect that experience to me, as my incorporation of the upsmash I witnessed from him, but was actually incorporated based on my own ideas.

I also did not type chapter 6, because it is an ongoing situation. This one contains Kylos, but we've battled only on two days' occasion, and so far I've learned nothing, thus the impact felt leads to an incomplete story.

I could type more about individual situations with many more players, but in all honesty, some of them are just not strong enough for me to recall them. Mrfap, SJP, yourself, blossom, Slaypes, and many more I've had experiences with, but they did not contribute to my evolution as a player.

Sometimes, the greatest lessons you can learn are from hardship and losing. Beating you on stream didn't teach me anything, so bringing that up would have just been me adding fluff to the story and entertaining my own ego. I felt good about winning against you, not about you losing.

This type of typing is convoluted and jumping from point to point without any cohesion, so I apologize for it's sloppiness. I just wanted to cover some bases as to why certain people who deserve credit were not added. I either could not write a chapter on the experience, or I felt that that is a story best told by yourself; that you could tell it better than I ever could.

ye, I got ya. I could write about how I started losing to a** players and completely failing in tour, but I jus dn have a way with words when talking about s*** like this.(nat5 English in s3, yet I've never handed in an English essay throughout my entire highschool life, lmao.) It's cool to see your perspective of yourself improving as a player thou.