Week 3: Training

This week I started training and it was quite a roller-coaster. I’m still working out the kinks of how exactly to set up my training schedule and what to practice, when and for how long.

My original plan is outlined in the table below:

This may not have been the best plan, since I couldn’t stick to it past Thursday.

It started out great reviewing the 10 unranked matches I played last week. I did this with Tyler to identify common mistakes I was making and elements that I was doing well. All of this to focus on strategy and game knowledge instead of mechanics, since that would come naturally as I practice.

Here is what we noticed:

Strengths:

· Solid contact with the ball at kickoff

· Conservation of boost

· Using boost on kickoff to get more power (see Image 1)

· Knowledge of what to do when

· Good attitude, not focused on winning but playing well instead

· Doing front flips to conserve boost

· Exercises patience, when calm

· Near post defending (see Image 2)

Image 1

Image 2

Needs improvement:

· Staying patient and calm when doing poorly

· Using reverse instead of turning around and using boost (see Image 3)

· Control of car when boosting

· Tight turn hits

· Stealing boost from opponent

· Field rotation too wide (see Image 4)

· Using Freeplay properly

Image 3

Image 4

Based on these strengths and weaknesses, we decided that the first thing to practice was how to properly train in Freeplay mode.

TRAINING IN FREEPLAY

In this mode, you have the field and ball all to yourself to do whatever you want with unlimited boost. One of the exercises I practiced every day was making contact with the ball as hard as I can and as frequently as I can while using boost constantly. This will help me learn how to control my car better when moving faster with boost. The goal of this training is to make good contact with the ball at a fast pace and from all sorts of angles.

Another exercise I practiced in Freeplay training this week was to flip into the ball so that I hit it with the side of my car. This helps with knowing how to use all of the car to hit the ball and move it to different areas of the field. There was also a bit of timing that came in here as well, especially when my car shifted from boost speed, to the faster, super-sonic speed. There is a bit of a perceptual challenge here to be able to know when my car will increase in speed and also the distance my car is from the ball to make contact when flipping to the side.

OTHER TRAINING MODES

In addition to doing 15 minutes of Freeplay training every day, I also did some of the training packages that Rocket League offers. I did the Striker Training, to practice taking shots on the goal, and the Goalie Training, to practice defending. Both of these come with 3 difficulty levels (Rookie, Pro, and Allstar), I stayed within Rookie and Pro.

Instead of just going through the motions with these training packages to simply clear all of the challenges, I tried to clear the challenge a certain way, either making contact with the ball on a certain side or defending right away as opposed to waiting until the last minute. I plan to repeat these training packages in the coming weeks to further develop the mechanics that go with taking shots on the opponent’s goal, as well as defend my own.

THE WEEK’S MATCHES

Now, I mentioned earlier that this week was pretty rough, that was primarily because the matches I played did not go so well. The biggest issue: I expected that after a few days of training I would be exponentially better. This just was not the case.

As I’ve said before, Rocket League is a really difficult game to master, and my road to Platinum II will be long and challenging. From the matches I played this week, my rank dropped down to Silver I Division II due to the number of matches that I lost, and this really bummed me out, even though it is totally expected that my rank will probably get worse before it gets better.

I put too much pressure on myself to be good at the game all of a sudden, which is totally unrealistic. As a result, I got frustrated really easily when I did something that I knew I needed to be working on. The rest went downhill from there. But something I noticed from all of that was that I did worse when Tyler wasn’t around to help me stay calm. This made me realize how important it is to have support when learning a new skill, especially a skill that is really difficult to master. Since he has gone through being bad at the game to being really good, he is able to recognize the small progress I have already made, even if I can’t see it.

TRAINING PLAN REVISED

The new plan now is to focus more on training instead of playing matches. I will continue to do the training that I have done this week, and I will also add in watching some videos of other Rocket League masters to observe their game play. However, instead of playing for 3 hours throughout the week, I will play for 2 hours at the end of the week after focusing on training for the beginning of the week.

I think this plan will work better since right now I need to focus more on improving my mechanical skills rather than my gameplay knowledge. Here’s hoping it does!