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The
Art of War, Part 3: Deception
Let us return to The Art of War so that
Sun Tzu might help us glimpse the ways of the best fighting game
players in the Western Hemisphere. I omit the East because I am not
intimately familiar with its players as I am with the unquestionable
champions of the West. Of course, Sun Tzu was acquainted with
neither when he wrote his little manual of warfare 25 centuries ago,
but he still managed to strike directly at the truth.
“…the clever combatant imposes his will on
the enemy, but does not allow the enemy’s will to be imposed on
him. By holding out advantages to him, he can cause the enemy to
approach of his own accord…[and]…entice him with a bait.”
–Sun Tzu, The Art of War
In fighting games like Street Fighter,
positioning is of paramount importance. One maneuvers to place his
character just barely outside the range of his opponent’s likely
moves and just within range to retaliate should the opponent
foolishly try to attack from this distance. For example, in all five
versions of Street Fighter 2, when Ken and Ryu fight, a sweet spot
of positioning is just beyond the reach of the opponent’s low
roundhouse sweep. If Ryu stands at this distance without blocking
(this reduces his the size of his hittable zones…shhhh!), Ken’s
low roundhouse sweep will miss him. If Ken’s sweep misses, Ryu can
easily sweep Ken in retaliation or even throw him. Also from this
distance, Ken’s projectile can be easily blocked on reaction. Any
attempt by Ken to jump can be easily countered with Ryu’s dragon
punch. In short, a wide variety of Ken’s most common moves are not
effective at this very specific range. The exact location of this
sweet spot, of course, varies by character match up and by game.
 |
| This
is the so-called "sweet spot" position for Ryu or
Ken in Street Fighter: Hyper Fighting. It's just beyond the
range of the opponent's sweep. |
The best players are well aware of this nuance
of positioning and fight hard to position themselves favorably. The
weaker player, though also “fighting hard” in some sense,
probably doesn’t even know he should be fighting for this exact
distancing, so the expert player is easily able to occupy it. And
from this catbird seat, the expert is in control.
Commonly, the expert will conceal the very
existence of this sweet spot. He’ll do a variety of safe moves in
quick succession. He’ll maneuver back and forth across the sweet
spot in an elaborate dance designed to hide the true advantage he
holds. Mysteriously, whenever the weaker player tries to attack,
he’s always just barely out of range and gets hit back for his
attempt. In frustration, he makes even bigger mistakes and soon
falls completely apart. He is not unlike a deaf person trying to
read the lips of someone doing an impression of a poorly dubbed Kung
Fu movie; the real movements are too masked by the false movements
to make sense of any of it.
The expert player is also aided by the “fear
aura” around him. If, during his elaborate dance, he does a
certain move or series with great intensity and purpose, the enemy
cannot help but believe the tactic is valid. Often, it’s just an
illusion—a diversion—to waste time until the weaker player takes
the bait and falls into the positional trap.
The low strong move from which I’ve become
legendary (described in my first article on Sun Tzu’s Sheathed
Sword), is a great example of the fear aura. Often in tournaments,
I’ve done my seemingly-unstoppable low strong at times I know full
well it’s ineffective, but the opponents don’t know that. Their
hesitation often allows me to claim the sweet spot position I’m
really after.
This tactic of dancing around just out of range
of the opponent to lure his moves out is amazingly relevant in
nearly every fighting game, including the myriad versions of Street
Fighter, the Virtua Fighter series, Tekken, Soul Calibur, even
pitiable games like Mortal Kombat.
Personally, I’ve used the sweet spot of
positioning in another way, designed to unnerve the opponent. Like
the magician’s magician who gives away the secret yet still wins
in the end, I have been known to stand at the sweet spot in neutral,
doing no moves, and not even blocking. I learned this tactic from
better players than myself, but I have that mixture of defiance and
infinite patience that lets me hold the stance longer than most.
“Tu Mu relates a strategem of Chu-ko Liang,
who in 149 B.C., when occupying Yang-p’ing and about to be
attacked by Ssu-ma, suddenly struck his colors, stopped the beating
of the drums, and flung open the city gates, showing only a few men
engaged in sweeping and sprinkling the ground. This unexpected
proceeding had the intended effect; for Ssu-ma I, suspecting an
ambush, actually drew off his army and retreated.” –Editorial
note by Lionel Giles, The Art of War
What’s the purpose of standing, seemingly
defenselessly? From this range, I’m pretty safe…it is the
sweet spot after all. And standing defenselessly and doing no moves
is usually a sign that the joystick is broken or something…it’s
an extreme rarity in fighting game play. In a way, it’s an open
taunt to the enemy saying, “Just try to do something, you can’t
touch me.” That can be intimidating. When opponents are confronted
with a situation they don’t quite understand, they’re likely to
1) make a mistake or 2) wait until the situation passes. Of course,
against me they can wait forever, since I stand in confidence and
unending patience, while they sweat in nervousness. Even if I am
vulnerable to them in some way, the sheer deception of it all can be
utterly convincing.
“If the enemy is taking his ease, harass him;
if quietly encamped, force him to move; if well supplied with food,
starve him out. Appear at points that the enemy must hasten to
defend; march swiftly to places where you are not expected.”
–Sun Tzu, The Art of War
 |
| Gandhi
knew how annoyed you can get someone by not attacking them. |
As a side note, a good way to deal with overly
defensive players is to simply not attack them. I’ve even gone as
far as positioning my character across the entire screen from the
overly defensive opponent, and letting go of my joystick. They
expect attack, and so they shall not get it. I have the will to let
time run down to zero, but do they? They never do. They are put off,
and must go against their instincts and feebly try to attack. They
often get quite mad, which seems odd, since I only employed the
logical extreme of their own strategy.
I’ve also paused and done no moves for
stretches of even 20 seconds—in tournament matches—far more than
anyone else I’ve ever heard of. If I must get near the opponent
but can’t…oh well. Maybe if I wait 20 seconds he’ll be
flustered and let me in. If the opponent is waiting for my immediate
attack, ready with some quick-reflex counter…let him wait on edge
for 20 seconds and see how his nerves fare. If the opponent allows
himself to be so antagonized, then antagonize him, I say. It’s war
after all.
Traps
Traps in fighting games are like the “in
motion” version of the positional deceptions I’ve described
already. A trap is a sequence of moves that prevents the opponent
from acting. A trap might be throwing one projectile after the next
at the opponent, and when he jumps, there always seems to be some
sort of anti-air attack waiting. A trap can also be one or more
tightly spaced moves (no gaps between them) followed by a move that
allows the attacker to advance close enough to repeat the trap
again. (When the enemy blocks or is hit by the moves, he’s knocked
back out of range, so an advancing move is needed to repeat the
set).
Traps are hardly ever as solid as they seem to
be in Street Fighter. Rarely can the attacker complete 3, 2, or even
1 repetition safely without leaving gaps. The effective trapper,
though is a master of deceit. Although gaps exist, there appear to
be none, and the gaps that are visible are often bait.
Let’s take a specific example of a trap to
illustrate this. I’ll take Ryu’s fireball trap in Hyper Fighting
Street Fighter, which is basically the same as most fireball traps
in any version. Ryu has his opponent knocked down and in the
“corner,” which means the edge of the playfield. The opponent
cannot back up any farther. The game is two dimensional, so there is
no way “around” the fireballs other than jumping over them at
Ryu. The key to the fireball trap is the slow speed fireball
followed immediately by the fast fireball. When the opponent blocks
the slow fireball, the fast fireball will hit him basically every
time if he tries to jump at Ryu in between. So the “trap” here
is really only 2 move long! Not much of trap, yet by illusion, the
trap can go as long as 30 fireballs or more!
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| Do
you know how hard it was to get this badass shot? Red
fireballs appear randomly in SF: HF, and very infrequently. |
First, Ryu can start with a “meaty” or
“early” slow fireball against his knocked down opponent. This
means the fireball is right on top of the opponent as he rises from
the ground, so he’s forced to block. If timed correctly, the very
tail end of the fireball will make contact (rather than the front).
This means Ryu has had time to finish the recovery phase of his
first fireball in time to throw another one. The mechanics here are
not important to the discussion, so just take my word for it that
“meaty” slow fireball, another slow fireball, then a fast
fireball form a 3 move trap. The opponent will not (easily) be able
to jump at Ryu until that series is over.
So now you have your poor opponent knocked down
in the corner. He might try to jump before the 3 series is over, in
which case he’ll get hit and probably give Ryu the chance to reset
the series. Eventually, he’ll wait for the 3rd fireball
(the fast one) after which there can be no more true trap. This is
the gap. This is when he can jump. Of course, this is exactly what
Ryu expects and that’s why he didn’t throw a 4th
fireball, but instead waited for the jump and did an anti-air dragon
punch to knock the opponent on the ground, in the corner again. The
trap is reset. Now the enemy is shaken. This trap seems to be
unbreakable. Ryu has created the illusion, and can now use it to his
advantage.
At this point, Ryu might throw a “meaty”
slow fireball, then another slow fireball (that’s a real trap),
then another slow fireball. Now, that is not a true trap. The
enemy could have easily jumped over the 3rd slow
fireball, but he’s probably too afraid of the illusion to try. Ryu
could then throw a fast fireball, since slow to fast is a trap. Ryu
might even sneak in 3 non-trap slow fireballs in a row, then
complete the trap with a fast fireball. Everyone knows you can jump
after the fast fireball, but Ryu must surely know that too
so…bam!, another slow fireball, trap reset. Shouldn’t have
hesitated. The Ryu player is using his “fear aura” to do moves
that aren’t even a real trap (many slow fireballs in a row) and to
reset the trap secretly (by going back to a slow fireball after the
fast one). Though the Ryu player’s intense, purposeful execution
of these moves might make them appear to be a real trap, it’s all
just an illusion. It’s an elaborate dance designed to conceal
where the trap begins and ends.
The gaps are the key aspect of the traps.
Because of deception, the defender is not able to detect which gaps
are real and which ones are merely bait. Sometimes after a real gap,
the attacker will simply wait for the defender to stupidly attack.
The defender though he was being pretty clever since he weathered
the storm, then attacked at his first opportunity. Of course, this
is such an obvious thing to do that the expert fully expects it.
I remember doing difficult reversal attacks at
“clever” times during one opponent’s traps, only to be
countered every single time. I finally realized I was as clever as
the man who runs from his pursuer into a room totally empty save for
a large chair. It may seem “clever” to hide behind the chair,
but the lack of all other alternatives makes the “clever” move
wholly obvious to the opponent.
Not only can the attacker now fake his way
through gaps that let him reset the trap, but he can also create
artificial gaps as bait. After blocking a series of 8 fireballs (it
sure seemed like a trap), there is an apparent opportunity to
jump out. Is it a real gap? Is it a gap that Ryu put there just to
make me think there’s a gap so I’ll jump? Bam! Another blocked
slow fireball. The opponent is second guessing himself, hesitating,
and completely lost in the web of illusion.
“Thus one who is skillful at keeping the
enemy on the move maintains deceitful appearances, according to
which the enemy will act. He sacrifices something that the enemy may
snatch at it. By holding out baits, he keeps him on the march; then
with a body of picked men he lies in wait for him.” –Sun Tzu, The
Art of War
The top fighting game players are able to
conceal their strengths (sweet spot positioning) and weaknesses
(gaps in traps) while simultaneously putting on mesmerizing dances
designed to harass and confuse the opponent into hesitation,
irritation, or worst of all—second guessing himself. If only Sun
Tzu were here to see it!
Talk back!
Discuss this article in the forums.
|
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| "I
bet Sirlin made up this hogwash. 149 BC? Please!" |
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| "Fun,
fun!" |
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| "This
example is too long. No one cares about Street Fighter,
anyway." |
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