[Before I begin, let me give thanks where thanks is due: I truly appreciate every one of you who emailed me following my last article. Most of the emails were from players who had an experience to share regarding coming back to the game after a long absence. I enjoyed reading your stories and your advice. All a writer can ask for is an audience. I know now that my audience is not only great in size, but great in generosity and kindness. I reply to every email, so keep them coming if you have any questions, comments, or anything of that nature.]

 

IMPROVEMENT: NOTHING WORTH HAVING COMES EASY.

 

I played this game competitively for years, traveling all across the country to compete with the best of the best as often as I could. In triumph and in defeat, I always gained valuable experience. I learned that although a passionate desire to be great is necessary in any competitive endeavor. it will never make up for a lack of experience, training, or knowledge. That desire is merely requisite for greatness. In order to truly master something, you must possess an unnatural desire to be great, and you must position yourself in a situation where you can use that unstoppable desire to access the knowledge and experience necessary to truly be great.

 

Remember the greatest players in our game's history. The first names that should pop into your head are guys like Wilson Luc, Jae Kim, Matt Peddle, Dale Bellido, and Theerasak Poonsombat. When these players were at the height of their game (some of them still are!), they were unstoppable. These players were absolutely the best in the game, and we all aspired to get on their level of greatness. All of the players named here shared one necessary (but not sufficient) trait: the desire to be great. These players were willing to work hard for something that they thought was important; that is, to be the very best at what they were doing. They all got there.

 

ADVERSITY IS A PREREQUISITE TO GREATNESS

 

As I stated before, having the desire to be great isn't enough. One thing that all of these players used to their advantage was the opportunity to play in an environment that pushed them to the point where they learned essential knowledge and experience of the game. Do you think that the Jae Kim that we know would be nearly as good if he played at locals every Saturday, and never once traveled to a large-scale event? Of course not. These players improved through painstaking practice and countless failures before they became the players we know them as today. In order to be great, you must first overcome adversity. It's the only way we learn.

 

In order to improve, you must play as much as possible against opponents who are better than you. The better they are, the better the experience. For the normal duelist, this doesn't sound very appealing. I'm asking you to play against opponents who are far superior to you in skill. Doing so would almost certainly lead to you losing game after game to a clearly superior opponent. This sounds frustrating and bleak. But this is how you improve.

 

I know that when I first started playing, I started like everyone else: at a local tournament. Local tournaments are a great way to gain knowledge of the cards, rulings, and general nuances of playing YGO competitively. That's where the benefits stop. If you get to the point where you are dominating your local tournament week in and week out, you're not improving any longer. You've reached a plateau.

 

When you reach a plateau, it means that you've gotten to a certain point, and you can't advance past that point. When bodybuilders reach plateaus, they must adjust their routine if they want to see more results. Many do this by adding more weight to the bar, or changing to a completely different exercise. What do these adjustments do? They make the workout harder. No pain, no gain. If what you're doing is easy, you're not getting any better at it. That's it. You've mastered it. The same can be said for any sport or game. In order to get better, you must keep raising the stakes. You have to push yourself. You can always get better. Even guys like Jae, Dale, and Peddle will harp on misplays, errors, and poor judgment during games. These players know that they can always get better, and can always learn something.

 

EMBRACE A CHALLENGE

 

I always hated the idea of playing against a player much better than myself. Once I reached moderate success on the local and regional level, I was satisfied with that. I would go to regionals and locals where most of the people in the room knew exactly who I was, and they would hope that they wouldn't have to play me. I was satisfied with the amount of success I was achieving, and the respect I was getting. Then I decided to take my game to the next level, by attending a Shonen Jump Championship. I went 6-3 at my first Shonen Jump Championship, and knew that I had to get better. I ended up learning that the “practice” I was getting by dominating at locals and 130 person regionals every month wasn't helping my game at all! I had to challenge myself.

 

I set out to find a challenge. I needed someone to push me, so I found the best out there. I ended up finding a willing playtest partner in one notable player, one Wilson Luc, of Comic Odyssey. Although the gap in our skill level was quite large, our levels of dedication were not. I think that a guy like Wilson enjoyed the fact that I was always available for a game, and that I was willing to play cookie-cutter decks for his playtesting purposes. I enjoyed the fact that he was a much better opponent than I had ever faced, and I could learn a lot from him. The games never went well for me; I hardly ever won in the beginning. But throughout those grueling losses, I gained more good experience than I ever would have at any local or regional tournament. We cannot improve without some sort of adversity. Some sort of challenge is necessary for success in any endeavor. Improving is never easy, and it's always hard. You have to push yourself outside of your comfort-zone in order to improve.

 

PUTTING TOGETHER A PLAN

 

If you're interested in getting better at this game, you must be willing to not only put in hard work, but the right kind of work. Find someone better than you, and play them as much as possible. Play with an open mind. Ask yourself why you're setting the Bottomless Trap Hole instead of Dimensional Prison. Think about what your opponent has face down. Try to figure out why your opponent made a specific play. After the match, talk to your opponent about how the games went. See if you can steal some knowledge from him. I would always ask a skilled player why he made a certain move when other options were available. A question like that can yield essential nuggets of information that will improve your game far more than beating 1,000 newbies at your local tournament.

 

Ricky can be contacted at pojorj@gmail.com