Using previews Options

[retep]

Hi, I was wondering if any one could offer any tips/advice/drills etc. for getting better at using the piece previews. I feel this is probably the biggest thing slowing me down at the moment. I currently average around 1:30 in sprint, with a best of like 1:21. I feel I can place pieces fairly quickly but spend a relatively large amount of my time thinking about where to put the piece and doing this for each new piece. I try to look at previews with my peripheral vision and sometimes do quite well for like 5-15 pieces, but then I get like lazy or whatever and just go back to looking at my current piece and just glancing at the preview just before dropping the piece. Basically I was wondering if there are good drills or something I can do to focus on getting better at using the previews or is it something that just develops with time? Also do you look at the previews with your peripheral vision or do you actually look at it and use your peripheral or simply glance at the playing field when necessary?

Also I recently learned to rotate both ways and most of 2 step finesse (still sometimes getting things mixed up, particularly things like DAS to wall, wall kick with rotate and then move away from wall, whereas I will often rotate while tapping 3 times in the direction). I also got the nullpo add-on download thingy I found on here that detects finesse faults or can keep track of keys per tetromino and was wondering what you would consider like an "acceptable" number of faults during a game of tetris. I currently have like 15-20 faults in a game when I am trying to go as fast as possible and like 5 when slowed down and focusing on having good finesse (these games I generally have a sprint time around 1:45-2:00). Is this okay? Is it something I should be concerned about?

Also I want to try to practice the finesse without looking at the pieces to see if I really got it down, but I cannot figure out how to turn off the ghost piece in nullpomino, could any one tell me how to do this?

[Barneey]

Hey, I don't know if making a conscious effort to pay attention to the previews will really help you, it'll be hard to practice paying attention to both places at the same time, but it'll come naturally with experience, don't worry.
20~ finesse faults per game is not bad at all, whether it's acceptable or not is completely up to you, however.
My advice would be, try not to rush things, my friend.

[myndzi]

I see caffeine lurking, so listen to whatever he has to say.

Sounds like you've got a great start. Practice will go the longest way towards reducing hesitation. Most of the time you'll want to stack as flexibly as possible, but if you're aware of a necessary piece coming up that makes a better combo, you can stack something that requires it; that's a good use of the previews.

You can turn off ghost piece in the rule editor; load the rule file you use and uncheck Ghost on the Basic tab, then save it. If piece spawn is above the field, this is a rather easier way to practice finesse placements than tape on your monitor

I push king of stackers somewhat relentlessly, but I honestly find that it has helped me a great deal in planning play with large chunks of a bag.

[Paul676]

practise practise practise

[caffeine]

First off, you have a lot of work ahead of you no matter how you train. Most people break a minute without paying any mind to how good they are at reading the previews. As a disclaimer, I don't believe what I'm about to say will be very helpful in the short run. However, I do believe it was extremely helpful, for me at least, in the long run. It helped me develop good habits.

You asked about what I call "blind active piece training." This is what it looks like:


So, playing like this forces you to know exactly how to place every piece in every situation, strictly on "instinct." It's fantastic for solidifying your finesse knowledge. I suggest training on this until you come within 120% of your best regular sprint time. If you'd like to try it, I've explained how to tweak your settings in this post.

Now, you asked specifically about becoming better with previews. Well, we can take this concept one step further: blind training hard mode. You simply cover the next preview piece with electrical tape or something, and then now you must always try to remember what next piece is coming. You have to keep the active AND the next piece in mind at all times. It was extremely difficult for me at first.



I stopped training with this method after I could consistently play with the next three previews covered. Although, I still sometimes practice regular blind mode. I hope this helps.

[myndzi]

Tip: Falling Down has levels in chaos mode where it does exactly this (cover X next previews). I didn't think of practicing that way on purpose, but it's a great idea.

[MarioThePhenom]

i feel like i dont even look at my next piece and just play off of instinct....
doesnt xenoslah look at his previews only and his field with his peripheral view?

[xenoslash]

i feel like i dont even look at my next piece and just play off of instinct....
doesnt xenoslah look at his previews only and his field with his peripheral view?

Yeah, that's what I force myself to do. I honestly don't think finesse is that important until you are sub 30. My finesse sucks (ask Barney), and I have yet to even start learning it. I think what Mario said " play off instinct" is more important. Once you reach the state where you see a color, and instinctively be able to move the piece to where it belongs, sub 30 should be feasible. But of course, if you aim to be in the low 20s, then having those skills would probably help.
Oh, and definitely lots of practice. I used to play > 3 hours the first few weeks when I first started tetris (>2:30 in sprint )

[myndzi]

Learning finesse is more about learning how to efficiently, reliably place pieces in a structured way than anything else. Sure, you could memorize quadruple taps if you want, but why bother if there's a better alternative? Seeing it as "just something to make you faster" is missing the point IMO.

[tjenyao]

Holy, it's retep from speedsolving ^__^ I'm also learning how to do this efficiently. Thanks for the tips guys!