Breaking through the plateau/elevator help

[DonkeyWessel]

Hey everybody --

I have had a machine for a bit over a year now. I have found myself plateaued at around the 200,000 mark but can feel the "breakthrough game" that a lot of you have talked about coming. I feel myself getting more and more confident and know I am close to breaking through. Anybody got any tips or stories of their moment of breakthrough for inspiration?

Also, where I tend to lose most my men is (surprise, surprise) the 4+ elevator boards. I have read all the literature on here about beating that infamous board and am getting better at watching the second spring after I make my move. But dumb question I could use help on. Does anybody have any screen shots of the ideal foot positions for Mario to run on in each of the two safe positions? I feel like I am overthinking how his feet are lined up sometimes.

Thanks for any help and inspiration. This board rocks.

[Adam_Mon]

Hey everybody --

I have had a machine for a bit over a year now. I have found myself plateaued at around the 200,000 mark but can feel the "breakthrough game" that a lot of you have talked about coming. I feel myself getting more and more confident and know I am close to breaking through. Anybody got any tips or stories of their moment of breakthrough for inspiration?

Also, where I tend to lose most my men is (surprise, surprise) the 4+ elevator boards. I have read all the literature on here about beating that infamous board and am getting better at watching the second spring after I make my move. But dumb question I could use help out. Does anybody have any screen shots of the ideal foot positions for Mario to run on in each of the two safe positions? I feel like I am overthinking how his feet are lined up sometimes.

Thanks for any help and inspiration. This board rocks.

Hello

I'll stick some screen shots below and explain.

The first safe zone/ safe spot for the lvl 4 / lvl 5+ elevator board is in the picture below, if you look at the girder you can make out that its made of little red triangles, (you can use these as a visual reference to help make sure you're in the correct position.. )

The general rule for the 1st safe spot is never cross over the 3rd red triangle (the yellow line shows how far in you can go without getting hit by the springs) as long as you wait behind that line you will be out of the path of the springs.

It's also worth noting that jump man is standing pretty much as close as possible to the line in this pic but you can definitely move back a little to give yourself some room.

http://postimg.org/image/cab4e9j57/


For the second safe zone you pretty much want half of jump mans body to cover the yellow elevator mechanisim and the other half covering the red girder as shown below.

http://postimg.org/image/stunmzrqb/


 
there is a couple ways to get from the first safe spot to the second.
here's a quick video showing how to get between safe spots on long and short springs.

! No longer available

good luck!

[timhett]

Adam, that was awesome!
There is also this if you want too much information about that board lol

https://donkeykongforum.net/index.php?topic=492.msg8895#msg8895

 

[YesAffinity]

Very good information here, and after studying the post at the link that timhett posted (back when I realized that elevators was a major weakness in my gameplay), I determined that facing the ladder with jumpman facing the ladder and the front of his foot at the line shown in the below picture is about the closest you can safely get to the ladder, in order to get a good jump at the ladder.  This is an aggressive position, though, so timing your "leave time" gets a little bit tighter than if you were a couple pixels back like shown above.

I've found, and noticed the greats doing it before I really started doing it comfortably (it just started happening naturally for me, wasn't anything I really tried to develop as a skill), that the more comfortable I get with the spring timing and jumpman's positioning left of the ladder, I am able to watch the spring bouncing at Kong, and then cheat towards the ladder while watching for the second spring, and kind of "wiggle" back and forth at the waiting spot to the left of the ladder.

I detail this in my blog, but the elevators was definitely the sticking point for me until I started studying how to get better and focusing on practicing practicing practicing.  My PB was 178,000 until getting proficient at springs.

All that is to say good luck sir, and keep going!

[mrvaya]

Nice post and great info.

About the plateau thing I would like to add, that I feel there are MANY of them. I just did some quick notes about my own feel for different plateaus according to my own development/knwoledge with a few examples (stronger players feel free to add in):

Beginner (getting into the game)
- in general: learning all sorts of info about the screens/levels
- steering barrels (basics)
- safespots
- hammertime for barrel boards
- fireball spawn rules
- conveyor behavior

Intermediate (reaching 1/3 of the killscreen)
- in general: coping with all sort of arising dangers
- steering barrels away, no-steering etc.
- different jumping teqniques according to critical barrel combos
- positioning according to kong cycle
- transition teqniques according to the specific levels on barrel boards (e.g. from 4th to 5th girder and between safespots)
- eliminating deaths on L4+ elevator screens
- wild barrel behavior according to internal timer
- steering fireballs (vertically)

Advanced (refining all teqniques and gunning for killscreen)
- in general: precision positioning/timing according to POTENTIAL dangers
- alternate paths on pie- and rivetscreens according to fireball positions
- grouping for safety
- how to avoid deaths from all types of wild barrels
- beginning to do all of the above with "ease" so you dont get worn out too early

Expert (getting from killscreen to 1m)

Guru (getting from killscreen to 1.1m)

Legend (getting above 1.1m)

"There can be only one" (getting past 1.2)

[DonkeyWessel]

Thank you all so much for the help. You guys are amazing. The kindness on this board is great.

I have read over everything and have carved out some time Saturday afternoon to go after the big ape. I even printed out the screen shots Adam posted and am going to hang them on my cab's marquee for guidance.  Ill keep you all posted.

Have a great weekend and thanks again for the help!

[YesAffinity]

Hope to see a new PB posted from you in Score Submissions, on Saturday!   

[Mitch Mitchell]

Hello

I'll stick some screen shots below and explain.

The first safe zone/ safe spot for the lvl 4 / lvl 5+ elevator board is in the picture below, if you look at the girder you can make out that its made of little red triangles, (you can use these as a visual reference to help make sure you're in the correct position.. )

The general rule for the 1st safe spot is never cross over the 3rd red triangle (the yellow line shows how far in you can go without getting hit by the springs) as long as you wait behind that line you will be out of the path of the springs.

It's also worth noting that jump man is standing pretty much as close as possible to the line in this pic but you can definitely move back a little to give yourself some room.

http://postimg.org/image/cab4e9j57/


For the second safe zone you pretty much want half of jump mans body to cover the yellow elevator mechanisim and the other half covering the red girder as shown below.

http://postimg.org/image/stunmzrqb/


 
there is a couple ways to get from the first safe spot to the second.
here's a quick video showing how to get between safe spots on long and short springs.

! No longer available

good luck!

-------
Amazingly helpful reply, the pics and especially the vid; Thanks.
-Mitch

[JAM]

Where I die has been shifting over the last several months.

I used to always die on the LVL 4+ elevator, but then those deaths became less frequent.  For me, it was all about being able to watch the springs and sort of blindly control Mario to either commit to the ladder or retreat on a double C spring.

Then I found myself dying due to the fireball randomness on the pie factory and rivets stages.  I've pretty much eliminated my deaths in the pie factory by becoming more patient, but I still die once or twice on the rivets stage per game.

Today, the majority of my deaths (2-3 per game) are on the barrel stages.  Usually it's a wild barrel when I'm below DK, or getting rolled over or hit while trying to escape something that I can't jump.  I think the biggest hole in my game right now is my inability to jump safely with the direction of the barrel.  I generally stick to straight up or opposite the direction of the barrel.  When you watch the experts play, they often jump with the barrel.  I mean, I can do it, but I need to learn how to do it safely every time.

I had the most heartbreaking game yesterday morning.  I made it to LVL 12 without dying, 388K points, and then everything just went to hell.  I got nervous and just started doing stupid things like getting stuck on ladders or jumping into wild barrels.  I thought for sure that I was going to get a new PR.  I lost 3 of my lives on one barrel screen.  Once I get close to a PR my nerves get me every time.  I think I just need so much repetition that getting up near my PR is no big deal and I can remain calm.

[Barra]

I had the most heartbreaking game yesterday morning.  I made it to LVL 12 without dying, 388K points, and then everything just went to hell.  I got nervous and just started doing stupid things like getting stuck on ladders or jumping into wild barrels.  I thought for sure that I was going to get a new PR.  I lost 3 of my lives on one barrel screen.  Once I get close to a PR my nerves get me every time.  I think I just need so much repetition that getting up near my PR is no big deal and I can remain calm.

Great game.
Generally barrel deaths are very avoidable, especially if you're running boards.

The key is to dump barrels down the broken ladders, especially the one between the 4th and 5th girders. The 4th girder is a common death-point for players just running boards, usually due to bad combos. You can eliminate this completely by clearing the 5th girder using the broken ladder I mentioned before.

Also be sure to "Watch the Monkey", i.e before ascending the ladder under Kong, watch for a wild barrel. If its not a wild you can safely ascend and stand position yourself under the hammer

Hope that helps