[hr] Part 4 [hr] In this section I will discuss how to train jumpstats to improve as fast as you possibly can. [hr] Grouping jumptypes to train efficiently Something most people who are beginning in KZ fail to understand is that the only main difference between any two given jumpstat types is the prespeed. The speed that you start at is the basically sole contributor to making them different. Some jump types do require more mechanical skill than others, particularly longjump and countjump being the hardest. However, once a player has mastered the execution of the technical aspects of those jumptypes, and applied the different types of strafing I have described above, skill between jumpstats can have a huge carry over. For example, the way that you strafe between countjumps, longjumps, and weirdjumps is largely the same. This is because their prespeed caps are extremely similar. Countjumps and longjumps have a relatively higher mechanical input requirement than weirdjumps. Therefore, anybody who practices lots of longjumps and countjumps, will naturally be able to get a good weirdjump. It is unnecessary to train weirdjumps at all until you are ready to break a weirdjump record. For the most part, your skills from countjumps and longjumps will carry over. This same idea can be transferred over to the comparison between single bunnyhops and drop bunnyhops. They both have the same prespeed cap and relatively similar technique, so you only ever need to train one of them to be good at both. Players only need to practice longjumps, countjumps, bunnyhops, and multi bunnyhops to master jumpstat strafing. Most of a player’s time should be spent on longjumping and multi bunnyhopping because they are the most drastically different styles of jumping. [hr] How much should a player practise? When trying to become great at strafing, it is more important that you practice well and practice often than to practice a lot. I suggest everybody practices at least thirty minutes every day, at least five times every week. I also recommend that you only play in the ideal conditions I stated above, where you are hydrated, have recently been physically active in some way, and are not hungry or tired. If your hands are tired from a previous day of practicing, or you are unable to get warmed up within thirty minutes of sitting down to play, you are probably never going to manage to get warmed up for that day. In this case I recommend players take a day off. Further, whenever your hands start to get tired, it is time to quit. Do not continue to practice after becoming fatigued. You will only make yourself worse by practicing in a way that can lead to the development of incorrect muscle memory. I would say that the ideal amount of practice is approximately 1 hour and 15 minutes of longjumping per day and twenty minutes for the other three primary jumpstats, bunnyhop, countjump, and multi bunnyhop. I would suggest that this amount of practice should be applied six days per week at most, and three times per week at minimum. However, as I already stated, it is much better to get less practice every day than a lot all at once. If you can not get this much practice every day, try to get in whatever you can. [hr] Start from the bootom and build strong fundamentals A lot of players in KZ come in and try to emulate what the best players are doing right away when they are unprepared to do these things. Before practicing strafing at all, a player should be able to reach at least 274 prespeed on longjumps consistently. Once a player has done that, they should practice with only three strafes for several days or possibly weeks until they are able to get a successful W release nearly every time (indicated in the jump panel by going to !options, and choosing to enable the speed panel and the advanced jump panel). Then, move on to five strafes. Practice five strafes until you feel like you have absolute mastery of it, and then move on to six. Master every number of strafes before moving on to the next one. You cannot set out to build a house by laying the bricks for the top floor first. You must first build a base on which to lay those bricks. The same applies to strafing. If you want to be good at seven strafes, you have to be able to do the first six of them perfectly. You do not have to do a high amount of strafes to be able to go far. You can do more than 270 units with a longjump on just three strafes, and more than 280 units with just 4. While some people like to try to do 11 or 12 strafes, they are not getting any farther than somebody else who is doing only eight, but doing them perfectly. [hr] Should you train both pre-strafe directions? For the purpose of just improving in jumpstats, the answer is no. There is no benefit to training yourself to be able to execute jumps from both sides. However, anybody who wants to be able to transfer their strafing skills into map running should practice both directions evenly on both longjump and multi bunnyhop. There is no need to practice both sides on other jump types if you do not wish to. It’s also important to know that while you may feel like your jumps are particularly bad on some days, you may still be able to jump normally on your non-dominant prestrafe side. [hr] Should you train backwards and sideways? There is no use in maps to being able to strafe sideways or backwards. At this time, there are no officially kept leaderboards for either of these techniques. The only purpose for training them as it is right now is to impress people. Considering how easy it is for somebody who is already good at jumping normally to learn them, there is no merit in practicing them regularly. [hr] How long does it take to become good? Do not become discouraged quickly when pursuing skills in strafing. It takes a large amount of practice and time to be truly skilled. With the help of this guide and regular practice, you will be able to become very good within months to a year. Something I frequently hear is people saying they are having a bad day strafing, or that they were performing very well for a day or two, and then they have several bad days in a row afterwards. What is happening here is that people are under the impression that the days where they were playing great are the measure of their skill level. The reality is that they were having a lucky day, and their normal skill level is what they are seeing on their so called “bad” days. Do not let this discourage you. It takes a lot of time to be truly consistent to the point where you are better than the majority of other players even when you are not “on fire.”
