It’s been on my mind for quite some time to revisit the topic, but I was recently reminded of my interest in third-party training tools for the C:SI system when Aimee brought a new one to my attention in a comment to the Jump Slash Difficulties post.
She mentioned one that I’d not yet heard of called "Straight Razor’s Iaido Reflexes", which apparently comes available in a version that has sit pads for people to make use of and seems to provide some pretty good numbers for reaction times.
I use Yasuragi’s original complete set quite frequently, and have since the day that he released them (before I joined C:SI). I’ve also used his Perfect Timing tool a few times, though not recently.
Eyana Yohkoh also has training tools available that include obstacle courses in addition to slash testing, and I still remember quite fondly when they were set up in the now-defunct Shrouded Isle sim.
I’ve often wanted to make my own training tools for C:SI, though I simply don’t have the time : I have 50,000 things I want to do, and maybe enough time and energy to do two of those at any given time. It may be that some day I will finally get around to it, or one of the other C:SI devs will do so, but I make absolutely no promises to that effect; We are all very busy and just can’t do everything we’d like to.
I do often make very crude "tools" for testing purposes, suck as kick and block testers, and use those constantly, but they are far too crude to let anyone else use.
And, to be honest, I think that the third-party interest in (and market for) training tools is pretty darned neat. I’m betting there are more such products out there, and while I can’t give any sort of "official endorsement" of any of them, I’d surely love to check them out and perhaps write some reviews on them.
So my questions to you are:
- Which third-party training tools are available?
- Which ones have you tried?
- What did you like/not like about them?
- What would you like to see in training tools that’s not already out there?
Feedback is strongly encouraged 
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I know we have some interesting one at our dojo. I have no idea what the names, of them are, or who they were made by. I’m pretty sure Mal does though.
Straight Razor’s Iaido Trainer is really cool, especially as it can be a little game between several people (who’s fastest?). I also like Yasuragi’s Perfect Timing device. One thing I wish both of them did was give reaction time of each strike in milliseconds (Yasuragi’s gives an average in ms after going through an entire set of tests, about 35 I think).
A training device I thought about after using Perfect Timing is something like a “tanking trainer”, something which goes through block, kick, and slash animations against which one can practice basic ‘kata’, like the stun-counterslash thing for example. Maybe it turns green if you hit it and red if you are blocked, or something. Reaction speed of the device and particular patterns practiced might be controllable by user? If a dev got involved it might even be made to hit back, though the more fighting features you add, the more it starts to look like a bot…
On the other hand, it’s perhaps better to just IM a friend and practice tanking that way^^
And just what’s wrong with bot? Just kidding. Well, sorta, as I actually do use a bot for testing and training (though it’s in dire need of fixing at this point).
It seems to me that there are really some great training tools out there, and really the only reason for a dev to get involved in training tools would be (as you say) to add the ability to hit back.
A tanking trainer does indeed sound cool, and I bet there are quite a few people who would use such a thing. I’m hoping that the makers of training devices will see these comments and take away some ideas for “the next version” too, hehe.
Practicing with a friend is *always* good, but not always possible. Plus, there are just times when you want to hammer the living crap out of something after a hard day’s work, and that’s sometimes hard to ask a friend to put up with
I luuuuv the yasuragi perfect timing tool. It’s fun and it’s a great way to get people new to c:si used to the keys. It’s good for reaction time. Just great in general.
I like eyana’s obstacle courses and jump slash trainers. Cages/boxes are awesome in all their unscripted glory.
I forget the name of it, but I like yasuragi’s tool with the three balls that surround you, move in and out, and the other one which I first learned about from Aimee when I joined c:si is the Infamous Designs target dummy. The one thing I’d like to see in something similar is a very minute hp count in each part of the dummy. That way it won’t count bumping into it as a hit.
Yasuragi’s tool with the ball that moves on a mat is one I find helpful too.
I’d like to see more training tools use the same trick as yasuragi’s timing tool so that they can recognize kicks and even blocks when necessary.