Question from a convert to Zone hitting

[The_Joneser_PSN]

Mostly, I’m posting this to eat crow. Because I should.

Having railed against the Zone interface in these forums many times in the past, I’m now a fairly recent convert (maybe 100 of my 500+ RS games this year have been with Zone)… and I have to admit that I’m starting to kind of like it... after being vehemently against it. I still can’t hang with the giant, double-parentheses eyesore that comprise the inner and outer PCI flitting about my screen, but eliminating them from view and just using the dots the in middle (white, with reduced opacity) as a guide has improved my experience.

I still suck. I’ll just get that out of the way, but even picking this up at the tender age of 51, I feel I’m slowly improving as I go. My time with Timing (using analog input) was fun, and still feels more intuitively like swinging, but the results—even with the modicum of placement control analog provides—were wildly inconsistent. I’d seesaw tremendously, but now I can better stick in the 600s, and my trips into the 700s are less fleeting. I’m able to stay closer even in games I lose, but the biggest surprise, honestly, is that it’s improved my pitching, as I have a better understanding of the pitfalls of “jamming” and the holes in the zone they can create for people who are as bad at this as I am.

And that leads me to my question: do precision rings really help with the jamming problem? I’ve heard some people use a claw grip, but with the amount of times I’ve broken my fingers over the years, I can’t see my arthritis allowing that unless I cut my playing time dramatically. I imagine the real answer is just to practice more, and to try to control myself instead of throwing the stick around, but thought I’d ask what others might recommend.

Any tips?

[Blind_Bleeder_PSN]

I’m 64 and began using zone four years ago. It was a tough conversion, but now, when I switch to directional, I hit worse than with zone (if that’s possible).

I like KontrolFreeks because they raise the sticks and make them easier to control. I also use a claw grip. It helps me steady the stick because my fingers shake.

It sounds like your on the right track.