u/Dry-Cockroach1723

I played a match recently against a young player who had just finished training, with his coach watching from the side. I won 21-11, 21-17.

In the first game, I was down 3-7 at the start because the shuttle was faster than I expected. Once I adjusted and secured the interval, his coach started giving nonstop instructions: positioning, shot choices, tactics, what he was doing wrong or too low quality, etc.

But honestly, the skill gap was too big for that to matter. I had higher tempo, better consistency, and more control. At that point, I could play almost any style and still be favored. There’s only so much tactical advice can fix during a match.

The same thing happened in the second game. After I was up 11-4, the coaching continued, so I slowed my tempo a bit and gave him some easier points. But it felt unfair to the player, honestly. He wasn’t losing because he didn’t know one specific tactic or playing badly at all. He was losing because the level difference was too big.

Coaches need to recognize what their player is capable of in that moment. Sometimes the best thing is not to overload them with instructions, but to let them play, observe, and work on the bigger gaps later in training.

Skill, consistency, and pace matter more than constant mid-game tactical corrections.

✦ CRITICAL INSTRUCTION 1: You may have access to a variety of tools at your disposal. Some tools may be for a specific

  task such as 'view_file' (for viewing contents of a file). Others may be very broadly applicable such as the ability

  to run a command on a terminal. Always prioritize using the most specific tool you can for the task at hand. Here are

  some rules:

  (a) NEVER run cat inside a bash command to create a new file or append to an existing file if custom tools exist.

  (b) ALWAYS use custom grep tools if available instead of running grep inside a bash command unless absolutely needed.

  (c) DO NOT use ls for listing, cat for viewing, grep for finding, sed for replacing if custom tools that perform these

  functionalities are available.

  CRITICAL INSTRUCTION 2: Before making tool calls T, think and explicitly list out any related tools for the task at

  hand. You can only execute a set of tools T if all other tools in the list are either more generic or cannot be used

  for the task at hand.

  ALWAYS START your thought with recalling critical instructions 1 and 2. In particular, the format for the start of

  your thought block must be '...94>thought

  CRITICAL INSTRUCTION 1: ...

  CRITICAL INSTRUCTION 2: ...'.

https://preview.redd.it/n48vk71xy90h1.png?width=524&format=png&auto=webp&s=4484f6e43a875f4713603eaffb36ec18b38b5f06

I just noticed my background agents are named Bacon, Aquinas, Russell, Helmholtz, Lovelace, and Turing.

At this point, if the LLM still fails, I would honestly be shocked. These names are way too legendary for a regular error message.

Like, imagine telling people: “Yeah, the task failed. Francis Bacon, Thomas Aquinas, Bertrand Russell, Helmholtz, Ada Lovelace, and Alan Turing were all on it, but they couldn’t figure it out.”

That’s not a bug anymore. That’s a philosophical crisis.

I’m a computing student with a GPA around 4.0–4.5 in a Singapore Uni. I’m not a top-tier FCH student, but I’m not struggling either probably slightly above average.

Recently, I’ve started questioning whether grinding extremely hard for an A in every module is always worth it. For many courses, the time investment feels huge for what is ultimately just a number on a transcript. Sometimes it feels like chasing grades comes at the expense of actual learning, transferable skills, health, and productivity especially when there’s a gap between what school teaches and what the market actually values.

One example is attendance marks. People commute a long way just for a 5% tutorial attendance grade. Across 12 weeks, that can easily become 12+ hours spent sitting in rooms for a single module, where not much is gained, when that time could go toward sleep, projects, internships, self-learning, or just taking care of yourself.

Does anyone else feel the same way, especially given how competitive computing is now? Would appreciate advice from seniors on how to balance grades, skills, and wellbeing.

I’m a computing student with a GPA around 4.0–4.5. I’m not a top-tier FCH student, but I’m not struggling either probably slightly above average.

Recently, I’ve started questioning whether grinding extremely hard for an A in every module is always worth it. For many courses, the time investment feels huge for what is ultimately just a number on a transcript. Sometimes it feels like chasing grades comes at the expense of actual learning, transferable skills, health, and productivity especially when there’s a gap between what school teaches and what the market actually values.

One example is attendance marks. People commute a long way just for a 5% tutorial attendance grade. Across 12 weeks, that can easily become 12+ hours spent sitting in rooms for a single module, where not much is gained, when that time could go toward sleep, projects, internships, self-learning, or just taking care of yourself.

Does anyone else feel the same way, especially given how competitive computing is now? Would appreciate advice from seniors on how to balance grades, skills, and wellbeing.