Practice as low as you feel comfortable/confident. I spent too much time hovering all day long at 10-20 feet. Once I got up the nerve to bring it down on the deck I found it was actually much easier. Now it's like 2nd nature.

I didn't lose any planes in the learning process. I did, however, lose the below pictured plane in a hover. I did a high speed pass into a wall and about 3 seconds onto the hover I ran out of fuel.[:'(] The fuse broke in half where the servos are..

RIP Katana GS