I’m knitting my very firstest pair of mittens on my very firstest set of DPNs. :cheering: Anyway, I’m to the point where I decrease at the fingertip edge and it’s calling for both SSK and K2tog in the same round (i.e., for the first round of decreases the pattern says: (SSK, K4, K2tog) 4 times - 20 sts). What would it look like if I just did K2tog all the way around? I’m having a bit of difficulty with the SSK, especially if I’m doing it on the first stitch on a needle - the other 2 needles are flipping every which way…
SSK vs k2tog
If I remember correctly it has to do with which way the resulting stitch slants - K2tog goes to the right and SSk to the left. I am working on felted clogs for Christmas presents and it calls for both decreases as well. I tend to be a pattern follower, you can always try the K2tog all the way around and see if you like the look of it - just be prepared to frog it out and start again if you don’t like it.
k2tog is a right slanting decrease, ssk is a left slanting decrease. It looks nice when they are together, but there are no rules that say you have to do it that way. 
It’s also easier if you knit one stitch and then do the decrease or decrease and then knit one last stitch. Just be consistent.
Maybe instead of SSK you could S1, K1, PSSO?
Yep Rachel’s suggestion gives the same result.
Decreases lean like this / or this \ not like this l
Now imagine a lot of these lines / arranged end-to-end in a diagonal line going southwest to northeast. They line up to make a straight line like this, except vertical ---------
But when the lines are not straight end-to-end you get something a bit like this ////\ not exactly, but the line is jagged rather than straight.
There’s a very nice discussion about the types of decreases (left-slanting and right-slanting) on:
Yes; this decrease will also lean to the left. I use it sometimes instead of ssk if I find that I’ve knit a bit tighter than I should.
Wow - thanks to all for the fantastic suggestions! I like the idea of using S1, K1, PSSO as I’ve been finding I’m knitting really tight. I don’t know if it’s just the 1st time DPN thing or if the yarn stays better b/c they’re bamboo needles, but I had a pretty hard time doing the ssk on the right mitten. The right mitten is all finished now & I just finished the cuff on the left so I should have it completed by this afternoon. I’ll let you all know how it turns out. Thanks again!!! 
Amy did a good job of showing the different decreases on this page:
http://www.knittinghelp.com/videos/decreases
She also did the same for increases:
http://www.knittinghelp.com/videos/increases