Automatic L-Cancelling Discussion

[Rawkobo]

@ Rawkobo There is no uniform "other side", I don't really care what anyone elses' reasoning is for enjoying L-cancelling. I've put forth my reasoning and you can argue that I'm wrong, or that they're wrong, but not that I'm wrong on their behalf and they're wrong on mine.

Whether or not the "casuals" know how to L-cancel is not the question, can they do it when their tournament life is on the line?

To address these in order:

1) Your reasoning is similiar if not exactly the same as many others, which is why we've raised the same points continually.

2) What you just described is a scenario of mental fortitude, which again has nothing to do with L-cancelling.

 

[AuraMaudeGone]

Have you picked up a controller and tried to make L-cancelling easier for yourself by spamming all the shield buttons all the time while you do your aerials? Let me know how that goes for your gameplay. I have experimented with spamming it myself, I didn't find it helpful.

Yes. I don't spam all of the shield buttons though, just Z. I L-Cancel just fine with that method. You can't air dodge out of an attack animation so personally, it's not difficult. As you can see, I mainly play Sheik if that helps.

 

[Narpas_sword]

Another Point id like to bring up:

This was posted on reddit recently:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SSBM/comments/3c37zu/common_errors_made_in_melee/

This list demonstrates areas where interactions can happen between players where one makes a mistake.
One player makes a mistake, the other gets a free 'in' (damage, combo, stock, however they capitalize is up to them)

All of these interactions come from errors in play, and selecting a poor option.

Note that 'Missing an L Cancel' isn't on there.

Why do you think that is?

Because it's a rarity?
Because it's not something we are able to react to feasibly?
or is it because it isnt an option?

This is obviously not a exhaustive list, there are others. But i think it goes well to show that the 'punish' window offered by a missed l-cancel really isnt a big punish at all. At least not in comparison to simply making a bad choice.

And further to this, i believe that players may THINK that they're punishing a missed L-Cancel, when they are probably punishing something the opponent did as the result of a bad choice.

Smashes, jabs, and throws can not be used in the air, hence there is no reason to cancel their landing lag. I take your point though. And I guess I should make it clear, I'm not saying there should be no option to play with auto-cancelling on. I'm talking about why I like the manual L-cancelling mechanic, specifically how the mechanic adds value to my experience.

So, from what ive gathered, it adds value to you, because it means the opponent can make a mistake, is that correct?

However, we've already discussed how the extra landing lag from missing an LC isn't something you can feasibly react to. So what are you really gaining in value?

And I'm sorry, but i still don't see a good reason for adding L cancelling to special moves.
The only reason is 'it would be consistent'
which is again, appealing to tradition.

 

[OninO]

@ Narpas_sword
One doesn't react to a single missed L-cancel, one notices a pattern of missed L-cancels and punishes on anticipation, as one punishes a lot of things in smash. Perhaps missing an L-cancel isn't mentioned because it's assumed you'll be trying your hardest not to already?

@ Rawkobo
Mental fortitude and L-cancelling are totally intertwined. I, and I'm sure many others who play Melee have felt execution begin to slip as I get nervous. Missing L-cancels is one way in which that can manifest. Missing short-hops, wavedashes, not reversing a laser, phantasming the wrong way while trying to reverse a laser are other ways it can manifest.

Also, I think you're being dishonest. In your previous post you explicitly tried to paint me into a corner as holding a dichotomous position (L-cancelling is both easy and hard) to undermine what I was saying about execution barriers. Here let me paint it for you. "Some people think L-cancelling is fine because it's easy not onerous, etc." "Onino thinks L-cancelling is fine because it's a good level of execution difficulty (somewhat difficult, requires continuous practise) which acts as an additional pressure source to separate out competitors".

 

[Narpas_sword]

@ Narpas_sword
One doesn't react to a single missed L-cancel, one notices a pattern of missed L-cancels and punishes on anticipation, as one punishes a lot of things in smash. Perhaps missing an L-cancel isn't mentioned because it's assumed you'll be trying your hardest not to already?

Sound like 'hope' to me.

I just cant see a player who misses l-cancels to a pattern.

 

[OninO]

I can and have, can't get the fast fall out in time, hits too high on shield, hits L to early. I've been that guy. I can be made to be that guy again by having someone smartly step into me and shield right before I try to connect.

A lot of smash reads can be derisively dismissed as hope, and in effect they are. All reads are educated guesses based on a pattern of action and a belief (hope) that said pattern will repeat.

 

[Rawkobo]

@ Narpas_sword
One doesn't react to a single missed L-cancel, one notices a pattern of missed L-cancels and punishes on anticipation, as one punishes a lot of things in smash. Perhaps missing an L-cancel isn't mentioned because it's assumed you'll be trying your hardest not to already?

@ Rawkobo
Mental fortitude and L-cancelling are totally intertwined. I, and I'm sure many others who play Melee have felt execution begin to slip as I get nervous. Missing L-cancels is one way in which that can manifest. Missing short-hops, wavedashes, not reversing a laser, phantasming the wrong way while trying to reverse a laser are other ways it can manifest.

Also, I think you're being dishonest. In your previous post you explicitly tried to paint me into a corner as holding a dichotomous position (L-cancelling is both easy and hard) to undermine what I was saying about execution barriers. Here let me paint it for you. "Some people think L-cancelling is fine because it's easy not onerous, etc." "Onino thinks L-cancelling is fine because it's a good level of execution difficulty (somewhat difficult, requires continuous practise) which acts as an additional pressure source to separate out competitors".

1) Punishes are in regards to seeing habits. Previously, it was brought up that punishes happen regardless of L-cancelling or not, which leads to imply that L-cancelling has nothing to do with being punished for a poor aerial choice in the first place. Actually hitting those L-cancels wouldn't matter because in this implicit example, you're vying for a scenario that is chalked up to some sort of repeated habitual mistake.

2) Mental fortitude is a fundamental that is tied to all of the quintessential fundamentals of a fighting game. Missing techs comes from situations of pressure. This same pressure exists regardless of a single-trigger press that provides no positive/negative net gain. All of the other tech flubs you described are much more serious and obvious errors, which is why they're significant towards this particular point. I could miss L-cancels and still be ahead, in the reverse line of logic.

3) I'm not being dishonest; you're assuming you're saying something drastically different from everyone else when you simply aren't. There's an implication that L-cancelling is relevant tech skill; we've established several scenarios throughout this thread where all of its so-called companions (dashdancing, wavedashing, wavelanding, character-specific technology, etc.) are vastly more significant in writing the story of growth in tech than L-cancelling itself. There's also an implication that L-cancelling is a technical barrier, where realistically, if a single-button press was a technical barrier, it would have some sort of real effect on the game, but numerous times throughout this thread we have shown that the button press lacks significance in regards to punishes, defensive play, offensive play, etc.

You can rephrase your post all you like to say that what you believe is different from the other side and I'm "painting you into a corner" and "undermining" what you're saying, but if you're willfully choosing to ignore the fact that your arguments hold the same core fundamental flaws as the rest, that's on you, not me.

 

[OninO]

The thing is, you haven't shown anything. You've constructed some hypotheticals which you think prove your point and then stated they were gospel. Where's Mango vs. Armada with auto-cancelling on? Where's Mango vs. Scrublord6000 with auto-cancelling on and off so we can see if there's a difference in how well scrublord can compete, or maybe he gets run over even harder?

You talk a lot about proof but you still argue from the hypothetical.

Here's a hypothetical scenario, you cross-up aerial my shield, if you L-cancel it, I can't punish, if you don't I can wavedash with you and shine your landing.

If you suck, I try for counterplay to your cross up aerial, if you don't I whiff the shine, have to eject with a wavedash and possibly get punished myself. Is that not another layer of interaction that would have otherwise ended at a free cross up aerial?

 

[Rawkobo]

The thing is, you haven't shown anything. You've constructed some hypotheticals which you think prove your point and then stated they were gospel. Where's Mango vs. Armada with auto-cancelling on? Where's Mango vs. Scrublord6000 with auto-cancelling on and off so we can see if there's a difference in how well scrublord can compete, or maybe he gets run over even harder?

You talk a lot about proof but you still argue from the hypothetical.

Here's a hypothetical scenario, you cross-up aerial my shield, if you L-cancel it, I can't punish, if you don't I can wavedash with you and shine your landing.

If you suck, I try for counterplay to your cross up aerial, if you don't I whiff the shine, have to eject with a wavedash and possibly get punished myself. Is that not another layer of interaction that would have otherwise ended at a free cross up aerial?

Explain how you can't punish if I L-cancel.

 

[OninO]

You dash away before I can reach you.

 

[Rawkobo]

You dash away before I can reach you.

Explain how that's possible if L-cancelling only halves landing lag and doesn't remove it entirely.

 

[GP&B]

That's implying L-canceled landing lag is sufficient enough to make aerials safe. This is blatantly not the case.

 

[Narpas_sword]

I think the important thing to remember here is the difference between low and high level play.

What most of us are arguing is that it won't make a difference to high level play.
We know it will make a difference to low level, and that's the point of having it on.

Having it on will make low level play easier, not having to perform an arbitrary input, and instead learning options (and working on the mistakes they make in that big reddit list instead).
This will make it easier for low level players to compete at a higher level faster.
This in turn will allow more players to advance to a higher level faster.

This is only good for the game. more people playing, at a higher level is a good thing. That's what evolves the meta.
At the moment we have the barrier of LCing raising the skill floor so beginners have an extra step in order to get to, what I like to call, the 'Skill Room'.

 

[OninO]

****ing really? No wonder you guys can't conceive of a scenario where it matters you have no idea what you're talking about.

@ GP&B The difference between an L-cancelled late Nair on shield and a non-L-cancelled Nair (for Falco) is the difference between a 1 frame input being required of the defender to get the shield grab (can't be buffered) and like 6 frames or whatever the **** trivially easy input it is.

Now back to the scenario I was talking about, from this thread connecting a rising nair on shield http://smashboards.com/threads/falco-shield-pressure-data.294444/

If the defender inputs a frame perfect wavedash out of shield they're moving as I land. There is undoubtedly a spacing for landing that nair that puts me beyond the reach of anything but your perfect wavedash, or at the very least far enough out to make frame perfection required to hit me before I can move. If I miss the L-cancel you now have an additional 7 frames to close that distance, you can get a dash attack into that time frame after the wavedash if you want.

Edit: Can you not see how those two scenarios differ? Not even the greatest are frame perfect on their OoS options after 15 YEARS of metagame development, the closest I've ever seen was Leffen for ONE game he was playing out of his mind and it was astounding. He has not recreated it since.

 

[Rawkobo]

@ OninO I'm afraid you still haven't answered my question. No harm done, though. You're finally offering to dig a bit deeper into the context, which I appreciate in an argument of this caliber considering what's been discussed prior.

is this a hypothetical statement? because, unless there was a change in 3.6 that wasn't noted in the changelog, there is no fail window. you can mash shield inputs the entire time you're doing an aerial and not have it affect your lcancelling. it'll mess up tech windows,but lcancelling is unaffected.

Is this where your 7 frames are coming from?

EDIT: Okay, wait, I see where you're coming from.

No, as far as I'm aware, based on the scenario you provided, it does not matter how many frames you provide me; it is still 100% plausible to get a punish on a cross-up on shield if you choose to do so. It's a matter of making that mental decision independent of you following through with a button press.

Technical precision is independent of me making a choice.

 

[Narpas_sword]

****ing really? No wonder you guys can't conceive of a scenario where it matters you have no idea what you're talking about.
.

I know that these conversations get heated easily, and it's especially hard when the 'other side' can't see your point of view, but remarks like that don't help your cause.

I can't speak for others, but I personally have come from your side. where I thought L_cancelling was a deep mechanic made to separate high level from low level.

But upon reading the arguments against it, and analysing the mechanic, I have changed my opinion. I now see that it is a terrible mechanic that in no way compares to the other good mechanics offered by smash.

I'm employed as a Software Tester. it's my job to find things in our software made by the Devs that are arbitrary and serve no purpose.
Things that make using the software harder for no good reason.
Things that a Dev puts in, thinking it's good design, until the client sees it and goes 'why do i have to do 'x' to open 'y', why isn't that automated'?
I'm definitely not trying to say i'm more qualified to speak on these matters, more that this is why i see things as they are.

I think the best way to look at this, is if smash never existed (or, you're on the design team before deployment).
You're making a game, and someone suggests doubling all the landing data, to add a feature in to make users press a button to halve it.

can you honestly sit at the conference table and say that yes, this sounds like a great thing to add to a game?

Too much of these arguments are coming from it already being implemented.

and it's just a case of:

Melee = good
Melee = LC
.:
LC = good

 

[Rawkobo]

I know that these conversations get heated easily, and it's especially hard when the 'other side' can't see your point of view, but remarks like that don't help your cause.

To be perfectly fair, he's right that it's hard to be explicitly clear in hypothetical scenarios. We haven't exactly painted a picture with the greatest detail, it's more of picking apart others that don't compensate for the full range of punish options. Which people have trouble with regardless because, y'know, split-second thinking.

But that's the thing about these scenarios. There's a vast array of punish opportunities that exist, and all of them act independently of landing lag. They rely on punishing poor spacing and followups, aka what tends to happen if you get hit/grabbed in response.

So in that particular scenario you provided, @ OninO , you didn't actually mention what would happen if I were to, say, shield-grab you. It could be unwise if you spaced the aerial, but if you get up close to me, it really does not matter if you L-cancel your landing, I can still shieldgrab your unwise decision.

Likewise, there are numerous punishing tilts that cover out-of-shield. These too can be avoided getting the full blunt of, maybe even get a punish on me for doing so, if you space well. Just L-cancelling won't put you in shield fast enough to respond if I choose to punish the aerial directly.

What you're suggesting is that the choice to punish is one made directly in response to you L-cancelling, when there are a large amount of punishes that do not involve what appears to be...some sort of patience that you're suggesting? It seems that in discussing technical precision we are not accounting for precise responses.

Also, as a follow-up to "even at the top level people miss tech" thing, nobody was questioning that at all.

 

[OninO]

Last thing I'm going to say.

Technical precision requirements are not independant of your choice, they inform it. If you can hit a frame perfect, perfect wavedash out of shield to punish a cross up every time, I look forward to seeing you soon on the main stage.

I think you will choose not to attempt that because you know you don't have the technical nous to pull it off. An execution barrier constrains your decision making, even though the possibility exists. It is 100% possible, not 100% plausible, an important distinction.

Now we introduce the fact that I'm **** at hitting L-cancels on otherwise well spaced cross ups, something you have observed in game 1 of our set. The relaxed technical requirements of you make it more plausible that you can hit that punish, thus it makes more sense to attempt it.

 

[Rawkobo]

Last thing I'm going to say.

Technical precision requirements are not independant of your choice, they inform it. If you can hit a frame perfect, perfect wavedash out of shield to punish a cross up every time, I look forward to seeing you soon on the main stage.

I think you will choose not to attempt that because you know you don't have the technical nous to pull it off. An execution barrier constrains your decision making, even though the possibility exists. It is 100% possible, not 100% plausible, an important distinction.

Now we introduce the fact that I'm **** at hitting L-cancels on otherwise well spaced cross ups, something you have observed in game 1 of our set. The relaxed technical requirements of you make it more plausible that you can hit that punish, thus it makes more sense to attempt it.

That implies it's the only viable option to your decision to cross-up your shield, which, as I established above, is not the case.

If you're going for well-spaced cross-ups, I have to change my punish to be something vastly different from if you actually butted up against my shield, because you spaced well, something that has completely different implications from reducing landing lag on your aerial.

 

[TheKmanOfSmash]

@ OninO I know you've stated that that was the last thing you were going to say, but everything you have said does not answer the core question this thread and all the threads on this topic from years before have been asking: How does doing manual L-canceling add depth into the game?

In my, and other people's arguments, we acknowledge that the practice, hard work and consistency of executing L-cancels can have inherent value by increasing the game's skill floor. We acknowledged that one can view the ability to consistently preform the manual L-cancel over others as not only having value, but also being a possible definition of depth. However, the problem with this definition of depth is that not only is this definition highly subjective (because not everyone views the value of hard work in the same way; some value efficiency over brute-force training, etc), it doesn't even answer the fundamental question: "How does doing manual L-canceling add depth into the game?" Doing. As in you are actively doing it. All of your and some other people's arguments have been based on how a negative usage of the mechanic adds depth. Essentially, your argument is dependent on the player missing the manual L-cancel input and analyzing the opportunities that spring from this error and labeling this as proof of depth. Even if the value of hard work and physical consistency is depth, no one has shown how this directly relates to how a positive usage of the mechanic adds depth, which would not be dependent on failing to execute the mechanic. As I've said in previous posts, this is a red herring argument because we're not arguing about how the negative usage of manual L-canceling adds depth. We're talking about how the positive usage of L-canceling adds depth to the game. "How does doing manual L-canceling add depth?" is the argument , NOT "How does NOT DOING manually L-canceling add depth" which is a completely different and separate argument.

To answer this question obviously requires some sort of objective means of analysis. It requires a method of analysis that is well equipped to answer questions about the inner working of games and how the addition or subtraction of key mechanics gives or takes away from the player experience. The best possible method we have is utilizing game design theory, which is what we were doing. Your apparently immediate dismissal of game design theory by labeling it as "too subjective" because "not everyone likes the same thing" is an extremely poor argument. Game design theory already acknowledges that not everyone will like the decisions people put into a game. It is impossible to please everyone. But what they can try to do is to please the most people by having an understanding of what most players would want from the game and how these wants and desires add to the gaming experience. This is why I and others have used game design theory to tackle the question of how a positive usage of manual L-canceling adds depth compared to its automated variant. And when you look at things that are required to add depth to a game (especially a fighting game) such as increasing the in-game option pools and decision trees for the player with proportionality to difficulty level, it's very clear that manual L-canceling fails on almost every single account: It increases difficulty without adding any additional options or increasing possible decision trees. The only thing is adds is halving landing lag which can be accomplished by a superior method called automatic L-canceling.

You have not adequately shown why game design theory is wrong or insufficient to answering the question. You have not argued for how a positive usage of the mechanic adds depth. You have not sufficiently tackled our arguments based on the counter-points I've made here. I'm not trying to blame you or put you in a corner, I gain absolutely nothing for doing so. We want you to understand our position and directly argue against it. You say that we don't understand your position but it's extremely clear that this is not true. We have acknowledged your position, we are just directly showing you why we think it's false and all we want you to do the same to our positions. This is how discussions progress closer to the truth (as I'm sure you know). All we want is to have a conversation.

 

[4tlas]

I have wanted repeatedly to respond to individual arguments but I just haven't had time. Overall, I agree with KMan and love that he explains his (and oposition's) arguments so thoroughly. This thread has been moving too fast for me to bother responding to individual people, and most of the intelligent debate is being drowned out in vitriol, so I will be unfollowing this thread after this post. Quote or tag me if you want a response from me personally. Otherwise, here is my last go at this.

L-cancelling is a physical performance barrier to play. While this is a perfectly fine notion by itself, much like how you have to aim in a shooter (aiming is the "critical skill", and influenced by dodging), throw a spiral in football, play or step in time in a rhythm game, or perform frame-perfect button combos in other fighters, this physical test is not an inherent part of Smash. I can understand the desire to have it be as such, especially for "competitive" players, because many enjoy that physical challenge but don't want as much as other fighters. That is fine, and a reason to have manual L-cancelling continue to be an option of play. Essentially, L-cancelling is hybridizing Sakurai's game design of a simplistic fighting game with that of more traditional fighters.

If physical prowess were a skill inherently tested by Smash (which, judging by the control scheme, it pretty objectively isn't), then L-cancelling could be considered one of those "critical skills" I gave examples of above. However, it is not. Furthermore, since it not only isn't a core mechanic but ALSO isn't providing any gameplay depth (as in decision-making. You make all your decisions assuming you will hit the L-cancel and just try to not mess up), then it is doing nothing but separating the men from the boys, or in other words the "competitives" from the "casuals". This is not a division that needs to be made. No true "casual" is going to come into tournament and kick your ass just because L-cancelling has been removed from the game. If that does happen, then arguably they are better at the REAL game than you. The real game being the decision-making, which is the only "critical skill" of Smash (you know, fighting-game fundamentals). By separating the competitive players from the casual players, all you are doing is excluding other people from helping to advance the metagame- which, aside from crazy advanced tech that a) wouldn't be removed with L-cancelling gone, so you still have technical prowess to aspire to and b) casuals won't be touching anytime soon anyway, is mostly simple RPS gameplay that we call fundamentals. What's so bad about allowing other people who invest time in thinking to compete with the people who instead invest time in tech?

You are absolutely correct when you say that even the best players sometimes screw up their tech. And that might cause them to lose a match, set, or tournament. Usually that's not an L-cancel though. And the truly best players are outSMARTing each other, not out-teching each other. Removing L-cancelling from the equation would not effect them at all. If you have ever watched a set of Brawl (oh no, the B word), Sm4sh, or even Smash64, you will see incredibly careful spacing and mindgames. This type of play can still be prevalent in a fast-paced game and, even without a crazy technical barrier, the speed at which the players have to do these fundamental plays makes for a great game. But L-cancelling isn't a part of that. And you know, if you really like L-cancelling so much, you can still play with it on! But we really should remove it from tournaments because all it does is scare away players who feel like that initial technical barrier is too much. And yes, those are valuable members of the community just like everyone else.

 

[Bleck]

^ look at that beautiful post

 

[Rawkobo]

@ 4tlas with the basic summary of what we've been trying to say

yes okay we're sorry that we've been ****s about it in ways but you have to understand that the entire reason this came up in the first place is because someone claimed that debating its tournament usage was bad because manual l-cancelling is good

and then never provided sufficient evidence to suggest that it was

the entire initial points of this thread are agreed on

is it a bad feature to have in the game in the first place? no
is it completely up to the TO's to decide whether or not it's reasonable enough to implement for their communities at large? yes

 

[4tlas]

^ look at that beautiful post

Aw thanks bae

is it a bad feature to have in the game in the first place? no
is it completely up to the TO's to decide whether or not it's reasonable enough to implement for their communities at large? yes

I think these 2 are pretty obvious things everyone can agree on. First, more options of play are certainly not a bad thing. Second, the TO, as the person who sets the rules, picks whether or not their tournament will use those rules. If people don't want to attend, there will be no tournament. If most people agree that they want to be judged by whatever rules are being used, then they will attend. Simple enough.

However there are a few other things I want to mention with regards to both of these points, as the main TO of a large PM scene. The first is that auto-L-cancel, just being an option to select, can actually be bad for our scene. Just this week, someone was turning it on for friendlies and forgetting to turn it off, forcing some entire sets to be replayed once the players realized it was on. The fact that it is non-intrusive enough to go unnoticed probably tells you we could compete with it on just fine, but it also caused a lot of headache this week. The other is that I would find an extraordinary opposition to implementing auto-L-cancel into the scene, even as the head TO. At the end of the day, our community is so large and so strong that the players could easily override me and ignore a change in ruleset. So no, TOs do not necessarily have the final say (which I don't think is a bad thing. After all, the "job" is about serving the community). To be honest, it seems difficult to implement ANY changes in ANY part of our scene, simply because it is so large. Someone loud and angry is bound to object to anything I do, so as much as I think L-cancelling should die in a hole, I sincerely doubt I will ever push for it as a TO. So yeah, I sorta invalidated both of those things I said we should all agree upon. Oops =(

 

[Rawkobo]

Aw thanks bae



I think these 2 are pretty obvious things everyone can agree on. First, more options of play are certainly not a bad thing. Second, the TO, as the person who sets the rules, picks whether or not their tournament will use those rules. If people don't want to attend, there will be no tournament. If most people agree that they want to be judged by whatever rules are being used, then they will attend. Simple enough.

However there are a few other things I want to mention with regards to both of these points, as the main TO of a large PM scene. The first is that auto-L-cancel, just being an option to select, can actually be bad for our scene. Just this week, someone was turning it on for friendlies and forgetting to turn it off, forcing some entire sets to be replayed once the players realized it was on. The fact that it is non-intrusive enough to go unnoticed probably tells you we could compete with it on just fine, but it also caused a lot of headache this week. The other is that I would find an extraordinary opposition to implementing auto-L-cancel into the scene, even as the head TO. At the end of the day, our community is so large and so strong that the players could easily override me and ignore a change in ruleset. So no, TOs do not necessarily have the final say (which I don't think is a bad thing. After all, the "job" is about serving the community). To be honest, it seems difficult to implement ANY changes in ANY part of our scene, simply because it is so large. Someone loud and angry is bound to object to anything I do, so as much as I think L-cancelling should die in a hole, I sincerely doubt I will ever push for it as a TO. So yeah, I sorta invalidated both of those things I said we should all agree upon. Oops =(

nah that's part of the point though tbh

we can argue semantics for days, it's just a matter of making sure people aren't misinformed about things they assume are true rather than anything actually happening

i can honestly tell you that if i were to explain my case to my pm scene it would probably get shot down because the insignificance of l-cancelling leads to the follow-up claim of "well even if it's bad and servers no purpose, if it's not really changing much, why worry about it?"

that being not necessarily false, but in some ways disappointing

 

[Draco_The]

https://www.reddit.com/r/SSBPM/comments/3c83gb/can_we_talk_about_auto_lcancel/

 

[CORY]

what if... they change the actual tourney mode to be a locked ruleset with a set label on character and stage select screens?

is something like that even feasible?

@Magus420 @Strong Bad

(i'm assuming there's still a separate tourney mode in the menu...)

 

[Rawkobo]

what if... they change the actual tourney mode to be a locked ruleset with a set label on character and stage select screens?

is something like that even feasible?

@Magus420 @Strong Bad

(i'm assuming there's still a separate tourney mode in the menu...)

that's a loooooot of code to be edited iirc

 

[AuraMaudeGone]

https://www.reddit.com/r/SSBPM/comments/3c83gb/can_we_talk_about_auto_lcancel/

I almost shed a tear when I saw this on Reddit. :T The conversation is a lot calmer though since there's a lack of people flaming.

 

[Rawkobo]

I almost shed a tear when I saw this on Reddit. :T The conversation is a lot calmer though since there's a lack of people flaming.

there was a person that posted the thread for people to read

although there was also a person saying that we came to no conclusions, which i guess is partially true

the legend continues :/

 

[4tlas]

I am the TO of that tournament that the OP in the Reddit thread posted about. I made a post addressing his tournament concerns and the L-cancel concerns in this thread. It tells me I've been up and down voted a lot, so I don't know what that means. Obviously Upvotes are supposed to mean "this is a good contribution to the discussion" and Downvotes are supposed to mean "this is a ****post", but Reddit hasn't functioned like that in a looooooong time.

 

[AuraMaudeGone]

Is there any legitimate documentation of Sakurai's thoughts on Smooth Landing/L-Cancel? I thought I read some article about it a while ago, but I can't seem to find it now...

 

[4tlas]

Is there any legitimate documentation of Sakurai's thoughts on Smooth Landing/L-Cancel? I thought I read some article about it a while ago, but I can't seem to find it now...

I believe Z-cancelling was in Smash64 because Sakurai wanted people to shield ASAP upon landing rather than get screwed by landing animation. This just happened to also work on aerials, because who would think to test shielding during an aerial?! This seems to indicate it was intended to help casual players not get hung up on the controls.

As a nod to how people liked that and thought it made for some cool gameplay, I think Sakurai added in L-cancelling to Melee and actually put it in the instruction manual. This seems to indicate that he intended for Melee to cater more toward traditional fighting game players, as he has said with regards to Melee in general.

He then removed it entirely in Brawl, which probably indicates he thought it was needless complication of the "simple fighter" he intended Smash to be.

In Sm4sh, there is equipment that does something similar to L-cancelling. This seems to indicate that he appreciates that some players might want a faster game but still thought the button press was a hindrance.

I have no idea what Sakurai actually thinks. I do know he often likes to mix it up just because there's no point in making the same game twice but with different graphics.

Edit: Also what the heck Smashboards why do I have to keep unfollowing this thread every time I post...

 

[Rawkobo]

I believe Z-cancelling was in Smash64 because Sakurai wanted people to shield ASAP upon landing rather than get screwed by landing animation. This just happened to also work on aerials, because who would think to test shielding during an aerial?! This seems to indicate it was intended to help casual players not get hung up on the controls.

As a nod to how people liked that and thought it made for some cool gameplay, I think Sakurai added in L-cancelling to Melee and actually put it in the instruction manual. This seems to indicate that he intended for Melee to cater more toward traditional fighting game players, as he has said with regards to Melee in general.

He then removed it entirely in Brawl, which probably indicates he thought it was needless complication of the "simple fighter" he intended Smash to be.

In Sm4sh, there is equipment that does something similar to L-cancelling. This seems to indicate that he appreciates that some players might want a faster game but still thought the button press was a hindrance.

I have no idea what Sakurai actually thinks. I do know he often likes to mix it up just because there's no point in making the same game twice but with different graphics.

Edit: Also what the heck Smashboards why do I have to keep unfollowing this thread every time I post...

i meant to bring up z-cancelling because z-cancelling handled ~12 frames of lag iirc, which makes a huge difference in how smash 64 works in comparison to melee/pm because it actually negates endlag for particular aerials rather than just reducing it

so essentially it had a purpose for learning that made a noticeable difference in play

 

[AuraMaudeGone]

I believe Z-cancelling was in Smash64 because Sakurai wanted people to shield ASAP upon landing rather than get screwed by landing animation. This just happened to also work on aerials, because who would think to test shielding during an aerial?! This seems to indicate it was intended to help casual players not get hung up on the controls.

Yea, I read the same thing, but I can't find the interview where he states this so I dunno if it's really true.

Well, I mentioned this to say that no one has brought up the developer's intentions in this debate, just assumed intentions from past experiences (that's not bad or invalid at all)..

Traditional Fighter solution to this would be "Trip Guard" from Street Fighter, but we don't have that here, obv.

 

[Trollinguy]

I didn't bother to read the last 3 pages of this thread (if anything major changed in the last 3 pages my b), but here's my opinion.

L-Cancelling is like 3 frame buffering in that it lowers the skill floor without changing the skill ceiling. Through practice mistakes can be eliminated so that both are unnecessary to turn on. Both would require minimal balance changes.

L-cancelling requires an extra button, whatever. It really comes down to "did you practice it enough". The exact same could be said for buffering.
"Why do I have to practice this?" - because the community values timing/precision even though we could just change the game to make it easier.

Almost all of the arguments for removing L-cancelling could also apply to buffering (besides having to push an extra button). If we really wanted to invite casuals then we should also throw in 3 frame buffering.

and since this thread hates metaphors/comparisons, here's one.
Why cant we have an auto-exit tumble feature? (Exiting tumble without having to slam the control stick 1 direction in case you didn't know). For arguments sake lets say you can choose to not exit tumble by holding down taunt and a direction to tech or up taunt to not tech the landing. This is also an extra button push that's unnecessary if we want to make the game easier.

 

[Bleck]

I didn't bother to read the last 3 pages of this thread

I didn't bother to read your post

 

[Phaiyte]

But because moves are so safe, no one's going to want to punish because landing lag is so low. This is what the whole point is.

Soooo like, are you literally just praying someone misses an L cancel every time they approach you via shorthop?
If that's your tactic on trying to win, you should probably quit. This is what the whole point is.

Damn near everything in the game isn't even safe on shield anyways. Literally almost anything can be shield grabbed.

 

[Cuccu Maestro]

L cancelling offers a way to interact with your opponent, actually. Ice Climbers players do it all the time, and in Melee with light shielding it's even more relevant. It can happen with any character though, especially with shield angling (yoshi can't angle shield but can still do it).

Hitting a shield or whiffing a move (or hitting two shields which is how ice climbers do it to you) changes the timing of you hitting the ground and can force players who weren't expecting it to miss their L cancel window. If you hit two shields from the ice climbers, or the bubble of a shield popping up that you weren't expecting to be there hits your fair that ended up being just short of hitting your opponent if they hadn't shielded, your timing gets changed up and the L cancel timing of your aerial changes. Spot dodge roll can also contribute to this, and the room for interaction is increased a lot in doubles where not only can you punish someone for missing an l cancel on your partner who spot dodged at the last frame and caused them to l cancel late but also you can double shield aerials ice climbers style and even recognize an l cancel will be missed as an aerial HITS your teammate and your own shield shortly after.

The other time people miss L cancels is when a platform rises surprising them and making them L cancel late, or vice versa from the platform falling. This happens on FoD and PS1 a lot from players not realizing the platform will rise/fall, or can actually be done to an opponent on purpose on distant planet with the leaf platform mechanics.

L cancel is not just a skill barrier, it is a mechanic which adds interaction to the game. Lots of people do this and recognize the times when someone is likely to miss an L cancel, and then they punish them for it.

This is completely ignoring the fact that missing L cancels under pressure is completely something that can be read and punished (as has already been stated), the same way you can read someone under pressure has a habit of teching in place. I have no idea how anyone is arguing that you can't punish someone for missing an L cancel, that's just a dumb argument - don't project onto others your own low standards of play.

 

[Bleck]

I have no idea how anyone is arguing that you can't punish someone for missing an L cancel, that's just a dumb argument - don't project onto others your own low standards of play.

nobody is saying that you can't punish a missed l-cancel, they're saying you can't punish a missed l-cancel on reaction - if you're punished a whiffed l-cancel, you're doing it on a read, and what people have been arguing is that about whether or not there's any inherent value in having an arbitrary button press that determines the safety of your moves instead of leaving that aspect of the metagame to be determined by other, less transparent things like reach and un-altered recovery frames

this is also why people have repeatedly rhetorically asked why we don't add other button presses to other arbitrary points of action that benefit your attacks/movement in some capacity and/or further complicate l-canceling with additional required inputs; if raising the skill floor arbitrarily is a good thing, why don't we do it with everything? ? ?

maybe instead of calling other people dumb and bad you could try reading the thread