Balanced Brawl Standard Release

[Amazing Ampharos]

That's not likely given that it can only be played on the WiFi Training Room.

 

[Steeler]

code it so that after a certain amount of ledgegrabs, you cannot grab it again for a certain amount of time...or you just go into helpless state after x ledgegrabs if you ledgedrop!

 

[JOE!]

code it so that after a certain amount of ledgegrabs, you cannot grab it again for a certain amount of time...or you just go into helpless state after x ledgegrabs if you ledgedrop!

wait, for planking or...?

 

[Eyada]

The most elegant and consistent solution would simply be to make regular ledge-grabs behave as if they were tether-grabs. (Perhaps with a slightly higher grab limit though, like 4-6.)

Don't know if that's codeable though.

 

[Eldiran]

I know it's do-able very easily if we edit Fighter.pac properly. (Don't think that PSA can edit Fighter.pac yet, but I could be mistaken.)

 

[Lokee]

Hey I was playing Ganon in BBrawl the other day and I found a strange thing.

Sometimes when I MurderChoke Wario he ends up behind me somehow. (possibly do to his great DI?) Anyway its not gamebreaking just something that needs mentioning.

 

[Mr. Escalator]

PT is good on Norfair.
Annnnnnnnd who cares about you playing AA and going even in BBrawl? One set of players playing the matchup in a single region for a few matchs when I doubt they are either the top of their metagame or of a very close skill level to each other isnt really enough to change anyone's mind on the matter.

It's just one step. More Ganons need to give feedback. Well, there were ganons earlier but their complaints were dismissed so I doubt they would be willing to even try arguing again.

 

[LordshadowRagnarok]

Gah! Why do all the cool PSAs have to be balanced to Brawl+

 

[A2ZOMG]

Ganondorf goes approximately even with Luigi and and Bowser...those matchups got better. Luigi's Fireball is still an easy powershield, and Ganondorf can actually do stuff that is safe on block here, so his extra power does tip the matchup more favorably for him. Bowser is Bowser, and still an unsafe character who is an easy target for huge punishment, so that works a little more in Ganondorf's favor. Also, King DDD should be pretty even. He always was pretty mediocre outside of his grab game, so considering that he no longer chaingrabs Ganondorf, and how he's a huge target for Ganondorf's aerials, Ganondorf probably goes reasonably neutral with him too.

Samus however completely destroys Ganondorf, and it's WORSE in this game because she actually KILLS you when she lands D-tilt/F-smash/Charge shot.

G&W reeeealy shouldn't be ever getting Flame Choked by Ganondorf. Ganondorf can't do anything if you just poke him with D-tilt/F-air/B-air, and if you shield, you can spotdodge any grab he tries to do on reaction. Ganondorf still literally can't punish G&W for randomly running around and throwing out Smashes. If he just randomly does an Up-smash, you're not punishing him before he can just run away and counter. Fullhop F-airing is so good against Ganondorf not just because it's nearly impossible for him to punish, it gets him offstage, where he gets gimped reeeealy easily.

Also, Lucario is ridiculously bad for Ganondorf still. Like G&W, you can't do anything to him while he pokes you. Worse, he can't be D-tilted out of Flame Choke.

ROB also still largely dominates Ganondorf, being able to grab Ganondorf out of nearly anything he does, and with the improvements of his D-throw, U-throw, and full charge laser, I'd probably argue that this is another matchup that got harder for Ganondorf.

Oh yeah and I still maintain that ROB's D-throw is broken. Assuming he follows your DI correctly, either you airdodge and potentially get regrabbed, or you get killed by Up-smash. It's comparably ridiculous to something like Snake's D-throw to be honest. This throw is honestly too good considering how easy you can land an Up-smash at kill percents when this throw is stale.

 

[TP]

Hey I was playing Ganon in BBrawl the other day and I found a strange thing.

Sometimes when I MurderChoke Wario he ends up behind me somehow. (possibly do to his great DI?) Anyway its not gamebreaking just something that needs mentioning.

That was there in normal Brawl too. It is an incredibly simple way to see if the Wario knows the matchup or not. The matchup immediately gets much harder if they do.

PT is good on Norfair.
Annnnnnnnd who cares about you playing AA and going even in BBrawl? One set of players playing the matchup in a single region for a few matchs when I doubt they are either the top of their metagame or of a very close skill level to each other isnt really enough to change anyone's mind on the matter.

It's just one step. More Ganons need to give feedback. Well, there were ganons earlier but their complaints were dismissed so I doubt they would be willing to even try arguing again.

I'd say I'm pretty ****ing near the top of Ganon's metagame, seeing as I am one of about 7 Ganons in the world who has placed well in tournament, I made several discoveries that helped Ganon's metagame (nothing huge, but lots of little things), I have chats with other top Ganons about specific matchups, and I have mained him since Brawl came out. AA is at least as good as me at the game in general, probably a lot better, and places better in vBrawl easily. Then consider that he is an absolute authority on BBrawl, since he ****ing made it, and I have been playing it since before it was posted online at all. As for other Ganons disapperaing, A2 just owned that concept, and I haven't seen Swoops anywhere in a long time, not just this thread. When we both agree that Ganon does just fine now, it is NOT just two players sharing what happened.

That rant aside, we appreciate all input and videos of other people playing. A2, I perfectly understand what you are saying about the G&W matchup, but even a top player will make mistakes. And he can't just throw out Usmashes; I choked him for trying that strategy. Also, people can dodge grabs on reaction? They have 100 milliseconds (since dodge is not invincible until frame 2) to press down on the control stick far enough for it to be registered, and Ganon's grab is not easy to notice on its first frame, since he barely moves during it.

I might use ROB specifically to deal with the Samus matchup. Haven't tested enough yet, but Ganon does probably have a really rough time.

 

[Linkshot]

Ganon's WizKick eats through Missiles; both Super and Homing.

 

[Big O]

I'm pretty sure wizkick doesn't power through Samus's missiles. They stop him in his tracks which is probably a good thing considering how lagless they are when canceled properly. I'd give more input on BBrawl Ganon and DK MU's but I've been pretty busy for a while now. Hopefully I'll get a good amount of free time to play this soon.

 

[A2ZOMG]

That rant aside, we appreciate all input and videos of other people playing. A2, I perfectly understand what you are saying about the G&W matchup, but even a top player will make mistakes. And he can't just throw out Usmashes; I choked him for trying that strategy. Also, people can dodge grabs on reaction? They have 100 milliseconds (since dodge is not invincible until frame 2) to press down on the control stick far enough for it to be registered, and Ganon's grab is not easy to notice on its first frame, since he barely moves during it.

It's very easy to spotdodge Ganondorf's Flame Choke, and I do this all the time in say...Ganon dittos or any matchup against other Ganondorfs whenever I'm not making a horrible spacing mistake. Furthermore, I can do this consistently on WIFI. He makes a noise and his hand flashes purple as it starts up, and it only starts grabbing on frame 16, which is HORRIBLY slow for Ganondorf's most viable grab option.

Dashgrabbing is even slower due to Ganon's poor run speed hindering the effectiveness of that move, and you are not shieldgrabbing anyone who spaces well.

If the G&W doesn't suck at timing Up-smashes, you're much more likely to get hit for trying to punish his Up-smash considering that the release time for Up-smash is something like 2 frames. And the key thing is, if he doesn't do it predictably, you're never punishing it on reaction. You have to be EXTREMELY careful that he doesn't D-tilt, F-smash, or F-air you instead of baiting with Up-smash. He can kill you extremely fast, and much more reliably than you can since all he needs is to land a F-air offstage to kill you.

This matchup is like vBrawl Wario vs any garbage character who can grab release infinite him. Sure, you can do dumb grab stuff on him, but you can't actually grab a competent G&W that knows his zoning and spacing options, and he ***** whenever he hits you, and he hits you extremely easily and gimps you hard once you're offstage.

In short:

****** extremely hard and being near-impossible to touch >>>>> ****** extremely hard with very unsafe moves that are easy to avoid on reaction.

 

[rPSIvysaur]

So, after we had proof in videos of AA and Twilightprince going even, A2Zomg called AA a bad GnW. Sometimes I wonder if I should actually listen to him.

 

[A2ZOMG]

From the strategies he explained to me several pages ago, AA doesn't even do the matchup correctly and he goes even with top level Ganon users (too conservative with poking, zoning and edgeguard options BY FAR). That should be pretty fair indicator that obviously something is wrong.

I have EXTREMELY intimate knowledge of this matchup. You forget, I use both characters, and I've played this matchup multiple times on both ends against other high level players.

Tell me, when a character outpokes and zones you to the point that you're losing around 80/20 in a given matchup, do you HONESTLY think that getting a power buff on an option that is VERY difficult, nay, virtually unviable to land SERIOUSLY helps in the matchup?

Oh sure, it helps when he screws up massively, but fundamentally, you still don't have the tools to do anything, while G&W has the tools to counter everything on reaction, AND poke you to death. And you die when you go offstage since there is nothing you can do when he F-airs (or D-airs) you.

For this same reason, Lucario destroys Ganondorf in BBrawl extremely well. The matchup is identical to that of vs G&W, with Lucario killing you a little slower, but being immune to Flame Choke combos. More importantly, Ganondorf CANNOT do anything against Lucario that doesn't easily get outprioritized or punished, and he's virtually never punishing any of Lucario's super safe kill moves on reaction.

 

[LordshadowRagnarok]

Are any of the new Boss stages going to replace some of the banned stages? *cough*newpork*cough* in coming versions of BBrawl?

 

[Linkshot]

The Boss stages are on Layer 2, and thusly can't replace anything.

 

[MK26]

WAIT JUST ONE MINUTE

Are you sure the BBrawl showcase is larger than Super Smash Bros Metagame?

 

[JOE!]

WAIT JUST ONE MINUTE

Are you sure the BBrawl showcase is larger than Super Smash Bros Metagame?

uhhhh, what?

 

[Deleted member]

The Boss stages are on Layer 2, and thusly can't replace anything.

except that just this day dantarion crack that nut and made them playable.

 

[Eldiran]

The Boss stages are on Layer 2, and thusly can't replace anything.

He is referring to this:

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=253652

 

[Linkshot]

Nonetheless, we need to make sure the Samus glitch doesn't take effect.

 

[Lokee]

He is referring to this:

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=253652

Thats pretty cool. I hope BBrawl makers allows for some of these to replace the non viable stages. Personally Id love the (original)Ridely boss stage, the Stadium, The Stage with Samus's armor in the background. They are more or less Final Destination varients but they look visual cool.

 

[Linkshot]

Every Great Maze Character Boss room is competitively viable and fresh.

 

[MK26]

uhhhh, what?

In order to allow players to see the game in action before playing, we have prepared a demonstrational video that shows this standard version of Balanced Brawl in action. Created with 300 replays showcasing every character, it is the largest Smash video production ever created

that. isnt SSB:M bigger?

 

[Linkshot]

How is Melee a VIDEO PRODUCTION?

 

[MK26]

Shame on you.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

I am honestly not very interested in the legitimacy of our claim that our video is the longest ever. It's not important.

As per the stage stuff, it's still very new. It's our policy to explore this sort of new stuff, privately assess the potential utility and potential downsides, and make an informed decision. We handled PSA like this, and that's how we're handling this. So, in other words, we can't say anything right now about it.

I haven't seen much evidence of Ganon getting serious, deep playtesting from most of the people dismissing him; it seems more theoretical. There is competing theory that reaches different conclusions, and the actual play also supports this. Never getting hit by Flame Choke? Never, really? That just doesn't happen in real matches. You WILL get hit by Flame Choke. Deception, punishment, prediction, etc. allow Ganon to land it not a lot but enough to really matter. It's just actually "playing the game" that makes it work. Ganon has been used a lot around here, mostly by Twilight Prince and Thinkaman (who play Bbrawl a lot and have deeply explored Ganon in it through countless matches). It's not just me they played; I'm just the G&W player involved here. My WiFi matches with swoops followed a similar model even (and I haven't seen anyone try to provide videos of them totally shutting down a Ganon on swoops' level even on WiFi). It's just WiFi, but it did look pretty similar to the local play so it only makes me suspect what I have been thinking all along. Our theory of how Ganon works and the evidence provided from actual play suggest he's pretty decent. We can't speak for all matchups only due to a lack of comprehensive testing, but we do know he is quite functional in quite a few of them (including, specifically, his matchup with Mr. Game & Watch). When we play, we see everything we added put to use, even the things people constantly dismiss on the boards as useless (such as the grounding on aerial Wizard's Foot).

A competing explanation, that in the end he can't really land anything and is thus still awful, is suggested. We only see it backed up by theory and don't see much evidence of playtesting. This theory also seems to suggest that, in general, Ganon should pretty much never land anything which would imply that in standard Brawl he should be subject to things like losing without landing a single hit. The evidence suggests that this simply does not happen. There seems to be some sort of theoretical rejection of the idea of slow, less safe characters who are very powerful. The evidence from "every fighting game ever made" suggests these characters have fine potential but are simply tricky to balance, and the unique things about Brawl on a theoretical level help them more than hurt them. I mean, if there are few combos, who benefits? The slow characters who couldn't combo in any case and rely on really powerful single hits in every game or the fast ones who can only combo in more combo friendly games and have horrible damage output if their pokes aren't giving them follow ups? When some big and heavy characters are easier to combo than the average character, who benefits more from fewer combos? It is the big and heavy characters or the average characters? It makes the dismissal of heavyweights in Brawl seem even more silly. Sure some were underbalanced regardless (Ganondorf), but some were also really good (Snake) so I'm really not seeing the ground the constant dismissal of this model is coming from at all.

Honestly, what are we supposed to believe? The objective evidence in front of us makes the case of "Ganon is not bad" simply seem far stronger than the case of "Ganon is awful". It's not that we're not listening to the other side. We are, and then we're looking at the competing evidence. The competing evidence is simply looking far stronger here. I don't really know what else to say; we're just doing our best to try to make the game as best as possible. We have to go with what we see as the strongest case, and I find it hard to see from the perspective that the opposite case is stronger here.

 

[Lokee]

I can understand where AA is going.
One. Using a definite term like NEVER should be disreguarded in a game with so many variables epecially speaking of a move that is not in the bad calibur of Warlock Punch. While I will agree Ganon still needs bit more to handle his worst matchups he is pretty good in his standing as of now.

Two. Many games have failed to balanced the Heavies with the Lighties.
As an example I played the japanese Tatsunoko vs Capcom and they have the same problem in a sense. Lets take Karas and the Giants: Gold Lightan/Lost Planet Mech

Karas is like Metaknight. He has speed, range, combos, and priority and is virtually the best character. His drawback is he has lower health and so can die easily if they combo him too much. (Similar to Metaknight's weight)

Then we have the Giants. They have massive damage, range, and cannot be comboed in the sense all attacks have no hitstun on them. Now their weaknesses: their slow, attack and mobility wise, few combos as a result, fight alone in a game of two on two, and are extremely suspectable to grabs and certain beam and continuous attacks. (causes a knock out stun)

Now Karas is regarded as the best and the Giants generally the worst. Wanna know the Irony, The Giants have really good matchups against Karas. (mind you it doesnt take into account Karas' partner)

but I hope you see want I mean. basically Ganon is simlar to the giants as he is a very polarizing character in that he does extremely well at times but does really bad the rest of the time. I know its not extactly Ganon's situation but I just want to make the point that balancing these forces is not an easy task but it is certainely doable.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Well, I think that we can argue about matchup thoughs during all the 6-months-trial long, and not everyone will be pleased with next built.

So, at this point, videos will be more useful (if wouldn't be the most useful thing to do). They could be properly duscussed, any argument could be pointed and proven, and not to be merely theorical (like most post actually are).
But there's actually any competitive BBrawl video on the whole Youtube (you can recall it, there's not).

What I mean is: we NEED BBrawl videos, so discussions could be agilized.

Well, is just a though.

 

[Linkshot]

The problem is that Brawl+ beat us to the punch as a Brawl Hack, and then further kick us while we're down by giving misleading information to people that showed an interest. Maybe not purposely, but it's still tossed around like a festering rumour.

 

[JOE!]

what kind of misleading info?

 

[Linkshot]

"They changed nothing."
"The balance is worse."
"They didn't change enough."
"It's the same."
"There's no point."

Some things I've heard thrown around.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I haven't seen much evidence of Ganon getting serious, deep playtesting from most of the people dismissing him; it seems more theoretical.

And...I in fact have playtested him and recorded matches. You forget, Ganondorf is one of my most commonly used characters. And that I've been one of the longest participants of the Ganon forums ever since Brawl's release.

This isn't just theory. It is in fact extremely difficult to land Flame Choke on people who don't make dumb mistakes, and generally speaking, I'm just waiting for people to make a stupid mistake in order to do anything. Had that person just been a little more patient, or used a poke more intelligently, I would have never been viably landing that move, and due to the glaring blindspots of Ganon's moveset, it's painfully hard to stop most pokes without staling a KO move.

There is competing theory that reaches different conclusions, and the actual play also supports this. Never getting hit by Flame Choke? Never, really? That just doesn't happen in real matches. You WILL get hit by Flame Choke.

Trust me, there are some characters you literally cannot land this move on if they play correctly. By correctly, I mean it just takes a certain outlook and not horrible reaction time when playing against Ganondorf to never get hit by most of his movepool.

G&W, Lucario, Samus, Wario are a few characters where Flame Choking simply isn't viable if they know their options. These characters have an incredible combination of defensive tactics, priority, and mobility that is much too powerful for such a slow move to ever be viable.

Sure, G&W can take a lot of damage from Flame Choke regrabs, but a really careful player who pokes extremely well with him will make it so hard to punish him that you are forced to bet on perfectly spaced F-airs to have any chance of doing damage to him. This has happened to me before in a serious match against Aer_However - in vBrawl though - but the point was I was literally being shut down to the point where I could not land a Flame Choke (or a D-tilt for that matter). He beat me 2-1, and only because he was infinitely less experienced in this particular matchup with random spacing nuances such as the range of Ganondorf's F-air and F-smash. The inability to viably land any moves meant he actually survived up to 180% with use of my discovery of Bucket Braking on at least one stock of the set, until I got an extremely lucky grab -> fresh B-throw.

Also, you completely ignored me when I pointed out that Ganondorf literally cannot win against Samus or Lucario ever. These are matchups that were unwinnable in vBrawl in the first place, and considering that these characters got BETTER, Samus in particular is definitely WORSE for Ganondorf. Easily a 90/10 matchup, which I can back up since I play against a very good Samus main frequently. Lucario...not sure, although this is a matchup I have always lost, basically always getting at least 2stocked by competent players. His buffed F-smash however is going to be an even bigger nightmare to deal with. And as if Ganondorf didn't have enough problems, Flame Choke does not combo on Lucario on flat terrain.

It's very possible that I have actually spent more hours playing Ganondorf than any other character in this game (considering that a large percentage of my footage on youtube features my Ganondorf). People have in fact mistakenly said that I main Ganondorf.

As much as I have wanted to prove Sadaharu Inui wrong ever since Brawl's release, I find myself now agreeing with him that Ganondorf isn't allowed to move (at least in certain matchups). What I didn't know long ago was the extreme extent to which Ganondorf lacked any means of safely attacking or forcing mistakes before reaction time. Seriously though, I stress. Ganondorf's frame data is really really seriously too awful for him to be a viable character. He can followup and trap very effectively when he gets an opening or if his opponent makes a big enough mistake. However he cannot create openings or force mistakes in any real or reliable way before human reaction time can allow his opponent to avoid punishment. Due to the extreme limitations of his movepool, he is also generally extremely hurt by stale moves when his opponent is very competent, and actually struggles to kill at reasonable percents due to his lack of a safe, consistent, and reliable damage dealer. This is a slightly less prominent in BBrawl due to various things that Ganondorf does doing more damage, but it's still very problematic in several matchups, most obviously against Lucario and Samus, who are almost untouchable to Ganondorf, the former benefiting from Aura, and the latter being very heavy and ungimpable.

 

[Alphatron]

"They changed nothing."
"The balance is worse."
"They didn't change enough."
"It's the same."
"There's no point."

Some things I've heard thrown around.

These stupid statements come from ignorant people, the same people who probably say that brawl+ has wavedashing, is melee 2.0, is making Fox and Falcon top tier, etc. There's little that can be done about people who make assumptions without trying anything.

I've seen people who play brawl+ both on gamefaqs and on smashboards say good things about BBrawl, including some of the WBR. Personally, I have a lot of respect for this project and would like to see it become something. If you ask me, barring stupidity, the thing holding BBrawl back the most is this.

It's a hack. That alone forms a stigma. Most of the people who already place well in vbrawl may also not want to switch.

 

[Euclid]

Is Meta Knight still top tier in Balanced Brawlol?

 

[JOE!]

Is Meta Knight still top tier in Balanced Brawlol?

no, its either Marth or Spamus

 

[Linkshot]

It's Pokemon Trainer.

Then Spamus/Mario/shtuff.

 

[Mr. Escalator]

PT/G&W/Marth/maybe Samus are all pro. MK is high.
Mario is also high but not top.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I don't see the PT being top minus the fact Squirtle himself is in fact S tier material, and then the other two still have major safety issues, and really should never be landing kill moves on you viably. Charizard is still low tier or lower mid at best, as he's basically Bowser without the SideB approach shenanigans and a less solid out of shield game but with a better shieldgrab. Ivysaur is like a slightly less sucky version of vBrawl Ike, with the failures of a tether grab, but a better B-air for spacing and a very small degree of camping to potentially force approaches. If you're going to argue that the PT is S tier because all three Pokemon are good, this is not a valid argument.

Mario by virtue of shield pressure and KO options I think is top, and only loses to Marth and G&W, although this will be difficult to prove due to his poor representation and high learning curve in general. There are not many people who can actually use Mario correctly, due to how technical he is.

Also, ROB is definitely top tier. He has ridiculous grab range, and two of the best throws in the entire game. His Up-throw is a VERY good kill move, killing Metaknight at like 126% or something. His D-throw is the best D-throw in this game along with Snake's in terms of limiting options and setting up combos into kills or massive damage. Seriously, people don't get how broken this throw is. Furthermore, ROB's worst matchups (besides G&W) lost something that made the matchup bad for him. DDD no longer chaingrabs him, and Metaknight no longer autotraps him with Tornado, nor does Metaknight get easy gimps with Shuttle Loop on such a heavy character. ROB is also extremely good at poking, arguably better than Metaknight or Marth at poking in several situations, and his F-smash, lasers, and Gyros give him a defensive game that is very hard to break. ROB at any rate still beats the PT pretty easily due to how easily he can camp and gimp them (not that I think the PT is necessarily S tier anyway), and it was arguable that ROB vs Marth was even in vBrawl, in which case due to ROBs buffs, he would probably have slight advantage.

My idea on the top 10:

Marth
G&W
Wario
Mario = Samus, give or take a few matchup ratios
Snake
ROB
Metaknight
Olimar
Then someone who is either Luigi, Donkey Kong, Lucario, Peach, Link, or Zero Suit Samus, but I have trouble picking right now.