Ban coaching

[Master WGS]

This is why I pointed out that one of my problems with "banning coaching" is I wanted specifics. If "Play him like he's Zelda" isn't coaching, where do we draw the line? If this comment, shouted from a crowd, had the undesired result of changing the tide of a match, how do we quantify it? How do we enforce it?

I AM against wasting time between matches. I think, beyond coaching, we as a community need a hard-and-fast rule of "You can't spend more than x time between matches in a set figuring out counterpicking." I understand this WILL be difficult to enforce, but it's a good start and can at least be specified and quantified.

 

[Phaazoid]

there are people reading this right now who think someone spending five minutes of one-on-one time detailing insights the player missed about their opponent and explaining how to abuse those weaknesses is the same as a crowd of people screaming things

https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/personal-incredulity

And several of these people have been to many tournaments themselves and experienced it first hand. That's enough for me.

 

[Nihonjin]

I am forced to question your motives here. I think you're simply trying to win the argument here if you're going to try to dismiss this issue which is integral to the problems with enforcing a coaching rule.

Directly from my first post.

If you ban coaching, you should ban the crowd too!
This is a red herring. There’s a significant difference between having a player calmly and directly explaining to you why you’re losing and how to adjust, opposed to trying to filter out good pieces of advice from a roaring crowd. It’s incomparable.

We can argue about the crowd some other time, but don’t bring it up here because it has nothing to do with this issue.

Unless you can give me a way to deal with that Street Fighter player, then you don't have a way to enforce the rule.

It's a separate issue.

coaching will be as easily enforced as the "no stalling" rule that seems to pop up from time to time

which is to say, not at all because it's so subjective that the TO has a better chance of always screwing it up than not

Wait, are you really saying we should allow stalling because it's too hard to enforce?

 

[Kneato]

Not if both statements break the same mental barrier. This is about improving player performance, not about fancy language. If pros can internalize complex playstyles (which they can) and people can assign those playstyles nick names (LIKE HE'S ZELDA) then the crowd can shout things just as performance enhancing as a coach could break down in several minutes.



I'm trying to get to the point that there's a difference between banning coaching and banning coaches from being able to talk to players.

One is easy to enforce, but doesn't stop coaching from happening in other forms, which could cause the same negatives, and potentially piss people off a lot.

The other is idealistic, but nigh impossible to accurately enforce.

My talk about splitting the community may have sounded exaggerated but imagine if an inconsistently enforced rule changed a major tournament outcome sometime. That would cause some major ire.

The only way I could see anyone honestly enforcing this is to have the players not even be in the same building as the tournament in separate rooms, with someone observing them at all times to make sure there are no phone calls/other communication. Possible but... do you want to go that far? Wouldn't that be even more of a hype kill than coaching?

I understand the ideology between wanting to ban coaches. In fact, I agree with the general argument, it should be about the two players. But in order to ban something, you have to be able to very specifically quantify what you are banning.

So before you suggest banning coaching, can you answer exactly what you are physically banning? And if that doesn't encompass all forms of coaching, that's where inconsistencies arise, and tempers flare.

...Obviously what you are suggesting is unrealistic, but forcing a player to remain at the TV for the set and not allowing people [coaches] to sit next to him is both realistic, and arguably effective...

That's exactly what I propose be done. It is unreasonable to believe coaching can be completely stopped, but it is possible to minimize its effects this way. No opportunity to kill momentum by leaving your seat to go talk to someone in the crowd. In depth coaching is also prevented if no one sits by the players. Advice may be yelled from the crowd, but at least a player can no longer get stuff like "He keeps doing U-tilt into F-air so DI this way".

These two things are easily enforceable and help minimize the negative effects of coaching.

 

[Mithost]

there are people reading this right now who think someone spending five minutes of one-on-one time detailing insights the player missed about their opponent and explaining how to abuse those weaknesses is the same as a crowd of people screaming things

Oh how I love smashboards

 

[Phaazoid]

That's exactly what I propose be done. It is unreasonable to believe coaching can be completely stopped, but it is possible to minimize its effects this way. No opportunity to kill momentum by leaving your seat to go talk to someone in the crowd. In depth coaching is also prevented if no one sits by the players. Advice may be yelled from the crowd, but at least a player can no longer get stuff like "He keeps doing U-tilt into F-air so DI this way".

These two things are easily enforceable and help minimize the negative effects of coaching.

So you're suggesting a complete removal of the players from the tournaments themselves? While this would definitely solve the coaching problem, it brings up another host of problems. First of all, it removes the human element from tournaments. Second, why would anyone pay to go to a tournament at all if they aren't going to see the pros play? Why not just stream from home? That would kill at least some revenue.

I'm not saying you're wrong. I kinda do lean toward your solution, because I'm not the type to go to tournaments physically anyways. I'm just saying it's a complex issue, with many things coming into play, and there might not be a universally 'right' solution that makes everyone happy on all fronts.

 

[Juushichi]

Also, to add to the arbitration (and I am not sorry for this, get rekt nerds):

What about phones and the beauty of 20XX telecommunication?

Here is a real scenario: Apex 2013 rolls around and I am spectating from my good ol' friend @SoulPech's apartment in Ohio. A particular set comes on --- Ally vs Zhime in Top 8 of Project M. I see Ally struggling to adjust to Zhime tricky and pretty effective style in Game 1 iirc. What people don't know is that I think of Ally and his coach/moral support Xatic as homies and I wanna see MW (as Ally spent most of his time in MI that year) do well. Also that I have loads of experience vs Zhime in particular and vs Zelda in general with online play through many Zelda iterations. I highlight a few short concepts to Xatic and send a text. Now, we know the result of the set (Ally won), but I got a text about 5 min afterwards telling me that Ally didn't need it and Xatic didn't actually tell him anything. This is ok by me, my homie won.

But what if I had texted Ally personally?
What if Ally took notes on Zhime ahead of time and reviewed them (as many SF/Marvel players now practice, actually) between matches? Is this a bad thing?
SHOULD you police this?
How do you police this in either case?

I'm almost 100% certain that something similar to this happened before.

@ N Nihonjin -senpai?

 

[EnIgma24]

In my opinion coaching isn't against the 1vs1 rules in the fact that if you compare it with boxing or other kind of sports like that, having a coach between the round and here the sets is legit and yet it´s still considered as a 1vs1 fight: the one who fight have the glory. Of course both side have a coach but not necessarly as competent and yet it is still considered as fair. If the problem of one not having a coach is an issue just ban coach only if one of the player does not have one dońt you think?
On tye other hand i quite agree with some of your arguments player can sometimes have some disavantages but i think everyone can overcome them with practicing and trying to know more and more smasher.

 

[trash?]

there are people reading this right now who think someone spending five minutes of one-on-one time detailing insights the player missed about their opponent and explaining how to abuse those weaknesses is the same as a crowd of people screaming things

because, functionally, they're the same thing, because they can accomplish the same task

trying to just dismiss it as a "red herring" or "irrelevant" because you don't want to take it too seriously isn't a good look, you know

 

[ShortFuse]

It would be too draconian to ban coaching before and after a set but during a set (or double set in terms of bracket resets) should be banned.

Why?

Because players can't truly sit there and analyze our opponent as well as somebody who is just watching. Picture somebody like Taco, Prog, etc that analyze numbers. They can sit and scout a match. They can say how well they've been LCancelling, what directions they've been favoring when recovering (high, edge, straight), what directions they have tendances of teching, how they DI, how they recover from the ledge, etc etc.

When we're playing it's impossible to filter all that data, but a coach can tell you what to exploit since they were sitting analyzing their opponent. The best players, as Armada said, have a great subconscious/automatic gameplay so they can split their focus analyzing their opponent. Its a skill that pros need to develop and coaching seriously dampens that.

 

[Nihonjin]

So you're suggesting a complete removal of the players from the tournaments themselves?

Yes, that's exactly what we're suggesting. [/sarcasm]

 

[Kneato]

So you're suggesting a complete removal of the players from the tournaments themselves? While this would definitely solve the coaching problem, it brings up another host of problems. First of all, it removes the human element from tournaments. Second, why would anyone pay to go to a tournament at all if they aren't going to see the pros play? Why not just stream from home? That would kill at least some revenue.

I'm not saying you're wrong. I kinda do lean toward your solution, because I'm not the type to go to tournaments physically anyways. I'm just saying it's a complex issue, with many things coming into play, and there might not be a universally 'right' solution that makes everyone happy on all fronts.

Since you seem to love logical fallacies, here is yours.

I didn't say remove people from the tournament. The two additional rules I suggested are:

1: Players must remain in their seats for the entirety of the match they are playing.
2: Spectators must not sit in the direct vicinity of players to ensure no whispered or discreet coaching is given.

These, I think, are perfectly reasonable and enforceable, and will be effective in cutting down excessive coaching.

 

[trash?]

y'all still ignoring one of the points I've made

note that, also, coaching doesn't even need to be spoken; in evo 2009's SF4 grand finals, justin wong knew to pick balrog at one point after losing, because someone on the front row was doing boxing motions to him, with the intent of telling him to switch

that was coaching. that was a tip that was the reason justin wong started to stand a chance. what you're considering "coaching" is arbitrary, and doesn't help much at all to deter what you consider to be an unfair advantage.

 

[Master WGS]

1: Players must remain in their seats for the entirety of the match they are playing.
2: Spectators must not sit in the direct vicinity of players to ensure no whispered or discreet coaching is given.

These, I think, are perfectly reasonable and enforceable, and will be effective in cutting down excessive coaching.

What do we do in scenarios with very cramped venues? I've been to plenty of tournament finals where people are crowding around a TV because that's the only way you're going to watch the match. You're all elbow-to-elbow, players included. In these situations, is it more important to hold to the coaching ban and tell people "Sorry, but only a few/none of you are going to be able to see what's going on in this match," or forget the ban and say "People are still here because they want to SEE this match. Let them sit/stand where they like?"

 

[Phaazoid]

Since you seem to love logical fallacies, here is yours.

I didn't say remove people from the tournament. The two additional rules I suggested are:

1: Players must remain in their seats for the entirety of the match they are playing.
2: Spectators must not sit in the direct vicinity of players to ensure no whispered or discreet coaching is given.

These, I think, are perfectly reasonable and enforceable, and will be effective in cutting down excessive coaching.

I'm sorry, I mis-interpreted what you wrote. You quoted my entire chunk of writing and I thought you were agreeing with a different part of it. I'm trying to argue, not insult.

And those rules are seemingly fine. But there have been several points in this thread that make them not quite perfect. Such as text messages/evolving technology. Such as the fact that at a starcraft tournament players were able to hear the crowd in sound proof rooms.

Sure, those may be extremes. But that still means it's possible, and if it ever does happen you're in a pickle, because suddenly tournament results could be in question and you have no one you can properly penalize.

also, gonna quote @ trash? - "
note that, also, coaching doesn't even need to be spoken; in evo 2009's SF4 grand finals, justin wong knew to pick balrog at one point after losing, because someone on the front row was doing boxing motions to him, with the intent of telling him to switch
"
@ Master WGS also brings up an excellent point - different venues have different accommodations - are we to standardize buildings just for smash tournaments? That would be extremely limiting and strangle the community.



Doesn't even have to be sound. there's a LOT that can cause accidental quoting.

Yes, that's exactly what we're suggesting. [/sarcasm]

I apologize only for mis-reading a post. I legitimately thought that's the part of my post he was agreeing with.

 

[Kneato]

I'm sorry, I mis-interpreted what you wrote. You quoted my entire chunk of writing and I thought you were agreeing with a different part of it. I'm trying to argue, not insult.

And those rules are seemingly fine. But there have been several points in this thread that make them not quite perfect. Such as text messages/evolving technology. Such as the fact that at a starcraft tournament players were able to hear the crowd in sound proof rooms.

Sure, those may be extremes. But that still means it's possible, and if it ever does happen you're in a pickle, because suddenly tournament results could be in question and you have no one you can properly penalize.

also, gonna quote @ trash? - "
note that, also, coaching doesn't even need to be spoken; in evo 2009's SF4 grand finals, justin wong knew to pick balrog at one point after losing, because someone on the front row was doing boxing motions to him, with the intent of telling him to switch
"
@ Master WGS also brings up an excellent point - different venues have different accommodations - are we to standardize buildings just for smash tournaments? That would be extremely limiting and strangle the community.



Doesn't even have to be sound. there's a LOT that can cause accidental quoting.




I apologize only for mis-reading a post. I legitimately thought that's the part of my post he was agreeing with.

Sorry, I thought you were attempting to twist my argument. No hard feelings.

 

[Aldwyn McCloud]

As hard as this may be to enforce due to the language barrier making it hard to assess whether people are coaching or not using their foreign language, I totally agree on every single point of Amsah's post.

 

[ToxicSis]

If we're going to compare SSB to physical 1v1 sports like boxing or wrestling, it absolutely seems fair to have a coach between games in a set. Personally, though, I don't even agree with coaching in boxing and wrestling in between rounds against the opponent, and both of those are LONG-established sports. Coaching on personal time as well as in between sets seems completely reasonable, but to me, it really does seem to take away from adapting on your own when you have someone next to you giving you advice.

However, that's just my own opinion. Some people might not think that learning to adapt against your opponents on your own is what playing the game is about. They may be more concerned with just winning, and that's totally reasonable, since that's a major reason we humans compete in anything. I just feel like there should be some regulation to it at the very least.

For instance, we'll say I took a pretty convincing game off of my opponent, and I'm really feeling some momentum and I can't wait to get into game 2. However, my opponent happens to have a coach available, and he spends a minute or two discussing the previous game with him, meanwhile I have no one to talk to and I'm twiddling my thumbs while I wait for them to finish their discussion so we can get on to the next game. I don't even mind that he's getting some advice, but during those few minutes where I'm not doing anything, I'm just losing momentum that I had gained from the last game.

I guess my point in that scenario is just that if one person doesn't have a coach, the wait time between games can really get to them since they're just sitting around. I personally believe that there should be rules/regulations on coaching if it's ultimately decided to not ban them, and that may not mean much from a new player looking to get into the scene, but these are just my 2 cents. From a spectator's perspective, specifically when concerning larger tournaments that are on streams, it's really frustrating for a set to last 20 minutes because of a 2-minute hand-warmer and two 3-minute coaching sessions.I like what was done at CEO, where they had a timer for before the set and in between games to make sure that the sets were going on in a timely fashion.

I know this debate may be more about the ethics of coaching than about the time strains, but ethics are hard to determine between each individual. In the end, people will disagree with it and people will agree with it. Either decision will upset someone.

 

[tekkie]

"during a set the two/four players may only discuss the game/set amongst themselves" this really isnt difficult

by the way, this is a much bigger deal for smaller/amateur tournaments

 

[<π]

making rules is easy.

enforcing them is the hard part.

 

[tekkie]

making rules is easy.

enforcing them is the hard part.

if someone doesn't have the stones to DQ/ban people from the venue/future tournaments for breaking the rules they shouldn't be a TO

get people to help

 

[<π]

Or... we could just keep doing it the same way we have been for 10+ years.

 

[EnIgma24]

Those ideas sould be applied by an open minded person so that all smashers can be satisfied, also all tournaments have to agree so of course it's hard if the rules are too drastics or if it don't change much things, in any ways the decision must be shared by most of the players.

 

[FreeVelocity]

1: Players must remain in their seats for the entirety of the match they are playing.

R.I.P Hungrybox

 

[sneakytako]

People have already said this, but enforcing any anti-coaching rule seems to be a hurdle.

Imo it creates more problems than it solves.

 

[kujibiki57]

I think if anything, a rule should be implemented stating something along the lines of "If, before the set begins, either player requests that coaching be banned for the set, the request cannot be denied by the other player, and neither player can be coached for the duration of the set". This way both players can be coached if it's not a problem to them.

This gets rid of the coach accessibility issue; one player having the advantage over his opponent because of things like
- Opponent's coach(es) couldn't make it to the tournament for whatever reason (this would include something like somebody travelling from afar alone to this tournament. What if aMSa and Vectorman weren't buddies at Apex 2014? What if there's a language barrier?)
- Opponent has fewer friends that can serve as coaches (so far I haven't seen any tournies outside of Apex 2013 where each player could only have one coach in a given set)
- Opponent's coach(es) couldn't be beside their coachee (dunno if that's a word) during their set for whatever reason, even though the coach was AT the tournament
- Any other things that apply that I can't think of right now

Point is, I don't think factors like these should affect (even slightly) the outcome of a match. Like sure, if somebody has a totally ****ty personality and nobody likes him/her because of it (and thus he/she doesn't have a coach), I'd want him/her to lose too. But I don't think he should be forced to a disadvantage during the set because of his behaviour outside of the game.

Notice how most of this thread can be addressed in this single post? In the first page?!

Create this rule that a person can request no coaching on a set, and voilé, all is fine (except for the crowd, but that's impossible to control, and generally not that noticeable).
This lets TOs keep some control, since it's very unlinkely that all players will request banning the coaching.

Personally, I don't really have a problem with coaching, and while it probably isn't anyone's intention in here, people arguing against it seem like those people that won't tell anyone that there's a flaw in something they do just because they don't want to lose or adapt.

I'll exemplify: I had a friend who, in another fighting game, had a setup that was a 100% guardcrush into a free combo. This setup, however, wasn't actually 100%, and in fact, if you knew how to avoid it, it would never work. He knew this, but hid it from all other players just to have the advantage. Of course, in this particular case, he was much better than everyone else, so it didn't really matter, and he did tell us in the end.
However, the problem with things like this is that it doesn't help the community grow. Sharing knowledge is what makes the metagame go higher and higher, and coaching contributes to this, though at the POSSIBLE expense of someone's win.


Also, I'm a HUGE Armada fanboy, but I can't help but feel a bit mad at his post in here, since he has been coached numerous times over the years and yet he comes here saying that people who get coached should lose, wtf bro?

In the end, getting coached doesn't give anyone a necessary advantage, and if it does, that means that you could just lose anyway.

 

[Nihonjin]

Or... we could just keep doing it the same way we have been for 10+ years.

Because change is bad and tradition is good! Yaay slavery! Wait..what?

Notice how most of this thread can be addressed in this single post? In the first page?!

Create this rule that a person can request no coaching on a set, and voilé, all is fine (except for the crowd, but that's impossible to control, and generally not that noticeable).
This lets TOs keep some control, since it's very unlinkely that all players will request banning the coaching.

I already addressed why that's still fundamentally unfair.

Personally, I don't really have a problem with coaching, and while it probably isn't anyone's intention in here, people arguing against it seem like those people that won't tell anyone that there's a flaw in something they do just because they don't want to lose or adapt.
I'll exemplify: I had a friend who, in another fighting game, had a setup that was a 100% guardcrush into a free combo. This setup, however, wasn't actually 100%, and in fact, if you knew how to avoid it, it would never work. He knew this, but hid it from all other players just to have the advantage. Of course, in this particular case, he was much better than everyone else, so it didn't really matter, and he did tell us in the end.
However, the problem with things like this is that it doesn't help the community grow. Sharing knowledge is what makes the metagame go higher and higher, and coaching contributes to this, though at the POSSIBLE expense of someone's win.

We're not trying to improve the metageme during tournaments. We measure who's the strongest.
Improving the metagame and sharing knowledge is what smashboards and smashfests, friendlies, FB and anything other than tournaments or money matches are for.

Also, I'm a HUGE Armada fanboy, but I can't help but feel a bit mad at his post in here, since he has been coached numerous times over the years and yet he comes here saying that people who get coached should lose, wtf bro?

OMG HE CHANGED HIS MIND! WTF!

In the end, getting coached doesn't give anyone a necessary advantage, and if it does, that means that you could just lose anyway.

If you don't think it does, you either don't understand what coaching means or you don't understand what an advantage is.
It's inarguable.

 

[JPRyan04]

Why are you guys so against improved gameplay?

 

[Shokio]

1) Allow coaching for Top 8 only.
2) Both parties must agree on coaching, as suggested before.
3) Put a time limit on coaching. Run an actual 30-second timer in-between matches. Once the timer has run out, coaches must immediately return to their seats.

Or we could scratch out #2 and just have 1 and 3. As the OP stated, the main problem with coaching is how much time it takes up. The simple solution to that is to just limit the time. I don't see what's so complicated here, but maybe I just think too simply. *shrugs*

 

[trash?]

Because change is bad and tradition is good! Yaay slavery! Wait..what?

you genuinely just compared a racist tradition spanning over centuries to a ruleset in a game

europe's best is filled with a bunch of scumbags, apparently. screw y'all, I'm out

 

[EnIgma24]

Do you mean that ban coach only at big tournaments would be fine?

 

[NickRiddle]

Coaching banned?
I'm going to go on stage with a bluetooth headset attached to my phone and call my coach before my match.
I'm going to have him talk to me as the match goes on without responding at all.
I've found the loophole, we can ban it.

 

[Overswarm]

Coaching banned?
I'm going to go on stage with a bluetooth headset attached to my phone and call my coach before my match.
I'm going to have him talk to me as the match goes on without responding at all.
I've found the loophole, we can ban it.

Excuse me, mr. TO? There's a man in the crowd that appears to be using sign language but I'm not entirely sure because I don't know enough about it. Do we... do we remove him from the venue? We're just not sure.

 

[EnIgma24]

Coaching banned?
I'm going to go on stage with a bluetooth headset attached to my phone and call my coach before my match.
I'm going to have him talk to me as the match goes on without responding at all.
I've found the loophole, we can ban it.

Haha that situation would settle all this : what now? Controlling players phones? :D

 

[festizzio]

I haven't read a lot of this, but I personally have no problems with the act of coaching at all. The problem, in my opinion, comes from fairness and equality. If only a few people in a tournament have dedicated coaches, then it creates an unfair environment where those players have an advantage (the significance of which is arguable, however even the smallest difference can lead to lost stocks/matches). If every player had a coach, then you could work as a team, train as a team, and eventually grow as a team. This would be very interesting to see, and I think it would create a much different atmosphere/metagame.

Of course, the above point could theoretically stem from TOs encouraging coaching. If suddenly coaching was not only allowed, but encouraged, we could see a rise in players searching for coaches within their region. The problem with this is consistency. The player base in each region would be very limited when it comes to players exclusively coaching. We all love to play these games, and it could begin to turn into more of a job than a hobby, as sports coaching is.

The other end of the spectrum is banning coaching entirely, or at least attempting to ban it. Implementing bans on coaching would be difficult I agree, but something being difficult isn't a solid argument against doing it. We're all smash players after all, we've all learned to play 64/Melee/Brawl and play it well. Even creating clear consequences for coaching mid-match would be more than enough to deter most coaching in tournaments. Shouting, "You shouldn't roll towards the edge!" among a sea of cheers is worlds apart from calmly whispering, "When he's pressuring your shield near the edge, you have a tendency to roll towards the edge," in between or during games. I don't see any problems with crowd coaching except maybe in smaller venues (where it would be a lot easier to warn that person).

My official stance is that coaching should not be allowed at tournaments, and actual consequences should be explicitly stated in the official tournament rules to deter anybody from doing it. Personally, I hate when people try to coach me during matches, as it subtracts from all the hard work I've put into the game, and takes away from the feeling of accomplishment if I win. That's just me, and doesn't really have any bearing on what I've stated above.

 

[NickRiddle]

My last post was sarcastic, but I guess it got the point across.

Coaching should be legal between matches with a time limit of 30-60 seconds depending on the size of the event.
Afterwards, in order to prevent in-game coaching, players should be forced to wear headphones that receive the game-audio, at least at big tournaments.
No possible way to coach mid-match, while still allowing help.

 

[Comprehend13]

My last post was sarcastic, but I guess it got the point across.

Coaching should be legal between matches with a time limit of 30-60 seconds depending on the size of the event.
Afterwards, in order to prevent in-game coaching, players should be forced to wear headphones that receive the game-audio, at least at big tournaments.
No possible way to coach mid-match, while still allowing help.

I think the time limit should be decreased, but otherwise I agree with this sentiment.

 

[EnIgma24]

There is so many good ideas that limit coaching for the game to be fair at tournaments so why people still argue to ban coach? :/

 

[NickRiddle]

Less than 30 seconds? I've taken longer than that to consider a CP choice WITHOUT somebody helping me.

 

[Nihonjin]

you genuinely just compared a racist tradition spanning over centuries to a ruleset in a game

No, I used the exact same logic to justify something we all agree is horrible.
Since I can do that, it means the logic is flawed.

It's a quite effective way to expose dumb arguments.

europe's best is filled with a bunch of scumbags, apparently. screw y'all, I'm out

Byeeee