Meta Competitive Smash Ruleset Discussion

[HFlash]

So why is Peach's Castle not a tournament viable stage? It has less "jank" and more consistency compared to say, Castle Siege, Halberd, and Delphino? All there really is is the two random blocks on the top corners, and the bumper at the middle top. At the very least, those are always consistent, and like the moving platform in SV, so is the moving floors at the bottom part of the stage.

Plus this is an amazing stage for Marth xD.

 

[dav3yb]

So why is Peach's Castle not a tournament viable stage? It has less "jank" and more consistency compared to say, Castle Siege, Halberd, and Delphino? All there really is is the two random blocks on the top corners, and the bumper at the middle top. At the very least, those are always consistent, and like the moving platform in SV, so is the moving floors at the bottom part of the stage.

Plus this is an amazing stage for Marth xD.

I'm using it at the next tournament in our area. I too see nothing wrong with it over other stages the some people think deserve to be legal.

People don't like it because too many johns as far as i can tell.

 

[ぱみゅ]

PC is banned under the assumption of "We tech those"

 

[MajorMajora]

PC is banned under the assumption of "We tech those"

Even though we don't? Also, since when has it been okay to ban on assumption?

 

[HFlash]

I'm using it at the next tournament in our area. I too see nothing wrong with it over other stages the some people think deserve to be legal.

People don't like it because too many johns as far as i can tell.

Meanwhile, Halberd has several moving hazards, and Delfino/CS both have transitions that bring shorter ceilings, narrower walls, AND walkoffs. Much higher chance for janks/johns.

 

[Radical Larry]

Meanwhile, Halberd has several moving hazards, and Delfino/CS both have transitions that bring shorter ceilings, narrower walls, AND walkoffs. Much higher chance for janks/johns.

And where does Peach's Castle break the regulation of stages?
(Answer: It doesn't.)

 

[Tobi_Whatever]

PC can be a very rewarding stage to learn to if you're actually able to tech every time. A slope that's often outside of your view that is.
Also if you don't tech you will probably die earlier than without the slopes. Sounds balanced to me.

 

[Radical Larry]

PC can be a very rewarding stage to learn to if you're actually able to tech every time. A slope that's often outside of your view that is.
Also if you don't tech you will probably die earlier than without the slopes. Sounds balanced to me.

The fact that people go with the "we tech those" thought when applying it to Peach's Castle is not a valid statement. If you're too close to the slopes and you get hit into a stage spike, it's your own fault for even getting there. Untechable Space (I'm calling it by that name) is applied to every single stage out there, and this stage is no different.

Peach's Castle only has one true hazard, the Bumper. That thing only deals little damage and knocks you a set distance. That's literally all it does, nothing else. The slopes aren't even hazards and are a part of the stage, the moving object on the bottom of the stage is slow, so you could potentially recover, and the stage is mostly flat.

It's a great stage to be allowed as a Legal stage. It shouldn't be counterpick, though, since it is very well balanced compared to the likes of Halberd, Castle Seige and Delfino.

 

[Yikarur]

Additionally to the cheese grater and the bumper the layout is just not thaat suited for competitive play.
Everytime I play on this stage the battle is about who can camp the lowest section (the moving tiles) the most, because the position is insanely advantagous. For that reason I personally would not like to play on that stage. It creates a certain, defensive playstyle with an odd risk/reward ratio if you follow a certain strategy that doesn't make it seem like a fair competition.
We have www.smashboards.com/threads/stage-legality-discussion-thread.401784 this thread for stage discussions by the way.

 

[Treveen]

Additionally to the cheese grater and the bumper the layout is just not thaat suited for competitive play.
Everytime I play on this stage the battle is about who can camp the lowest section (the moving tiles) the most, because the position is insanely advantagous. For that reason I personally would not like to play on that stage. It creates a certain, defensive playstyle with an odd risk/reward ratio if you follow a certain strategy that doesn't make it seem like a fair competition.
We have www.smashboards.com/threads/stage-legality-discussion-thread.401784 this thread for stage discussions by the way.

^^That sounds like counter pick material

 

[Gunla]

I think a lot of people are used to how it was in Smash 64, being banned, or just state the Bumper for the reason it is banned. I can say that quite a few people would probably call it better than something more controversial like Castle Siege.

I think the physics might warrant some analysis and experimentation with the stage; I'd definitely say that if anything, it'd likely be a counterpick if it ends up being legal; there's already a very good 3/5 set of starter stages to work with.

 

[MajorMajora]

Okay, I need to go on a rant about counter picks. It hurts my soul so much whenever someone happily says "This will make a great counterpick stage!" or something to that effect. Seriously, I can respect so many arguments on stage legality, but counter picks are one of the ideas that have never made any sense. And I'm pretty sure that's because they don't make sense.

Now forgive me if I've missed some key reason as to why it's a reasonable argument, but for now I'm going to goon a rant.

First off, let me summarize my feelings on counter pick stage lists, that is, as opposed to FLSS. I feel like the sentence "Counterpick stage lists are a beneficial thing to include in a smash ruleset" is very similar to the sentences "Perpetual motion machines are possible" or "I'm not eating meat because I'm on a gluten-free diet", in that they all make a lot of sense only if you have no knowledge on the subject at hand.

Seriously, what even is the point of excluding stages to this land of exile?

Is it because some stages are more uncompetitive than others? That's a stupid argument. Stages are banned because they are unfit for tournament play. We don't play on them because they are uncompetitive. If a stage is uncompetitive, we shouldn't play on it. So, if a stage is deemed uncompetitive, why isn't it simply banned? Are you saying that it is okay for games 2 and on to be uncompetitive (not unbalanced, but uncompetitive)? No, a stage is fit to play on in all games or not at all, because there's no reason the first game should be more competitive. They all should be.

Is it because stage striking would otherwise take too long? Okay, seriously, what the hell. We have time for people to input custom tags that have nothing to do with controls, and even in some cases counter pick music, but we can't so much as take a few more seconds each match, not each game, each match, to make an incredibly important part of the game better? Really? Not to mention we aren't even stage striking the fastest we can. Things would go much faster with, say, a paper and pencil or dry erase marker on a laminated stage list.

Is it because we want the first game to have the most even match up possible, and therefore be the fairest for both players? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHA oh that's a good one. There's so much wrong with this argument. I could talk about the philosophy of whether you want it to be the closest matchup possible (so that, if, say, I was using character A and my opponent character B, and A generally wins the match up, then my opponent would get a stage that was better for their character to make the matchup more even) or whether you want the median matchup between the 2 characters, which is already achieved by FLSS anyways. I could talk about how creating a starter list that does either of those for any matchup by hand would be nearly impossible and would inevitably favor certain characters.

Or, I could talk about how not once when discussing starter lists have I seen matchup data ever been discussed to any significant extent, and how the only criteria for meeting most starter lists is having as few dynamic elements as possible, based not around sound principles, but instead around an irrational fear of this illogical concept most people call "jank", not even thinking through what this list actually does or what purpose it serves, and whether or not it serves it effectively.

The worst part is that most people just use starter/counterpick lists because they're used to them. That is a horrible reason to do something, especially when faced with a better alternative.

tl;dr, Starter/CP lists are cancer, FLSS is jesus.

 

[ぱみゅ]

If anything, the only reason I miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight ban Peach's Castle is to have more setups available, not forcing them to buy DLCs.

 

[Tybis]

If anything, the only reason I miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight ban Peach's Castle is to have more setups available, not forcing them to buy DLCs.

I think you'd have to ban any DLC characters as well in order to be consistent.

 

[ぱみゅ]

I think you'd have to ban any DLC characters as well in order to be consistent.

The thing is, you know beforehand if a player would likely use a DLC character and you can tell them to wait until a setup with all characters is available, but that's not the case with stages.
A stage is selected until the very moment, and it would be bad if after calling it, you realize it isn't even there.
Slightly worse in FLSS, where they might end up there for game 1.

And even then it's just a "maybe" for me.

 

[Ghostbone]

Pretty much everyone knows to buy DLC characters for their console for tournaments, but a lot of people won't be willing to buy dubious stages just for them to be tested out in a tournament setting and ultimately banned.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Pretty much everyone knows to buy DLC characters for their console for tournaments, but a lot of people won't be willing to buy dubious stages just for them to be tested out in a tournament setting and ultimately banned.

I have to mildly protest at the bolded wording. It implies that there's no point in testing DLC stages in the first place. (Also obvious counterpoint: Dream Land 64.)

I'll agree that Peach's Castle is far from a typical stage and it's feasible that it'll end up banned, but enough people seem to enjoy it from what I've seen that it being banned is far from a foregone conclusion.

 

[Ghostbone]

I mean that's people's mindset, they feel like the stage will be banned and thus they're potentially wasting money buying it.
Why take the risk essentially.

 

[Ansou]

I mean that's people's mindset, they feel like the stage will be banned and thus they're potentially wasting money buying it.
Why take the risk essentially.

Yep this is true. But banning a stage for that reason would literally be banning something because people are afraid that it will be banned. Which is not really a good banning criteria.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

because for now, we're just running customs off.

"Because for now, we're just banning your main."

Miis moves aren't customs, palutena's moves are.

Convince me why palutena should get special treatment

Because fundamentally there are two reasons why customs are banned: the difficulty in setting them up/inconsistency in the OCSMP, and a handful of "bad apples" that stupid people ***** and moan about. Neither applies to Palutena. Also, because this kind of special treatment costs absolutely nothing and indisputably makes the game better. Other people gonna complain "what about my character"? Let 'em. Who cares? When have we ever cared about consistency? We ban and legalize things because of completely arbitrary, nonsensical reasons all the time. See also: Yikarur's opposition to Peach's Castle, as if there weren't more or less advantageous position on other stages.

 

[Ghostbone]

Palutena still requires you actually turning the toggle on, and if the toggle's on then every other character has a right to use the options available to them (easy enough with 3DS uploading).
That just demands you make the ruleset needlessly complicated for one character, while also being unfair to everyone else.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

On the one hand, it's easy enough to simply say "Custom moves are banned for all characters except Palutena, Mii Brawler, Mii Swordfighter, and Mii Gunner." On the other hand, it's equally easy to say "The customization option shall be set to OFF." and not mention any characters explicitly by name. On the third hand, not elaborating further makes it ambiguous if the Miis should get to use their customs or not without an additional clause saying so. (Because let's face it, most players and/or TOs probably don't think about the Miis that much unless they use them.)

I would like to also express my personal annoyance and frustration that this entire customs debate stems from menu organization. If Sakurai had simply let us pick an ad hoc custom set from the CSS then I'd bet money we wouldn't be having this conversation.

 

[thehard]

What does the regional landscape look like stock-wise these days? I'm interested in how 3 stock would fare at majors at this point in time.

 

[T0MMY]

From when I talk to people at tournaments most people say they are ok with either 2 or 3 stocks and a good deal of players prefer 3 stock more but silent preference alone isn't going to change anything.
Mostly right now for the TO it's way too enticing to cut time constraints by simply using 2 stocks instead.

 

[Yikarur]

At Brawl times no one complained about time contraints even though the matches lasted 1.5 times as long at average..

 

[Ghostbone]

Very late there was a movement for 1 stock games, but the sets were lengthened to 7 or 9 games so the time involved would have been essentially the same.

 

[T0MMY]

Very late there was a movement for 1 stock games, but the sets were lengthened to 7 or 9 games so the time involved would have been essentially the same.

I actually enjoyed the 1-stock matches in Brawl, but best of 7 made me hate it. Bo5 would have been perfectly fine. Oh well, missed that chance.

 

[smashbro29]

The next upcoming national in Japan!

Rules here: http://kokucheese.com/event/index/322714/

Anyone wanna translate?

 

[Deleted member]

So did tournaments stop using customs? I've been out of the loop and I noticed Paragon didn't have customs on.

 

[ぱみゅ]

So did tournaments stop using customs? I've been out of the loop and I noticed Paragon didn't have customs on.

For the most part they have.
There are small movements here and there to try to bring them back, but the majority of TOs right now decided to keep them banned, for whatever reasoning, decisions about it being informed or otherwise (uninformed being the most common).

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Palutena still requires you actually turning the toggle on, and if the toggle's on then every other character has a right to use the options available to them (easy enough with 3DS uploading).
That just demands you make the ruleset needlessly complicated for one character, while also being unfair to everyone else.

Who cares? Why? Seriously, why should we care?

It's a toggle. It's a menu option. It's not what matters in-game. It's not even an important one like stock where no matter what you set anything else to or how you ban anything else, you're playing something completely different. As PD pointed out, it's trivial to write in the ruleset, "Custom moves are banned for all characters except Miis and Palutena". Easy, one line, totally not complicated, everyone else who wants customs can explain their plan to unlock all customs on all WiiUs currently slated to be present at the event or share their 3DS with every other player there. Who cares if it's the difference between "We toggle this menu option to X" (you still have to explicitly state the rule with Miis either way, because nobody knows how to deal with Miis otherwise) or "We allow X"? Why does this matter? Why does this matter more than essentially adding a new, unique, viable character to the roster?

None of this makes any sense whatsoever to me.

You want complex? The average ruleset in any smash game has a two-paragraph segment dedicated to "these are the stages we are allowed to play on during round one, this are the stages we're allowed to play on at all". This list varies greatly from region to region, indicating that there is no clear standard whatsoever. And this is exactly what we see when we zoom in. We ban countless stages, often for completely arbitrary (Mario Circuit "interrupts gameplay too much", which is a completely meaningless accusation), baseless (Peach's Castle is broken because reasons, I guess?), or unfair/favoritistic (Metaknight in Brawl, 'nuff said) reasons. SoCal basically just banned three stages because they essentially didn't like transitions, which is like banning five characters in street fighter because you don't like grapplers. HEY MORONS, THEY'RE A PART OF THE GAME AND THEY'RE THERE FOR A REASON. There's not even a game setting for that, we just agree on it (or more commonly don't and just go by whatever the TO says) arbitrarily because we have to have some way of doing things.

By comparison, saying, "customs toggled ON, all custom equipment is banned, all characters except Miis and Palutena locked to 1111" is simpler and considerably less arbitrary: we have good, clearly explained reasons to lock every character out of using customs that simply do not apply to Palutena, and we have extremely good, clearly explained reasons why legalizing custom palutena is a good thing - to wit: adding a completely new, extremely unique viable character to the game is good enough for people to pay money for in most cases. Hell, adding a completely old, non-unique, non-viable clone character to the game is good enough for people to pay money for.

 

[ATH_]

Hello people of this thread, I have returned for some discussion.
Might anybody enlighten me on the advancements or problems we've gone through/are going through? I'd like to know to give my piece of opinion.
From what I can tell customs seem to be the main discussion here, but I may be wrong.

 

[Ghostbone]

Who cares? Why? Seriously, why should we care?

It's a toggle. It's a menu option. It's not what matters in-game. It's not even an important one like stock where no matter what you set anything else to or how you ban anything else, you're playing something completely different. As PD pointed out, it's trivial to write in the ruleset, "Custom moves are banned for all characters except Miis and Palutena". Easy, one line, totally not complicated, everyone else who wants customs can explain their plan to unlock all customs on all WiiUs currently slated to be present at the event or share their 3DS with every other player there. Who cares if it's the difference between "We toggle this menu option to X" (you still have to explicitly state the rule with Miis either way, because nobody knows how to deal with Miis otherwise) or "We allow X"? Why does this matter? Why does this matter more than essentially adding a new, unique, viable character to the roster?

None of this makes any sense whatsoever to me.

You want complex? The average ruleset in any smash game has a two-paragraph segment dedicated to "these are the stages we are allowed to play on during round one, this are the stages we're allowed to play on at all". This list varies greatly from region to region, indicating that there is no clear standard whatsoever. And this is exactly what we see when we zoom in. We ban countless stages, often for completely arbitrary (Mario Circuit "interrupts gameplay too much", which is a completely meaningless accusation), baseless (Peach's Castle is broken because reasons, I guess?), or unfair/favoritistic (Metaknight in Brawl, 'nuff said) reasons. SoCal basically just banned three stages because they essentially didn't like transitions, which is like banning five characters in street fighter because you don't like grapplers. HEY MORONS, THEY'RE A PART OF THE GAME AND THEY'RE THERE FOR A REASON. There's not even a game setting for that, we just agree on it (or more commonly don't and just go by whatever the TO says) arbitrarily because we have to have some way of doing things.

By comparison, saying, "customs toggled ON, all custom equipment is banned, all characters except Miis and Palutena locked to 1111" is simpler and considerably less arbitrary: we have good, clearly explained reasons to lock every character out of using customs that simply do not apply to Palutena, and we have extremely good, clearly explained reasons why legalizing custom palutena is a good thing - to wit: adding a completely new, extremely unique viable character to the game is good enough for people to pay money for in most cases. Hell, adding a completely old, non-unique, non-viable clone character to the game is good enough for people to pay money for.

Because simple rulesets are the best rulesets.
We ban a lot of stages because the definition of what's competitive or not is subjective, and different people draw the line at different levels. That discussion is more suited for the stage legality thread anyway tbh.

Rulesets have a lot of necessary complexity, because we have to make rules about things the game doesn't cover. Double blind character selection, counter-picking, stage selection, etc. None of this is governed in game, so it has to be explicitly stated in the ruleset. Suicide clauses are bad, because in most cases we should just let the result screen tell us who wins. We make exceptions in the case of sudden death because that mode is uncompetitive.

Your ruleset is arbitrary, you're favouring Palutena by nerfing everyone else. At that stage, you're also supporting things like a bowser or dedede suicide clause because they increase those character's "viability" at a cost of ignoring the game. Hell, we might as well start putting in handicaps based on tiers, or giving a low tier main the win if they even take a stock, they deserve it right? It would make their characters more viable right? Favouring Palutena has no place in a competitive ruleset. As players we shouldn't be stepping in to try and influence the balance of the game. Who's to say default Palutena isn't better than Custom Palutena anyway? Her moveset is coherent and has various strengths and weaknesses, but you're claiming that default Palutena isn't even worth playing to the point that we have to make an exception in the ruleset to buff her specifically.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Your ruleset is arbitrary, you're favouring Palutena by nerfing everyone else.

Um... No. I'm allowing custom Palutena, who is a fundamentally different character. This would be like if a custom suddenly turned ganon from a heavy grappler into, I dunno, Fox. This is the big flaw with your reasoning. Custom Palu and vPalu are fundamentally different characters from the ground up. The closest parallel I can think of is banning Zero Suit Samus in Brawl because you have to hold down a button (which, I might add, I'm sure quite a few people didn't know about) in order to use her - it's not "giving Samus more options"; we are talking about two fundamentally different characters. They don't even have the same playstyle, and they don't appeal to the same group of players, unless we're talking about franchise/personality loyalists, who rulesets shouldn't and don't give a toss about. There are many people who really enjoy using custom Palutena, but hate her default set because the playstyle it forces her into is campy, slow, and boring. Paging @ Thinkaman to the thread.

Fundamentally, let's imagine an analogue. Imagine Snake came out as DLC, but due to some asinine bug, you couldn't select him unless Handicap was turned on. Wouldn't it be ****ing stupid to ban Snake just because we don't want to add a clause to the ruleset saying "Handicap is not to be applied to anyone" and wanted to keep it to "Handicap is OFF"? That's the situation we're at with Palutena. Custom Palutena is not simply an extension of default Palutena. It's not like Ganon getting a move that helps his recovery and works as an anti-projectile tool. It's not like Doc getting a zoning tool so that people have to come to him. It's not like Pikachu getting an aerial kill move. It's a fundamentally different character with a completely different playstyle.

 

[Ghostbone]

Custom Palutena isn't a separate character to vPalutena, it's vPalutena with a few different moves. If you're good at default you're good with custom Palutena (though the inverse may not be as true). THEY HAVE ALL THE SAME NORMALS, sure they're more different than Pit/Dark Pit, but that's not saying much. I don't care about making the ruleset more complicated to make one character more viable (especially since it's unfair to the rest of the cast), whether that be turning customs on just for Palutena, letting Bowser win every bowsercide, giving ganon the win whenever he lands a warlock punch, banning chaingrabs/infinites, etc.

Your Snake example sounds absurd and is more akin to the Master hand glitch in Melee, who is actually banned at melee tournaments lol.

 

[Thinkaman]

I think most of BPC's arguments distract from the real issue.

Should custom Palutena be banned? If there is no good reason to, the default should be "no."

Other characters and other customs have nothing to do with this question.

 

[Dinoman96]

It'd be nice if the comp scene gave her special privileges, but from a logical stand point that's most likely not going to happen.

The thing about the Mii Fighters is that people are arguing for their customs to be used in a default setting not because they become better (ok some do atleast), but because the game literally allows for it. With Palu however you have to flip the Customs button ON, which many in the competitive scene for this game are against. Mii Fighters can still use their stuff in default, the seemingly preferred meta. That's why people argue for them.

It's true that Palutena improves a lot through customs. However, she isn't the only one, technically. Certain other characters like Ganondorf and DK also get better through customs. Even though they're more integral to Palutena's overall design, with the way things are currently set up, people would just think its unfair that we'd be turning customs on just for Palutena, but not for the other characters also improved by custom moves like WFT or Gdorf.

Honestly, unless the competitive scene decides to give custom moves in general another shot, the best we could really hope for with Palutena is for a patch that gives her similar coding to the Mii Fighters that allows her to use her custom sets even when customs are off. Now that could potentially persuade people.

 

[dav3yb]

I feel custom palutena is different than mii customs, since it toggles with the option when you select it. Mii fighters have whatever load out they were made with available from the start, so i can see, in a customs off environment, allowing those. Palutena on the other hand, has a clearly defined default set. Just because hers are unlocked by default doesn't make them different than any other characters customs. Customs off = no custom palutena imo.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Custom Palutena isn't a separate character to vPalutena, it's vPalutena with a few different moves.

A few different moves that completely change how the character plays. Superspeed and lightweight completely shift Palutena's playstyle. They have the same normals, yes. The same completely garbage, barely usable normals. Is it any wonder that they act so differently when you change their specials?

I don't care about how complex the ruleset gets when it comes to making the game a better competitive game. Nobody else seems to give a **** when it comes to making the game a worse competitive game.

Your Snake example sounds absurd and is more akin to the Master hand glitch in Melee, who is actually banned at melee tournaments lol.

And if that glitch unlocked a real, viable, non-broken character instead? Would it still be banned? What if it was easier to do? Would it still be banned?

 

[Yikarur]

A few different moves that completely change how the character plays. Superspeed and lightweight completely shift Palutena's playstyle. They have the same normals, yes. The same completely garbage, barely usable normals. Is it any wonder that they act so differently when you change their specials?

Doesn't matter. He is still right.