Completely lost in online. Need some help

[He Who Hungers]

So I just picked up smash 2 weeks ago, grinded some adventure, and wanted to try my hand at online today. Big mistake, it turns out. First game I queued up to, I ended up in a 1v1, was unable to unready because I wanted to wait for more people, and had to leave the game because this wasn't what I was queueing for. Immediately get a popup saying I will be punished if I keep leaving, I get it, need to find the unready button for cases like that. Moving on.

Queue into a new game, find 2 others, it's playable, only I never played this stage before and didn't realize it was going to move up, leaving me on the edge and killing me. Respawn, fight the others for a bit until I fall off the stage, and I'm eliminated. I see the other players both have 3 stocks. Somehow I only had 2. Weird. Since they are both going, and I am already out, I decide to quit and find a new game. Can't find a normal way to leave the game, so have to close my Smash software and restart it. Again I am presented with the warning that I will be punished if I keep leaving. Bit weird, since I only left after I was already eliminated and wasn't hurting anyone. Figure it may be bugged out. Next game resolved without issue, next one I run into (still haven't found a way to unready in the lobby, but haven't run into any other 1v1s so no big deal), I instantly dash off the stage again because I am bad at the game and am still learning my hero. respawn, fight the others for a bit until I am killed again, and, once again, eliminated while the others, again, have 3 stocks. Somehow I keep getting two stocks while my enemies all get three. Again, didn't feel like sitting the game out if I am already eliminated, so close software and restart to see I'm banned for half an hour for 'unsportmanlike behaviour'.

I have three questions I hope someone can help me with.

1. How do you unready a game in the lobby?

2. Is there a way to leave a game after you're knocked out that won't get you banned or are you supposed to just do something else and wait for the others to finish?

3. How do I make sure I start the game with the same number of stocks as my opponents (I did have my preferred rules set to 3).

Any help would be very much appreciated!

 

[Oneiros5321]

1. Only way to unready in the lobby is to put the Switch on sleep mode. This should not get you a warning as the match hasn't started yet.
That being said, as far as I experienced, if someone does that, the other players might be stuck in the lobby and might also have to force close it. So, maybe just stick with it for a game, it will only lasts 4 minutes or so most of the time anyway.

2. You can't leave a match mid game. This is to prevent people cheating their way through the ranks.
Also, it is really annoying when someone disconnects mid game and gets replaced by a CPU. Think about your opponent, it's not his fault that you end up in a wrong ruleset and he shouldn't pay for it (if you disconnect mid game, the GSP will stay unchanged...it is really annoying to take 2 stocks from someone and seeing him disconnects leaving the winning player with no reward at all)

EDIT = I realized you were talking about when your stock ended but the game was still going on....and no, there's no way to quit, you have to stick around. FFA matches are so chaotic that they usually don't last very long though so it shouldn't be too much of an issue.

3. You most likely died at some point and did not realized due to the chaos or something like that. There is no way you start with less stock than your opponents.

 

[He Who Hungers]

I don't understand your answer at 2. That applies to normal leaving, but if you're already eliminated, you can't be replaced by an AI, or cheat your way through ranks (unless you get rank points for losing). It's equally annoying being eliminated early because you receive less stocks than your opponents do, and be stuck watching them for 5 minutes while you could already be playing a new game.

And no, I am 100% sure I only died two times in both games. I know, because I'm really bad and both of them happened very quickly. I may not know everything about this game, but I can count to three, and on these ones, I never reached three.

 

[Oneiros5321]

I edited my message, I just misunderstood your original post, my bad.

As for the stock issue, well, this is the first time I ever hear about this issue so I'm afraid I won't be of much help.

 

[He Who Hungers]

I see. Thanks for answering either way. I guess it's just a real harsh punishment on bad players. Maybe that's the issue with the stocks as well, is it possible to lose 2 stocks if you die early enough? It's the same with the downtime, if you're just not a good player and die fast, you're stuck watching the entire game from the sidelines, or risk getting banned, and neither will help you get better at the game.

 

[kraawlimatsy]

I believe self destructing takes away 2 stocks instead of 1

 

[He Who Hungers]

Self destructing meaning falling off the stage? Wow, that's really harsh on new players...

 

[Oneiros5321]

I believe it only counts as self destruct if you purposely run off of stage.

 

[He Who Hungers]

What does 'purposely' mean though? I myself am playing Meta Knight a lot, and one of his things is that if you use any of his specials in the air, you're unable to move until you hit the ground or take damage. Which makes your forward special which is a dash attack a risky maneuver as you'll only get the chance to jump back to safety if you hit someone. What happens to me a lot is that the enemy dodges my attack, leaving me defenseless in the air and unable to get back to the stage since I can't move. As a result I have no way of preventing myself from falling off. Apparently that counts as 'intentional' in this game.

I can't believe they'd be so punishing to new players. I've got nearly no space to learn the game this way.

 

[Gabesta99]

honestly I feel ya just continue to work hard and you'll do good I'm a cloud main struggling to elite smash because Zero Picked up my character in a tournament so people know what's coming sometimes but hey just shrug it off

 

[He Who Hungers]

I guess it's Nintendo's way of trying to make the learning curve steeper, but it just leaves me struggling to find something that incentivises me to actually use the 15 seconds or so I get per game before I am eliminated and forced to sit the entire thing out on the sidelines to try and learn the game,

 

[Coolboy]

they literally punish self destruct.. and that's 1 thing i find bull****, everyone makes mistakes even pro players at times :l
you either lose 2 stocks or 2 points, like i had a few laggy matches where not everything would respond as it should, but nintendo tries to punish players to harshly, they already can ban you for self destructing to much so why even punish players before that? -.-

 

[ALiBi212]

It’s unfortunate how the game calculates self destructs. If you fall off stage quickly without engaging opponents the game takes 2 stocks. Not fair, but it is what it is.

If you are having this issue, then online play may not be the best place for you to learn. Online, you will face players of various skill levels as well as laggy connections, which make it impossible to learn the basics.

Instead, try practicing offline against computers. Level 1 computers will teach you how to run, jump, and attack without forcing you off stage. They are great for learning how to play the game. I suggest playing as Kirby until you can beat a Level 3 computer in a one on one match. He is nearly impossible to accidentally fall of stage because of his amazing recovery. Then, move to Mario and play as him until you can regularly beat level 3 computers in one on one matches. It is important to play one on one matches, as 4 player matches may teach you how to run and hide, which develop bad habits and prevent you from learning. This process shouldn’t take very long to learn as the game’s AI is designed to walk you through the learning curve. If you are bored with 1v1’s, try playing Classic Mode on the easiest setting. It is another great place to learn.

Once you can regularly beat level 3 CPU’s as Mario, you will be able to confidently join online matches without the fear self destructing or instantly losing. You may even start winning!

 

[Sucumbio]

What does 'purposely' mean though? I myself am playing Meta Knight a lot, and one of his things is that if you use any of his specials in the air, you're unable to move until you hit the ground or take damage. Which makes your forward special which is a dash attack a risky maneuver as you'll only get the chance to jump back to safety if you hit someone. What happens to me a lot is that the enemy dodges my attack, leaving me defenseless in the air and unable to get back to the stage since I can't move. As a result I have no way of preventing myself from falling off. Apparently that counts as 'intentional' in this game.

I can't believe they'd be so punishing to new players. I've got nearly no space to learn the game this way.

suicide is when you ko before anyone has touched you including items. So after spawning if you side special with mk and no one hits you before you do it or after the move is complete (which as you've learned leaves you in Helpless state) and you can't grab a ledge or land on solid ground then yah you're ko and it's a minus 2 stock which is a setting you can change for local but not online.

But that's a lot to happen really. Just stop using that move in ways that'll get you ko and you're golden!

 

[He Who Hungers]

I see that most of the advice comes down to "just get better". I hope you realize this is not useful advice in any way. I understand you cannot give much else, as the system is just that bad, but then I would advise you to just come out saying "I don't have any advice for you", because getting better at the game is something I was going to try to do anyway.

ALiBi212 : I appreciate the effort you took to set up a training regimen, but this is not the way I play the game. If I have to grind away offline for half a year in a game that was made to be played multiplayer, I'd rather be punished for not being as good for a while if that's the way Nintendo will have it.

I just can't believe they would make their online system this terrible in a game that was meant to be played with others. Maybe their idea is just that their existing playerbase is robust enough that they can afford to scare off new players by overly punishing them for making mistakes?

 

[Oneiros5321]

I see that most of the advice comes down to "just get better". I hope you realize this is not useful advice in any way. I understand you cannot give much else, as the system is just that bad, but then I would advise you to just come out saying "I don't have any advice for you", because getting better at the game is something I was going to try to do anyway.

Just stop using that move in ways that's gonna get you killed and "get better" are 2 different things.
I mean, you have many offence options and you know which one is going to get you killed (if you don't then maybe just spend 10 minutes in training mode reviewing your attacks).
And if you can't get around this attack that gets you killed everytime, well try another character. There are 74 of them.

Also I think it's important to understand that if there was no penalty for SD, many people would do it constantly and it is disrespectful and annoying for those who want to play the game (and I know you don't do it on purpose, I am just explaining why this system exists)

This is not something that Smash only does, most online video games give penalty for disconnecting during a match (and in Smash, SD can be a way to quickly end the match for the person who's losing, similar to disconnecting)

Anyway, try another character or spend a bit of time in training mode, you don't need to even spend an hour to understand your moves and the experience will be much more enjoyable than just jump online and SD all the time and then complain about getting a 30 minutes ban.

 

[He Who Hungers]

I understand what you're trying to say, but it just doesn't work the way you make it out to be. I like MK's drill move, so I won't just stop using it altogether just because Smash punishes new players overly hard for making mistakes (even beside that, it's very easy to accidentally use a side special when trying to use a neutral one coming out of a run). As much as you'd like to believe your advice is helpful: it's not. Not in any way.

And, as I said before (I kind of feel like I'm wasting my time repeating it as you clearly didn't read it the first time), I have no problem with a penalty on disconnecting. I just cannot see why you would prevent people from disconnecting AFTER THEY ARE ALREADY ELIMINATED. You cannot do that. It doesn't end the match for a person whose losing, because the match has already ended for them, and holding them captive for the remainder of the game does nothing to improve their experience (especially if the reason are eliminated is because you gave them one less life than each other player, as it was in my case).

I did spend some time in training mode, but it's not the same as a normal game (aside from that, I am not going to practise every single stage in training before going online, I don't have the time for that). One of the games where it took two lives from me was actually only down to the stage which suddenly moved upward which I wasn't prepared for. Setting up such obvious traps for new players, then robbing them of two lives saying they are 'intentionally selfdescructing' can really not be called anything but taking the piss. I don't see why you need to be so agressive, and I can't imagine why you'd even be on the forums if people asking questions makes you so angry.

 

[pollo20x620x6]

My advice would be to stay offline for a couple hours or days. Get to know the stages and characters.
The only players I've ever seen who self-destruct constantly are those who literally never play video games. Even my most casual of casual gamer friends and family don't have these issues.

So maybe some time in training mode and looking at all the stages will help prevent accidents.

Also, you can't quit a match even after being eliminated because you are still technically linked to the match. Anyone who has ever played anyone who rage quits will see that there is a ~10 second lag spike because your switch is trying to see where the other player went before replacing them with a CPU. If you disconnect, even after you are eliminated, the lag will still occur as it is trying to find the spectator who went missing. Imagine how annoying that would be for everyone else if you could just disconnect after losing?

And automatic removal would suck because what if you wanted to rematch? Even if there was an option to quit, there would still be some processing that would inconvenience the other players.

 

[Dark 3nergy]

for half an hour for 'unsportmanlike behaviour'.

I have three questions I hope someone can help me with.

1. How do you unready a game in the lobby?

2. Is there a way to leave a game after you're knocked out that won't get you banned or are you supposed to just do something else and wait for the others to finish?

3. How do I make sure I start the game with the same number of stocks as my opponents (I did have my preferred rules set to 3).

Any help would be very much appreciated!

1. How do you unready a game in the lobby?

Reading your OP, you did not specifically mention which online mode you qued up for. With your description, my guess is it was Quick Play. So the answer here is, press and hold the B button while you're in the waiting room. This will bring up a prompt asking if you would like to leave. You can do so then.

The issue you're facing when playing during matches is simply just punishment for leaving preemptively and being unsportsmen like. To your credit, you're not intentionally doing unsportsmen actions. You just prefer to move onto the next match. However. The game engine is not coded in such a way where it recognizes that. It only sees the black and white.

2. Is there a way to leave a game after you're knocked out that won't get you banned or are you supposed to just do something else and wait for the others to finish?

Unfortunately, no. The game was coded in such a way that if a person who once participated is defeated then exits the match, the game will go to No Contest and boot everyone out. This is not something that is explained to new players. But the game developer intends for all participants to stay and watch the match conclude.

3. How do I make sure I start the game with the same number of stocks as my opponents (I did have my preferred rules set to 3).

There are mini icons located near the damage meter of your character at the bottom of the screen. These icons show how many lives you have left.

This game can be overwhelming at first, so take your time and go at your own pace. Let me know if you have any more questions. And I am sorry that the developer failed to really explain any of these rule set decisions to you. In all honesty they should do that.

 

[kraw23]

What country are you in? If Australia, give me your friend code and I'll help you learn the game

 

[Mischiiii]

Seems like there are big problems aside from playing 1v1. I’m happy that 1v1 turns out to be very playable aside from not being able to change characters while keeping a opponent (although there are benefits that you can’t switch before a rematch).

The stock issue seems weird. Never heard of it. If that would exist i bet i would have heated about it before.