Custom Specials: Misconceptions and Publicizing

[Raijinken]

and of not ehere is that this logn post proves that zelda likes custom move.s

and zelda is one of the characters that, imo, benefits the less from the addition compared to, say... nah, palu's too extreme, i guess ganondorf is a good comparison.

Ganondorf, Ike, and Samus are probably my top three examples of "Look at how much better this character is, yet their playstyle is fundamentally the same." type characters.

 

[◥θ┴θ◤ | JJ]

I've said this kind of thing multiple times on the forum, but I'll say it again.

I do custom move matches all the time since I have them all unlocked on my 3DS, and they make the game substantially better. Different builds allow for different setups, some builds are great at countering others, select characters become much more viable... and, just in general, it's a lot more fun because of the larger amount of variety.

There's no telling how much depth we're leaving untapped by not allowing customs in tournaments, and that really makes me sad. We need to push for legalizing them, and push hard. We need to get their positive effect on the game more known to the public (as someone in this thread said, big-name streams like S@X allowing them would be great). We need to do whatever we can to get the community to adopt their usage, because if we don't, we'll never see the full extent of what this game has to offer.

My suggestion is for people with the 3DS title to purchase a PowerSaves so that they can unlock them all instantly (which is what I did). It's not much different than using an Action Replay to get Melee's debug mode going to more efficiently learn that game's moveset properties -- I say this because PowerSaves is made by Action Replay, the company -- and you can't use any kind of legality arguments against it because it's not illegal. Some people will certainly consider it cheating, but given how cumbersome getting them the normal way is (which is the main reason why they're not already legal), I really don't think that matters.

 

[Scarlet Jile]

With APEX gone and the EVO ruleset disappointingly unrevised, I think it bears consideration again how to tackle the logistical problems with custom movesets in such a way that it becomes viable from a larger TO perspective.

The EVO organizer has basically flat-out said it's "too time consuming." In fairness, the EVO stage with the world watching is probably not an optimal testing ground for custom moves in a large tournament environment.

Here's what I think needs to happen:

1. Offline tournaments with >100 people between now and March need to start experimenting with custom movesets allowed. TOs need to agree on a rule for movesets, whether it's @ Amazing Ampharos 's or something a little less ambitious. Even 1 custom moveset is better than 0.

2. The knowledge and experience from these events needs to be pooled and distilled into concrete, usable steps for how to optimally run a larger tournament with custom moves.

3. TOs need actual human beings to volunteer their time to attend these events and put the distilled information from step 2 into action from the very beginning of the setup process.

4. TOs need to elect a knowledgeable and trustworthy representative to ensure that these custom move rulesets are being complied with on each of the units before the tournament begins to save time.


Unless each of these things can happen in a way that everyone is satisfied, it's just not a worthwhile risk for TOs to take when trying to ensure that their event moves as smoothly and painlessly as possible. If we get up on the world stage and blow it, though, that's it--good luck convincing other TOs in the future it's viable. There's no need to rush this, so let's use this space for sharing and collating useful custom move information and see if we can get step 1 moving.


Update 1: EVO coordinator may be reconsidering his stance, which makes this thread all the more imminently necessary, in my mind.

 

[T0MMY]

Of all the points you made I think having a good Representative for your area is the best one.
If any change that competitors want to happen it's probably best to have someone speaking honestly on behalf of their area.

The crying shame is the Smash Community doesn't have this in place. I've been doing what I can to tell people to be prepared for it and when it comes time that we need representation instead of unilateral decisions and we're not prepared we have nobody to blame but ourselves.
Maybe @SmashCapps isn't too overworked to help oversee some of that.

Edit: Looking over the Evo rules I like them soooooooooooooooooo much better than Apex. I don't think Halberd is competitively viable, but I'll take that over DSR and character restrictions any day.

 

[Scarlet Jile]

Here's a quote from the Custom Moveset thread that I'm putting here as an example of what I mean:

The TO would be setting them up. If you are suspicious of them being correct, test them out during button checks. If something's wrong, report it to the TO and he should fix it.

See, there are already several logistical problems with just these couple of points.

1. The TO is busy enough as it is. Telling him to just do all this tedious extra work when he doesn't have a stake in it is going to backfire.
2. If something's wrong in a button check and requires a fix, that's more time ticking by in a tournament with thousands of people watching and hundreds of players waiting for their turn to play so they can go home. That's the exact opposite of what TOs, spectators and even players want.
3. Having to ensure that your loadout is correct will force more button checks, lengthier button checks, and eat up even more tournament time. There's 3 strikes against custom movesets, if I was the EVO TO, I'd be seriously reluctant to do this by now.

 

[T0MMY]

As a TO I offer Custom Fighters: ON as an option, but the attendees don't want it nearly unanimously so I haven't had a chance to fully experience going through the whole process in tournament. It was even overruled for a side event to test out!
Since I have helped host local events I have been busied quite a lot with helping set up consoles and make sure the game rules are set. Having to deal with the issues customs brings to play would be quite a considerable amount of work, so in one regard I'm happy it's just a straight up normal game like the community has been used to for years now.

Also I mostly am posting to emphasize the EVO rules I just realized (because it's something we take for granted).
ALL GAMES ARE AT DEFAULT UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED
What exactly is "default"? When the game is originally started up for the first time with no content unlocked?
Or default from when the game is started up after everything is unlocked and settings are made?

Important because...
There was no additional ruling for Items.

Are Items considered "On" as a default or "Off"?
Evo has had its history of pushing items on the Smash Community and they got a big push back. There was no push to have items on for Melee and seemed to be perfectly fine letting the Smash Community define the rules for Melee, so I am wondering if this is a point that will be added later or a point of pushing items into the game.

This does get me to kind of a tangent that there is nothing I found about having Smashballs ON that would violate competitive principles. No random explosions or trophies/CDs that could impede competition spawn with just Smashballs on.

 

[Scarlet Jile]

Well, I don't want to get too much into the competitive viability of items (even Smash Balls) here, because it derails the primary focus. But I will say that breaking Smash Balls heavily favors characters with high aerial mobility and faster aerials, which tend to be pretty good characters anyway.

 

[Thinkaman]

Buttons checks for customs is totally unnecessary.

The only logistical issue the TO faces is making sure the setups have common movesets transferred before the event starts, possibly by drafting a minion to do it before the event begins. As long as there is a single prepared 3DS on hand, that's it.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Buttons checks for customs is totally unnecessary.

The only logistical issue the TO faces is making sure the setups have common movesets transferred before the event starts, possibly by drafting a minion to do it before the event begins. As long as there is a single prepared 3DS on hand, that's it.

Or minions, plural. (It's EVO, I'm certain they have staff.) Multiple 3DSs (3DSes? 3DSii?) would speed it along too. If Nintendo's involved again maybe they could be persuaded to help out? (That's a long shot.)

 

[Piford]

Here's a quote from the Custom Moveset thread that I'm putting here as an example of what I mean:


See, there are already several logistical problems with just these couple of points.

1. The TO is busy enough as it is. Telling him to just do all this tedious extra work when he doesn't have a stake in it is going to backfire.
2. If something's wrong in a button check and requires a fix, that's more time ticking by in a tournament with thousands of people watching and hundreds of players waiting for their turn to play so they can go home. That's the exact opposite of what TOs, spectators and even players want.
3. Having to ensure that your loadout is correct will force more button checks, lengthier button checks, and eat up even more tournament time. There's 3 strikes against custom movesets, if I was the EVO TO, I'd be seriously reluctant to do this by now.

If the TO did it right in the first place there wouldn't be a need to fix anything, therefore there shouldn't actually be any fixing. Also for huge events like EVO there are multiple TOs. Plus someone has to go unlock all the characters and stages on the setups too. I don't see how custom moves are any different.

 

[Thinkaman]

If the TO did it right in the first place there wouldn't be a need to fix anything, therefore there shouldn't actually be any fixing. Also for huge events like EVO there are multiple TOs. Plus someone has to go unlock all the characters and stages on the setups too. I don't see how custom moves are any different.

It takes 12 minutes to load customs from a 3DS. (I've timed it after doing it to ~10 setups, and this matches what others have said too)

This is indeed less time than it takes to unlock characters or stages.

 

[Scarlet Jile]

Buttons checks for customs is totally unnecessary.

You think? If there were a few thousand dollars on the line, I would make very sure that the loadout I selected had been correctly labeled on at least the first WiiU I encountered. With 51 characters, even if there were only 4 different loadouts a piece, that's 204 movesets with the possibility for error. With 8 different loadouts per character and 408 movesets to choose from total, it's almost more unlikely that there isn't an error somewhere along the line.

If there are 20 Wiis, with 12 minutes of additional work per unit (assuming everything was going smoothly), that's 4 hours of additional labor if there's only 1 3DS. Even with 4 3DSes and 4 people on only 20 Wiis, it's an extra hour of labor. That's still significant to consider.

 

[Thinkaman]

You think? If there were a few thousand dollars on the line, I would make very sure that the loadout I selected had been correctly labeled on at least the first WiiU I encountered. With 51 characters, even if there were only 4 different loadouts a piece, that's 204 movesets with the possibility for error. With 8 different loadouts per character and 408 movesets to choose from total, it's almost more unlikely that there isn't an error somewhere along the line.

I understand the concern, but I feel we can put our trust in the TO and staff on this. It's easy to double check them on the master 3DS(s), and everything is a strict clone of that repository. I haven't had any issues locally.

Plus, any possible mistake would be promptly discovered and rectified. There would be no confusion that it WAS a TO error that a set was mislabeled, and that the players had nothing to do with it.

If there are 20 Wiis, with 12 minutes of additional work per unit (assuming everything was going smoothly), that's 4 hours of additional labor if there's only 1 3DS. Even with 4 3DSes and 4 people on only 20 Wiis, it's an extra hour of labor. That's still significant to consider.

For a 20+ console event, it is a significant time requirement. It does require proper planning and organization.

I'm just pointing out the reality though, that while this is one more thing for the TO to have to plan around, it doesn't crack the top 20 of most time-consuming jobs the TO has at an event like this. Not even close.

Unlocking characters takes more time than this.[/quote]

 

[Scarlet Jile]

Well, I'm playing devil's advocate because these are all real TO arguments we need to collect evidence for to the contrary.

In addition, consider this: If Nintendo provides consoles like they did at APEX, I wonder if it's unreasonable to ask for characters/stages to be unlocked by default?

And for that matter, why not custom moves?

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Well, I'm playing devil's advocate because these are all real TO arguments we need to collect evidence for to the contrary.

In addition, consider this: If Nintendo provides consoles like they did at APEX, I wonder if it's unreasonable to ask for characters/stages to be unlocked by default?

And for that matter, why not custom moves?

Come to think of it, they must have been unlocked from the start. Mostly because I can't imagine Apex staff actually taking the time to unlock all the characters + Duck Hunt/Smashville on every single console.

 

[Piford]

Well, I'm playing devil's advocate because these are all real TO arguments we need to collect evidence for to the contrary.

In addition, consider this: If Nintendo provides consoles like they did at APEX, I wonder if it's unreasonable to ask for characters/stages to be unlocked by default?

And for that matter, why not custom moves?

JC at Nintendo went around and unlocked everything at all 64 setups before Apex.

 

[Scarlet Jile]

Presumably, he had some kind of insider knowledge or tool for doing this faster than a standard consumer? Because that would essentially be two days' worth of work for one person.

 

[19_]

Honestly I would just like to see Wii U Powersaves be manufactured so we can be done with logistics.

I also would like to mention a quick batter + homerun (and first strike invincibility) bat equipment set with proper stats can tear through crazy orders.

This kinda gives me idea of using the 3ds powersave to create some overpowered equipment that you could just take it over to the wii u and go nuts.

I'm not sure if that is a thing yet though.

But honestly, a Wii U Powersave is all we need to end this. Seriously.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

I think I'm going to make another video about this (with better volume balancing I promise) making things clear and simple from the perspective of both a large scale TO and of players who would be entering such an event; I have so much schoolwork over the next few days and am about a full night behind on sleep but somehow I have to make this a priority ASAP.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I think I'm going to make another video about this (with better volume balancing I promise) making things clear and simple from the perspective of both a large scale TO and of players who would be entering such an event; I have so much schoolwork over the next few days and am about a full night behind on sleep but somehow I have to make this a priority ASAP.

Keep hitting "like" instead of "reply." Whatever.

Anyway, if you're aiming to have it done while EVO rules are still up for discussion, then the deadline for that is March 27. Yay pressure!

 

[ぱみゅ]

Guys, I merged Scarlet Jile's thread ("TO Custom move logistics") to this one because they treat basically the same topic and this discussion needs to keep going

 

[DunnoBro]

Honestly I would just like to see Wii U Powersaves be manufactured so we can be done with logistics.

I also would like to mention a quick batter + homerun (and first strike invincibility) bat equipment set with proper stats can tear through crazy orders.

This kinda gives me idea of using the 3ds powersave to create some overpowered equipment that you could just take it over to the wii u and go nuts.

I'm not sure if that is a thing yet though.

But honestly, a Wii U Powersave is all we need to end this. Seriously.

Unfortunately, Wii U blocks hacked equipment from being transferred from 3ds.

You can, however use the code to complete all challenges and get the legit home run bat, quick batter, and KO heal badges for crazy orders grinding.

 

[MrGame&Rock]

Since Nintendo is providing the sets presumably, maybe we can get them to provide setups with all custom moves unlocked?

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Since Nintendo is providing the sets presumably, maybe we can get them to provide setups with all custom moves unlocked?

That would be ideal and I tweeted Mr. Wizard suggesting such, but IDK if it'll happen.

 

[MrGame&Rock]

That would be ideal and I tweeted Mr. Wizard suggesting such, but IDK if it'll happen.

I also tweeted Mr. Wizard asking of more stages could be legal if we simply turned off the music, and his reply was a simple "Nope"

 

[Sixfortyfive]

So are Powersaves the simplest method of getting all of this stuff unlocked on a 3DS? Can anyone link me to the exact product that I should be looking for? Just want to make sure.

Also, is there nothing else that could get the job done just as well (like some kind of standard Action Replay device for 3DS)? What's the best option?

 

[DunnoBro]

So are Powersaves the simplest method of getting all of this stuff unlocked on a 3DS? Can anyone link me to the exact product that I should be looking for? Just want to make sure.

Also, is there nothing else that could get the job done just as well (like some kind of standard Action Replay device for 3DS)? What's the best option?

Actually, powersaves -are- action replay for 3ds. They're just called powersaves cause they apply the codes via save exploits, but in essence they're the same.

http://www.amazon.com/Action-Replay...UTF8&qid=1423679310&sr=8-1&keywords=powersave

 

[Teh Sandwich]

everyone keeps saying there is "such an easy solution" to the time issue. Yet, I still haven't seen it prove itself.

I'm not against customs. I think they would be really fun to have on. I just still don't see a tourney running smoothly with them.

 

[Raijinken]

everyone keeps saying there is "such an easy solution" to the time issue. Yet, I still haven't seen it prove itself.

I'm not against customs. I think they would be really fun to have on. I just still don't see a tourney running smoothly with them.

Obviously if you take the time during the tournament, it's going to take forever and run poorly. The idea is to load the setups in advance (down-time in non-customs tourneys, during teardown, setup, whatever). If that's done, then for every player who uses one of the loadouts covered by the setup, the time it takes to select characters is increased by exactly one button press plus scrolling time, less than three seconds all told, and stored between matches if the player doesn't change characters. For every player who doesn't use a setup not covered by the project or other setup theories, you add a short bit of time, and if really necessary, could restrict their matches to a specific setup that has their set installed.

Basically, if you front-load all of the setup to a time not conflicting with tournament procedures, it's negligibly slower than a regular setup, and in a worst-case scenario, adding a new setup takes less time than coaching and fingerwarmers usually do.

 

[Thinkaman]

the time it takes to select characters is increased by exactly one button press plus scrolling time, less than three seconds all told

If it takes you three full seconds to select your customs, you need to get on my level, brah.

 

[Balgorxz]

vgbc rules everyone as soon as they stream tournaments and games with customs everyone is going to be "yeah customs should've been legal since day one", you know this.

 

[Octagon]

vgbc rules everyone as soon as they stream tournaments and games with customs everyone is going to be "yeah customs should've been legal since day one", you know this.

A lot of things have changed with the Smash 4 metagame since launch, and customs are among those changes

 

[Raijinken]

If it takes you three full seconds to select your customs, you need to get on my level, brah.

Takes me nothing near it, less than one unless I wasn't really sure if I wanted to experiment or go with a regular one. I was being very generous to the point of severe inflation to point out that, even severely inflating the time it takes, you're looking at roughly the time it takes a very slow player to pick their color.

 

[Thinkaman]

Takes me nothing near it, less than one unless I wasn't really sure if I wanted to experiment or go with a regular one. I was being very generous to the point of severe inflation to point out that, even severely inflating the time it takes, you're looking at roughly the time it takes a very slow player to pick their color.

I dunno man, I've seen some people really go at color selection like it's a chess move.

 

[Octagon]

I dunno man, I've seen some people really go at color selection like it's a chess move.

For my secondaries I always have that one costume I pick before anything but with my main Duck Hunt I can never decide, its so annoying

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Am I the only one who just sticks with default colors?

 

[Raijinken]

Am I the only one who just sticks with default colors?

Depends on the character, for me. Much like the customs that are this thread's actual topic, I prefer alt-colors on certain characters (probably about half or 2/5 of the roster) and defaults on the rest.

 

[Scarlet Jile]

If you know a TO who runs customs on, it would help if you tagged them in this thread to mine their feedback and start putting together a comprehensive guide for running these events. I don't want to beat a dead horse, but EVO is a big stage, and we don't want to burn any bridges by getting in over our heads before we're absolutely ready.

 

[smashmachine]

I dunno man, I've seen some people really go at color selection like it's a chess move.

you're telling me you don't color counterpick?

 

[MrGame&Rock]

you're telling me you don't color counterpick?

I dont, but my sparring buddy does with Sheik. I pick one costume per character and stick with it. Unless its Bowser Jr

edit: Okay, without customs I use Diddy and Bowser, with some Falcon thrown in now. Given my love for those characters, who do you guys suggest I pick up in a new meta with customs on?