Do We Need Combos?

[Ove]

Brawl's shields aren't that great, and they're certainly not universally better.

Let's just say that the defensive game is better in Brawl then? The sidestep, air dodge and shield are very fast and effective in Brawl.

 

[TreK]

I'm starting game design as a hobby, and this is an issue I had to consider for a game I'm working on haha

I'm from a Smash background, so of course I wanted to be pressing buttons at all time, and not have phases where my opponent is playing guitar hero and I'm hopelessly watching.

But the usual combo breakers in non-smash game don't seem to work quite well for me. It's usually a costly option, or a tech which is often a bad choice. In smash, it's always a good choice to try to break from a combo, but the rate of success is pretty low, I like that about it. You have to make the most out of an advantageous situation or lose the least out of a disadvantageous situation, and not just wait passively for it to end.

The mechanic I decided to apply consists in two combo systems :
-Red combos (true combos) have decreasing damage and increasing knockback over time
-Blue combos (reads within combos) have a stackable damage boost and reset the red combo meter. 1 stack per read, generally speaking.
->Red combos become blue combos if you perform a read, blue combos contain several red combos if your read leads into another combo.

The red combo meter resets as soon as you are able to dodge, attack, tech, or jump, depending on your fastest option. The blue combo meter resets at the last frame of a tech, a getup move, a dodge or an attack, or 30 frames after the red combo meter if none of these options occurred, and can only gain a stack after the red combo meter has ended. Red combos are contained within blue combos : there are no infinites, but there are 0-death blues that takes you at the very least 4, and up to 6 or 7 reads to perform. On average, only 1/5 red combos end in a blue combo inducing situation : if you want to blue combo your opponent, you have to interrupt your red combo and try a read.

This system rewards you correctly for taking risks and doing reads à la Smash Bros, while still having very fighting-y combos. And it's infinite proof, of course, because who likes the ICs matchup in brawl except for me ?

So this is still about Smash4 ? I think they will end up somewhere between melee and brawl, and I'd be happy for it. I see it that way : smash64 was the first game with a combo breaker mechanic, though it wasn't really effective. Capcom crossovers took the concept and gave it a twist, but it wasn't very fitting in street fighter typed games. So they tried to emphasize it in melee, and it was a huge success. And then in brawl, they decided give it even more importance, but as it turns out, they overdone it and the game became a low risk, low reward fighter, aka fun to play, boring to watch unless circumstances allow for highly frequent hype peaks for a short time (grand finals, last set, last match, last stock, high percent, big tourney, underdog story, big comeback... rings any bell ?)

 

[El Duderino]

Let's just say that the defensive game is better in Brawl then? The sidestep, air dodge and shield are very fast and effective in Brawl.

Don't know about that. Braw'ls Airdodge gives less options, spot dodge is essentially on par (minus Brawl's random input delay), and perfect shielding overshadows the rest of the ground game, plus much of the general spacing strategy.

Guess it depends on the context of what you mean by better.

 

[-LzR-]

Brawl's shields aren't that great, and they're certainly not universally better.

I agree they are overrated, but they are far far more useful than in the first 2 games of the series. If anything, spotdodges needs to be nerfed or totally removed.

 

[Biz_R_0]

Can we get off the shield thing? This is actually a good thread.

 

[Big-Cat]

I've often wondered if spot dodges should go or not.

So from the sounds of things, it sounds like it's not so much that the defensive game is so good, but rather that the offensive game is so poor.

@Teneban
Sounds pretty similar to what I hand in mind for the combo game though IDK if the meters are necessary. Reminds me of BlazBlue though.

 

[Biz_R_0]

The offensive game isn't that poor either. If it was, the entire game would be projectiles and pokes, like in '08. I hate that you're trying to find Brawl's "big problem" as if there's a huge element of the game that's ****ing horrible and ruins everything (but somehow you don't know what it is). Maybe there are quite a few things that could be minorly improved, maybe you don't just need to completely remove spot dodges or buff all the attacks or increase shield lag to infinity and call it a day. This is like when they were banning MK and people kept blaming every problem in the game but tripping on him.

Before anyone even starts, I'm not saying that Brawl is more offensive or has better offense than other installments, it's just not that bad.

 

[El Duderino]

The offensive game isn't poor either.

There's a lot of examples out there of why people feel offensively Brawl has issues. Many of those naturally also have to do with the defense.

Instead of just saying they are wrong, I'd love to hear some examples of what makes parts of Brawl's offensive game worth defending. Just think the debate should move away from "it's not as bad as you think", and focus on debating what gives it merit. A good way to start would be outlining these differences and explaining why there is value to them.

 

[TreK]

@Teneban
Sounds pretty similar to what I hand in mind for the combo game though IDK if the meters are necessary. Reminds me of BlazBlue though.

(when I say meter, I do not mean special meter as in SF, I mean combo counter, my bad)
These (whatever they're called) are useful for beginners, so they can see what is legit, what is cool, and what is unlegit. It's a way to get a feel of the game quickly, but it won't be applied in a smash game I fear, because of the game's original intent to be played in FFA.

 

[Biz_R_0]

@El Duderino I honestly hate debating, you will realistically never change the other person's mind and even if you "win" that doesn't mean you're right. Debates don't lead to understanding, they lead to stubbornness and arguing and, metaphorically, off of a cliff.

 

[El Duderino]

@El Duderino I honestly hate debating, you will realistically never change the other person's mind and even if you "win" that doesn't mean you're right. Debates don't lead to understanding, they lead to stubbornness and arguing and, metaphorically, off of a cliff.

If you feel that way, why continue posting in this thread then? After all, the OP is asking a question up for debate.

I like debates, they are entertaining and help me solidify my opinion as well as consider others. Also gives me an excuse to talk about Smash. It's not really about 'winning' or changing the other person's mind, both of which are pretty meaningless goals given this is an internet message board.

 

[Big-Cat]

(when I say meter, I do not mean special meter as in SF, I mean combo counter, my bad)
These (whatever they're called) are useful for beginners, so they can see what is legit, what is cool, and what is unlegit. It's a way to get a feel of the game quickly, but it won't be applied in a smash game I fear, because of the game's original intent to be played in FFA.

And this is very close to BlazBlue's combo counter. Red is for when the combo is inescable, but it turns blue and tells you where the opponent could have escaped. However, it doesn't turn red if you continue a combo from a read.

 

[TreK]

Oh, I didn't know that about blazblue. The HUD for this game is so messy, I didn't really look into it.

 

[Biz_R_0]

If you feel that way, why continue posting in this thread then? After all, the OP is asking a question up for debate.

You misunderstand. There are differences between a debate and a discussion, the primary one being that debates are about asserting your opinion over someone elses at all costs, while discussion is about sharing opinions and gaining new knowledge and ideas.

We're probably just calling it something different but mean the same thing, though.

 

[El Duderino]

You misunderstand. There are differences between a debate and a discussion, the primary one being that debates are about asserting your opinion over someone elses at all costs, while discussion is about sharing opinions and gaining new knowledge and ideas.

I really don't want to get in another pointless tangent, in this case over your negative connotation with a type of discussion involving two opposing viewpoints.

All I requested was a simple explanation of your opinion about Brawl's offensive game. I'm all ears and curious to hear what people find the positives are. Given Brawl's lower emphasis on combos, I think it's relevant to the discussion. Don't you?

 

[Biz_R_0]

It's definitely less offensive than Melee, but it's not all projectiles and pokes. It doesn't give the other player the advantage, and in a lot of cases you have more time to react. All the less hitstun really does is give your opponent a chance if they're quick enough.

 

[El Duderino]

It's definitely less offensive than Melee, but it's not all projectiles and pokes. It doesn't give the other player the advantage, and in a lot of cases you have more time to react. All the less hitstun really does is give your opponent a chance if they're quick enough.

Being able to cancel hitstun definitely doesn't give either player more of an advantage, as both players have it at their disposal. That said ssbwiki does a good job explaining some of the consiquences:

Brawl allows characters to attack and airdodge during hitstun (after a certain minimum amount). It is unknown why this was implemented as it completely defeats the purpose of the mechanic (hitstun) and allows momentum cancelling. It is one of the most controversial additions to Brawl, with detractors criticising it for making combos much rarer, skewing character survival rates, and even allowing characters to get punished when landing a hit.​

Like Brawl's perfect shield, it gives the defensive player more opportunity to counter. The extra ability to do so however presents some questionable situations that can disrupt the flow and strategy in a match.

Personally I'm all for giving the defending player more opportunities to react, just not when it comes in the form of a low risk reversals. I'm of the opinion that if you've been hit, shielding or not, there should be less guarantee you can then turn around and use it to your advantage. Don't mind some room, just nowhere near what Brawl gave you. If they try this stuff again, I'd much rather see it in the form of something like crouch canceling that comes at some risk and without the needed 'tech skill' of either perfect shielding or to a lesser extent hitstun canceling.

 

[-LzR-]

Being able to cancel hitstun does not make hitstun pointless. The first thing you can do is airdodge. Then you can a moment later use an aerial. So basically you know your opponent cannot jump, use a special or such. He can only airdodge or attack and you know they can't attack immediately. Only dodge. It's still a weird mechanic to add and I don't know why it was implemented.

 

[Nintendo 64]

Smash 4 will rock if they bring back the good and old smash 64 combos.

 

[Biz_R_0]

@El Duderino you're making it sound like, at any time during the hitstun, they can airdodge. Anyone who's played the game knows this isn't true, what's actually happening with hitstun is that it's slowly letting you regain options instead of giving them to you all at the end, starting with air dodge. So, even by the time your move has recovered, the only thing they could do against your next move is air dodge or wait a little to do an aerial, so they're still really predictable. That's also part of the reason why people in Melee get KO'd so easily.

Also, they didn't explain that well at all, it was completely biased against Brawl (which a source shouldn't be against anything).

 

[-LzR-]

Why did you pretty much copy+paste my post except change it into a more offensive version?

 

[El Duderino]

Being able to cancel hitstun does not make hitstun pointless. The first thing you can do is airdodge. Then you can a moment later use an aerial. So basically you know your opponent cannot jump, use a special or such. He can only airdodge or attack and you know they can't attack immediately. Only dodge. It's still a weird mechanic to add and I don't know why it was implemented.

There certainly is a delayed window, so I wouldn't call Brawl's hitstun completely pointless either. It is just a bit odd of a decision.

@El Duderino you're making it sound like, at any time during the hitstun, they can airdodge.

You are confusing me, I said nothing at all along those lines. I'm just not keen on the idea of canceling hitstun, especially in the form of an attack. It takes what should be a dependable resulting penalty for being hit and arbitrarily messes with it. It does reduce the ability to combo, but at the expensive of the underlying system. Canceling hitstun is just not an ideal solution, that is if you consider combos to be a problem in the first place.

 

[Elyssa Xey Hexen]

I thought Guilty Gear had a system involved in which you could break out of any combo, but it involved a meter or some sort of requirement that made sure you could only do it a few times a match.

 

[El Duderino]

PSABR also has the rule where after so many hits you get a free break. Don't particularly like that either though, similar to hitstun canceling it feels like an afterthought patch rather than addressing the underlying issue.

 

[Biz_R_0]

You're confusing me. If that's not what you're saying, why is there a problem? The hitstun is still there, it just doesn't last until knockback is over.

 

[El Duderino]

You're confusing me. If that's not what you're saying, why is there a problem? The hitstun is still there, it just doesn't last until knockback is over.

The problem is canceling knockback does not follow the rhyme or reason of the underlying rules of the game. When you get hit, you expect to be unable to attack for a given amount of time depending on the attack and %. Breaking that rule adds an element to the game that is counter intuitive by going against expectations.

 

[Biz_R_0]

Then you learn and expect the right thing. Here's a nice chart for you:

 

[umegames]

Its nice we have smash games which shows us the extremes.

Smash64 had legitimate inescapable, 0% to death combos.
Brawl was the almost exact opposite. Most hits in the game will never lead into another guaranteed attack at any percent.

With brawl, a competitive scene did develop for it despite not being combo heavy. If anything, we see that the game becomes much more dependent on winning every single engagement instead of winning on a single engagement and getting free hits off of it.

However, we do know there was a general split between brawl and melee. Why? In part I believe its because Combos were largely removed. There is something very satisfying about continual hits and leading a combo into a KO. Its gets hype tournaments when such things happens and is enjoyable to the person getting the combo.

Being too combo heavy is not enjoyable either. Smash64 is the scapegoat on this one. Most high level matches in smash64 I come across are many one hit deaths. This to me is really depressing to play in a match on the receiving end. Make one mistake and you lose a stock.

In the end, I think melee does this very well. It gives you the opportunity for combos, but most are not 0% to death. Even if they are you do have mechanics that allow for some mix-up on the defensive end that leads to many improvised combos and keeps it interesting. Even then, a combo can be dropped quite often making the game a bit more forgiving on mistakes.

I agree with you. As a long time street fighter, marvel vs capcom player, I've always known combos. But what makes brawl so appealing to me is it's not so much about muscle memory combos as it is anticipating your opponent, reacting quickly, and thinking on the fly. For this reason, i love brawl more than melee, and i think it's also why PS all stars isn't as enjoyable (though it is fun), because its combo centered and It doesn't feel like defense really has any reward. In smash, defense can win you a match as much as offensive awareness. to me.....

 

[Biz_R_0]

^the top half of that (I like PSASBR).

 

[BTmoney]

I like combos

I am especially a fan of comboing based off of reads. That should always be a part of the game and rewarded.

Guarenteed 0-deaths though are pretty ugly, like someone stated above

 

[Nintendo 64]

PSABR is all about hitting your opponent faster you can to fill your special gauge, there's no much strategy in this game.

 

[El Duderino]

Then you learn and expect the right thing. Here's a nice chart for you.

I'm not saying you don't eventually learn, I'm just saying it's really not an ideal method to dampen combos. It's just too much foundationless tampering, resulting in momentum canceling and yet another deterrent to playing offensively.

I am especially a fan of comboing based off of reads. That should always be a part of the game and rewarded.

Couldn't agree more. It's something I hope with Namco they further explore, not stifle.

 

[Biz_R_0]

You're just repeating the same thing over and over, I'm not gonna just magically understand you don't change/expand on what you're saying. This is going nowhere, I see that you just really don't Brawl and I think your dislike of this mechanic is rooted to that.

 

[Big-Cat]

Is it me or is that graph more complicated than it needs to be? I have never seen hitstun rendered so complex.

 

[Biz_R_0]

I couldn't find a better one, sorry.

 

[El Duderino]

You're just repeating the same thing over and over, I'm not gonna just magically understand you don't change/expand on what you're saying. This is going nowhere, I see that you just really don't Brawl and I think your dislike of this mechanic is rooted to that.

You misinterpreted my take and I clarified. Find it a little strange that now I'm being criticized for trying to word it better for you. Again I never intended to change your mind, just lay the pros and cons on the table so we can all better understand where everyone is coming from.

If you want to turn this into a bias witch hunt, go ahead. I just don't think anyone will respect you for it. Besides, I thought you wanted to avoid discussions going off the cliff. You've just enacted one of the easiest ways for that to happen.

 

[Vkrm]

Is thread implying brawl doesn't have combos? Brawl has combos, and they're actually more reliable then melee's.

 

[El Duderino]

Is thread implying brawl doesn't have combos? Brawl has combos, and they're actually more reliable then melee's.

Certainly some truth to that, though they are fewer in number.

 

[Biz_R_0]

You misinterpreted my take and I clarified. Find it a little strange that now I'm being criticized for trying to word it better for you. Again I never intended to change your mind, just lay the pros and cons on the table so we can all better understand where everyone is coming from.

First off, no you didn't. You said your point, I said I didn't understand, you clarified. I responded, you then said "That's not what I was saying, I was saying [same thing I just told you I didn't get]". I'm criticizing you for doing the opposite. Second, not only did you completely fail to do that, but that's a textbook debate.

If you want to turn this into a bias witch hunt, go ahead. I just don't think anyone will respect you for it. Besides, I thought you wanted to avoid discussions going off the cliff. You've just enacted one of the easiest ways for that to happen.

And here you go, trying to place blame and make accusations. And it's not a "bias witch hunt", it's that every one of your opinions I've seen is so tightly rooted to Melee that it's kinda obvious which side you're gonna take with everything. I never said that was a bad thing, though.

Also, you claim that I'm driving the conversation off a cliff, but you're actively taking part in said off-a-cliff conversation. If you really have a problem with where it's going, you can stop it at any time by just not hitting the quote button.

 

[Johnknight1]

Brawl has combos, it's just not beyond the very tip top of the food chain, and they aren't very electric. Personally, I would like some combos that lead to some awesome spikes and flashy kills (the same goes with gimps, such as early shine spiking, which is largely lacking in Brawl). The lack of momentum change in Brawl and highlight moments made that slow and drab game much less entertaining to watch.

If your opponent makes a huge mistake, there should, at various points, be an opening for an early game that the game engine and your characters' moveset allows, which is largely lacking in Brawl.

Couldn't agree more. It's something I hope with Namco they further explore, not stifle.

Namco usually in their fighting game rewards you for good reads. They definitely know the basics of making fundamentally sound fighting games. Execution can sometimes be a problem though, especially in Soul Calibur. I haven't played SCV, but I heard it has better balance than SCIV, which had those 3 awfully balanced Star Wars guest characters.