is the meta more defensive than 5 years ago?

[KP17]

I am positive that good players' defense has gotten alot better, in terms of evasion and blocking intelligently, generally speaking, but I am wondering whether the overall meta has shifted to where baiting is more important than landing a direct hit.

maybe im just bad at the game and need to think about this more, idk

 

[-ACE-]

YES, yes, and yes. Although the trend has slowed somewhat in the past 5 years, melee has been undergoing this change since it came out. It takes years for the majority of players to catch up to the metagame that is mostly created by the top players. Pieces of knowledge, good habits, and good techniques sort of trickle down to the masses after top players get showcased on youtube. The easiest parts of melee to see have been figured out, now the less obvious, more intricate parts of the game are becoming mainstream as well.... stage control, zoning, spacing, etc. are much more important today than 5 years ago. It will continue to go down this same path. And now with the 20xx hack you'll eventually see another small spike in safe play as well as multiple option coverage on techchasing (less hard reads). It just keeps going.

 

[KP17]

i agree!

i wonder if the top players keep secrets about the game from others

 

[Elyssa Xey Hexen]

Eh, there might be some random tidbits about how to say play certain match-ups that one person has more experience with than others. I seriously doubt there is really any "top secret" piece of information that is kept hidden away. The biggest thing for me is simply how I approach the game and understand it is going to be different from theirs given experience and exposure. That is probably the closest secret I can think of and its not even really a secret. Its just a different take on understanding.

Although, the only undercover sort of thing recall occurring was YLink armada for hungrybox jigglypuff.

 

[Red Rice]

It's becoming much more defensive lately. So much so that even Mango admits that the only way to beat Armada is to shoot the gun. But he still does some smart aggro approaches too.

 

[Cap'nChreest]

Top players are playing a lot more campy recently.

 

[Bones0]

Idk where people are getting the idea that the game is becoming campy or defensive... I rarely see the pros refusing to approach because their opponent always just takes space until they are trapped near the ledge and forced to do something. Stage control and punishes are too strong for hit and run gameplay to be reliable. Approaching is only bad at low to intermediate levels where people do bad approaches that get DD grabbed or something.

 

[タオー]

Not that I'm an expert on the subject, but it would make sense that defensive aspects of the meta have become slowly more viable over time. Both aspects of the meta have obviously progressed (the aggressive and defensive strategies) but seeing as the nature of Melee does favor aggro play, its not surprising to see this slow but steady defensive trend. That's also not to say that the meta has become more "campy" than 5 years ago, but instead its become a much more sophisticated style of play. Just watching old school matches compared to the more contemporary ones is enough to see the distinction.

 

[KP17]

its hard to define clear borders between 'campy playstyle' and 'taking stage control without making an aggressive commitment' and various other phrases

Most people would say hbox is campy but i disagree (he actively tries to acquire stage control, as opposed to s0ft)
I think Armada has a more defensive playstyle than anyone in the top is the most defensive player in the history of the game. Which is unrelated to his superb punish game.

Bones, I sorta agree with your statements after the first one. Approaching will always have a place in the game.

I wonder if the meta is cyclic, or if previous meta will always succumb to the current meta (simply in terms of playstyle, whatever that means)

 

[タオー]

There does certainly seem to be an ebb and flow to the meta in this game, due to the high level of control that Melee gives a player. However, it shouldn't be overlooked that overall meta trend that we're talking about is a call and response between the best strategies and counters to said strategies at the highest level of play. While that might seem obvious, there are always going to be many forces at work that "define" the current meta.

 

[Gentlefox]

I think spamming aerials as an approach will stop being so common, which will slow things down.

The tools to counter it are already there, it's just an issue of thinking fast enough to get your hitbox out there.

 

[polypuff]

Since the meta is always evolving, the current meta is very defensive because since the previous meta was more aggressive and direct, players had to adapt to that, which caused them to adopt the defensive meta to counter the aggression. There was actually a really interesting discussion a few years back that said old metas can sometimes beat current metas, so we might revert back to an old style to counter this defensive style.

 

[Twinkles]

You guys are limited thinking of it in terms of offensive or defensive play imo. It's all about keeping control, and playing it safe so you don't show your cards at the wrong time and get busted.

Mango realized some time ago that running in guns blazing doesn't work well when your opponent literally murders you off one mistake. He probably could get away with it a lot before because he was that much ahead of the curve and could a) space out most poor defenses and b) not get punished as hard cuz his DI was really good. Now that everyone's gotten so good at destroying people regardless of DI, he has to play that much smarter to stay ahead.

BTW, the "old metas occasionally beating the new metas" is not really a rock-paper-scissors scenario. It's more like, if you watch old school matches, you will occasionally see very strange or rarely utilized options for certain punish or micro-spacing scenarios where you can throw it in today as a mixup. Saying old meta will somehow counter new meta based on this though is jumping the gun quite a bit imo.