Melee mechanics and tech, good or bad?

[Son of Slobodan]

So I just have this fascination with game mechanics and the way games "feel" in general. Melee really excels in this regard in just being really fun to play and move around your character because you have so much control. In regards to the tech necessary to be competitive however, I have mixed thoughts about which mechanics are good to have and which ones aren't.

In most competitive games, there are certain muscle-memory skills you have to train in order to properly play. For example, making workers, getting used to hotkeys and working the mouse in SC2, or wave-dashing, l-canceling, shffling etc in Melee. Certain mechanics, such as l-canceling, are just something you do over and over again until its second nature to you. There's never any thought or decision making when you l-cancel because there is never a reason NOT to do it.

Which begs the question, is this sort of mechanic even worth having when there's no thought behind it? Why even have the extra landing lag from aerials if players can just half it 99% of the time? Even so, there might be a place for this sort of mechanic in game. Perhaps it makes it feel like more engaging and interactive when you're actively controlling as many of your actions as possible (input for jump, input for attack, input for fast fall, input for l-cancel etc...) I'm not really sure if its a good thing or not.

On the other hand, SHFFLING, or jumping in general is a much more strategic choice where you have to decide whether a jump should be short or full, and whether you should fast fall or not depending on the situation. Wavedashing is kind of unique because even though it requires muscle memory, I think the mechanic elegantly fits into the melee physics engine and is not always the optimal choice next to say, a dash. Therefore there is some decision making involved in choosing to use it.

What do you guys think? Could another melee like game do without something like l-canceling and have it really matter that much? Or is it a critical aspect of the way the game feels?

 

[oukd]

this is one of the oldest topics of discussion ever

i love lcancelling (because i like muscle memory) and the subtle depth it brings (namely through adjusting your defense to mess up opponent lcancels). there are definitely situations where two players have to adjust to each other solely thanks to the lcancel mechanic, and it does make a difference in higher level play...but i dont think its an ideal tradeoff for the amount of people the community loses who try to learn the game and get frustrated by lcancelling. to say that it's thoughtless, however, is incorrect.

so tldr - i dont think its necessary, but its definitely not mindless

quick jumping attacks are pretty common in fighting games so idk if thats really worth mentioning

 

[Massive]

L-cancelling is a very interesting mechanic from a game design point.

Right now L-cancels are only for reducing the lag of moves to improve combos/defensibility. They are, with maybe one or two instances, universally beneficial to do.

However, altering the way L-cancelling channels into moves slightly could totally change the feel of a game.
Imagine if not L-cancelling something made your landing aerial chain into another move laglessly, or if the landing animation of that move imparted invincibility or another hitbox, which would be reduced by L-cancelling. Perhaps some moves would only chain together with L-cancels and some without. Things like that could greatly deepen the metagame and make for more interesting combinations of moves, as well as allow for more varied combos/options.

Slight alterations to the way shields work could also make L-cancelling a more interesting tactic. Making the differences in L-cancel timing after hitting a light shield or shifted shield more substantial could throw people's L-cancels off and add another topic of interest to the metagame.

There are really a lot of possibilities for the L-cancel mechanic. We probably wont see them in another Nintendo branded smash game due to the way Brawl discarded it, but there is hope for any smash clones or platform fighters in the future.

 

[Son of Slobodan]

L-cancelling is a very interesting mechanic from a game design point.

Right now L-cancels are only for reducing the lag of moves to improve combos/defensibility. They are, with maybe one or two instances, universally beneficial to do.

However, altering the way L-cancelling channels into moves slightly could totally change the feel of a game.
Imagine if not L-cancelling something made your landing aerial chain into another move laglessly, or if the landing animation of that move imparted invincibility or another hitbox, which would be reduced by L-cancelling. Perhaps some moves would only chain together with L-cancels and some without. Things like that could greatly deepen the metagame and make for more interesting combinations of moves, as well as allow for more varied combos/options.

Slight alterations to the way shields work could also make L-cancelling a more interesting tactic. Making the differences in L-cancel timing after hitting a light shield or shifted shield more substantial could throw people's L-cancels off and add another topic of interest to the metagame.

There are really a lot of possibilities for the L-cancel mechanic. We probably wont see them in another Nintendo branded smash game due to the way Brawl discarded it, but there is hope for any smash clones or platform fighters in the future.

I dont like the idea of l-cancelling chaining some moves and not others. It just makes the mechanic more confusing and inconsistent. It's kind of why I don't like street fighter because some moves arbitrarily chain into others and there's no real rhyme or reason behind it. I do really like the idea of trying to throw off an opponent's l-cancel, but I don't think that has enough depth in melee atm in order to make it something someone actively thinks about during a match (like "i'm going to mess up his l-cancel and then punish or whatever).

 

[oukd]

well, everything will always seem arbitrary until you learn what cancels/links and what doesnt. if you learn your character in sf thoroughly it wont feel arbitrary at all. dont quote me on this though, i dont play competitive sf <_<

i actually really like what massive is suggesting, where you get to choose between various viable landing options after an aerial by adding inputs during aerial attack animation or something.

also, people tilt shield to punish missed lcancels all the time also people punish spacie shffls prior to landing with quick knockdowns since it deactivates their tech window. the list goes on, but its definitely a thing that people consider during matches

 

[Son of Slobodan]

well, everything will always seem arbitrary until you learn what cancels/links and what doesnt. if you learn your character in sf thoroughly it wont feel arbitrary at all. dont quote me on this though, i dont play competitive sf <_<

i actually really like what massive is suggesting, where you get to choose between various viable landing options after an aerial by adding inputs during aerial attack animation or something.

I'm sure you get the hang on if it but the difference is you're taking one skill and applying into to every situation because its consistent, as opposed to memorizing a set input that's different for many moves/characters, which makes the game take much longer to learn for no reason.

 

[oukd]

i suppose that's true, but character-specific tech is gonna have to exist in one way or another. why can falco/fox randomly jump out of shine and ness can't? why can peach float cancel while everyone else has to lcancel? etc.

there's definitely a reason to it - people like having their character distinguished from others - sure there has to be some level of consistency across how everyone plays to maintain a coherent overall feel to the game, but without enough distinguishing techniques the game will feel stale when switching characters.

i believe that if you're learning the game and focusing on one character, it won't matter how different your character-specific techniques are; if you want to learn all the characters, something like this won't stop you from trying to learn everyone.

 

[Ramo]

When you're applying shield pressure with arials, it can probably be a good thing to switch up l-canceling/not l-canceling to mess up the timing of, say, a shield grab.

There is so much depth to this game because of the different things you can do to improve your play, while beginners can still play the game without doing those things. I think the simplification of these things is why melee players hate brawl so much. (Never played brawl, just speculating)

 

[oukd]

not to pick on you but if you dont lcancel youll just have more landing lag. the opponent wont be affected by you having more lag on landing, except for having a bigger window to punish you lol. if you lcancel and wait, its the same option as not lcancelling - id rather have the option of choosing to wait rather than missing my lcancel and being forced to wait

op is right in that its *always* better to lcancel. but the opponent has options to mess your lcancel timing up, and you can adapt to these attempts. you shouldnt ever be doing mixups between lcancelling and not lcancelling <_<

 

[Bad Cupboard]

i like l-canceling because it makes me feel like I'm pushing lots of buttons

and that's fun

 

[Cactuar]

It is always better to successfully l-cancel, but the difficulty of l-cancelling varies dependent on the situation. L-cancelling's depth is similar to the decision making and natural body feel a boxer has to have when throwing a punch. Do I just jab or do I commit to a straight? If I went for a straight, my follow-through body motion needs to be different if I hit the opponent or if I miss. L-cancelling is like the "regain your balance" action that is necessary whenever you are throwing yourself off-balance to attack the opponent. The fighter's proficiency in being able to link their balance/punches together(l-cancel + start their next action) leads to fluidity/speed.


blahblahblah

 

[clubbadubba]

However, altering the way L-cancelling channels into moves slightly could totally change the feel of a game.
Imagine if not L-cancelling something made your landing aerial chain into another move laglessly, or if the landing animation of that move imparted invincibility or another hitbox, which would be reduced by L-cancelling. Perhaps some moves would only chain together with L-cancels and some without. Things like that could greatly deepen the metagame and make for more interesting combinations of moves, as well as allow for more varied combos/options.

ssb64 player here. I'm kinda learning melee on the side too, cool game. I know in 64 there are a few cases where choosing not to z-cancel (64's version of l-canceling which gets rid of ALL landing lag) is actually a good idea because it actually changes the mechanics of moves. For example, if jigglypuff z-cancels her dair on a standing character, the last hit doesn't have hardly any knockback. However, if jigglypuff were to not cancel her dair in the same situation, the last hit works like a spike in that it pops the opponent off the ground. This is really useful vs yoshi because otherwise if you let yoshi stay on the ground where he can parry and counter, whereas if you pop him up you have time to combo him after your landing lag. Is there nothing similar to this in melee?

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

Lcanceling poses a bit of risk. For example, fox does an aerial and properly fast falls and lcancels it. If he is hit or trades just before hitting the ground, he will be holding down and have already pressed L/R. This means he will hit the ground fast and miss his tech. Hbox has used this to get many jab reset rests.

There are also tricks one can do to attempt to force an error from your opponent: ICs can use double shield tricks to make the timing weird or anyone can spotdodge the attack at the last moment. These little things can make the lcanceler miss the timing and thus get punished.

If lcanceling were automatic, it would take significantly less skill to execute offensive tactics while giving the defense fewer options to exploit it. From a design perspective, this would force the creators to make defense passively better to compensate, which would only lead to the game being more easy to execute at all levels of play and have less depth for players to compete with.

 

[voorhese]

I really like that point sveet. I knew about it, but I havent actually ever seen it used in this debate >_<

I always just see someone say "there is never a time u shouldn't l-cancel" and I always just say Ice comblets can time it so only 1 cliber l-cancels causing a desynch out of like a retreating fair, which is enough for me to cancel their argument. BUT that wouldn't necessarily make the end all be all argument for l-canceling, cuz they could just have made IC's different.

Also on the same path as it causing missed techs, it can be the determining factor of air dodging on the ledges of both the stage and platforms.

 

[oukd]

don't soft lcancels eliminate this teching problem entirely?


not that anyone actually does this

 

[1MachGO]

Anyone else annoyed when they see someone put L-Cancelling in the same category as shffling, wavedashing, dash dancing, etc.?

L-cancelling is an input tied to the proper execution of an aerial attack. For those who keep saying that "there is no reason not to L-Cancel!", you are really just saying "there is no reason not to perform my aerial attack correctly!".

The depth lies in the choice to use the attack itself. "Do you forward air or do you not forward air?" is the depth in technique. Pressing the c-stick forward and l-cancelling in order to perfectly perform the forward air has no depth.

 

[oukd]

^ no
the opponent has options to disrupt proper execution of lcancelling, and the attacker has options to adjust to these disruption attempts. its not as 'deep' as aerial selection or w/e, but 'depth' is absolutely there

(assuming 'depth' is defined as whether multiple choices are available or not. which is kind of not a good definition but whatever)

 

[voorhese]

It's true that soft l-canceling does get rid of the teching problem, which imo adds depth. I don't think people who are filling their shoes with sweat should be able to beat calm players. That's why 1 frame links and things like that exist in other fighting games.

 

[The 2t]

I kind of like L canceling as a mechanic. Even though it may be frustrating to new players to have to learn all these intricate little things they need to pull off consistently, that's one of the things I really like about Melee. Even if the idea of having to eventually learn to consistently L cancel every aerial may seem daunting to a new player, it makes it so much more rewarding when you do get it down. I understand the whole mentality of "if it's always better to L cancel and high level players are going to do it anyway, why not just make it automatic" but to me the whole learning process is all part of the fun of picking up the game. Not that L canceling is the only thing new players have to learn, obviously there is a ton of stuff in there, but it's all part of it.

 

[1MachGO]

^ no
the opponent has options to disrupt proper execution of lcancelling, and the attacker has options to adjust to these disruption attempts. its not as 'deep' as aerial selection or w/e, but 'depth' is absolutely there

(assuming 'depth' is defined as whether multiple choices are available or not. which is kind of not a good definition but whatever)

I would agree that l-cancelling is more dynamic than other button presses because its sensitive to the location of the character in relation to the ground but you seemed to miss my point.

When I said that l-cancelling has no depth, I mean that when you are in a situation where you are trying to perform a perfectly executed aerial attack, there is no benefit not to perform a correct L-cancel. Missing an L-cancel is the equivalent of pressing the c stick upwards when you meant to press it forwards. Both of these things are inputs dealing with execution. Things like these don't have a "mind game". However, the aerial option they are associated with does. They are situational actions which are meant to trigger certain responses and can create certain risks/rewards.

 

[Strong Badam]

^ no
the opponent has options to disrupt proper execution of lcancelling, and the attacker has options to adjust to these disruption attempts. its not as 'deep' as aerial selection or w/e, but 'depth' is absolutely there

(assuming 'depth' is defined as whether multiple choices are available or not. which is kind of not a good definition but whatever)

the level of interaction available is little, and the interaction itself isn't very meaningful. it doesn't add anything interesting to the skillset that ssbm tests as a game.

 

[oukd]

yea i agree with you there lol (my opinion is stated in an earlier post). i just don't like saying there's no interaction at all

 

[♡ⓛⓞⓥⓔ♡]

L-canceling is what makes this game so ****ing difficult

 

[Bones0]

L-canceling is what makes this game so ****ing difficult

LOL

No.

 

[♡ⓛⓞⓥⓔ♡]

LOL

No.

It's still pain in the ass

 

[Son of Slobodan]

L-canceling is what makes this game so ****ing difficult

Not really its like learning how to bike or something. Just becomes second nature after a while. What really makes the game so ****ing difficult is the psychological aspect of playing against another intelligent human being in an incredibly fast, demanding game.

 

[The 2t]

It's pretty easy to take stuff like consistently L-canceling for granted for those of us who've been doing it for years

But man, that **** was pretty daunting and frustrating when still trying to learn it.

 

[RockinRudy]

It's still pain in the ***

Consistent Wave-shining come back and talk.​

 

[Double Helix]

Turns out, my scrub is showing again. What exactly is soft L-cancelling?

I can honestly say that the mechanics and the tech, in my opinion are what makes this game not only super fun to play, but also interesting to watch. I can honestly say that I sometimes have fun playing Brawl, but watching it is not nearly as interesting as Melee.

When you compare this game to all 2-d fighting games, I cannot think of a 2-d fighter that facing away from your opponent is ever a good thing. So wavedashing is a way to move about while still facing toward or away from your opponent, something that would be useless in other fighting games.

L-cancelling is just something that requires execution, like in SF FADC is required. I just play SF for fun but it seems like all the tournaments i watch, FADC is a huge part of it.

For those who don't know, FADC means to focus attack -> dash cancel. A focus attack is similar to if you had to fully charge a smash attack. But you can dash forward to cancel the focus attack. During a focus attack you can take the damage of a single projectile without knockback and it is treated as chip damage (so if you aren't hit again, you regain health). That is the primary use. I know the comparison was a stretch, but good luck fighting Hadouken without it sometimes.

Outside of the in-game advantages, there is also this: The FGC will respect us once again. Here is why. Aside from maybe King of Fighters, Melee will be the most technical demanding game at EVO. Most people don't even know the technical requirements for this party game (let's face it, it is also a party game in the same way that SF is an arcade game). So making the technical requirements of Melee known at an event like EVO, where people are sometimes in 2 or 3 different games, our community could grow and we could appear at EVO 2014. Who knows.

 

[CaptainFabulous]

Turns out, my scrub is showing again. What exactly is soft L-cancelling?

It's l-cancelling without fully pressing the L or R button down, similar to how you would lightshield.

 

[voorhese]

yeah, basically pushing your shoulder button in all the way puts your tech on cooldown, but you can l-cancel with out doing that.

 

[mas_torque]

As someone who is new to the competitive scene, but is able to perform all techs, I love having the little things that make the game "harder" when getting better because it lets you see improvement. I get bodied but I think it's so cool that there's such a gradient of skill. My one friend who's a casual said to me "Wow I've never seen a Falco move so fast" when all I was doing what's considered basic to high level players (SFFLs, dashdancing, WDing). Sure it seems extraneous and convoluted when you don't have to think about it, but it's this kind of stuff that makes the game so deep.

It's also exactly why I can't stand Brawl. Brawl stifles the player's ability to grow and learn as they play, while making movement (the whole reason I like Melee so much) static and boring.

 

[Jim Morrison]

^ this
The reason I tolerate L-cancel is because now I can **** casuals up that can't L-cancel. And that adds to my superiority complex.

 

[ph00tbag]

I'm kind of getting the sense that no one is really reading OP's main point as to why L-canceling is an inelegant mechanic, even if it's not a bad mechanic, per se. He's not saying it's imbalanced, and he's not saying it can't be manipulated. The core, fundamental problem with it is that there is no reason not to do it. It sets an arbitrary skill cap for the attacking player without appealing at all to their decision-making process. And while it's a skill cap that a player can be proud of being able to achieve, there's no weight to the decision to l-cancel.

The lack of weight is really important, too. Most things you can do in the game have some sort of cost that forces you to ask yourself if there's a lower cost option to remain safe, or maximize advantage in that situation. A cost-benefit analysis can be performed on practically every action a player performs, and that can yield even situations where a player does nothing at all. You can go back to a recording of a match and ask, "did I have to do this action?" And it's entirely possible that the answer could be no. This quite simply doesn't happen with L-canceling. Not L-canceling is not an option, which makes it, from a design standpoint, arbitrary and limiting. And that's why the mechanic is inelegant.

And mind you, this isn't an argument that l-canceling ought to be removed. There just needs to be a reason not to do it.

 

[mas_torque]

Wouldn't JC grabs be the same? There's never a reason to not use it unless you're using Samus.

 

[ph00tbag]

Some characters have longer-ranged dash grabs, too.

Bowser, for example.

But for the most part, JC grabs are kind of extraneous.

 

[The 2t]

Meh, the game's full of stuff that there's no reason not to do. There's pretty much no reason to ever stand still and shoot a laser as either of the spacies when you could short hop it (or full jump), there's rarely a reason to ever not immediately jump cancel a shine after you hit someone with it, either by jumping or wavedashing out of it. Most of the time, as has already been said, there's no reason not to JC a grab either for most characters. L-canceling is the same.

Just because something should always be done without question, it doesn't necessarily make the mechanic redundant or inelegant. These things are all there to separate mid level players from low level players, and low level players from casuals. Sure, once you get to a high enough level you can argue that everyone does these things all the time, but there's enough decision making in this game as it is, I don't see a problem with having a few mechanics that we need to train ourselves to do consistently.

 

[1MachGO]

I'm kind of getting the sense that no one is really reading OP's main point as to why L-canceling is an inelegant mechanic, even if it's not a bad mechanic, per se. He's not saying it's imbalanced, and he's not saying it can't be manipulated. The core, fundamental problem with it is that there is no reason not to do it. It sets an arbitrary skill cap for the attacking player without appealing at all to their decision-making process. And while it's a skill cap that a player can be proud of being able to achieve, there's no weight to the decision to l-cancel.

The lack of weight is really important, too. Most things you can do in the game have some sort of cost that forces you to ask yourself if there's a lower cost option to remain safe, or maximize advantage in that situation. A cost-benefit analysis can be performed on practically every action a player performs, and that can yield even situations where a player does nothing at all. You can go back to a recording of a match and ask, "did I have to do this action?" And it's entirely possible that the answer could be no. This quite simply doesn't happen with L-canceling. Not L-canceling is not an option, which makes it, from a design standpoint, arbitrary and limiting. And that's why the mechanic is inelegant.

And mind you, this isn't an argument that l-canceling ought to be removed. There just needs to be a reason not to do it.

Please read the first post I made in this thread ( its #16). L-Cancelling isn't supposed to have a reason "not to do it"... aerial attacks do.

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

Take from the game what you will. A game is simply a group of arbitrary rules players agree to follow. I like the rules and I can go on and on about why; if you don't like canceling go play brawl+

Cactus put it best imo

L-cancelling's depth is similar to the decision making and natural body feel a boxer has to have when throwing a punch. Do I just jab or do I commit to a straight? If I went for a straight, my follow-through body motion needs to be different if I hit the opponent or if I miss. L-cancelling is like the "regain your balance" action that is necessary whenever you are throwing yourself off-balance to attack the opponent. The fighter's proficiency in being able to link their balance/punches together(l-cancel + start their next action) leads to fluidity/speed.


blahblahblah

 

[bertbusdriver]

The existence of L cancels makes shield tilting better and provides some added factors involved to teching (can't push all the way on your attempted l cancel in case you get hit and can no longer tech). Melee loses some of its depth without it.

"It's always better to jump cancel a shine, why don't we just make the shine end sooner so it's even more OP and an autowin button?"