Nerf Culture?

[Deleted member]

My previous thread has at least 4 replies saying it's too early for nerfs (which I don't agree with), and one of them mentioned "Nerf Culture", which supposedly got bad in the Smash 4 days.

What is this "Nerf Culture"?

How bad does it get?

It's been weeks since release, when will calling for nerfs be acceptable if it already isn't? And why does the meta matter here?

Do we have to wait until after tomorrow's tournament?

 

[R208]

I began to observe "Nerf Culture" during the very beginning of League of Legends. Prior to that, you had games that either never changed (early fighters), rarely changed (re-released games, like Melee), required an entirely new game to change (Street Fighter), or never experienced nerfs (Runescape, early MMOs).

When games like League were introduced, it generated something unique: shallow number of options that can be used in deep ways. 4 abilities and a passive unique to the character, plus 2 additional abilities available to everyone. This allowed for 2 things: Balance changes could be easily implemented and the game was very easy to pick up, learn, and play. But this had a very specific issue: Riot Games' policy was almost always to nerf and not buff, or to rework. Buffs came from time to time, but nerfs were more common.

This made way for the foundation of, "Nerf Culture:" If the playerbase demanded a nerf, they might just get it. Doing this is far, far easier then dealing with the thing that they are asking to be nerfed. Therefore, if they ask for a nerf, the whole situation would be handled and they won't have to do any of the work that would of otherwise been required to beat that thing. They did not need to "git gud." Devs took care of their issue for them.

Ever since that instance, I've noticed it come up in a ton of other things, such as DotA, HON, Overwatch, Street Fighter, etc. Anything you can go against someone to prove you're "better" and win. I'm not saying LoL created this, but it's when I first noticed it and is the prime example.

But then, here's the issue: too many buffs and nerfs can kill a game. Each change requires players to adapt to said change. In low option, high depth games, like League and DotA, this isn't a big issue. How you use your options is the bigger deal, even if they don't have as much reward post-nerf, or can't be used as often. In high option, high depth games, such as fighters, Hearthstone, etc., a change to an option can have a much, much more severe impact. There are options that are simply not used because reward/risk ratios are so skewed. A change to a fundamental option can change how entire characters are played and fought against.

Because of this, early, kneejerk nerfs to characters can irreparably damage a character because we're still figuring out every character's options and how to use said options. I'll use Little Mac as an example. He destroyed new players because he had unique aspects of his options that people could grasp really quickly, but couldn't quickly figure out how to beat. So, he was hit very early on. As it turns out, he's one of the worst characters in the game. He likely still would be even if he was never touched, but it took time to figure him out. It took time to find the counterplay. He ended up way, way worse off because the devs responded to "Nerf Culture" and hit Mac's weakness hard, turning him into a joke. It was never needed, it was never really warranted, but the "Nerf Culture" took hold.

So that's the issue with asking for nerfs early on: The game is undeveloped. It takes months to fully explore a character, figure out that character's matchups, and really dig deep to find the strengths, options, and style of a given character. If you hit a character that ultimately doesn't need it, it does damage that might not even be needed.

It's easier to ask for a nerf then to figure those things out for yourself. That is nerf culture.

 

[Perversion]

Nerf Culture is simply a call out to nerf certain characters rather than buffing others. Personally, nerfing should only be something done when a character is obscurely broken in the current meta. Nerf culture is generally seen as people who view a character who is not their own as powerful when utilized by more skilled players and they want to call for a nerf on that character just because they're not good at the game.

Example: King K. Rool. People are calling out for nerfs on his armor. I disagree with this because I know how to play around his armor.

Secondly, the meta hasn't even settled yet. Tournaments are being held constantly with a wide representation of characters, which is awesome. Characters who are proclaimed by so many low on their 'tier list' are placing high. This is good. This means that there is a decent balance, but not without exception. Sure, calling out for those nerfs on the exceptions sounds reasonable, but it isn't. Why? For the point I gave above. The meta hasn't settled. We have barely scratched into Ultimate and what these characters are capable of doing. We don't understand all of the mechanics despite labbers constantly trying to figure stuff out. Hell, we were still figuring stuff out in Smash 4 late in the game.

There is no one tournament that is going to influence Nintendo to nerf a character. What they are most likely going to look at is their Online play statistics, and Majors representation and how they honestly feel about where the character stands as Nintendo is a finicky mistress. As of right now, I would guess they are also more so focused on bug removal as we find them as the Isabelle Assist Trophy bug is still effectively in the game.

Lastly, why is Nerf Culture bad? Because it is quite self-centered. My character has a bad matchup with Inkling, nerf inkling into the ground. When the desire should be Inkling is quite a bit more powerful than a lot of the cast, we should tone her down a little bit. We should also be pushing "Buff Culture" where we improve characters, rather than take away. This way players who main the character who people want nerfed don't feel like their wings are clipped, and people who called for the nerfs feel like they've had stuff added upon their character. That is the win-win scenario. The problem with "Buff Culture" is that there's often so many character, especially with Smash, to tune upwards appropriately to become level with the one. Especially when it's just easier to tone down the one to be on the same level, if not lower than the rest of the cast.

Nerf culture also breeds animosity between players when we should be acting as a community. Saying Nerf Chrom brings up resentment in the Chrom players and they lash out. However, when given the same situation and saying 'Buff Kirby" there's not as much there, especially if you suggest an appropriate buff.

 

[GrownManJones]

Games were never patched before and there are hundreds of examples of meta-games changing after years of play or new discoveries. Most people that don't want nerfs want to figure it out without the game dev fixing it for them.

The people who want nerfs are people who lose to OP things and wonder why anyone has something OP when you can just patch it to make it fair.

The second person will win because of the times we are in but the top person wont like it.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

The idea that balancing a game should revolve around nerfing good characters instead of buffing bad ones.

 

[Deleted member]

I began to observe "Nerf Culture" during the very beginning of League of Legends. Prior to that, you had games that either never changed (early fighters), rarely changed (re-released games, like Melee), required an entirely new game to change (Street Fighter), or never experienced nerfs (Runescape, early MMOs).

When games like League were introduced, it generated something unique: shallow number of options that can be used in deep ways. 4 abilities and a passive unique to the character, plus 2 additional abilities available to everyone. This allowed for 2 things: Balance changes could be easily implemented and the game was very easy to pick up, learn, and play. But this had a very specific issue: Riot Games' policy was almost always to nerf and not buff, or to rework. Buffs came from time to time, but nerfs were more common.

This made way for the foundation of, "Nerf Culture:" If the playerbase demanded a nerf, they might just get it. Doing this is far, far easier then dealing with the thing that they are asking to be nerfed. Therefore, if they ask for a nerf, the whole situation would be handled and they won't have to do any of the work that would of otherwise been required to beat that thing. They did not need to "git gud." Devs took care of their issue for them.

Ever since that instance, I've noticed it come up in a ton of other things, such as DotA, HON, Overwatch, Street Fighter, etc. Anything you can go against someone to prove you're "better" and win. I'm not saying LoL created this, but it's when I first noticed it and is the prime example.

But then, here's the issue: too many buffs and nerfs can kill a game. Each change requires players to adapt to said change. In low option, high depth games, like League and DotA, this isn't a big issue. How you use your options is the bigger deal, even if they don't have as much reward post-nerf, or can't be used as often. In high option, high depth games, such as fighters, Hearthstone, etc., a change to an option can have a much, much more severe impact. There are options that are simply not used because reward/risk ratios are so skewed. A change to a fundamental option can change how entire characters are played and fought against.

Because of this, early, kneejerk nerfs to characters can irreparably damage a character because we're still figuring out every character's options and how to use said options. I'll use Little Mac as an example. He destroyed new players because he had unique aspects of his options that people could grasp really quickly, but couldn't quickly figure out how to beat. So, he was hit very early on. As it turns out, he's one of the worst characters in the game. He likely still would be even if he was never touched, but it took time to figure him out. It took time to find the counterplay. He ended up way, way worse off because the devs responded to "Nerf Culture" and hit Mac's weakness hard, turning him into a joke. It was never needed, it was never really warranted, but the "Nerf Culture" took hold.

So that's the issue with asking for nerfs early on: The game is undeveloped. It takes months to fully explore a character, figure out that character's matchups, and really dig deep to find the strengths, options, and style of a given character. If you hit a character that ultimately doesn't need it, it does damage that might not even be needed.

It's easier to ask for a nerf then to figure those things out for yourself. That is nerf culture.

Se essentially, Nerf Culture would result in King K. Rool (one of my mains) and Inkling becoming the next Little Mac just because players were lazy and entitled? I'm not, and now I regret calling for nerfs.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

Se essentially, Nerf Culture would result in King K. Rool (one of my mains) and Inkling becoming the next Little Mac just because players were lazy and entitled? I'm not, and now I regret calling for nerfs.

Calling for nerfs is only necessary when a fighter crosses the point where they begin to effect the meta. The game is waaaaaaaay to young for the meta to see any changes yet.

 

[Perversion]

Agreed, the only thing we should be focusing on right now as far as patch changes is bug fixes.

 

[Necro'lic]

I would like to build on Perversion and R208 comments.

The idea of nerf culture is more what R208 said where asking for nerfs is substituted for adapting and figuring things out. This takes time, but to nerf something gives instant gratification when sometimes it isn't needed because the thing that is demanded to be nerfed is actually fine.

However, I would not say nerf culture is about people "preferring to nerf high tiers over buffing low tiers", because absolutely no one I've seen out and out prefers this sort of thing. The closest you will get is people saying doing both simultaneously is ideal, which I agree. However, I sometimes will disagree with frequency and nature of the changes being demanded, but I'm not going to say the very act of nerfing is a negative thing like some more reactionary people have started doing.

Sometimes nerfs aren't even specifically done to nerf a character overall, but instead to balance their moveset with itself more smoothly. In fact, almost all of the transitioning changes from Smash 4 to Ultimate were of this nature. DK and Bowser lost their UThrow-UAir kill combos, the main reason they saw play in Smash 4 at all. These nerfs caused their overall kit to be more useful overall and cause them to both to switch away from one-trick pony type strategies. Another example but for a low tier is Samus, who lost her dash attack combos in exchange for more kill power, shield damage, and overall utility. Now Samus is played much differently, but is the very act of nerfing something in her kit a bad thing when that nerfed move was basically the center of her play to the point of being the only good thing about her?

This isn't even mentioning the fact that nerfs are sometimes just better than buffs, especially for nerfing high tier characters or characters that overcentralize the meta. And the idea I've seen going around to "buff all low tiers to highest tier level" is absurd in the extreme for two reasons:

1: Development time is finite, and to nerf two or three high tiers to go down to high-mid tier level is FAR more reasonable than buffing everyone else. It takes less manpower and causes far less confusion in trying to predict the future meta or going against the characters' design.

2: Power creep comes in. This usually results in what happened to PM early on where they though making everyone as good as Melee Fox was the way to go, not realizing Melee Fox is NOT a balanced character at all. This caused every character to be based on a specific, overpowered gimmick that was either hard to counter or not counterable in any way other than "don't get hit". This will eventually lower viable options, but within a character's moveset, which in some ways is worse.

In short, this "nerf high tier before buff low tier" idea of nerf culture that is pedaled around is nothing more than an overly reactionary and misguided backlash, trying to act like a lot more people have a viewpoint that in actuality very few if anyone actually has. R208 is more right in what nerf culture is.

 

[Deleted member]

Calling for nerfs is only necessary when a fighter crosses the point where they begin to effect the meta. The game is waaaaaaaay to young for the meta to see any changes yet.

How long until the game becomes old enough and nerfs become a thing?

 

[Ryu Myuutsu]

Because it breeds an unhealthy mindset. Some people start thinking "Why should I improve myself or learn a matchup when I can just ask for the thing that gives me trouble to be toned down?" Case in point: your previous thread.

Balancing a game is a herculean task that can take from months to years. It warrants observation and analyzing on what overcentralizing playstyle needs some toning down or what underpowered move needs to be retooled.
Back in the 90s and early 2000s, most competitive games couldn't be updated. Characters normally stayed the same forever with no magic fix ever coming so players had no choice but to adapt and learn.

 

[UltimateXsniper]

How long until the game becomes old enough and nerfs become a thing?

I'd probably say until we get enough information of each character and how well characters do in tournaments for awhile. Growth of meta might get delayed with patches that changes some characters too. Wouldn't be too big of a deal later in the future once we get plenty of information from lots of characters but as of now, a change with a character could be a hassle.

I believe a recent example was that Mii swordfighter had a change in a patch and people didn't even knew what they changed about him. It took longer than usual to find out because the game was fresh, an update came out also very soon and we simply couldn't know everything about all characters in time before that happened. I don't remember exactly but I think they nerfed the range on one of his specials.
probably wouldn't have been a huge deal if they told us what exactly they've changed in the notes.

 

[REZERO]

Buffs/Nerfs creates a meta in the game so I welcome change. This is good because it prevents people from using the same character with the same advantages over and over again. It creates a playing stage for competitive games and things stay interesting.

As long as the changes aren't too constant it is healthy for the community otherwise you have people talking about the same mechanic for years. Yes, that does allow discovery but the game stagnates and people get bored. People expect patches and change.

Like there is so many ways to buff or nerf characters. You can nerf other characters by buffing their counters and you can also indirectly buff characters by changing stages or certain aspects of the game.

To really understand meta/nerfing there needs to be patch notes with these updates nintendo comes out with. A good example of how patch notes should be done is here:
http://www.dota2.com/news/updates/

When you look at the changes you should think about how even the smallest change can impact gameplay. Sometimes one little thing causes a character to be less viable. It would be great if we had a site like dotabuff that analyzed the particulars of each and every match. The reason the meta hasn't settled is because data is not yet being analyzed yet with code so we just have to watch tournaments and see which characters are doing well. I can guarantee that different characters do well at different tiers but we don't know that because Nintendo doesn't have a way for players to gauge that unless it is by personal experience.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

How long until the game becomes old enough and nerfs become a thing?

Give it at least six months before calling nerfs. Because by then if there's a counter to a strategy it should be discovered by then. If not, yeah call for nerfs.

 

[Uffe]

How long until the game becomes old enough and nerfs become a thing?

Super Smash Bros. 3DS came out in 9/13/2014 in Japan. On 11/18/2014, that's when any balance changes were made to characters. So it took them a little over 2 months. Of course character balances can come sooner, or it could come way later. Hell, it could even never happen if they decided not to do so this time around.

 

[Deleted member]

Agreed, the only thing we should be focusing on right now as far as patch changes is bug fixes.

What about getting better? How does one even do that?

 

[Teeb147]

What about getting better? How does one even do that?

Are you asking about getting better at the game, or making the game itself better? Entire threads could be made on how to improve

The main thing is learning to use the tools you have (with the characters you want to use). Thankfully smash doesn't have an enormous amount of moves, so it's more about using the basics well. Know your options, and at first experiment with them, with the goal of winning (but not being too hard on yourself, we always have things we can improve). Basically, practice using your attacks in ways that will hit the other player, and try not to get hit yourself (unless there's a reason to, or taking calculated risks)

Eventually, you'll want to understand how others use their character, which means coming to know in what ways they tend to attack you or how they move, so you can be ready for what they do (whether it's to block or evade, counter, or just position yourself well). Each character moves differently and has different attacks, so the more you know what they can do, the easier it is to counterplay them, and just make good use of your own characters's strengths.

When you don't know what to do, like in certain matchups, besides trying things it can help to see how others deal with it and learn it for yourself. If lots of people have trouble with something in particular, it might mean that something is pretty powerful, and it could be a bad matchup. You can't count on a nerf, so it's better to take it as an opportunity to put more time into finding a counterplay, or picking up another character that's better for the matchup if it's really bad.

If they do patch a lot for balance, I'd rather see buffs than nerfs too. But yeah, in general it's better not to count on it and instead grow as a player.

 

[Rhus]

Most people have discussed why nerf culture is harmful very well so I'd like to bring up another problem - overcentralization. I'll use pokemon as an example.

Competitive formats used by the pokemon company are typically very dynamic, the rulesets change entirely each year, so as to keep the game feeling fresh. Sadly, it doesn't work too terribly well from a balance perspective. You will typically see the top 8 of the world championships having more or less the same 10 or so pokemon with maybe one or two exceptions. This is because of overcentralizing options - pokemon that are simply strong enough that they invalidate other pokemon who would otherwise be usable. It's not that the powerful pokemon cannot deal with them, it's that is substantially limits your options and what you have to choose from and can expect to be competitive with. As someone who played competitive pokemon for years and mostly used unconventional pokemon and strategies, I will tell you that you have to be significantly better than your opponent to win.

Smogon, the premier Pokemon competitive community, attempts to rectify this by having their own rulesets and tiering system. Smogon became the most popular pokemon competitive format fairly quickly for people aiming to have a more dynamic and interesting experience. Smogon's grounds for banning a pokemon or strategy from a tier is "overcentralization." The best example I can think of would be Dugtrio in the Gen 7 metagame. Dugtrio's ability, Arena Trap, prevents pokemon from switching out, and to top it off, his attack power received a notable buff in Gen 7. He was banned from the "standard" tier for his overcentralizing game design. No one who has played Pokemon competitively for any length of time will tell you that Dugtrio is flawless and without weaknesses. It has bad defensive typing, awful defenses, and a relatively average movepool - so why did it get banned? It snuffed out a ton of things from the standard tiers because they couldn't function in an environment where Dugtrio could come in and revenge kill it immediately. It felt like you were punished for knocking out one of your opponent's pokemon. This is overcentralization.

The best analog to smash I can see would be in Brawl, where Dedede was a gatekeeper to half the cast. He could chaingrab a large percentage of the roster and his matchups against them were so commanding it was hard to do anything. It invalidated those characters almost entirely. Similarly, as a Fox main, Brawl's Pikachu was basically unwinnable - if Pikachu grabbed me I was literally dead because he could Dthrow chaingrab me to kill percents then Usmash for the kill. The matchup boiled down to "don't get grabbed or lose a stock". I absolutely *had* to switch characters for the matchup, which is not ideal.

So when people cry about K Rool's belly armor they have not experienced the Pikachu vs Fox Matchup in Brawl, or Dugtrio in Pokemon. Does it need a nerf? Not right now, no, I don't think so. Like many others have echoed in this thread we should wait to figure out both the characters we are having trouble with and the ones we play. It's important to know your characters options as well - you might be ignoring something vital about them.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Personally I prefer to call it patch culture.

We live in an era where instead of looking for a current solution trying to get a character buffed is what people aim for. This isn't a healthy mindset to what and hope for it rather than trying to look for a way to play with it.

 

[Necro'lic]

Personally I prefer to call it patch culture.

We live in an era where instead of looking for a current solution trying to get a character buffed is what people aim for. This isn't a healthy mindset to what and hope for it rather than trying to look for a way to play with it.

100% this. I already mentioned this in my first comment here, but people saying things need to be buffed instead of nerfed are also wrong, at least at this point in time. The end goal is the same: trying to game the system by changing it instead of working with your skill within the system. This goes both ways.

I am not saying imbalance doesn't exist, but really, we've only had the game for about one month. No one should be asking for any changes yet (besides bugfixes obviously).

 

[Deleted member]

I am not saying imbalance doesn't exist, but really, we've only had the game for about one month. No one should be asking for any changes yet (besides bugfixes obviously).

But reads, approaching, punishing, and other such advanced techniques take a lifetime to practice. How do you even practice those until you're able to counter armor, projectiles, disjoints, and lightweights while at a disadvantage? As someone trying to get into Elite Smash, it gets demoralizing at some point.

 

[Sean²]

Scenario: You're practicing for a large Smash competition. Your travel is booked and you're more than excited for it. You feel confident in your ability to play your character and feel as if you'll do well. You play a character that is fairly renowned for being very good within the current metagame. Good enough that people on Twitter, Youtube, etc may occasionally call for him to get a nerf. Two days before the tournament, a patch drops and your character received several changes that renders a lot of what you practiced no longer applicable. To you, 'nerfed' is an understatement - to you, your chances could be blown.

I know that's a very subjective way of thinking about it, but I like to put it into player perspective when I see people calling for nerfs. Buffs too, to an extent, as it also affects how you learned to fight against different characters as well.

Calling for too many changes now could possibly send this game down the same path that Smash 4 took. There are a huge variety of characters making top 8 across the world in Ultimate. There is no overcentralization on one or two characters. At this point in Smash 4's release, almost every large tournament one month in had several Diddy Kongs placing in top 8. In Brawl, Snake and MK dominated early and never really stopped. It was obvious who was the number one. I think with the extreme variety we have now, it's too hard to say which characters are the absolute best. I think it's easier to see which characters have underwhelming capabilities. But even those characters are a bit unexplored at the moment.

In the long run, considering we're inevitably getting a patch that affects character balance (I feel like I smell one coming around Piranha Plant's release), I would rather see buffs than nerfs. Nerfs should maybe be considered ONLY if something gets discovered that absolutely dominates and suffocates the entire cast to the point where the metagame revolves around beating that strategy. You can gradually buff a bad character who can't keep up and not ruin other characters viability. Player adaptation should take priority to both buffs and nerfs, though.

 

[zipzo]

Personally I believe buff culture to be just as toxic as nerf culture. Only ever buffing leads to power creep and this is just as bad if not worse than a never ending chain of nerfs.

The idea that you should only ever buff is ridiculous and highly misguided. Sometimes a nerf is necessary to bring one character in line with the other 60-70, because it's simply not practical to buff the other 60-70 to match that one single outlier.

IMO the idea of a "nerf culture" even being harmful is silly. Developers aren't scanning random forum topics with 10 views and a couple replies and going "oh, yeah, before doing any extensive testing on what this rando online has proposed, let's go ahead and put that in the game".

This assumes way too much power to those outside of the internal development conversation. They have playtesters for heaven's sake, some of very prominent name in this community. I don't mean disrespect, but any topic on this forum is extremely unlikely ever effect any design decisions. Developers have very rigorous testing circumstances based not just on feedback but practical, applied experimentation and processes not unlike the scientific method. While there is definitely always a subjective element (SHOULD a character be strong at X?), you highly underestimate the necessary testing required before iterations get made to a game of this stature.

Since it's very unlikely to actually manifest within the game outside of predictions or lucky guesses, I don't see the problem with discussing possible nerfs that MAY or may not happen based on our observations based on gameplay.

 

[Necro'lic]

Scenario: You're practicing for a large Smash competition. Your travel is booked and you're more than excited for it. You feel confident in your ability to play your character and feel as if you'll do well. You play a character that is fairly renowned for being very good within the current metagame. Good enough that people on Twitter, Youtube, etc may occasionally call for him to get a nerf. Two days before the tournament, a patch drops and your character received several changes that renders a lot of what you practiced no longer applicable. To you, 'nerfed' is an understatement - to you, your chances could be blown.

Counterpoint: I would say if these nerfs to your character cause you to need to relearn things so much to the point where you don't think you can use them in tournament, I would put the blame on bad nerfs rather than nerfs in general. Same for your inverse point about buffs.

Nerfs and buffs, ideally, should not completely take away what makes a character good or take away very good tools from them. They can weaken the tools, but taking them away is a strange nerf to do. As for buffs, buffing a character to have more options is usually what happens, which is good. But this is usually in the form of buffing a previously lackluster or useless tool that most likely won't be practiced by the buffed character's players.

But besides this, changing characters during tournaments is a bad idea in general. Luckily, you don't have to update your switch when the patch comes out so you all can continue playing on the same patch until the tournament is over (I think).

I'm sounding like a broken record, but this is why relying on cookie cutter combos to repeatedly practice in the training room is not a great way to go about a competitive game, both on the player end and the developer end, because it makes changes to these particular combos far more apparent and far less subtle. It also wastes players' precious time with them practicing combos when they could just play the game and find out combos naturally.

In short, buff DI and increase hitstun for build-a-bear combos plz Sakurai so we don't have to continuously lab for tight true combo timings.

 

[LancerStaff]

It’s just a direct result of how Nintendo balances things. Even outside of Smash, nerfs usually come swiftly and hit hard. Quite objectively the “power levels” of all the games they’ve given a steady supply of patches to has dropped substantially from release.

Well actually it’s not just Nintendo. It’s basically everybody.

Nerfs are inevitably given more focus over buffs because leveling out the top is obviously more important than clearing up the bottom.

As far as “patch culture” goes, I would largely blame that on the immaturity of the Smash fanbase more than anything else. Not that it’s ever really effected anything. I mean, I suppose it effects motivation somewhat (lots of people aren’t going to play ICies “because they’ll just patch it out” for example) but motivation surrounding bad characters is going to be incredibly low in Smash anyway.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

Any and all nerf culture in Ultimate that wasn't there in Smash 4 may or may not be the result of so may online platformers in recent years releasing with some content that clearly wasn't playtested enough and ends up being broken. What I'm saying is, people are overreacting to some extent.

 

[T-Donor66]

Personally I believe buff culture to be just as toxic as nerf culture. Only ever buffing leads to power creep and this is just as bad if not worse than a never ending chain of nerfs.

The idea that you should only ever buff is ridiculous and highly misguided. Sometimes a nerf is necessary to bring one character in line with the other 60-70, because it's simply not practical to buff the other 60-70 to match that one single outlier.

IMO the idea of a "nerf culture" even being harmful is silly. Developers aren't scanning random forum topics with 10 views and a couple replies and going "oh, yeah, before doing any extensive testing on what this rando online has proposed, let's go ahead and put that in the game".

This assumes way too much power to those outside of the internal development conversation. They have playtesters for heaven's sake, some of very prominent name in this community. I don't mean disrespect, but any topic on this forum is extremely unlikely ever effect any design decisions. Developers have very rigorous testing circumstances based not just on feedback but practical, applied experimentation and processes not unlike the scientific method. While there is definitely always a subjective element (SHOULD a character be strong at X?), you highly underestimate the necessary testing required before iterations get made to a game of this stature.

Since it's very unlikely to actually manifest within the game outside of predictions or lucky guesses, I don't see the problem with discussing possible nerfs that MAY or may not happen based on our observations based on gameplay.

Your argument implies that any of the characters actually NEED nerfs. We have had quite a few majors already and each one had a Top 8 with completely different characters than the other. Hell, people can’t even decide on who is the best character in the game. There are just so many viable picks. The lackluster characters with like 3 good options need buffs 10x more than k rool needs a nerf because you got slammed on quickplay.

 

[zipzo]

Your argument implies that any of the characters actually NEED nerfs. We have had quite a few majors already and each one had a Top 8 with completely different characters than the other. Hell, people can’t even decide on who is the best character in the game. There are just so many viable picks. The lackluster characters with like 3 good options need buffs 10x more than k rool needs a nerf because you got slammed on quickplay.

I can also guarantee you that tournament results are meaningless to the dev team in terms of any nerfs they may apply. Smash 4 Little Mac says hi.

They balance for all levels of play in Smash so not every change you see is even going to make sense through the lense of a competitive player, and you'll have to accept that.

 

[T-Donor66]

I can also guarantee you that tournament results are meaningless to the dev team in terms of any nerfs they may apply. Smash 4 Little Mac says hi.

They balance for all levels of play in Smash so not every change you see is even going to make sense through the lense of a competitive player, and you'll have to accept that.

>Implying 2019 Nintendo has the same philosophy as 2014 Nintendo

 

[Mogisthelioma]

As far as “patch culture” goes, I would largely blame that on the immaturity of the Smash fanbase more than anything else. Not that it’s ever really effected anything. I mean, I suppose it effects motivation somewhat (lots of people aren’t going to play ICies “because they’ll just patch it out” for example) but motivation surrounding bad characters is going to be incredibly low in Smash anyway.

When it comes to patches people are more concerned about logistical issues and technical difficulties they're experiencing than nerfs, buffs, or gameplay changes, but you're pretty much right in the long run.

 

[zipzo]

>Implying 2019 Nintendo has the same philosophy as 2014 Nintendo

We're talking about the same company, right?

 

[T-Donor66]

We're talking about the same company, right?

The company that just did a massive turnaround and completely changed their philosophy on multiple buisness and game related policies, yeah, that one.

 

[Perversion]

What about getting better? How does one even do that?

But reads, approaching, punishing, and other such advanced techniques take a lifetime to practice. How do you even practice those until you're able to counter armor, projectiles, disjoints, and lightweights while at a disadvantage? As someone trying to get into Elite Smash, it gets demoralizing at some point.

Do what people do when they want to get better at something. You practice. Play more, play against people who are better than you. Learn the jargon, make combo strings into something that is now something you hesitate on and turn that into instinct. People who want to do better get better by sticking to it, and learning, and watching others who are better than they are. I know I do. I watch tourney matches all the time even with characters I have no interest in ever playing in because the more information I have the better equipped I am in the future if I ever play against that character. It doesn't take a lifetime of practice, but it does require practice. I've only been playing competitively for about 3-4 years and while I'm not amazing, I'm still competent. My issue is that miy execution is awful, despite knowing the techniques. What you need to do is step back and look at yourself and how you play. Look at how pros play, look at how people in your local scene play, look at how your friends play, and then look at how you play again. Compare, and at first try to emulate. Then once you start getting a feel for it, branch out and explore on your own.

No one picks up a fresh game that they have no experience in and immediately becomes good. It takes time, it takes effort, it takes labbing, and it takes information to get that way. You also need to learn the character you're playing. What are they good at? Play towards utilizing that in your advantage state. What are they bad at? What can be done to exploit this weakness by my opponent, and how can I make up for this weakness? All in all, play more and learn more. That's the hard truth.

 

[Crystanium]

It could be argued that buff culture isn't good, either. Both buffing and nerfing are from dissatisfied results of a character or characters. Maybe I want Charge Shot to deal 40% damage and fully charge within 100 frames. It won't mean other people won't complain about it.

 

[Nagol]

in games like Fortnite and Overwatch "balance" (nerf culture) is fine. This is because the meta will consistently shift season to season and things that were overpowered one season might not be as relevant as the next. They can get away with this though because the game will consistently change forever as they add new things and replace others. The developers of these games also care about what is it fun for everyone but also listen to top players on their input for balance and opinions on current characters.

Smashbros on the other hand will only be balanced up until the last DLC is added and maybe a few more times after. This bothers me because if we ask for nerfs now we can heavily ruin a character before the end game is even in place. I would rather as a community we focus our voice on improving game quality and finding any bugs. In a years time then I would like us to focus on balance changes that might be necessary for quality of life. Have individuals discussions that lead to proper and fair improvements as well as discuss things that might be too strong in the meta.

Online play is out of our control and we are just going to have to adapt to things that will probably get changed because they are un-fun for none competitive play. This might be for an example the bury Meta for certain characters as it seems to be challenging for newer players to adapt. This could also be something like the FOR GLORY Incineroar play which is sitting in Neutral waiting to use counter and then spamming side B and down smash. These things might not be a big deal for the more serious players but for sure there will be online warriors that can't adapt and cry about it.

 

[Sean²]

I can also guarantee you that tournament results are meaningless to the dev team in terms of any nerfs they may apply. Smash 4 Little Mac says hi.

They balance for all levels of play in Smash so not every change you see is even going to make sense through the lense of a competitive player, and you'll have to accept that.

IIRC, Hazards Off, Battlefield stages, weaker defensive options, and faster general gameplay were highly requested in majority by the competitive community. And we got it. Reggie wants Nintendo to sponsor more major tournaments. And not only ones played the “Nintendo way”.

It honestly appears that Nintendo is finally ready to listen to their fans for once since the onset of the rapid exodus of casual gamers, their long standing target audience, to mobile gaming.

I’d give it a year or so to see if any of the promises and speculation come to fruition, but I don’t think this is the same EVO blocking Nintendo we knew from 5 years ago.

 

[LancerStaff]

>Implying 2019 Nintendo has the same philosophy as 2014 Nintendo

Last patch in Splatoon 2, about a month ago, was almost entirely nerfs to the brand new thing they introduced the month before. So yes, it is.

IIRC, Hazards Off, Battlefield stages, weaker defensive options, and faster general gameplay were highly requested in majority by the competitive community. And we got it. Reggie wants Nintendo to sponsor more major tournaments. And not only ones played the “Nintendo way”.

It honestly appears that Nintendo is finally ready to listen to their fans for once since the onset of the rapid exodus of casual gamers, their long standing target audience, to mobile gaming.

I’d give it a year or so to see if any of the promises and speculation come to fruition, but I don’t think this is the same EVO blocking Nintendo we knew from 5 years ago.

Nintendo literally blocked Smash from EVO Japan back in December and haven’t backed off. And most of those changes were wanted by casuals.

There’s no sign that they’ve changed. Really, the anti-patch notes should of been a hint.

 

[T-Donor66]

Last patch in Splatoon 2, about a month ago, was almost entirely nerfs to the brand new thing they introduced the month before. So yes, it is.



Nintendo literally blocked Smash from EVO Japan back in December and haven’t backed off. And most of those changes were wanted by casuals.

There’s no sign that they’ve changed. Really, the anti-patch notes should of been a hint.

>Implying Bandai namco and Sora Ltd develop Splatoon 2

>Implying Ultimate didn’t focus significantly on buffing instead of nerfing in the transition from Smash 4

 

[LancerStaff]

>Implying Bandai namco and Sora Ltd develop Splatoon 2

>Implying Ultimate didn’t focus significantly on buffing instead of nerfing in the transition from Smash 4

Nintendo design philosophies shine through in basically every Nintendo game.

...Are we even playing the same game? There’s far, faaaar more nerfs than buffs coming into Ultimate. Even ****ing Dorf got nerfs in this game.

 

[T-Donor66]

Nintendo design philosophies shine through in basically every Nintendo game.

...Are we even playing the same game? There’s far, faaaar more nerfs than buffs coming into Ultimate. Even ****ing Dorf got nerfs in this game.

The fact that you even dare imply that the majority of the cast was not buffed in the transition to Ultimate shows me you aren’t work talking to. Literally go on each character page on the Smash wiki and look at how many buffs every character received. There is nothing to debate here, it is an objective fact.

But hey, why wouldn’t I expect backwards thinking from the guy who made the thread “I would prepare for the worst, especially with Chrom”. That sure aged like fine wine, didn’t it?