Official Metaknight Discussion

[¯\_S.(ツ).L.I.D._/¯]

Sign of Madness, if an MK had won Pound 4 would you have changed your tune?

Of course, because 1st place is obv all that matters.

 

[theunabletable]

Ally and ADHD are not "the peak of Snake's/Diddy's metagame", they are really ****ing good players who play their characters at a high level.

They play their characters better than anyone else, thus they are the current peak of their character's metagame.
Keyword current.

They show what is currently practically possible with their characters.

M2K is not "the peak of the current MK metagame", he is just a really good player who plays MK at a high level

So the best MK doesn't play MK at the highest current practical level? That makes no sense.

ADHD beating M2K != Diddy beating MK.

Of course. You are correct.

So what is it that makes MK bannable?

But still, how does this one victory by these two players prove beating MK is a reasonable expectation after all of the other losses?

They've won more than M2K has. Afaik anyway

@Vrael: Read the edits in my last post.

WHAT MAKES MK BANNABLE? What is it about having 6 MKs in the top 8 of Pound 4 that makes him bannable?

Sign of Madness, if an MK had won Pound 4 would you have changed your tune?

Depends.

If ADHD wasn't there? Nah it wouldn't have changed my opinion. But if M2K had figured out there how to beat ADHD consistently? I probably wouldn't be pro-full-ban, but the pro-ban argument wouldn't look as stupid and ridiculous as it does now.

But that didn't happen.

ICs don't have practical 100-0 matchups on everyone, and M2K didn't win, ADHD did.

 

[RDK]

I do think its funny that the anti-ban want the concrete evidence for why MK should be banned, but neglect to request the concrete evidence for rules that were created either directly or indirectly because of MK (namely the Ledge Grab Rule).

Stalling is not banned because of MK. Planking is banned because planking is stalling, and it falls under the general stalling rule.

 

[Ganonsburg]

picking up dedede would be easier than not making mistakes with TL


BAN DEDEDE

Too bad its easier to learn Metaknight than not make mistakes as DDD. DDD has too much against him to be broken and unfair.

If there were a character that had all good match-ups except for Metaknight, I'd say that banning Meta would be a bad idea because then we have that other character simply replacing Metaknight. But as of now, with the DATA that has been presented, the characters below Metaknight in the upper tiers all have a foot in the door to be best. With multiple characters are the best, no one is THE best ("And when everyone is super, no one will be.").

So what does that mean? Well, the upper tiers won't be defined so much as "Oh, we have okay match-ups against the only good character in the game," than as "Oh, we have decent qualities, but we aren't top tier because of another character." With Metakight influencing the top tiers so much, the lower tiers won't have to worry about any one character showing up in swarms at tourneys because all the top characters will be balanced by other top characters, so the swarms won't exist. This means the lower tiers won't be AS bad as they were because the characters that counter them hard can be weeded out by other characters.

That means that the higher tiers become more balanced, and the lower tiers become more balanced. Everyone is happy (sans Ganon, who trolls the entire game).

The fact that this could happen (I'm not going to say would, because I don't predict the future) shows that currently Metaknight is (very probably) degenerating gameplay. Granted, we can't say anything for sure because people refuse to ban Metaknight even to gather data.

Which brings up this next point. The biggest reason pro-ban doesn't have the data to convince anti-ban is because anti-ban isn't allowing pro-ban access to data. It's like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There's_a_Hole_in_My_Bucket

 

[Jack Kieser]

Stalling is not banned because of MK. Planking is banned because planking is stalling, and it falls under the general stalling rule.

RDK, Planking isn't banned. Some TOs ban it, but that's far from the majority, and it isn't even mentioned in the SBR rule list.

 

[RDK]

Yes it does matter. If no one is arguing against you, then you're just arguing with yourself.

Wasn't the reason that the items discussion was brought up was because we were trying to argue about what goes and what doesn't go with the ban criteria that YOU brought up?

The ban criteria is obviously going to be brought up because we're discussing banning a character in a ban thread. That should be obvious to a 5-year old.

Items were brought up because somebody who doesn't know what they're talking about said that they don't fit the ban criteria.

In any case, items do have relevance to this discussion; currently there's an attempt to experiment with items in a tournament-standard setting to see their effects on MK and planking.

 

[Magus-Cie]

Stuff that directly answered my question.

I would just like to take a post and show a little civility in this thread since there is an obvious lack of it.

Even if our opinions differ, thank you for the direct responses Sign. My opinion of you is actually turning around.

 

[RDK]

If you people listened for even five minutes, you'd know that ISN'T TRUE.

What pro-ban is arguing about is realism. It's like when people tell you to expect the unexpected; will you really expect a meteor to fall from the sky and strike you dead (or even a toilet from the MIR Space Station)? Of course not, because even though it's technically possible, it's SO IMPROBABLE that it doesn't make sense to reasonably account for it.

People can swim across the Atlantic, but it doesn't make sense to expect even most of the highest echelon of swimmers to be able to do so; it's unrealistic. There are two hard body athletes who can exert over 2500 lbs of force in a single blow, but that doesn't mean every strength trainer should reasonably be expected to do so. There are plenty of instances in human history where extremely exceptional people have done extraordinary things that would be totally improbable to expect other people to reliably replicate... even if it is theoretically possible for the human body to do so!!

So, stop saying that pro-ban is looking to make things easier for everyone as if that's their argument! Pro-ban is looking to make things logically and reasonably possible for people to do! It's not the same thing, and it's disingenuous, at best, for you to say it is.

I just put up an argument explaining why the whole "if ADHD can do it, why can't you?" argument would only prove the pro-bans point, but it went completely ignored. Here it is again, but written differently.

I use TL. I am one of the many characters that are at a disadvantage to Metaknight. NOTHING WRONG WITH BEING AT A DISADVANTAGE, I'M JUST SAYING.

Now, I know that the matchup is 40:60, although some TLs think it's at 35:65. This means that if I knew the matchup 100% and so did my opponent, I would be predicted to lose. I'm not saying that being predicted to lose is bad, or that MK is unbeatable or broken. I'm just saying that it's going to be an uphill battle and that I have a bigger chance of losing than my opponent does.

So, what can I do to get better chances of winning? I could work EVEN HARDER to make my character go against the odds and learn how to reduce all my mistakes consistently. That's an option.

OR

I could pick up a character with more chances of winning. The best choice would be MK. Why?

-Because MK is MK's biggest enemy.
-MK is generally easier to pick up than Snake, Diddy, or any of the other characters.
-There's a lot more room for error with MK, since he has so many options available to him. I wouldn't have to play perfect like I would if I were to play as TL.
-If I pick up MK, I would have no need for another secondary, or better yet, another main.

So if I were to play to win, what would the obvious choice be? Playing perfect with TL, or counterpicking the best character in the game?

If I were me (which I am), I would go Metaknight.

Spoiler

best statement ever lol

Since everyone who isn't Ally or ADHD apparently sucks and needs to learn the matchup. So what happened if EVERYONE did what I did?

MK would dominate Brawl, which would eventually prove that MK is overcentralized, and should be stopped.



But why should we appeal to all the noobs that aren't in the top level of play?
....Well, because they are the majority in our community, and the community is what's helping the TOs by paying off the venues, prize money, and bringing setups.

I'm going to respond to these two posts because they kind of go hand-in-hand.

What we see here are two players arguing that the bar be lowered to cater to people who don't necessarily win.

Let me say it again. What Jack and Flan are endorsing here is that because X amount of people can't realistically stand a chance against top Metaknight players in tournaments, we should simply ban him. "It's whats' best for the community!".

They are advocating that we, as a competitive fighting game community - emphasis on competitive fighting game - make it easier for players who aren't as skilled. It should be obvious to anyone with a brain that this is the antithesis of competition for competition's sake. It has now become not about skill - about seeing who's the best, who has put the most time and dedication in - it's become about something else.

This is just a rephrasing of the "fun" argument. "But it's not fun!". "MK is destroying variability in tournaments!". "He's killing the metagame!".

Let's talk for a little bit about competitive fighting games.

Competitive gaming is meant to be fair to players, not characters. Since everyone has the option of choosing any character, MK is just as viable a strategy for you as for your opponent. It’s still fair to all players. Nobody is forcing you to pick any other character.

If all players have the right to choose an inferior option, it's still fair. Otherwise, don't play Brawl competitively.

Competitive fighting games are not about always being able to play as your favorite character. There are many match-ups in which you have to pick up a secondary or just switch mains altogether to stand a chance of winning. This is one of those circumstances. Competitive fighting games are not about playing as your favorite character no matter what, it's about playing to win. People who play as Metaknight obviously hold playing to win more important than playing as their favorite character.

If you insist on playing specific characters despite their bad match-ups, be our guest. Just don't demand things be banned to make match-ups easier. I didn't whine when Kirby was nerfed into infinity in Melee; I just immediately switched mains. This is the reality of how competitive fighting games work.

This is the deal, folks. If your character has bad match-ups, counterpick or switch.

As far as banning MK for metagame health / variety. Why ban this to ensure more variety and not other things that would also ensure more variety? Why make the arbitrary decision to ban one thing for the sake of variety, yet not ban other things, such as other chaingrabs, locks, quasi-infinites and infinites, characters, etc.?

For diversity, why draw the line at characters? What's the reasoning behind this?

People can't just make up arbitrary ban criteria if it is valid for banning other things as well, ban it and then go "Oh, we won't ban those other things because we just dislike this one thing a lot". That's not objective at all, that's subjective bias where you arbitrarily ban things just because you don't like them.

Oh and we should also ban brawl, because, you know, it's just so unfair. There are so many unwinnable matchups!

We should also ban Melee, and SF, and you know, just about every fighting game, because they had, you know, unviable characters and bad matchups. God forbid people be forced to CP when they want to play their favorite character, so yeah ban all that stuff.

And lastly I think we should ban life, because it just isn't fair, and anything that's not fair shouldn't be allowed to exist and should be banned.

As for Metaknight's tournament dominance:

How many top spots must a character occupy before said character becomes worthy of a ban?

How great a gap must there be between the best character on the tier list and the remaining characters before said character becomes worthy of a ban?

What is the specific criteria used in pro-ban's reasoning for getting rid of Metaknight?

Can this criteria be saved and applied in future situations?

These are questions that the pro-ban camp needs to answer.

 

[MarKO X]

Stalling is not banned because of MK. Planking is banned because planking is stalling, and it falls under the general stalling rule.

Is planking stalling or is planking putting yourself in an advantageous position?
Can I plank with Falcon, Fox, Sonic (characters that probably shouldn't plank) Marth, G&W, Pikachu (characters that supposedly have pretty good planking ability) and have be equally as effective, if not more effective, than MK
Can you plank even with the 50 Ledge grab rule in tact?

I'm reading my question and they sound quite silly, but I would appreciate answers nonetheless, if possible.

And I'm still interested in seeing your response to this: http://www.smashboards.com/showpost.php?p=9425837&postcount=285

 

[Jack Kieser]

Jeez, RDK... no wonder you're reading the paper now, lol. Well, I'll get on that. ...that was quite the post though; patience, plz?

 

[Black Marf]

They play their characters better than anyone else, thus they are the current peak of their character's metagame.

Oh man, I've seen this discussion go on in the melee boards! I'll see if I can explain it.

Mango has been placing absurdly well in many tournaments with jiggs. For this reason, many people want to move jiggs up to top tier. Many other people are saying that jiggs is still only high tier. Why? Because the jiggs metagame hasn't actually advanced at all, Mango is just a really good and really smart player.

A character's metagame has nothing to do with the individual accomplishments of the players. It has to do with what the character. This is separate from how smart a player is, or how good at reads they are. It is also separate from how good a player's technical game is in comparison to another player's, although I'm sure that doesn't really come up between M2K and ADHD.

By extension, it is separate from any individual's knowledge and experience in a matchup.

M2K does not personally represent the top metagame of MK in the same way that Mango does not personally represent the top metagame of jigglypuff. They are simply playing the characters at a high level, and from there their individual strengths come into play. The ranking and mechanics of their characters are not directly connected to the individual characters.

 

[RDK]

Is planking stalling or is planking putting yourself in an advantageous position?

I made a post about this before, but I'll go over it again in case anyone missed it.

When people use the term "planking", it usually has negative connotations. I.E. when a Metaknight planks, he is attempting to stop the other player from engaging him and possibly run the clock out. This would count as stalling.

MK can still use the ledge grab trick to his advantage, but TO's usually take action when they feel it has crossed over into intentional stalling territory.

Can I plank with Falcon, Fox, Sonic (characters that probably shouldn't plank) Marth, G&W, Pikachu (characters that supposedly have pretty good planking ability) and have be equally as effective, if not more effective, than MK

I would argue that Kirby comes the closest to doing it as well, but MK is clearly a step above everyone else.

Can you plank even with the 50 Ledge grab rule in tact?

Yes.

And I'm still interested in seeing your response to this: http://www.smashboards.com/showpost.php?p=9425837&postcount=285

That's a huge post, so it'll take me a while to get to it all.

 

[theunabletable]

@Marko:

Does the tactic / character prevent competition? Are there freeze glitches, invisible characters, stall tactics, are characters removed from the field, etc.? No.

Can't certain characters stall under the ship?

Posts were made, lemme edit accordingly...

A character's metagame has nothing to do with the individual accomplishments of the players.

It shows us what is within the potential of that character. What Mango has done is not practically possible with, say, Ness.

He is the best at Jiggs (and an amazing player altogether (as is M2K)). He shows what Jiggs played to the highest CURRENT known practical level is.

M2K does not personally represent the top metagame of MK in the same way that Mango does not personally represent the top metagame of jigglypuff. They are simply playing the characters at a high level, and from there their individual strengths come into play. The ranking and mechanics of their characters are not directly connected to the individual characters.

They aren't simply playing their characters at a high level, they are playing their characters at the HIGHEST PRACTICAL CURRENT LEVEL OF THAT CHARACTER. That's what it means to be the best at a character. Armada shows what Peach is capable of at the highest practical know level, Amsah does the same with Sheik, Mango with Puff, etc

How can you be the best at a character, but not play that character at the highest current practical level?

 

[¯\_S.(ツ).L.I.D._/¯]

That's the biggest Brawl tourney IIRC. Then what IS the reason for why he should be banned?

I don't know, that's not up to me to decide.

Most pro-ban do.

Please show me this.

Why would we ban a character that isn't broken?

Characters in other fighting games have been banned without being broken.

Once again, what is the EXACT reason from YOU NOT OVERSWARM for why he should be banned.

Like I said, I don't know. It is not up to me to decide what makes a character bannable.

A character that you have to play to win at the highest level of practical play. MK isn't this.

Was Old Sagat in Super Turbo? He was soft banned. Why can't we do this to MK?

Popularity =/= bannable

He's not only popular, but people who play him take top spots.

This form of dominance is irrelevant for seeing anything other than who is most popular.

Are you stupid or are you just so stubborn that you can't change your opinion? Are you saying that if a bunch of CF's came onto the scene and started placing well that it would ONLY show that CF is popular?

If he can be beat, then he shouldn't be banned.

In your opinion, using your ban criteria.

People should get to ADHD/Ally level if they plan on winning. If they aren't good enough to win like ADHD and Ally do, tough luck for them.

I've continuously argued with this point and you have not given me a legitimate response. I'd like one please.

Tell me, what IS BANNABLE to you?

I don't know. I don't even care what the outcome of this is.

 

[ShadowLink84]

It's a response to pro-ban people who say it's impossible to beat MK in a higher-level tournament setting.

Mmk, on that I agree, but what about what I said earlier.
WHat is your opinion in that event?

 

[Magus-Cie]

How many top spots must a character occupy before said character becomes worthy of a ban?

How great a gap must there be between the best character on the tier list and the remaining characters before said character becomes worthy of a ban?

What is the specific criteria used in pro-ban's reasoning for getting rid of Metaknight?

Can this criteria be saved and applied in future situations?

These are questions that the pro-ban camp needs to answer.

Before I leave for the day I just wanted to post my opinions and ideas on these.

1.) I would say if a character was placing 5+ of the top 8 in 4 (an arbitrary number, basically a significant portion of major tournaments) major tournaments in a year, a ban might be considered. Just an idea, I do not know tourney results (except the infamous pound 4/genesis results) so I would like to point out if tourney results really are like this I am not calling for a ban soley because of it.

2.) This is a question niether side can refute/support because short of tournament results, we have no way to measure it. Frame data is irrellevant because there is no solid way to compare them between characters given the amount of options Brawl offers compared to a traditional fighter. Moveset could be, but again we would need a standard. Not something as hard to pin down as a banning criteria (this would merely be a part of a proper pro-ban argument), but something based on data. Still, this is not obviously not without flaws (there has to be a best character in the game).

3.) I am no expert on this debate, so I have nothing concrete, but tournament results would be a start (see #1 as an example). Or moveset (see #2). The problem I see is that so many Pro-Banners use attacks of character, judgement, and emotion as arguments (anti-bans are not exempt from this either) which simply do not work towards advancing the argument in any way, as a rebuttal will be aimed at the attack, not the reasons behind the argument.

4.) If, and this is a big if, we could come up with something that somehow worked around the aforementioned problems, it could be saved and used as a future banning (or unbanning) criteria. We have a long way to go before that happens however.

I hope this post was constructive in some way.

QUICKEDIT: I would be interested to see how far along the BRoomers are towards this.

 

[Omni]

That argument is ridiculous. It proves nothing. At the highest level of play, some people (ADHD, Ally) can beat MKs. We know this. Because ADHD beat M2K in the finals, it shows that ADHD is better than M2K, or at least was on that day. Nothing more.

Stop clinging to this argument, it isn't a good one. Think of a real argument, please.

01 Mago (Sa) 555.033
02 Daigo (Ry) 375.365
03 Ojisan Boy (Sa) 357.451
04 RF (Sa) 299.149
05 Tokido (Go) 214.968

Just pointing out the range in how far Mago is ahead compared to Daigo. Very similar to the gap between Metaknight and Snake (except

Yes, Daigo or... *scans for the next non-Sagat* oh, Tokido can beat Mago, but they lose on a much more frequent basis.

It isn't stupid to compare one fighting game to another. It also is not stupid to compare the player rankings and tier placement with another game's player rankings and tier placement.

 

[Black Marf]

How can you be the best at a character, but not play that character at the highest current practical level?

Because intelligence, technical skill, ability to pull off reads, and the like have absolutely NOTHING to do with a character's frame data, options, hitboxes, priority, and the like.

One has to do with the player, the other has to do with the character.

Here's an example. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that MK is a stronger character than Marth. There are many aspects of his character that can simply counter Marth's strengths. Let's say that the top MK player is Bob, and the top Marth player is Alice.

Alice and Bob play eachother often, seeing as they're the best of their individual characters. However, Alice is smarter than Bob. She can read his game and counter almost every single one of his moves before he even knows he's going to use that move. She can DI better than he can, she can react faster than he can. And to boot, Bob doesn't know the Marth/MK matchup nearly as well as Alice does. Bob just gets completely and utterly destroyed in the mental game by Alice. However, because the Marth matchup with MK is in MK's favor, Alice only barely wins. She can read Bob well and react well, but that doesn't matter that much because of MK's options against her.

Under your reasoning, Marth is a better character than MK because Alice represents Marth's metagame at the top level. In truth, Alice is just playing better than Bob is.

 

[theunabletable]

I don't know, that's not up to me to decide.

Then doesn't burden of proof just destroy that argument since no one has a clear and logical criteria for banning MK?

Please show me this.

I don't feel like going through 800 replies in JUST this thread to find you posts from pro-ban that says he's broken.

A LOT of pro-ban think he is broken.

Characters in other fighting games have been banned without being broken.

Isn't that something?

I don't believe we should ban a character if it isn't broken.

Like I said, I don't know. It is not up to me to decide what makes a character bannable.

Then I don't need any reason to show that he isn't bannable. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burden_of_proof

He's not only popular, but people who play him take top spots.

Who woulda thunk, the best character for 2 years might take some top spots?

Are you stupid or are you just so stubborn that you can't change your opinion? Are you saying that if a bunch of CF's came onto the scene and started placing well that it would ONLY show that CF is popular?

It would depend on the circumstances.

CF hasn't come onto the scene and started winning anything often, just like how ICs are not shield SDIing everything perfectly.

It hasn't happened. How is this hypothetical question relevant?

In your opinion, using your ban criteria.

Yeah that is my opinion. And that opinion won't change until people can show me how a character who loses tournaments can be considered a bannable character anymore than, say, ICs.

I've continuously argued with this point and you have not given me a legitimate response. I'd like one please.

How have my responses been illegitimate?

Sure player skill is very likely the most important part here.

I don't personally see how that disproves a **** thing.

Either it makes no sense, or I'm missing what's wrong. Could you elaborate further how MK losing to skilled players shows that he is still bannable?

Because intelligence, technical skill, ability to pull off reads, and the like have absolutely NOTHING to do with a character's frame data, options, hitboxes, priority, and the like.

And what does frame data and options have to do with anything if other people can utilize other characters options better than the best player of the best character?

Under your reasoning, Marth is a better character than MK because Alice represents Marth's metagame at the top level. In truth, Alice is playing better than the MK is.

So we should ban MK in Super Theorycraft Bros. Brawl?

Practical play =/= theorycraft

So does anyone have a criteria for banning a character?

 

[Jack Kieser]

I'm going to respond to these two posts because they kind of go hand-in-hand.

What we see here are two players arguing that the bar be lowered to cater to people who don't necessarily win.

No, that's not what we're arguing, or at least, not what I'm arguing; I won't speak for Flan.

What I'm arguing is that when it's reasonably realistic for a significant enough (and I know, I'm being very vague here; I'll get to that) amount of the competition to, you know, compete, there's no reason to even consider a ban. But, let's just throw out some hypotheticals so that the discussion can continue; let's say that we, as a community, actually agreed that, say, 90% dominance was enough for a ban. That would mean that if 89% of people can't compete with Meta, he's still ok, but if 90% of the community can't beat him, that's too much. If that 90% can't realistically be expected to beat him, we have to ban. I'll continue in a bit.

Let me say it again. What Jack and Flan are endorsing here is that because X amount of people can't realistically stand a chance against top Metaknight players in tournaments, we should simply ban him. "It's whats' best for the community!".

Actually, that's happened many times in many communities, and even in our own, in a few ways. The original Akuma ban that most ban criteria (including yours, borrowed from Sirlin) is based off of was certainly not unbeatable, in all technicality. Isolated cases existed where Akuma did not win the tournament by the admission of old SF players who have commented on this in past MK threads, and honestly, you'd expect that; no one is perfect. Items were banned originally because of random chance, which is basically a simple way of saying that no player could reasonably be expected to outplay random chance... but few could argue that there were players that could outplay random chance and win. Rules, however, weren't made for them; because a vast majority of the player base couldn't do it, items were banned.

Regardless of the percentage, there will always be players that can do incredible things, like beating Akuma or winning an items match (gasp). Bans are made, though, when those events become exceptions, and not the rule. So... technically EVERY ban that ever has or ever will happen is because "X amount of people can't realistically stand a chance against" something.

They are advocating that we, as a competitive fighting game community - emphasis on competitive fighting game - make it easier for players who aren't as skilled. It should be obvious to anyone with a brain that this is the antithesis of competition for competition's sake. It has now become not about skill - about seeing who's the best, who has put the most time and dedication in - it's become about something else.

Not true. Pro-ban, on numerous occasions, have stated that this ban is not to make things easier on people within their own metagame. Remember, though; how many pro Brawl players are there? How many pro Snakes, Diddys, Warios, etc. exist? And how many of them have been playing their characters for just as long, if not longer, than the MK mains? I'm pretty sure, for instance, that AZ has been a Diddy main since day 1. Plenty of people in the pro circles have put in just as much time, if not more, than the MK mains, but they still lose, and by respectable margins, too. We're talking about 7-minute time outs; that's no small margin.

This is just a rephrasing of the "fun" argument. "But it's not fun!". "MK is destroying variability in tournaments!". "He's killing the metagame!".

Not true, again. You're rephrasing the argument in a way that simply isn't equal. It has nothing to do about fun. It's not a "fun" argument. It's a realism argument. The only difference is that your definition of "realistic chance" is different from ours. "2 people in 2 years" is enough of a margin for us to consider beating MK at the highest levels of play (or even in closed system metagames) to be unrealistic for most people; meanwhile, for you, an "unrealistic chance" means that it has to be MK and only MK winning tournaments. That's a standards difference, in which case the majority will win; you may not like that, but it is the majority who is financing this operation. Trust me, I don't find cheap populism to be any good, either, but even you have to understand WHY people are thinking what they do, especially after Overswarm's charts/data (even if you don't agree with it).

Let's talk for a little bit about competitive fighting games.

Competitive gaming is meant to be fair to players, not characters. Since everyone has the option of choosing any character, MK is just as viable a strategy for you as for your opponent. It’s still fair to all players. Nobody is forcing you to pick any other character.

Very true. I agree with this. I used to main Link in Melee, then switched to Doc. I haven't touched Link (or even TLink, honestly) in Brawl in quite some time. It sucks, because Link is one sexy mother... but, oh, well.

If all players have the right to choose an inferior option, it's still fair. Otherwise, don't play Brawl competitively.

Competitive fighting games are not about always being able to play as your favorite character. There are many match-ups in which you have to pick up a secondary or just switch mains altogether to stand a chance of winning. This is one of those circumstances. Competitive fighting games are not about playing as your favorite character no matter what, it's about playing to win. People who play as Metaknight obviously hold playing to win more important than playing as their favorite character.

Let's assume for a moment that MK was never in Brawl and (like most people are predicting) Snake and Marth got the new top spots. I'd totally agree with you... but that's because, again, it's realistic to expect more people to be able to dominate Snake or Marth. It wouldn't be just M2K and 2 other dudes playing other characters; it'd be a whole slew of people getting top spots, proving that the people beating Snake/Marth are the rule. not the exception. All of the data right now, though, proves that Ally and ADHD are the exception, though (obviously, you don't agree to this due to a difference in statistical standards).

If you insist on playing specific characters despite their bad match-ups, be our guest. Just don't demand things be banned to make match-ups easier. I didn't whine when Kirby was nerfed into infinity in Melee; I just immediately switched mains. This is the reality of how competitive fighting games work.

This is the deal, folks. If your character has bad match-ups, counterpick or switch.

Again, no one is arguing that this is a bad thing. The extent to which it is happening NOW, however, is too much for a lot of people. That's why they believe it's banworthy. Again, you don't agree due to a difference in standards... but remember, this isn't the "Convince RDK to Win the Debate!" game. We honestly don't care if you agree, because our job is to convince the TO's/players.

As far as banning MK for metagame health / variety. Why ban this to ensure more variety and not other things that would also ensure more variety? Why make the arbitrary decision to ban one thing for the sake of variety, yet not ban other things, such as other chaingrabs, locks, quasi-infinites and infinites, characters, etc.?

For diversity, why draw the line at characters? What's the reasoning behind this?

Well, were it possible, people might be more for it; unfortunately, it's really hard to ban those things outside of judges/hacking, neither of which are realistic. Personally, I don't think they need banning because there's no data to show they need banning. They aren't winning tournaments left and right like, oh... MK.

People can't just make up arbitrary ban criteria if it is valid for banning other things as well, ban it and then go "Oh, we won't ban those other things because we just dislike this one thing a lot". That's not objective at all, that's subjective bias where you arbitrarily ban things just because you don't like them.

Oh and we should also ban brawl, because, you know, it's just so unfair. There are so many unwinnable matchups!

Well, we keep trying to prove to you that there are plenty of things that we've banned in Brawl without using our (supposedly) sacrosanct banning criteria. Remember, RDK, the argument against this is "If we didn't then, why start now?", and no one's refuted that. It's a massive contradiction, and until it's proven that it isn't, then the "ban criteria" argument will probably just go ignored by most people; right now, it just seems like a petty time waster, an argument thrown in at the last second to distract from OS's charts. In reality, the community can make up any ban criteria it wants to, no matter how arbitrary... as long as it is uniformly and fairly applied to EVERY aspect of the game. So, really, you'd only have an argument here if we made our criteria not apply to, for instance, Snake if he ever got as bad as MK. THEN you could yell... like we are doing about some stages and items.

We should also ban Melee, and SF, and you know, just about every fighting game, because they had, you know, unviable characters and bad matchups. God forbid people be forced to CP when they want to play their favorite character, so yeah ban all that stuff.

And lastly I think we should ban life, because it just isn't fair, and anything that's not fair shouldn't be allowed to exist and should be banned.

Well, I'll say this. Smash is our own game; ultimately, I think the "other communities" argument should be treated like the "Hitler" argument: the first person to mention it automatically loses. Of course, I also feel like this towards people who use the word "scrub".

As for Metaknight's tournament dominance:

How many top spots must a character occupy before said character becomes worthy of a ban?

According to popular opinion (that I can tell from these threads without a specific poll), somewhere underneath the number of top spots that Meta has already taken according to Ankoku's thread. Again, without a formal survey, I can't really answer that because I'd be speaking for others and it's ultimately, a standards argument.

How great a gap must there be between the best character on the tier list and the remaining characters before said character becomes worthy of a ban?

See above.

What is the specific criteria used in pro-ban's reasoning for getting rid of Metaknight?

I'd re-read OS' posts/every other thread for that one.

Can this criteria be saved and applied in future situations?

I honestly don't see why not. No one else in the game has any LOGICAL reason to replicate Meta's results, and anyone who argues such obviously is being disingenuous.

These are questions that the pro-ban camp needs to answer.

I'm pretty sure they HAVE been answered before, but because so many of them are simple standards questions, they keep getting shot down for no other reason that you don't happen to agree; they are sound in their own right when taken in their own context (away from Street Fighter, Melee, and Sirlin), but you just don't happen to agree with the specific numbers used. Like I said, though, we're fortunate in that we don't have to convince YOU... just the TOs and public who make, host, and finance all of Smash.

 

[Dekar173]

SoM is obviously afraid he'll place even worse if MK is banned! vouch!

 

[Jack Kieser]

D*mnit... my epic rebuttal got BoP'ed. Dekar, why couldn't you have posted faster?!?!

 

[Black Marf]

And what does frame data and options have to do with anything if other people can utilize other characters options better than the best player of the best character?

I'm not sure what you're saying, but I'm going to attempt to respond.

If another player can utilize the options available to them better than the best player of the best character, than that person is simply playing better than the best player. It doesn't mean that the character THEY'RE playing has stronger options, they're just better at choosing them.

So we should ban MK in Super Theorycraft Bros. Brawl?

Practical play =/= theorycraft

Strawman.

I'm not arguing for MK to be banned. I haven't argued for MK to be banned in any post I've made my entire time on SWF.* I'm pointing out how ADHD can beat M2K without Diddy being a better character than MK. More specifically, without the current metagame being that Diddy beats MK.


You seem to be assuming that all players at the top of the competitive scene have equal player skill. I'm just throwing that out there.

Also, here's an interesting thought experiment. Have you ever tried making a tier list between a group of friends? As in, trying to show a character's strengths just between you and 7 other friends. Let's say that the best player in your group plays Diddy Kong. I'd assume that because the Diddy in question keeps winning among your group of friends, that you'd assume that Diddy is top tier. However, in reality, it is more likely that the Diddy player is just better at playing the game than anyone else there. Some people are just better at things than other people. Over time, the Diddy player will win more often than not.

The 8 friends in this thought experiment are the top 8 players in the world. Compress the skill gap between the players due to the fact that you only get to be in the top 8 through rigorous tests of intelligence, skill, and experience.

That's basically how competitive games roll.


*Oh wait, I think I trolled earlier in the thread. Nevermind.

EDIT: vv RDK, good trolls usually don't make it so obvious what they're doing.

 

[RDK]

D*mnit... my epic rebuttal got BoP'ed. Dekar, why couldn't you have posted faster?!?!

It's fine; nobody needs to see it anyways.

 

[Jack Kieser]

RDK, you snarky devil. *shakes fist angrily*

 

[Jim Morrison]

Everything here is tl;dr.

MK shouldn't be banned, I enjoy playing as him too much.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Everything here is tl;dr.

MK shouldn't be banned, I enjoy playing as him too much.

Well, my friends, debate over.

EDIT: Reminds me somehow of an idea I had. Brawl- likes to lampoon things. For example, we made fun of BBrawl not buffing sonic's kill power by... also not buffing sonic's kill power and instead buffing his damage output to 3x the size. My idea was make Metaknight obviously above the curve, refuse to tweak him to nerf him, then cause debates if he should be banned in Brawl-. :V

 

[theunabletable]

SoM is obviously afraid he'll place even worse if MK is banned! vouch!

I'm not denying that I suck. I am a bad player right now.

Ironic borderline flaming and off topic posting from mods is funny.

And I play ICs as much as I play MK.

I'm not sure what you're saying, but I'm going to attempt to respond.

If another player can utilize the options available to them better than the best player of the best character, than that person is simply playing better than the best player. It doesn't mean that the character THEY'RE playing has stronger options, they're just better at choosing them.

That is true. And I honestly have trouble believing that a character whose best player loses should be banned.

I'm not arguing for MK to be banned. I haven't argued for MK to be banned in any post I've made my entire time on SWF. I'm pointing out how ADHD can beat M2K without Diddy being a better character than M2K. More specifically, without the current metagame being that Diddy beats M2K.

Yeah you are right. ADHD is likely a better player than M2K. I don't see how this is relevant

You seem to be assuming that all players at the top of the competitive scene have equal player skill. I'm just throwing that out there.

No I'm not assuming that. I just think it's worth noting that the best player of the best character can't beat ADHD.

ADHD is very likely a better player than M2K.

 

[MarKO X]

Ummmm.... Akuma is unbeatable.
Just because a noob didn't know that he can use the air fireball as a 99.9% safe approach (the 00.1% coming in when, for whatever reason, you actually allowed your opponent to gain some kind of super and the super somehow beats or bypasses the air fireball), or didn't know how to infinite red fireball lock, or didn't know how to do a high damage dizzy combo with the air fireball, grounded normal(s), hurricane kick, and dragon punch doesn't mean that Akuma is beatable. it just means that a noob picked him up and failed. If Daigo could use Akuma, JWong, Alex Valle, the Graham brothers, etc. would have to use Akuma. You literally have no choice. Period.

And this is what Anti-ban is using for their argument. While it may be a solo point, it's a very strong one, one that keeps me from completely believing that MK needs to be banned. MK is beatable. The question might be how beatable is he and whether or not the level by which he is beatable qualifies for a ban, and so far, while he is dominant, there is nothing that shows that in terms of raw results.

Edit: I also wanna know if I'm the only one that has a hunch that the Ledge grab rule actually gives MK an advantage...

 

[Black Marf]

Yeah you are right. ADHD is likely a better player than M2K. I don't see how this is relevant

It's relevant because it means that MK could be too good and bannable, even if ADHD won. That depends on your ban criteria though.

I'm glad we agree on this point though.


Also, whenever I attempt to directly quote someone's post, I see text that's completely different from the one I saw before I tried to quote. I'd assume an edit occured, except I see the same post as before no matter how many times I refresh. What the hell?
Nevermind I just noticed that it's because SoM's been spacing his posts oddly.

 

[napZzz]

*****es should shorten their posts and ****. Everything is too long

 

[C.J.]

SoM, you're arguing player ability, not character ability. You're saying ADHD is possibly a better player than M2K, which is only hurting your arguments. Especially considering M2K does not know the match-up while ADHD does. We're not talking about whether or not a player's specific way of playing the character should be banned, we're talking about what the character is capable of under the realm of human possibility. In the realm of human possibility, M2K, once he learns the MU, will probably beat ADHD, just as M2K now pretty much always beats Ally now that he has learned the Snake MU. Honestly, saying ADHD beat M2K is like saying Michael Hey placed top 8 (actually top 3-4 iirc) using only ganon so obviously ganon isn't the worst character in the game/has winnable MUs. When obviously, we all know this is far from true. What a player does w/ a character does not indicate what that character is capable of at the top of it's metagame. The top of the metagame REQUIRES that both players know the MU equally well which is quite obviously not true in terms of M2K vs ADHD.

EDIT: We can get good enough to win. We can beat the PLAYER, not the CHARACTER.

 

[Jack Kieser]

*****es should shorten their posts and ****. Everything is too long

That's what she said.

..seriously, though. A 15 minute drought of posts can only mean that people are working on ridiculously long rebuttal posts, so... I wouldn't count on posts getting shorter any time soon.

 

[theunabletable]

SoM, you're arguing player ability, not character ability. You're saying ADHD is possibly a better player than M2K, which is only hurting your arguments.

Maybe all those MKs in the top 8 are just much more skill than the other players.

It shows that if you're skilled, you CAN pick a viable non-MK char and do well.

Imo that means he shouldn't be bannable if you can do well with other characters.

 

[C.J.]

It shows that if you're skilled, you CAN pick a viable non-MK char and do well.

Yes you can, but, you're only beating the player, not the character.

Maybe all those MKs in the top 8 are just much more skill than the other players.

Maybe they are, but, because of the density of them, it makes the possibility of that far more unlikely.

 

[Kewkky]

Maybe all those MKs in the top 8 are just much more skill than the other players.

Or, it might ALSO mean that they're far less skilled players than ADHD naturally, but by using MK they gain a much-needed boost to reach "top player" status. It's true that no random noob that picks MK will win any match... But obviously these guys are skilled players, and they do their homework, so they'll know what to do with MK's dominant tool set (no disrespect meant to top MK players).

Think about it, I just gave you another point of view on the situation. Same as Akuma, dude. The Akuma player might be beating everyone, but that doesn't mean that naturally he's a better player... All he needs to know is how to use Akuma to win.


And why did people bring up Akuma? He's not really a good comparison... Like I stated before, Jin from Tekken4 is a MUCH better comparison, even down to the community split on "to ban or not to ban".

 

[theunabletable]

Yes you can, but, you're only beating the player, not the character.

What difference does it make? And ADHD says the matchup is even.

That by itself, imo, is enough reason for him to not be banned.

Not yet, anyways.

 

[Col. Stauffenberg]

I would hope we're not hinging our decisions on banning or not banning MK "Because ADHD said so."

 

[Jack Kieser]

I would hope we're not hinging our decisions on banning or not banning MK "Because ADHD said so."

I hope we're not hinging our decision to ban MK or not on ANY one person saying so; it should be on the sum of each argument's parts.

 

[MarKO X]

And why did people bring up Akuma? He's not really a good comparison... Like I stated before, Jin from Tekken4 is a MUCH better comparison, even down to the community split on "to ban or not to ban".

Because Akuma is bada*s.

Spoiler

And because an unrestricted MK is probably Akuma in Brawl form.

I hope we're not hinging our decision to ban MK or not on ANY one person saying so; it should be on the sum of each argument's parts.

Oh, you mean the same way we did when this guy said something about our precious ledges?