Official Metaknight Discussion

[CRASHiC]

You misread my post. That was exactly my point.

Wait, then are you saying that Sagat is bannable? Because he's not. He's not at all. No where near. He is neither over centralizing nor is he god tier. He's just a little above the rest of the cast. Just a bit.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

The word "bannable" is kind of weird to me, first of all because it isn't a real word, and second because any character or anything is bannable. If we collectively decided we don't like Lucas' hairstyle (I mean it is pretty 1974) we could ban him. If we decided we didn't like people grabbing ledges at all we could ban that, and say that anyone who grabs a ledge loses a set. Anything is "bannable," and any criteria is going to be arbitrary even if it's an official criteria.

So please for the love of Sakurai stop saying things like "he doesn't fit ban criteria" or "he isn't gay enough" or "he isn't broken enough" or "he isn't overcentralizing" because these are all just expressions of a personal ban criteria and mean absolutely nothing in an argument like this. Actually, none of this really means anything, but we do have a lot of data showing that a lot of people play MK and he wins a lot. The only thing we should be discussing in this thread is whether or not it's too much, and whether or not micromanaging MK's strengths to keep him playable is worth M2k's bankroll.

 

[MetalMusicMan]

Wait, then are you saying that Sagat is bannable? Because he's not. He's not at all. No where near. He is neither over centralizing nor is he god tier. He's just a little above the rest of the cast. Just a bit.

I'm saying Sagat isn't bannable, or a "god", but that he is obviously the best character in the game, despite not being very widely used.


I'm sorry you misinterpreted my post so badly... but I'm not sure how that happened :\

The word "bannable" is kind of weird to me, first of all because it isn't a real word, and second because any character or anything is bannable. If we collectively decided we don't like Lucas' hairstyle (I mean it is pretty 1974) we could ban him. If we decided we didn't like people grabbing ledges at all we could ban that, and say that anyone who grabs a ledge loses a set. Anything is "bannable," and any criteria is going to be arbitrary even if it's an official criteria.

"I don't care what scientists in thems fancy coats with labs say, I gots my bible and I know what daddy told me."

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

MMM, what are you talking about? There was nothing arbitrary or plucked from my personal feelings on the matter in that post.

 

[Overswarm]

that particular bracket worked out that way, you're the one who's been saying that there have to be trends, consistency. so where are the MK's consistently taking down ADHD and DEHF? ally barely lost to any of them until he started using MK a lot himself. yes, I believe that vs diddy and falco the better player tends to win. lucario, sheik, fox, wario, ice climbers, ZSS, maybe snake and a few others are also close to that status IMO, only losing to him by a slight margin

and I do think he should be banned because having even matchups isn't enough when he's obviously a much easier option and there's no point maining these characters that go even with him when you could just main him instead and not have to worry about any bad MU's period. he's clearly overcentralizing the game and it only gets worse as time goes on, but I do think he has even matchups.

It didn't "work out that way", they were the only ones left.

2. M2K - Meta Knight (Lost to Ally, Ally)
3. Tyrant - Meta Knight (Lost to Mew2King, Ally)
4. Dojo - Meta Knight (Lost to Larry, Tyrant)
9. Judge - Meta Knight (Lost to M2K, Dojo)


That was Genesis, and the same thing happened. You can say "it only worked out taht way" for Judge, but that was ignored when we said it since having 4 MKs in the top 8 of Genesis was something a few (then anti-ban) had said would be "troublesome".


These are trends people. This isn't an exaggeration, this is what happened.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

no I wouldn't, where did I say that? There's no reason I should have to be set back 2 years behind the character I put all my time into when no other player of any other character (the characters WINNING big tourneys, like top 2 always being jiggs in melee or adhd dominating pound and snes) has to. That is extremely unfair

Well M2K, as you said in the interview you did here.

Gheb
-Would you drop MK for somebody else if he turned out not
to be the best? Or would always keep him at least as a 2nd?

M2K: I'd already be good with him why would I drop him? LOL. My 2nd would probably just go back to DDD if MK got banned but there's no reason he should be banned that's ridiculous.

The bolded sounds like you said if MK got banned you'd play DDD. But I might be interpreting this incorrectly.

This is still assuming if MK did get banned.

 

[Omni]

I don't know of any conclusive tournament evidence. That's my point, though.

Sure, there are theoretical advantages that we can GUESS would make characters broken. Sometimes it may *seem* obvious. But until someone abuses it in tournament, we can't be sure.

I'm trying to get people to quit making decisions based merely on their own personal judgments. Doing so biases the decision based on who is making the observations.

anti-ban doesn't want to ban MK because he doesn't *seem* broken. But we do have data on MK, unlike all these other things we've banned right off the bat. And the data not only shows that MK is on top, it shows that he's on top by a ridiculous margin.

Now why is that? Some have argued that it's merely because MK is popular. Well that makes a difference, but not as much as you'd think. I already gave my popularity speech a long time ago, but it boils down to it doesn't matter how popular or unpopular a character is if they always lose. Same if they always win. (that's just a summary, popularity DOES have an influece, it's just that the influence is small)

Nah, dude. We don't have to guess in terms of some of the stages in Brawl whether it should be tournament viable or not. Not every good judgment call needs to be supported by trial and error and results. If you're attempting to invent a wheel, you don't test to see if a cube would work. You also can't make the statement, "Since the cube wasn't tested then it's not conclusive." You're thinking too hard.

When stages did have conflicting view points they were tested out.

The data you have on MK is not conclusive evidence that he needs to be banned. It only reemphasizes the fact that MK is the best character and the most overused character. YOU may think this is conclusive evidence that Metaknight needs to be banned, but other people will view it as normal for a competitive fighting game.

Popularity is directly influenced by win %. Sonic was the hot topic when the game started; then people realized Sonic sucked and his popularity dropped DRASTICALLY. In any competitive fighting game, the better your character has at a chance of winning the more popularity they will have. The influence, in my opinion, is huge.

 

[adumbrodeus]

I don't know of any conclusive tournament evidence. That's my point, though.

Sure, there are theoretical advantages that we can GUESS would make characters broken. Sometimes it may *seem* obvious. But until someone abuses it in tournament, we can't be sure.

Can't we? We know what situations are common, we know what moves break those situations, we know the fall-back options.


Keep in mind that street fighter is a far more controlled game due to having considerably less movement and therefore it's easier to examine from a MU prospective.

I'm trying to get people to quit making decisions based merely on their own personal judgments. Doing so biases the decision based on who is making the observations.

If people's biases are coming into play, then get a better paper. We know that MU numbers are less then reliable in smash, and I'm personally made an effort to improve on that (nobody seems to wanna help though).


But that is not the case in SF, MU numbers are a GREAT DEAL more reliable in SF.


But the problem is, your "in practice" numbers have much deeper issues relating to statistical validity, and you can never have perfect statistical conclusions anyway, it still only proves correlation and we can't know that player population isn't a significant influence.

anti-ban doesn't want to ban MK because he doesn't *seem* broken. But we do have data on MK, unlike all these other things we've banned right off the bat. And the data not only shows that MK is on top, it shows that he's on top by a ridiculous margin.

Now why is that? Some have argued that it's merely because MK is popular. Well that makes a difference, but not as much as you'd think. I already gave my popularity speech a long time ago, but it boils down to it doesn't matter how popular or unpopular a character is if they always lose. Same if they always win. (that's just a summary, popularity DOES have an influece, it's just that the influence is small)

You've made every statistician in the world cry.


If a character always loses, yea you're right. But no character always loses, there's always that small percentage, especially when you account for varying skill, the fact is that as you increase the number of people maining a character the raw number of players of amazing skill increases while the ratio of good to bad players simply remains the same.



Again, by this reasoning, you should take up smoking to avoid cardiovascular disease.



That's why unless you account for population size, any correlation drawn is presumed invalid, period.

The word "bannable" is kind of weird to me, first of all because it isn't a real word, and second because any character or anything is bannable. If we collectively decided we don't like Lucas' hairstyle (I mean it is pretty 1974) we could ban him. If we decided we didn't like people grabbing ledges at all we could ban that, and say that anyone who grabs a ledge loses a set. Anything is "bannable," and any criteria is going to be arbitrary even if it's an official criteria.

So please for the love of Sakurai stop saying things like "he doesn't fit ban criteria" or "he isn't gay enough" or "he isn't broken enough" or "he isn't overcentralizing" because these are all just expressions of a personal ban criteria and mean absolutely nothing in an argument like this. Actually, none of this really means anything, but we do have a lot of data showing that a lot of people play MK and he wins a lot. The only thing we should be discussing in this thread is whether or not it's too much, and whether or not micromanaging MK's strengths to keep him playable is worth M2k's bankroll.

Which is exactly why a large number of people don't want him banned, because it's acknowledged that there is no rigid universal criteria, and banning without such is ridiculous because that means it comes down to philosophy.

 

[Omni]

Considering that Metaknight has characters that do really well against him (whether's it's even or slightly in his favor) there are several contenders.

What then happens is that we disagree with how many contenders there needs to be. Or we disagree with how many characters need to be viable. All of these points are just preferences of shaping the game into a metagame we see as fit. You and OS may be more comfortable with a game that sacrifices its best character for more character playability. Other people may be more comfortable with only a few characters truly being viable but making sure a ban isn't implemented in an attempt to cater to a different metagame.

So your argument is not a statistical point for why MK needs to be banned. It is a point made on your perception of how the metagame should be rather than what it is. What something should be is completely subjective making the argument itself subjective although what it claims is a fact.

Overswarm, do you ban a character because they are dominant or because they are broken?

If it's because they are dominant, then your perspective dominance and what should and should not be allowed will be severely different from many people. Also, dominance does not necessarily equal ban worthy. Proving dominance only shows your dislike in it; not how it constitutes a ban. The numbers and data show what you perceive to be as dominance.

If it's because they are broken, you cannot prove that point by focusing on tournament results. As I said before, tournament results and data on MK only show how the best character in the game and most popular used character has successfully done what is expected.

Overswarm.

The first post was directed to someone else, but you took a single point from it to ask a question.

The second post was directed toward you but you haven't responded.

Can you address these? I'd like to hear your response on it.

 

[Overswarm]

Ask a question that isn't loaded and I will.

Omni, do you beat your girlfriend or kill your neighbor?

 

[fkacyan]

Actually, my numbers have been long met and don't really matter at this point.

Actually, my numbers have been long met

Actually, my numbers.

my numbers

Man, it's great to have an invisible scale that determines whether or not a character is banworthy.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

2: Mew2King (Lost to ADHD, ADHD)

3: Ally (/) (Lost to KSizzle , M2K )

4: KSizzle (/) (Lost to ADHD, Ally)

5: Shadow_111 () (Lost to Mew2King , Ally)

5: Judge () (Lost to Shadow , KSizzle )

7: Havok () (Lost to ADHD, Ally)

9: Lee Martin (/) (Lost to Shadow , Havok )

9: Seibrik () (Lost to Ninjalink, Ally)

Put Lucario's face in ya jerks. :/

edit:

Yeah, good job OS.
Leaving out the character icon for Lucario.
EDIT: CP System doesn't exist.

Thank god you noticed, it was bugging the crap out of me.

 

[Omni]

Ask a question that isn't loaded and I will.

Omni, do you beat your girlfriend or kill your neighbor?

The first point isn't a question.

The second point isn't a hard question to answer. One or the other, both, or neither and why.

Stop making excuses and making things more difficult than they need to be.

 

[adumbrodeus]

Man, it's great to have an invisible scale that determines whether or not a character is banworthy.

Everyone does, that's the problem I addressed again and again in the podcast.


As long as we have this issue, we've got a broken base, we need people to agree to that otherwise this is just a matter of philosophy.

 

[Delvro]

You've made every statistician in the world cry.

If a character always loses, yea you're right. But no character always loses, there's always that small percentage, especially when you account for varying skill, the fact is that as you increase the number of people maining a character the raw number of players of amazing skill increases while the ratio of good to bad players simply remains the same.

Again, by this reasoning, you should take up smoking to avoid cardiovascular disease.

That's why unless you account for population size, any correlation drawn is presumed invalid, period.

Well duh, of course popularity has an influence. But it's nowhere near what people think it is. You're forgetting that in the data, only the top 8 players in each tournament are counted. The rest, no matter how many there are, are discarded.

You completely misunderstood the point I was trying to make. Read this.

Differences in population, while it would be helpful to know, turns out to be misleading because of two reasons. One is the fact that the subset of players that choose to play metaknight is difficult to measure. How many are there? Is the average MK player an accurate sample of the SSBB community at large? I do not think that it is. There is an unknown variable that determines whether a player switches to MK or not and we currently have no clue and no way to measure whether or not this variable has an affect on player skill.

Second, and more importantly, is that OS uses data where all but the top 8 placings in 100+ tournaments are thrown out. At this point, differences in popularity become less important. Let's say you add 20 (skilled) Link mains and 20 (skilled) mario mains to the Pound 4 tournament. Would the top 8 results have changed at all? I very much doubt it.
Add 20 Pit mains? It may change the results very slightly. Perhaps a highly lucky! (and highly skilled, of course, but skill is a variable which should be held constant for these arguments) player breaks top 8.
Add 20 MK mains? This one should be obvious (taking skill out of the equation)

The result is that while popularity DOES have an influence upon character placements, the importance is dampened by the fact that the character is better, plain and simple, and that only a constant sampling from each tournament (8) is drawn from these large samples with varying popularity for each character.

 

[Overswarm]

Man, it's great to have an invisible scale that determines whether or not a character is banworthy.

The point I was making is my numbers are irrelevant because they've long been met.

If you found out that drinking diet coke caused cancer in 95% of the people drinking it and someone asked you "What is your criteria for removing diet coke from the shelves of stores aroudn the world", your reply would be "WTF is your problem? It's long been met, I've told you I wanted it gone already. It gives cancer to 95% of the people drinking it. Go ask the one guy who says we shouldn't take it off the shelves!"

 

[Mew2King]

lol @ M2k.

I can say the same thing vise versa. Would it be fair for other people to drop their mains for MK, after working on their character for 2 years?

people have tried this on me many times and all got 2-3 usually 3 stocked. Some answer


Overswarm, Ally should not have MK next to his name at all. You listed Judge as losing to Ksizl then put (MK) when he should be put Lucario because Ksizls MK lost then Lucario won 2 games in a row to win the set. You're extremely biased and constantly feeding these people extremely biased data. You concentrate on only tourneys that benefit what you have to say and ignore everything else even if and when most tourneys don't abide like this (ESPECIALLY when ADHD/Ally dominate EC while DEHF dominates the WC), then you do not even present the data fairly, but instead you present them in the most biased fashion possible, exaggerating and even lying as you see fit / as you need to. It's no wonder everyone is brainwashed now.

Red Ryu - I guess I did say that then, but I changed my mind now because there are too many people now that concentrated on one character and got really good such as ADHD and Ally and Larry and a bunch of others, and having for me to restart from scratch while they don't is not fair at all especially when I'm the only MK truely "dominating" and I'm not even dominating at all.

 

[_Keno_]

Stop making excuses and making things more difficult than they need to be.

Such a hypocrite.

 

[MetalMusicMan]

Overswarm, do you ban a character because they are dominant or because they are broken?

OS, I don't see how this is loaded, other than that it already seems obvious that you are trying to ban MK because he is dominant... and we all know that is the wrong answer

It seems less like a "loaded question" and more like you already know the answer and how conflicting your viewpoint is, but you want to ignore that.

 

[Palpi]

Unless you take examples from other games, there is no way to determine if a character is banworthy or not. You are basing this off absolutely nothing.

It bugs me that people claim that other games mean nothing, but it is the only thing you can relate to.

 

[Omni]

Such a hypocrite.

 

[CRASHiC]

people have tried this on me many times and all got 2-3 usually 3 stocked. Some answer

That only means you are more skilled, but what does it mean for when Lee Martin beat C018 at WHOBO? Clearly from the first set C018 had Lee outranked, clearing up Lee clearly, then Lee went Metaknight, and lost becuase of a single last hit at the last 3 seconds of the final match.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

Which is exactly why a large number of people don't want him banned, because it's acknowledged that there is no rigid universal criteria, and banning without such is ridiculous because that means it comes down to philosophy.

I think that's perfectly fine, though. Let's argue ban philosophy. Personally, I've said how I feel about the ban before. I think that because MK requries micromanaging to fit in with our vision of how the game ought to be played, he should be banned, or instead, we should stop trying to microban him and let him reign.

No LGL, no scrooging or planking rules, no IDC ban, nothing. Let him reign or ban him.

 

[MetalMusicMan]

Unless you take examples from other games, there is no way to determine if a character is banworthy or not. You are basing this off absolutely nothing.

It bugs me that people claim that other games mean nothing, but it is the only thing you can relate to.

Thank you!

 

[fkacyan]

The point I was making is my numbers are irrelevant because they've long been met.

If you found out that drinking diet coke caused cancer in 95% of the people drinking it and someone asked you "What is your criteria for removing diet coke from the shelves of stores aroudn the world", your reply would be "WTF is your problem? It's long been met, I've told you I wanted it gone already. It gives cancer to 95% of the people drinking it. Go ask the one guy who says we shouldn't take it off the shelves!"

Except that the tourney scene changes. Your analogy would be better stated like this:

"What if you found out that drinking Diet Coke a few months ago gave cancer, and then they changed the formula, but because the old one gave people cancer the critics ignored people asking why the new one, which was potentially different, couldn't be put back on the shelves."

Here are the issues with your argument, OS:

- Your criteria is invisible, thus nobody can effectively debate it
- Known criteria for character bans says MK should not be

The first one is the biggest problem. As per your usual standard, you are pushing for a change in the metagame with 'data to back it up' without actually ever posting any of it for the rest of us to see.

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

- Known criteria for character bans says MK should not be

Actually most communities deal with character bans on a case-by-case basis and there isn't really a "set criteria." In most cases, it's something like:

"He's too good" or something similar
and after a lot of arguing
"K we'll ban it."

What if I told you Sirlin himself advocates an MK ban?

 

[Overswarm]

OS, I don't see how this is loaded, other than that it already seems obvious that you are trying to ban MK because he is dominant... and we all know that is the wrong answer

It seems less like a "loaded question" and more like you already know the answer and how conflicting your viewpoint is, but you want to ignore that.

Well, go ahead and answer then. Do you beat your wife or kill your neighbor?

What if I told you Sirlin himself advocates an MK ban?

He does.

We checked.

We just don't care.

 

[Delvro]

Stop brainwashing us, OS


ignorance is strength
war is peace
freedom is slavery

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

He does.

We checked.

We just don't care.

I'd think we would, given he's the guy that wrote the book everyone is basing their criteria on.

 

[fkacyan]

Actually most communities deal with character bans on a case-by-case basis and there isn't really a "set criteria." In most cases, it's something like:

"He's too good" or something similar
and after a lot of arguing
"K we'll ban it."

What if I told you Sirlin himself advocates an MK ban?

I said 'known criteria.' Not set. As in going by previous, well-known and documented examples.

I ignore the Pokemon community entirely, because they are trigger-happy ban freaks for the most part.

 

[CRASHiC]

Wait, did we seriously check?

I ignore the Pokemon community entirely, because they are trigger-happy ban freaks for the most part

No they aren't. No more than we are.

Banning items=banning double team

 

[Supermodel From Paris]

I said 'known criteria.' Not set. As in going by previous, well-known and documented examples.

I ignore the Pokemon community entirely, because they are trigger-happy ban freaks for the most part.

1. I addressed that.
2. Sirlin is part of the Pokemon community?

Wait, did we seriously check?

Yes.

 

[MetalMusicMan]

Well, go ahead and answer then. Do you beat your wife or kill your neighbor?

Hoohah, but you see, my wife is my neighbor!!!

/rim shot


Seriously though... your example of a loaded question is not in any way the same thing. He isn't presenting you with a loaded or trick question, he's merely making obvious the short coming of your stance here.

It is obvious that you want to ban MK because he is dominant. It is obvious that you believe that dominance = bannable. Your entire argument rests on that point and you have made it time and time again.

He does.

We checked.

We just don't care.

Where is this listed? The last I checked, Thinkaman talked to him at GDC and he had no stance on the issue but "assumed based on his limited knowledge of the game that he should not be banned".

I'm pretty sure you're making this up and are just as uninformed on this as you were on Akuma's status as a cheat code character.


If Sirlin has made some sort of official stance against MK, then I am not aware of it.

 

[Omni]

Well, go ahead and answer then. Do you beat your wife or kill your neighbor?

I beat my wife when she acts up.
I kill my neighbor when he comes to my house with a gun.

The first point isn't a question.

The second point isn't a hard question to answer. One or the other, both, or neither and why.

Stop making excuses and making things more difficult than they need to be.

Your turn. Unless you wanna play...

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

people have tried this on me many times and all got 2-3 usually 3 stocked. Some answer


Overswarm, Ally should not have MK next to his name at all. You listed Judge as losing to Ksizl then put (MK) when he should be put Lucario because Ksizls MK lost then Lucario won 2 games in a row to win the set. You're extremely biased and constantly feeding these people extremely biased data. You concentrate on only tourneys that benefit what you have to say and ignore everything else even if and when most tourneys don't abide like this (ESPECIALLY when ADHD/Ally dominate EC while DEHF dominates the WC), then you do not even present the data fairly, but instead you present them in the most biased fashion possible, exaggerating and even lying as you see fit / as you need to. It's no wonder everyone is brainwashed now.

Red Ryu - I guess I did say that then, but I changed my mind now because there are too many people now that concentrated on one character and got really good such as ADHD and Ally and Larry and a bunch of others, and having for me to restart from scratch while they don't is not fair at all especially when I'm the only MK truely "dominating" and I'm not even dominating at all.

edit - gtg

I'm glad you noticed the bolded.

I commented on this before but it got buried in this thread.

I guess maybe I shouldn't have comment on an interview you did a while back, my apologies for that.

 

[fkacyan]

1. I addressed that.
2. Sirlin is part of the Pokemon community?

1. There are only a select few bans of this nature in games, so if I missed one where there was debate and disagreement to the level of this one, link me so I may become informed.
2. When did myself, or anti-ban for that matter, state that we gave a **** about Sirlin?

I think you're confusing something here. My criteria is based on logic. It goes as follows:

- Is the character really good? -> Do they win a lot? -> Are they the only character that wins / does well? -> How many other characters can win / do well? If N>X, where X is 1/10 cast, character is not banworthy.

Note that 'doing well' for me entails money at regionals and like top 16 at nationals.

We've seen MK, Diddy, Snake, ICs, Falco, GaW, Lucario, just off the top of my head, in positions listed above. 7 / 37 = ~1/5 the cast is viable by these standards, thus I do not vote for a ban.

Stop assuming the counterargument to mine, and other anti-ban arguments, is throwing Sirlin in our face.

 

[Tien2500]

OS, I don't see how this is loaded, other than that it already seems obvious that you are trying to ban MK because he is dominant... and we all know that is the wrong answer

It seems less like a "loaded question" and more like you already know the answer and how conflicting your viewpoint is, but you want to ignore that.

It was a loaded question because Omni limited him to two replies and already addressed each one...

But as has been said this is a philosophy question. As much as people seem to try to deny this Smash Brothers is a game. If the game becomes unfun then people stop playing. Perhaps these people are just scrubs but regardless of whether they are scrubs or if they play to win their money and presence is needed at tournaments.

So ultimately I think this matter comes down to what is fun (or if you want to use a less loaded word enjoyability) and that isn't something that can be easily defined and is not something we have tried to address yet.

 

[Zankoku]

So wait, Overswarm wants MK banned for a reason other than being broken or dominant?

 

[Tien2500]

So wait, Overswarm wants MK banned for a reason other than being broken or dominant?

Probably not but regardless the question came with a response for each of the answers. If that isn't loaded I don't know what is.

 

[Delvro]

It was a loaded question because Omni limited him to two replies and already addressed each one...

But as has been said this is a philosophy question. As much as people seem to try to deny this Smash Brothers is a game. If the game becomes unfun then people stop playing. Perhaps these people are just scrubs but regardless of whether they are scrubs or if they play to win their money and presence is needed at tournaments.

So ultimately I think this matter comes down to what is fun (or if you want to use a less loaded word enjoyability) and that isn't something that can be easily defined and is not something we have tried to address yet.

This is very true.