Official Stage Legality Discussion

[bobson]

I don't think I'll ever understand the logic that causes Pirate Ship to be flagged as a "good" stage.

It's because it doesn't cause the "omg this stage is lame ban it" reflex upon first glance like Port Town.

Congratulations on finally backing up your point, Thio! It's caused me to rethink my stance on Pirate Ship. I'm not convinced that it's as unbeatable as you say, but the likelihood of it causing the timer to always run out makes it a legitimate concern.

 

[fkacyan]

Congratulations on finally backing up your point, Thio! It's caused me to rethink my stance on Pirate Ship. I'm not convinced that it's as unbeatable as you say, but the likelihood of it causing the timer to always run out makes it a legitimate concern.

Toon Link is even worse than GaW because you can't punish him from above - He'll just uair, and that thing lasts disgustingly long.

 

[Nidtendofreak]

Courtesy of AA from more than a while ago!

This is even more refined now. I think this video helped get the stage banned on the whole to begin with, though I'm not sure. It's been a while since that can of worms.

A video of one of the best characters at a stage VS one of the worse characters at a stage =/= good proof as to the staging being bad for tournament play. Particularly over wifi. That would be like showing a Falco VS Link match at Jungle Japes over wifi, and claiming it should be banned based on that.

Toon Link is punishable from above, just not very easily. I can already think of a few moves with Ike that can do so. Counter, Eruption, Dair (longer hitbox), heck moving to the side and using fair should work, they have the same aerial movement speed after all.

Anyone with better movement speed in the air can also just go to the side of him and hit him just before hitting the water.

Or drop projectiles on him (Link, Peach, etc)


All that I'm seeing is that Pirate Ship is a good CP stage. Which, of course, you can always stage strike if your character is THAT bad there.

And again: you can not water camp forever. The wind doesn't allow that. And in that video, AA got nailed with cannonballs because he was in the water.

 

[Kamikaze*]

why is distant planet legal anywhere?

Why is japes/green grrens/norfair/RC legal anywhere, lol.

 

[Linkshot]

That Falco was absolutely terrible.

 

[bobson]

And again: you can not water camp forever. The wind doesn't allow that. And in that video, AA got nailed with cannonballs because he was in the water.

The wind shows up for about twenty seconds until you can camp again, and the decreased gravity as it falls back makes it easy to camp in the air until the water is back, too. And, before you mention it, drowning is trivial to avoid while still camping.

 

[deepseadiva]

Pirate Ship allows for some pretty stupid water camping.

My only conflict with that is if that's worth banning a stage for?

I mean, I've witnessed it first hand. There's a player here in my region who's entire strategy after losing the first match was to counterpick Pirate Ship as Ness. They don't even play Ness.

Get the percent advantage, then spam PK Thunder from afar, and spike them from up close. It was nearly fool-proof.

I did manage to get a ship spike as a Peach with Jesuswalking - but then he ran behind the ship. Turnips didn't help much due to them being slower then PK Thunder to both pull and hit with. The rock and the tornado merely gave me a break from the situation.

I've only encountered it once myself, so I'm open to ideas to "beat it", but it really is stupid.

 

[AvaricePanda]

Why is japes/green grrens/norfair/RC legal anywhere, lol.

Why is Green Greens legal anywhere?

In order of CP to banned-ness, it'd be
RC
Norfair
Japes
Greens.

Why would anyone ban RC? Just because the stage is moving doesn't mean it's banworthy at all. There aren't any outside elements from the stage that kill you, and navigating around the moving stage is quite simple if you aren't stupid.

 

[bobson]

I present the:
No Johns Competitive Stage List
This stage list runs off of the philosophy that stages have no reason to be excepted from the ban philosophy followed with everything else; a ban is a last resort and only warranted when leaving the offender allowed would destroy competitive play. A stage being annoying to play on is not a valid ban criterion.

Reasons a stage should be banned:

1. The stage makes one (or a very small amount) character or strategy overwhelmingly powerful so as to devolve the game into a competition of who can abuse said character or strategy the best.
2. The stage promotes camping in such a way that the timer will run out nearly 100% of the time. This restriction is primarily called because of tournament time constraints; tournaments do not have an infinite amount of time, and all matches cannot realistically be allowed to take the full eight minutes.
3. The stage functions in such a way that a fair, competitive match on it is rendered impossible.


STARTERS

Smashville
Battlefield
Final Destination
Yoshi's Island (Brawl)

Starters are intended to have as little effect on the outcome of the match as possible. All stages listed here should be self-explanatory.
I'm a fan of a conservative starter list so as to preserve the most neutrality possible in the first match, but it can be argued that Lylat Cruise, Delfino Plaza, Pokemon Stadium 1, and Castle Siege have a small enough effect on the match that they can be allowed as starters.


COUNTERPICKS

Delfino Plaza
Delfino Plaza has many areas with walls, water and walk-offs which have enough effect on the match to not be allowed as a starter, but certainly not enough to be banned.

Norfair
Norfair is a hate-it-or-love-it stage and a popular counterpick in tournaments where it's allowed. The hazards are trival to avoid, and its multiple edges have yet to create any unstoppable strategies. Counterpick.

Frigate Orpheon
The stage flipping mechanic and the lack of a ledge on the right side of the first formation make this a counterpick.

Halberd
The way the main platform works favors some characters more than others enough so that this stage becomes a counterpick instead of a starter.

Lylat Cruise
Lylat Cruise's shifting ground and whoops-there-goes-your-stock ledges make it a counterpick.

Pokemon Stadium 2
This stage is banned in a lot of tournaments and I still don't know why. The one offender on this stage is the wind transformation, and it doesn't last long enough to force a stall-out on the stage. Counterpick.

Port Town Aero Drive
The cars on this stage are very strong, but also very easy to see coming. Aside from the cars, the lack of ledges on the main platform puts characters with poor recoveries at a disadvantage, but not nearly enough to be worthy of banning.

Castle Siege
The only thing stopping this stage from being a starter is the second section's walkoff blastzones.

Distant Planet
I have no idea why this stage was ever considered for a ban. Do people just hate Ai no Uta that much? The walkoff is easily avoidable and often unusable due to the rain, and the only thing that you could call a hazard is one of the most glaringly obvious and incredibly easy to avoid hazards in the game. This stage is the definition of a counterpick.

Skyworld
Skyworld's janky platform setup effectively puts any character lacking a decent recovery at a disadvantage, but the majority of Brawl characters do have decent recoveries. Spiking people through the bottom is not an unbeatable strategy, either, nor is it powerful enough to upset the balance of the game enough for this to be banned. Counterpick.

Pictochat
The only valid concern with this stage is the few transformations where camping/stalling is heavily promoted, and they don't last nearly long enough for this to be a problem. Counterpick.

Yoshi's Island (Melee)
The permanent looming threat of getting chaingrabbed off the right side almost led this stage to be banned, but attacking the boxes in the middle and staying on the left mitigates it enough to be allowed as a counterpick.

Jungle Japes
The campiness if Jungle Japes has long been a point of contention, but it fails to reach the level of violating reason 2. The Klap Traps and quickly-moving water offer a unique offstage game that isn't offered elsewhere. Counterpick.

Onett
The cars appear often enough for wall infinites to become merely a good strategy rather than an overwhelmingly powerful one, and getting chained off the sides is fairly easy to avoid given the layout of the stage. Counterpick.

Rainbow Cruise
Rainbow Cruise is a stage that largely favors characters with a strong aerial game, but not to the point of overpowering them. The walkoffs and wall infinites are avoidable and don't last too long, and camping is largely a non-issue. Counterpick.

Green Greens
Green Greens' one main problem is the possibility of wall infinites that are opened up by the blocks falling on either side. The ability to keep the blocks destroyed, though, keeps it from becoming an overwhelming strategy. The small stage boundaries and unique layout lead it to be a counterpick.

Brinstar
So far, Brinstar's lava and unique stage layout hasn't made for any overpowered strategies, and camping here is fairly difficult due to its small size. Counterpick.

Pokemon Stadium
Pokemon Stadium's walls and occasional campy transformations make it a counterpick.

Rumble Falls
Ah, Rumble Falls. This stage is banned nearly universally because the way the stage functions immediately puts off most of the community, but I believe it's worth a second look to see if it actually merits banning or not. The few walkoffs and walls it has don't last long enough for chaingrabbing to become overpowered, and it serves as a strong counterpick against characters with a strong ground game like Snake and King Dedede. There is one issue which calls for attention, however: the ease with which the timer can be stalled out. In my own testing of this stage, I've seen that matches here typically take longer due to the forced aerial game and tendency for players to wait until the stage layout favors them before approaching. To my knowledge, though, no major tournaments have allowed this stage, so there's little evidence of how this would affect a tournament atmosphere. This stage list goes by "innocent until proven guilty"; as such, Rumble Falls is a counterpick pending further evidence.

Corneria
The permanent wall here offers immediate concerns, but it is avoidable and camping it in the hopes of getting an infinite puts you at the risk of being hit outside of the alarmingly close blast zones on that side. There is another issue, though, involving how powerful Mr. Game & Watch is here. His bucket can be freely filled here with powerful lasers, giving him a quick one-hit KO which he can abuse whenever he so chooses. Although this could potentially break reason 1, I haven't seen enough tournament evidence to prove whether or not Mr. Game & Watch is too powerful here. Counterpick pending further evidence.

Big Blue
This stage is an instant ban for many due to its constantly changing layout, instant death road and frankly uncomfortable playstyle, but I don't see why any of those factors merit a ban. This stage forces a change in playstyle from the usual stages, but there are no largely dominant techniques here thus far. Stalling is a concern; the stage has large blastzones, and hopping from object to object until the timer runs out isn't totally unrealistic. Despite this, the amount of high-level data on this stage ranges from very very small to none, so nothing has been proven. Counterpick pending further evidence.

Pirate Ship
Pirate Ship is notable for its strong hazards and being the only stage with a distinct water game, but neither of those are strictly bad things. The tendency for water camping to run out the timer, however, brings this stage under violation of reason 2... perhaps. The extents of all the characters' water strategies and counters against them are still largely unexplored, and major tournament data is fairly scarce. To be a counterpick or banned pending a TO's discretion or further evidence.

Luigi's Mansion
A controversial stage. Luigi's Mansion skirts the edges of reason 2, combining large blastzones, a pseudo cave of immortality, projectile-stopping pillars and elements of circle camping into a stage where the timer can be run out very easily. It's not overwhelming enough for stalling to be the only strategy, though; the mansion can be destroyed, at which point the players will run out of places to run, and the stage itself offers a unique dynamic that other allowed stages do not. This stage can be allowed as a counterpick or banned pending a TO's discretion or the attendance of Plank.

Green Hill Zone
Green Hill Zone flirts with reasons 1 and 2 like a cute checkout girl, but it tries to flirt with them both at the same time and ends up sending some very confused messages. Chaingrabbing is very powerful here, except when the checkpoint is up, at which point camping behind it and spamming projectiles becomes the winning strategy. Both the stalling potential of checkpoint camping and the killing potential of chaingrab spamming counteract eachother and make for a very weird match where stocks can be lost with one move yet most of the time is spent camping. Given this weird dynamic, this stage can be allowed or banned pending a TO's discretion.


BANNED

Mushroomy Kingdom 1-1 and 1-2
Both of these stages exhibit the same flaw; chaingrabbing and wall infinites are the strategy here, violating reason 1.

Mario Circuit
The winner is King Dedede. It is nearly impossible to avoid getting chaingrabbed out of the stage, breaking reason 1.

Bridge of Eldin
See Mario Circuit. In addition, matches almost never finish on this stage without the timer running out.

Spear Pillar
Spear Pillar's layout almost forces circle camping in a competitive environment. Banned under reason 2.

WarioWare, Inc.
WarioWare is damned by its one flaw of having randomly-picked awards for completing the microgames, bringing the possibility of one player getting a star while the other gets a megamushroom, despite both of them having done the exact same thing. This is the only stage banned by reason 3.

New Pork City
This stage is intensely circle-campy and no one ever dies here. Banned under reason 2.

Summit
See Spear Pillar.

75M
See New Pork City.

Mario Bros.
On this stage, you can either fling hazards at your opponent, chaingrab them out of the screen or lose. Banned under reason 1.

Flat Zone 2
See Mario Circuit.

Hanenbrow
See Spear Pillar.

Shadow Moses Island
See Mushroomy Kingdom.

Hyrule Temple
See New Pork City.



Post your objections and I'll probably consider them briefly before writing them off and calling you a scrub. This is a work in progress and needs input from someone other than myself.

 

[Linkshot]

Bobson, Mario Bros. is banned due to degenerative gameplay: Anybody can win, but the goal isn't to damage your opponent and then Smash them off stage anymore.

Your new goal is to stun baddies and chuck them at your opponent for instant kills. Epic ban.

 

[buenob]

fail list...

/troll

it's nice to see someone who just says what they like instead of just attacking others, but there's a lot in there to dispute... I've thoroughly tested bramble falls and it is _not_ a competitive level... MK wins on skyworld with tornado without even trying... there's so many

I think that if that's what people want to play, and other people will play with them with that set of rules, that's awesome and people should keep doing what they like but, at the same time, eventually, it'll get to a point where a lot of the maps will be overrun by specific tactics, and you'll be forced to ban them...

 

[Linkshot]

Yes, but eventual banning is what we want, if they are to be banned at all.

They're currently innocent, and need to be proven guilty first.

 

[bobson]

Your new goal is to stun baddies and chuck them at your opponent for instant kills. Epic ban.

I'm thinking this would fall under rule 1 if anything, with baddy-flinging being the overwhelming strategy. I'll edit its description.

 

[Linkshot]

75m isn't just circle camping. Zelda can successfully camp in the bottom right and very few can approach her, none easily.

She is protected by Din's Fire, roaming fireballs, bouncing jacks, and Nayru's Love.

 

[deepseadiva]

75m isn't just circle camping. Zelda can successfully camp in the bottom right and very few can approach her, none easily.

She is protected by Din's Fire, roaming fireballs, bouncing jacks, and Nayru's Love.

That's still just good camping with a positional advantage...

We can't ban because of camping.

 

[fkacyan]

That's still just good camping with a positional advantage...

We can't ban because of camping.

When the only viable method of play becomes camping, play degenerates. Thus, camping is a reason to ban only when the stage not only encourages camping but eliminates non-camping play.

 

[Kamikaze*]

I present the:
No Johns Competitive Stage List

RUMBLE FALLS?

You do know that crack is bad for you, right?

 

[Linkshot]

I support Rumble Falls, thank you very much. It is an okay stage due to Brawl's floatiness. The hazards don't move, and are completely predictable. It's like a completely vertical Rainbow Cruise.

 

[Kamikaze*]

I support Rumble Falls, thank you very much. It is an okay stage due to Brawl's floatiness. The hazards don't move, and are completely predictable. It's like a completely vertical Rainbow Cruise.

<-----------------You and bobson.

That is all. also, rc should be banned

 

[Linkshot]

If Bobson and I were able to play a match on Rumble Falls, we'd show you it's CP worthy.

 

[fkacyan]

If Bobson and I were able to play a match on Rumble Falls, we'd show you it's CP worthy.

If me and Spam could play a match on Rumble Falls, we'd show you it's ban-worthy.

See what I did there?

 

[AvaricePanda]

Or instead of unsupported claims, you could actually back up what you're saying.

Brumble Falls doesn't help support the meta-game or anything involved with it.. At least other debatable stages like Norfair and other moving stages like RC actually compliment and hinder certain styles of play without things that make it so only one character wins on the stage.

Brumble Falls is a vertically moving stage that moves through the ENTIRE cycle, not only that, but it speeds up at arbitrary points, so a really weak spike that normally wouldn't come close to killing you does. It has stupid spikes that, if touched, mean instant death (what's more fun than dying because you got hit or thrown into a spike at 15?). Oh yeah, the walk off ledges that are there almost the entire stage length don't help either. Falco, D3, ICs, Yoshi, and really anyone with a walking chain-grab wins.

Aside for those arbitrary, unnecessary hazards and walk-off ledges, the stage really does nothing for different characters. At least with RC, there's a "normal" stage part, a vertically moving part, and a horizontally moving part. If you're playing someone with a walking CG, you just space well for like 30 seconds out of two minutes and you're safe. With Bramble, the stage moves vertically the entire time and speeds up randomly, so someone could viably be safe and trying to recover (like if they were using Diddy's UPB where you have to charge, or something), but they get lolscrewed by the stage.

tl;dr: Other than a ridiculous advantage to characters with walk-off CGs, the stage offers nothing new, different, or advantageous to any characters. People would have to play here trying to avoid getting into stupid situations because of the stage (constantly having to worry about Marth's fsmash at like 10% when you're anywhere other than the center?). There's no point of having this stage as a CP. It isn't CP-worthy at all, and even if it was, it provides nothing new that Rainbow Cruise doesn't.

Rumble falls should DEFINITELY be banned.

 

[MysticKenji]

I'd like to point out that you can tech the death spike and there's only one true walk-off.

 

[Kamikaze*]

I'd like to point out that you can tech the death spike and there's only one true walk-off.

Doesn't Matter. You still focus on the stage too much.

 

[Ryusuta]

I agree. Rumble Falls is a HORRIBLE stage all-around. Even Temple is a more playable stage than that.

 

[Linkshot]

Maybe -you- focus on the stage too much, but people that KNOW the stage can focus on their opponent and subconsciously avoid death.

 

[deepseadiva]

Rumble falls should DEFINITELY be banned.

Wha? Some of your points are kinda crazy.

I mean, Brumble Falls brings nothing to the metagame? It's an additional Rainbow Cruise, with crazy little nooks and funnels and switches and platforms and crates and switches and hazards. Brumble falls would bring tons of options as a counterpick.

The walkoffs? They're temporary. Like on Delfino. There's lots of them, but they're temporary.

The speed? It gives you a huge warning before it does anything.

The only thing I'd consider an argument would be the one spike that has enormous knockback in the beginning of the stage. But even then, that could be argued to be super obvious after playing once.

 

[Linkshot]

I could hug you Meno :3

The only, and I mean ONLY walkoff is the very beginning bottom section. The rest look like walkoffs but actually aren't.

 

[bobson]

75m isn't just circle camping. Zelda can successfully camp in the bottom right and very few can approach her, none easily.

She is protected by Din's Fire, roaming fireballs, bouncing jacks, and Nayru's Love.

A lot of aerials go through Din's Fire, and the jacks/fireballs are situational.
I'd have to see it in action.

Brumble Falls doesn't help support the meta-game or anything involved with it..

Even if this was true, we don't ban for not helping the metagame.

Brumble Falls is a vertically moving stage that moves through the ENTIRE cycle, not only that, but it speeds up at arbitrary points, so a really weak spike that normally wouldn't come close to killing you does. It has stupid spikes that, if touched, mean instant death (what's more fun than dying because you got hit or thrown into a spike at 15?). Oh yeah, the walk off ledges that are there almost the entire stage length don't help either. Falco, D3, ICs, Yoshi, and really anyone with a walking chain-grab wins.

Don't get spiked or knocked into the spikes, then.
The walkoffs on Rumble Falls are there for a shorter period of time than they are on Rainbow Cruise, and there are just as many platforms to get around them when they are.

tl;dr: Other than a ridiculous advantage to characters with walk-off CGs,

Wrong.

the stage offers nothing new, different, or advantageous to any characters.

Also wrong.

People would have to play here trying to avoid getting into stupid situations because of the stage (constantly having to worry about Marth's fsmash at like 10% when you're anywhere other than the center?).

I have to avoid getting gimped by Final Destination's ledges. Ban?


I'm going to say this again, because I can already foresee a thousand posts like this:
This stage list runs off of the philosophy that stages have no reason to be excepted from the ban philosophy followed with everything else; a ban is a last resort and only warranted when leaving the offender allowed would destroy competitive play. A stage being annoying to play on is not a valid ban criterion.
Consider banning a stage on the same level as banning a character.


And it's Rumble Falls, ****it.

I could hug you Meno :3

The only, and I mean ONLY walkoff is the very beginning bottom section. The rest look like walkoffs but actually aren't.

Typically an fthrow will kill by the time you get chained to the end of those, though, because the blastzone is so close.

 

[Linkshot]

I'd like to point this out about Rainbow Cruise. The walkoffs can't be chaingrab-to-death'd. The horizontally moving stage is enough to put too much space between the characters even for D3.

CONTINUE RUMBLE FALLS DISCUSSION

 

[deepseadiva]

Brumble Brumble Brumble

 

[fkacyan]

Maybe -you- focus on the stage too much, but people that KNOW the stage can focus on their opponent and subconsciously avoid death.

I'd pretty much just run away until I could do something ******** using the stage, like combo in and out of the spike, use the walls and choke points, etc.

The match would become stage abuse for anybody at a decent level of play very quickly.

 

[Linkshot]

Falco and D3 abuse FD. We should ban that, then.

 

[fkacyan]

Falco and D3 abuse FD. We should ban that, then.

The difference between that and Rumble Falls is pretty obvious: One is character-based, and one is player-based. FD is a good stage for characters who don't like platforms or who have good ranged games. Rumble Falls doesn't give any character-specific advantages, it just rewards running away until you get through on of the choke points and can force the opponent to get hit or die off the bottom of the screen.

 

[Kamikaze*]

I'd like to point this out about Rainbow Cruise. The walkoffs can't be chaingrab-to-death'd. The horizontally moving stage is enough to put too much space between the characters even for D3.

CONTINUE RUMBLE FALLS DISCUSSION

I'm starting to think that you are just plain horribad at brawl, and suck so fiercely that you depend on stages to aid. Just face the ****ing fact that rumble falls is far too ridiculous of a stage to be allowed in serious competition. Face the fact that neutrals are the best stages to determine skill and always will be. All of your arguments such as "Chaingrabs on fd are just as bad as being thrown into a death spike" are invalid because the character and the player are the only ones doing the damage. Whereas an aid is involved on rumble falls.

 

[fkacyan]

I'm starting to think that you are just plain horribad at brawl, and suck so fiercely that you depend on stages to aid. Just face the ****ing fact that rumble falls is far too ridiculous of a stage to be allowed in serious competition. Face the fact that neutrals are the best stages to determine skill and always will be. All of your arguments such as "Chaingrabs on fd are just as bad as being thrown into a death spike" are invalid because the character and the player are the only ones doing the damage. Whereas an aid is involved on rumble falls.

You're welcome to come to that conclusion (Admittedly, it's hard for me to think otherwise myself at times), but you don't have to say it. And it doesn't help the argument being made, either.

 

[infomon]

CoT4 got criticized heavily for allowing Norfair and Jungle Japes, actually. They also allowed PS2 but nobody played on it, ever.

People can criticize it all they want. Or call for an MK ban, or whatever they fancy that day. It doesn't make it any more correct. If noone plays on PS2 then we certainly don't have any reason to ban it. Clearly noone has any unbeatable tactics on it, since they're not willing to go to the stage to use them. And the stage is only as random as PS1.

This is ironic; in my experience, more scrubs tend to argue for liberal stage lists than non-scrubs.

I think you're confused. A scrub will complain about tactics being "cheap" and call for them to be banned, because they are not learning how to actually deal with them effectively. They would rather play a version of the game twisted around their own rules of what they like and dislike, rather than getting better at playing the game the way it actually is.

I'm going to be arrogant and presumptuous here. Brawl saw a tragic occurrence; many of the best players came from Melee, dislike the ways Brawl is not like Melee, and john all day about these "overpowered strategies" that they've barely put in the time learning to deal with. Because they're excellent players, they can't conceive that maybe it takes more than 5 minutes to come to a conclusion about a stage or a tactic. Many people always disliked chaingrabs because "it's not how smash should be" so they want them banned, before they even know how they work or how to deal with them. The same is happening for planking. And apparently now for swimming

It's sad because so much of the ban-happy camp are actually really good players. And some day I might come to agree with them, that many of these tactics will in fact become degenerate. But right now is way too early; there is no proof. Just like there's no proof that MK is ban-worthy broken, there's no proof that PS2 is degenerate, there's no proof that planking on Norfair is unstoppable. Please provide evidence.

Courtesy of AA from more than a while ago!

This is even more refined now. I think this video helped get the stage banned on the whole to begin with, though I'm not sure. It's been a while since that can of worms.

Hurray, evidence! Thank you. Now we can start discussing whether or not this strategy is overpowered.
1. This isn't a TLink. So at the very least there's some class of characters for whom swimming may even be a useful strategy.
2. The G&W got punished hard in his first stock, because it turns out the bomb segment of the stage is one of the many ways the stage makes it difficult to water-plank all day.
3. That Falco played horrible. He kept jumping in the water recklessly. It's clear that he had no idea how to deal with this scenario; it was perhaps the first time the strategy has been used against him? It would be laughable to call that as evidence of "brokenness".

RUMBLE FALLS?

Stop trolling, and/or provide any argument ever. I'm going to start reporting your posts because they contribute nothing to this thread, and are thus spam.

Rumble Falls doesn't give any character-specific advantages

That's not exactly true. Every stage does this. But I would expect that RF does eventually reduce to degenerate strategies, perhaps with just a few characters.

 

[deepseadiva]

I'm starting to think that you are just plain horribad at brawl, and suck so fiercely that you depend on stages to aid.

Lol. Go away small creature.

The difference between that and Rumble Falls is pretty obvious: One is character-based, and one is player-based. FD is a good stage for characters who don't like platforms or who have good ranged games. Rumble Falls doesn't give any character-specific advantages, it just rewards running away until you get through on of the choke points and can force the opponent to get hit or die off the bottom of the screen.

You're explanation of character-based and player-based differences is flawed. I can say the same thing by just switching the two stages.

Rumble Falls is a good stage for characters who don't like platforms or who have good ranged games. FD doesn't give any character-specific advantages, it just rewards running away until you get through on of the choke points to the end of the stage and can force the opponent to get hit or die off the bottom of the screen.

And how exactly do you "force the opponent to get hit or die off the bottom of the screen"?

By outplaying them?

 

[AvaricePanda]

I say that Rumble Falls adds nothing to the meta-game not as a "this is why we should ban it" point, but as a point that there's already a stage somewhat like it. Rainbow Cruise is also a moving stage, but unlike Rumble Falls, you don't have to constantly be worrying about the stage. You also didn't comment on my statement of the whole, "It's always vertically moving, speeds up randomly, and weak spikes can kill you" thing.

Your mind on Rumble Falls is very much involved with the stage rather than your opponent. And as Thio said, Rumble doesn't give any character specific advantages, it just makes all people think too much on the stage they're playing. And don't just say, "Wrong" to my statement about the stage providing nothing new and advantageous to different characters, actually back up your claims.

Don't weight banning stages and banning characters as the same thing. They're completely different. We choose neutral stages that are exactly that; neutral. Counterpick stages are a little different and provide benefits and disadvantageous to a character (RC, Orpheon, Halberd, Castle Siege, etc.,) but they should never be to the point where there's too much going on (Rumble Falls, WarioWare, Spear Pillar) or walk-offs or walls put some characters at unwinnable advantages (Shadow Moses, Eldin). The purpose of counterpicks isn't to completely engage players in the stage or mask the skill of the two people because of the stage.

Saying "Don't run into the spikes" and "Work around the stage" are pretty invalid arguments. I could always say "Don't get hit by the Pokemon's attacks in Spear Pillar," or "Don't get hit by the minigames and avoid the guy with the Starman on WarioWare." Whether or not you have the ability to get around a stage's obstacles doesn't matter too much on a stage's place in the list. It's whether or not, during a high-level of play with money on the line, your mind is too focused on the stage every 5 seconds to actually fight your opponent without horridly abusing said stage.

 

[fkacyan]

And how exactly do you "force the opponent to get hit or die off the bottom of the screen"?

There are several points at Rumble Falls where there's only one or two ways to go up. If I get up there first, you're getting punished. Why bother fighting you the rest of the time? I'll just make sure I'm always higher and get through said choke points first.