Official Standard Custom Moveset Project Initial Release

[SyphoV2]

If I understand this topic correctly, these finalized sets (that are under construction) are going to be the official sets used for Evo?

 

[Splash Damage]

Hello everyone.

For the past month or so, @SmashCapps, @newbzoors and myself have been working on an encyclopedia for the Custom Move Project that would be printable for TO's to bring to venues. The encyclopedia would have every move's effect and how they are different to their original move, as well as more info about customs to add later. We have been working on a comprehensive version as well as a "printer-friendly" version, if anybody wanted a hard copy to keep for themselves or to place next to their set-ups at tourneys.

However, I face a couple dilemmas and was wondering if anybody would be interested in helping out.

• Typing up descriptions of every move: To avoid plagiarism, newbzoors and I watch footage and test customs ourselves, so we can properly describe each move without copying straight from wikis or others. Although it is a ton of typing (between the two of us, we have only done 21 out of the 52 playable character), so if anyone could help us typing, we could be finished much more quickly.
• Extra Info: We had originally planned to talk about the top 3 loadouts of each character with members of the community, so they could provide a small background on "what makes this build tick/what kind of MU's do they cover". However, with the loadouts changing so fast, keeping them up to date could be a struggle. I was wondering if anyone had a suggestion on what else you'd like to see in this compendium of information. Perhaps feedback on what makes each move valuable (if they need an explanation, like for DK's "Hot Slap")? Rankings of each move? I'm curious as to what kind of info people would like to see. Any feedback would be awesome!

We are currently working of having the explanations done by the beginning of April, to give people the chance to print it out before EVO, though with a couple more helpers, I feel we could be finished much sooner. Any help would be very much appreciated! If you'd like to help, feel free to respond to this or send me a PM, and I'll get you all hooked up with Skype info and where we are working on it!

If any help is needed, I have extensive experience with Little Mac and Shulk that I could type some things up for if you'd like.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Do we actually need to post the finalized lists here? I...wasn't prepared to dredge through our topic and actually make a definitive list.

 

[Splash Damage]

Do we actually need to post the finalized lists here? I...wasn't prepared to dredge through our topic and actually make a definitive list.

I'm sure a quick Strawpoll and some extra discussion could solve the problem.

 

[GeneralLedge]

I think AA may be taking a few days after the 'deadline' to sleuth all the topics and figure out the priority to put them in. I don't want to put words in his mouth, though.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

I think AA may be taking a few days after the 'deadline' to sleuth all the topics and figure out the priority to put them in. I don't want to put words in his mouth, though.

We have our eyes on all 51 topics; there's no need to cross-post stuff from those topics here. You are correct.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Oh goody. I did take a moment to review some of the more recent posts and post my own thoughts on a possible list. But it's good to know I don't have to be responsible for finalizing our list.

 

[thehard]

Just thinking out loud here, but seeing as how it looks like EVO will have no custom bans, it would be cool to have some routine "Better Know a Custom Move!" threads designed to collect information on the strong ones (Kong Cyclone, Luma Warp, Timber Counter etc.) and hash out how best to counter/play around them.

 

[Splash Damage]

Just thinking out loud here, but seeing as how it looks like EVO will have no custom bans, it would be cool to have some routine "Better Know a Custom Move!" threads designed to collect information on the strong ones (Kong Cyclone, Luma Warp, Timber Counter etc.) and hash out how best to counter/play around them.

No better way to make it happen than to taake the initiative yourself; I'm sure plenty of people would frequent the threads to discuss way to beat them together if you made them. I know I would.

 

[thehard]

No better way to make it happen than to taake the initiative yourself; I'm sure plenty of people would frequent the threads to discuss way to beat them together if you made them. I know I would.

Ugh, but I've already had such a long day of effortlessly tweeting TOs to change their timers

Yeah, once EVO is all locked in I'll definitely make those and spread them around reddit/Smashboards/twitter

 

[SyphoV2]

If I understand this topic correctly, these finalized sets (that are under construction) are going to be the official sets used for Evo?

Just want to clarify on this. These sets will be sent to the Evo organizers and made official for the tournament? When is the deadline? I apologize for not combing through the topic in advance.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Just want to clarify on this. These sets will be sent to the Evo organizers and made official for the tournament? When is the deadline? I apologize for not combing through the topic in advance.

Yes. EVO's hard deadline is March 27, no exceptions. AA wants to start wrapping this up starting tomorrow, so he'll have 10 days grace to get it all neatly sorted and handle any last-minute emergencies.

 

[SyphoV2]

Yes. EVO's hard deadline is March 27, no exceptions. AA wants to start wrapping this up starting tomorrow, so he'll have 10 days grace to get it all neatly sorted and handle any last-minute emergencies.

Awesome, thank you. I was curious because I just finished unlocking the last of the custom moves last night and want to practice with the official sets.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Yeah, the process is that public discussion "finishes" tomorrow (like you can keep discussing if you want, but no guarantee any of us internally will read it after tomorrow). We'll probably have to take a few days to go through and process everything, should have something posted around this weekend which will comfortably beat the EVO deadline... unless something comes up in which case, well, something will have come up and we have a buffer for that so we're still quite safe to hit our March 27 deadline.

 

[warriorman222]

The "deadline" is tommorow. How many boards are actually done?

 

[Nintendrone]

The board seems to be good. Pretty much all the sets have been agreed upon, and no one has argued the list yet.

 

[Splash Damage]

The "deadline" is tommorow. How many boards are actually done?

The Shulk and Mac boards are finished, Mac having been done for quite a while.

 

[kirbyfan66]

The Kirby boards are just about done. We have a list of sets we think are good, we're just waiting on our moderator to give us that okay, and he's going to be doing that today. So by the end of the day we'll be good.

 

[BigHairyFart]

Team Sheik is also nearly done, with just one set still being in talks.

 

[Quickhero]

Nobody on the Marth boards had objection to this list, it basically covers everything. I posted this a week ago but I'm posting again just to confirm.

Spoiler

3123
3133
3113
1133
1123
3131
1131
1113
3121
2113

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Ampharos pretty much did the work of the D3 boards for us. We're done, I guess.

Smooth Criminal

 

[Jaxas]

Pretty sure the ZSS board is basically done too, just discussing 'filler' sets at this point.

 

[TLMSheikant]

Only 3 Toon Links replied/liked my post but they all seem to like the 10 sets I posted:

2111
2121
2131
2113
2133
2112
2211
2212
2213
3131

Someone mentioned liking 1113. 2113 is basically the same but with better arrows though and I don't know what I would replace tbh.

I wish there were more discussion but a lot of Toon Links seem indifferent about customs .

 

[DunnoBro]

Okay, quick thing about putting sets on via 3ds, updating after already having an older projects sets is HELL. it only lets you take new sets but you need to manually pick what to overwrite to avoid deleting an older legit set.

I think it's worth noting a few ways to help with the 3ds upload process.

1: Change 3DS name Temporarily to "EVO" or similarly titled relevant code so you can put the number AFTER THAT. This makes it easy to know what sets are new/old or shouldn't be deleted. Along with enabling their status as a "new set" that will let them all be uploaded in proper order by just overwriting everything.

This will let them completely overwrite without any room for error in a single go. It takes longer to set up on one 3DS, but saves time in the long run.

This will also help ensure slots #s are in the right ones for local overwriting usage.

2: A changelist per character is pretty needed. Ignore what custom sets stay, just point out new ones and ones that were dropped. (So people know what to delete)

3: Using a 3ds is the absolute ideal method.

All that said, there were 7-11 fully set-up Wii U Units, and the Beta EVO list I was provided was a huge help to many players (Including myself and the grand finalist Average Joe) Things also went fine logistically for the most part, some general player confusion slowed things up but nothing serious.

 

[SoniCraft]

The Villager discussion is pretty much complete. We had a lot of discussion a couple weeks ago, but now it's kind of died off. I made a new list that incorporates everybody's opinions, so hopefully that one will be used.

 

[SyphoV2]

Okay, quick thing about putting sets on via 3ds, updating after already having an older projects sets is HELL. it only lets you take new sets but you need to manually pick what to overwrite to avoid deleting an older legit set.

I think it's worth noting a few ways to help with the 3ds upload process.

1: Change 3DS name Temporarily to "EVO" or similarly titled relevant code so you can put the number AFTER THAT. This makes it easy to know what sets are new/old or shouldn't be deleted. Along with enabling their status as a "new set" that will let them all be uploaded in proper order by just overwriting everything.

This will let them completely overwrite without any room for error in a single go. It takes longer to set up on one 3DS, but saves time in the long run.

This will also help ensure slots #s are in the right ones for local overwriting usage.

2: A changelist per character is pretty needed. Ignore what custom sets stay, just point out new ones and ones that were dropped. (So people know what to delete)

3: Using a 3ds is the absolute ideal method.

All that said, there were 7-11 fully set-up Wii U Units, and the Beta EVO list I was provided was a huge help to many players (Including myself and the grand finalist Average Joe) Things also went fine logistically for the most part, some general player confusion slowed things up but nothing serious.

There's a Beta Evo list? Is this something accessible?

 

[BestTeaMaker]

They're about to create the Beta EVO list.

 

[Ansou]

They're about to create the Beta EVO list.

Not really... The beta list was just something preliminary that was made for Dunnobro to have at Xanadu which was hosted yesterday. By march 27th, the final list will be done.

 

[Davis-Lightheart]

For those who watched the customs tournament yesterday, or the vods, VGBC Tantalus is asking about what people thought of customs on his twitter.

https://twitter.com/TheTantalus/status/578032699673329665

 

[BestTeaMaker]

Wow, Seagull Joe is salty.

 

[Davis-Lightheart]

The biggest problem is that he just doesn't seem to explain himself. He just says they are bad and leaves them at that. The same thing happened in the Competitive Character Impressions thread. @ Seagull Joe can prove me wrong if he'd like though. I just want to hear a logical explanation and have a civilized discussion.

 

[W.A.C.]

Without custom moves, a lot of people consider DK one of the worst characters in the game. Customs make him way more viable but not broken, so of course a DK main is way more likely to make it to grand finals. My recommendation to Seagull Joe is to better learn the matchup. At the most recent Tourney Locator tournament, Denti gave advice at the beginning on how to deal with DK's custom up special. [LINK] Tourney Locator has been experimenting with custom moves for many weeks now, so their frequent players are better used to matchups involving customs.

The metagame is completely different with customs and I don't view that as a bad thing. It inspires way more diversity and options for players and can cause some people to pick up a character they otherwise wouldn't use at a tournament. For example, I never thought I would use King Dedede at a tournament, but did last Friday because I love his custom moves and now he might be my third favorite character in the game entirely because of custom moves. More character diversity is a good thing and it causes players such as myself to use Diddy Kong less often. Worst case scenario, if a custom move proves to be beyond broken and destroys the balance of the game, that specific custom could always get a ban. But that should only be done if it's absolutely necessary.

 

[Raijinken]

Without custom moves, a lot of people consider DK one of the worst characters in the game. Customs make him way more viable but not broken, so of course a DK main is way more likely to make it to grand finals. My recommendation to Seagull Joe is to better learn the matchup. At the most recent Tourney Locator tournament, Denti gave advice at the beginning on how to deal with DK's custom up special. [LINK] Tourney Locator has been experimenting with custom moves for many weeks now, so their frequent players are better used to matchups involving customs.

The metagame is completely different with customs and I don't view that as a bad thing. It inspires way more diversity and options for players and can cause some people to pick up a character they otherwise wouldn't use at a tournament. For example, I never thought I would use King Dedede at a tournament, but did last Friday because I love his custom moves and now he might be my third favorite character in the game entirely because of custom moves. More character diversity is a good thing and it causes players such as myself to use Diddy Kong less often. Worst case scenario, if a custom move proves to be beyond broken and destroys the balance of the game, that specific custom could always get a ban. But that should only be done if it's absolutely necessary.

Pretty much this. And I'd add that pending seeing Mewtwo or any other future characters, nothing indicates that anything will warrant a ban, assuming bans are left up to rational people who ignore mobs of angry people slipping on Timber Counter.

 

[BearUNLV]

As a Mega Man main, here is my list of 10 CMs:
Mega Man
1311
1112
1113
1312
1313
1121
1212
2312
2122
2322

PS
This is Bear from Vegas Smash 4. I am the TO/host/creator of the DVDA Tournament Series. DVDA#8 will be our first DVDA with CMs On.

 

[SyphoV2]

Is it possible for the Beta Evo list to be shared currently, to tide those waiting for the official list?

 

[TheASDF]

Is it possible for the Beta Evo list to be shared currently, to tide those waiting for the official list?

It's barely over a week until it's locked in, just sit tight for a bit.

 

[Seagull Joe]

The biggest problem is that he just doesn't seem to explain himself. He just says they are bad and leaves them at that. The same thing happened in the Competitive Character Impressions thread. @ Seagull Joe can prove me wrong if he'd like though. I just want to hear a logical explanation and have a civilized discussion.

Customs are just dumb. They have similar effects to if items were on. People posted about not seeing and character variety.

NEWS FLASH: MD/VA's best wasn't even there. Not many in my region even use the character.

NEWS FLASH 2: The same top 5 placers got top 5. The only large upset was Average Joe beating people all the way to GF (Including Boss). Average Joe has not once placed into top 5 before the initiation of customs. Having an invincible recovery move that covers large range and sucks you in is worst then spamming brawl 's tornado. At least that was fairly punishable.

NEWS FLASH 3: The players who go to tournaments are not the ones enjoying them. A small percentage (Usually people who place about 13th regularly) are trying to advocate for them. Almost every poster I have seen who likes customs does not attend tournaments. They just watch streams.

NEWS FLASH 4: I wasn't even at this tournament. I watched the brokenness unfold from my apartment. I could've went to the tournament myself and won the whole thing using a custom set of that kills people at 50%-60%. Does that make me feel good doing broken ****? No.

My overall opinion is that customs themselves are inherently overpowered and end up centralizing the metagame. Smash 4 without customs has existed for less then a year. Give the game time to develop. Tournaments are for players to compete with one another. The ones who know the game the best and pick the best options should win. It shouldn't become Smash 4 Minus, which is what I have seen with customs.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

My overall opinion is that customs themselves are inherently overpowered and end up centralizing the metagame. Smash 4 without customs has existed for less then a year. Give the game time to develop. Tournaments are for players to compete with one another. The ones who know the game the best and pick the best options should win. It shouldn't become Smash 4 Minus, which is what I have seen with customs.

I have exactly zero faith in the community's ability to actually step back and go "you know what, we've developed the default specials meta enough, let's try out customs now." There's no fair way to incrementally add customs to the game, it's all or nothing. And defaulting to "nothing" cuts out a lot of options for characters. The fact that customs got pushed hard like this after Apex in the first place is, IMO, a miracle.

Would Average Joe have made it to GF without customs? Maybe, maybe not. But you're glossing over the fact that with customs enabled, DK can compete through GF. I doubt that would be the case if he was stuck with defaults. Other characters I've seen compete in a customs-on GF are Dr. Mario, Wii Fit Trainer, and Palutena. (This of course in addition to the usual suspects of Diddy, Sheik, Rosalina, etc.)

Also, I noticed while watching the VOD last night that a lot of people seemed almost uninformed about customs. The commentators thought that Greninja's Shifting Shuriken could be charged just as long as default. (It can't, the move works off of a simple binary tap/hold distinction.) A Villager using Timber Counter landed several hits with the actual tree, both as it grew and by chopping it down, and none of them killed even past 100%. There was a Meta Knight vs. DK set where all 3 matches were on Battlefield, by far DK's best stage to platform cancel his Kong Cyclone. (The Meta Knight still won, which honestly surprised me.) It's true that Kong Cyclone is an excellent combo breaker due to the super armor and windboxes, but if JohnNumbers is able to punish it with WFT of all characters (dem range issues, mmm) then I am decidedly not convinced that it's the overpowered juggernaut it's made out to be. And in a different tournament entirely, the commentators got their description of Mario's Super Jump custom completely wrong.

I mean, if you bust out a full custom set against someone who, for whatever reason, hasn't bothered reading up on them, learning what they do, or practicing against them in general, then no **** you'll probably faceroll just from the surprise factor alone. You can apply the exact same argument to a rarely-used character but that's no excuse to ban the character. And history shows us that we're unwilling to ban overpowered characters, so why are custom specials suddenly under such scrutiny? It seems like the pro-customs crowd is being held to a higher burden of proof.

Finally, you noted elsewhere in your post that the only reason Diddy didn't show up on stream last night is because your area's top Diddy wasn't attending. Okay, let's stipulate that Diddy (and Sheik) still dominate overall in a customs meta. But with customs, you can also give a fighting chance to DK, WFT, Palutena, the list goes on. Probably add Villager and Ganondorf to that list too, plus the rest of whoever's currently high tier to begin with. And given that people living to sometimes insane percents has been a common point of contention with Smash 4, I'm surprised you consider customs allowing kills at 60-70% to be a downside.

 

[BestTeaMaker]

Also, top people won't suddenly drop from being top players just because customs are now a thing. Tourney Locator's Shockwave is a very good example of that. The people who usually are in the top 10 are still in the top 10. Maybe once in a while there will be an upset, but in the end, better players will rise.

It's also a good idea to implement customs now so that we can actually learn how they work. Can you imagine the outrage if we introduced customs a year after? No way people would take time to understand that DK is still vulnerable above and below him, or that Timber Counter doesn't actually kill like regular Tree. It's about getting as much knowledge we can with this game to help improve how we play the game.

 

[warriorman222]

Customs are just dumb. They have similar effects to if items were on. People posted about not seeing and character variety.
Oh god, here we go again... Items are random. They never spawn the same thing in the same place, they can blow up, and if a Smash Ball appears next to Sonic, Wario, or a character with a good FS, it's over. even food is random, and a tourney wants to take out luck. If you use Dragon Rush, it isn't gonna randomly use hammer, or Peach Bomber, or Ice Slasher. It's gonna be Dragon Rush. Not seeing Diddy is GOOD. We're tired of Diddy.
NEWS FLASH: MD/VA's best wasn't even there. Not many in my region even use the character.

NEWS FLASH 2: The same top 5 placers got top 5. The only large upset was Average Joe beating people all the way to GF (Including Boss). Average Joe has not once placed into top 5 before the initiation of customs. Having an invincible recovery move that covers large range and sucks you in is worst then spamming brawl 's tornado. At least that was fairly punishable.
You talking about Kong Cyclone? You don't know what invincibility is then. Because clearly Kong Cycloen ahs Super Amor, only 2 hits leaving it vurnerable to command grabs and normal grabs, as well as the fact that armor ends a little before the last hit, so you can hit them out of it with enough patience. If a frekaking WFT with chronic range issues an deal with Kong Cycloen, I think it's fine. Villy with Timber Counter got lots of tree falls but barely used the sapling, all at %s where it would ahve killed with Timber. That means's it's overrated, to some degree.

Joe may have not made it to top-5 without customs, but that may be because he might be better with customs on, adn his opponents lack knowledge. Or ddoes knowledge not matter in smahs. Should the more skilled person win even if the person with 1% less skill know literally everything about the ins and out of the stage, opponent's character and their character?

NEWS FLASH 3: The players who go to tournaments are not the ones enjoying them. A small percentage (Usually people who place about 13th regularly) are trying to advocate for them. Almost every poster I have seen who likes customs does not attend tournaments. They just watch streams.
And 13th is bad in a tournament of over 50 or so? K then. Opinion. But we have some player input on it, and we're trying to get more on it too. Just wait.
NEWS FLASH 4: I wasn't even at this tournament. I watched the brokenness unfold from my apartment. I could've went to the tournament myself and won the whole thing using a custom set of that kills people at 50%-60%. Does that make me feel good doing broken ****? No.
Define brokeness. And define this custom that kills at 50-60%, because Sonic has no custom like that.

My overall opinion is that customs themselves are inherently overpowered and end up centralizing the metagame. Smash 4 without customs has existed for less then a year. Give the game time to develop. Tournaments are for players to compete with one another. The ones who know the game the best and pick the best options should win. It shouldn't become Smash 4 Minus, which is what I have seen with customs.
Inherently overpowred? No. You want to know what centralizes the metagame? Bananas. Most characters can deal with Timber Counter. Each character can easily deal with Kong Cyclone. Everyone cnan deal with penetrating Needles, Twisting Fox, and such. Bananas invalidate a few characters, and turn many MUs into hell, or a cesspool of bull s***. If you're banning customs for overcentralization, we should force every Diddy to use Shocking Peel. Or just straight out ban Diddy.

If they get better treatment for being default, then unban all stages, allow all items, ban all unlockable characters and stages, set it to 2-minutes Time, then play. OH wait! All of those have good reasons to be banned! Okay. Customs have good reason to be legal.

And if we wait,e everyone's gonna be so used to the normal format, that such a drastic change is impossible to get accepted. Assuming it does, the initial "broken" stuff nobody will be willing to get used to. who would want to figure out that Shiek loses a lot on non-shield Pressure with Penetrating Needles? Or that Kong Cyclone loses Super Armor near the end, is destroyed by Jumping Inhale, and vulnerable to grabs and other armor? Nobody. And if we waited a year to know this, these things would have never come to light.

Are rules hard to change? No, if they seem more competitive. Yes, if they don't. Do randomly spawning gifts sound competitive. Not that much, and they've proven not to be. does killing as much as you can sound better than having set lives? To this community no(I'd be fine with either), and in practice it is worse. Does customizable special moves sound competitive. No, but in practice, it's shown to:

1. Increase balance objectively and statistically: Extra chances to have a good specials meaning extra chances to finally shine.

2. Increase variety: Oooh! Shiny! But this is unexplored, fun to use stuff. people will mess up. People will want to see if their mains get better with this People on't drop their characters for top tiers until this is fully explored.

3. Drop Diddy from top: And good riddance.

Read the bold.