Pac-Man Stage Analysis/Discussion (Open Discussion)

[Reaper Talk]

Pac-Man Stage Analysis and Discussion Thread

“Separating the Pac-Boys from the Pac-MEN”​

Welcome to the Pac-Man Stage Analysis thread! The purpose of the thread is to discuss how Pac-Man performs on all tournament legal stages. Every week, the Pac-Man Board will analyze the pros and cons of each stage in order to increase our knowledge of proper counter picking and to learn how to play on unfavorable Pac-Man stages. Although Pac-Man is a versatile character, we do have to recognize the importance of picking stages in a tournament setting.

I have made this rating criteria to keep a consistent rating for all stages in this thread.
Stages will range from, Not Preferred -> Equal -> Favorable

As well as your rating, please give your recommended custom move set that you would use on this stage and include you opinion of difficult matchups.

CRITERIA​

Not Preferred: Not preferred stages either limit Pac-Man from his full potential or make Pac-Man have to work harder against certain match ups. In other words, when a stage is listed as Not Preferred, try to avoid it. Never choose these stages as a counter pick and ban your opponent from choosing it if you can.
*Just because a stage is not preferred does not mean Pac-Man can’t win. These stages require a different approach and a change in strategy. If these stages are chosen, it’s not the end of the world


Equal: Equal stages are not horrible but do no possess qualities that make Pac-Man shine. These stages usually can work well for any character in the roster. Typically, equal stages provide a 50/50 matchup for each player. Winning is typically dependent on player skill.


Favorable: Favorable stages give Pac-Man a noticeable advantage over the other player. These stages provide Pac-Man a chance to utilise his moveset to the fullest extent and dominate the stage. Whether it be a certain technique or strategy Pac-Man has at his disposal on these stages, favorable stages are the ones you need to know by heart if you want to compete using Pac-Man (as a main or a secondary)

As well as your rating, please give your recommended custom move set that you would use on this stage and include you opinion of difficult matchups Pac-Man might face.

Criteria is subject to change based on this thread’s feedback.
To keep things clean, please use this format in your post:

Stage Name :
Rating:
Recommended custom sets:
Difficult Matchups:

Example:

Spoiler

Final Destination
Rating: Neutral
Recommended Custom Sets: 2232, 1111, 2111
Difficult Matchups: Rosalina and Luma, Sheik

Stages we will be discussing (list to be updated)

Spoiler

EVO 2015
Battlefield
Final Destination
Smashville
Delfino Plaza
Halberd
Lylat Cruise
Town and City

Other stages
Skyloft
Pilot Wings
Kongo Jungle (doubles and up)
Pokemon Stadium 2 (3v3 or 4v4)
Pyrosphere (3v3 or 4v4)
Norfair (3v3 or 4v4)
Yoshi's Island (3DS)

Stages we have already covered

Duck Hunt

Spoiler

Rating: Favorable
Recommended custom sets: 1133, 2132, 3132
Difficult Matchups: ROB, Villager, other campy characters

For a more in-depth analysis, these are some summaries users submitted.
Some quotes are cut short for convenience and to emphasize important tips for Pac-Man.

Duck Hunt is a phenomenal Pac-man Stage. With the smaller blast zones Pac-man is more able to finish out kills before crazy percents become an issue. The Tree its a great spot for a breather to charge fruit. The other side is great for recovery options against aggressive edge guarding. The ducks only slightly hinder Pac-man's attacks, and they do not stop hydrant from dealing damage. With the ability to set where the Dog will spawn based on where you kill ducks. You are able to add yet another layer to Pac-man's traps.
...The issues with the stage are very few, Pacman does lose his Stage spiking, but this is negligible, as higher levels of play opponents should be able to tech pretty easily. The smaller blast zones that help Pac-man, do hurt him as well on the receiving end. If you do not pay attention to the background, you are prone to make mistakes with setups, like missing a hydrant smash, or worse trying to hydrant dash a smash attack, then falling short, missing and getting punished. The ducks are a large part of the beauty of the stage.
I feel this is Pac-man's strongest stage.

Duck Hunt is basically FD in a lot of ways. It's fairly flat for the most part which is conducive for our traps. The tree provides nice breathing space if you can get to it and will give us a massive advantage in matchups against low jump characters as we can probably just z drop/spam hydrants on them. I'd say the main drawback to this stage is actually one of it's strengths too. Although the tree is great for camping, we aren't the campiest character and characters like Rosalina (I've experienced this personally) can take advantageous positions and camp the tree.

Castle Siege

Spoiler

Rating: Favorable
Recommended Custom Move Sets: Default (1111), 2122, 3122
Difficult Matchups: None in Particular
For a more in-depth analysis...(note: some quotes were condensed, special thanks to @ fromundaman for this excellent summary.

Spoiler

↑
Assume in every post I make that I am talking about our default moveset.
1st phase:
-Slanted surface. This is ALWAYS an advantage. We can easily regrab Galaga, Strawberry, Melon and Apple. Z-dropped fruits get horizontal movement when dropped on the slant. Interesting bounces on fruits and hydrants (Keep in mind Orange does not bounce off of slants but will stay active and follow the slant along the ground when thrown).

During this part of the stage both platforms are low enough for Usmashes to go through, and fruit/hydrant bounces to reach. They are also low enough that Fair>Hydrant will bring us on top of the platform, so keep that in mind.

The slant in the middle is what allows us to control pretty much everything.
A Z-dropped fruit on that slant controls the area below the left platform. If you have a Hydrant down there, when the fruit hits it, it will bounce up to the platform, controlling some of that space too.
If you Z-drop a fruit in this same situation while a water blast is coming out, your fruit will be gushed back to the right side, controlling that area.

This alone controls most of the screen without launching a hydrant, actually throwing a fruit or placing a trampoline.
Once you mix all of those in, the entire stage is yours to command.
For example, put a trampoline by the ledge: Bam, the entire area below the platform near that ledge is now off limits and they are forced to recover above the platform. Murder them for this as there is no longer a guessing game at all.
-Low platforms allow Usmash launched hydrant when the hydrants are on the platform and you are below. This launches it at an interesting angle, so that's useful too (Can also be done on BF and Lylat, though on BF it's kind of less useful since it hits the top platform).
-Small-ish blast zones. When combined with our stage control on this phase, this becomes a boon as we pretty much control the match then kill whenever we want on this phase.
2nd phase:
-This is the camping phase. Hydrants, Keys, Galaga and bell all go through the statues. Abuse this heavily.
-Galaga, Melon, Apple, and Strawberry are all easily regrabbed off of the slanted top platforms. The first 3 in this list can be useful for instant launching the hydrant (I am refering to the instant redrop tactic I put in the social thread the other night).
-My personal strategy for this phase is to camp with keys and hydrants, constantly launching the hydrants. They will attempt to camp the platforms on top of the statues, but within 6-8 hydrants you will knock both of those out, turning the stage into another FD.
The issue with this is that you are going to completely scale your hydrant. On the plus side, it means other moves that would usually be to stale to kill like Nair and Bair are back to full kill power. Also even staled out, hydrant is powerful, and opponents are still going to try to stay far from it.
3rd phase:
-Tilts everywhere. Abuse this and make things bounce in unpredictable ways.
-Be very aggressive offstage. This form has a huge offstage area, and due to the tilts a lot of characters have some issues recovering, so make their job of recovering that much harder.
-This is basically a tilting FD. It has all of the advantages of FD with the added benefits of the two above factors.
-Hide trampolines: Due to the rapid tilting, you can throw a trampoline down, have the stage cover it, then tilt again to put it back in the opponents way again before it disappears. This is pretty situational, but once they've been punished for hitting a hidden tramp, they will think twice about approaching any place you recently put one down, especially since most people won't know exactly how long those last.
Transitions:
-Dthrow on top of where pits are going to be is pretty much a suicide throw.
-Throwing fruits as the transition appears/disappears changes the way they act. As transitions appear, the ground will rush up and grab the item, allowing you to regrab it (I actually need to test if this will work with key). As the transition disappears, it will cause the fruit to have a downwards diagonal angle compared to it's usual trajectory. This is most visible with the melon, which controls the a large portion of the stage when thrown this way.
-If a transition comes up and grabs a launched hydrant, the hydrant will bounce in place, acting as a wall, regardless of it's previous trajectory, so long it was close enough to the ground for the transition's floor to reach it. I haven't messed with this one as much as I probably should.
That concludes Castle Siege !

If you have any questions or recommendations, please private message me and keep posts on the thread related to the stage we are discussing.

 

[Reaper Talk]

Week One: Duck Hunt​

Duck Hunt is one of the most interesting competitive stages. For Pac-Man, it’s a playground of fun. With multiple platforms, a high ceiling, and plenty of places to camp, Duck Hunt has many diverse options for approaches.

You have one week (3/20 to 3/27) to discuss!

 

[Firedemon0]

Duck Hunt is a phenomenal Pac-man Stage. With the smaller blast zones Pac-man is more able to finish out kills before crazy percents become an issue. The Tree its a great spot for a breather to charge fruit. The other side is great for recovery options against aggressive edge guarding. The ducks only slightly hinder Pac-man's attacks, and they do not stop hydrant from dealing damage. With the ability to set where the Dog will spawn based on where you kill ducks. You are able to add yet another layer to Pac-man's traps.

When recovering, the wall straight down to blast zone allows Pac-man to wall jump and change up his recovery. It also allows him more options to avoid the bowling ball of doom from Villager. As stated earlier, the bush and tree also allow for interesting recovery options that make it even harder to gimp Pac-man.

The issues with the stage are very few, Pacman does lose his Stage spiking, but this is negligible, as higher levels of play opponents should be able to tech pretty easily. The smaller blast zones that help Pac-man, do hurt him as well on the receiving end. If you do not pay attention to the background, you are prone to make mistakes with setups, like missing a hydrant smash, or worse trying to hydrant dash a smash attack, then falling short, missing and getting punished. The ducks are a large part of the beauty of the stage.

I feel this is Pac-man's strongest stage.

 

[Paper Maribro]

I was considering a thread like this for a while so props to the guy who made but I feel that a section to the discussion should be added.

Matchups.

Although some stages may work for us on paper, other characters could have access to some traits that allow that character to
beat us on that stage even though it is a good stage.

What I'm think is that you have a Stage Not Recommended For: and then list characters who it wouldn't be such a good idea to take to that stage.

i.e. Final Destination, Stage Not Recommended for: Little Mac

 

[Reaper Talk]

I was considering a thread like this for a while so props to the guy who made but I feel that a section to the discussion should be added.

Matchups.

Although some stages may work for us on paper, other characters could have access to some traits that allow that character to
beat us on that stage even though it is a good stage.

What I'm think is that you have a Stage Not Recommended For: and then list characters who it wouldn't be such a good idea to take to that stage.

i.e. Final Destination, Stage Not Recommended for: Little Mac

If you have any questions or recommendations, please private message me and keep posts on the thread related to the stage we are discussing.
This is my first time doing a thread like this and I don't want all of the replies to be recommendations.
But, you did have a very valid point so I added a Matchup Section

This is my opinion of Duck Hunt.
Rating: Favorable
Recommended custom set: 2132, 3132, 1131
Difficult Matchups: None! Besides the matchups not already in our favor (i.e. Rosaluma) Duck Hunt does not affect Pac-Man's perfomance in a negative way. Characters like Robin come to mind since they rely on charging attacks and Duck Hunt is great for them as well, but Pac-Man still has options such as Bair and Fair to deal with these characters.

I am in complete agreement with Firedemon0 and say Duck Hunt is the best stage for Pac-Man. The trees serve as excellent camping options against Little Mac, Ganon, Dr. Mario, and other character with low jumps.

 

[Jay-kun]

If you play campy like me. Opponent can camp on tree and it is devastating.

 

[WeirdChillFever]

I don't own the WiiU version, so this is all theory crafting

This stage is good for Pac.
The tree allows for a stupidly easy Kong of the Hill type of play and the flat part is a nice FD clone in general.

The tree might ruin walling tactics though, so play carefully.

 

[Paper Maribro]

Kong of the Hill

I'm sorry but I couldn't resist. I now present to you a picture made in 5 minutes in "Preview" (mac users will know what this is).

Anyway, Duck Hunt is basically FD in a lot of ways. It's fairly flat for the most part which is conducive for our traps. The tree provides nice breathing space if you can get to it and will give us a massive advantage in matchups against low jump characters as we can probably just z drop/spam hydrants on them. I'd say the main drawback to this stage is actually one of it's strengths too. Although the tree is great for camping, we aren't the campiest character and characters like Rosalina (I've experienced this personally) can take advantageous positions and camp the tree. The other main disadvantage of this stage is it's massive roof. This will somewhat slow down our ability to take out opponents with Up Smash and apple. Not too big of a deal because the side blast zones are closer but something to keep in mind, especially against heavy FFers like D3 or C.Fal.

Definitely a favourable stage for us in most instances and one that should be considered as a solid CP.

 

[Nu~]

Yeah, never take a ROB here. Normally, we can get in on him and smash his face, but this stage is like a playground for him.

 

[Galaxian]

Pac-Man does benefit from all the breathing space, the trees and other stuff, but Pacman9 has a point. Don't bring another campy character here - namely one that benefits from the stage more than anything. R.O.B is the worst offender of this.

 

[Reaper Talk]

R.O.B with his lasers is really annoying, not to mention his other tools of robot destruction.
BUT, with an agressive Freaky Fruit Set, I feel we can throw R.O.B off guard. Orange is great for stage coverage and Melon can hit R.O.B if he's camping in a tree. Usually my strategy is to zone my opponents onto the right side then go to the tree if needed too. If the opponent is already in the tree, I spam fruit or try to get in a side-B.

 

[Galaxian]

R.O.B with his lasers is really annoying, not to mention his other tools of robot destruction.
BUT, with an agressive Freaky Fruit Set, I feel we can throw R.O.B off guard. Orange is great for stage coverage and Melon can hit R.O.B if he's camping in a tree. Usually my strategy is to zone my opponents onto the right side then go to the tree if needed too. If the opponent is already in the tree, I spam fruit or try to get in a side-B.

I suppose this would work. Still though, R.O.B can camp really well on DH.

An aggressive FF set might work but I really wouldn't want to take R.O.B to this stage to find out.

Also side-B will not work on anyone paying attention to this game. It might be okay to try and snipe but really I doubt the R.O.B wouldn't see a side-B coming. Maybe once you'd hit him but it'd be incredibly obvious the other times.

 

[Reaper Talk]

Agreed.
One character I have trouble with in general is Pikachu.
I feel thunderjolt can be spammed a lot on Duck Hunt and even take away our ability to wall jump.

 

[Galaxian]

Agreed.
One character I have trouble with in general is Pikachu.
I feel thunderjolt can be spammed a lot on Duck Hunt and even take away our ability to wall jump.

I forgot that Pac-Man has a wall jump sometimes, due to his incredible recovery. Villager has one too, why does Villager need a wall jump..?

Yeah, against other spammy characters it can be a tad annoying for Pac, though it's not the worst. Thunder Jolt you can just jump into the bush and force the Pika to approach. This is a perfect stage to take someone with no projectiles (Falcon, maybe) or ones with projectiles that can't apply too much pressure on bush/trees (Sheik maybe).

EDIT:

Okay Sheik was a bad example, I kind of meant they don't really harass Pac and force the other to approach / use the projectile in weird ways. Sorta like Metal Blade? I dunno.

 

[Jay-kun]

This might of been mentioned earlier, but Villager destroys us on this stage (haha meant offstage).
1) bowling ball
2) tree
3) turnip-spike
4) pocket
5) fair/bairs that knock us farther offstage so we HAVE to recover low, but then are subject to all of the above.
Recovery options:
-the tree (only on left side )
-throw fruit after getting knocked offstage
-set hydrant before you get knocked offstage
-KEEP DOUBLE JUMP

 

[Galaxian]

This might of been mentioned earlier, but Villager destroys us on this stage (haha meant offstage).
1) bowling ball
2) tree
3) turnip-spike
4) pocket
5) fair/bairs that knock us farther offstage so we HAVE to recover low, but then are subject to all of the above.
Recovery options:
-the tree (only on left side )
-throw fruit after getting knocked offstage
-set hydrant before you get knocked offstage
-KEEP DOUBLE JUMP

Yeah DH seems like a stage you should only take Pac to if you and only you benefit from it. Giving the campy space to R.O.B, Villager, etc. makes it more of a hassle for Pac. While it still gives Pac-Man all the space he needs, it gives the other campy character that space too.

Ban DH against R.O.B, no questions asked.

 

[Reaper Talk]

Villager is a god damn nightmare with customs on

 

[Jay-kun]

Villager is a god damn nightmare with customs on

?

 

[Reaper Talk]

?

Exploding balloon and counter tree are perfect for Duck Hunt

 

[dragontamer]

Villager is extremely good with customs. The tripping tree prevents ground-based approaches in their entirety, and Villager can just Fair / Rocker behind the tree sapling all day long.

Against Villager, you'll want to pick a stage with more platforms in the neutral. Its bad though, because Villager really likes platforms for Fair hijinks. Pac-Man can't really approach from above villager anyway, because Villager's UAir is excellent.

Approaching Villager is an exercise for sure. And its much more difficult when Villager gets the tree-sap on bottom platforms.

 

[COLINBG]

@ D dragontamer Also, you're forced to approach in some way, because he can just pocket your things and throw them back. You don't get anything done by staying far from him. That's partly why he's so tricky to deal with.

 

[Reaper Talk]

For those of you who don't know the power of the Villager in a Pac-Man matchup...

Spoiler

https://youtu.be/Ov3bzwDLg3g?t=4m55s
Just watch...especially the trampoline part

But Duck Hunt is still one of our most reliable choices. This stage just makes our difficult matchups even more difficult.
If you run a Lazy Fruit set with regular Hydrant, the stage is literally yours.

 

[Nu~]

Villager doesn't scare me. One hydrant covers his trip sprout, and smart item usage prevents pocket spam. Even if he does pocket your fruit, you can charge another as long as he isn't holding it which limits his options severely.

 

[Nu~]

For those of you who don't know the power of the Villager in a Pac-Man matchup...

Spoiler

https://youtu.be/Ov3bzwDLg3g?t=4m55s
Just watch...especially the trampoline part

But Duck Hunt is still one of our most reliable choices. This stage just makes our difficult matchups even more difficult.
If you run a Lazy Fruit set with regular Hydrant, the stage is literally yours.

side B, let him pocket it, then up B.

R.O.B. And villager are the only characters that I wouldn't want to take here, but neither are difficult matchups for us. We beat R.O.B. and villager is even. We have a strong CQC where they lack one (although villager's nair is very good). Lloid is invalidated by the power pellet, and fair/Bair have extremely low priority. Just nair them and they fizzle. Villager can't keep us out for long.

ROB has the better camp game, but even that is inconsistent. Drop a hydrant on his gyro to slow it down, and then pick it up. He can't zone you out with lasers, so he is forced to come in where we murder him.
Also, once you get ROB above you, he loses. Delicious juggle bait.

 

[Reaper Talk]

side B, let him pocket it, then up B.

R.O.B. And villager are the only characters that I wouldn't want to take here, but neither are difficult matchups for us. We beat R.O.B. and villager is even. We have a strong CQC where they lack one (although villager's nair is very good). Lloid is invalidated by the power pellet, and fair/Bair have extremely low priority. Just nair them and they fizzle. Villager can't keep us out for long.

ROB has the better camp game, but even that is inconsistent. Drop a hydrant on his gyro to slow it down, and then pick it up. He can't zone you out with lasers, so he is forced to come in where we murder him.
Also, once you get ROB above you, he loses. Delicious juggle bait.

I agree with your point on ROB but I still have a difficult time with Villager on Duck Hunt. He can space with well with Fair and Trip Seed. Is it a horrible match up? No, but I wouldn't say it's even either, but let's just talk about that in the Matchup thread (I'm actually really curious on the Villager Matchup)

 

[COLINBG]

smart item usage prevents pocket spam. Even if he does pocket your fruit, you can charge another as long as he isn't holding it which limits his options severely.

Indeed, most of the time Villager won't be holding the fruit. If you're at kill percent, he'll hold it to try to kill you (Apple, Orange, Bell, Key, maybe Lemon) in which case you have other things to do than to charge fruits anyway (except if he's at kill percent too), and you can take advantage of it.

If you're not at kill percent, he won't hold it. He won't keep it either; it's better to throw them back asap because that let's him pocket hydrants who are a more dangerous threat and catch/immediatly throw any other fruits you use.

Villager doesn't care if the fruits don't hit when he throws them back (most of the time) because it's a defensive option before anything else in this MU. The pocket simply negates any projectile that would help you. If you throw them at him, he loses nothing by going for the pocket. It's a pretty-decent-reward-zero-risk move almost every time. If he throws them back at you, if forces you to dodge them, putting you in a worse position he can take advantage of and rendering you ''useless'' for like half a second that he can use to set up/do his things, or you take shield damage. Villager doesn't take shield damage by pocketing, while you do when you shield the fruits he throws back. That's the difference. Any safe hit that does shield damage is considered good in this game, that's why projectiles in general are good. Villager can abuse that while you can't, and it's an essential part of Pac's gameplay. This is why pocket is good against us. It basically renders our hydrant launching/fruit throwing useless. Even if you throw two projectiles at him, like a key and an hydrant, pocket has invincibility frames so he can pocket one and not get hit by the other. As you said, and having said all that, that doesn't necessarily mean the MU is in his favor, but I just think you underevaluated pocket's power. You have to play much more conservatively with your B moves, and try to surprise him with them, or use them when it's really advantageous, as opossed to throwing them ''randomly'' like in other MUs. You actually have something to lose if you do that. At least, as someone who played both Villager and Pac a lot, that's how I view it.

Is it a horrible match up? No, but I wouldn't say it's even, but let's just talk about that in the Matchup thread (I'm actually really curious on the Villager Matchup)

True, this is a stage thread after all. My bad. But I'd be glad to continue this discussion in the MU thread.

 

[Reaper Talk]

Here's what we have right now​

It's pretty much agreed Duck Hunt is favorable.
The difficult matchups are: ROB, Villager
Today is the last day to add anything before we move on!
If you have anything to say, say it now so I can make a complete stage analysis quoting the best bits of this thread.

 

[MegaBlaster1234]

This is one stage where the Diddy and Sheik matchups are way more tolerable.
You can control most of the ground space and charge fruit on the elevated platforms, and react accordingly since they need to jump to hit you. The Apple, Galaxian and Bell are amazing in this stage thanks to their angles when thrown, and if they try and recover up on the tree, Side B will often catch their landings, or at the very least pressure them into a position they're not comfortable with.

On-Fire Hydrant makes this stage yours. The three fire spurts it shoots will almost always guarantee you a couple of seconds to plan your next move. And all UpB variants work very well in this stage because you can shorten the recovery afterwards by landing on the bush or the tree.

 

[COLINBG]

This is one stage where the Diddy and Sheik matchups are way more tolerable.

Except Diddy was never that big of a problem anyway, and while Sheik is tricky she's managable if you know what you're doing.

You're still right about errthing though.

 

[Reaper Talk]

Week one of our stage discussion has come to an end! ​

Thank you to all of the users who contributed!
Here is the final analysis...

Stage Name: Duck Hunt
Rating: Favorable
Recommended custom sets: 1133, 2132, 3132
Difficult Matchups: ROB, Villager, other campy characters​

For a more in-depth analysis, these are some summaries that users have submitted.
Some quotes are cut short for convenience and to emphasize important tips for Pac-Man.

Spoiler

Duck Hunt is a phenomenal Pac-man Stage. With the smaller blast zones Pac-man is more able to finish out kills before crazy percents become an issue. The Tree its a great spot for a breather to charge fruit. The other side is great for recovery options against aggressive edge guarding. The ducks only slightly hinder Pac-man's attacks, and they do not stop hydrant from dealing damage. With the ability to set where the Dog will spawn based on where you kill ducks. You are able to add yet another layer to Pac-man's traps.

...The issues with the stage are very few, Pacman does lose his Stage spiking, but this is negligible, as higher levels of play opponents should be able to tech pretty easily. The smaller blast zones that help Pac-man, do hurt him as well on the receiving end. If you do not pay attention to the background, you are prone to make mistakes with setups, like missing a hydrant smash, or worse trying to hydrant dash a smash attack, then falling short, missing and getting punished. The ducks are a large part of the beauty of the stage.

I feel this is Pac-man's strongest stage.

Duck Hunt is basically FD in a lot of ways. It's fairly flat for the most part which is conducive for our traps. The tree provides nice breathing space if you can get to it and will give us a massive advantage in matchups against low jump characters as we can probably just z drop/spam hydrants on them. I'd say the main drawback to this stage is actually one of it's strengths too. Although the tree is great for camping, we aren't the campiest character and characters like Rosalina (I've experienced this personally) can take advantageous positions and camp the tree.

 

[Reaper Talk]

Now on to week 2....

Castle Siege

Ready to storm the castle??
You have one week, 3/27 to 4/3 to discuss !!
Have at it! ​

 

[Galaxian]

I haven't had much time to play on this map, but it seems...alright.

The second transformation is one Pac-Man doesn't like, with the statues. Fruit gets stuck on them, which can be tedious at times. However, it's not too awful, you just need to really steer clear of them.

The third one is actually kind of okay. If my memory serves me right, it rotates a little, so fruit MIGHT get caught, but otherwise it's practically FD which is a stage in our favor.

The transformation part is...well, good. It's flat, it's time to charge fruits or set up traps. Just watch where you land, don't want to SD because you got caught on the stage.

The first part is alright. Little cramped, but it doesn't hurt us too much since we still have breathing room. Transformation is probably our best spot in this map, alongside the FD-like part.

I really don't think Pac-Man benefits much from this stage, honestly. It's not awful, however.

 

[WeirdChillFever]

I DON'T HAVE SMASH WIIU THIS IS ALL THEORYCRAFTING A GAME THEORYCRAFTING:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I see slopes in every transformation.
Stage is good.

First Transformation:

Get on the right platform and spam Apples and rolling in the deep Hydrants.
Play around with Nairs to knock opponents away. (Stage is a bit small)
And screw over recoveries easily. Drop down Hydrants and win.

Transformation platform
Watch out, don't set down Hydrants yet, they'll just stand there.
Charge Fruit here.

Second Transformation
Slopes.
Abuse the slopes, you can't camp here like normal, you just gotta roll those Hydrants.

Third Transformation
This is SPAR- Final Destination with a twist.
Watch carefully how your fruit acts, watch carefully when the Hydrant will roll over and watch opponents fail to recover.
This transformation will separate the rookies from the Pac-Men.
Smart play not required, but will gain you a big advantage.

EVERYTHING BELOW HERE IS DANGEROUS THEORYCRAFTING. MIGHT NOT BE ACCURATE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'd say that Default Fruit is good, but that's purely because Default Key rips through the statues in Stage 2.
Bring PPJ because recovering here is a nightmare and Stage 2 might net you some kills of the top
Bring Default Hydrant because recovering here is a nightmare.

 

[MegaBlaster1234]

First and third transformations benefit us the most since we the slopes help us grab our fruit easier, and the layout helps us control space much more easily. Second transformation is unfavorable only if they have the percent lead, since the statues can get in the way, and the enemy can safely camp on other side of stage until it changes. We can't really deal any damage if they just wait out the next transformation, but we can do that too with Pac-Man if we have the lead, and catching us will be no easy task.

 

[Reaper Talk]

The second transformation is troublesome, but 1st and 3rd are great for fire hydrant and fruit. The only problem I have with this stage as a whole is the low ceilings and small blast lines.
Really any set can work here, I'd prefer standard hydrant and freaky fruit for stage control.
I'd say this stage is equal for us

 

[Galaxian]

The second transformation is troublesome, but 1st and 3rd are great for fire hydrant and fruit. The only problem I have with this stage as a whole is the low ceilings and small blast lines.
Really any set can work here, I'd prefer standard hydrant and freaky fruit for stage control.
I'd say this stage is equal for us

Yeah, it seems either equal or just a TAD against Pac-Man, but very little. The 2nd with statues is annoying, yeah, but it ends quickly anyway.

All in all an okay stage. If Duck Hunt is banned (which is incredibly likely) then Castle Siege is okay.

 

[fromundaman]

This stage is amazing; you guys don't even know.

I am currently too busy to write up the wall of text on how much we can abuse every single part of this stage, but by posting in here it will show up in my notifications and I'll remember to come back to it later.

One thing I will say though, we benefit more than almost every other character from the second transformation (Not that it's OP for us, but it disrupts us far less than others while the other transformations are awesome).

 

[Reaper Talk]

This is the last day to send in your thoughts
I will contribute as well when I get on my computer tonight.
Remember to include difficult matchups as well as recommended custom move sets

 

[WeirdChillFever]

1111 is the best.

Default Fruit because Key pierces through the statues in Stage 2 and Apples trajectory is amazing.
Power Pellet because Duh.
Default Trampoline because recovering here is a nightmare.
Default Hydrant because recovering here is a nightmare.

 

[fromundaman]

EDIT:

Assume in every post I make that I am talking about our default moveset.

/EDIT

Castle Seige:

1st phase:

-Slanted surface. This is ALWAYS an advantage. We can easily regrab Galaga, Strawberry, Melon and Apple. Z-dropped fruits get horizontal movement when dropped on the slant. Interesting bounces on fruits and hydrants (Keep in mind Orange does not bounce off of slants but will stay active and follow the slant along the ground when thrown).

-EXCELLENT stage control.
This is kind of big, and honestly would work better if I had the time or artistic skill to draw it all out.

During this part of the stage both platforms are low enough for Usmashes to go through, and fruit/hydrant bounces to reach. They are also low enough that Fair>Hydrant will bring us on top of the platform, so keep that in mind.

The slant in the middle is what allows us to control pretty much everything.
A Z-dropped fruit on that slant controls the area below the left platform. If you have a Hydrant down there, when the fruit hits it, it will bounce up to the platform, controlling some of that space too.
If you Z-drop a fruit in this same situation while a water blast is coming out, your fruit will be gushed back to the right side, controlling that area.

This alone controls most of the screen without launching a hydrant, actually throwing a fruit or placing a trampoline.
Once you mix all of those in, the entire stage is yours to command.

For example, put a trampoline by the ledge: Bam, the entire area below the platform near that ledge is now off limits and they are forced to recover above the platform. Murder them for this as there is no longer a guessing game at all.

-Low platforms allow Usmash launched hydrant when the hydrants are on the platform and you are below. This launches it at an interesting angle, so that's useful too (Can also be done on BF and Lylat, though on BF it's kind of less useful since it hits the top platform).

-Small-ish blast zones. When combined with our stage control on this phase, this becomes a boon as we pretty much control the match then kill whenever we want on this phase.



2nd phase:


-This is the camping phase. Hydrants, Keys, Galaga and bell all go through the statues. Abuse this heavily.

-Galaga, Melon, Apple, and Strawberry are all easily regrabbed off of the slanted top platforms. The first 3 in this list can be useful for instant launching the hydrant (I am refering to the instant redrop tactic I put in the social thread the other night).

-My personal strategy for this phase is to camp with keys and hydrants, constantly launching the hydrants. They will attempt to camp the platforms on top of the statues, but within 6-8 hydrants you will knock both of those out, turning the stage into another FD.
The issue with this is that you are going to completely scale your hydrant. On the plus side, it means other moves that would usually be to stale to kill like Nair and Bair are back to full kill power. Also even staled out, hydrant is powerful, and opponents are still going to try to stay far from it.


3rd phase:

-Tilts everywhere. Abuse this and make things bounce in unpredictable ways.

-Be very aggressive offstage. This form has a huge offstage area, and due to the tilts a lot of characters have some issues recovering, so make their job of recovering that much harder.

-This is basically a tilting FD. It has all of the advantages of FD with the added benefits of the two above factors.

-Hide trampolines: Due to the rapid tilting, you can throw a trampoline down, have the stage cover it, then tilt again to put it back in the opponents way again before it disappears. This is pretty situational, but once they've been punished for hitting a hidden tramp, they will think twice about approaching any place you recently put one down, especially since most people won't know exactly how long those last.


Transitions:

Oh yes, we have stuff during the transitions too.

-Super situational, but if you put a trampoline down as a transition starts, then get a grab over where the trampoline was, Dthrow will combo into the trampoline hit as the transition ends.

-Dthrow on top of where pits are going to be is pretty much a suicide throw.

-Throwing fruits as the transition appears/disappears changes the way they act. As transitions appear, the ground will rush up and grab the item, allowing you to regrab it (I actually need to test if this will work with key). As the transition disappears, it will cause the fruit to have a downwards diagonal angle compared to it's usual trajectory. This is most visible with the melon, which controls the a large portion of the stage when thrown this way.

-If a transition comes up and grabs a launched hydrant, the hydrant will bounce in place, acting as a wall, regardless of it's previous trajectory, so long it was close enough to the ground for the transition's floor to reach it. I haven't messed with this one as much as I probably should.






Anyway that's all I can think of at the moment, but yeah this stage is not bad at all for us. We have good to incredible stage control on all stages, and dirt on all of them.