Project: M Standard Timer Setting Discussion

[Overswarm]

And Overswarm, holy **** the idea isn't to make matches shorter over all for the 50th damn time.

I don't think we need 8 minutes on the timer.

You know this is contradicting itself, right?

If it doesn't make the match shorter then it didn't reach the end of the timer and if it didn't reach the end of the timer the timer didn't need to change in the first place.

If it does reach the shorter timer then the match is shorter than it would have been.

 

[B.W.]

That's what most people feel the 8 minute timer accomplishes. Long enough for characters that aren't Falcon and can't get a kill of 3 reads to have the time they need to work, not long enough to turn your hair grey from the handful of matchups that would take 9 or more minutes to really allow optimally safe gameplay from both players.

Most matchups at the higher levels do NOT take shorter time. It tends to be: Falcon dittos or other such read-heavy matchups, a single player getting absolutely bodied, or two low level players that know nothing of spacing and kill each other haphazardly.

That's why I was proposing a test (though originally I wanted the timer to be a bigger part of the game, but it's very true the that PMBR aren't balancing things around time outs being a constantly viable option and so making it low enough for time outs to be a constant option would make the game very different than how we enjoy it now).

I wanted to see if the characters that need more time really need as much as 8 mins of time or whether or not they needed an entire 8 mins of time to do so. On top of that I wanted to see if lowering the timer to 6 or even 7 would have an overly drastic amount of change on characters, specifically those who are more zone heavy, and see if these changes made any character much more powerful or much less powerful because if it didn't there would be no reason to play with less than 8 mins left on the clock. The clock would still serve its purpose and the balance of the game would not be hurt in the process.

You know this is contradicting itself, right?

If it doesn't make the match shorter then it didn't reach the end of the timer and if it didn't reach the end of the timer the timer didn't need to change in the first place.

If it does reach the shorter timer then the match is shorter than it would have been.

It contradicts itself only if you look at it as you posted it. At this point you're really just reading things how you want to read them rather than how they are said.

Lowering the timer would make time outs take less time, but ideally it would not make the average match any longer by people pushing the timer.

Ideally the standard match would not take any longer, but time out matches would indeed be shorter.
It does in fact say "the point is not to make matches shorter overall" referring to the fact that matches don't take 8 minutes.

Matches that normally take 8 minutes would get shorter, but if the clock is put lower but still kept at a spot where people aren't fighting for the time out (and thus keeping the average match time the same it is now), why should the match take 8 mins? The timer should be as close to the average match time as possible, so long as that lower time limit doesn't make players change how they currently play.

 

[Mithost]

I skipped ahead a bit because things are starting to repeat themselves. Forgive me if this has been said before.

Project, your main argument about increasing the timer is to make it a bigger part of the game, correct? If that is the case, I can tell you without any further testing that if you drop it even by one or two minutes, it becomes a huge part of the game that people need to pay attention to. This has already been proven for years before with multiple smash games, including Project M. You are correct in this regard. Congratulations on a working theory. However, another thing that has been proven for years was the fact that the timer shouldn't be a larger part of the game.

The main issue with smash outside of items (which were used in brawl's balancing) not being used is how easy timeouts can be. Stalling is always in your favor (assuming you already have a lead), with the only thing preventing it is how long you have to do it for. I explained already how much easier it is to stall a 6-7 minute timer than it is to stall an 8 minute timer. 8 minutes is the closest you can get between "matches are lasting too long" and "timeouts are too easy". Do you know why Brawl uses 3 stocks instead of 4 stocks? It's because too many matches were going to time, and raising the timer made the matches too long.

The timer's job is not to be a big part of the game. It is only there to make tournament organizer's jobs physically possible scheduling wise, and to prevent people quitting games due to fatigue of an endless match. This is absolute fact for smash games. The timer has been proven to be more overpowered for every minute you put it closer to the average match time, and all dropping it down does is promote defensive play, more matches going to time, an unfair advantage to those who stall, an unfair disadvantage to players who want to play the game "correctly", and most importantly, a boring game to play.

So please stop asking for people to test this and give it a shot. It already has been over-tested, and we have an entire game's history (brawl) to back up the potential issues that a change regarding the timer causes. I really don't care if you play 6 minute timer and enjoy it with your friends. In tournament settings, people care quite a bit if a player that is clearly less skilled can win solely based on running away. I've tried it outside of a tournament setting and we were still almost at the point where we were going to put stalling rules in place.

Edit: Just a few things. It's not that characters like snake need the 8 minutes to play the way they should. It's that they need the 8 minutes to keep timing out out of reach. Making timing out a constant option for matches is a horrible idea. The game will honestly turn into "who can get the first stock" because after that they can just resort to the constant option of timing out.

 

[B.W.]

That was originally the main argument yes, but I see where that becomes a bigger issue in the long run.

Now it's more about seeing whether or not it possible for things to go unchanged with a lower timer.

And while I'm glad you tested it 2 people (you and myself) hardly warrants enough info to see if the clock could potentially be lowered.

However, this thread gets the attention of very few people, and even it has been going nowhere for the last page. It's pretty easy to see by the lack of people in this thread, that there are a lot of people who feel the timer does not need to be touched, which is fine I can play with an 8 minute timer though I still don't feel it to be necessary.

Most of the entire thread is circles really and it gets no where without other people trying things out and coming back with results, which is the reason I constantly urged people to try it before talking about it.

 

[Overswarm]

It contradicts itself only if you look at it as you posted it. At this point you're really just reading things how you want to read them rather than how they are said.

It was a direct quote from you. There's no misquoting or anything here; that's exactly what you said.

If you lower the timer, then either matches take less time due to a faste timeout or the timer was irrelevant in the first place. Thus, the only time that you'd get results from changing the timer to a lower state is when the timer itself affected the match.

Lowering the timer to 7 minutes wouldn't do anything to lower the amount of time a match under 7 minutes would take. It'd just make timeouts more frequent.

Matches that normally take 8 minutes would get shorter, but if the clock is put lower but still kept at a spot where people aren't fighting for the time out (and thus keeping the average match time the same it is now), why should the match take 8 mins? The timer should be as close to the average match time as possible, so long as that lower time limit doesn't make players change how they currently play.

You know how an average works, right? By definition, making the timer the "average" amount of time a game takes means that any match that took the average amount of time or greater would by default be an automatic timeout. This would be an awful thing. Go play some 4 stock, 4 minute matches and try to run the timer. A minute per stock is not enough time. That's what you'd be shooting around for an "average" time.

You still haven't proposed an actual reason for the time change though. That's what I'm really wondering. WHY change the timer in the first place when there's no issue with it affecting gameplay?

 

[B.W.]

How is "to make a possible improvement to the overall game" not a reason? I've said it plenty of times.

And I didn't say make the timer the amount of time the average match takes, I said put it closer to the average without making it too close.

Again, reading things how you want to read them.

 

[Overswarm]

How is "to make a possible improvement to the overall game" not a reason? I've said it plenty of times.

What improvement? Shorter doesn't = improvement, and there's no cause to really think so.

And I didn't say make the timer the amount of time the average match takes, I said put it closer to the average without making it too close.

I think you're reading my statement on the average incorrectly. I'm not saying that you want to move it to the average. I'm saying using the average game time as a metric is pointless because:

By definition, making the timer the "average" amount of time a game takes means that any match that took the average amount of time or greater would by default be an automatic timeout.

Which makes it useless as a metric

 

[Mithost]

"And while I'm glad you tested it 2 people (you and myself) hardly warrants enough info to see if the clock could potentially be lowered."

Have you not read half of my post? This has been tested by more than just Project M people. The proof of this is the history of Brawl, Brawl having 3 stocks instead of four, etc etc. Project M isn't different enough (it's actually is the closest any game is to each other) to warrant retesting all of the fundamental conclusions we have made from tests.

The timer is already at the point where it is close to the average amount of time a match takes without being too close. This is what I have been saying the entire time. It just seems stubborn to ignore all of this "because I don't think all this stuff about smash applies to a smash mod that replicates a smash game".

 

[Kink-Link5]

That's why I was proposing a test (though originally I wanted the timer to be a bigger part of the game, but it's very true the that PMBR aren't balancing things around time outs being a constantly viable option and so making it low enough for time outs to be a constant option would make the game very different than how we enjoy it now).

I wanted to see if the characters that need more time really need as much as 8 mins of time or whether or not they needed an entire 8 mins of time to do so. On top of that I wanted to see if lowering the timer to 6 or even 7 would have an overly drastic amount of change on characters, specifically those who are more zone heavy, and see if these changes made any character much more powerful or much less powerful because if it didn't there would be no reason to play with less than 8 mins left on the clock.

The biggest problem with this is the lack of a metagame and, with no offense to players, no one is playing this game optimally at the moment. Just as a lot of recreational players today could probably do astonishingly well playing patiently in a 2007 Melee metagame, it is very hard to say how much the result short matches is due to the game really being faster or, again with no offense meant, to players really being just not that great or patient in the neutral game as they optimally could be. Experimenting in a metagame before it develops in other words. Specifically, offense works a looot better when the opponent doesn't know a way around it for whatever reason.

This is why I mentioned Hax's "don't approach" sentiment. It isn't "don't approach," it's "don't approach stupidly," to put it bluntly, or "approach smarter than your opponent can deal with" more nicely. As almost every game I can think of evolves, it becomes more careful and spacing-oriented than it starts out because of what strategies are optimal as understanding of the game evolves. It is very different than saying never approach, because you still need to find some way to get near your opponent and do something, anything smarter than they do, to secure a hit. Even if you run up and dash away as a super simple bait, you are still taking the initiative to approach and doing something smart to get a hit.

Before this universal understanding of more blind offense comes about, however, the blind approach is more effective and faster than other strategies, and matches typically end up shorter because of it. But there are still inherently characters that do take a longer time to work with, and there are still matches that take longer for the exact same reason as the ones that take shorter: By continuously halting approaches and slowly whittling at the opponent, they are at a non-understanding of how to deal with this seemingly unstoppable "gay" strategy.

That is to say, until they realize they can be safe too in lieu of strictly outsmarting the opponent with an approach.