QAC Theory

[Stealth Raptor]

Something that has always obsess me with games is the why or how of things. If say an item drops in a game that has stats associated with it, are the stats generated when the item is spawned, or when it is picked up? I know such things are trivial but always bug me. A move in Brawl has done this to me-the all-mighty QAC. Why does it work? Was it put in for that porpose, or is the result of something else (I believe the latter)? Here I will attempt to address it.

First I woul like to say I consulted the appropriate threads, and noone mentions this, so if I am wrong and this has been mentioned, dont say I never looked.

Ok first off lets address the mechanics of the QAC. You QA into the ground, and instead of hitting the ground with a noticable amount of lag, instead you appear at the end just falling towards the ground like normal, which allows a short time frame to imput moves, such as aerials, tjolt, thunder, skull bash, or even another QA. The final thing you can do, and this is sort of overlooked in meaning is that you can do you second jump. After that you can QAC again and jump again. Anyone who has been following techniques around the board should understan where this is going. I belive it is an ISJR (Infinite second jump recovery). Again it doesnt matter that it is one, but I am just pointion out the facts. QA has a very convenient feature in that if you QA into the ground, you don't impact the ground, just skim above it at the perfect height for the ISJR to happen.

 

[Piman34]

Is this the only move of Pika's that counts as an ISJR? Cuz I never thought of it like that, but it may be, and makes sense, cuz from my experience ISJRs can only happen and use certain moves after the technique in order to keep it going. QAC seems as such, since you can input a D-air really easily from QAing into the ground, but the other aerials are cut short. However if you jump, and do anything besides a B-air you have time to QAC again and again. I think because of this, it is more than just an ISJR since being able to do basically any aerial, jump or QA again gives it more properties than what I've seen of the other characters doing the ISJR. Any thoughts?

 

[Pikaville]

It does open up some interesting attack patterns if you will.

If someone could essentialy master this..........

GOOD GOD!

Pika SH f air>bair can create a pseudo wall of pain on fastfallers.(If what Ive been testing is proven correct)

1#Basically f air(just above their head)
2#Autoland
3#Buff a b air
4#Auto land again
5#Dash backwards
6#REPEAT!

Its a great combo

 

[plasmid]

QAC is ISJR. Just easier to pull off. Basically I think it happens because somewhere in development of Brawl. They decided it was easier to make QA not able to hit the ground, than it was to give it different properties on the ground. So QA would always end slightly off the ground. This caused them to have to make the move autocancel, because otherwise you would have way too much lag from QAing into the ground (notice that if you don't QAC, there still is some lag). The end result when combined with the buffering system being that you can buffer a second jump to happen right after QA, if it is done into the ground.

My theory anyway.

 

[Stealth Raptor]

Well, my thought is that the programming behind ISJR is the reason why there is a QAC. if we didnt have the bowser ISJR, or every characters aerial ISJR, then we wouldnt have QAC. But there is obviously no way to prove it.

 

[Pikaville]

Im seriously starting to believe that the QAC could be(were it mastered even near perfected) to be one of the best techs in the game.Imagine the chasing possiblilities.....

 

[Piman34]

That's one of its main uses, although one downside is if you use it before you use your first jump you lose it

 

[Stealth Raptor]

lol most of us have it down well. only Anther could be called a master at it, but a master he is. QAC isnt new, i am just speculating on where QAC came from in the programming.

 

[Anther]

I've actually wondered the same thing for a while. I think you're right and it has all the properties of a ISJ but a bit more special just because of the way Quick attack works.

Lucky Pikas. The only disappointing unlucky part is that it carries the property of up-b's that give you extra landing lag next time you touch the ground.

 

[Piman34]

I've actually wondered the same thing for a while. I think you're right and it has all the properties of a ISJ but a bit more special just because of the way Quick attack works.

Lucky Pikas. The only disappointing unlucky part is that it carries the property of up-b's that give you extra landing lag next time you touch the ground.

Wouldn't this only effect it if you don't QA into the ground? Like if you go sideways and fall, then you get the lag, or are you talking about if you QAC into say a jump, and just fall and do nothing you get the lag from the up+B as if you did a laggy up+b move to begin with?

 

[Anther]

I'm talking about the latter. It doesn't really come into effect very often since as others have said you can just thunderjolt or whatever and the lag isn't there.

 

[gallax]

i just want to ask what is the main point of this? is it to determine what exactly to do with the QAC or if we can start comboing? we say it is an ISJR and it does work like one, but what else?

 

[Piman34]

I think Stealth was just curious and wanting to share his opinions on the theory behind QACing, I mean he knows how to use it, but I'm sure he was just thinking about how it all came together or something

 

[gallax]

well im wondering if this is what people have been waiting for. you see, i have always thought, and still do, that there is something we are missing in brawl that is going to make it a greater game. i think that this could be it for pikachu.

 

[Stealth Raptor]

I dont see how this would affect the way we play at all. Piman is right, i was just speculating on its causes.

 

[gallax]

well speculation>discoveries. if you can lock someone easy then pika will be broken.

 

[Peeks]

Okay, so you're wondering about the programming in Brawl that allows Pika's QAC to actually happen? I've been wondering this, too... Here's how the basic game loop looks like:

Handle //handles user input
Update //updates game objects
Render //refreshes the screen to display the updated game objects

It's an infinite loop that continues to happen, as long as the user does not change the Game State. A Game State would be like, moving from the Character Selection screen to the Stage Selection screen. So, throughout the Brawl, there's this infinite game loop that won't break out until... say, time runs out, or all other characters' lives = 0.

My current theory is something along the lines where, the user inputs Quick Attack, which is grabbed in the Handle part of the game loop. Then, it moves to the Update part of the loop, and during this, it checks for collision with anything (ie other characters, the stage, etc.). So, if the collision check returns true, it flags a variable to trigger the Hitting-the-floor animation for Pikachu. However, I think that this function comes somewhere before the collision check, so that during the next game loop, that animation is actually displayed. But, this means that we get to run through the Handle process again before the animation starts, meaning if we push our Jump button in that loop, the Hitting-the-floor animation is overwritten by the Jumping animation. Somewhere AFTER the collision check, though, if collision with floor returns true, then the Being-able-to-jump variable is reactivated, so that we can use our jump during the next game loop. Sorry, kind of a ramble, but I'll try to simplify by using the basic game loop I provided above.

-GAME LOOP 1-
Handle //We push Quick Attack into the ground
Update //Update Pikachu's velocity and position based on Quick Attack
Render //Refresh the screen to display to the user Pikachu's current location

-GAME LOOP 2-
Handle //Nothing
Update //When updating Pikachu's position, collision with floor returns true. Pikachu's jumps refreshed
Render //Refresh the screen to display to the user Pikachu's current location

- GAME LOOP 3-
Handle //Jump, since it got refreshed last game loop
Update //Jumping animation overwrites Hitting-the-floor animation, Pikachu's location updated
Render //Refresh the screen to display to the user Pikachu's current location

Again, this is just an idea. That really is how game loops work, though. I'm going to school to program video games, so this gets beaten into us pretty hard =) And yeah, if we can find something concrete, we can definitely try to exploit it.

 

[gallax]

i really like this idea. it explains what happens bery nicely and it seems to be based on something conctete(programming).