Ruleset Discussion: Character Striking

[peeup]

It's like stage striking, but you do it with characters. It would probably have to be double blind, or maybe it wouldn't have to be. It could add some flairzestspice to the game, or it might remove some flairzestspice.

Could it happen in Sm4sh? Could it be the new thing? Will all the kids on the block talk about how they character struck for days and are the cat's meow because of it?

But actually, is this a viable thing? Would have made more sense in Brawl so people can stop complaining about MK and just strike him. To counter people saying "you should just learn the matchup" it could be just as easily said about striking Pokemon Stadium and have people say "you should just learn the transitions." Or something like that. I dunno, it could make for some more interesting matchups at higher levels because everybody will have to be proficient with at least 2 characters.

 

[Fatmanonice]

I would argue no because then you'd basically have people deliberately striking people's mains all the time and nobody should be forced to learn how to effectively play as the whole cast and their match ups just to counter this.

 

[LiteralGrill]

I don't want to sound mean, but I'm going to be blunt: this will NEVER happen. Telling a player which character they can or can't use, and forcing people to learn every single character in the game would be INSANE. Not only that, but it'd honestly be scrubby to tell someone not to play a character because you don't like it.

 

[Ulevo]

Yes. It takes a lot of time and dedication to master even a single character. Being able to single handedly ban someone's main is not a rule anyone is going to be willing to adopt. Rules like this have their place, but not in 1v1 fighting games.

 

[Dark Phazon]

Goku would get in before this s_it went down...RealTalk...

 

[Admiral Pit]

I'm staying true to Pit, and no one's gonna tell me not to use him, unless it's a low tier event or something... Then I have Bowser for that. But then what if they remove my Bowser with that character striking rule? Then forget it. I say no.

 

[peeup]

First of all, you wouldn't have to learn to play every character in the game... just 2. That's something people can manage.


Second of all, aside from what I just mentioned, this is pretty much the response I was expecting. Thought it might be feasible because that's what happens in games like LoL and DotA, but I think Ulevo is right that such a rule isn't fit in a fighting game.

Twas just a thought.

 

[peeup]

First of all, you wouldn't have to learn to play every character in the game... just 2. That's something people can manage.


Second of all, aside from what I just mentioned, this is pretty much the response I was expecting. Thought it might be feasible because that's what happens in games like LoL and DotA, but I think Ulevo is right that such a rule isn't fit in a fighting game.

Twas just a thought.

 

[INs4niTY-]

Thing is, in games like Dota there are a bunch of heroes that fulfil the same type of role. So when banning a hero in that game there's other possibilities. However in Smash every character is pretty unique so if you have a play style that suits Diddy kong for instance you'll have no other choice. Some people may lose just because they are forced into using their weaker main character which isn't really a satisfying win.

 

[Ulevo]

The other thing is that there is significantly more to learn about a character in a fighting game than a single champion in League of Legends, or other such games. What makes League of Legends a deep experience is the interactions 10 players have with one another on the map, not necessarily the champions themselves. For all intents and purposes, champions in League of Legends are typically pretty simple, at least based on what their moveset provides and what they can do. The scope of the game is about more than just the characters you play, while in fighting games that's the only focus at all. So banning characters in fighting games is a much bigger deal.

 

[lordvaati]

Character striking would be iffy.

now Character Lock(winner stays with the character they won with), that could be debated for.

 

[TreK]

Strike my Diddy, I'll go MK and shark for 8 minutes out of saltiness.

Yeah. That's probably a bad idea.

 

[Double Helix]

It is pretty funny. Striking would benefit Mango and M2K more than anybody ever. I am assuming you mean only striking a character each. So strike Mango's Fox, he goes Falco, Falcon, Puff, or Mario. Good luck man. Besides...who would strike MY main Ness when I have a secondary that is a worse matchup every time? I mean, I don't have one yet, but when I do it'll be either Ganon, Fox or Weegee. All better than Ness...yep.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

League of Legends does this to some extent; it's a 5v5 game with each team only being able to use any character once and each team being able to ban their choice of some number of characters from the set. The idea is that having only one "main" or even merely two or three isn't considered acceptable for a high level player and that just simply must be able to play several characters.

In all liklihood, this won't work well as a mainstream smash format. For one, characters in smash (and fighting games in general) are a bit too complex to reasonably expect wide swaths of players to be able to play a lot of them effectively. For two, the way the game and match-ups work and such, this quickly ends up making the procedure too big a part of the game. By this I mean that effectively navigating this system is a skill (as is navigating all in-between game choices, including stage procedure, character counterpicking, etc.), and when it becomes a "game" with too much real skill involved, being good at the picking stuff in-between games game can substitute for a lot of real skill. This is doubly true since you don't really know which characters someone else is good with in a tournament with strangers; even if I ask around and find out that Diddy is your best character, I'm still at a loss as per who your next best characters are that I need to strike with a huge reward if I luck out and guess right. This is bad.

Gimmicks like this are relatively compatible with a format like crews though, and if this game has good online, I expect a lot of gimmick formats to have one-off runs just to enjoy playing the game in different ways. Restricted character formats are certainly one interesting possibility of many, and I look forward to seeing what ends up playing out.