Should Metaknight Be Banned? The Poll (LISTEN TO THE SBR PODCAST!)

[Praxis]

He's light, has slow horizontal aerial movement without using special moves or gliding, his crouch barely reduces his height, has no projectiles, and he lacks attacks that do a lot of damage by themselves.

The problem is that none of these are exploitable advantages. Lacking attacks that do a lot of damage by themselves isn't that big a deal when you can chain them up like he can (same thing goes for Peach), especially with his speed and autocancels. His light weight results in him escaping combos and chain grabs faster, and the fact that he has the best recovery in the game and is impossible to gimp (a good MK player will gimp YOU if you're trying to edgehog or spike him) mean he still lives to good percentages compared to heavier characters, while dishing out **** the whole time.

No projectiles doesn't hurt him much with his speed.

These are points he's not strong in, but not weaknesses.

If by "broken" you mean "necessary to ban for the game to function well," then you are wrong for thinking you'd have to be stupid or bad not to think MK is broken.

MK is absolutely not broken in this sense. MK suffers from Old Sagat Syndrome, except worse. He makes half the cast unplayable, and runs the risk of making everyone play him to get by.

Old Sagat ended up not completely dominating the metagame, but he had several characters that were his equal, and he did significantly reduce diversity (he was soft banned in Japan, and more characters were viable there). Metaknight has no equals, and is indisputably the best character (which Old Sagat was).

If Old Sagat is the baseline of bannable (and note that Sirlin uses Old Sagat as a baseline measuremend of the border between bannable and not bannable), then MK passes the border and is in the bannable territory. He completely dominates the metagame, can't be counterpicked, and makes half the cast competitively unviable. He has no bad stages and no bad matchups, and we'll all be forced to main or second Metaknight if we want to place at major tournaments.

My point is that MK DOES have disadvantages. He's not so good that it's totally ******** and you'd notice from the first time you saw someone play him.

Indeed. Akuma = Too Good. MK is not "too good" to Akuma levels, but he really wrecks the entire metagame.

The tier list in Melee was a set of equals- Fox, Falco, Marth, Sheik, Peach. Some of them countered each other, or had even matchups with each other.

MK is the equivilant of all of them combined. If you ban MK, you are left with Snake, G&W, Dedede, ROB, Marth...ROB counters Snake and G&W, Dedede counters Snake and is countered by G&W, Snake counters G&W and Marth but is countered by Dedede and ROB, Marth has almost all neutral matchups except he counters G&W and loses to Snake and slightly ROB...

Do you see how balance the game ends up in the high tiers? Not only that, without MK, a ton of characters who simply could not fight MK at all suddenly become competitively viable, especially characters like Samus that had decent matchups on Snake but couldn't do ANYTHING against MK, or ROB who is extremely good but has impossible matchups against MK and G&W.

 

[Samuelson]

You guys don't know what you're talking about. Metaknight is the only part about this game that's balanced. I'm gonna start a group that's Pro Metaknight. Just because someone gets good at a character does not mean you need to ban it. I can understand some of the other character bans but banning Metaknight is pretty much saying "Go ahead, ban them all". Most people aren't even good at this game anyway. Its the equivalent of banning guns that look "scary".

LOL

MK is superior to every character in the game. He doesn't really have any bad matchups or bad stages. His worst matchups are 50:50 and even those matchups are sparse. More then 1 person is good with MK also, I think MK wins something like 20% of tournaments. MK just makes certain characters worthless in tournies, people should still pick up a good secondary that can handle MK though. I think it's too early to ban MK, a temporary ban would be interesting though.

 

[Xzax Kasrani]

Snake coutners meta.
ZSS goes even with him too.

 

[Samuelson]

Snake coutners meta.
ZSS goes even with him too.

Snake doesn't counter MK, he goes even with him at best. Not really sure how the ZSS vs MK matchup works out but i guess i'll take your word on it.

 

[Praxis]

You guys don't know what you're talking about. Metaknight is the only part about this game that's balanced. I'm gonna start a group that's Pro Metaknight. Just because someone gets good at a character does not mean you need to ban it. I can understand some of the other character bans but banning Metaknight is pretty much saying "Go ahead, ban them all". Most people aren't even good at this game anyway. Its the equivalent of banning guns that look "scary".

Don't ever speak again. Seriously. Some people value their IQ points, and reading this causes permanent damage.

 

[Praxis]

Snake coutners meta.
ZSS goes even with him too.

Right.

Cause DSF's Snake totally does fine against M2K's MK.

The matchup is even at best, 45:55 MK's favor in likelyhood.

MK's worst matchup is another MK.

And what ZSS has beaten a truly high level MK? Inui, Plank, Overswarm, M2K, DSF? Find me one and show me evidence they beat one of these MKs please.

 

[Samuelson]

Right.

Cause DSF's Snake totally does fine against M2K's MK.

The matchup is even at best, 45:55 MK's favor in likelyhood.

MK's worst matchup is another MK.

I would say that M2K and Azen are on a completely different level then DSF. DSF is an amazing player but i heard he got 3 stocked twice against Azen in MK dittos at HOBO, not 100% sure if thats true though.

 

[Praxis]

I would say that M2K and Azen are on a completely different level then DSF. DSF is an amazing player but i heard he got 3 stocked twice against Azen in MK dittos at HOBO, not 100% sure if thats true though.

The point remains that no Snake player has taken down M2K or even run him down to last stock though, including DSF, the best in the world.

Maybe it's possible that no Snake is good enough, rather than the matchup. But isn't it telling that DSF takes MK dittos over CPing Snake?

I think MK has a slight, slight advantage on Snake at a high level. Enough that MK dittos are a better option.

 

[coolstorybro]

http://zip.4chan.org/v/res/21645173.html#21645887

Some raid*** /b/tard is trying to get us to vote no.

Just thought you should know that.

Looks like it's failing miserably though.

 

[Deoxys]

MK is absolutely not broken in this sense. MK suffers from Old Sagat Syndrome, except worse. He makes half the cast unplayable, and runs the risk of making everyone play him to get by.

Old Sagat ended up not completely dominating the metagame, but he had several characters that were his equal, and he did significantly reduce diversity (he was soft banned in Japan, and more characters were viable there). Metaknight has no equals, and is indisputably the best character (which Old Sagat was).

If Old Sagat is the baseline of bannable (and note that Sirlin uses Old Sagat as a baseline measuremend of the border between bannable and not bannable), then MK passes the border and is in the bannable territory. He completely dominates the metagame, can't be counterpicked, and makes half the cast competitively unviable. He has no bad stages and no bad matchups, and we'll all be forced to main or second Metaknight if we want to place at major tournaments.

Old Sagat simply could not be beaten by much of the cast. This is totally untrue in SSBB. In SSBB, there are very, very few matchups where there is no chance for one of the characters to win. In Brawl, MK's best matchups are still won through interaction, whereas Old Sagat completely removed the opponent's ability to use mindgames or interact in a reasonable, skill-intensive way. Furthermore, Old Sagat wasn't banned (only soft-banned), and it would have been considered ridiculous to suggest banning him as early as we are suggesting banning MK (as Sirlin points out).

Also, MK has bad stages... Yoshi's Island (Melee) anyone?

http://zip.4chan.org/v/res/21645173.html#21645887

Some raid*** /b/tard is trying to get us to vote no.

Just thought you should know that.

Looks like it's failing miserably though.

Haha, you think people from /v/ are /b/tards....

 

[Samuelson]

It's really hard to say. I know that Azen used MK at HOBO a good amount of times so he could ensure a victory against some opponents. Matchups are really hard to judge when you compare it to two people who are the best with their character because one of the players could just be an overall better player.

The MK ban IS going to happen in the future. At least a temporary ban will happen, there's just too many good players that want the ban to go through.

 

[WakerofWinds]

Old Sagat simply could not be beaten by much of the cast. This is totally untrue in SSBB. In SSBB, there are very, very few matchups where there is no chance for one of the characters to win. In Brawl, MK's best matchups are still won through interaction, whereas Old Sagat completely removed the opponent's ability to use mindgames or interact in a reasonable, skill-intensive way. Furthermore, Old Sagat wasn't banned (only soft-banned), and it would have been considered ridiculous to suggest banning him as early as we are suggesting banning MK (as Sirlin points out).

Also, MK has bad stages... Yoshi's Island (Melee) anyone?

Would you be in favor of a soft ban on MK? I mean really, people aren't finding counters to MK because nobody wants to risk playing a different character against him. A soft ban sounds like a good idea, or a temp ban. It doesn't have to be long, just long enough for other characters metagame to improve.

 

[Praxis]

Old Sagat simply could not be beaten by much of the cast. This is totally untrue in SSBB. In SSBB, there are very, very few matchups where there is no chance for one of the characters to win. In Brawl, MK's best matchups are still won through interaction, whereas Old Sagat completely removed the opponent's ability to use mindgames or interact in a reasonable, skill-intensive way. Furthermore, Old Sagat wasn't banned (only soft-banned), and it would have been considered ridiculous to suggest banning him as early as we are suggesting banning MK (as Sirlin points out).

Also, MK has bad stages... Yoshi's Island (Melee) anyone?

Japan does not hard ban. They soft-banned Akuma, putting Akuma and Old Sagat in the same class. You can't argue that Old Sagat wasn't a problem because they only soft-banned him, because they only soft-banned Akuma.

Also, I think the tornado pretty well removes "opponent's ability to interact in a reasonable way" in the case of some matchups that don't have an effective way to counter it (ROB? Fox trying to get back on the stage?).


"Also, MK has bad stages... Yoshi's Island (Melee) anyone?"

Has that EVER been tournament legal?

 

[:034:]

I voted yes.

The reason why a character gets a ban is when tournament matches are basically just that character. Tourney's are slowly going into MK vs MK in a lot of finals. Those who don't main MK use him as a secondary for when they get *****.

Second, MK does NOT have a counterpick. There is arguably not even an even match-up besides MK himself. Sure, every board has pretty much been going "We go even with MK!" and they've all been largely untrue. Bowser? Yeah, right. DK? Keep dreaming. Yoshi? Don't make me laugh. The only character that has the greatest chance against MK that is not MK himself is Falco... And their boards agree that MK is one of their hardest match-ups BY FAR.

I can't help but think how remotely unfair this is.

Now people can say 'but tourney's aren't solely MK yet!', but they WILL be. We can ban him now and, as a community, move on to a better metagame, or wait until terror strikes, people leaving Brawl forever because people were just too stubborn to see the facts.

I do suggest a compromise: ban Meta Knight in singles, but not in teams. In teams, Meta Knight appears to be less trouble. Still really, really, really good, but a lot less dangerous when facing a good team.

 

[Praxis]

Would you be in favor of a soft ban on MK? I mean really, people aren't finding counters to MK because nobody wants to risk playing a different character against him. A soft ban sounds like a good idea, or a temp ban. It doesn't have to be long, just long enough for other characters metagame to improve.

Japan doesn't do (or at least rarely does) hard bans, and the United States doesn't do soft bans.

Soft bans work on the honor system- that players using the banned character will be looked down upon by the other high level players. In the US, MK mains won't care if they're looked down upon, as long as they're making money. In Japan, culturally, that matters more.

 

[coolstorybro]

Haha, you think people from /v/ are /b/tards....

No, I said that op is a raid*** /b/tard that wants us to vote spam to piss all of you off.

I think he should **** off to /b/.

 

[Deoxys]

Would you be in favor of a soft ban on MK? I mean really, people aren't finding counters to MK because nobody wants to risk playing a different character against him. A soft ban sounds like a good idea, or a temp ban. It doesn't have to be long, just long enough for other characters metagame to improve.

I can always just attend the tournies that don't ban MK, but it will be annoying because tournies are hard enough to come by in Greater Boston as it is and I fear the MK-allowing tournaments will become all MKs, since everyone else will **** out and play the no-MK tournies.

Personally, I think the metagame is way too young for banning a character as tame as MK to be the right call to advance it. Also, I think it would be ridiculous to ban him without considering ways to weaken him first (i.e. handicap or letting opponent pick starter).

 

[Deoxys]

Japan does not hard ban. They soft-banned Akuma, putting Akuma and Old Sagat in the same class. You can't argue that Old Sagat wasn't a problem because they only soft-banned him, because they only soft-banned Akuma.

Also, I think the tornado pretty well removes "opponent's ability to interact in a reasonable way" in the case of some matchups that don't have an effective way to counter it (ROB? Fox trying to get back on the stage?).


"Also, MK has bad stages... Yoshi's Island (Melee) anyone?"

Has that EVER been tournament legal?

My argument wasn't that Old Sagat wasn't a problem. I thought that was clear from my post.

The tornado doesn't remove interaction against a large portion of the cast at all. Fox trying to get back on the stage is just a certain scenario in which a character is f***ed. Such scenarios will always exist.

Also, Yoshi's Island is usually tournament legal. At least in good tournaments. Banning it is pretty stupid, especially with everyone and their grandmother whinning about how good MK is.

Japan doesn't do (or at least rarely does) hard bans, and the United States doesn't do soft bans.

Soft bans work on the honor system- that players using the banned character will be looked down upon by the other high level players. In the US, MK mains won't care if they're looked down upon, as long as they're making money. In Japan, culturally, that matters more.

This argument just doesn't make sense to me, and it's not that I don't understand Japanese culture. It's just that it's ludicrous to claim that no good player in Japan would be willing to defame himself for money but all the good MK players in the US would be willing to.

Forgive my double post please!

 

[WakerofWinds]

I can always just attend the tournies that don't ban MK, but it will be annoying because tournies are hard enough to come by in Greater Boston as it is and I fear the MK-allowing tournaments will become all MKs, since everyone else will **** out and play the no-MK tournies.

Personally, I think the metagame is way too young for banning a character as tame as MK to be the right call to advance it. Also, I think it would be ridiculous to ban him without considering ways to weaken him first (i.e. handicap or letting opponent pick starter).

That's a fair point Praxis. (the hard ban soft ban thing)

From what I can tell, what's being suggested that will happen is exactly what you said in your first paragraph.

Second, the metagame will continue to remain young if MK is allowed at the rate things are going. I would be in favor of some handicap if it would allow other players to play their characters more, and stop using MK. The problem is, nobody is improving the metagame because they can't, not with MK dominating the scene.

From what I can tell, that's what the problem being discussed is. If I'm wrong please correct me...

 

[Fatmanonice]

I'm not going to vote yet but, is it just me or there something wrong that when you click on the poll results button it shows you EVERYONE who voted for each side? Shouldn't polls be confidential?

"Durr, then don't click the button then, ******."

There, I beat the five people who were going to respond like this. Anyways, couldn't this also be leading to blacklisting of people who support a certain side depending on what ends up happening?

 

[DRaGZ]

I don't see this "poll results" button.

 

[Xiivi]

post

If you aren't confident enough in your opinion that you want it to be kept secret from everyone else, then you shouldn't be voting.

I don't see this "poll results" button.

http://www.smashboards.com/poll.php?do=showresults&pollid=502

 

[Paff]

I'm ignorant-enough to not be able to carefully analyze top-level play (or even tournament play in general) and come to a solid conclusion about this issue; however, I'm not a moron (or so I think, anyway), and I've been lurking around these debates for a while, so I think my views may have _some_ validity. But again, I'm ignorant, so I apologize if my thoughts are of no use:

It seems to me that, of those members of the community who know what they're talking about in terms of Meta Knight's matchups and the situation at large, consensus is nowhere near being reached. To the point where it seems to pretty much be brick-wall-versus-brick-wall, in terms of how flexible everyone's opinions are, and going with either the "ban" or "no ban" option will piss a lot of people off.

From seeing this, I've come to the conclusion that perhaps the best solution for this issue would be for some tournaments to ban Meta Knight, and others to not ban Meta Knight, and for the tournament community at large to regularly attend both types of tournament. Then, in perhaps a year or so, the issue should be reconsidered based upon how both the Meta-Knight-banned tournaments have developed and how the Meta-Knight-not-banned tournaments have developed.

This'd allow those who want to try to learn how to defeat Meta Knight to play against him seriously, and those who wish to see more diverse tournament environments to avoid him. And it'd allow those Meta Knight mains who aren't just playing him to win to use their character. Characters would be developed both in a "how can we defeat Meta Knight" fashion and in a "how can we defeat everyone else" fashion simultaneously, so interesting things would happen to the Meta-Knight-banned meta game and at the same time there'd be a good chance of finding a way to take care of high-level Meta Knights, assuming that a way exists.

The only issues would be worries that it might "split the community" if about half of everyone develops strong preferences one way and the other half develops strong preferences the other way. However, as things stand, the community is pretty bloody divided on this, and perhaps a partial split would be preferable to dragging half of everyone along kicking and screaming?

This is just a thought; I'm by no means certain that it'd be the best course of action.

This poll (obviously) hasn't got any options between "ban Meta Knight now" and "don't ban Meta Knight", so I haven't voted since both of those options seem a bit dodgy.

 

[Praxis]

This argument just doesn't make sense to me, and it's not that I don't understand Japanese culture. It's just that it's ludicrous to claim that no good player in Japan would be willing to defame himself for money but all the good MK players in the US would be willing to.

Then explain to me why soft-bans work in Japan? I'm fairly sure it's a cultural thing.
I've personally known people who lived there and played competitively, and they scoff at Akuma players, and when I asked noted that sure, lots of bad players played Akuma in tournaments but nobody good ever would.

Also, Yoshi's Island is usually tournament legal. At least in good tournaments.

I've never even heard of it being legal. Are you positive? We've got walk off ledges, a short ceiling and very little edgeguarding on this stage.

 

[joshgrrr]

I remember when Shiek was the best character in melee, then fox, Then some other **** bag.
You ****ing idiots dont know **** when it comes to these games. Next year, Pikachu will be up for banning because of its thunder vaccum. Believe it.

Just play better.

If anything, I vote for a ban on pit. ****ing sora looking homo.

 

[DRaGZ]

I remember when Shiek was the best character in melee, then fox, Then some other **** bag.
You ****ing idiots dont know **** when it comes to these games. Next year, Pikachu will be up for banning because of its thunder vaccum. Believe it.

Just play better.

If anything, I vote for a ban on pit. ****ing sora looking homo.

You don't know aaaaanything.

At all.

Not just about Meta Knight.

Just...in general you are lacking in certain cognitive faculties.

 

[WakerofWinds]

I remember when Shiek was the best character in melee, then fox, Then some other **** bag.
You ****ing idiots dont know **** when it comes to these games. Next year, Pikachu will be up for banning because of its thunder vaccum. Believe it.

Just play better.

If anything, I vote for a ban on pit. ****ing sora looking homo.

I'm sorry, who are you? (then again, who am I? )

I'd like to see you "play better" I really would. MK Dominates the scene for a reason. At least Shiek and Fox had counters. MK doesn't.

 

[poisonedkris]

Stop complaining he's unfair. Deal with it. Learn to play around it. It's not that hard. Just another character...

 

[Fatmanonice]

If you aren't confident enough in your opinion that you want it to be kept secret from everyone else, then you shouldn't be voting.

That's not it... voting is supposed to be a confidential process that's sole purpose is to show the percentage of people who support or don't support something, not the individuals who vote for either side. It can be freakishly obvious which side a person is going to vote but it really isn't everyone's business. Eh... I just don't want this to break out into some ******** flame fest based on who voted for which side because that's pretty much what happened with both "Should Metaknight Be Banned" threads.

 

[IkeStriker]

Mk might be a strong chracter but that is no reason to ban him

If your the best and Mk can beat you then to bad your not good enfough go pratcise
I can asure you there is a way to beat mk and FYI few weeks ago in brawl on wifi
p1 ike (me)
p2 mk
p3 mk
p4 captain falcon

winner : captain falcon and he won by a good one

 

[Deoxys]

Then explain to me why soft-bans work in Japan? I'm fairly sure it's a cultural thing.
I've personally known people who lived there and played competitively, and they scoff at Akuma players, and when I asked noted that sure, lots of bad players played Akuma in tournaments but nobody good ever would.



I've never even heard of it being legal. Are you positive? We've got walk off ledges, a short ceiling and very little edgeguarding on this stage.

Maybe they don't usually play for a lot of money in Japan. Also, people still play Old Sagat in Japan, just only against characters that aren't made unviable by him.

And I am positive. SBR recommends its legality, and I firmly agree with their decision. The only Banned/Counterpick stages that should be banned IMO are Mario Circuit and Green Greens.

Well, I sure should go to bed, as it's 4 AM....

 

[WakerofWinds]

Mk might be a strong chracter but that is no reason to ban him

If your the best and Mk can beat you then to bad your not good enfough go pratcise
I can asure you there is a way to beat mk and FYI few weeks ago in brawl on wifi
p1 ike (me)
p2 mk
p3 mk
p4 captain falcon

winner : captain falcon and he won by a good one

Your logic just failed you, and proved OUR point.

If you're the BEST and MK beats you, then that means there's something INITIALLY unfair about him. If you're the best, MK shouldn't just /beat/ you.

Just because of ONE match, on WIFI, doesn't mean he's beatable at the top levels of metagame.

Also, poisonedkris, he's not just one character right now, he's a rising epidemic. MK is like the new bubonic plague, but worse.

 

[Fatmanonice]

Mk might be a strong chracter but that is no reason to ban him

If your the best and Mk can beat you then to bad your not good enfough go pratcise
I can asure you there is a way to beat mk and FYI few weeks ago in brawl on wifi
p1 ike (me)
p2 mk
p3 mk
p4 captain falcon

winner : captain falcon and he won by a good one

... You have to be an ALT... or a troll... because you pretty much just fed yourself to the lions with this post...

 

[coolstorybro]

If you start to see tons of people voting no and haven't even posted yet, or have only posted in this thread, they're probably misguided /b/tards in /v/ trying to "raid".

Last post in here, I guess if I see more ******** **** in /v/ I'll post here to troll the trolls.

 

[IAmSmarterThanYou]

Would you dorks listen to yourselves?

Grow some god**** balls and learn to play.


Only a bunch of whiney spoilt losers are going to seriously think a character should be banned just because YOU fail at beating them.

A "scrub" beating your "expert" ***? Cry some more.

Adapt, learn to play.



If this was really Natural Selection you ***gots would be dead by now.

Holy **** I want to wipe all of your genes off the face of the planet. It just boggles the mind that people like you exist in the world. Half the word in poverty and starving? Sod that, WE CANT HAVE SCRUBS ****ING ALL OVER MY FRAGILE EGO WITH A VIDEO GAME CHARACTER.

 

[Praxis]

Maybe they don't usually play for a lot of money in Japan. Also, people still play Old Sagat in Japan, just only against characters that aren't made unviable by him.

And I am positive. SBR recommends its legality, and I firmly agree with their decision. The only Banned/Counterpick stages that should be banned IMO are Mario Circuit and Green Greens.

Well, I sure should go to bed, as it's 4 AM....

I'm going to bed. Tomorrow morning, I am going to KILL YOU for daring to suggest Greens be banned. I will kill you painfully. Greens is the best stage in this game, and the only stage that actually is a good counterpick against MK.

Go die.

EDIT:
Read this page.
http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=153706&page=206

 

[Icntspll]

Broken moves are banned.
Broken characters should be banned.

 

[WakerofWinds]

Anybody else ever wonder why people come into an actual discussion, and then tell them they're crying?

If you have an answer, I'd like to hear it.

 

[DRaGZ]

Stop making alts just so you can flame and post in the polls.

Gawd, what a stupid affair this has turned into.

 

[Deoxys]

I'm going to bed. Tomorrow morning, I am going to KILL YOU for daring to suggest Greens be banned. I will kill you painfully. Greens is the best stage in this game, and the only stage that actually is a good counterpick against MK.

Go die.

Why isn't Yoshi's Island a good counterpick against MK in your mind? You want me to go die because I think a stage that already adds more luck to the game due to its random elements and is also totally broken by DDD!? I mean, it's just a pile of infinites with bombs that appear randomly in certain areas....