Smash Wii U Community Leaders Release Recommended Ruleset

In the aftermath of Genesis 4, many Super Smash Bros. for Wii U players have taken to social media to discuss the ever present issue of stage legality and a competitive ruleset that can accommodate the needs of all players while remaining competitively proper. Amidst months of disagreement and adjustment, a collective of profound tournament organizers from various Smash Wii U regions have come to a consensus on what they are calling the “2017 Recommended Ruleset”.

The ruleset was announced through a Twitlonger published by Scott “VGBC | Tantalus” Robertson. The group behind it, comprised of BAM, Bear, Blind, Champ, D1, Martakia, Tantalus, TLTC, TMPR, Vayseth, and Zan, agreed upon several factors that have been previously dubious to tournament settings, be they unestablished in official ruling or met with varying restrictions from region to region. These rulings cover such aspects as Coaching, Gentleman’s Rule, Settings Check, Controller Settings, and a consensus on a concrete stage list.

Tantalus' Twitlonger covers the details behind these rules as well as a brief explanation to the conclusions the community leaders had come to. On top of expounding on some of these factors officially for the first time, Tantalus noted that “This is a living, breathing document, not a set in stone document. We are open to change and that is how we got to this point, so if this doesn't improve the playing field, we aren't opposed to reverting changes”.

As well as Tantalus' quote, a quote attributed to the entire team reads "We think this ruleset will solve most of the challenges and qualms of the current metagame while springing the game into a new healthy meta". It is clear that the leaders of the community are open to future suggestion and adaptation of this recommended list as the meta evolves and needs of the players evolve alongside of it.

As of right now, tournaments confirmed to be using the 2017 Recommended Ruleset include all future 2GGaming, Midwest region, and Smash at Xanadu events. It will likely be in use at more regionals and majors in the the coming months.

Author's Note With a semi-finalized ruleset being formed so early into 2017, it will be exciting to see how these rules suit the ever evolving meta of Smash Wii U and it will quell the dissent from those dissatisfied with the now previous variety of rules.

Feel free to sound off in the comments section below how you feel about the 2017 Recommended Ruleset and make sure to check back here at Smashboards for more content as the 2017 competitive year picks up into full swing!

 

Repeat post:
can't believe this notion is getting by with people. Lylat and DH need to stay legal so they can encompany all sorts of gameplay, but not so heavy handedly change the the tide of the match. DH doesn't per se enforce slow gameplay, but it encourages more precision. Yes the tree could be detrimental to MUs, but so can the SV Platform. Fact of the matter is DH is a lot better than people give it credit. The tree placement can cause unique vertical combos.

Lylat is a FANTASTIC stage that people are really not understanding how good it is. I say it's the best stage for a vertical juggler. Why you ask?:

Tri plats that are all at the same level.

The platforms are some small you can cover with most uair, utilt, usmash.

If they try to land in the space in between, easy punish.

You can reach through plats really easy too.

I see Lylat as an UNDERUTILIZED AND UNDERRATED stage that is suffering collateral loss due to this new stage proposal.

Condensing stage list only benefits the best characters and the best players truly and is actually anti-competitive. Smash is an oligopoly ruled by people want it their way and will use their swaths of fans (Stans) to fight their arguments for them. This form of seduction shouldn't be encouraged and replicated. I can't believe full scale seduction is taking place here. If this ruleset goes through, I can't wait to see in the future "Dreamland and Town&City should be banned too"!

This is the first game where we could have about 10 stages legal, but we want half because of some reductive reasoning (but hey whatever is hip with the kids daddy yo). I understand why the first 3 left, but DH and Lylat? Cmon.

/rantover
¬_¬

 

This is horrible. If it becomes the standard I will seriously consider dropping sm4sh for melee.

 

Though I like Lylat a lot, I can understand why it's banned.

If you're going to pretend that Dreamland and Battlefield are the same thing (they aren't) you should remove both and make Mii Verse the 3 platform stage since it removes BF jank.

 

Changes to encourage neutral and offensive gameplay. Something that the casual viewer can't understand as the gameplay change in Lylat because of the airship declination and plataform layout, or people avoiding the tree because of the kill throws some characters have there...things like these are not good for the "community". The gameplay is being encouraged to be default ,for the viewers.,... But the game is turning more and more tedious TO PLAY. We already have Melee that is fast paced and focused in aggressive gameplay, why hurt Sm4sh defensive gameplay so much ?

Really sad news. I hope TO's don't use this a lot.

 

As of right now, tournaments confirmed to be using the 2017 Recommended Ruleset include all future 2GG events, Midwest, and Smash at Xanadu

I'm sorry? The whole Midwest?

You got all 12 states to agree?

That's funny, no one mentioned this to me, a TO in the Midwest.

 

This is awful. We shouldn't touch the stages until we can see what stages we get on a switch port. I don't care about viewers, I care about players. that's who TOs should care about too.

 

There are some really good things, and some really bad things. Let me say this, though.


If stages being removed make you less inclined to play this game competitively, you should not be playing this game.

 

I would've been happier if Delfino was legalized, and this was left for all the organizers and TOs to discuss over a longer amount of time.

 

I just want to point out that since this stage system is technically using only 4 stages (they count dreamland as the same as battlefield) this game will have incredibly limited stage options.

Getting rid of Lylat is the worst decision yet, since it's actually not bad at all, most of the jank has been patched out. Duck hunt is banned basically because of stalling, which there is a rule about in the proposed ruleset "1.7. Stalling includes but is not limited to...reaching a position that your opponent can never reach you" I actually like the stage.

I'm a big advocate of the more stages, the better. However, I'm not going around saying we should add Delfino and Castle Siege back. saying Duck Hunt and Lylat are banned is just going too far. Just saying, as a T.O. I really don't like this stage list. I'm going to stick to my own.

 

Ugh. This is terrible. DL and BF aren't the same stage. Town and city shouldn't be counterpick. But DH and Lylat... They are amazing stages and you never see people abusing the ducks or the tilt. DH especially creates some fun MUs. Everyone knows how the ducks work. And Lylat isn't half as jank as people say. This better not be legalized in alabama

 

"1-1-1-1 only"
i mean as ****ty as it is that's about expected, despite how few problems mii fighters have actually caused when legal
"Guest A only"
literally the worst

 

"1-1-1-1 only"
i mean as ****ty as it is that's about expected, despite how few problems mii fighters have actually caused when legal
"Guest A only"
literally the worst

FRII THE MIIS PLIISE
Okay, so America is adopting the Japan ruleset. I'm OK with that for now. RIP Dream Land though Legal stage in every other Smash game and banned here. NOT the same as Battlefield. I see no reason to illegalize it.
Duck Hunt, sure you can ban it in singles because it's big and campy. But it's great for doubles. Why ban it there? Plus you get the old ban system back for doubles only.

 

Duck Hunt banned? How else will Kirby get early Up Throw kills?

 

I personally like this and would like to try it out before tossing it to the side.

 

Great day in the morning! This leaves 10% of stages to select. And only guest 1111 s? Too poorly balanced to be of any use IMHO, so the **** with this. I'm dropping them for instead.

That said, it's going to be interesting to see where this ruleset takes us this year. I hope Sm4sh competitive play doesn't fall into obscurity like Brawl.

 

Finally some people are realizing what I realized a long time ago: Battlefield should be treated as Dream Land 64. Finally. They are too similar to be different stages, just like how Omegas are different stages but too similar to be counted as separated stages. Yes, the blast zones on DL64/Bf are different, but so is it on all the other Omega stages.

It sickened me how my opponent always could pick between Battlefield and Dream Land in the counterpick phase...

 

Ok, even I know some of these bans are stupid

I can see how people would want duck hunt banned, because the tree encourages stalling, but what about the smashville platform? Most zoners stay on it till the guy goes aggro, and either way the ducks can easily change gameplay

Lylat being banned is the most stupid thing I've ever heard. The point of that stage is to be precise with your recovery, adding the ship to tilt a little. Sure there are some jank kills, but most of them have been passed out.

Now dreamland and battlefield being the same stage is straight up BULL****! Does everyone forget about whispy, the different layout of ledges. The height of ledges, and overall a different blast zone.

Town and city as a counter pick... Good Lord I think we hit a road block

At this point this stage has now less stage options than MELEE! A GAME THAT IS LITERALLY DESIGNED AS STRICT

Melee has six stages while smash 4 now has 5

At this point I think community is become more on impressing the viewers than actually being fair to the PLAYERS! It just doesn't feel like it used to

 

no one will actually use it, but the 3ds is legal? My friends and I had a small tournament a while back, but all of them only used the 3ds as a controller. The lag was real every stinkin' time. Curious choice...

 

I hope people aren't willing to accept all the garbage arguments they put there. The standards for banning should be way better than this. I used to play Duck Hunt in tournaments, and now I guess I just have to suck it up? Literally nothing is making me go "Oh that makes sense".

"Defensive play"
This is not a bannable tactic to do on any other legal stage and a time limit exists. TOs have the power to fix the "defensive play" stigma with a better time limit that works for ALL stages including Duck Hunt, but they'd rather ban the stage than actually fix the problem. You can't ban defensive players, so just ban all their options til you don't see it (or those players) anymore, right? Even if this is the reasoning, it's not like any alternatives were provided for people who actively use the stage for defensive play. Just "screw off and pick something else".

"2D plane"
They talk about how 2D plane is fine later.

"Ducks that block hits"
Look at what you're doing on the stage! The duck is right there and you hit it! No one's fault but the players for something like this.

"Additionally, there are characters who can’t reach the tree platforms without using an attack move that puts them in freefall."
This is incorrect and they should be specific about who so they can be proven wrong. They did do research on this...right?

Everybody, including Mac not leaving the ground, can hit the ducks and use the dog as a platform to get up there without using freefall. It doesn't take long, take a little bit of planning in neutral (not really), and Mac doesn't even have to jump to hit them. Remember that GIF where Mac used KO punch after getting risen by the dog? People should do that more intentionally instead of thinking it's random. Everybody has this option so people should use it. Doing one attack to hit a duck will not put you at great risk, and if your opponent tries to stop you, guess what? They're off the tree.

"Often, much like dream land, this stage is used as an alternative Final Destination when that stage is banned." "If we are just using Duck Hunt and Dream Land as alternatives to the stages we want to go to anyways, why keep them?"
This is just projection. Just because YOU ignore how the stage works doesn't mean everyone does this. I'm not part of that "often" yet I'm affected by the ban. I use this stage in tournaments and don't use it as a secondary FD because there are trees, bushes, and ducks I try to take advantage of to get a win. It's the only stage left with some sort of flavor to it.

This is exactly why I barely get excited to go to Sm4sh tournaments anymore. Why would I go to locals or try to travel to majors with these terrible, restrictive rulesets with obvious bias against defensive play? At this point I'm convinced these guys could make up any reasoning to get an unpopular stage banned. Have you ever heard of a stage being REALLOWED?

 

Some points, like those about coaching and the gentleman rule make sense. Being open to a lot more controllers is also nice. However, I do disagree with a few things in this ruleset:

They argue that you can just pick dreamland if battlefield is banned, and vice versa, and made banning one equal to banning both. Also, they said that you could just cp to duck hunt if FD was banned. But they kept dreamland as a cp but banned duck hunt.
Promoting defensive play is not a reason to ban stages. Time limits exist for a reason.

I understood when they removed castle siege, delfino, and halberd, but lylat and duck hunt add variety and have a niche. At this point, i feel like smash 4 is being focused on being fun for the viewers to watch instead of being fair for the players.

 

i would write out why this is stupid but everyone else has already done that

so let me just say that this is bull****

 

bring back DH and Lylat they have always exaggerated on how bad they are and each bring something special to the game. not to mention a striking system for nuetral stages is wayyyyy better than rps which is what this enforces, also diversity in stages is always a good thingand this just takes diversity and throws it out the window

 

Repeat post:
can't believe this notion is getting by with people. Lylat and DH need to stay legal so they can encompany all sorts of gameplay, but not so heavy handedly change the the tide of the match. DH doesn't per se enforce slow gameplay, but it encourages more precision. Yes the tree could be detrimental to MUs, but so can the SV Platform. Fact of the matter is DH is a lot better than people give it credit. The tree placement can cause unique vertical combos.

Lylat is a FANTASTIC stage that people are really not understanding how good it is. I say it's the best stage for a vertical juggler. Why you ask?:

Tri plats that are all at the same level.

The platforms are some small you can cover with most uair, utilt, usmash.

If they try to land in the space in between, easy punish.

You can reach through plats really easy too.

I see Lylat as an UNDERUTILIZED AND UNDERRATED stage that is suffering collateral loss due to this new stage proposal.

Condensing stage list only benefits the best characters and the best players truly and is actually anti-competitive. Smash is an oligopoly ruled by people want it their way and will use their swaths of fans (Stans) to fight their arguments for them. This form of seduction shouldn't be encouraged and replicated. I can't believe full scale seduction is taking place here. If this ruleset goes through, I can't wait to see in the future "Dreamland and Town&City should be banned too"!

This is the first game where we could have about 10 stages legal, but we want half because of some reductive reasoning (but hey whatever is hip with the kids daddy yo). I understand why the first 3 left, but DH and Lylat? Cmon.

/rantover
¬_¬

i totally agree tbh as a puff main I love lylat because it hinders even good recoeries so if u take that stage away it hurts her overall viability

 

this is nonsense im a puff player and I would counter pick to battlefield but I would NEVER counter pick to Dreamland. Dreamland and battlefield are NOT the same stage the diffrence being the super close blast zones

 

Also dont ban lylat and duck hunt

 

I have wanted ds controllers being permitted for a very long time.
But sacrificing two beloved, fun stages for smaller things is just ****

 

Is Duck Hunt banned due to stalling? Because if you're banning stalling specifically for that reason, then why ban Duck Hunt if the banning of stalling discourages it? And I can see that stage being beneficial to some characters who would otherwise have an issue with certain match ups. If you look at characters who are all about zoning, then DH is a great stage for them. Think of a low tier like Samus on that stage. Why punish a character like her when it can actually benefit her? I thought that's what counterpicks were for. If you're banning stages that can turn the tide of a match, then you're only hurting the meta game for a number of characters who gain something from it.

 

#notmyruleset

 

These guys can straight up go **** themselves. This isn't "community leaders" leading the community, it's the TOs for a few big tournaments getting together and completely gutting the game, then tossing it down from on high to all the rest of us.

And besides, their ruleset is **** and basically nobody agrees with it.

 

Treating Dreamland and Battlefield as the same stage is like saying Fox and Falco are identical. THIS IS S T U P I D

 

I think that this is a good idea with good intentions but it fell a little short of where it should be. In the case of the Dreamland and Battlefield striking situation I think we will have to see how it plays out before it gets judged, but right now I am leaning away from it. The main problem I have with this ruleset is the stage list. I think that the omegas should be banned just for consistency but there is no real problem with them being legal. Duck Hunt and Lylat being banned is just stupid. Duck hunt promoting defensive play isn't a problem, it is just a way some characters can effectively. Banning a stage just because it promotes camping also hurts the characters that focus on zoning like Duck Hunt and Samus as if they didn't already need some help. Lylat is not as janky as some people make it out to be and it is the only tri plat with that type of layout. I think it is very important to have it back as well so there can be bans during sets. In a best 3/5 now you have to go to BF and DL against ZSS without the gentleman's clause. Having stage bans throughout a set makes it so characters don't get free wins on stages. I also believe that Town and City should be a starter but it doesn't really matter. What is amazing about this ruleset is the outline of settings so there can be no arguing any rulings. I think it is also good how they set a amount of time for coaching and hand warmers. I also like how they open up all controller options to players and opening up the game to many more players. I think they should have freed the miis but that doesn't need to be argued here.

TLDR: Step in right direction but stagelist needs work.

Edit: Also if Dreamland and BF are counted as the same in banning why is Dreamland a counterpick? And If they are allowing omega stages why are they counter picks?

 

If this ruleset ever gets adopted (which I hope it doesn't) I wouldn't be surprised if the stage list boils down to 3 in the future (Battlefield, Smashville, Final D), just like how it is in Japan. :/

EDIT: I guess I should mention the obvious problem with having a ban for a 3 starter list: It heavily favors the second person to stage-strike as they basically decide what stage they wanna fight on.

 

Rip Charizard on duck hunt.

Edit: Also, the current system isn't bad enough to be needed to be changed. It's not like there has been some unbeatable strategy on DH and LC.

Edit: Wily Castle, why not Wii fit studio? (Omega)

 

"No other specials for Mii Fighters will be allowed."

Spoiler: mfw

"Treated as Battlefield in striking phase. If Battlefield is banned, Dream Land 64 is also banned and vise versa."

No Lylat or Duck Hunt stages,

Spoiler: mfw

"Tournament Staff recommends the use of the Nintendo Gamecube controller, however, The Wii U Pro controller (Battery removed), Wii Remote + Nunchuck, Wii Remote + Classic Controller, and the Nintendo 3DS controller mode are all permitted control options."

Spoiler: mfw

There are some really good things, and some really bad things. Let me say this, though.


If stages being removed make you less inclined to play this game competitively, you should not be playing this game.

Disagree. Stages are gameplay affecting, and someone could easily like a game for it's stage options aswell as it's characters. If you take part of that out which you enjoyed, it is definitely a legitimate reason to not want to play the game (although I personally don't care about the stages enough to do so). Don't put your priorities as everyone else's, or that somehow their enjoyment is less valid. If this were something like a skin or anything not gameplay altering, I would agree.

 

**** like this kills my passion for the game. DH and Lylat are like the only fun stages. Tourney's are gonna be so boring. Variety makes things fun for both the player and audience. I'm not saying DH and Lylat don't have problems, but it's a small price to pay to avoid a goddamn Stage List of 4! I don't even wanna play right now. Maybe Switch will bring some more stage variety, but if this is what were going with, I'll probably drop-off.

 

These rule changes are beyond horrible. I seriously hope whoever came up with these changes goes back and edits them after seeing the overwhelmingly negative community reaction to them.

Honestly the extra control options is the only good change (and is well overdue, why wasn't this in place from the start?).

Removal of Dave's Stupid Rule - I don't think you've really thought through what this is going to result in, especially with the ridiculous changes to the stage list. While you had noble intentions, this rule really needs to stay in place or entire best-of-5 sets being played out entirely on Smashville are going to become the norm.

Removal of Gentleman's rule - WTF WHY? The Gentlemen's rule exists in the first place to allow the players, if they both agree, to play on a non-legal stage. Why deny them that if that's what they want to do? This is beyond stupid at this point. I didn't see anyone complaining that it existed.

Treating Battlefield and Dreamland as the same, so banning one is banning the other - What is this I don't even...the two stages are very different. You *can't* treat them as the same thing. It'll be like treating Mario and Luigi as the same character. Who decided this was a good idea?

Removal of Lylat and Duck Hunt - These stages were counterpicks for a reason. They broke up the monotony of the other stages and offered players a bit of variety. There's absolutely no reason to remove them and they should be reinstated. You mention Melee Pokemon Stadium as being another example but Melee Pokemon Stadium IS STILL A LEGAL STAGE! Once again, you must really like seeing best-of-5 sets being played out entirely on Smashville because under these rule changes that's what we are going to get.

These changes are honestly horrible. I really hope these don't become the new standard. Change them back or you are going to get a lot of players dropping this game. All the evidence you need is in replies in this thread. Not a single poster so far has agreed with these changes.

 

Convoluted and jokey solution is to make Pokemon Stadium 2 legal.
How, you may ask?

• First, go into 8 player smash.
• Set the stock count to 3, and handicap to on.
• Add three level 1 CPUs alongside the players.
• Give the CPUs a handicap of 300.
• Get rid of the CPUs, then SD.
• Lastly, use a manual timer instead of the in-game timer.

If only it didn't have to be that hard to get another "legal stage" under the restrictions in these rules. See, these strict rules would work if there was a good selection of stages that met these criteria, but there isn't, so it could be a flop. Only time will tell.

But seriously, use the Glitch 2 Mii ruleset. It was great. GimR was right there, it could have happened.
1132 Brawler, 1332 Swordfighter, 3111 Gunner. Please bring this back if possible.

 

Convoluted and jokey solution is to make Pokemon Stadium 2 legal.
How, you may ask?

• First, go into 8 player smash.
• Set the stock count to 3, and handicap to on.
• Add three level 1 CPUs alongside the players.
• Give the CPUs a handicap of 300.
• Get rid of the CPUs, then SD.
• Lastly, use a manual timer instead of the in-game timer.

If only it didn't have to be that hard to get another "legal stage" under the restrictions in these rules. See, these strict rules would work if there was a good selection of stages that met these criteria, but there isn't, so it could be a flop. Only time will tell.

But seriously, use the Glitch 2 Mii ruleset. It was great. GimR was right there, it could have happened.
1132 Brawler, 1332 Swordfighter, 3111 Gunner. Please bring this back if possible.

For the pokemon stadium 2 idea(which is greaaaat) you could have three players and 5 CPUs so that the third one could take out the CPUs without having staled other people's moves.

 

This reminds me of a parent trying to settle an argument between their two kids.

Kid: "Mom, I wanted to play with the red car! He won't let me play with it"
Parent: "I don't have time for this, no one gets the red car. And furthermore, I'm going to ban trucks and motorcycles.. Because playing with a truck counts as playing with a motorcycle "