Spawn Points.

[Mera Mera]

I'm not sure what I would suggest for fair spawns in 2v2, but in 1v1 at the least I feel like people should both appear in locations that mirror each other. I don't think that one person should start on a platform, and the other on the ground, which seems to happen a lot in stages with the battlefield platfrom layout (and probably more stages?)

Would it be possible for the game to recognize that it's a 1v1 and then pick mirrored spawn locations?

I think randomly spawning on a platform (with the opponent on the ground) hurts Ice Climbers in particular a lot. It's pretty hard to get out of that situation safely for them. While it seems like less of a big deal for most other characters, it would still be nice to see this changed.

Is there a technical complication that would get in the way of this?

Also @ everyone, any thoughts on what would be a good/fair way of spawning for 2v2? It seems like it'd be hard since certain characters care less about being stuck on a platform than others.

 

[Narpas_sword]

Fair:
Learn where the spawns are.
Chose your Player slot accordingly

 

[CORY]

i'm pretty sure it picks at random, as it was in brawl.

unless it was changed back to melee style spawning and i've just never noticed at all.

 

[shairn]

Just tested, the spawn points are semi-random dependant on how many players there are. On battlefield-like stages (With triangular platforms) in a 1v1, both players will always spawn on the side platforms. The only random element is the side on which you spawn.

EDIT: On dreamland, players will spawn randomly on either the middle of the stage or the left platform. From what I can see, Dreamland is the only stage where spawn position has a significant effect on the beginning of the match. On FoD, the player who spawns on the left might have a very, very slight advantage seeing as how the left platform begins slightly lower than the right, but I don't think it affects the game in any noticeable way.

I'll go check second row stages, I've got nothing better to do and just finished my second coffee.

 

[Mera Mera]

Just tested, the spawn points are semi-random dependant on how many players there are. On battlefield-like stages (With triangular platforms) in a 1v1, both players will always spawn on the side platforms. The only random element is the side on which you spawn.

EDIT: On dreamland, players will spawn randomly on either the middle of the stage or the left platform. From what I can see, Dreamland is the only stage where spawn position has a significant effect on the beginning of the match. On FoD, the player who spawns on the left might have a very, very slight advantage seeing as how the left platform begins slightly lower than the right, but I don't think it affects the game in any noticeable way.

I'll go check second row stages, I've got nothing better to do and just finished my second coffee.

Oh fair enough haha. I hadn't tested it since I thought of it, I just remembered that it was random and I thought I remembered spawning on the ground on battlefield but maybe it was just dreamland? Or maybe the ports affect what possible places you could spawn? I'll mess around with it as well. The FOD part isn't a big deal.

 

[shairn]

Ports affect nothing as far as I've seen.

 

[Mera Mera]

Yeah, I just messed around with it. Tested thoroughly on Battlefield with port combinations and the ports never changed anything.

After actually checking, I found that in the bottom two rows of stages the two spawn points for 1v1s are set (didn't test all of them excessively except Battlefield, Skyworld, and Dreamland admittedly).

The ones that spawn with disadvantages that imo could/should be fixed are:
Dreamland: 1 person starts on the left platform (bad position) and one person in the middle on the ground (good position).
Skyworld: 1 person starts on the left platform (bad position) and one person in the middle on the ground (good position).
Final Destination: 1 player starts nearer to the ledge than the other player.

For Skyworld there isn't that much room on the actual ground admittedly, but I think that both spawning on the ground would be best. Both on the opposing lower platforms would be okay as well.
For Dreamland just make them appear on the opposing lower platforms like people do in Yoshi's (Melee) and Battlefield.

There are going to have to be some small differences some stages simply because they aren't symmetric, but as long as they're either both on a platform (of similar height) or both on the ground, then that's as good as it gets. Oh, and each player should be equidistant from their respective nearby ledge.

Edit: My bad for thinking it was random and my bad for thinking this was a problem on more stages. I still think it'd be good to get the spawn points changed on the stages I mentioned though. Also I noticed that on pretty much any big stage, 1 person was closer to a ledge. I realize that most tournaments don't do the top row for 1v1s but it wouldn't hurt to change those too if it's an easy fix.

 

[shairn]

I don't think edge distance is influential on FD, considering the stage is fairly large.

 

[hotdogturtle]

I don't think edge distance is influential on FD, considering the stage is fairly large.

Regardless, for a stage that's symmetrical like FD there's no reason not to equalize them.

 

[Fortress]

I noticed that on Pokemon Stadium (Melee) that one player spawns on the floor and the other on the platform directly above them. Ports have anything to do with this?

 

[Mera Mera]

I noticed that on Pokemon Stadium (Melee) that one player spawns on the floor and the other on the platform directly above them. Ports have anything to do with this?

I thought this happened on a lot of stages, but when I tested it, I only found 3 stages that were less fair than they could be in the bottom two rows, and ports never changed the possible spawn points (nor did it change which spawn point you got, which was instead random).

I just tested Pokemon Stadium 1 three times with every 1v1 port combination just to be sure, and both players spawned on the platforms every time. It may very well have been true in earlier versions of PM, but it doesn't look like it's the case in the current version.

If it's still happening to you, are you using the full set or the wi-fi one? Not sure why that would change spawn points but who knows.