Meta SSBU Stagelist Discussion

IsmaR · Sep 19, 2019

I mentioned it in my last post (in regards to their set at Shine 2019)

IsmaR said:
I don't judge people for having preferences, but when it makes a substantial difference in how a set might go (factoring in stuff like DSR/number of stages vs bans especially) it is inexcusable, particularly when a blatantly large number of the similar stages heavily favors one side than another.

Full DSR, 2 bans, and 7 stages is bullshit, I didn't have a CP game 5 so I had to bring Nairo to a Palutena favored stage
— Liquid | Dabuz (@DabuzSenpai) August 26, 2019

Rough timestamp of the game 5/check in with the TO mentioned above in the thread/comments

ATH_ · Sep 19, 2019

ParanoidDrone said:
Can you elaborate on the Dabuz v. Nairo thing?

This tweet.

Edit: Oops, someone beat me to it but SB didn't give me the notification. My b!

SMAASH! Puppy · Sep 19, 2019

ATH_ said:
I think the same can be achieved in a way that more people will agree with, that is to say having 10+ stages for a list. You accomplish the same amount of variety, while minimizing that feeling of always giving your opponent too much of an advantage.

For instance, let's say we have a list where there's 2 of each major layout (FD-like, BF-like, SV-like, PS-like) and then a bunch (we'll say 5) of other stages that are unique, but offer similar benefits to the major layouts. How many bans do you give?

If you give 2 bans, then they can ban a major layout, which is good! However, then you can go to one of the unique, somewhat-similar stages and still land on a potentially large advantage (for example: they ban SV layout and you go to Castle Siege, a small stage with a slope in the center that makes it extremely difficult to camp on. if they banned Siege + YI:B, then you'd just go to SV which is your best stage for the character.)

If you give 3 bans, this can work if the list is put together properly, but 9/10 times what you'll end up seeing is that most games are played on one of those 5 unique stages. Is that a bad thing? No, but it's not real variance. It's just different.

What I mean is, if every game 2 and 3 are played on the 5 unique layouts and not on one of the 4 major layouts, then you might as well have a list of those 5 stages and it'd be basically the same thing. Overall, the 4 major layouts are tried and true. They're proven to be balanced and good for the competitive scene. So logically, the 5 unique stages are less balanced by nature, until they become proven balanced. The thing is, the smash community won't wait for that to happen, and will choose the easier route: banning any extra stages so that most games take place on the 4 major layouts instead.

So like:

Battlefield/Battlefield Forms* & Yoshi's Story
Final Destination/Omega Forms* & Kalos Pokémon League or Yggdrasil's Altar or Town & City
Smashville & Yoshi's Island
Pokémon Stadium & Unova Pokémon League

Then take your pick from/rotate:

Mementos**
Frigate Orpheon**
WarioWare, Inc.**
Lylat Cruise**
Castle Siege**
Rainbow Cruise***
Green Greens***
Delfino Plaza
Norfair***
Halberd
Reset Bomb Forest
Skyloft
Prism Tower
Promising DLC stages that have yet to be revealed and may or may not ever exist.

*Both players have to agree to the Battlefield or Omega form chosen.
**What I would pick if there wasn't a rotation.
***Only under rotation.

I think that'd be interesting. If I were to pick a second Final Destination-esque stage I would pick Yggdrasil's Altar since I think it offers the most dynamic elements. The competitive community would probably pick Town & City though considering it was one of the only two used stages in the previous game. As for the rotation thing, I could see it being done to test a wide variety of stages until a definitive fair stagelist could be determined (which hopefully won't happen before we stop getting new stages).

Kankato · Sep 20, 2019

Why do people hate Lylat? I come from melee so I have no brawl or smash 4 experience.

Idon · Sep 20, 2019

Kankato said:
Why do people hate Lylat? I come from melee so I have no brawl or smash 4 experience.

A few reasons.

The platforms are really low and hinder movement.
The slants on both the main stage an the platforms cause jank and spacing issues with projectiles and grounded normals.
The overhang on the sides of the stage often lead to recoveries being caught or sometimes just bouncing off and killing the player.

ATH_ · Sep 20, 2019

Kankato said:
Why do people hate Lylat? I come from melee so I have no brawl or smash 4 experience.

Since you're from melee, before you make any assumptions, you ought to read below.

Idon said:
A few reasons.

The platforms are really low and hinder movement.
The slants on both the main stage an the platforms cause jank and spacing issues with projectiles and grounded normals.
The overhang on the sides of the stage often lead to recoveries being caught or sometimes just bouncing off and killing the player.

I assume you are playing the role of messenger here, and not directly complaining about those things yourself.

However, either way, let me dismantle these complaints. People make it too easy.

1. The platforms are really low and hinder movement.

What movement is hindered by the platforms being low? That seems like an artificial issue. You see TOs debating between PS1 and PS2 because PS1's platforms are low enough to be full-hopped to by a lot of characters, but you never see anyone complain they're too low. Lylat's platforms are actually higher than Battlefield's. This is such a fake complaint it's hilarious...

2. The slants on both the main stage and the platforms cause jank and spacing issues with projectiles and grounded normals.

I've gone over this before, but I'll repeat myself. Slants change the angles of moves in predictable ways, especially on Lylat where the slants are much shallower than say YI:B. Whether that aspect gives an advantage or disadvantage to a character is its own aspect of the stage. Stages aren't meant to be perfect 50/50s, not even starters. What """jank""" is caused by the slants? Olimar's Dsmash being "unpredictable"? Might as well complain about walled stages too because those are unique aspects to certain stages that change how a character's recovery can be mixed up. It's "unpredictable" who can wall jump, so how is it any different? It's not different. Knowledge about the game is on the side of the player. Knowing how things work and why they work is part of becoming a better player. Taking these baseless "unpredictable" and "jank" complaints as real criticisms of a stage is just useless. Projectiles and normals are difficult to space and use on slopes? That means Lylat is worse for the camping vs rushdown playstyles. That's a good thing. Not every single stage should be tailored to those only, as we see with the socal list. There are aspects of a stage you can adapt to, and aspects you can't. Slopes are an aspect you can adapt to and learn.

3. The overhang on the sides of the stage often lead to recoveries being caught or sometimes just bouncing off and killing the player.

Send a video. I guarantee it has nothing to do with Lylat after they fixed the ledges. Roy misses the ledge? His recovery has a ton of end lag that prevents him from grabbing ledges during the last few frames. This happens on any stage. We've gotten these complaints so many times, it's silly how little people know about their character's recovery.

If anyone has any counter-arguments, please, feel free to let me know. So far I've seen the same things over and over against Lylat, and it's all either things that were patched, things that aren't a problem, lack of knowledge, or aspects of the stage that other stages have more extreme as is (double standard).

Mooer · Sep 20, 2019

I think you pretty much covered the issues. A lot of people still have reservations about the stage from Smash 4 when it used to tilt.

The only other complaint about Lylat that I’ve heard is that it can be really hard to see some characters against the nearly black background. Even if the character costumes change to something with a good contrast some players report vision difficulties.

I haven’t personally had any problems with Lylat but the background issue is on the list of complaints that I’ve heard.

Zoljinx_ · Sep 25, 2019

I am curious, I remember there being a stage list format around Ultimate's release that pooled stages together by archetype (Tri-Plat, Mono-plat, Flat, ect.), was there a flaw in this idea that made the format fall through? it showed a lot of promise from what i could tell.

ATH_ · Sep 25, 2019

Zoljinx_ said:
I am curious, I remember there being a stage list format around Ultimate's release that pooled stages together by archetype (Tri-Plat, Mono-plat, Flat, ect.), was there a flaw in this idea that made the format fall through? it showed a lot of promise from what i could tell.

The main issue is there isn't a 5th major layout, and nobody can agree on the ideal 5th starter. As well, differences go beyond the platform layout. In my personal list, I divide the stages by the 4 major layouts and choose 2 stages that fit as unique layouts (ygg and lylat personally).

Monoplats (Smashville, Yoshi's Island Brawl, Semi-central Biplats (Pokemon Stadium, Unova Pokemon League), Triangle Triplats (Battlefield, Yoshi's Story), and Open stages (Final Destination, Kalos Pokemon League, and Town & City).

Amazing Ampharos · Sep 26, 2019

I know tournaments have trended arch-conservative, but I've put a lot of time since the game came out really checking out all the stages in the game and thinking about things. Here's basically what I've concluded. Warning ahead this post will be VERY long.

There are really two situations. First you have to decide what your philosophy on stages is (include what you like or only exclude what's actually problematic) and then you have to figure out how to make procedure work to it. Certainly communication and practicality are big issues; I actually ran an event with three pools of 9 starters and while we made it work, it was a huge communication hassle (and still didn't avoid one dude being super salty that Delfino Plaza had the audacity to exist). Certainly any ruleset that includes hazards on has the same problem; mistakes are just going to happen and people will play with the wrong ruleset selected, and it really does just damage your event no matter what rules you have around this point.

The main advantage of traditional structure is ease of communication, but the downside is that it severely limits variety. I think those of us who want things to be better would be best focused on a really simple point. The main degeneracy in stage selection is that 5 starters is just too few. The nature of 5 starters is that most match-ups are ordinary, and in most ordinary match-ups, such a small set of stages will trend toward one conclusion. This has a secondary cultural effect that players expect this and en masse agree to play on that one culturally "middle" stage game one constantly even in situations that, as it turns out, would have been execptions had they actually struck. It becomes so ubiquitous that newer players are actually flat out intimidated away from even trying to avoid this outcome. Playing with a 5 starter list has one inevitable, unavoidable conclusion, and that's the vast majority of tournament sets playing on the same stage game one which will also, due to familiarity, be the most popular counterpicked stage too. We know that there's no such thing as a neutral stage so this effectively distorts the metagame to focus on the biases of whatever this stage is. It was Smashville in Brawl and 4, and it's Pokémon Stadium (2) in this game.

I can say that I've been at lots of events in Brawl and 4 that used 9 starters, and I can tell you this problem is greatly muted. Some subset of people are still kinda sheep and still just said Smashville which honestly if they want it that badly and their opponent does too why not I guess, but a lot more players were interested in striking and you got a lot more different outcomes. 9 is still a relatively small number, and within 9, it's pretty easy to find stages that are still meaningfully different and extraordinarily non-objectionable. I remain convinced that a better, more innovative system could be used, but inevitably there would be tradeoffs whereas this simple shift would represent a strict upgrade with no downsides so I think this is the "next move" that would be logical to try to make. As per particular stages, I've mulled it over, and if I were going to pick what I think the 9 best starter stages would be, here's what I think makes the most sense:

Final Destination
Battlefield
Pokémon Stadium
Smashville
Town & City
Kalos Pokémon League
Lylat Cruise
Yoshi's Island (Brawl)
Yggdrasil's Altar

Every one of these stages I believe is viewed as widely acceptable for competitive play in at least a decent number of regions, and they're all really tame while all really standing out from each other. Because this is important, here's the point by point for why each stage is specifically selected for those who want to dive into my reasoning:

Final Destination - The game has many platformless stages that are acceptable competitive stages so it's important to include one as a starter. The basic Final Destination has by far the most "normal" sizing so it's the only rational choice.

Battlefield - Likewise there are a ton of triplats so you should definitely take one, and while honestly they're all generally okay, the basic Battlefield has the most "normal" parameters on size and stage underside shape.

Pokémon Stadium - I think it's widely agreed that this stage type belongs as a starter. Yes, 1 is better than 2, and this is for two reasons. The commonly known, and still correct, reason is that PS1's platforms are slightly lower than PS2's which is generally more fair to a lot more characters (note PS1's platforms are still higher than Battlefield's platforms, just only barely instead of a whole 3 units). It's also worth noting that, while the blastzones are the same distance, the stage itself on PS1 is slightly shorter and again this is still longer than Battlefield but not as "very long" as PS2. In match-ups with lower mobility characters versus projectile heavy characters, believe me this makes a huge difference. PS2 is just the flat out more extreme stage and produces more polarized match-ups, and it's honestly a serious mistake that tournaments continue to use it over PS1.

Smashville - This stage is just a little bit small but not by much and has a unique and generally fair platform layout. It's an obvious include.

Town & City - This stage is a little big but not all that big and has a very good and unique platform dynamic. I think few would argue its merit on this list.

Kalos Pokémon League - This stage is actually a lot more "neutral" than you probably realize. The main stage's length is nearly identical to Battlefield's (less than 1 unit bigger), and the blast zones are only 5 units further out horizontally with the same ceiling. The orientation of the side platforms is very helpful for extending stocks, but that just makes it a good choice for a gameplay unique inclusion.

Lylat Cruise - This stage is pretty easily the best stage with non-flat ground which has a ton of unique and interesting gameplay with it, and the platform layout is also really unique. This stage is a little smaller than Smashville (the actual stage size is BF/FD with blastzones that are Smashville with a somewhat lower ceiling), but it's not small to the point of causing issues really. The ledges are things people complain about but that never really come up unless the players are being really bad; it's super easy to recover to Lylat's ledges in this game (frankly more generous ledges than the two Animal Crossing stages on this list) and I think most complaints are memories of 4 moreso than actually playing on this game's Lylat Cruise.

Yoshi's Island (Brawl) - This stage may raise the most disagreements, but I think this is overall the optimum in both not including a REALLY different stage and also not playing too close to other stages on the list. This is actually the smallest stage on this list (both in main stage length and in blastzones), but the gameplay dynamic of the minor slopes combined with the significantly longer platform versus Smashville provide a balance there as you have a shape that extends gameplay combined with a size that shortens it that in my extensive experience on this stage about cancel out. I also think it's good to have two different "walled bottom" stages for characters who get a little extra out of walled stage undersides (both the walljumpers and characters like Villager with unique ledgeguarding mechanics that benefit from walls). I think it bears repeating that, much as with Lylat, the slopes here are "big enough to matter but small enough not to cause problems", and I think there's a lot of value to rewarding players who are prepared to take advantage of that as well.

Yggdrasil's Altar - Thanks Nintendo for adding this stage as DLC; it's a really good inclusion! Its cycling platforms are honestly an even better variation on what Town & City does, and it also has sizing that is a lot more "neutral" than I think a lot of people realize. The main stage is BF/FD length. The side blastzones are PS/PS2 out while the upper blastzone is BF height (this blastzone combination is nearly identical to Dream Land for those with experience on that stage) so in practice you just get a stage with average length with a little extra offstage versus average which is a good dynamic to have. I feel like this stage is honestly a very easy inclusion and that if this stage shipped with the base game it would be a starter everywhere, but a lot of people are just that relucatant to explore.

Now, I have extensively experimented with every other stage that even vaguely warrants it. Here are the remaining stages that I feel don't have any real problems at all that make them non-competitive and a brief note of the story with each:

Dream Land - It's pretty much just Battlefield with the side blastzones a bit further out, main stage a tiny bit shorter, PS2 platform height, and a stage underside that is very slightly less friendly (but you're being pretty bad if you actually get "pineappled"; it's super easy to avoid). I think the sizing is generally just a bit "worse" than Battlefield while playing out super similarly most of the time, but the stage is perfectly fine competitively on its own merits.

Yoshi's Story - This is pretty well known as the smaller Battlefield with the super slight slopes, and it's a popular stage to have legal at some tournaments. It works as well as advertised; I didn't think it quite made top 9, but it's a stage I would strongly stand behind myself.

Fountain of Dreams - This stage is actually the most similar to BF of all the other tri-plats in terms of sizing. I don't think the frame dropping is still a thing as of the current patch at least in singles (this stage does not help Squad Strike). Given all that, this stage is perfectly fine, just very, very close to BF.

Delfino Plaza - This is the best Delfino Plaza has ever been. I'm going to make the note now that passthrough main stages have very picky ledges in this game, but they're not "bad" they're just specific. They're hyper consistent if you target right at the ledge, and you very consistently don't grab them if you are off-target. This makes these stages a bit more skill intensive, but I think as competitive players it's hard to say a stage being more about skill is bad... Either way, unlike in 4, the blast zones are always exactly where you want them to be here, and I don't think any cheeky under stage runaway tactics even vaguely work in this engine. Water is a bit odd in this game as doing plunging moves into the water tends to just kill you, but once you know not to do that, it's about the same as ever (being in the water is pretty bad in general, but it can be useful to recover) and most of the natural abuses of walk-offs and water just don't work when they're so temporary. I don't really expect people to be open minded about this stage, but if you just play it, you notice it plays out WAY better than stages like Prism Tower and honestly produces consistently quality matches so I feel I would be dishonest not to list it here.

Halberd - Halberd's blast zones are not tiny in this game so completely vanquish from your mind the nonsense Bayonetta did here in 4 as nothing vaguely like that exists here. I've said what there is to say about passthrough stages above. Honestly it's a pretty simple and excellent stage. I think the nature of passthrough bottoms was enough to keep it out of top 9, but beyond that, this is a really easy to endorse stage.

Pokémon Stadium 2 - I covered in depth in an above section why PS1 is better than this, but on its own, this stage is a pretty good stage too as it's very similar to the generally outstanding PS1 in the end.

Unova Pokémon League - This I think is well understood to be a good stage. It's kinda the mirror opposide of the stadiums in terms of sizing (shorter with close sides and a bit bigger ceiling) but within completely normal parameters, and while its similarity combined with "not quite as good" I felt were reason to keep it out of the top 9 (though honestly this might be my "10th stage" if I were going to remove a stage from the 9), this stage is very easy to say is a very competitive stage.

PictoChat 2 - This stage is way more "normal" than you probably think. It's FD length with closer side blast zones and a heigher ceiling. It has those little slopes going to the ledges which are interesting. The camera kinda fools you into thinking the bottom blast zone is hyper close, but it's in reality only 10 units closer than FD's which means the overwhelming majority of recoveries don't notice the difference. I think actual FD is a bit better which is why this isn't in the 9, but this stage is definitely a much better stage than Wily Castle or Umbra Clock Tower and is very easy to stand behind fully as a viable competitive stage.

Mushroom Kingdom U - This stage was honestly just never given a chance by the community, but there's nothing wrong with it. The stage's total blast zones are Yggdrasil's Altar except the main stage is actually really long (which puts its ledges actually kinda close to the blast zones, but it's not quite WarioWare Inc. in that regard) and the main stage is set down a bit on the grid so effectively it has an actually notably high ceiling (again not as extreme as WarioWare Inc. in this regard). The platform shape is asymmetrical but not really height wise divergent from all of the other stages we play on (the platforms are pretty long, but that's just scaling with stage length). The only really odd thing is that the lower blast zone is uncomfortably close to the point that you actually do have to adjust for it with some characters, but it's not a game ruiner. This stage produces consistently good matches if you just give it a chance; it's one of the more plausible legal stages honestly.

Skyloft - If not for people's general fears over passthrough main stages this would be legal everywhere as there's literally no flaw otherwise. I don't think passthrough main stages are a particular problem based on having played on them a lot; this is a good stage and is probably my 11th stage I would have picked for a starter. I really think this one is good.

Midgar - To finish off the tri-plats, here's the one that's just kinda huge. In practice, a huge triplat actually plays out just fine and this stage produces consistently excellent games, but this stage is really quite supersized compared to BF.

Next here are the stages with what I'd consider minor issues, stages that are just a little obnoxious but not "that bad":

WarioWare Inc. - This stage I think is kinda notorious as it has comically close side blast zones and a massive ceiling combined with a unique but mostly fair platform shape. It's really match-up polarized, the characters who are best here are not the ones you think (spoiler: power characters who kill easily on every stage aren't the main ones who want a super close blast zone), and I think this is really the only place for it. Generally speaking, the games here tend to be good, competitive games but you definitely adjust your thinking to account for this stage's uniqueness a lot.

Castle Siege - The stage is pretty small, and the slope encourages an even more cramped neutral. I think this stage is generally a fair stage that produces generally competitive quality matches, but it's definitely more match-up polarized than stages I mentioned before which is why it's here.

Wuhu Island - This stage is absurdly large and matches take forever. If you just accept how slow paced games are here, it's otherwise without serious issue I feel.

Wily Castle - See above really. This stage is just gargantuan but tends to work out just fine in practice if you just accept that. Smash Ultimate isn't really a timeout friendly game so the massive stages don't do the things they would do in Brawl or 4; they make the game longer in a linear and not exponential way.

Umbra Clock Tower - Likewise a very big FD except with very tiny slopes that almost never matter until they do, a weird asymmetric underside, and everyone's favorite background dragon that really shouldn't matter in theory but somehow seems to consistently matter in practice. This stage is clearly 100% fair but consistently unpleasant to have matches on so take that how you will.

Mementos - As a player, honestly, I really dislike this stage. It's really big, and the slope is just steep enough to make playing neutral against a defensive opponent far harder than on almost any other stage. I think it's definitely a fair stage but a stronger cp than stages in the first two groups. Why this stage got more of a chance than Mushroom Kingdom U I'll never understand.

Then we have a set of stages that I think are fair enough to be eligible for tournament play with a generally liberal mindset but that tend to produce wonkier games. I don't think the modern culture would ever entertain stages like this even if they understood them, but in a different era, these would have been legal stages:

Kongo Jungle - It's not massive like it used to be, but the shape still just produces weird, annoying games over and over again.

Rainbow Cruise - As a Bowser main, I have taken to calling this stage Bowser in the Sky as it's ridiculously good for me. The shape of this stage just lends itself to all kinds of consistent nonsense and it's fairly match-up polarized, but in the end the stage still "works" for serious play.

Brinstar - This stage produces mostly fair but consistently dumb games as neutral is just a struggle here but disadvantage can be a killer.

Frigate Orpheon - This stage tends to be very campy, but it's not outside of what the engine can handle and still produce fair, interesting games.

Port Town Aero Dive - This stage is a ton better than most people think, but it still has some nonsense. It can be really hard to recover here with some characters as the track is in the way, the track will just kinda hold Luma or your gyro in a death spiral, tall characters sometimes hit the track when grabbing the ledge at a bad time (yes, this is basically the worst Rosalina stage ever if you take all that together), and the wall lends itself to some cheeky shenanigans for sure. Honestly even all that being the case, the stage mostly "works"; a majority of games here are good games, and a lot of its unique dynamics are actually competitively really interesting if both players are experienced on the stage.

Prism Tower - This stage just kinda has a magic way of producing consistently dumb games honestly. It's kinda a camper's paradise and it tends to create uncomfortable situations, but nothing is really unfair or beyond what the base engine allows to produce competitively viable gameplay.

Duck Hunt - This stage is not only supermassive, but unlike Wily Castle, it adds to it with that tree that doesn't really allow for permanent stall if your opponent picked a reasonable character (Little Mac is not reasonable) but is still effective at somehow dragging games out even more. I hope you love defensive gameplay!

New Donk City Hall - Honestly in practice it plays out very similarly to Prism Tower. On paper this stage is worse, but in practice it seems a little better though the two stages should probably be thought of together. Take that as you will.

The last group of stages are the ones that I'm pretty sure are fair in the strictest sense of the word but are in practice poor choices for competitive play:

Big Battlefield - As the name implies, this stage is really big. If you give it a shot anyway, it works... kinda, but man, it's a timeout waiting to happen.

Green Greens - It's not the worst, but the shape definitely produces a ton of standoffs that are the sort you really don't want to see in competitive play.

Norfair - This stage has a truly bizarre neutral that basically negates all traditional concepts of space. It's actually really interesting in its own right, but it's so hyper different that it's hard to see including this as a competitive stage.

Mute City SNES - This stage is very campy and produces a lot of really suspect situations with the track, but fair gameplay is possible.

Reset Bomb Forest - This stage is a timeout waiting to happen but it's not quite at the level of true degeneracy.

Mario Circuit (7) - This stage is really dumb with the track hitting you while it's moving, but if you were adamantly stage liberal, you could just demand that everyone memorize the timing of all of this and adjust their strategy to account for it. That's not pragmatic, but hey, it's not the worst thing in the game.

Garden of Hope - This is the worst stage in this group as it's by far the biggest timeout waiting to happen and has a layout that encourages a lot of nonsense interactions, but in the strictest sense of the word, it's not broken.

Dracula's Castle - This stage is probably the best one in this group but is still just way too much of a timeout waiting to happen to be in any more favorable group. In practice this stage will have routine standoffs and very, very long stocks due to the very big size.

The remaining stages are stages that I think any possible ruleset would have to ban, but because I believe you have to actually think about every stage if you're being serious, I'll collapse tag them into "reasons to ban" with write-ups only for the ones that have unique problems. Some stages may fall under multiple groups, but I'll only show them under the "worst" group they apply for (no one cares that there are actually 3-4 very strong reasons Temple must be banned when one suffices):

Hard loops - Some stages allow for infinite run-away with no possible strategy catching a higher mobility character.

Mushroom Kingdom 64
Great Bay
Temple
New Pork City
Summit
Skyworld
Luigi's Mansion
Spear Pillar
75m
Mario Bros.
Hanenbow
Balloon Fight
Great Cave Offensive
Palutena's Temple

Unapproachable camping spot(s) - Many stages have at least one position that is basically impossible to approach and allows for a player with a lead to effectively instantly win.

Peach's Castle (64)
Hyrule Castle
Super Happy Tree
Saffron City
Peach's Castle (Melee)
Kongo Falls
Corneria
Venom
Brinstar Depths
Fourside
Spirit Train
Magicant
Pilotwings
Windy Hill Zone
Spiral Mountain

Walk-offs - Permanent walk-offs encourage high volatility gambits that diminish the need for skill in matches.

Yoshi's Island (Melee)
Onett
Mushroom Kingdom II
Mushroomy Kingdom
Mario Circuit (Brawl)
Bridge of Eldin
Distant Planet
Green Hill Zone
3d World
Golden Plains
Paper Mario
Gerudo Valley
Dream Land GB
Living Room
Mario Galaxy
Coliseum
Flat Zone X
Wii Fit Studio
Boxing Ring
Gaur Plain
PAC LAND
Suzaku Castle

Other:

Jungle Japes - You can stall infinitely in the water under the main platform. This stage's layout is suspect otherwise, but this dynamic hard kills this stage.

Big Blue - You can stall on the track if you're smart/skilled and have the right character.

Shadow Moses Island - The stage is a techfest in which, if you can't kill up, you literally can't win.

Pirate Ship - Permanent water has very similar dynamics to permanent walk-offs in practice.

Arena Ferox - It's randomly generated, but some forms have hard loops. This isn't pragmagic to deal with.

Tortimer's Island - See Pirate Ship.

Find Mii - Just a deceptively awful stage. It almost has a loop but not quite with the cage, it almost but not quite has an unapproachable position with the platform on the right, in practice it's just really obvious this stage can't work at all.

Tomodachi Life - It's not quite permanent runaway but it's really close. It's just too close to possible to make this stage ever not end in a timeout which is just not okay.

Gamer - See Arena Ferox.

Wrecking Crew - Like Tomodachi Life, this is just almost infinite runaway.

Super Mario Maker - Depending on RNG, this is either the best stage in the game or the worst stage in the game.

Great Plateau Tower - The main question this stage poses is how perfect you are at teching with a lot of microspacing stuff to ensure you can continue to do this. It's a pretty poor dynamic that doesn't work well at all for serious play.

Moray Towers - I considered listing it among the hard loops as it effectively is when you consider vertical mobility (Luigi can never catch Falco), but seeing the loop requires different thinking so I figured more words were required.

So yeah, that's my thoughts on stage procedure and a good direction as well as a summary of where I think all 106 stages in this game really stand in terms of actual merits. I honestly have no idea how action can even happen; right now it seems like TOs all individually do whatever they want with minimal communication (regions don't really synchronize rulesets, and rulesets seem never up for discussion) so I dunno how to actually go from "having ideas" to "discussing them in a way that will make things happen", but regardless this is my decade+ of experience exploring this stuff combined with a lot of intense exploration of this game and its various stages since the day it came out. I hope someone will find this post of some use even if I honestly have no idea what to do with it other than enjoying it for its own sake.

SMAASH! Puppy · Sep 26, 2019

I really liked this. I personally think that anything that gives us more variety (while still being fair of course) is a good thing. I'd like to try my hand at another stagelist. I'll keep the starters the same:

Final Destination
Battlefield
Pokémon Stadium
Smashville
Town & City
Kalos Pokémon League
Lylat Cruise
Yoshi's Island
Yggdrasil's Altar

I don't know how many counterpicks would be provided with 9 starters, so I'll just pick my top fifteen:

Prism Tower
WarioWare, Inc.
Mementos
Delfino Plaza
Castle Siege
New Donk City Hall
Skyloft
Halberd
Mushroom Kingdom U
Rainbow Cruise
Frigate Orpheon
Fountain of Dreams
Unova Pokémon League
Yoshi's Story
Kongo Jungle

Something like this would be pretty wild to me (even with only five counterpicks).

Call_Me_Red · Oct 8, 2019

Amazing Ampharos said:
I know tournaments have trended arch-conservative, but I've put a lot of time since the game came out really checking out all the stages in the game and thinking about things. Here's basically what I've concluded. Warning ahead this post will be VERY long.

There are really two situations. First you have to decide what your philosophy on stages is (include what you like or only exclude what's actually problematic) and then you have to figure out how to make procedure work to it. Certainly communication and practicality are big issues; I actually ran an event with three pools of 9 starters and while we made it work, it was a huge communication hassle (and still didn't avoid one dude being super salty that Delfino Plaza had the audacity to exist). Certainly any ruleset that includes hazards on has the same problem; mistakes are just going to happen and people will play with the wrong ruleset selected, and it really does just damage your event no matter what rules you have around this point.

The main advantage of traditional structure is ease of communication, but the downside is that it severely limits variety. I think those of us who want things to be better would be best focused on a really simple point. The main degeneracy in stage selection is that 5 starters is just too few. The nature of 5 starters is that most match-ups are ordinary, and in most ordinary match-ups, such a small set of stages will trend toward one conclusion. This has a secondary cultural effect that players expect this and en masse agree to play on that one culturally "middle" stage game one constantly even in situations that, as it turns out, would have been execptions had they actually struck. It becomes so ubiquitous that newer players are actually flat out intimidated away from even trying to avoid this outcome. Playing with a 5 starter list has one inevitable, unavoidable conclusion, and that's the vast majority of tournament sets playing on the same stage game one which will also, due to familiarity, be the most popular counterpicked stage too. We know that there's no such thing as a neutral stage so this effectively distorts the metagame to focus on the biases of whatever this stage is. It was Smashville in Brawl and 4, and it's Pokémon Stadium (2) in this game.

I can say that I've been at lots of events in Brawl and 4 that used 9 starters, and I can tell you this problem is greatly muted. Some subset of people are still kinda sheep and still just said Smashville which honestly if they want it that badly and their opponent does too why not I guess, but a lot more players were interested in striking and you got a lot more different outcomes. 9 is still a relatively small number, and within 9, it's pretty easy to find stages that are still meaningfully different and extraordinarily non-objectionable. I remain convinced that a better, more innovative system could be used, but inevitably there would be tradeoffs whereas this simple shift would represent a strict upgrade with no downsides so I think this is the "next move" that would be logical to try to make. As per particular stages, I've mulled it over, and if I were going to pick what I think the 9 best starter stages would be, here's what I think makes the most sense:

Final Destination
Battlefield
Pokémon Stadium
Smashville
Town & City
Kalos Pokémon League
Lylat Cruise
Yoshi's Island (Brawl)
Yggdrasil's Altar

Every one of these stages I believe is viewed as widely acceptable for competitive play in at least a decent number of regions, and they're all really tame while all really standing out from each other. Because this is important, here's the point by point for why each stage is specifically selected for those who want to dive into my reasoning:

Final Destination - The game has many platformless stages that are acceptable competitive stages so it's important to include one as a starter. The basic Final Destination has by far the most "normal" sizing so it's the only rational choice.

Battlefield - Likewise there are a ton of triplats so you should definitely take one, and while honestly they're all generally okay, the basic Battlefield has the most "normal" parameters on size and stage underside shape.

Pokémon Stadium - I think it's widely agreed that this stage type belongs as a starter. Yes, 1 is better than 2, and this is for two reasons. The commonly known, and still correct, reason is that PS1's platforms are slightly lower than PS2's which is generally more fair to a lot more characters (note PS1's platforms are still higher than Battlefield's platforms, just only barely instead of a whole 3 units). It's also worth noting that, while the blastzones are the same distance, the stage itself on PS1 is slightly shorter and again this is still longer than Battlefield but not as "very long" as PS2. In match-ups with lower mobility characters versus projectile heavy characters, believe me this makes a huge difference. PS2 is just the flat out more extreme stage and produces more polarized match-ups, and it's honestly a serious mistake that tournaments continue to use it over PS1.

Smashville - This stage is just a little bit small but not by much and has a unique and generally fair platform layout. It's an obvious include.

Town & City - This stage is a little big but not all that big and has a very good and unique platform dynamic. I think few would argue its merit on this list.

Kalos Pokémon League - This stage is actually a lot more "neutral" than you probably realize. The main stage's length is nearly identical to Battlefield's (less than 1 unit bigger), and the blast zones are only 5 units further out horizontally with the same ceiling. The orientation of the side platforms is very helpful for extending stocks, but that just makes it a good choice for a gameplay unique inclusion.

Lylat Cruise - This stage is pretty easily the best stage with non-flat ground which has a ton of unique and interesting gameplay with it, and the platform layout is also really unique. This stage is a little smaller than Smashville (the actual stage size is BF/FD with blastzones that are Smashville with a somewhat lower ceiling), but it's not small to the point of causing issues really. The ledges are things people complain about but that never really come up unless the players are being really bad; it's super easy to recover to Lylat's ledges in this game (frankly more generous ledges than the two Animal Crossing stages on this list) and I think most complaints are memories of 4 moreso than actually playing on this game's Lylat Cruise.

Yoshi's Island (Brawl) - This stage may raise the most disagreements, but I think this is overall the optimum in both not including a REALLY different stage and also not playing too close to other stages on the list. This is actually the smallest stage on this list (both in main stage length and in blastzones), but the gameplay dynamic of the minor slopes combined with the significantly longer platform versus Smashville provide a balance there as you have a shape that extends gameplay combined with a size that shortens it that in my extensive experience on this stage about cancel out. I also think it's good to have two different "walled bottom" stages for characters who get a little extra out of walled stage undersides (both the walljumpers and characters like Villager with unique ledgeguarding mechanics that benefit from walls). I think it bears repeating that, much as with Lylat, the slopes here are "big enough to matter but small enough not to cause problems", and I think there's a lot of value to rewarding players who are prepared to take advantage of that as well.

Yggdrasil's Altar - Thanks Nintendo for adding this stage as DLC; it's a really good inclusion! Its cycling platforms are honestly an even better variation on what Town & City does, and it also has sizing that is a lot more "neutral" than I think a lot of people realize. The main stage is BF/FD length. The side blastzones are PS/PS2 out while the upper blastzone is BF height (this blastzone combination is nearly identical to Dream Land for those with experience on that stage) so in practice you just get a stage with average length with a little extra offstage versus average which is a good dynamic to have. I feel like this stage is honestly a very easy inclusion and that if this stage shipped with the base game it would be a starter everywhere, but a lot of people are just that relucatant to explore.

Now, I have extensively experimented with every other stage that even vaguely warrants it. Here are the remaining stages that I feel don't have any real problems at all that make them non-competitive and a brief note of the story with each:

Dream Land - It's pretty much just Battlefield with the side blastzones a bit further out, main stage a tiny bit shorter, PS2 platform height, and a stage underside that is very slightly less friendly (but you're being pretty bad if you actually get "pineappled"; it's super easy to avoid). I think the sizing is generally just a bit "worse" than Battlefield while playing out super similarly most of the time, but the stage is perfectly fine competitively on its own merits.

Yoshi's Story - This is pretty well known as the smaller Battlefield with the super slight slopes, and it's a popular stage to have legal at some tournaments. It works as well as advertised; I didn't think it quite made top 9, but it's a stage I would strongly stand behind myself.

Fountain of Dreams - This stage is actually the most similar to BF of all the other tri-plats in terms of sizing. I don't think the frame dropping is still a thing as of the current patch at least in singles (this stage does not help Squad Strike). Given all that, this stage is perfectly fine, just very, very close to BF.

Delfino Plaza - This is the best Delfino Plaza has ever been. I'm going to make the note now that passthrough main stages have very picky ledges in this game, but they're not "bad" they're just specific. They're hyper consistent if you target right at the ledge, and you very consistently don't grab them if you are off-target. This makes these stages a bit more skill intensive, but I think as competitive players it's hard to say a stage being more about skill is bad... Either way, unlike in 4, the blast zones are always exactly where you want them to be here, and I don't think any cheeky under stage runaway tactics even vaguely work in this engine. Water is a bit odd in this game as doing plunging moves into the water tends to just kill you, but once you know not to do that, it's about the same as ever (being in the water is pretty bad in general, but it can be useful to recover) and most of the natural abuses of walk-offs and water just don't work when they're so temporary. I don't really expect people to be open minded about this stage, but if you just play it, you notice it plays out WAY better than stages like Prism Tower and honestly produces consistently quality matches so I feel I would be dishonest not to list it here.

Halberd - Halberd's blast zones are not tiny in this game so completely vanquish from your mind the nonsense Bayonetta did here in 4 as nothing vaguely like that exists here. I've said what there is to say about passthrough stages above. Honestly it's a pretty simple and excellent stage. I think the nature of passthrough bottoms was enough to keep it out of top 9, but beyond that, this is a really easy to endorse stage.

Pokémon Stadium 2 - I covered in depth in an above section why PS1 is better than this, but on its own, this stage is a pretty good stage too as it's very similar to the generally outstanding PS1 in the end.

Unova Pokémon League - This I think is well understood to be a good stage. It's kinda the mirror opposide of the stadiums in terms of sizing (shorter with close sides and a bit bigger ceiling) but within completely normal parameters, and while its similarity combined with "not quite as good" I felt were reason to keep it out of the top 9 (though honestly this might be my "10th stage" if I were going to remove a stage from the 9), this stage is very easy to say is a very competitive stage.

PictoChat 2 - This stage is way more "normal" than you probably think. It's FD length with closer side blast zones and a heigher ceiling. It has those little slopes going to the ledges which are interesting. The camera kinda fools you into thinking the bottom blast zone is hyper close, but it's in reality only 10 units closer than FD's which means the overwhelming majority of recoveries don't notice the difference. I think actual FD is a bit better which is why this isn't in the 9, but this stage is definitely a much better stage than Wily Castle or Umbra Clock Tower and is very easy to stand behind fully as a viable competitive stage.

Mushroom Kingdom U - This stage was honestly just never given a chance by the community, but there's nothing wrong with it. The stage's total blast zones are Yggdrasil's Altar except the main stage is actually really long (which puts its ledges actually kinda close to the blast zones, but it's not quite WarioWare Inc. in that regard) and the main stage is set down a bit on the grid so effectively it has an actually notably high ceiling (again not as extreme as WarioWare Inc. in this regard). The platform shape is asymmetrical but not really height wise divergent from all of the other stages we play on (the platforms are pretty long, but that's just scaling with stage length). The only really odd thing is that the lower blast zone is uncomfortably close to the point that you actually do have to adjust for it with some characters, but it's not a game ruiner. This stage produces consistently good matches if you just give it a chance; it's one of the more plausible legal stages honestly.

Skyloft - If not for people's general fears over passthrough main stages this would be legal everywhere as there's literally no flaw otherwise. I don't think passthrough main stages are a particular problem based on having played on them a lot; this is a good stage and is probably my 11th stage I would have picked for a starter. I really think this one is good.

Midgar - To finish off the tri-plats, here's the one that's just kinda huge. In practice, a huge triplat actually plays out just fine and this stage produces consistently excellent games, but this stage is really quite supersized compared to BF.

Next here are the stages with what I'd consider minor issues, stages that are just a little obnoxious but not "that bad":

WarioWare Inc. - This stage I think is kinda notorious as it has comically close side blast zones and a massive ceiling combined with a unique but mostly fair platform shape. It's really match-up polarized, the characters who are best here are not the ones you think (spoiler: power characters who kill easily on every stage aren't the main ones who want a super close blast zone), and I think this is really the only place for it. Generally speaking, the games here tend to be good, competitive games but you definitely adjust your thinking to account for this stage's uniqueness a lot.

Castle Siege - The stage is pretty small, and the slope encourages an even more cramped neutral. I think this stage is generally a fair stage that produces generally competitive quality matches, but it's definitely more match-up polarized than stages I mentioned before which is why it's here.

Wuhu Island - This stage is absurdly large and matches take forever. If you just accept how slow paced games are here, it's otherwise without serious issue I feel.

Wily Castle - See above really. This stage is just gargantuan but tends to work out just fine in practice if you just accept that. Smash Ultimate isn't really a timeout friendly game so the massive stages don't do the things they would do in Brawl or 4; they make the game longer in a linear and not exponential way.

Umbra Clock Tower - Likewise a very big FD except with very tiny slopes that almost never matter until they do, a weird asymmetric underside, and everyone's favorite background dragon that really shouldn't matter in theory but somehow seems to consistently matter in practice. This stage is clearly 100% fair but consistently unpleasant to have matches on so take that how you will.

Mementos - As a player, honestly, I really dislike this stage. It's really big, and the slope is just steep enough to make playing neutral against a defensive opponent far harder than on almost any other stage. I think it's definitely a fair stage but a stronger cp than stages in the first two groups. Why this stage got more of a chance than Mushroom Kingdom U I'll never understand.

Then we have a set of stages that I think are fair enough to be eligible for tournament play with a generally liberal mindset but that tend to produce wonkier games. I don't think the modern culture would ever entertain stages like this even if they understood them, but in a different era, these would have been legal stages:

Kongo Jungle - It's not massive like it used to be, but the shape still just produces weird, annoying games over and over again.

Rainbow Cruise - As a Bowser main, I have taken to calling this stage Bowser in the Sky as it's ridiculously good for me. The shape of this stage just lends itself to all kinds of consistent nonsense and it's fairly match-up polarized, but in the end the stage still "works" for serious play.

Brinstar - This stage produces mostly fair but consistently dumb games as neutral is just a struggle here but disadvantage can be a killer.

Frigate Orpheon - This stage tends to be very campy, but it's not outside of what the engine can handle and still produce fair, interesting games.

Port Town Aero Dive - This stage is a ton better than most people think, but it still has some nonsense. It can be really hard to recover here with some characters as the track is in the way, the track will just kinda hold Luma or your gyro in a death spiral, tall characters sometimes hit the track when grabbing the ledge at a bad time (yes, this is basically the worst Rosalina stage ever if you take all that together), and the wall lends itself to some cheeky shenanigans for sure. Honestly even all that being the case, the stage mostly "works"; a majority of games here are good games, and a lot of its unique dynamics are actually competitively really interesting if both players are experienced on the stage.

Prism Tower - This stage just kinda has a magic way of producing consistently dumb games honestly. It's kinda a camper's paradise and it tends to create uncomfortable situations, but nothing is really unfair or beyond what the base engine allows to produce competitively viable gameplay.

Duck Hunt - This stage is not only supermassive, but unlike Wily Castle, it adds to it with that tree that doesn't really allow for permanent stall if your opponent picked a reasonable character (Little Mac is not reasonable) but is still effective at somehow dragging games out even more. I hope you love defensive gameplay!

New Donk City Hall - Honestly in practice it plays out very similarly to Prism Tower. On paper this stage is worse, but in practice it seems a little better though the two stages should probably be thought of together. Take that as you will.

The last group of stages are the ones that I'm pretty sure are fair in the strictest sense of the word but are in practice poor choices for competitive play:

Big Battlefield - As the name implies, this stage is really big. If you give it a shot anyway, it works... kinda, but man, it's a timeout waiting to happen.

Green Greens - It's not the worst, but the shape definitely produces a ton of standoffs that are the sort you really don't want to see in competitive play.

Norfair - This stage has a truly bizarre neutral that basically negates all traditional concepts of space. It's actually really interesting in its own right, but it's so hyper different that it's hard to see including this as a competitive stage.

Mute City SNES - This stage is very campy and produces a lot of really suspect situations with the track, but fair gameplay is possible.

Reset Bomb Forest - This stage is a timeout waiting to happen but it's not quite at the level of true degeneracy.

Mario Circuit (7) - This stage is really dumb with the track hitting you while it's moving, but if you were adamantly stage liberal, you could just demand that everyone memorize the timing of all of this and adjust their strategy to account for it. That's not pragmatic, but hey, it's not the worst thing in the game.

Garden of Hope - This is the worst stage in this group as it's by far the biggest timeout waiting to happen and has a layout that encourages a lot of nonsense interactions, but in the strictest sense of the word, it's not broken.

Dracula's Castle - This stage is probably the best one in this group but is still just way too much of a timeout waiting to happen to be in any more favorable group. In practice this stage will have routine standoffs and very, very long stocks due to the very big size.

The remaining stages are stages that I think any possible ruleset would have to ban, but because I believe you have to actually think about every stage if you're being serious, I'll collapse tag them into "reasons to ban" with write-ups only for the ones that have unique problems. Some stages may fall under multiple groups, but I'll only show them under the "worst" group they apply for (no one cares that there are actually 3-4 very strong reasons Temple must be banned when one suffices):

Hard loops - Some stages allow for infinite run-away with no possible strategy catching a higher mobility character.

Mushroom Kingdom 64
Great Bay
Temple
New Pork City
Summit
Skyworld
Luigi's Mansion
Spear Pillar
75m
Mario Bros.
Hanenbow
Balloon Fight
Great Cave Offensive
Palutena's Temple

Unapproachable camping spot(s) - Many stages have at least one position that is basically impossible to approach and allows for a player with a lead to effectively instantly win.

Peach's Castle (64)
Hyrule Castle
Super Happy Tree
Saffron City
Peach's Castle (Melee)
Kongo Falls
Corneria
Venom
Brinstar Depths
Fourside
Spirit Train
Magicant
Pilotwings
Windy Hill Zone
Spiral Mountain

Walk-offs - Permanent walk-offs encourage high volatility gambits that diminish the need for skill in matches.

Yoshi's Island (Melee)
Onett
Mushroom Kingdom II
Mushroomy Kingdom
Mario Circuit (Brawl)
Bridge of Eldin
Distant Planet
Green Hill Zone
3d World
Golden Plains
Paper Mario
Gerudo Valley
Dream Land GB
Living Room
Mario Galaxy
Coliseum
Flat Zone X
Wii Fit Studio
Boxing Ring
Gaur Plain
PAC LAND
Suzaku Castle

Other:

Jungle Japes - You can stall infinitely in the water under the main platform. This stage's layout is suspect otherwise, but this dynamic hard kills this stage.

Big Blue - You can stall on the track if you're smart/skilled and have the right character.

Shadow Moses Island - The stage is a techfest in which, if you can't kill up, you literally can't win.

Pirate Ship - Permanent water has very similar dynamics to permanent walk-offs in practice.

Arena Ferox - It's randomly generated, but some forms have hard loops. This isn't pragmagic to deal with.

Tortimer's Island - See Pirate Ship.

Find Mii - Just a deceptively awful stage. It almost has a loop but not quite with the cage, it almost but not quite has an unapproachable position with the platform on the right, in practice it's just really obvious this stage can't work at all.

Tomodachi Life - It's not quite permanent runaway but it's really close. It's just too close to possible to make this stage ever not end in a timeout which is just not okay.

Gamer - See Arena Ferox.

Wrecking Crew - Like Tomodachi Life, this is just almost infinite runaway.

Super Mario Maker - Depending on RNG, this is either the best stage in the game or the worst stage in the game.

Great Plateau Tower - The main question this stage poses is how perfect you are at teching with a lot of microspacing stuff to ensure you can continue to do this. It's a pretty poor dynamic that doesn't work well at all for serious play.

Moray Towers - I considered listing it among the hard loops as it effectively is when you consider vertical mobility (Luigi can never catch Falco), but seeing the loop requires different thinking so I figured more words were required.

So yeah, that's my thoughts on stage procedure and a good direction as well as a summary of where I think all 106 stages in this game really stand in terms of actual merits. I honestly have no idea how action can even happen; right now it seems like TOs all individually do whatever they want with minimal communication (regions don't really synchronize rulesets, and rulesets seem never up for discussion) so I dunno how to actually go from "having ideas" to "discussing them in a way that will make things happen", but regardless this is my decade+ of experience exploring this stuff combined with a lot of intense exploration of this game and its various stages since the day it came out. I hope someone will find this post of some use even if I honestly have no idea what to do with it other than enjoying it for its own sake.

I really enjoyed this write-up. Personally I'd love to see a tournament with some more liberal stages (Halberd, Delfino, Pictochat) just to test the waters a little bit. I feel like the community kind of picked a handful of stages, and then doubled down on only a small handful that were considered as safe as possible. Even stages like Unova were tossed because there's like 3 characters who struggle on it. I definitely want to see our stage list expanded to get just a little more variety, and maybe have just one semi-whacky stage in there.

RPGsFTW · Oct 11, 2019

Amazing Ampharos as a fellow long time, old af Smash player, I hard agree with basically your whole write up.

I remember back in early competitive Melee days where Mute City and PokeFloats were counterpicks. I even remember back in Brawl when Delfino Plaza, Halberd and Rainbow Cruise were counterpicks.

Obviously, looking back at it now those stages were removed not long after their initial trials, but, that's the thing. At the time, they were actually given a chance, which seems to be a big factor in stage lists nowadays. Fear and misconceptions tend to have us stuck with these boring, linear stages that are all similar without making room for the variety that our characters need. The more and more I play online the more I've noticed how awful FD and BF can be as neutral stages, and it becomes more apparent when you realize, that even in Brawl days, that people often started matching by going to Smashville or Pokemon Stadium.

It's honestly baffling to me that so many of the great stages you mentioned have been ignored for so long. I've been playing Mushroom Kingdom U, Unova, Skyloft and Prism Tower online with my friend for a while now and they are very obviously consistently solid stages. As you already mentioned as well, Prism Tower kinda fits in that weird moving stage niche alongside New Donk City, Delfino, Halberd, etc, and can be occasionally campy, but is otherwise probably a fair counterpick as well.

Also, I never understood why PS2 was chosen over PS1 either. I've looked at the stage size and slight platform difference and I've always thought PS1 seemed a bit more true neutral overall.

Probably one of the biggest issues we have now is that the few sources that exist to show stage size and platform data tends to focus on the currently used stages, rather than showcasing how many stages, especially like Mushroom Kingdom U, aren't actually as big as people think they are. I never realized that the stage was actually a decent size because the data tends to be hidden.

Unfortunately, it's probably not just me that thinks this, but because this is being mentioned on SmashBoards and not Reddit, Discord, or perhaps even Twitter, this probably won't reach out as far as it should. It seems to me that SmashBoards definitely isn't as lively as it used to be.

ParanoidDrone · Oct 11, 2019

This is going to sound weird, but I think the main reason PS2 won out over PS1 is aesthetics. PS1 simply looks a bit more squashed, and the border around the main stage is sleeker on PS2.

Call_Me_Red · Oct 11, 2019

RPGsFTW said:
Amazing Ampharos as a fellow long time, old af Smash player, I hard agree with basically your whole write up.

I remember back in early competitive Melee days where Mute City and PokeFloats were counterpicks. I even remember back in Brawl when Delfino Plaza, Halberd and Rainbow Cruise were counterpicks.

Obviously, looking back at it now those stages were removed not long after their initial trials, but, that's the thing. At the time, they were actually given a chance, which seems to be a big factor in stage lists nowadays. Fear and misconceptions tend to have us stuck with these boring, linear stages that are all similar without making room for the variety that our characters need. The more and more I play online the more I've noticed how awful FD and BF can be as neutral stages, and it becomes more apparent when you realize, that even in Brawl days, that people often started matching by going to Smashville or Pokemon Stadium.

It's honestly baffling to me that so many of the great stages you mentioned have been ignored for so long. I've been playing Mushroom Kingdom U, Unova, Skyloft and Prism Tower online with my friend for a while now and they are very obviously consistently solid stages. As you already mentioned as well, Prism Tower kinda fits in that weird moving stage niche alongside New Donk City, Delfino, Halberd, etc, and can be occasionally campy, but is otherwise probably a fair counterpick as well.

Also, I never understood why PS2 was chosen over PS1 either. I've looked at the stage size and slight platform difference and I've always thought PS1 seemed a bit more true neutral overall.

Probably one of the biggest issues we have now is that the few sources that exist to show stage size and platform data tends to focus on the currently used stages, rather than showcasing how many stages, especially like Mushroom Kingdom U, aren't actually as big as people think they are. I never realized that the stage was actually a decent size because the data tends to be hidden.

Unfortunately, it's probably not just me that thinks this, but because this is being mentioned on SmashBoards and not Reddit, Discord, or perhaps even Twitter, this probably won't reach out as far as it should. It seems to me that SmashBoards definitely isn't as lively as it used to be.

I played on Prism Tower for the first time recently, and that stage is beautiful. I would LOVE for it to become legal.

I think the hardest part of this change is going to be getting people to actually play on these stages. Smash players are so...set in their ways. If you have a weird set up, they complain. If you turn stacked-echoes on, they complain. If you suggest going anywhere besides FD no items Fox only, they will complain. Really I just want someone to grind out these stages with me, because I think they look fun and also, I think they even have a chance to become viable stages.

Last thought, I feel like Little Mac will always be a reason that some of these stages aren't viable. The argument will always be how easy it is to gimp / camp Mac. It's a valid argument, and no disrespect to the character, but I think just the wide variety in characters we have make it hard for everyone to agree on more liberal stage lists. And tbh, I'm not sure what the work around is.

SMAASH! Puppy · Oct 11, 2019

Call_Me_Red said:
Last thought, I feel like Little Mac will always be a reason that some of these stages aren't viable. The argument will always be how easy it is to gimp / camp Mac. It's a valid argument...

Considering Little Mac can be camped out on any stage that isn't Final Destination (or at least can be camped out super hard on already legal stages such as Smashville and Kalos Pokémon League) I don't think that argument is valid. It's like saying that heavies are easy to camp even though that comes with the territory. Really what needs to be done on that front is a slight increase in Little Mac's full hop and a buff to his aerials so he can actually pressure would-be campers (Though not enough that you would want to use them for much else. That would defeat the purpose of the gimmick).

Call_Me_Red · Oct 11, 2019

SMAASH! Puppy said:
Considering Little Mac can be camped out on any stage that isn't Final Destination (or at least can be camped out super hard on already legal stages such as Smashville and Kalos Pokémon League) I don't think that argument is valid. It's like saying that heavies are easy to camp even though that comes with the territory. Really what needs to be done on that front is a slight increase in Little Mac's full hop and a buff to his aerials so he can actually pressure would-be campers (Though not enough that you would want to use them for much else. That would defeat the purpose of the gimmick).

Agreed, I think at this point it's just a character flaw. But this is a common argument, and I don't think the needs of this very few is worth the enjoyment of the many.

Another issue I see popping up is the backlash of allowing new stages to be legal, especially more liberal ones. I feel like people are really happy with Ultimate's meta right now (which is great). I think the general consensus is that the game is very well balanced and there is very minor 'jank' in the game. I think adding these stages (if they even make it that far) could really throw off the perception of the competitive environment and leave a bad taste for the general competitive player. I just don't want to upset the balance that I feel is working really well right now (even if I do think the stages are a bit stale...).

SMAASH! Puppy · Oct 11, 2019

Call_Me_Red said:
Another issue I see popping up is the backlash of allowing new stages to be legal, especially more liberal ones. I feel like people are really happy with Ultimate's meta right now (which is great). I think the general consensus is that the game is very well balanced and there is very minor 'jank' in the game. I think adding these stages (if they even make it that far) could really throw off the perception of the competitive environment and leave a bad taste for the general competitive player. I just don't want to upset the balance that I feel is working really well right now (even if I do think the stages are a bit stale...).

"The perception of balance is more important than actual balance" -Some FPS dev who keeps being quoted.

I get this, but I'd also like to see as many characters as possible get a fair shot. The heavies are so close to actually being viable in this game and the stagelist seems to be holding them back. This and I'm tired of seeing Game 1 & 2 being Pokémon Stadium 2 90% of the time. I'm not a competitive player though so I suppose my perspective doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things. As long as people are happy.

Call_Me_Red · Oct 11, 2019

SMAASH! Puppy said:
"The perception of balance is more important than actual balance" -Some FPS dev who keeps being quoted.

I get this, but I'd also like to see as many characters as possible get a fair shot. The heavies are so close to actually being viable in this game and the stagelist seems to be holding them back. This and I'm tired of seeing Game 1 & 2 being Pokémon Stadium 2 90% of the time. I'm not a competitive player though so I suppose my perspective doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things. As long as people are happy.

Why do you think heavies are held back by the stage list (as a heavy main myself I'm interested).

Also, nah, we're all tired of PS2. I had to sit through years of Smashville, I don't want to sit through years of PS2.

SMAASH! Puppy · Oct 11, 2019

Call_Me_Red said:
Why do you think heavies are held back by the stage list (as a heavy main myself I'm interested).

Also, nah, we're all tired of PS2. I had to sit through years of Smashville, I don't want to sit through years of PS2.

Probably just me hearing a thing and thinking it's an absolute fact so long as it makes sense. The idea is that heavies don't do so well on large stages and most of the stages in the current meta are decently large.

Call_Me_Red · Oct 11, 2019

SMAASH! Puppy said:
Probably just me hearing a thing and thinking it's an absolute fact so long as it makes sense. The idea is that heavies don't do so well on large stages and most of the stages in the current meta are decently large.

I'm not entirely sure I agree with this. To be fair though, I play a heavy with two very strong projectiles. But it is weird how many viable large stages there are. I don't think it's the communities fault that there are so many legal big stages. Tbh there just really aren't that many small stages to choose from. We could amend this a little by making PS1 legal instead of 2. I dont want Wario Ware, and I'm only a little skeptical of Castle Siege. But aside from those, I can't think of many small stages even in the running.

SMAASH! Puppy · Oct 11, 2019

Call_Me_Red said:
I'm not entirely sure I agree with this. To be fair though, I play a heavy with two very strong projectiles. But it is weird how many viable large stages there are. I don't think it's the communities fault that there are so many legal big stages. Tbh there just really aren't that many small stages to choose from. We could amend this a little by making PS1 legal instead of 2. I dont want Wario Ware, and I'm only a little skeptical of Castle Siege. But aside from those, I can't think of many small stages even in the running.

Thinking about it, it probably just applies to Incineroar because he has trouble keeping up with everyone under normal circumstances. Especially since Bowser and Piranha Plant seem to be doing well for themselves (though I hesitate to call Piranha Plant a heavy in terms of its archetype). The other heavies seem to suffer because of frame data or because they're not actually heavy for some reason (Ridley).

Gunman1357 · Oct 21, 2019

The Stage List Problem (2.0)
- There are a few people fantasizing about a massive stage list that'll never happen, and most of the community isn't fighting hard enough against a stage list that support a specific play style, and characters. Our community should have a balance between Big, Medium, and Small stages. Between Tri-plats, Dual-plats, Uni-plats, and FDs to support all characters in this game.

What Those Problems Are. (Mew2King brought up some of these problems already)
- Currently the competitive scene has gotten rid of most small stages. This leaves many character unviable or much weaker because of it. Incineroar, Kirby, Ike, Ganondorf, those with low movement speed. While many characters got to keep their larger stages legal stages got better overtime. What we need are more small and medium sized stages.
- Currently there are much more Final Destination esque stages then True Triplets or Dual plats, this needs to be balanced.
- Currently the Hazards On function is unused in competitive play, and those style of stages would greatly help the small stage problem. This is understandable for online tournaments, but for offline there is no excuse. Tournament organizers just need to label the rule sets properly in the menu's and it'll be easy to switch back into. Japan has being doing this for a bit, it can work. So there will be two primary stage list rule sets here. One for Mixed Hazards, and no hazards for online players.

The Strike Ban System
- The strike system was made so that the winner is in a state of point advantage would be able to strike the counter pick stages in order to give him a better chance against the losers pick of any stage. Stages list balance determines how powerful this ability is. Everyone fears this number, but here are the rules.
1. Starters stages only. Toss a coin, who ever wins strikes the first stage,
2. the loser bans the second,
3. this cycle will continue in till one stage is left.
4. Play the match
5. Winner of the match will get 3 strikes against starter or counter pick stages, before the looser chooses their stage. The loser cannot choose these stages for the rest of the set. (This last part is debatable)
6. Repeat from step 3 in till the match is finished.
The Stage List
Starters
- Battlefield
- Dream Land (Hazards Optional)
- Pokemon Stadium 2
- Smashville (Hazards On)
- Final Destination
Counter picks
- Fountain of Dreams (Hazards On)
- Lylat Cruise
- Unova Pokemon League
- Kalos Pokemon League
- Town & City (Hazards On)
https://pasteboard.co/ID1AhHW.png

Alt Rulings :
- For Online players using Hazards off, Use Yoshi's Story instead of FoD, though that will make the overall stage list slightly less balanced.
- If you want more variety, add both Mushroom Kingdom U, and Wario Ware Hazardless to the counter pick list. This most likely wont pass in competitive, due to the divisiveness of those stages, but I thought it would spice things up.

Potential Complaints
- "FoD is laggy" :
That got fixed back in 3.0, unless your playing doubles with Icy's you wont get problems.
- "Lylat is Janky, Mah Jablocks" :
Its a counter pick stage, are you not allowed to counter pick jab lock set ups? We are able to counter pick other strategies.
- "Three Tri-Plats eww" :
Balancing liberties needed to be made, and these stages are different enough to warrant their inclusion, and are needed to improve the meta of the game.
- "Unova eww, shadows" :
Get some glasses, and increase the brightness of the screen.
- "T&C is a Counter pick?" :
Ah a decent question. Yes, it messes too match with the starting balance, and dual plats are the most even stages in the game, we need more medium sized stages. Having a second dual plat should be alright when we have 2 FD esque stages, and 2 triplat esque stages.
- "You want is to change rule sets mid match" :
The Japanese have been doing it, its for the betterment of the game, i'm sure your capable of using menu's. If not, do something about it, Gather everyone up and raise awareness to Nintendo that you want a quick way to change between hazards on and off quickly on the stage select menu. Talk with other smash members, create petitions, talk about it in tourneys, send letters. Do this so the game will get better. Look when ESAM gathered his troops! He was able to get Nintendo to fix the game from the weird buffer system bugs. You can cause change, you just need to start it.

Final Statement
- I know many of you won't take this list seriously, it will be another lost list in the sea of endless stage lists debate, but I thought about this list alot. I know these rule changes will make the game even more exciting. Its simple, only 3 added stages that are on and off at tournaments, and its balanced. Maybe i'm ignorant in thinking I can change your guys minds, but something needs to change about our stage list. I might not be my change, we all want the game to be more exciting and fun to play. Finally, thanks for sticking through and reading this, give it an up vote and share this if you want to help make a change.

(2.0) Changes
- After much discussion I have come to the conclusion that Skyloft was too ambitious. The community won't budge on this stage, and for good reasons that convinced me. I also needed to balance out the starter stage list because it was leaning a bit towards aggressive play.
- Skyloft is removed, and replaced with Dream Land
- Dream Land has been moved to a starter stage.
- Unova Pokemon League has been moved to a counter pick stage.

Call_Me_Red · Oct 22, 2019

Gunman1357 said:
The Stage List Problem (2.0)
- There are a few people fantasizing about a massive stage list that'll never happen, and most of the community isn't fighting hard enough against a stage list that support a specific play style, and characters. Our community should have a balance between Big, Medium, and Small stages. Between Tri-plats, Dual-plats, Uni-plats, and FDs to support all characters in this game.

What Those Problems Are. (Mew2King brought up some of these problems already)
- Currently the competitive scene has gotten rid of most small stages. This leaves many character unviable or much weaker because of it. Incineroar, Kirby, Ike, Ganondorf, those with low movement speed. While many characters got to keep their larger stages legal stages got better overtime. What we need are more small and medium sized stages.
- Currently there are much more Final Destination esque stages then True Triplets or Dual plats, this needs to be balanced.
- Currently the Hazards On function is unused in competitive play, and those style of stages would greatly help the small stage problem. This is understandable for online tournaments, but for offline there is no excuse. Tournament organizers just need to label the rule sets properly in the menu's and it'll be easy to switch back into. Japan has being doing this for a bit, it can work. So there will be two primary stage list rule sets here. One for Mixed Hazards, and no hazards for online players.

The Strike Ban System
- The strike system was made so that the winner is in a state of point advantage would be able to strike the counter pick stages in order to give him a better chance against the losers pick of any stage. Stages list balance determines how powerful this ability is. Everyone fears this number, but here are the rules.
1. Starters stages only. Toss a coin, who ever wins strikes the first stage,
2. the loser bans the second,
3. this cycle will continue in till one stage is left.
4. Play the match
5. Winner of the match will get 3 strikes against starter or counter pick stages, before the looser chooses their stage. The loser cannot choose these stages for the rest of the set. (This last part is debatable)
6. Repeat from step 3 in till the match is finished.
The Stage List
Starters
- Battlefield
- Dream Land (Hazards Optional)
- Pokemon Stadium 2
- Smashville (Hazards On)
- Final Destination
Counter picks
- Fountain of Dreams (Hazards On)
- Lylat Cruise
- Unova Pokemon League
- Kalos Pokemon League
- Town & City (Hazards On)
https://pasteboard.co/ID1AhHW.png

Alt Rulings :
- For Online players using Hazards off, Use Yoshi's Story instead of FoD, though that will make the overall stage list slightly less balanced.
- If you want more variety, add both Mushroom Kingdom U, and Wario Ware Hazardless to the counter pick list. This most likely wont pass in competitive, due to the divisiveness of those stages, but I thought it would spice things up.

Potential Complaints
- "FoD is laggy" :
That got fixed back in 3.0, unless your playing doubles with Icy's you wont get problems.
- "Lylat is Janky, Mah Jablocks" :
Its a counter pick stage, are you not allowed to counter pick jab lock set ups? We are able to counter pick other strategies.
- "Three Tri-Plats eww" :
Balancing liberties needed to be made, and these stages are different enough to warrant their inclusion, and are needed to improve the meta of the game.
- "Unova eww, shadows" :
Get some glasses, and increase the brightness of the screen.
- "T&C is a Counter pick?" :
Ah a decent question. Yes, it messes too match with the starting balance, and dual plats are the most even stages in the game, we need more medium sized stages. Having a second dual plat should be alright when we have 2 FD esque stages, and 2 triplat esque stages.
- "You want is to change rule sets mid match" :
The Japanese have been doing it, its for the betterment of the game, i'm sure your capable of using menu's. If not, do something about it, Gather everyone up and raise awareness to Nintendo that you want a quick way to change between hazards on and off quickly on the stage select menu. Talk with other smash members, create petitions, talk about it in tourneys, send letters. Do this so the game will get better. Look when ESAM gathered his troops! He was able to get Nintendo to fix the game from the weird buffer system bugs. You can cause change, you just need to start it.

Final Statement
- I know many of you won't take this list seriously, it will be another lost list in the sea of endless stage lists debate, but I thought about this list alot. I know these rule changes will make the game even more exciting. Its simple, only 3 added stages that are on and off at tournaments, and its balanced. Maybe i'm ignorant in thinking I can change your guys minds, but something needs to change about our stage list. I might not be my change, we all want the game to be more exciting and fun to play. Finally, thanks for sticking through and reading this, give it an up vote and share this if you want to help make a change.

(2.0) Changes
- After much discussion I have come to the conclusion that Skyloft was too ambitious. The community won't budge on this stage, and for good reasons that convinced me. I also needed to balance out the starter stage list because it was leaning a bit towards aggressive play.
- Skyloft is removed, and replaced with Dream Land
- Dream Land has been moved to a starter stage.
- Unova Pokemon League has been moved to a counter pick stage.

Is T&C different with or without hazards?

ATH_ · Oct 22, 2019

Call_Me_Red said:
Is T&C different with or without hazards?

It's very different. The platforms move a lot more and it's much more balanced.

VietnameseHOTGIRL · Oct 28, 2019

We just changed our locals to this stage list:

Starters
Hazards Off: Battlefield, Final Destination, Pokemon Stadium 2
Hazards On: Smashville, Town & City

Counterpicks
Hazard Off: Kalos Pokemon League
Hazard On: Fountain of Dreams

boysilver400 · Oct 28, 2019

Hazards off Smashvile isn’t broken and does not need to be fixed. I’d rather not go back to the campy days of sm4sh.

My ideal stage list would look like this

Starter: BF, FD, Smashvile(hazards OFF pls thx), PS2, Town and City

Counterpick: Kalos, Unova, Lylat, Yoshis Story, FoD(if fixed)

I put Town as starter instead of Lylat because Lylat is just much more controversial in general with the slants. Slants are absolutely not neutral imo. I don’t think it needs to be banned(I wouldn’t be upset if it was though tbh) but I don’t know why people think it should be a starter stage.

Fenrir VII · Oct 30, 2019

Has anyone actually verified if FoD is good or bad now? It'd be nice to definitively know if that stage is viable at this point..

The main reason being that FoD being good would unlock the hazards-on neutral list of BF, FD, SV, T&C, FoD. This list fixes a lot of the issues with the unbalanced, camp-heavy stagelist / metagame currently (when 3/5 of the current neutral stages are large, and Hazardless Kalos/FD/T&C all benefit similar characters).
The obvious downside is the loss of PS2 as a neutral, but I do think this list would be more balanced overall... all assuming FoD is viable now.

Nidtendofreak · Oct 30, 2019

Fenrir VII said:
Has anyone actually verified if FoD is good or bad now? It'd be nice to definitively know if that stage is viable at this point..

Probably not, particularly since we've had false "its fixed now!" claims in the past. Its not a consistent problem, so realistically speaking unless a Nintendo patch note specifically says they've fixed it people aren't going to trust the stage because it could appear to be fixed but then it comes back during a match when X character uses Y move at the same time A character uses B move and it costs a player a game/set. Its overall best to move on from the idea of it being legal, it ain't going to happen unless Nintendo says something.

ATH_ · Oct 30, 2019

I will continue to believe that the stage is fixed until someone can provide concrete proof that it is not. I feel I've been asking for this for forever but somehow nobody seems to come up with actual proof. :think:

ParanoidDrone · Nov 6, 2019

Terry and the KOF Arena stage are out and the stage is 100% banned no question lmao. The sides have invisible walls like in normal 2D fighters so you can't even get horizontal kills most of the time. (If you're sent flying hard enough you'll bust through and die anyway -- being in close range exacerbates this so early kills at the side are possible.)

I'd assume vertical kills are still a thing but it seems purely academic at this point.

Flowen231 · Nov 6, 2019

ParanoidDrone said:
Terry and the KOF Arena stage are out and the stage is 100% banned no question lmao. The sides have invisible walls like in normal 2D fighters so you can't even get horizontal kills most of the time. (If you're sent flying hard enough you'll bust through and die anyway -- being in close range exacerbates this so early kills at the side are possible.)

I'd assume vertical kills are still a thing but it seems purely academic at this point.

Let's not be too hasty now. I think it will most likely be banned because unorthodox stages tend to be banned in general but there is a little reason to consider it. I have done a bit of testing and this is what I found:

Walls are banned because they can allow someone to live forever, but kof's walls are thresholds that break, and you cannot tech a wall break to save yourself.

Walk offs are banned because they lead to early cheese kills, but the walls prevent that, and while the walls are easier to break the closer you are, they aren't made of paper by any means. I took gannon into training mode, turned on stale moves and tested his f smash at point blank range vs a few characters to test weight. At point blank range from the wall, gannon's f smash killed nobody at 0%, even pichu survived. Fully charged was differen't however, it killed most characters instantly. You have to be as heavy as rob to survive it at 0% point blank. That does beg the question though; Who would ever get hit point blank against the wall with a fully charged smash attack let alone gannon's?

EDIT: some more practical data: Stale moves on gannon's f smash kills link at 50+ from starting position on kof, and at 53 on fd. But for this I think it's best to use the most extreme example. Pichu on FD dies off the side from starting position at 36% uncharged and at 52% reverse. In KOF he dies at 37% from starting position and 63% reverse. This is all really fast day 1 testing of course but so far it seems to fit in as far as death percents on other stages go.

Yes the stage is unorthodox, but the walls don't let people live forever and you can't really cheese people at low percents. Again, I fully expect a ban and we can all move on, but should we just outright ban it without giving it a try when the preconceived reasons to ban it don't really apply?

Mooer · Nov 6, 2019

Flowen231 said:
I fully expect a ban and we can all move on, but should we just outright ban it without giving it a try when the preconceived reasons to ban it don't really apply?

Walls are also banned because of infinite combos. I don't think this stage mitigates that possibility?

Flowen231 · Nov 6, 2019

Mooer said:
Walls are also banned because of infinite combos. I don't think this stage mitigates that possibility?

That is a good point. Are there any that do work on this stage though? Like a true infinite combo that can't be teched and leads into a guaranteed kill? I know there are a few impractical ones that work on any stage, I know some that work and rely on a vertical finisher in past games which could be mitigated by this stage's high ceiling, and I know a few that we allow in tournament via Palutena and Joker (hard to do, yes, but still infinite).

That may come off as sarcastic, but I promise it isn't XD. I genuinely don't know of any infinite wall combo that can't be teched at some point in this game, and if there is a sort of infinite, how much are we willing to tolerate it (or rather how impractical does it have to be) given that we already have infinites to a degree on platforms?

Flowen231 said:
That is a good point. Are there any that do work on this stage though? Like a true infinite combo that can't be teched and leads into a guaranteed kill? I know there are a few impractical ones that work on any stage, I know some that work and rely on a vertical finisher in past games which could be mitigated by this stage's high ceiling, and I know a few that we allow in tournament via Palutena and Joker (hard to do, yes, but still infinite).

That may come off as sarcastic, but I promise it isn't XD. I genuinely don't know of any infinite wall combo that can't be teched at some point in this game, and if there is a sort of infinite, how much are we willing to tolerate it (or rather how impractical does it have to be) given that we already have infinites to a degree on platforms?

Don't listen to this man he is dumb.

But yeah I tested the stage for a while at a buddy's house. Low percent launches aren't bad, and starting position isn't bad, but cross stage KOs take way long than on regular stages. Def ban.

Vulgun · Nov 6, 2019

I'm going to put it as simply as this:

1) Calling for a stage to be banned for outright early kills is an extremely close-minded argument considering how fast kills can be gained in Ultimate on our current stagelist. This alone should not be the reason a ban should be applicable to any stage whatsoever. Like stated previously, some kill moves in this stage fall under the average kill% of other stages.

2) There is only one particular infinite that could feasibly cause this stage to be bannable, but that is also not the route we should take when considering a stage for its legality. The infinite I am referring to is the potential down special infinite that can be performed by Ness on all walled off stages, which itself is untechable and completely traps the opponent the second they are put into the stage's walls. This could easily be remedied by simply banning the infinite (as should be the status quo regarding these situations) and examining the stage once all infinites have actually been properly banned for better clarity.

3) The only other thing that this stage does as a trade-off that may cause some slight issues is the removal of edgeguarding at the expense of removing ledge pressure and options on the stage. Since the stage itself is flat and has no edge upon it as an outer boundary, this changes up gameplay significantly to where an entire metagame can be derived from this stage alone (as a potential side-event, maybe). This isn't even the only instance of a trade-off we see on this stage, as while the stage is enormous in size, it is also nigh impossible to kill at reasonable damages off of the top blast zone. To what extent this could affect is unknown to my knowledge currently, but I can at least assume it's something along the lines of "good for horizontal killers, bad for vertical killers".

4) While the stage itself could provide interesting results if it was used in tournaments, I would have to admit that this unorthodox stage style may be too much for our current competitive meta. However, if the game develops further and we get more stages like this, potentially with other platforms and the like, I would actually be on board in saying this could be our second main event for Ultimate in replacement to the infrequent Doubles. But, that's just a pipe dream of mine to be honest.

Tl;dr: Stage is interesting and showcases some problems we have in regards to the current stage selection philosophy, but is not competitively viable in our current metagame in spite of the potential it could bring to the table. As a different competitive event altogether, this stage could see a significant surge in potential and I wouldn't be against adding more stages like this if it meant something exciting happens.

Rizen · Nov 6, 2019

The walls have some kind of priority for which attacks break them. I was throwing Terry as Terry against the wall at 200+% and they didn't break. The stage is jank and we already have a better version:FD.

Gleam · Nov 6, 2019

King of Fighters Stadium effectively hinders if not outright mitigates the impact of setups or gimps that would've worked offstage. You're essentially required to win through the manipulation of your character and not the manipulation of the other character, via set ups and what not (though the stage leads to enough potential for such possibilities)

This means that any character like

whom to differing degrees struggle when taken off stage, no longer have to worry about that.

The walls themselves effectively work in the same way that kill zones/kill moves work on a regular stage. For example, Ganondorf can't kill at the edge of KOF at 0%, the same way he can't kill at the edge of Final Destination at the same percentage. If it takes around 70% to kill on a stage, that's about what it's going to take in the same position on KOF.

Assuming nothing broken comes up (and honestly we allow some questionable things anyways) I hope this stage does become viable, if perhaps as a counter pick stage. We may need some minute changes in terms of size but it would allow for a unique and differing viability across the roster. A character like

sucks on a normal stage because piss poor recovery, rockcorcking and an assortment of other issues makes it darn well near impossible to get the best out of him.

KOF Stadium pretty much negates that issue. You can't gimp Ganondorf here, you can't edgeguard him here. You can't ledgetrap him here. Nearly all the things that made it so easy to deal with Ganondorf are either gone or severely mitigated. Instead of gying at 40-70% because of the poor game design, Ganon can now live to 120-150% easily. Now he can actually kill early as he should and not worry about recoveries .

I'd love to see this stage become viable, either as a counter pick or as an entirely different tournament style to both test the ideology of how a stage would work out in the long run and to give some fresh new air within the tournament setting.

The walls have some kind of priority for which attacks break them. I was throwing Terry as Terry against the wall at 200+% and they didn't break. The stage is jank and we already have a better version:FD.

The wall priority effectively works the same as what it would take to KO someone off a regular stage in a similar position. Terry's throws are weak so the same thing happens even on Final Destination. You won't kill until you get well past 200%. In other words, if your attack wouldn't normally KO on a regular stage, it's not going to KO against the wall on KOF..

Rizen · Nov 7, 2019

Gleam said:
Terry's throws are weak so the same thing happens even on Final Destination. You won't kill until you get well past 200%. In other words, if your attack wouldn't normally KO on a regular stage, it's not going to KO against the wall on KOF..

I thought something like that might be the case which is why I mentioned it was Terry. I haven't had much time to test things yet but I imagine it will have the same problems as any walled stage.

Vulgun · Nov 7, 2019

A simpler term for what happens on the stage is that the kills are "knockback dependent". Think of the King of Fighters Stadium like a significantly larger Home-Run Contest platform.

Rizen said:
I thought something like that might be the case which is why I mentioned it was Terry. I haven't had much time to test things yet but I imagine it will have the same problems as any walled stage.

The only real problems it would have as a walled stage are the infinites that would spawn (and should subsequently be banned instead of the stage) and the fact that attacks can combo into others that normally wouldn't occur on a regular stage (though this, in my personal opinion, would be more interesting to see than the normal combos we do get from time to time).

Also, projectile characters may have it a lot harder on this stage than I may suspect with the current preliminary knowledge I have on the stage. I may test it out later on to see how they would fare under the new stipulations the stage provides.

NerdThomas3 · Nov 9, 2019

KoF Stadium is really more of a stamina match type stage really. The vertical blast zones are too high, in my opinion, and the walls, while a really cool idea, can really hinder a lot of match ups. Wall combos can still be a thing and KoF's walls break upon high impact like smash attacks or G&W's 9.

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