Stage Analysis & Discussion Thread

[Reila]

I'm so mad that they missed that perfect opportunity to make so many legal stages.

Just add different types of platforms to each FD stage and we get like 30 legal stages.

I don't see what is not legal about FD stages, but hey I am not exactly a competitive player :3

 

[yahooda]

I personally don't want Tortimer Island as a legal stage, but that's just because I'm picky and don't like randomness in a competitive game.

 

[GamerGuy09]

I don't see what is not legal about FD stages, but hey I am not exactly a competitive player :3

Its not the fact that they aren't legal, because they are.

They just missed a huge opportunity. A Waste of Potential.

 

[mygamecube]

I'm gonna be honest here...it's not looking pretty good for the 3DS it terms of viable stages for competitive play. The 3DS was clearly designed to be a bit more casual. All these stages are gimmicky, which is great for friendlies, but not so much in terms of competitions. I think you'll have a better selection pool of stages to weed out legal vs banned in the Wii U version.

That's not to say the 3DS is completely inept at competitive play, it's just hard when there's so many stages that are gimmicky. FD forms of each stage is only a FD re-skin, nothing more. From what I see, all stages except for FD, Battlefield, Arena Ferox and Yoshi's Island (Brawl) will be frowned upon in competitive play.

Those 4 may be all that's needed tho, who knows. Far too early to tell. I'll be able to contribute more when the game launches in the US in a few weeks.

 

[Untouch]

The mushroom kingdom omega mode is WAY too large to be viable.

 

[Mamp]

The mushroom kingdom omega mode is WAY too large to be viable.

But they're all the same size?

 

[Untouch]

But they're all the same size?

Are you sure? This one seems much larger than the other ones.

 

[Raziek]

The stage or the blast zone?

The stages are all completely identical lengthwise.

 

[<π]

The mushroom kingdom omega mode is WAY too large to be viable.

what is the viable blast zone limit again? Wasn't aware THAT had to be standardized too.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Are you sure? This one seems much larger than the other ones.

Someone (can't remember who) did some testing and all the FD variations are the exact same width. It was done by having Robin do his side roll from one end to the other and it always took the same number.

Blast zones are another matter but I'm not sure we can easily test that right now.

 

[Raziek]

Someone (can't remember who) did some testing and all the FD variations are the exact same width. It was done by having Robin do his side roll from one end to the other and it always took the same number.

Blast zones are another matter but I'm not sure we can easily test that right now.

Hi, that was myself and @ #HBC | Ryker

 

[PK_Wonder]

Important question. In random stage select, can you specifically turn off the default stage, but leave Omega form on?

 

[Maxoxpower]

Important question. In random stage select, can you specifically turn off the default stage, but leave Omega form on?

yes

 

[TheMagicalKuja]

I'm of the opinion that there MUST be video proof on why stages are banned, or you can count on semi/pseudo-competitive and casuals once again giving the middle finger or complaining all about the lack of options. I still think PM messed up badly by neutering the stage list.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

Blast zones are another matter but I'm not sure we can easily test that right now.

All of the blast zones seem the same, but it was done simply by eyeballing it. Robin died at about the same height on every stage by jumping off, double jumping, UpBing, and then drifting to the blast zone.

 

[Count Bleck]

Concerning the Wall Omega stages, should they be considered Counterpicks? Going by this defenition:

...to provide an environment that slightly favors one fighter over the other.

Since we already know that many characters LOVE having platforms to stand on, It should be noted that there may be some characters that prefer walls in the arena as well, specifically Wall Jumpers. It still needs to be tested, as the game is not out to a majority yet, but I'm pretty sure this falls under a more favorable enviroment.

 

[Life]

Favors a fighter relative to what? That's basically the FD-is-the-most-neutral-stage argument, but more generalized. You could argue that wall-less stages favor fighters with no wall jump by making one of their weaknesses irrelevant.

 

[<π]

All of the blast zones seem the same, but it was done simply by eyeballing it. Robin died at about the same height on every stage by jumping off, double jumping, UpBing, and then drifting to the blast zone.

The mushroom kingdom omega mode is WAY too large to be viable.

See how much feelings can skew actual data.

I have been having a pretty busy week (kids are off of school this week) But I do want to stress that my last big post was an example of how to present ideas more than a practical working list of what we should be doing. Being clear and redundant even about WHY stages are banned is huge, and having reasons not linked things that aren't quantifiable. testable, or are personal preferences is not okay.

Whats the GOAL of the community? The answer to that is going to vary from person to person. For me it is figuring out who is the best at the game, which again, admitedly, is a little hard to define, but this game is huge! It isn't just Omega FD and battlefield, it is so much more than that. For me mastering all of that is part of being the best at the game. I'm an older guy I grew up on smash 10 years ago when (like I said before) that was the mindset of the community.
Watering it down so that best at the game means best at FD and Battlefield feels like a huge loss for me.

More than that though I feel like it is a loss to people playing and watching the game. When I'm talking to my children about these kinds of things I use an example of a fisherman. You catch more fish with a net than you do a spear.
Translating that to smash it means the more board your ruleset the more people you will capture the attention of, you may miss out on some specific group, but you net a larger group over all. The more narrow your ruleset the fewer people you can grab a hold of, but conversely you can target that one fish much better.

Smash games sells in the tens of millions. The competitive smash scene is in the 100,000s(and that's being very generous). That's a 1% turn over. If our goal is to get as many people as possible invested in the competitive community we are going about it the wrong way.

1. What is defined as Intrusive game play?

I don't know... it changes per person so that isn't a word I really like using... For something to be intrusive it has to be unwanted. and I really enjoy stage hazards and playing around them. Anything you can't reasonably react to is too much for me.

2. What criteria must a stage hazard (or stage as a whole) must meet in order to be considered 'Intrusive to the competition'?

Anything you can't reasonably react to is too much for me... We have some quantifiable time limit. X frames.

above.

4. What should an ideal stage provide to benefit both the competitors and for a viewing audience?

as many stages as possible! A stage should offer something different compared to other stages. With smash we have the opportunity to do that with more than just visuals but how we approach the game as well.

KK gotta go to work and feed my babies!

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I think that the best way to handle Omega forms is to disallow them completely for game 1, so that if FD is selected then you play on the "real" one, and for counterpicks if someone chooses it then the players get to do a secondary round of striking and selecting between all the Omega forms, "true" FD included.

That said, I'd like it if @Amazing Ampharos would chime in with his thoughts on how Omega forms would fit into a stage selection process where the idea of "neutral" and "counterpick" stages were merged into a single "legal" category. I don't feel qualified to address this on my own.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

Not having starter stages and counter pick stages has been done before. It's full stage striking. I've run it and the biggest complaint people bring up is that it takes too long (spoiler: it doesn't).

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Not having starter stages and counter pick stages has been done before. It's full stage striking. I've run it and the biggest complaint people bring up is that it takes too long (spoiler: it doesn't).

I don't doubt it, but my own tournament experience has been very small-scale local things so I was hesitant to say anything definitively.

 

[Life]

Personally, I'd just say that someone who counterpicks to FD may opt to go to an Omega Mode stage instead. It might not be theoretically perfect, but it's super simple and easy to understand, which is valuable considering how many new people the game will bring in.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

I don't doubt it, but my own tournament experience has been very small-scale local things so I was hesitant to say anything definitively.

I've run a 80 man event with it.

 

[T-block]

I just wanted to echo the concerns about carrying over the Starter-Counterpick distinction from Melee/Brawl. If we allow stages with dynamic elements at all, then we are implicitly declaring that those stages enable us to evaluate the players' relative skill. It then makes no sense that game 1 should be arbitrarily limited to stages that don't move. Perhaps all those years of auto-banning FD against ICs will make people see that "static" is completely unrelated to "fair". And hopefully, it's obvious that "fair" is what we should be aiming for in game 1 of a set.

I realize it's a long shot to hope that the majority of the community and TOs will be able to doff the "static starter" mentality, but ONE CAN HOPE.

Also, I wanted to ask: just how bad is Pictochat 2? I've only seen a couple vids (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z36iEHMp_8Q), and nothing stood out to me as completely over-the-top, but I've still only seen a subset of the possible drawings.

 

[DJ Dong]

what is the viable blast zone limit again? Wasn't aware THAT had to be standardized too.

It's boring when people won't die quickly enough to good play. It's mundane seeming to the player and lengthy for the audience.

The mushroom kingdom omega mode is WAY too large to be viable.

All of the blast zones seem the same, but it was done simply by eyeballing it. Robin died at about the same height on every stage by jumping off, double jumping, UpBing, and then drifting to the blast zone.

We have to kind of accept Sakurai ****ed us for seemingly no reason at all when it comes to blast zone size. I just can't imagine why he'd decide to make them unnecessarily large.

It's like he thought "oh, wait. stocks might take a reasonable amount of time. I know! Let's make it so that the attacker becomes frustrated as he smacks his opponent around at 140% for 40+seconds at the least!"

 

[JamietheAuraUser]

I just wanted to echo the concerns about carrying over the Starter-Counterpick distinction from Melee/Brawl. If we allow stages with dynamic elements at all, then we are implicitly declaring that those stages enable us to evaluate the players' relative skill. It then makes no sense that game 1 should be arbitrarily limited to stages that don't move. Perhaps all those years of auto-banning FD against ICs will make people see that "static" is completely unrelated to "fair". And hopefully, it's obvious that "fair" is what we should be aiming for in game 1 of a set.

I realize it's a long shot to hope that the majority of the community and TOs will be able to doff the "static starter" mentality, but ONE CAN HOPE.

Also, I wanted to ask: just how bad is Pictochat 2? I've only seen a couple vids (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z36iEHMp_8Q), and nothing stood out to me as completely over-the-top, but I've still only seen a subset of the possible drawings.

Pictochat 2 has a kind of really annoying drawing where tornadoes appear on the ground in rapid succession. They're difficult to dodge due to their size and due to the fact that they appear to specifically target players. When you're hit by a tornado, you're launched a fixed distance into the air in tumble, but take no damage. It's not lethal nor even dangerous, and it's incredibly difficult for an opponent to take advantage of simply because of how often they appear and the fact that they appear to target and will almost certainly target both players, but it sure as heck is disruptive. There's also a drawing where the entire background is penciled in black, which somehow turns the lighting pitch-black as well. You can see items, but you have to identify the position of yourself and your opponent by the player tag.


On an unrelated note, Spirit Train looks totally legitimate to me. It moves, but there's enough of a main platform to fight on effectively, and the bomb trains give an ample amount of warning before exploding (probably around 10 seconds). All the floors are drop-through, so you don't have to worry about tunnel combos or caves of life, and there's really not enough space at the conductor's section to wall-combo people, especially since you get pushed back instead if your opponent flinches and fails to move from the knockback, which makes jab infinites a non-option.

 

[#HBC | Ryker]

Also, I wanted to ask: just how bad is Pictochat 2? I've only seen a couple vids (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z36iEHMp_8Q), and nothing stood out to me as completely over-the-top, but I've still only seen a subset of the possible drawings.

There are multiple transitions that are ass. Have you seen the shooting star one?

I really, REALLY wanted Pictochat to be good, but it just isn't.

 

[Gawain]

Look I'm just throwing it out there, but the Wii U version of Smash comes out in probably 1 or 2 months tops after the 3DS version does. Are we seriously considering using the handheld for large scale tournaments? Honestly, I feel like this discussion isn't going to matter much because the competitive scene will focus on the console version. I just can't see the 3DS even being given any attention by TOs when the console one is right around the corner.

 

[infomon]

Also, I wanted to ask: just how bad is Pictochat 2? I've only seen a couple vids (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z36iEHMp_8Q), and nothing stood out to me as completely over-the-top, but I've still only seen a subset of the possible drawings.

Great video! Here's the time-breakdown. I don't remember Brawl's picto rules so I can't immediately tell if it's about the same.

Summary: First drawing starts 9-10s into the match. Different drawings take different amounts of time to be drawn and erased, and some forms (e.g. dolphins) aren't drawn, it just comes in from the sides. Drawings last for different amounts of time, somewhere between say 12s and 18s, probably depends on the drawing. Time between drawings is about 13s. Drawings with hitboxes had at least 1s drawing time before the hitbox comes out. In three drawings with hitboxes, one did 10% low knockback, the others did 12% low knockback.

Details:

Spoiler

3:00.00 Start, no drawings
2:51.03: Gear transform starts drawing
2:49.80: Gears are moving (hitboxes, presumably) -- hit for 10% low knockback.
2:32.20: Erasing
2:31.90: Done erasing. Erasing was fast.
2:17.53: Drawing a Möbius strip
2:17.00: Done drawing (No hitbox)
2:01.00: Erasing
2:00.70: Done erasing
1:47.70: Dolphins appear (No hitbox)
1:35.30: Dolphins are gone
1:06.00: Lovey faces are drawn. Thought-gear thing does 12% low knockback.
0:53.40: Erased
0:42.23: Tornado being drawn
0:41.35: Tornado active, blows wind (?). Players can jump in it as @ JamietheAuraUser described.
0:25.55: Being erased
0:24.50: Erased
0:12.83: Classic DK being drawn, then waves his arms
0:10.70: He tosses a barrel up, takes a second before it comes down and starts rolling. Hitbox does 12% low knockback.

 

[Boss N]

I'm of the opinion that there MUST be video proof on why stages are banned, or you can count on semi/pseudo-competitive and casuals once again giving the middle finger or complaining all about the lack of options. I still think PM messed up badly by neutering the stage list.

See how much feelings can skew actual data.

I have been having a pretty busy week (kids are off of school this week) But I do want to stress that my last big post was an example of how to present ideas more than a practical working list of what we should be doing. Being clear and redundant even about WHY stages are banned is huge, and having reasons not linked things that aren't quantifiable. testable, or are personal preferences is not okay.

Whats the GOAL of the community? The answer to that is going to vary from person to person. For me it is figuring out who is the best at the game, which again, admitedly, is a little hard to define, but this game is huge! It isn't just Omega FD and battlefield, it is so much more than that. For me mastering all of that is part of being the best at the game. I'm an older guy I grew up on smash 10 years ago when (like I said before) that was the mindset of the community.
Watering it down so that best at the game means best at FD and Battlefield feels like a huge loss for me.

More than that though I feel like it is a loss to people playing and watching the game. When I'm talking to my children about these kinds of things I use an example of a fisherman. You catch more fish with a net than you do a spear.
Translating that to smash it means the more board your ruleset the more people you will capture the attention of, you may miss out on some specific group, but you net a larger group over all. The more narrow your ruleset the fewer people you can grab a hold of, but conversely you can target that one fish much better.

Smash games sells in the tens of millions. The competitive smash scene is in the 100,000s(and that's being very generous). That's a 1% turn over. If our goal is to get as many people as possible invested in the competitive community we are going about it the wrong way.

THIS. ALL OF THE THIS.

I hate to repeat the same message but alot of people seem to have conpletely missed the point of my last post.

Guys what would be so bad about having all the stages available from the start? Whats the worst that can happen, a skilled player loses a couple games he could've won? I understand how it feels to be cheated out of a deserved victory, but thats only a couple of matches, when you consider the tens of thousands of games they will inevitably be playing, & if they are indeed skilled inevitibly winning, then is it really going to matter in the grand scheme of things?

No, it won't.

& just look at the benefits we would be recieving by actually giving stages a chance: A chance to create more dynamic games that are both fun to play and even more enjoyable to watch, in turn expanding our audiance and giving us more popularity as an eSport AND the chance to make new friends and meet new interesting people!

Someone PLEASE explain to me how this is a bad idea, we're obviously not gonna be running huge events soon so it's not gonna make or break champions, there are costs yes but they're short term and minimal at best compared to the HUGE long term benefits.

Yes people will be salty, people will get over it. We'll still walk out wiser than we where before & now have objective evidence instead of biased guesstimations.

Agian it's good to still have this conversation to know which stages to be weary of but c'mon, we'll never truely know until we actually try.

 

[Gawain]

Whats the worst that can happen, a skilled player loses a couple games he could've won?

Well when there is money involved that tends to matter a whole lot more haha

 

[JamietheAuraUser]

Well when there is money involved that tends to matter a whole lot more haha

Pfft, implying people will even do money matches during the first month or two of the meta.

 

[JCOnyx]

Uhm... that doesn't only cover money matches. Tournaments have entry fees and venue fees and it's not like Smash 4 is just going to be exempt for the first couple months. I'm attending one on the 4th, day after release lol. The current plans are only allowing BF and FD and all Delta versions with the possibility of YI, but it's not very unlikely.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Oh Pictochat....
I'm yet to see much gameplay of Pictochat 2, but even now I consider Pictochat 1 to be a very misunderstood stage.

The BBR guide said something along the lines of "Drawings have multiple effects, otherwise it's another flavor of FD".
IMO that's wrong. When the stage blank is the state you must be cautious the most as anything could appear. If you're not careful you create a High Risk, Random Reward situation most people would want to avoid, but again, that one risk is player-triggered.

I'll just state once again that I'm yet to watch more of Pictochat 2 to be convinced, but my opinion about the mechanics of that stage remains unchanged.


========================


Now, again, I love people's newer opinions about how we must handle stagelists for the future

 

[WindMajor]

I don't have the full game, nor have I even seen any of the stages you guys have been talking about, so I'll just chime in with the same philosophical jumbo jumbo that I've been going on about since the Brawl days.

First off, I want to stress that we shouldn't try to apply our bias to the game. What I mean by that is, I don't think we should say, "this is how the game should be played" and go cookie-cutter crazy on the ruleset and stagelist until you get an ideal result. That means no more emphasis on center-stage play or player vs. player combat or whatever.

We shouldn't try to shape the game into what we want it to be, we should only shape it into what it needs to be, when it needs to be shaped. It's always good to let your kids be themselves and have the freedom to create their own future, but you know that when he's eating way too many of mommy's pills or choosing to be a gang banger that maybe it's alright to step in and take some executive action.

(I hope that made sense)

Anyways, walk-offs should not be a problem now that chain-grabbing is a thing of the past. There was a post earlier which said that walk-offs were possibly an issue because they remove ledge and offstage play from the equation, and those things are a staple to Smash. I disagree, mainly because it applies bias to the stage list. Platforms have been a staple of competitive Smash since the beginning, considering that not even a handful of levels in Smash don't feature platforms. However, Omega stages remove platforms from the equation, which heavily changes how players fight their opponents. Those who play Brawl know this very well.

A counter to all of this would be developer's intent.

Previously, we had no idea what Sakurai thought about the competitive community, but then he introduced For Glory mode and its exclusivity to the Omega stage list. Does this mean that competitive Smash is supposed to be played without platforms, or is this Sakurai's way of making us realize that a boring stagelist is not the way to go, and that we have to make the executive decision to live a little and spice things up?

This is so amusing.

 

[T-block]

Developer intent is a fantastic point, and this whole discussion (and many other discussions) may be moot if Nintendo decides to host their own tournaments with their own ruleset. If they don't (but I think they will), then I guess we can argue about the meaning behind the For Glory mode until the end of time.

But for the sake of argument, let's talk walkoffs. I agree that they should not be banned on account of chain grabs (assuming they truly do not exist). I agree that they should not be banned on the removal of ledge play, off-stage play, or the advantage of center stage control.
But I think walkoff-camping is still a problem.

I know AA always argues that walkoff-camping is a bad strategy because when you initiate, you put yourself very close to the blastzone, and the opponent is farther from the blastzone, theoretically leading to a situation that is skewed in favor of your opponent. I think the point is valid if every player were of equal skill, or if the stock count were set to 5+. But in a 3-stock (potentially 2-stock?!) game, I'm pretty sure we'd see an unacceptable amount of variance in the outcome on permanent walk-off stages.

 

[Thinkaman]

I think the primary issue with walk-off camping is that it empowers the player with the lead with the option to raise the stakes to an undesired level. The player in the lead should have some overall control of the match, but not the freedom to force such an extreme.

 

[dskank]

can the fruit on AC island be thrown? if not then it could be this games frigate orpheon sans transition.

 

[<π]

I think the primary issue with walk-off camping is that it empowers the player with the lead with the option to raise the stakes to an undesired level. The player in the lead should have some overall control of the match, but not the freedom to force such an extreme.

I think that's just part of the risk involved with the stage. You get that first stock after agreeing to chose (our counter picking) a walk off. Then walk off camping (which I 100% agree with AA here is NOT an optimal strategy, even more so in this game) is something the opponent is going to have to play around.
This is just like if you get counter picked to FD or SV by the ICs you are forced to play around their huge advantages that are created by the lay out of the stage. I don't see much difference between that and this.

 

[Boss N]

Uhm... that doesn't only cover money matches. Tournaments have entry fees and venue fees and it's not like Smash 4 is just going to be exempt for the first couple months. I'm attending one on the 4th, day after release lol. The current plans are only allowing BF and FD and all Delta versions with the possibility of YI, but it's not very unlikely.

Valid point, but then again people gamble all the time and lose even more money than they ever will playing smash, and in that scenario there is even less control over the random factor. Hell, people play Poker professionally.

I think something else we should consider is our tournament structure, if we start doing more round robin's or swiss early on during this testing phase, not only would it give us even more data to work with but any chances of obtuse randomness that occurs will be likely balanced out by all the other matches players will engage in, so it won't immediately spell instant defeat if they ever do fall victim to it.

In fact I would like to point out this video on randomness in competitive play, for those who insist that any kind of randomness is game breaking.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9ZI9kMsvRQ