Stage Analysis & Discussion Thread

[Budget Player Cadet_]

However, I think it would lower your levels of frustration if you realized that there are other methods to choosing a stage list, and those can be also valid (FD BF SV only is not one of them). You see, we as a community have the power to choose a stage list that shapes play in a way that might not contain every non-broken element of the game.

What are these other methods? And if they don't maximize competitive depth, why are they considered legitimate?

Windy Hill Zone... There's reasonable belief that it encourages stalling and runaway and is degenerate and overcentralizing as a result, similar to Big Battlefield.

Banning a stage to get to an odd number... I dunno. You're removing depth from the game for convenience's sake. Even if nobody uses that stage, this feels wrong.

Honestly, I don't think I should have to study and quantify every concern I have with this game. I don't think that's fair of you. I'm already discussing and studying a handful of complicated topics, both on and off the boards, and they're already eating into more than a fair amount of my free time.

Just because I'm the one voicing an opinion that many people share, shouldn't mean the burden of solving every problem should fall to me. If it turns out that no other regions are concerned about the changes on 2D, that's fine too, but just fairly certain it can't just be Ottawa that doesn't want to lose stocks to arbitrarily nerfed dodges and not know it.

How can this be construed as anything but the antithesis of competitive play? "I don't want to learn how to deal with X, ban X". That's not how we design rulesets for games; otherwise I would have tried to have Sagat banned at my local USF4 ranbats. The changes are weird, and different, but to the degree that they matter, they will be noticeable, and those that are not noticeable won't matter.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Knowledge is a funny thing. Some of us have more than others, but none of us have as much as we could. I mean, you could pick Mii Swordfighter against me, and I'll be real that my knowledge of what you can do that's going to be generally safe on my shield is going to end at "not much". The character is just obviously extremely low tier, he plays weird, he has Mii size stuff to think about, and overall it just seems like a waste of my time to study him when I could be learning about gameplay mechanics involving more relevant characters. If I run into one in tournament, one of two things will happen. I'll either figure it out as I go and win (proving I was right not to bother learning ahead of time!) or I won't and I'll lose because I don't know things and then all that can be said for me is "no johns". I had the option to learn about that stuff, and it was my judgment that my odds of running into him were very low and that he was a sufficiently bad character that I wouldn't need to know much to win. Heck, I might even lose and not realize why I lost; maybe Mii Swordfighter has some clever trick that is so subtle I won't notice it when he's doing it and won't understand why he's getting some strange upper hand on me. It's still just "no johns", and it's my responsibility to figure it out if I want to be maximally prepared to deal with it.

I look at the 2d stage situation the same way. You can learn about the differences all you want; it's right there bare for you to study. Some people will do that, and that's great for them. Others will decide other things are more worthy of their time, and they'll try to muddle through knowing less. That's really fine too; all players just have to accept and live with the consequences of their decisions. Sometimes you might get hit out of a dodge in a way that wouldn't have worked on another stage and not even realize it, but of course, you could lose for any number of reasons and not catch on. It's really fine; just accept it for what it is.

My solution to only having 12 legal stages and being in a procedural bind is probably predictable but I'll share it anyway. Just add one more stage to make 13 which is balanced striking and really solves everything nicely. There are easily 13 quality stages in this game anyway.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Like, I don't know the T.Hawk-Sagat matchup in USF4. Supposedly it's about 6-4; not a hard counter by any stretch of the imagination and definitely not unwinnable for me. But when someone counterpicks me with Sagat, I don't know what to do. At all. I'm completely lost. I don't know the matchup, I don't understand how to get past his fireball/st.HK patterns, I can't jump because he can swat me out of the air from half screen with kara DPs, and it just feels like I'm completely unable to do anything.

And you know what? Tough ****. I lost that match because I didn't know. Not because my opponent was doing anything spectacular; he knew the flowchart and he knew how to use it. Not because the matchup is unwinnable; supposedly it's really not that bad. Certainly not as bad as the Chun-Li I beat earlier in the bracket, or much worse than the Ryus and Vegas I had to fight my way through. But because I don't know how to fight Sagat. I just don't get it. The matchup makes no sense to me. There's a trick to it, and I don't have it. And my player knowledge loses me that match. Oh well. It sucks. I'll get over it.

Compared to that, the changes on a 2D stage are nothing. You can learn them, or you can pretend they don't exist. I do the latter, and my game plan is pretty much completely unchanged.

@ Amazing Ampharos how would you handle it if there just wasn't another stage to add to make it even?

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

@ Amazing Ampharos how would you handle it if there just wasn't another stage to add to make it even?

I'd first do some very serious self-reflection to make sure that was *really* the case, especially since having "one too many" stages isn't actually that bad if your tournament rules are designed correctly (full list striking, multiple stage bans per player). Even if a stage is really bad for some players, you can use procedure to give them tools to deal with it so including a stage that's stupid in some match-ups but mostly fine wouldn't be the end of the world. I think the peril of having a legal stage that maybe would be fine to ban is overblown in a lot of people's minds. Having a semi-bad stage legal does very little damage to an event if the other rules are designed correctly.

If it was a really extreme situation like 12 stages were great and every other stage were absurdly unplayable, I'd probably just give in and ban whichever stage was either the most bad or the most redundant of the 12. I personally do think there are 14 legal quality stages (being what I would call conservative; in terms of raw "these stages are not broken" there are probably 25-30) in this game and would only ban Windy Hill Zone to hit the magic 13 target so I suppose I deal with this directly a lot. I consider it lucky that the numbers in this game match up so nicely; we have 14 good stages, and it has become obvious which of the 14 is the worst (Windy Hill Zone) to make an even 13. With full list stage striking and multiple stage bans per player, those 13 will almost never result in any player being subjected to a stage he strongly dislikes either; it just seems like everyone wins to me.

 

[Pazx]

What about 13 starters and Windy Hill as a CP? The only reason PS1 is a CP in Melee is because they needed an odd number to strike from.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

I feel very strongly that the starter-counterpick distinction is just plain dangerous.

 

[MrGame&Rock]

I feel very strongly that the starter-counterpick distinction is just plain dangerous.

Having one counterpick isnt too bad. Pokemon Stadium gets a lot of play from what Ive seen

 

[J_the_Man]

So as of right now KTAR XII has Pilotwings legal

The next local event I'm likely to go to has Pilotwings legal as well. I'm confused as to why people think it's a good stage?

 

[MrGame&Rock]

The next local event I'm likely to go to has Pilotwings legal as well. I'm confused as to why people think it's a good stage?

There's value in a tilted FD, and withiyt the camping thats what this is

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Yeah, the correct answer is to start counterpicking people to it and using ROB or something similarly stupid.

 

[Pazx]

Yeah, the correct answer is to start counterpicking people to it and using ROB or something similarly stupid.

See also: Ness, Jigglypuff

Make sure you win though. In fact, you should do very well, because once people start banning PW against you they've wasted a ban and you get your second best stage.

 

[ATH_]

As a quick announcement (I'll be making a much larger post soon), my private 3ds group has finally decided a final stage list.

Starters:
Final Destination
Battlefield
Yoshi's Island
Counterpicks:
Prism Tower
Arena Ferox

Stages that came very close but in the end lost to the vote:
1. Rainbow Road
2. Unova Pokemon League
3. Tomodachi Life
4. Tortimer Island
5. Mute City

The 5 stages that didn't pass were either very close or out of the ball park.
Rainbow Road was one of the stages that came EXTREMELY close. I put up a very good argument and even made an image to show the safe areas. Keep in mind that We have a choice 7 people who were voting on the stages. These 7 are experienced, intelligent smash players, and they just want everyone to have fun, as it should be.
The vote for Rainbow Road came down 4-3 in favor of banning. Everyone was firm on their stance and in the end it came down to the shy guys. I honestly wish it would've been allowed, and it MIGHT get another calling as we recruit more people, but who knows.

Biggest upset? Tomodachi. This one...
The biggest point against it is that you can do some real crazy and stupid chains of up airs and such because of the plats, and it's very easy to combo them into a kill.
The biggest point for it is that it has no hazards and a seemingly fair layout.
Low cieling, high bottom zone, got voted off. Not for circle camping. But for just how easy it is for many characters to get quick 0-Deaths. I've seen it, dude... It got voted off 6-1 quite quickly.

Tortimer has an absent ledge, it's weird, you can't grab the ledge where the dock isn't. It's very weird and just, I am disappointed in this discovery of the stage, as I had high hopes for it. 5-2.

Mute City and Unova are the same story. Too disruptive and sometimes can kill. Just, also disappointing. both were 7-0.

Other stages suffered the same fate. Pac-Maze, Port Town, etc. Some were close but were ruled out a while ago.

Anyway, big Wii U stage post coming soon from me. :3

 

[Piford]

Hah, yeah. It's not decided yet but there's a lot of discussion over banning Duck Hunt in my region. Surprisingly, I'm not the only one who feels unknown changes in gameplay are a problem. Honestly, I wasn't even the first person in Ottawa to suggest a ban on the stage. A lot of notable people, including our TO's don't feel it wise to use it as it stands. We can put it back in if we confirm a very limited amount of changes.

Despite the very purist views on legal/banned stages that some members of this discussion appear to have, there exist other views on the subject, and those can be legitimate as well.

Banning Duck Hunt because people don't know everything about the stage is just rewarding ignorance, which is something you do not want to do in a competitive environment. The few changes on Duck Hunt with some characters having weaker dodges doesn't really seem to effect the balance or favor certain characters any more than certain platform layouts do.

 

[Linkshot]

We were considering banning Duck Hunt because we were under the impression that the 2D has effects that nobody is wise to yet, and for some new interaction to show up in a match and screw somebody over would be very no bueno. If there is a very concise list of every animation that gets altered by this, it will be up to the players to study them and the stage will likely go back to being allowed.

As for Kalos, the only transformation that I find truly disruptive is Registeel (read: I need to learn the safezones). Basic Steel has safezones that work for all other 3 transformations, Water is very short, Manaphy allows really cool ground move cancels, Fire just shrinks the battlefield and does a little extra damage on a good play, Ho-oh just makes the damaging areas taller and briefly turns the ledges harmful, and Rayquaza is majorly telegraphed so the goal is to just combo into it. Heck, the most disruptive part might actually be scoring early kills by knocking somebody onto the rising platforms as it transitions, but that's the same thing as playing near the walkoff on Wuhu/Delfino.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

We were considering banning Duck Hunt because we were under the impression that the 2D has effects that nobody is wise to yet, and for some new interaction to show up in a match and screw somebody over would be very no bueno. If there is a very concise list of every animation that gets altered by this, it will be up to the players to study them and the stage will likely go back to being allowed.

God dammit. Not you too.

Yes, we don't know what 2D does. We don't have a full changelist. You know what else we don't have? A full matchup chart. Ban characters, I guess?

Come on, man. Figure it out. If it's degenerate, ban it. This is so dumb.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Like, I don't know the T.Hawk-Sagat matchup in USF4. Supposedly it's about 6-4; not a hard counter by any stretch of the imagination and definitely not unwinnable for me. But when someone counterpicks me with Sagat, I don't know what to do. At all. I'm completely lost. I don't know the matchup, I don't understand how to get past his fireball/st.HK patterns, I can't jump because he can swat me out of the air from half screen with kara DPs, and it just feels like I'm completely unable to do anything.

And you know what? Tough ****. I lost that match because I didn't know. Not because my opponent was doing anything spectacular; he knew the flowchart and he knew how to use it. Not because the matchup is unwinnable; supposedly it's really not that bad. Certainly not as bad as the Chun-Li I beat earlier in the bracket, or much worse than the Ryus and Vegas I had to fight my way through. But because I don't know how to fight Sagat. I just don't get it. The matchup makes no sense to me. There's a trick to it, and I don't have it. And my player knowledge loses me that match. Oh well. It sucks. I'll get over it.

Compared to that, the changes on a 2D stage are nothing. You can learn them, or you can pretend they don't exist. I do the latter, and my game plan is pretty much completely unchanged.

@ Amazing Ampharos how would you handle it if there just wasn't another stage to add to make it even?

@ Linkshot

-.-

 

[Piford]

We were considering banning Duck Hunt because we were under the impression that the 2D has effects that nobody is wise to yet, and for some new interaction to show up in a match and screw somebody over would be very no bueno. If there is a very concise list of every animation that gets altered by this, it will be up to the players to study them and the stage will likely go back to being allowed.

As for Kalos, the only transformation that I find truly disruptive is Registeel (read: I need to learn the safezones). Basic Steel has safezones that work for all other 3 transformations, Water is very short, Manaphy allows really cool ground move cancels, Fire just shrinks the battlefield and does a little extra damage on a good play, Ho-oh just makes the damaging areas taller and briefly turns the ledges harmful, and Rayquaza is majorly telegraphed so the goal is to just combo into it. Heck, the most disruptive part might actually be scoring early kills by knocking somebody onto the rising platforms as it transitions, but that's the same thing as playing near the walkoff on Wuhu/Delfino.

Again, you shouldn't just wait for the list to magically be brought to you. You want to know the list of the moves effected, go out and make one. I wanted to know the side blastzone distances for all the stages, so guess what I made one.

Also, you guys should all totally make Kalos legal, as people will be begging to play on PS2 after that (also I'd like to see some testing).

 

[ATH_]

I personally do not like Duck Hunt for it's grass and ducks specifically, however, I do accept that it IS an acceptable stage.
Until someone can prove that 2d changes something that makes it a drastically bad stage or proves that you can circle camp the tree, it stays a stage. I will wait for that day.

Not liking Duck Hunt and Disagreeing with Duck Hunt (Or any stage for that matter) are completely different things.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Are there seriously only 6 legit 3DS stages? That's really depressing. :/

 

[MrGame&Rock]

Are there seriously only 6 legit 3DS stages? That's really depressing. :/

Yeah, but now that the Wii U version is out it doesn't really matter anyway. Though itd be nice for the legal stages that arent in the Wii U version (Ferox, Prism Tower, Yoshi's, and whatever the other one was) to be added to the Wii U version down the line

 

[krazyzyko]

What do you guys feel about MKU?
I think that the hazards are doable like in Halberd.

 

[Gunla]

Are there seriously only 6 legit 3DS stages? That's really depressing. :/

The common stages are FD, YI, BF as starters, and Brinstar, Ferox, Prism, and Tomodachi as Counters.

 

[J_the_Man]

I don't understand this whole mindset of "Guilty until proven innocent" mindset. How does this work towards the evolution of Sm4sh U's metagame? You say "We don't understand the implications of what this and that have on the game and we don't want it to affect the game so ban it." So if that's the general consensus, then TO's aren't going to risk the competitive viability of their tournaments and throw stuff in that the attendees aren't going to receive well. As far as those in favor of this approach are concerned, it doesn't matter to them if the stages are legal or not. Eventually, all we have is a cycle of complacency where potentially legal stages will never get legalized because the metagame, as far as the important people are concerned, is fine as it is. There's no need to fix what isn't broken.

The metagame will only develop if we take a top down approach. Individuals spending hours testing certain stages and then making the case for them won't get stages legalized. The most amount of reasonable stages should be legalized until it becomes apparent that they aren't fit for competitive matches. Stages like Skyloft, Duck Hunt, Wuhu Island (heck I'd even advocate for Mario Circuit 8, but that's just my opinion) should be allowed in tournaments. Right now it is apparent that to a lot of people, the only thing that makes these stages ban worthy is uncertainty. We don't know if something bad will pop up that causes problems. I mean, we're throwing Skyloft under the freaking hubble telescope to see where, among 162 different routes, some stage hazard could possibly kill you that shouldn't have killed you.

Well, you become certain of them by repeatedly playing on them. Maybe it comes to pass that certain characters are too dominant or are reduced to being completely non-viable on these stages. Or maybe it happens that these stages are perfectly fine and may have strategic importance in matches.

Again, my point is that the metagame will get nowhere if we just ban things we are suspicious of. These stages will never see the light of day in tournaments. It's better if we legalize the most amount of seemingly reasonable stages, stages that now don't appear to degenerate play or have overcentralizing features, and proceed to ban if problems arise. Maybe then we can escape the fate of "No Items, Diddy Only, Smashville."

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Hell, there's a reason I'm doing all these stage research threads, and it ain't for my health. (I mean, it's fun in its own weird way but some are just annoying to collect data on, especially when random transformations are involved.) Speaking of which, Port Town Aero Dive, check it.

 

[Plain Yogurt]

I just wish there was more consistency. Halberd, Delfino, and Castle Siege shenanigans are fine but Wuhu, Skyloft, and Kongo are too janky/walkoffs/campy? The Apex list really just screams "hey our first national is coming and we can't make up our minds on stages. Just throw all the old legal Brawl stages in there." I'm not optimistic, but I'm hoping now that they aren't grinding for the biggest Smash tournament people will try things out a little more.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I just wish there was more consistency. Halberd, Delfino, and Castle Siege shenanigans are fine but Wuhu, Skyloft, and Kongo are too janky/walkoffs/campy? The Apex list really just screams "hey our first national is coming and we can't make up our minds on stages. Just throw all the old legal Brawl stages in there." I'm not optimistic, but I'm hoping now that they aren't grinding for the biggest Smash tournament people will try things out a little more.

It seems customs are gaining traction, so maybe stages are the next step?

 

[ATH_]

Also, I forgot to mention this but I'm no longer sure about Castle Siege...
I REALLY want it to be good but I'm starting to second-guess myself. The transformations (2nd being the bad one) last a VERY long time, which alone isn't enough to destroy the stage, however. I just witnessed something similar to OGA's ohkos through the stage transforming. My two friends were fighting on CS and when it transformed from the 3rd form to the 1st form, they both were on the far left of the stage (they had been edgeguarding/recovering and both landed on the stage at the same time), and when it transformed the white screen did NOT appear and the falling FD-like 3rd form flew down into the bottom blast zone, killing them both but one dying before the other (because of the uneven floor, which ftr is not the issue).

I am not certain if this is a good reason to get rid of it, and I really want to just keep it. At the same time I can see why it wouldn't be allowed.

upd8: Still working on my large post about the Wii U stages. :3 Coming soon to a forum near you...

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I mean, I've seen numerous videos of weird **** happening like players falling through stages, but that sort of thing has literally never happened to me ever in my entire Smash experience. I get the impression that if such glitches are rare enough (which by all accounts they are), then it's more hassle than it's worth to really worry about their impact on a match. Didn't Melee PS1 glitch out at Apex and have someone fall through and they just carried on?

 

[Krysco]

I don't understand this whole mindset of "Guilty until proven innocent" mindset. How does this work towards the evolution of Sm4sh U's metagame? You say "We don't understand the implications of what this and that have on the game and we don't want it to affect the game so ban it." So if that's the general consensus, then TO's aren't going to risk the competitive viability of their tournaments and throw stuff in that the attendees aren't going to receive well. As far as those in favor of this approach are concerned, it doesn't matter to them if the stages are legal or not. Eventually, all we have is a cycle of complacency where potentially legal stages will never get legalized because the metagame, as far as the important people are concerned, is fine as it is. There's no need to fix what isn't broken.

The metagame will only develop if we take a top down approach. Individuals spending hours testing certain stages and then making the case for them won't get stages legalized. The most amount of reasonable stages should be legalized until it becomes apparent that they aren't fit for competitive matches. Stages like Skyloft, Duck Hunt, Wuhu Island (heck I'd even advocate for Mario Circuit 8, but that's just my opinion) should be allowed in tournaments. Right now it is apparent that to a lot of people, the only thing that makes these stages ban worthy is uncertainty. We don't know if something bad will pop up that causes problems. I mean, we're throwing Skyloft under the freaking hubble telescope to see where, among 162 different routes, some stage hazard could possibly kill you that shouldn't have killed you.

Well, you become certain of them by repeatedly playing on them. Maybe it comes to pass that certain characters are too dominant or are reduced to being completely non-viable on these stages. Or maybe it happens that these stages are perfectly fine and may have strategic importance in matches.

Again, my point is that the metagame will get nowhere if we just ban things we are suspicious of. These stages will never see the light of day in tournaments. It's better if we legalize the most amount of seemingly reasonable stages, stages that now don't appear to degenerate play or have overcentralizing features, and proceed to ban if problems arise. Maybe then we can escape the fate of "No Items, Diddy Only, Smashville."

Hahaha xD Sorry I just love both the mention of the 162 routes in Skyloft and the No items, Diddy only, Smashville comments since those were both things I said (though the latter was purely for humor)

I do agree with the mentality though. In the beginning of Brawls life weren't some, if not all of the following stages legal? Rainbow Cruise, Norfair, Luigi's Mansion, Distant Planet, Port Town Aero Dive, Pictochat, Brinstar, Pirate Ship. All of those stages eventually got banned but that was through the process of having them legal and then realizing they weren't that great. The metagame changed AFTER allowing those stages and knowing for a fact that in tournaments they weren't good enough rather than merely glancing at it and saying 'doesn't look good'. Smash 4 should be the same way. Is it truly harmful to experiment with new things? Not directing this at you by the way, I just quoted you cuz those two points you made were amusing to me.

 

[ATH_]

I mean, I've seen numerous videos of weird **** happening like players falling through stages, but that sort of thing has literally never happened to me ever in my entire Smash experience. I get the impression that if such glitches are rare enough (which by all accounts they are), then it's more hassle than it's worth to really worry about their impact on a match. Didn't Melee PS1 glitch out at Apex and have someone fall through and they just carried on?

Good point. I still am not a fan of how long the second transformation lasts. ;;

 

[J_the_Man]

Hahaha xD Sorry I just love both the mention of the 162 routes in Skyloft and the No items, Diddy only, Smashville comments since those were both things I said (though the latter was purely for humor)

I do agree with the mentality though. In the beginning of Brawls life weren't some, if not all of the following stages legal? Rainbow Cruise, Norfair, Luigi's Mansion, Distant Planet, Port Town Aero Dive, Pictochat, Brinstar, Pirate Ship. All of those stages eventually got banned but that was through the process of having them legal and then realizing they weren't that great. The metagame changed AFTER allowing those stages and knowing for a fact that in tournaments they weren't good enough rather than merely glancing at it and saying 'doesn't look good'. Smash 4 should be the same way. Is it truly harmful to experiment with new things? Not directing this at you by the way, I just quoted you cuz those two points you made were amusing to me.

That's fine. I was copying what you said 'cause I like what you said.

 

[Piford]

Also, I forgot to mention this but I'm no longer sure about Castle Siege...
I REALLY want it to be good but I'm starting to second-guess myself. The transformations (2nd being the bad one) last a VERY long time, which alone isn't enough to destroy the stage, however. I just witnessed something similar to OGA's ohkos through the stage transforming. My two friends were fighting on CS and when it transformed from the 3rd form to the 1st form, they both were on the far left of the stage (they had been edgeguarding/recovering and both landed on the stage at the same time), and when it transformed the white screen did NOT appear and the falling FD-like 3rd form flew down into the bottom blast zone, killing them both but one dying before the other (because of the uneven floor, which ftr is not the issue).

I am not certain if this is a good reason to get rid of it, and I really want to just keep it. At the same time I can see why it wouldn't be allowed.

upd8: Still working on my large post about the Wii U stages. :3 Coming soon to a forum near you...

We have 6 years of testing in Brawl to know that the second transformation of Castle Siege isn't an issue. A lot of the supposed camping is easily beatable and not overpowered in the slightest.

Edit:

Hahaha xD Sorry I just love both the mention of the 162 routes in Skyloft and the No items, Diddy only, Smashville comments since those were both things I said (though the latter was purely for humor)

I do agree with the mentality though. In the beginning of Brawls life weren't some, if not all of the following stages legal? Rainbow Cruise, Norfair, Luigi's Mansion, Distant Planet, Port Town Aero Dive, Pictochat, Brinstar, Pirate Ship. All of those stages eventually got banned but that was through the process of having them legal and then realizing they weren't that great. The metagame changed AFTER allowing those stages and knowing for a fact that in tournaments they weren't good enough rather than merely glancing at it and saying 'doesn't look good'. Smash 4 should be the same way. Is it truly harmful to experiment with new things? Not directing this at you by the way, I just quoted you cuz those two points you made were amusing to me.

Some of those stages were legal for a while. I actually just went to Brawl tourney and they had Rainbow Cruise legal.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

As someone who played Brawl for years, I can vouch that this game's Castle Siege is way better than Brawl's. Brawl rewarded run-away a lot more so the 2nd form in Brawl was a stall-out like 95% of the time. This game's general dynamics aren't that way; people actually fight on the second form of Castle Siege. In Brawl the area under the ledges on the first form would snag recoveries leading to endless johns from people who aren't good at aiming straight at ledges. Now you can ride the side of the stage to the ledge. In Brawl the stage had a significant random factor in the load times between forms (and sometimes the transition form would last way too long); in Wii U it's always the same and it's short. In Brawl the mid-match loading really screwed with transforming characters as they would be locked in their transformation animation until the stage finished which was actually a really big problem for the Pokemon Trainer (much lesser extent but a factor for Zelda & Sheik). There are no such characters in this game, and even if there were, there's no mid-match loading to even make that come up.

There is a glitch when transitioning from the third form to the first that sometimes you don't "catch" on the first form and you fall through the stage (but you can jump to safety if you're paying attention). This was true in Brawl and 4; it's just a shame that wasn't fixed but it's not new either. The fast transitions, especially from form 3 -> 1, seem to catch some players off-guard and lead to self-destructs, but the amount of stage knowledge required to avoid that is pretty small so just don't let that happen. Castle Siege is pretty good in this game.

 

[ATH_]

As someone who played Brawl for years, I can vouch that this game's Castle Siege is way better than Brawl's. Brawl rewarded run-away a lot more so the 2nd form in Brawl was a stall-out like 95% of the time. This game's general dynamics aren't that way; people actually fight on the second form of Castle Siege. In Brawl the area under the ledges on the first form would snag recoveries leading to endless johns from people who aren't good at aiming straight at ledges. Now you can ride the side of the stage to the ledge. In Brawl the stage had a significant random factor in the load times between forms (and sometimes the transition form would last way too long); in Wii U it's always the same and it's short. In Brawl the mid-match loading really screwed with transforming characters as they would be locked in their transformation animation until the stage finished which was actually a really big problem for the Pokemon Trainer (much lesser extent but a factor for Zelda & Sheik). There are no such characters in this game, and even if there were, there's no mid-match loading to even make that come up.

There is a glitch when transitioning from the third form to the first that sometimes you don't "catch" on the first form and you fall through the stage (but you can jump to safety if you're paying attention). This was true in Brawl and 4; it's just a shame that wasn't fixed but it's not new either. The fast transitions, especially from form 3 -> 1, seem to catch some players off-guard and lead to self-destructs, but the amount of stage knowledge required to avoid that is pretty small so just don't let that happen. Castle Siege is pretty good in this game.

Alright, I understand. I just wanted to get some opinions on it, thanks for clearing things up. ^^

 

[Pazx]

Also, I forgot to mention this but I'm no longer sure about Castle Siege...
I REALLY want it to be good but I'm starting to second-guess myself. The transformations (2nd being the bad one) last a VERY long time, which alone isn't enough to destroy the stage, however. I just witnessed something similar to OGA's ohkos through the stage transforming. My two friends were fighting on CS and when it transformed from the 3rd form to the 1st form, they both were on the far left of the stage (they had been edgeguarding/recovering and both landed on the stage at the same time), and when it transformed the white screen did NOT appear and the falling FD-like 3rd form flew down into the bottom blast zone, killing them both but one dying before the other (because of the uneven floor, which ftr is not the issue).

I am not certain if this is a good reason to get rid of it, and I really want to just keep it. At the same time I can see why it wouldn't be allowed.

upd8: Still working on my large post about the Wii U stages. :3 Coming soon to a forum near you...

This glitch happened on Pokemon Stadium in Melee, both Stadiums in Brawl, CS in Brawl, Delfino Plaza in Brawl and probably something else that I'm missing. I don't think it's an issue, because most of the time you can jump to save yourself.

Also, CS is a **** stage for Diddy. /themoreyouknow

 

[The_Jiggernaut]

What are these other methods? And if they don't maximize competitive depth, why are they considered legitimate?

Windy Hill Zone... There's reasonable belief that it encourages stalling and runaway and is degenerate and overcentralizing as a result, similar to Big Battlefield.

Banning a stage to get to an odd number... I dunno. You're removing depth from the game for convenience's sake. Even if nobody uses that stage, this feels wrong.


How can this be construed as anything but the antithesis of competitive play? "I don't want to learn how to deal with X, ban X". That's not how we design rulesets for games; otherwise I would have tried to have Sagat banned at my local USF4 ranbats. The changes are weird, and different, but to the degree that they matter, they will be noticeable, and those that are not noticeable won't matter.

What you're not seeing is that the largest stagelist doesn't necessarily generate the best game. Depending on the meta, it might not even create the deepest game.

Say hypothetically we ended up with a very campy game using 13 stages with only 5 viable characters, but then someone found that removing FD, BF, and SV made the gameplay more varied and opened up most of the cast to competitive play, then the second ruleset would create the better game. When making a ruleset, we have the power to choose any set of stages and use it to shape the experience the game holds. And such a ruleset could absolutely be valid.

The thing your method has over the others is that is that it's objective and so it's easier to agree on things compared to a more subjective model. However, it's drawback is that it's blind to the game experience itself; it has a tendency to validate itself on principal alone, which can sometimes be meaningless.

So next time you try and argue that a stage being on the list makes for a better game, remember that it's not sufficient to say that it necessarily does so only because it makes the number of legal stages larger.

Knowledge is a funny thing. Some of us have more than others, but none of us have as much as we could. I mean, you could pick Mii Swordfighter against me, and I'll be real that my knowledge of what you can do that's going to be generally safe on my shield is going to end at "not much". The character is just obviously extremely low tier, he plays weird, he has Mii size stuff to think about, and overall it just seems like a waste of my time to study him when I could be learning about gameplay mechanics involving more relevant characters. If I run into one in tournament, one of two things will happen. I'll either figure it out as I go and win (proving I was right not to bother learning ahead of time!) or I won't and I'll lose because I don't know things and then all that can be said for me is "no johns". I had the option to learn about that stuff, and it was my judgment that my odds of running into him were very low and that he was a sufficiently bad character that I wouldn't need to know much to win. Heck, I might even lose and not realize why I lost; maybe Mii Swordfighter has some clever trick that is so subtle I won't notice it when he's doing it and won't understand why he's getting some strange upper hand on me. It's still just "no johns", and it's my responsibility to figure it out if I want to be maximally prepared to deal with it.

I look at the 2d stage situation the same way. You can learn about the differences all you want; it's right there bare for you to study. Some people will do that, and that's great for them. Others will decide other things are more worthy of their time, and they'll try to muddle through knowing less. That's really fine too; all players just have to accept and live with the consequences of their decisions. Sometimes you might get hit out of a dodge in a way that wouldn't have worked on another stage and not even realize it, but of course, you could lose for any number of reasons and not catch on. It's really fine; just accept it for what it is.

I appreciate this analogy and really understand what you're saying because of it. Taking a calculated risk by using your time to learn what will more likely come up makes a lot of sense to me. So not studying the 2D differences and just accepting a loss if one comes about because of this lack of knowledge is an understandable choice.

However, I do not feel that it's appropriate for us in the thread to make that choice for the entirety of the Smash Community. And that's exactly what we're doing while Duck Hunt is legal and no documentation is readily available for 2D stages.

The assumption that anyone who is curious can readily find this information is false (@ Piford ), as it requires a great deal of knowledge of the scientific process and of the game itself to even know where to begin. Let's discuss that for a minute, where DO we even begin? I find it strange that no one has put forth a method to test at least the dodges, if it's apparently so simple to do. How does one go about deriving frame data? What attacks are appropriate for testing the dodges? Do you need certain equipment to make these measurements happen? Once the method is established, 400 values need to be recorded (50 characters, 2D and 3D values, air and spot dodges, start and end of invincibility) and all of them would need several measurements to narrow down the exact frame. Suddenly, you're asking someone to write a variable academic paper in their free time... on a video game. And where do we even begin for the hitbox differences?

You cannot reasonably ask every player who doesn't want to chose to risk a loss due to ignorance on Duck Hunt to go through this process. Someone knowledgeable and reputable needs take the hit and study this, then post their results in a public place (somewhere on the forums would work) before players can make their own choices on this issue.

Claiming that the stage must not significantly effect gameplay is just as illogical as claiming that the changes must effect it. The proper and responsible thing to do is suspend Duck Hunt from play until someone makes a changelist of at least the dodges readily available. Then we can put the stage back and allow all players the choice of studying the stage or risking a loss by focusing their efforts elsewhere.

I don't understand this whole mindset of "Guilty until proven innocent" mindset. How does this work towards the evolution of Sm4sh U's metagame? You say "We don't understand the implications of what this and that have on the game and we don't want it to affect the game so ban it." So if that's the general consensus, then TO's aren't going to risk the competitive viability of their tournaments and throw stuff in that the attendees aren't going to receive well. As far as those in favor of this approach are concerned, it doesn't matter to them if the stages are legal or not. Eventually, all we have is a cycle of complacency where potentially legal stages will never get legalized because the metagame, as far as the important people are concerned, is fine as it is. There's no need to fix what isn't broken.

The metagame will only develop if we take a top down approach. Individuals spending hours testing certain stages and then making the case for them won't get stages legalized. The most amount of reasonable stages should be legalized until it becomes apparent that they aren't fit for competitive matches. Stages like Skyloft, Duck Hunt, Wuhu Island (heck I'd even advocate for Mario Circuit 8, but that's just my opinion) should be allowed in tournaments. Right now it is apparent that to a lot of people, the only thing that makes these stages ban worthy is uncertainty. We don't know if something bad will pop up that causes problems. I mean, we're throwing Skyloft under the freaking hubble telescope to see where, among 162 different routes, some stage hazard could possibly kill you that shouldn't have killed you.

Well, you become certain of them by repeatedly playing on them. Maybe it comes to pass that certain characters are too dominant or are reduced to being completely non-viable on these stages. Or maybe it happens that these stages are perfectly fine and may have strategic importance in matches.

Again, my point is that the metagame will get nowhere if we just ban things we are suspicious of. These stages will never see the light of day in tournaments. It's better if we legalize the most amount of seemingly reasonable stages, stages that now don't appear to degenerate play or have overcentralizing features, and proceed to ban if problems arise. Maybe then we can escape the fate of "No Items, Diddy Only, Smashville."

If you insist on using legal metaphors in this discussion, like a stage should be "Innocent until proven guilty", let's follow down that road to see what the equivalent allegory gives us. When someone is on trial for murder, the law considers them innocent of the crime, until the time they are proven to be guilty. Despite this, we still do not let the person resume their daily duties, we lock them up until a trial can be completed.

In this sense I feel it's totally reasonable to remove a stage like Duck Hunt from the stage list until a time where a "trial" can be preformed. I believe it's important to actually look at the differences instead of arbitrarily deciding that they won't make a difference to a game.

In a case like this, you're incorrect to say that the stage differences will become apparent through repeated play on the stage. Because humans cannot process 60 individual frames every second, differences in invincibility frames can only be guessed at during a real match. Until the time someone decides to take the measurements in a lab scenario, we will not know what these differences are concretely.

Additionally, your final statement creates a false dichotomy between your views and a 1-stage, 1-character metagame. (don't worry though, you're certainly not the first person in this thread to make that fallacy) In reality, there are many shades of grey between the "keep every stage legal" and the "ban everything to 3 stages" camps. It's possible for someone to feel that banning Duck Hunt (especially temporarily) is a good idea without also thinking that stages with purely static elements are the only proper stage choices.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Do you even have a frame data chart of spotdodge invincibility windows for the whole cast? If you don't know that, it seems strange to be bothered by not knowing the frame data on Duck Hunt. If you do know that, it's easy to test. Just go into training mode, set the game speed to 1/4 speed when holding L ("frame advance"), and input a spotdodge on one character and an attack that will hit on the last frame of invincibility with another character (we have frame data charts for "hits on" data for all normals and grabs). If the attack hits, there is z-axis behavior on other stages. If it doesn't, there isn't and Duck Hunt makes no difference. If it hits, you can then iterate for attacks that hit one frame faster until you don't hit to find out exactly how many frames of invincibility you lose. I don't know if that sounds complicated, but I can tell you from experience that's really easy testing even though it will be somewhat tedious to iterate over 51 characters just because 51 characters is a lot of characters (anything that requires testing the whole cast is kinda obnoxious in this game).

I have a lot of schoolwork this week. I can test this this weekend and deliver a full chart of z-axis behavior on spotdodges if you provide me with a starting chart of the normal invincibility windows on spotdodges. I'm not personally that curious but if it prevents needless bans of a good stage it's worth it. If you don't have one of those, I'm not sure I understand your complaint since we're similarly unknowledgeable on all stages in that case (and I don't have one and don't really intend to manually test invincibility windows on 51 spotdodges from no starting knowledge).

 

[SuperDavio]

So, maybe someone can lay this out for me: What makes the following stages worse than counterpick status?

Skyloft
Wuhu Island
Pilot Wings
New Super Mario Bros U Mushroom Kingdom.

I imagine the last stage is too erratic in its transformations. Skyloft has some holes, so maybe that's why it's banned? Wuhu has somewhat of a similar issue. And I guess Pilotwings tilts too much, but Lylat doesn't?

 

[Pazx]

@ everyone

Aussies are following Apex and banning Kongo Jungle

wat do

 

[SuperDavio]

@ everyone

Aussies are following Apex and banning Kongo Jungle

wat do

The stage is super vertical, it's pretty strange. What even makes it banworthy, though? The random platforms in the middle? The barrel? The "if you don't tech properly you die" platforms on the side? Probably that last one.