Stage Analysis & Discussion Thread

[ParanoidDrone]

The idea's been floated around, but until stage sharing is added there's no way it'll really be feasible. And even then, there's the issue of arriving at a consensus on what stages should be made, adopting them for widespread use, etc. All that is assuming that for some reason the existing stage list is insufficient.

In general it comes across to me like a solution in search of a problem, at least right now.

 

[Locke 06]

So... with 13 stages, how many stage strikes are tournaments giving to the winner?

Currently there's 14 stages that (I think) are pretty clearly competitive-quality.

• Battlefield
• Final Destination
• Delfino Plaza
• Kongo Jungle 64
• Halberd
• Lylat Cruise
• Pokemon Stadium 2
• Castle Siege
• Town & City
• Smashville
• Duck Hunt
• Wuhu Island
• Windy Hill Zone

Of these, Windy Hill Zone is the most contested due to the springs that can appear without warning and kill players if they bounce off them at the wrong angle, so it's commonly cut for a convenient 13. (13 being an excellent number for Full List Stage Striking since it satisfies y = 4x + 1.) Pokemon Stadium 2 is another hotly contested stage but I think it's still looked upon a bit more favorably than WHZ.

Other stages that aren't really accepted but I, at least, wouldn't mind fighting on:

• Mushroom Kingdom U
• Mario Circuit
• Luigi's Mansion
• Norfair
• Woolly World
• Orbital Gate Assault
• Kalos Pokemon League
• Gamer
• Garden of Hope

At this point I should point out that I'm decidedly a stage liberal and give remarkably few ****s about most stage hazards. It's doubtful you'd be able to convince anyone that the stages in this second list should be added. Maybe one or two people at most if they're liberal like me.

Of the stages on the second list, I have serious issues with Mushroom Kingdom U and Wooly World

- Mushroom Kingdom U, I think, is an awful stage for competitive play due to the fact that warnings happen off camera that affect play. Even with perfect stage knowledge, you still cannot account for the stage and that hurts it a lot in my eyes.
- Wooly World's 2 transformations are too easily camped and lead to degenerate play. The walkoff is fine, as it is temporary. However, the second transformation is circle camp city. Timing out with a % lead is too strong of a strategy here.

I'd group Kalos, Gamer, and Garden of Hope together as "strong hazards" with the asterisk on Gamer being a logistical annoyance avoiding bad random layouts.

Luigi's Mansion & OGA, I can see being somewhat fine. However, Luigi's Mansion forces some very serious stage play that many are not comfortable with and OGA requires a lot more stage knowledge than most for comfortable play. I'd also throw in Yoshi's Island (Melee) and maybe Wrecking Crew in this group as there's no real reason to make them illegal other than "most people don't like it."

Leaving #NorfairIsFair and #LegalizeMarioCircuit to round out my 16-stage stagelist. Personally, I dislike Windy Hill Zone and take it out of my stage list to make 15 due to the windmill walkoff and asymmetric large stage. However, I don't think either of those are strong enough reasons to actually prevent it from being legal.

Thoughts?

 

[Jaxas]

So... with 13 stages, how many stage strikes are tournaments giving to the winner?

We run 2 bans for the winner here; no idea about other places though.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

- Wooly World's 2 transformations are too easily camped and lead to degenerate play. The walkoff is fine, as it is temporary. However, the second transformation is circle camp city. Timing out with a % lead is too strong of a strategy here.

I'm not seeing the circle here. Maybe going under the rocket, but since the platforms seesaw around I'd first try standing on it and mess with the pathing that way.

 

[Locke 06]

I'm not seeing the circle here. Maybe going under the rocket, but since the platforms seesaw around I'd first try standing on it and mess with the pathing that way.

Yeah, under the rocket is what I was thinking. After labbing it further, I think it is only an issue for characters with horizontal burst moves that make it an issue. (admittedly was going off of experience trying to catch a pacman and his side-B with DK) The seesaw doesn't really help a whole lot.

While it is much less of an issue than I originally thought (possibly a non-issue), the first transformation is... A circle. The rocket being small helps, but it just seems to invite runaway games.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Yoshi's Island, Norfair, and Orbital Gate Assault are all legit stages.

Kalos is too, but it requires more than "few hours of practice" to be bearable.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Yoshi's Island, Norfair, and Orbital Gate Assault are all legit stages.

Kalos is too, but it requires more than "few hours of practice" to be bearable.

Or just an appreciation for Cynthia's theme. That remix is so good.

A thing about Woolly World that I don't think is common knowledge is that the platforms can sometimes be mirrored on match start, although the rocket always points to the right.

 

[Locke 06]

For competitive purposes, I'm not a fan of Kalos. The randomness of legendaries ruins it for me. Top tier music though. It's my training mode omega of choice.

OGA transforms a little too quickly for me. While that isn't a legit complaint, it's the reason why I dislike it. I rarely feel settled on that stage, especially during the arwings scenes, and while that probably has to do with some general inexperience with playing on the stage consistently, the stage speeds up on me much more than any other stage.

The reason why I ask about stage strikes is that striking 2 out of 13 or 17 stages seems really small and, I think, stems from tradition that I'd wager could use some reevaluating based on how many stages Smash Wii U could have legal. Personally, I think 3 strikes is minimum with that many stages and I could see up to 5 if 17 stages were legal. Obviously that means I prefer 4, and I think that allows characters to be okay from getting stage counter picked to death without ruining the advantage given to the loser.

Excuse me while I go play many serious sets on Kalos.

 

[Nintendrone]

I believe that I saw somewhere that an optimal number of stages vs. bans is shown in "y = 4x + 1", where y is number of legal stages and x is number of stage strikes. To satisfy this, one would have to add stages in groups of 4. 13 stages would have 3 strikes, 17 have 4, etc.

 

[DavemanCozy]

With full list striking, you need an odd number of stages. Conveniently, there are 13 that are pretty much unquestionably acceptable.

It's really straightforward: think of your entire stagelist as your starterlist, then go from there. Typically, it's struck 1-[2-]1; so for 9 stages you'd strike 1-2-2-2-1, for 11 1-2-2-2-2-1, and for 13 1-2-2-2-2-2-1.

For games 2 and 3, you just use the typical ban-counterpick setup as you know it from standard play.

What are these 13 stages?

Are they:

1. Battlefield
2. FD + omegas
3. Smashville
4. Town and City
5. Lylat Cruise
6. Delfino Plaza
7. Castle Siege
8. Halberd
9. Skyloft
10. Pokemon Stadium 2
11. Duck Hunt
12. Wuhu Island

Are you counting Omegas as #13?

 

[Locke 06]

What are these 13 stages?

Are they:

1. Battlefield
2. FD + omegas
3. Smashville
4. Town and City
5. Lylat Cruise
6. Delfino Plaza
7. Castle Siege
8. Halberd
9. Skyloft
10. Pokemon Stadium 2
11. Duck Hunt
12. Wuhu Island

Are you counting Omegas as #13?

You're missing KJ64 in most people's 13.

 

[Jaxas]

What are these 13 stages?

Are they:

1. Battlefield
2. FD + omegas
3. Smashville
4. Town and City
5. Lylat Cruise
6. Delfino Plaza
7. Castle Siege
8. Halberd
9. Skyloft
10. Pokemon Stadium 2
11. Duck Hunt
12. Wuhu Island

Are you counting Omegas as #13?

Pretty sure #13 is Kongo Jungle 64

EDIT: 'd

 

[DavemanCozy]

Ah, ok. So the end stage list for 1vs1 ends up being:

1. Battlefield
2. FD + omegas
3. Smashville
4. Town and City
5. Lylat Cruise
6. Delfino Plaza
7. Castle Siege
8. Halberd
9. Skyloft
10. Pokemon Stadium 2
11. Duck Hunt
12. Wuhu Island
13. Kongo Jungle

Another question then. Assume the following:

There's 13 stages, with full list striking implemented. Game 1 is about to start with the 1-2-2-2-2-2-1 process.

When it comes to the typical ban-counterpick setup for match 2 and match 3, the reasoning behind the ban process from the winner (as I understand it) is that they have enough bans to get rid of the stage types that they do not want to go to. This only gets more and more complicated the more stages that are introduced.

With 13 stages on, how many bans should be allowed to take this into account?

For example, if I'm playing as Wario, I want to be able to leave my bike near the ledge. Certain stages won't allow me to do this consistently: Wuhu, Skyloft, Delfino, and Halberd (travelling part), the bike will not slam next to the stage because of it being pass through. Kongo won't even allow me at any point to do this. While this introduces other movement advantages with Wario, it takes away my edge play with the bike.

I guess another way to put it: how many bans are fair?

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Ah, ok. So the end stage list for 1vs1 ends up being:

1. Battlefield
2. FD + omegas
3. Smashville
4. Town and City
5. Lylat Cruise
6. Delfino Plaza
7. Castle Siege
8. Halberd
9. Skyloft
10. Pokemon Stadium 2
11. Duck Hunt
12. Wuhu Island
13. Kongo Jungle

Another question then. Assume the following:

There's 13 stages, with full list striking implemented. Game 1 is about to start with the 1-2-2-2-2-2-1 process.

When it comes to the typical ban-counterpick setup for match 2 and match 3, the reasoning behind the ban process from the winner (as I understand it) is that they have enough bans to get rid of the stage types that they do not want to go to. This only gets more and more complicated the more stages that are introduced.

With 13 stages on, how many bans should be allowed to take this into account?

For example, if I'm playing as Wario, I want to be able to leave my bike near the ledge. Certain stages won't allow me to do this consistently: Wuhu, Skyloft, Delfino, and Halberd (travelling part), the bike will not slam next to the stage because of it being pass through. Kongo won't even allow me at any point to do this. While this introduces other movement advantages with Wario, it takes away my edge play with the bike.

I guess another way to put it: how many bans are fair?

For 13 stages, I'd assume 2-3. 1 seems pretty blatantly not enough, at the very least.

Other considerations:

There are 3 big travelling-type stages: Delfino, Wuhu, and Skyloft. Some players just loathe this type of stage in general, so 3 bans would allow them to strike the entire category, at the cost of maybe allowing a strategically worse stage to be picked by the opponent. (Basically comfort bans.)

That said, characters who really like travelling stages (anyone vs. camping Villager for instance) can be SOL if it's possible to strike all 3 of them, although there are workable substitutes in Halberd and Castle Siege.

FLSS works best with 4x+1 stages where x is a positive integer. 13 is satisfied by x = 3. Not sure if it's coincidence or indicative of something more.

Each player gets 6 strikes total for game 1 given 13 stage FLSS rules. 3 is half of 6, which seems like a convenient guideline. "Players can ban up to x/2 stages where x is the number of stages they strike for game 1." Convoluted to say in words though.

 

[DavemanCozy]

Thanks, based on the formula, 3 bans would make sense when counter-picking.

In application, I would need to experience it

 

[thehard]

#EVO2015 Melee and S4 Rules

@EvilMrWizard S4 starters are BF, FD, & Smashville.

Everything else is a cp. #SmashBros pic.twitter.com/6DFbeLUOI6

— xd1x.bsky.social (@xD1x) March 25, 2015

This is interesting, I didn't think Mr. Wizard would follow through on a couple of folks asking for FLSS. Shame on D1 tho

 

[webbedspace]

RIP Town and City for starter. *Kapp'n's bus does 6 donuts in its memory*

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Uh, unless I'm reading that completely wrong then D1 is saying that EVO should run 3 starters instead of FLSS. Which is no bueno.

 

[Davis-Lightheart]

Has D1 even acknowledged what you guys have been talking about here? Honestly, I didn't even know FLSS was happening at EVO.

 

[thehard]

Every EVO decision has been made via small Twitter conversations. It's so bizarre

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Y'all need to tweet @EvilMrWizard. Like, now. Last day before ruleset is finalized, and 3 starters is abysmal. Let's make sure D1 doesn't **** this up for everyone.

@MINUSTHEFIGHTER as for your question about why Skyloft and Wuhu are banned, the answer is basically "APEX ****ed us". There's no good reason to ban either of those stages. They're both eminently reasonable traveling stages. But APEX banned them for NO good reason, and then Evo used the APEX list as a template for their legal decisions, and they couldn't go back on those, so they were banned at Evo too. And most people want to use the same rulesets as the majors, to practice for the majors, regardless of how dumb that ruleset is.

 

[LiteralGrill]

@MINUSTHEFIGHTER as for your question about why Skyloft and Wuhu are banned, the answer is basically "APEX ****ed us". There's no good reason to ban either of those stages. They're both eminently reasonable traveling stages. But APEX banned them for NO good reason, and then Evo used the APEX list as a template for their legal decisions, and they couldn't go back on those, so they were banned at Evo too. And most people want to use the same rulesets as the majors, to practice for the majors, regardless of how dumb that ruleset is.

You do know that Mr.Wizard has heavily implied how he asked for most possible stages legal and Nintendo shot them down due to music issues right? From what I know, they wanted more stages and COULDN'T. If you wanna be mad, blame Nintendo, don't say Mr.Wizard just tried to copycat Apex.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Y'all need to tweet @EvilMrWizard. Like, now. Last day before ruleset is finalized, and 3 starters is abysmal. Let's make sure D1 doesn't **** this up for everyone.

@MINUSTHEFIGHTER as for your question about why Skyloft and Wuhu are banned, the answer is basically "APEX ****ed us". There's no good reason to ban either of those stages. They're both eminently reasonable traveling stages. But APEX banned them for NO good reason, and then Evo used the APEX list as a template for their legal decisions, and they couldn't go back on those, so they were banned at Evo too. And most people want to use the same rulesets as the majors, to practice for the majors, regardless of how dumb that ruleset is.

As of the time I'm posting this, the EVO rules make no mention of starter or counterpick stages. (Contrast to a few months ago, when the starter stages were identified as such.)

By all means, still let Wizard know that we'd prefer FLSS (or even 5 starters, that would be workable), but I expect he'd tweet if the rules change.

 

[Firefoxx]

FLSS at EVO? Who would have thought that Mr. Wizard would end up being one of the most liberal TO's.

Edit: And D1 stays trying to keep Smash 4 boring.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Edit: And D1 stays trying to keep Smash 4 boring.

Remember guys, if you want to talk about the EVO ruleset and it has to do with anything other than "what custom sets will be used", go to Twitter. East Coast should not make the rules for every damn Smash 4 major. Not when their ruleset is so awful.

 

[[Deuce]]

FLSS HYPE and 6 minutes glad MrWizard kept an open mind.

Someday we may get back to 3 stock 8min. Many TOs in cali have switched back to it, to preserve competitive integrity

 

[Piford]

Just found out EVO changed to FLSS. This is amazing, and one step closer to getting those last 4 stages legal. I really hope he doesn't change it in the next day.

 

[[Deuce]]

If youre talking the reddit thread I just posted that lol. Just omitted D1's tweet so there isn't controversy attached

 

[Davis-Lightheart]

If youre talking the reddit thread I just posted that lol. Just omitted D1's tweet so there isn't controversy attached

That's probably for the best in the long run.

 

[[Deuce]]

Can't wait to see Miiverse in action, I love that Mario paint medley!

 

[DavemanCozy]

If this is the route they're going to take, at least allow the omega forms of the allowed stages and have Town + Lylat as starters.

 

[Firefoxx]

Super Smash Bros for WiiU

• Game version: US Nintendo WiiU
• Game Settings: 2 Stock, 6 Minute Time Limit, Items Off, Equipment Off, 2/3 Games
• Amiibo’s are banned.
• Order of events: Pick characters, then stage striking, then custom move selection.
• Custom moves are allowed. See THIS document for allowed sets at the tournament.
• Available Stages:: Battlefield, Final Destination, Smashville, Lylat Cruise, Town & City, Castle Siege, Delfino Plaza, Duck Hunt, Halberd

If this is the route they're going to take, at least allow the omega forms of the allowed stages and have Town + Lylat as starters.

I get the feeling this is a Nintendo thing, easier to ban all Omegas then to have to tell people which ones they can't play on due to copyright concerns. Sucks for a lot of reasons, but that's the world we apparently live in now

 

[Nintendrone]

As awesome as FLSS is for Evo, I'm still bummed out that they asked for community input on everything except stages. This is Apex's fault for being stupid and making a stagelist that's even more conservative than Brawl's, despite the fact that this game has the largest selection of good stages. Now majors are following the most conservative Smash community: the East Coast (I must be the only liberal there!).

 

[ParanoidDrone]

In light of EVO's stagelist, would it be worthwhile to talk about those 9 stages in particular and any notable benefits/drawbacks they have for certain characters?

 

[Nintendrone]

I guess that would be the most relevant thing to do, since there's not much point to vouch for good stages that Evo left off at the moment. From my experience, Sonic loves FD and other big, flat stages. Wario has similar tastes, but doesn't mind platforms that help him be hard to catch. Sheik loves high platforms and low ceilings, as well as ones that have little room to avoid needles with, like SV, T&C, Halberd, and Delfino.

 

[Locke 06]

Castle Siege is a pick that I know very little about in terms of characters and how they do on each transformation. CS2 has a high ceiling, walk offs, and will appear twice in 6 minutes. However, CS1 is so small that I think it would be difficult for people to use Castle Siege specifically for time outs.

Mega Man generally likes big stages so he can space. I don't think CS is a good stage for Mega Man (slopes kind of mess him up along with the small CS1 layout), but I don't think it is terrible either even though it's a go to stage strike for most Mega Mains.

 

[Piford]

Almost always strike - when playing against.

Smashville - Ness, Sonic, Sheik, Diddy, Pikachu

Halberd - R.O.B., Diddy, Zero Suit Samus

Battlefield - Donkey Kong, Shulk, Zero Suit Samus, Luigi

Final Destination - Samus, Link, Duck Hunt, Diddy Kong, Sonic, Little Mac

Lylat Cruise - Zero Suit Samus, Donkey Kong

Delfino Plaza - Diddy Kong, R.O.B., Jigglypuff

Duck Hunt - Duck Hunt, Sonic, Villager

Town and City - Sheik, Ness

Castle Siege - Can't really think of characters that really benefit that much

Anything to add, or anything I messed up on?

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Almost always strike

Smashville - Ness, Sonic, Sheik, Diddy, Pikachu

Halberd - R.O.B., Diddy, Zero Suit Samus

Battlefield - Donkey Kong, Shulk, Zero Suit Samus, Luigi

Final Destination - Samus, Link, Duck Hunt, Diddy Kong, Sonic, Little Mac

Lylat Cruise - Zero Suit Samus, Donkey Kong

Delfino Plaza - Diddy Kong, R.O.B., Jigglypuff

Duck Hunt - Duck Hunt, Sonic, Villager

Town and City - Sheik, Ness

Castle Siege - Can't really think of characters that really benefit that much

Anything to add, or anything I messed up on?

Are these playing as or against the characters listed?

 

[Quickhero]

Are these playing as or against the characters listed?

Against. NO WAY am I banning Final Destination if I'm playing as Little Mac.

 

[Piford]

Are these playing as or against the characters listed?

Yeah it's against. I thought it'd be obvious, but your right that it's better to specify.