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Stage Analysis & Discussion Thread

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Thinkaman

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Hey guys, this week's Project Smash roundtable topic is bans, which is of course very significant regarding stage policy.

I encourage everyone to check in at http://smash.menu/roundtable3.html and follow the stream. We can discuss thoughts here after.

Cheers!
 

LiteralGrill

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Hey guys, this week's Project Smash roundtable topic is bans, which is of course very significant regarding stage policy.

I encourage everyone to check in at http://smash.menu/roundtable3.html and follow the stream. We can discuss thoughts here after.

Cheers!
What time does this start? And any chance a big reddit TO could get in on the conversation on stream? I'd love to be able to talk about everything I've experienced with stages thus far through testing, polling, and the like.
 

Piford

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What time does this start? And any chance a big reddit TO could get in on the conversation on stream? I'd love to be able to talk about everything I've experienced with stages thus far through testing, polling, and the like.
It starts in 2 minutes according to the timer at the top of the page.
 

CatRaccoonBL

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Hey guys, this week's Project Smash roundtable topic is bans, which is of course very significant regarding stage policy.

I encourage everyone to check in at http://smash.menu/roundtable3.html and follow the stream. We can discuss thoughts here after.

Cheers!
What time does this start? And any chance a big reddit TO could get in on the conversation on stream? I'd love to be able to talk about everything I've experienced with stages thus far through testing, polling, and the like.
It starts in 2 minutes according to the timer at the top of the page.
So, I think missed it. (Mainly because I didn't even know it was going to happen). How did it go? Was anything of significance said?
 

CatRaccoonBL

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Apparently Lylat can launch people into the air.
Like just launch, do damage, kill?

If it is just a fixed launching distance, doesn't sound too bad if we can figure out how to avoid it.

And was that it? Anything else like what should be banned not banned?
 

Piford

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Launch probably wasn't the right word. When the stage tilts, characters can make a small pop off the stage and into the air for a split second. This will interrupt attacks that take long to perform.
 

CatRaccoonBL

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Launch probably wasn't the right word. When the stage tilts, characters can make a small pop off the stage and into the air for a split second. This will interrupt attacks that take long to perform.
SSSooooooo...Could we consider that ban worthy, or maybe just move to counterpick? (If we still have that system of course).
 

Piford

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SSSooooooo...Could we consider that ban worthy, or maybe just move to counterpick? (If we still have that system of course).
Maybe. Bwett said he won a match because of it. Denti was bowser and made a good read and went for the side special which would've won him the game. The stage tilted and his animation was canceled and Bwett got the grab and won.
 

Thinkaman

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So, I think missed it. (Mainly because I didn't even know it was going to happen). How did it go? Was anything of significance said?
The council agreed to ban Magneto, and sent an assassin back in time to prevent his inclusion in the game. Did it work?
 

LiteralGrill

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Maybe. Bwett said he won a match because of it. Denti was bowser and made a good read and went for the side special which would've won him the game. The stage tilted and his animation was canceled and Bwett got the grab and won.
You can actually know when and how much the stage is going to tilt. The part you are flying through in the backgrounds tells you that. So nah, still all good.
 

Piford

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You can actually know when and how much the stage is going to tilt. The part you are flying through in the backgrounds tells you that. So nah, still all good.
Yeah I meant to say that Bwett actually was a bit misinformed. He said the tilting was random, which its not. One thing a lot of people don't know is Lylat Cruise is actually 5 stages, and the game randomly picks one of those stages before the match starts. Once you realize which stage has been chosen, you can tell when the stage is going to tilt.
 

Amazing Ampharos

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Yeah, I didn't get a chance to chime in on that point, but Lylat tilts in a fixed pattern according to what's going on in the background. In Brawl at least, I kinda always knew which way the stage was going to move based on the background; I couldn't tell you verbally, but I was never surprised by it since it was a part of the subconscious side of my mental iceberg. I have also observed the odd behavior Bwett was talking about, but when I was seeing it, we thought of it in the context of helping the attacker (since you could put out hitboxes and then have your action canceled, making any attack safe). I think it's a very interesting mechanic that we'd have to understand far better before ban talk really started making sense. Then again, if we go with my stage proposal, we need 13/14 stages, and there's no real downside to leaving Lylat out and taking the other 13 if people are less comfortable with Lylat tilts versus the other features on the other stages.

I was, however, happy on the roundtable that I got to spread some awareness that the Wuhu glitch isn't really a legitimate gameplay issue. Wuhu Island is one of my favorite competitive stages in smash 4, and I hope putting that out there might help people see what a quality stage it is.
 

ParanoidDrone

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For yet more shameless plugs, I have a twofer: Coliseum and Mario Galaxy. The Mario Galaxy thread in particular includes information on which projectiles ignore the curved gravity, so that's probably worth the price of admission (free!) by itself since it also applies to Windy Hill Zone.
 

Amazing Ampharos

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To be clear, I wasn't referring to the tilting being random. I was referring to the pop effect. The effect doesn't occur constantly with every move during the tilt.
I actually went into training mode after the talk to investigate this mechanic more in-depth since what you said about how it works (creating an airborne state) got me thinking about the mechanics and gave me ideas about how to study it. It seems to happen with specific moves that shift the animation of the attacker and only happens at four specific points on the stage (the ledges and the seams of the engines, interestingly not the platforms). I believe the internal mechanic is this. Certain animations move the character and the game has to correct for it in some way. Lylat tilting also requires some correction which is somewhat larger at the ledges or the seam due to the nature of the stage shape. Adding both together can create a cumulative error too great to automatically correct and thus you get placed in the air (if done at the ledge, you actually fall off-stage, but based on your story about tha tournament, I suspect it happened to you on the seam). I think this is actualy predictable enough to be a stage specific AT; it doesn't seem random to me as I toy with it though it's sometimes hard to figure which moves can trigger it and which can't. I believe that there's a good chance that this mechanic can simply be understood and that will make it perhaps more of a good thing than a bad thing.

I want to get a thread up going through Lylat's mechanics in depth, but that isn't going to happen tonight. Hopefully it will be relatively fast. I just wanted to put out there that hearing concerns about Lylat's legality got me into turbo research mode (you certainly surprised the room with that one, though I had seen the mechanic before I had a pretty poor grasp of what was causing it), and what you see above is the gist of what I found.

Also, if you guys find anything crazy like that in general otherwise, just let us know. We're nerds. We love sitting in training mode researching game mechanics, and as with this case, I think research can really help our understanding of these things.
 

ParanoidDrone

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I actually went into training mode after the talk to investigate this mechanic more in-depth since what you said about how it works (creating an airborne state) got me thinking about the mechanics and gave me ideas about how to study it. It seems to happen with specific moves that shift the animation of the attacker and only happens at four specific points on the stage (the ledges and the seams of the engines, interestingly not the platforms). I believe the internal mechanic is this. Certain animations move the character and the game has to correct for it in some way. Lylat tilting also requires some correction which is somewhat larger at the ledges or the seam due to the nature of the stage shape. Adding both together can create a cumulative error too great to automatically correct and thus you get placed in the air (if done at the ledge, you actually fall off-stage, but based on your story about tha tournament, I suspect it happened to you on the seam). I think this is actualy predictable enough to be a stage specific AT; it doesn't seem random to me as I toy with it though it's sometimes hard to figure which moves can trigger it and which can't. I believe that there's a good chance that this mechanic can simply be understood and that will make it perhaps more of a good thing than a bad thing.

I want to get a thread up going through Lylat's mechanics in depth, but that isn't going to happen tonight. Hopefully it will be relatively fast. I just wanted to put out there that hearing concerns about Lylat's legality got me into turbo research mode (you certainly surprised the room with that one, though I had seen the mechanic before I had a pretty poor grasp of what was causing it), and what you see above is the gist of what I found.

Also, if you guys find anything crazy like that in general otherwise, just let us know. We're nerds. We love sitting in training mode researching game mechanics, and as with this case, I think research can really help our understanding of these things.
I vaguely recall seeing a video of Donkey Kong going from grounded up B to airborne up B when they moved over the seam, but it was a while ago, before I think anyone understood it was because of Lylat Cruise. I wonder if other moves like Whirling Fortress may have this happen to them? What about teleports?
 

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In that case it's even worse since it'd be even easier to run away.

I think this is as good a time as any to figure this out. After the 20th I want us all in here to sit down and make a recommended stagelist together. Something so whenever I or anyone sees a tournament with odd stagelists we can go "hey this is reccomended by everyone discussing stages on smashboards" and we'll all be good with it. Sound good?
Yes, there would be more of an inventive to run away, and there shouldn't be anything wrong with that playstyle. You can win with it as long as there's any time limit at all, short or long.

The problem is that running away drags matches on far too long with the current 8 minutes. It's so long that the only way time limits factor in a match is if people intentionally camp hard, so everyone now associates intentional camping and time limits with excessively long matches. For 12-13 years straight.

It must be either the running away playstyle and/or that matches are too long. You can play aggressively on Big Battlefield or ANY stage, but it's really just down to the players and what they feel comfortable doing. This is why I was questioning your method of testing, since players won't feel comfortable being aggressive on a stage they're unfamiliar with. It's a losing battle from the start. Here's the big point:

Playstyles can be applied to every stage. If you're testing specific stages, why are you using playstyles instead of the stages themselves as proof of legality?

You can hard ban everything that allows an incentive to camp (proof of camping is cited everywhere as reason enough to ban stages), but that's not directly addressing the issue. There's always character matchups where camping is the smartest idea (vs. any big character), players who have trouble dealing with it, and honestly, people will always camp because that's just the way they play.

OR you can decrease the time limit so the maximum time each match will take is low enough for everyone to be happy regardless of playstyle. Aggressive players will gain more from taking risks early to get the lead and defensive players don't have to hold out as long to get their win. Win-win for everyone since the better player still wins! :b:

It seems like such an obvious thing to try so that more playstyles (and stages!) can be used. I know this has been a thing since Melee, but how much has the time limit really been evaluated since then? It's been 8 minutes for other Smash games as long as I can remember, but why? It MUST be considered because long matches, only caused by our time limits, are being used as evidence to ban stages!

This is something that's worth experimentation in future tournaments. Let people go crazy with stages but dial the time limit back so camping would last as much or a little longer than an average match. I know there's was a thread around here where someone logged average match times, but I can't seem to find it!

EDIT: We have the power to change time limits but not how stages work, so why not take that approach? The stages that are legal now are probably still ok with a lower time limit, so let's try this on stages people like camping on.
 
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SirKenneth

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Can I ask why is Mario Circuit not being considered. I've played on that stage plus Wuhu Skyloft and Delfino pretty extensively and after delfino, circuit seems the most tame even with the hazards that are harder to get hit by then halberd hazards. Skyloft and Wuhu without hazards feels like you are fighting the stage. I'm just wondering why circuit isn't being included.
 
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Omegaphoenix

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Can I ask why is Mario Circuit not being considered. I've played on that stage plus Wuhu Skyloft and Delfino pretty extensively and after delfino, circuit seems the most tame even with the hazards that are harder to get hit by then halberd hazards. Skyloft and Wuhu without hazards feels like you are fighting the stage. I'm just wondering why circuit isn't being included.
The reasons people are against Mario Circuit 8 are that the track can block off blast zones, the karts that come by on the track and can hit players at some points, and its a traveling stage, though it follows the same path every time.

Of course, the karts hurt less and knock back less than in previous versions, as well as having far less prominence. They'll only really kill at kill percentage. Also, I personally believe that the track blocking kill zones is simply rewarding stage control and character knowledge, as a smart player can line up themselves and the opponent so the opponents kill moves are blocked off. Some people don't like that, and thus, it gets lack of consideration.

Really, I think its people are knee jerking at this one, because it comes with blocking off kill zones, carts, and a moving stage, which would seem to make it crap, but honestly I think it has interesting ideas that make it a great pick for a player armed with stage knowledge.
 

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Can I ask why is Mario Circuit not being considered. I've played on that stage plus Wuhu Skyloft and Delfino pretty extensively and after delfino, circuit seems the most tame even with the hazards that are harder to get hit by then halberd hazards. Skyloft and Wuhu without hazards feels like you are fighting the stage. I'm just wondering why circuit isn't being included.
A lot of people are considering using Mario Circuit. It's been legal on the Subreddits tournaments. Also the only stages that you are really fighting the stage is Pyrosphere, Gaur Plains, and Wily Castle.
 

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A lot of people are considering using Mario Circuit. It's been legal on the Subreddits tournaments. Also the only stages that you are really fighting the stage is Pyrosphere, Gaur Plains, and Wily Castle.
I can't speak for Pyrosphere and Gaur Plains because I don't know much about them yet, but Wily's Castle acts on a timer for the platforms and Yellow Devil. What are you fighting that's outside of your control?
 

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I can't speak for Pyrosphere and Gaur Plains because I don't know much about them yet, but Wily's Castle acts on a timer for the platforms and Yellow Devil. What are you fighting that's outside of your control?
You're attacking the stage, and it attacks back.
 

Piford

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Here is the set, last game last stock:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLDYVlLpD1I
Did Denti know about the canceling ahead of time? And what looks like happened is Bowser's Side-B has strict horizontal movement, but since Lylat was tilted (it should really be noted that Lylat was tilted previous to him going for the move) he moved off the main platform. I don't think this calls for an immediate ban, but it should be looked into.
 

HavocThunder

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You're attacking the stage, and it attacks back.
Yes, he attacks, AND there's nothing out of control about what he does. You have options at every point in the stage:

His pattern is show up in background, come in, bounce about 4 times in his idle animation, attack with beams, bounce about 3 times, close eyes, move to the other side. He does this 2 more times, and the last time he'll move off the stage.

His beam attacks do 7%. They aren't unblockable and he shoots 1-3 times. You can stick close to him (best idea so you can kill him), move behind him, or position yourself behind the opponent as a shield.

YD colliding with you does 5%-6% every time he runs into you while switching sides. This move is not unblockable, either. He signals this by closing his eyes and does it at the same time everytime. You can't take advantage of this or move out of the way?

He takes the same amount of damage to kill (50%-51% to blink and about 60%-65% to destroy).

All of this verified in Training Mode using Charizard f-air, DK b-air and up-tilt, and Kirby n-air for the percents. Probably could've picked a better aerial that does 10% more consistently, though...

That's all proof that the stage is predictable with the hazards. Since it's a predictable stage, it becomes a question of how to take advantage of it. If someone feels comfortable at WC and can take advantage of all the above facts over their opponent, they are a great player. There's nothing uncompetitive about it. It's a lot easier to explain than Wrecking Crew, that's for sure.

EDIT: I could probably bring up similar facts for stages that are really being thrown out like Pac-Land. The stage does the same thing every time, and literally everything here has a warning on it. Is there anything here or Wily's Castle that has no warning, or not on a timer that I can verify in Training Mode for myself?
 
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KlefkiHolder

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That doesn't change the fact that you are LITERALLY fighting the stage.

As in, you are in actual combatative action with the stage.
 

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That doesn't change the fact that you are LITERALLY fighting the stage.

As in, you are in actual combatative action with the stage.
That's fine, we can call it fighting the stage. I'm not disputing that. Is taking damage from hazards that are well telegraphed uncompetitive?
 

SirKenneth

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Nice to know that Mario circuit is being considered it is a great stage and if we are considering Wuhu and skyloft then circuit belongs as well.

Now on to duck hunt. I'm sorry but I don't understand this one. That tree is sooooo campy. If I go up in stocks you will not touch me for the rest of the game I promise. If that stage is legal I will time out until it is banned. That tree is absurdly annoying
 

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BTW, a few weeks back I went into training mode on Mario Circuit and I got a bunch of glitches. Lemme find my post about it.


That's fine, we can call it fighting the stage. I'm not disputing that. Is taking damage from hazards that are well telegraphed uncompetitive?
Well, I'm not really here to debate that.

It just seemed like you were saying because Yellow Devil is telegraphed, then you're not fighting the stage when its literally what you are doing.

Personally, I think it depends on the hazard and going on a case-by-case basis is best when it comes to stages, and subsequently uncompetitiveness and stage legality.
 
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Piford

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Nice to know that Mario circuit is being considered it is a great stage and if we are considering Wuhu and skyloft then circuit belongs as well.

Now on to duck hunt. I'm sorry but I don't understand this one. That tree is sooooo campy. If I go up in stocks you will not touch me for the rest of the game I promise. If that stage is legal I will time out until it is banned. That tree is absurdly annoying
But you just leave yourself open for attacks if you are in the tree. The tree only is effective in drawing your opponent to you, but then you have to leave to avoid being hit.
 

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When it comes to the tree, I think we need to test it some. All we have so far is people saying "You can camp!" or "You can't camp!" without any real evidence. Let's hit the lab with it.

Found my posts on Circuit. Also read the other ones: Here
 

SirKenneth

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But you just leave yourself open for attacks if you are in the tree. The tree only is effective in drawing your opponent to you, but then you have to leave to avoid being hit.

Yes but it is good enough to force them to approch and which you proceed to circle camp I jump down you chase me I run back up. Imagine Mario just sitting up there chucking fire or better yet diddy tossing bananas and peanuts he can then use monkey flip to escape and then make his way back up there to camp again. If a diddy goes up in stocks and wants to be lame I don't see him getting touched on that stage

EDIT: In terms of you can/can't camp although I haven't done it in tournament yet. I have camped there with Mario and diddy during our smash fest lol I'll get some videos when I can. And thanks for that link for Mario circuit I'm going to check it out
 
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Piford

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When it comes to the tree, I think we need to test it some. All we have so far is people saying "You can camp!" or "You can't camp!" without any real evidence. Let's hit the lab with it.

Found my posts on Circuit. Also read the other ones: Here
You can just tech the actual stage instead of the track to avoid that.

For Diddy on Duck Hunt, you can just catch his Banana's and Peanuts and throw them back at him. And if your up there and they run down, what's stopping you from hitting them on their way back up?
 

LiteralGrill

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When it comes to the tree, I think we need to test it some. All we have so far is people saying "You can camp!" or "You can't camp!" without any real evidence. Let's hit the lab with it.
I encourage any person to come to any tournament I run and abuse this stage to the max. Prove it in a tournament setting and we're all good. :)
 

SirKenneth

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You can just tech the actual stage instead of the track to avoid that.

For Diddy on Duck Hunt, you can just catch his Banana's and Peanuts and throw them back at him. And if your up there and they run down, what's stopping you from hitting them on their way back up?

If your up on stocks you have no reason to approach ever. We do because on most stages you have to, to keep your lead. If you camp tree while im up be my guest. When you leave tree I'll go camp etc etc...
Just test it in your circles. Thus far I've seen some pretty lame things on that stage. When I get videos I'll post
 
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