Stage Information Database and Q&A

[ぱみゅ]

Double post cause it was 3 days ago.

What are you guys' thoughts on Rudder Camping? A sudden motivations struck to make a video on something stage-specific to put on Smash News, and I feel like rudder camping would make a good first step.

Or you know, Pirate Ship as a whole...

First off, the sole idea of stage showcase/tutorial videos sounds amazing and if there is something I can help with, just make me know.
I personally love Pirate Ship. It has a lot of free room and platforms helps to both Runaways and the ones chasing them. Hazards are only a problem if people do not know how to deal with them, as in, don't know to watch for the bombs from the tower or just to get the **** away from the catpult.
Same with water camping. Just get better ppl.
Ruddercamping is an interesting approach to stage legality. While some people would claim it is not broken and there are several events that can make the camper to move, people just don't want to watch someone doing that and wait for him to eventually pop out.
What I mean is that optimally, stage should be played with it and there would be no problem at all unless your character can't fall there and is at stock disadvantage; but in order to make the stage a little more appealing, it could just be banned and nobody would complain about it.

Well, hello stage crew! It's been a while. I was in the neighborhood, so I thought I'd stop by and say hello.

*face darkens* I've... heard rumors. Grim rumors. Rumors that stages lists have gotten more restrictive since I was here last (that is to say, like, 6 months ago). Is... is it true? Is the darkness claiming us?

Long story short,
URC disbanded and a lot of people thinks that the reason Japan "destroyed" many many players at APEX is the stagelist, so TOs (that are now entitled to their own rulesets) decided to run tournaments with 3-6 stages.
So yeah, it just happens that people being dumb and making dumb ruleset decisions is the new standard.

 

[Destiny Warrior]

Spoiler

This is why you guys should use the Indian ruleset, which is the most liberal one ever (shameless self-plug)!

Frankly, once you have the essentials down, you merely need to learn to adapt them to each stage(example: after I learned some Toon Link techs when I played, I studied how to adapt them to stages like Norfair, which have no main area. It wasn't that hard for me to adapt to it with any of the characters I played. Just a question of thinking laterally). The CP system kinda only necessitates knowing how to beat another character on 4 stages: the starters and a CP of choice. This kinda restricts your knowledge of the game. Practicing on all the stages(even banned ones) a couple of times AFTER learning your character(this is very important) will give you intricate knowledge of all the stages so you get a basic rundown on all the strategies your opponent might attempt. But if you want to learn your character and not just try to BS opponents using stage tricks, learn the ropes on the basic stages.

tl;dr: Learn your tricks on Final Destination, then apply them on Port Town Aero Dive

 

[Grim Tuesday]

My G&W, who I used to mainly use on CPs, is becoming less and less viable lol

 

[WindMajor]

Do you have a scene in India, Destiny Warrior? How is it?

 

[Destiny Warrior]

Destiny Warrior
Location: Chennai, India
Stance: Liberal(keep everything unbanned!)
Mains:
Secondaries:
Favourite Stage(s):
Other: I'm the best Smasher in India

I'm the same guy as in the OP(with the 1 main and 11 secondaries) Twinkie. There isn't a smash scene in India(which is the subject of a lot of my jokes), though I've got one of my friends into 64.

 

[WindMajor]

I didn't forget who you were, I never forget my Toon Link mains!

I remembered that you were interested in starting a Smash community in India, but I just never knew if you took off from there.

 

[Destiny Warrior]

I tried, but then my computer crashed, and Brawl hasn't worked since(nor has Melee) ;_; Only had 64 since.

 

[WindMajor]

Yo but 64 is pretty fun though.

 

[Destiny Warrior]

Yeah, Captain Falcon is a lot of fun to main

However, 64 acutely lacks anything in 1P, which is kinda boring, but then again, this came out in 1999...

 

[Raziek]

I've given up on fighting the legions of scrubs.

I've lost everything but Brinstar, RC and miraculously enough, Norfair.

Even Japes is gone, ****ing PS2 is gone.

And I still win tournies.

 

[WindMajor]

It was fun while it lasted I guess...

*sigh*

 

[Life]

Geez, the floors are pretty clean on Smashboards, must be all the scrubs.

/hope is likely to cut down on stages too.

I just don't get it.

 

[ぱみゅ]

My story is kinda weird.
When I make people play 20 stages and ban MK they complain because they don't like it.
When I make MK legal and and a short stagelist they complain because I get money places...

 

[#HBC | Joker]

In MI they've started using the Apex stagelist, which is pretty diverse compared to JP stagelist. They pretty much use the whole Apex2012 Ruleset + double MK banned in teams.

People seem to like that, I dunno why everyone else is gravitating to the JP ruleset so hardcore. The funny thing is, in Japan they're starting to try rulesets more like ours, with 8min timer and more stages.

 

[WindMajor]

I just saw Nairo vs. Vinnie last night and I was so bored throughout the whole thing. Only 3 stages used for 10 matches made me want to die.

 

[Raziek]

I played 8 consecutive matches of MarthvSnake on Smashville for Grand Finals 1/2....

Am I a bad person?

 

[WindMajor]

Did you win?

 

[Raziek]

I did. 3-2 GF1, 3-0 GF2.

 

[WindMajor]

Okay I'm not that mad.

 

[ぱみゅ]

I just saw Nairo vs. Vinnie last night and I was so bored throughout the whole thing. Only 3 stages used for 10 matches made me want to die.

Nairo kinda made it entertaining with his amazing techskill alone. Also Vinnie's Sopo.
But yeah, Nairo had no room to move to on FD and lost pretty much every match there. It was frustrating and somewhat demoralizing. As in, the player I admire the most with close-to-unpredictable gameplay, that always pulls the weirdest stuff off and moves lightning fast, got grabbed three times and lost...

Spoiler

Actually more because Vinnie was dropping CGs all day long

Random Stamina was entertaining even though it was full-smashville, tho.

 

[MEOW1337KITTEH]

What is it that makes Lylat Cruise so bad for Falco?

Is it just the tilting screwing with his lasers and recovery?

 

[ぱみゅ]

And Ilussion runaways, and the chaingrabs. Pretty much every Falco basics gets affected in the stage.
They don't become numb, just don't expect them to work everytime.

 

[Tesh]

i find falco and zss rely very much on clear and straight lines of sight

 

[MEOW1337KITTEH]

So it makes the match more luck based? If the tilts work in their favor, don't lasers and CGs work better?

And what if the Falco plays aggressively?

 

[ぱみゅ]

i find falco and zss rely very much on clear and straight lines of sight

I do not play Zamus like that lol
I like it when I have nothing in my way, but I guess my stage knowledge alone is enough not to make uneven terrains problematic for me.

So it makes the match more luck based? If the tilts work in their favor, don't lasers and CGs work better?

And what if the Falco plays aggressively?

Fun part is that Lylat's tiltings aren't random.
They have a set pattern within each transformation, but the order of each of them IS random.

 

[Tesh]

Well for short characters, I have a much easier time going under or over things like Side B and nB because they fly over my head if I'm playing metaknight or sonic.

Its not huge, but I'd rather fight ZSS on Lylat than Battlefield or SV.

 

[Life]

So a guy just asked me why Brawl has so many "dumb stages" legal. Stifling my condescension-born-of-repetition, I replied with this:

On the contrary, they're the most intelligent stages around. Stage interference raises the skill cap, which is a good thing.

To put it another way, Starcraft is played with game speed (or whatever they call it, too lazy to bring mine up and look) set to the maximum setting because it's the most difficult speed to play on and therefore leaves the most room open for skill. Why do Smashers insist on playing easy stages?

Can anyone see anything wrong with the analogy (barring SC2 not being remotely similar to Smash)?

 

[MEOW1337KITTEH]

The only problem there is that in Starcraft, increasing the speed does only that: Increases the speed
If we were looking to do that we would play the special brawl mode.

The analogy is flawed, but still valid. More stages are meant to require an increase in stage knowledge.

 

[Tesh]

The one that really stuck with me was the "tic-tac-toe" analogy. If our competition is too simple, it risks being "solved" and there is no longer a point in playing.

 

[Life]

The one that really stuck with me was the "tic-tac-toe" analogy. If our competition is too simple, it risks being "solved" and there is no longer a point in playing.

Problem with that: Rock Paper Scissors. Incredibly simple game yet totally unsolvable -- in fact, it's pretty much the foundation of fighting games as we know them. Barring some sort of ridiculously OP character (Akuma good at least), fighting games aren't in danger of being solved.

Spoiler

At least by humans--hypothetically, since AI have effectively instant reaction times, a fighter-solving AI is imaginable. But with humans? Mere mortals with significant reaction times, adaptable strategies, imperfect tech skill, and outside factors like mental fatigue, hype, or trash talk? Not so much.

We risk the game becoming boring. We risk the game becoming forbidding to new players. But "solved" is not a problem.

 

[WindMajor]

Brawl could only be played with half the cast and one stage, and it still won't be called solved. What it will be is so stale that it might as well be considered solved, which is what we should be fearing.

 

[Tesh]

Well it takes a certain kind of game to become completely 100% solved, but that message still stuck with me.

Tic-tac-toe is a game where you have only 2 options. Go first/draw and win or go 2nd and lose/draw.

Rock, Paper, Scissors is a game where there are 3 options with identical risk/reward. Thats 3x viable options compared to tic-tac-toe.

To me its just more options=more depth=less solvable.

The problem with some stages is that they just reduce options. Because the only thing you can really factor in is viable options.

Some might say "knowledge of RC being necessary increases depth", but you have to consider how a stage might reduce the knowledge necessary in other areas. Lets take MK vs Olimar on BF/Sv/FD and compare it to 2011 Unity stagelist. If MK can take Olimar to Brinstar and reduce the need to deal with pivot grabs, ground to ground combat or even starting his own juggles (eventually the stage forces olimar to jump or get hit) did Brinstar really "net" you any depth? What if RPS let you counterpick to a bowl of water? Now Paper is useless and Scissors isn't very good either. Meanwhile Rock doesn't give a ****. But *gasp* we added options so that added depth right?

Honestly where can you counterpick a rock to that won't completely **** up your paper and scissors?

 

[ぱみゅ]

Oh yeah, this is why I love this thread *tear*

 

[T-block]

rock paper scissors is easily solved. the optimal strategy is to throw each hand exactly 1/3 of the time, completely randomly. there's a difference between a game being solved and a game having a dominant pure strategy.

game theory wooooo

 

[Fluttershy]

On cs and dp does anything happen to jumps during the transformations? To me it feels like the height gets canceled but I'm not sure...

 

[ぱみゅ]

It's like, depending on a certain timing, your character is considered to be at the left-behind scrolling-down platform, so it keeps lowering the same height (and apparently, it's the same effect that causes the through-out glitch on CS and the Pokémon Stadiums).

 

[Supreme Dirt]

My region cut down to the japanese stage list.

Yeah I'm officially done with Brawl.


I miss the days of the stage rage crew ;.;

They were fun times.

 

[WindMajor]

At least your region is running tournaments.

My region is running an MK banned Apex ruleset, but I haven't played competitive Brawl in over half a year. That ruleset is better than nothing. :/

 

[-LzR-]

My country wanted MK legal again so we had to cut out a lot of stages. The fact everyone is OMG SMASHVILLE ONLY doesn't really make things any better.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Planning 3 tournaments for my event on december:
-Brawl1: 11 stages, MK legal
-Brawl2: 21 stages, MK banned
-Balanced Brawl: idk about stages yet, probably make it kinda short like 15 or something to help people to focus on characters' changes, and thus keep interest in the game.

All featuring FLOSS and not going to the same stage twice a set.

If everything goes just as planned, it is gonna be awesome.