Stock : Time Discussion

[Shaya]

As much as people ***** about brawl tournaments taking forever, I very much doubt the length of time extra is in the 50% longer range. If it is, it's definitely a tournament organiser thing. I would say even a third longer is probably a stretch.

But there's a lot to be said with design intentions. How long should a game of smash be? At the very least Sakurai has given us the nod towards 5 minutes and has correlated that to 2 stocks (where we know 3 stocks would be insane). When only 3 months ago the standard was 3 or 4 stocks 8 minutes (going by their official tournaments and demo defaults), and you're sitting here defending arbitrary decisions from over a decade ago that we now see as standard against other standards based from those same decisions... What was your stance on 4 to 3 stock when Brawl came out... the same?

And comparing any other series to Smash isn't going to be shifting my thoughts much, personally.
A set of time out match ups taking 15 minutes over 24 is a good thing. I'd rather not actually kill the prevalence of time outs being a valid winning option while at the same time appeasing to the viewer audience.

 

[Hylian]

I don't care if "the scene" as a whole grows to like playing 5 smash games or 20 fighters or loves to have a mariachi band play a song whenever someone gets a shine spike in tournament.

The ruleset and format for Smash 4 should in no way be altered at its core simply to make room for other games which, conveniently, aren't lowering their stock count.

You want to edit games to make room? Make Melee 3 stock and PM 2 stock. Their tournaments will run faster and you'll have time for Smash 4.

The 3rd largest smash tournament of all time is lowering the stock count of PM to make sure it runs efficiently, this is already happening(by the considered best tournament organizer in the scene).

Also, the rules at your tournaments don't need to be affected by other regions, I'm not sure why you would bring that up as an issue. TO's have always had different rulesets to adhere to their needs/wants.

 

[Keitaro]

I'm actually confused as to why this discussion is about how long a tournament will take regarding rulesets. Even with 5 stocks and having PM and Melee at an event can still have an event end by 11 pm easily as long as enough planning is made.

My main concern is how long the actual matches are taking. Which is boring both players and viewers. With enough good reason I can consider keeping 3 stocks at my events. But as of right now that direction is seemingly going to make this game go downhill at a faster rate as it will continue to look and feel like Brawl. The game is certainly different, but not so much to stop others from already complaining day 1.

In short, unless I see some really good reasoning for 3 stock, I don't see why we can't have faster matches and better viewership with 2 stocks.

 

[Overswarm]

The 3rd largest smash tournament of all time is lowering the stock count of PM to make sure it runs efficiently, this is already happening(by the considered best tournament organizer in the scene).

Also, the rules at your tournaments don't need to be affected by other regions, I'm not sure why you would bring that up as an issue. TO's have always had different rulesets to adhere to their needs/wants.

That's one of the reasons I decided not to go to Big House -- PM is played at 4 stock and making it 3 stock to make room for other games is beyond dumb.

 

[Keitaro]

That's one of the reasons I decided not to go to Big House -- PM is played at 4 stock and making it 3 stock to make room for other games is beyond dumb.

I didn't actually know they were doing that. Interesting.

I'm not a big fan of changing the standard of a game's ruleset to fix tournament time issues. However Smash 4 has no standard ruleset just yet. Also the fix wouldn't be to allow tournaments to finish faster. At least for me.

 

[Overswarm]

I didn't actually know they were doing that. Interesting.

I'm not a big fan of changing the standard of a game's ruleset to fix tournament time issues. However Smash 4 has no standard ruleset just yet. Also the fix wouldn't be to allow tournaments to finish faster. At least for me.

Your reasoning, "more fun to play 2 stock", is valid. It's an opinion that can change from player to player, but it's valid and logically consistent.

 

[Strong Badam]

Hello folks, I "made" Project M and also lowered the stock count of The Big House (not Juggleguy, me) to 3 stock in order to save tournament time while running the best tournament of the year. I looked at a variety of statistics to make this decision. The main contributing factor which I think @Ishieymoro has brought up in this thread for Brawl already is that in high level Project M games, the winner of the game takes his opponent's 3rd stock first an overwhelming majority of the time (this statistic was notably lower in Melee sets). I didn't make this decision to make room for another game, another event, or anything, but because:
1. Results would not change drastically, or at all.
2. 15-20% time would be saved. This was vital to scheduling for our event, which is by far the largest event that still runs Round Robin pools, on top of our insanely high production quality.

So please understand what you're talking about if you're going to reference TBH4.

I don't much care to argue in this thread. I had originally written up sizable paragraphs about why I think 2 stock is a far better stock count than 3 stock for this game, but now I'm not even sure if 2 stock is. I think it will be EXTREMELY obvious that this game needs to go to 2 stock or perhaps even 1 stock after players implement the new survival/combo breaking nonsense I discovered. The community will make that decision regardless of what other games are at the event. Unless ZSS vs. Robin infinite stuff is found for the entire cast, this game is going to be "Win Neutral 20+ times per stock." That's fine, but not only are spectators not going to want to watch it, players aren't going to want to play it, and if players stop playing, you'll get your one-way ticket to Grand Finals in your 1-man bracket for 3-stock Smash 4.
No intentions of arguing with brick walls back here, lest I become one myself; the prominent TOs understand what needs to be done to ensure this game doesn't suffer Brawl's fate.

 

[Overswarm]

But Meta Knight doesn't seem broken in this game, why would we ban him?

 

[Keitaro]

I believe I see what you're getting at Strong Bad. I've seen tests on Brawl too that showed the person who takes the first stock has an 80% chance of winning a 3 stock match. If you count that for 3 possible matches, the player who would have won a 3 stock set still has over a 90% chance of winning a 1 stock set. 1 stock was actually supposed to be best of 5, so the chances of that player winning eventually becomes over 95%. I'm sure you already understand this type of discussion Strong Bad.

I personally don't see why PM has 4 stocks anyway. I was only questionable about the change to 3 since people have been running 4 stock everywhere for quite a while. But overall that change isn't something I'd complain about anyway.

 

[Overswarm]

Someone want to give me these numbers showing hard %?

 

[Marc]

I have said this elsewhere, but I think it's naïve to want to run singles and teams for 5 Smash games at the same event while the FGC has like one singles bracket for the entire community of their game. Way too many tournaments end late or not at all or heavily compromise on the format. In most cases you should really pick one or two games, unless you have a ****ton of set-ups and time. Not all Smash games will survive and thrive.

This should be discussed regardless of other events being held at the same time. We have a timer to ensure sets don't take more than a set time, beyond that we should be looking at what is optimal for the game under review. It's always going to be arbitrary, but I feel like less than 3 stocks will result in a lot of noise, outlier happenings pretty much winning the game (1 stock to 2 is way worse to overcome than 2 stocks to 3) and it is true that a larger "sample" will lead to more accurate results. I'd rather have longer sets with only 1 stock than a normal set with 2 stocks, but more than that I never thought Brawl's stock count was a problem. This game doesn't seem significantly slower yet, especially assuming we will all get a LOT better at it.

 

[Overswarm]

@ Marc

 

[KuroganeHammer]

I read this today:

http://smashboards.com/threads/blas...m-tourney-locators-invitation-tourney.368643/

 

[Deleted member 245254]

I sort of figured that people were going off of preconceived notions (IE "This game is kinda like Brawl!"), so it's fitting to see data that adheres to that theory.

It's important to remember the one very true thing that Overswarm mentioned which is always true...more stocks will 100% of the time leave less actual room for variance in who wins given one player is more skilled than the other.

Given the difference between 2 and 3 stocks is so notably small, at least with the data presented, can't we reasonably conclude, with objectification that 3 stocks is the more optimal format?

 

[Overswarm]

I want 3 or more stocks. I want 3 or more stocks badly.

But it is important to note that this is just one data point and there's a lot of information that may be relevant that is not there. We should start with more stock, not less, but we need to continue to collect data.

 

[Shaya]

Initial data is telling us 3 stocks/8 minutes is fine.
Stream sensationalism is something we're going to have to learn to deal with in a fair way (blatantly ignoring them isn't going to work, at the very least).
I think the weight of 2 stock/5 minutes will be heavy (and forever growing) due to it being the default settings given by the game and I wonder whether it'll be the same for the WiiU version (I suppose it would be, I guess they have this idea that a match commitment shouldn't be longer than 5 minutes).


I think we could rationalise reasons for both right now.

 

[Overswarm]

By all means, we should completely ignore stream sensationalism. Why would we not?

"Compromise" when compromise is unnecessary is counterproductive. It feels like an "adult" thing to do, but it's not. If streamers started playing with items, playing Rainbow Road only, FD mode only, or just refused to use one of Jigglypuff's hats we wouldn't use those as a baseline for anything. Two stock / five minutes is no different.

We have had to deal with tournament entrants asking "why no final smashes", "why is meta knight banned", "why can't I play on Summit it's my best stage", "we play 6 stock at my house", "why no items", "you allow chaingrabs?!", "hey, edgeguarding is unfair" and all sorts of other arbitrary questions and complaints. "I play 2 stock 5 minutes FD only online" will be no more difficult to deal with.

More importantly, streamers only use 2 stock 5 minutes because Sakurai told them to. Sakurai's intent with "for glory" was to create very fast one-off matches that you could play casually with no items and is, essentially, a caricature of what competitive play actually is. He took "No items, Fox Only, Final Destination" as a serious request -- we should not make the same mistake.

 

[Overswarm]

Hi Thinkaman!

I was curious about your data as I, too, think using 2 stock / 5 minutes is only done by those who don't know any better. :B

I foudn a fairly low-skilled online tournament here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ofv8fvTs4V8&index=1&list=PLaBw5s_0ChpSHBV9ulsnOXL1Xve02ZyMK


With 2 stock, 5 minute matches. My hypothesis is that lower skilled players will take longer. Given the LARGE skill gap between the players involved in this tournament (seriously, watch it) it should be that the majority of longer matches should be earlier and as a whole, when compared to your data, should be longer. By how much I'm unsure, but I consider my data the "top end" of Smash 4 game length.

The run down: 2 stock, 5 minutes.

1 stock victories: 43 (76.786%)
2 stock victories: 16 (28.571%)

Stock remaining total (I add up all extra stock, so if a game ends with 2 stock remaining, it's +2 to the total)
First game: 33
Second game: 15
Third game :15

Total sets: 24
2 game sets: 16
3 game sets: 8
Total games: 56

Number of timeouts: 3 (5.357%)
Number of timeouts caused by the same guy in the same set: 2

Set average time: 2 minutes and 56 seconds

Average time to lose a stock: 2 minutes, 7 seconds

Keep in mind that 'average time to lose a stock' can look misleading as not every stock is lost and timeouts make things wonky. Set average time is the real king.



THINKAMAN'S AVERAGE TIME: 2 minutes 38 seconds
ONLINE TOURNAMENT AVERAGE TIME: 2 minutes 56 seconds

That's a paltry 18 second difference between competitive smashers and a group of people playing in the online tournament.

No one knows what they are doing. Games will be getting faster as even the pros are still getting the "noob" time.

Here's player data:

I'll be releasing this automated spreadsheet data sometime in the future -- I have more work to do on it yet.

Posted here: http://smashboards.com/threads/blas...m-tourney-locators-invitation-tourney.368643/

2 stock is so not necessary.

 

[Krynxe]

I hope you guys realize that as the Brawl metagame grew, matches took longer and longer. People understood characters, matchups, and how to DI properly to live the longest. This will be just as true with Smash 4, with larger blastzones, several nerfs to character's killpower, and the newly discovered mechanic, Knockback Vector Addition, which lets you literally suffer less knockback with no downside (a mechanic that nobody at the invitational tournament understood or applied).

It's ridiculous to try to use the Smash 4 Invitation that just happened as a baseline for anything. I watched many of the matches, and a majority of the kills were followed by a reaction or expression that made it clear that they weren't expecting to be hit or lose a stock. This game is brand new, so of course people are going to get hit be smash attacks they haven't experienced before and mess up recoverying off stage. People were also playing carelessly and aggressively because they were eager to try new things. Players over-extended constantly because they were unsure of their character and their limits. This is completely natural since the game just came out, but we have to remind ourselves that this one small statistic bears no real weight for us here.

You all should know as well as I do, if we try to solidify a ruleset this early, it will be difficult to change people's minds later. People like to stick with what they are comfortable with, which is why I believe people are trying to push the brawl ruleset in Smash 4 so hard. The way I see it, we should keep things open as they are now. The smash 4 invitational was a great example, they used both popular formats, 2s and 3s, so players and spectators could give honest feedback to each. It isn't until we receive this feedback and get an honest understanding of what direction this game is going until we can come to something genuine and conclusive.

We have to look to the future, not the present, with our decision

Given the difference between 2 and 3 stocks is so notably small, at least with the data presented, can't we reasonably conclude, with objectification that 3 stocks is the more optimal format?

Wouldn't 2 stocks be the more optimal format? If the difference is so small, than we should choose the option that will allow tournaments and streams to be run more quickly, smoothly, and efficiently?

 

[Overswarm]

Do you have evidence that Brawl matches took longer, Krynxe? I saw matches take much longer in the opening months, and then it capped out and remained pretty constant amongst most matchups.

Wouldn't 2 stocks be the more optimal format? If the difference is so small, than we should choose the option that will allow tournaments and streams to be run more quickly, smoothly, and efficiently?

Why in the world would 2 stock be more optimal than 3? Because it "takes less time"?

Why not run 2 minute matches? Why not 1 stock? Why not make sets best of 1?

What do we gain by moving to two stock as opposed to 3 or 4?

 

[Deleted member 245254]

I hope you guys realize that as the Brawl metagame grew, matches took longer and longer. People understood characters, matchups, and how to DI properly to live the longest. This will be just as true with Smash 4, with larger blastzones, several nerfs to character's killpower, and the newly discovered mechanic, Knockback Vector Addition, which lets you literally suffer less knockback with no downside (a mechanic that nobody at the invitational tournament understood or applied).

It's ridiculous to try to use the Smash 4 Invitation that just happened as a baseline for anything. I watched many of the matches, and a majority of the kills were followed by a reaction or expression that made it clear that they weren't expecting to be hit or lose a stock. This game is brand new, so of course people are going to get hit be smash attacks they haven't experienced before and mess up recoverying off stage. People were also playing carelessly and aggressively because they were eager to try new things. Players over-extended constantly because they were unsure of their character and their limits. This is completely natural since the game just came out, but we have to remind ourselves that this one small statistic bears no real weight for us here.

You all should know as well as I do, if we try to solidify a ruleset this early, it will be difficult to change people's minds later. People like to stick with what they are comfortable with, which is why I believe people are trying to push the brawl ruleset in Smash 4 so hard. The way I see it, we should keep things open as they are now. The smash 4 invitational was a great example, they used both popular formats, 2s and 3s, so players and spectators could give honest feedback to each. It isn't until we receive this feedback and get an honest understanding of what direction this game is going until we can come to something genuine and conclusive.

We have to look to the future, not the present, with our decision


Wouldn't 2 stocks be the more optimal format? If the difference is so small, than we should choose the option that will allow tournaments and streams to be run more quickly, smoothly, and efficiently?

Shouldn't the format be chosen based on a formula that allows first and foremost for the most amount of room possible for the most skilled player to demonstrate consistent skill over their opponent above the goal of easing tournament organization?

To me, increasing the likelihood/consistency of the better player winning seems twice as important as tournament organization. In either case, 8 minutes, I presume, was chosen because that was the most amount of time a match could acceptably last before it became a burden on tournament schedules without affecting the integrity of a any given match in almost any way.

It's not just that though, three stocks just has the benefit of "feeling better" to the player, two just feels too quick & haphazard, where a single mistake is punishable by death and a loss.

That means, unless we have some kind of serious time-out issue using 8 minutes, I suppose I don't see why we'd have an argument for 2 stock in the first place.

If tournament organization is your only concern then why any amount of stocks? Just use 1 stocks and put a 2 minute timer on every single match and let 'em fly.

 

[Shaya]

Well OS, the primary reasons why we're fine with 3 stocks in Brawl is due to

1. It being the default option given in the game.
2. Pokemon Trainer and Lucario having mechanics that revolved around 3 stocks.
3. ZSS being a *****
4. Initial feels/sensationalism winning out after the 4 stock melee standard didn't "work".

How long a game/set should be is a pretty magical concoction by everyone's standards, I hope.
I'm under the impression Lucario's aura is only based off percent now rather than stocks. There are no armor pieces. There are no forced transformation characters.
I'm pretty sure this is the first smash game that hasn't had the default stocks as three. Throughout single player modes and in 1v1 as a default, 3 stocks it always was. The reason 64/melee have it different doesn't seem any different to what you want here.
Sensationalism sets standards that people will vouch for 6 years later as being the way we should play the game, rather than it being acknowledged as us maintaining a status quo.

 

[Deleted member 245254]

Well OS, the primary reasons why we're fine with 3 stocks in Brawl is due to

1. It being the default option given in the game.
2. Pokemon Trainer and Lucario having mechanics that revolved around 3 stocks.
3. ZSS being a *****
4. Initial feels/sensationalism winning out after the 4 stock melee standard didn't "work".

How long a game/set should be is a pretty magical concoction by everyone's standards, I hope.
I'm under the impression Lucario's aura is only based off percent now rather than stocks. There are no armor pieces. There are no forced transformation characters.
I'm pretty sure this is the first smash game that hasn't had the default stocks as three. Throughout single player modes and in 1v1 as a default, 3 stocks it always was. The reason 64/melee have it different doesn't seem any different to what you want here.
Sensationalism sets standards that people will vouch for 6 years later as being the way we should play the game, rather than it being acknowledged as us maintaining a status quo.

To be fair, 3 stocks is actually the "default" stock amount when you change the setting to stocks in multiplayer.

I wouldn't really call For Glory's setting a "default", because you can't change it. "Defaulted to" maybe, but unless we can change it the only logic we are implicating on 2 stocks being a better standard is a fallacy on a setting imposed on us by Nintendo.

There are all sorts of factors that may have gone in to them making it two stocks in For Glory, one of them majorly likely being to make play sessions more improved as a temporary Smash fix. This is not something I believe we should be taking to the equation when we think about what the optimal amount of stocks are for Smash 4 in a competitive environment.

 

[Shaya]

To be fair, 3 stocks is actually the "default" stock amount when you change the setting to stocks in multiplayer.

I wouldn't really call For Glory's setting a "default", because you can't change it. "Defaulted to" maybe, but unless we can change it the only logic we are implicating on 2 stocks being a better standard is a fallacy on a setting imposed on us by Nintendo.

There are all sorts of factors that may have gone in to them making it two stocks in For Glory, one of them majorly likely being to make play sessions more improved as a temporary Smash fix. This is not something I believe we should be taking to the equation when we think about what the optimal amount of stocks are for Smash 4 in a competitive environment.

Oh, that shoots me a little in the foot then~