Legality Tentative: MBR Official Ruleset for 2012

[Luma]

^ Good point Kage saying Peach vs Ganon is broken on KJ64 because of this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTNaAUJZz5k

Is the same as saying that Fox can't beat Shiek on dreamland because of this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yI_hGcWjTKA

what a stupid post

 

[Strife]

And who's fault is that? The stage or the player?

Weird, I was backing up your point and now it seems like you're arguing with me. It's the player's fault obviously.

what a stupid post

Make a point instead of posting dumb insults, you dumb dum.

 

[trahhSTEEZY]

Weird, I was backing up your point and now it seems like you're arguing with me. It's the player's fault obviously.

came off like you were against him to me..

-nvm read your post wrong.


also why can't a specific match be an example, if the example can't be something that you can counter? You can watch 100 matches of a ganon not being able to catch a fox/whoever, it's all the same. if the problem can be countered then that's one thing, but if ganon can't catch a faster character regardless, then thats all there is to it.

 

[Divinokage]

came off like you were against him to me..

-nvm read your post wrong.


also why can't a specific match be an example, if the example can't be something that you can counter? You can watch 100 matches of a ganon not being able to catch a fox/whoever, it's all the same. if the problem can be countered then that's one thing, but if ganon can't catch a faster character regardless, then thats all there is to it.

Ya the first reply threw me off too, but ya I get it now.

But I was just pointing out that the Ganon vs Peach strictly is not correct evidence to prove that it is possible to do that because Ganon was not taking the proper opportunities to catch her and that's the player's fault not the stage. But I mean yes of course there are other match-ups which will be pretty much unwinnable if you do it right on KJ but Peach vs Ganon is not one of them.

 

[trahhSTEEZY]

what opportunities was he missing? you say he didn't approach but he seems to try the entire time without walking into pointless hits

it seems like he could get hits in, but not at a fair enough rate.. like peach was able to get free hits throughout the whole match, while rock was working towards like single uairs here and there.

 

[Divinokage]

what opportunities was he missing? you say he didn't approach but he seems to try the entire time without walking into pointless hits

it seems like he could get hits in, but not at a fair enough rate.. like peach was able to get free hits throughout the whole match, while rock was working towards like single uairs here and there.

I guess I could try to look at the match and try to point out where he could of hit her.. but I really don't feel like watching a camping match.. I hate them personally. But I mean usually when a Ganon is below Peach, that's really good and I don't think he took all the opportunities to punish her.

 

[Bones0]

I don't want to argue for Hylian, but I felt the need to interject here: you're clearly just arbitrarily balancing the game when you make arguments like this. Ness can never contest Sheik's victory on any of the stages, save for maybe by exercising an esoteric strategy on a counterpick stage. Should we ban Sheik?

Individual characters do not determine balance in a large enough degree to warrant bans. It's too bad that Ness can't beat Fox at all on certain stages, but that is not an inherently bad thing. It's just a character weakness. On the other hand, if there were only 4 viable characters against Fox on Kongo Jungle, you'd have a point, and the only thing we could do from there is argue on the number (i.e., the cutoff) of characters who should be viable on any given stage.

If, however, you feel 8 is too few a number, you're inherently contradicting yourself by not banning Sheik. We can go through the numbers and note that, at high level play, the following characters have a chance against Sheik:

1) Fox
2) Falco
3) Jigglypuff
4) Sheik
5) Marth
6) Peach
7) C. Falcon (detestably)
8) Ice Climbers

You can possibly introduce another character or two (depending on what your threshold for viability is), but it should be clear that a high level Sheik will beat any Dr. Mario, Ganondorf, Samus, Pikachu, Mario, Luigi, DK, Link, Y. Link, Zelda, Roy, Mewtwo, Yoshi, Mr. Game & Watch, Ness, Bowser, Kirby and Pichu as often, on every stage, as Fox will beat Ness on KJ.

If you want to get rid of the stage, but not Sheik, either I'm off on the matchups (which I'm willing to admit is possible, though I sincerely doubt), or you're creating a contrived rule along the lines of "stages can't make viable only 8 characters, but characters can."

You're WAY overestimating low tier matchups. Ness CAN'T beat Sheik? That statement is laughable. It's also hilarious you put Pikachu on the list considering Axe beat M2K's Sheik at Zenith, and he ended up losing as Falco. Shroomed, while he still lost, showed it was certainly possible for him to win against M2K at Genesis. Sheik at the very least has to land grabs, and that in itself isn't some sort of guaranteed scenario. Ask any IC player. I feel like you must have never actually played this game to actually believe that Sheik vs. a low tier is even close to comparable to things like Hyrule/KJ64 stalling.

 

[Deleted member]

Theres a difference between timing out the opponent in say, street fighter, where both players are constantly in reach of each other and it basically takes a lot of effort by the players to make the time out happen. In melee, you don't always have the ability to catch your opponent. If the faster character gets the lead and simply decides never to get caught, he wont. Stages that don't allow you to catch your opponent have always been banned because of this issue. Hyrule, Termina, Yoshi's Island 64 and probably others are all banned for this reason.

Actually, all 3 of these stages were banned SPECIFICALLY because of Fox. And many, MANY other stages. TheMoreYouKnow *whistle*

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

Uhh those 3 were not banned specifically because of fox. Fox may be the best at abusing them, but the stages fundamental problems were the reason... i watched ORLY time out some guy in friendlies on hyrule recently just because falcon is stupidly fast.

Yoshis Island 64 Is just as abusable by falco, if not more.

Termina is abusable by falco just as much and there are other characters that can abuse the circle too.

 

[Acryte]

Axe is too good.

Edit: Honestly this kind of an argument will never conclude. You have people who argue for items, banning characters, and saying that running away all match is a legitimate strategy. Im all for (legitimately competetive) stage diversity but this is getting ridiculous.

That's the reason why I drew out a model for these kinds of things because then the argument is debating key values or specific values like how many chars are affected etc.

Otherwise its just a mostly aimless argument. Some posts are productive but some just seem like diversionary wastes of time where someone is quibbling over semantics more than practicality...

 

[Bones0]

The problem with the model is people will just debate that instead, and end up citing the same examples they are now. We might as well cut out the middle man and discuss how broken a tactic is instead of discussing whether the tactic fits the model's description accurately enough... to be deemed broken.

 

[Acryte]

Right but the idea is that at some point we accept what values and criteria are up for debate and which ones that are decided upon and not up for debate at least... then its more people discussing how the stage falls within said criteria which is kinda more productive than running in circles (no pun intended). I guess I just htink that if cactuar isn't looking for certain things we are wasting what could be positive by quibbling over **** that won't change in this ruleset. The largest problem are people who disagree with very fundamental aspects and values of certain rulesets.

There is practically no merit in arguing those fundamental aspects because those are the ones that will be nearly impossible to get someone to change opinions on. Things like items, or that Timing someone out is an acceptable strategy. The whole reason the timer is used is to force people to approach... so the game can continue. The allotted amount of time decided upon is to promote fighting... I don't understand how anyone can actually get hung up arguing for it being legitimate when half the rules in place are to try and make sure it doesn't happen -_-

Also in melee, from an outside perspective, matches like those reflect poorly on the community and the competitiveness of the game. In fact, the player doing it probably feels bad about even doing it to someone else. I can't really imagine it being enjoyable for either person... which is what we want right? A game where both players feel like they lost and no one has fun.

 

[ShroudedOne]

At the end of the day, when you are in tournament, you must play to win. If that means running time, then so be it. Sure, it isn't fun for a lot of people, but:

1) Some people actually have fun playing that way.
2) A setting is only truly competitive when everyone is doing what they are best at to win, or what they think will net them a victory. Who is the most skillful with their strategy? Do I think that we should be trying to keep the game fun? Well, at what cost, is the question, and that's a different point, anyways. But my point is that time outs are not, in and of themselves, non-competitive. It's simply a different showing of skill.

Now, if you were to argue that time outs slow down the tournament, and make running it more unproductive, that is a more legitimate claim, because quite frankly, we don't have a definition for a "legitimate strategy," that people will be able to agree on. Sure, there are obvious things, but there are also issues such as wobbling, time outs, and even camping, that some people would call legitimate, and some would not. You first need to know what legitimate means, before we start placing things in boxes.

Also, I don't see what problem people have with arguing the fundamentals. You cannot legitimately fix something if the process that you're operating under is flawed itself. It's like trying to fix certain parts of a building without realizing that the underlying structure itself is what causes the issues. There is no problem with Kal arguing the fundamentals, simply because people are being hard-headed about them. Sometimes, when you're trying to fix something, you have to go all the way back to square one to do so. Being afraid, or reluctant, to challenge the ideas on which you founded the ruleset itself does nothing for the health of the ruleset in the long-run, because it will always be inherently flawed.

The arguments as to why the rules are inherently flawed have been given (mind you, I am NOT saying whether or not I agree with them), and you should at least reason why those flaws that Kal and others have pointed out are not true. This way, discussion can become oriented towards the actual rules, and their problems.

Trust me, I play this game for fun, as do most people. I want it to look fun and feel fun and be fun for as long as we can keep it alive, so that new people will always come in, and new things will always be discovered. To be honest, though, some people are entering tournaments just for the money. There are always people in it just for the money, or even just to beat people, or to humiliate them. The ruleset should cater to competition, not necessarily to having fun (in my opinion anyways), only because fun is really, really player dependent, and trying to quantify it will get no one nowhere.

I hope that makes sense.

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

My problem with arguing ideals is that its pointless at the end of the day. Make a ruleset that is more fair and we'll talk.

 

[FerrishTheFish]

My problem with arguing ideals is that its pointless at the end of the day. Make a ruleset that is more fair and we'll talk.

If someone like me or Kal came up with the best ruleset ever, you still wouldn't accept it because it is contrary to YOUR idea of "fair." Nobody is arguing that this new ruleset does not conform to YOUR idea of "fair." What we are arguing is that your idea of "fair" might not actually be fair.

Specifically, we have been arguing that the previous ruleset is more fair than this new one--if you're still claiming that nobody has suggested an alternative to the new ruleset, then apparently you have been willfully ignoring this fact. But the old ruleset doesn't conform as well to YOUR idea of fair. Unless you can be a little more open-minded in what makes a ruleset "fair," you won't accept any ruleset we come up regardless of whatever evidence or arguments we offer.

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

Either you believe counter picks can be empirically judged as less fair than neutrals or you say that they can't be judged as any different than neutrals. You can't say the former and then say that a fair ruleset includes those stages in a tournament environment where players are expected to abuse the rules in any possible way in order to win. If you say the latter, I can only say to you to play the game more. Attend or host a tournament with those stages and play them against good players who are abusing the most gay (read: effective) strategies possible.



edit- I hate bringing skill level into the argument but sometimes it has to happen. If someone comes in here saying "falcon > fox because of grabs, tech chases and auto combos" the only real response is "no, you're wrong, play better foxes"

 

[Acryte]

Each character has his or her own moves and properties. Some characters have decently disjointed hitboxes on their bairs; some their dairs. Some fall fast, some slow. The cumulative effect of their move coverage, movement speed, falling speed and all their various other intricacies will determine how good of a character they are. If they have lots of slow moves that don't connect to anything, they're really big targets, or they're super light for example, they are at a disadvantage in these areas. As those disadvantages stack up, you will notice their placings and overall viability in matchups decreases. This is the natural way of things. Cause and effect.

Whatever matchups result based upon these inherent abilities of the characters are fair, regardless of if it is a terribly one sided matchup. Just because you chose bowser doesn't mean they shouldn't play shiek. If we agree all characters are not bannable then we agree all matchups are allowed and fair. No one can cry "No fair he picked fox!". These are the natural character matchups and are generally either viable or not viable. Neutrals/CPs should not cater to making unviable character matchups viable or even look at unviable matchups to determine if the stage is Neutral/CP or bannable.

If a stage makes for example 6 different characters unviable in like 4 naturally viable matchups each. That would be pretty insane. One could say the stage provides too great an effect on the outcome of the fight. This is because for example IC's vs Fox is generally considered (not tryin to debate exact percents here) somewhere around 50:50 to 40:60 Fox. Now, if they go pokefloats, and it suddenly becomes almost completely unwinnable say 15:85 (not sure the actual numbers, this is just an example), one might say the stage decided the winner a whole lot more than the players themselves.

If this seemed to be the case for some predetermined amount of characters and matchups, one could make a strong argument that the stage provides much too great an effect on the winner of the fight. Whereas before all these characters had viable matchups, now they all have unviable matchups. This would suggest that the stage obviously provides an unfair advantage, or unfair disadvantages. In that case, the stage should probably be banned.If the stage does effect viable matchups but the matchups remain viable, then it could possibly be a counter pick stage. It could also possibly have too great an effect on the players or individual stocks. If the effect is too strong, then its probably providing an unfair advantage and should probably be banned. If not, then it should remain a counter pick.

That's basically fair in a nutshell. If you wanna ***** about fair, then propose what you think the definition of fair is. It's easier to shoot **** down and never get anything accomplished than it is to actually propose an idea.

 

[Acryte]

 

[Hylian]

This is because for example IC's vs Fox is generally considered (not tryin to debate exact percents here) somewhere around 50:50 to 40:60 Fox. Now, if they go pokefloats,

The problem with the above is you put "If they go to pokefloats". You are already basing the match-up off a predetermined stage. A character can be bad on a stage and it makes them inherently worse as a character, it doesn't make the stage broken. If a stage reduces the number of viable options on it to one thing, then you could say the stage is at fault for over centralization, but you cannot claim the stage is at fault when you picked a bad match-up of your own free will.

 

[Acryte]

Hylian, thats why I said you have to look at multiple characters and their matchups, if it is affecting a bunch of them it's more than likely the stage's fault and too strong to be considered a CP. (This isn't saying much really, more like assigning words to common sense or basic rationale)

That's why for the ICs vs Fox example I said that it also heavily affected many other usually viable matchups and made them unviable then obviously its OP. Honestly, you don't need to take it to a stage by stage basis to conclude that Falco vs Fox is a viable matchup. Same with most matchups, you can generally say its viable or unviable without needing to say on which stage specifically. If a stage takes 6 characters and makes all their matchups on that stage go to **** then you can be sure it has a major effect on the outcome of the match.

 

[FerrishTheFish]

I hate bringing skill level into the argument but sometimes it has to happen. If someone comes in here saying "falcon > fox because of grabs, tech chases and auto combos" the only real response is "no, you're wrong, play better foxes"

Not gonna pretend that I can compete on their level, but I have played with Forward, Wobbles, Axe, Taj, Tai, and all the best players in AZ. Don't try to tell me that I've never played good players or that I've never seen good players use effective strategies.

If you wanna ***** about fair, then propose what you think the definition of fair is. It's easier to shoot **** down and never get anything accomplished than it is to actually propose an idea.

Wow. Way to make a mature point. Maybe we should talk about the definition of "mature" first. I'll give you a hint: it has more to do with keeping your cool and less to do with making the kids leave the room first.

I seem to recall arguing in favor of my definition of "fair" AND proposing two rules (found in my signature) that would allow us to add in the CP stages and still form a middle ground between the "more stages" side and the "less stages" side. I'd really like you to read my posts before calling me a ***** who just shoots **** down, never gets anything accomplished, and doesn't propose ideas.

My definition of a "fair" ruleset is one that allows the more skillful players to win more consistently, but also allows players of all skill levels to demonstrate their skills. Since the second clause belongs in the realm of the CP system, I'll focus on the first clause and specifically on the key word "players."

Players: As in the people who play the game, not the characters they play. I've brought this point up before, but it's not that hard to learn a second! Just because your main is not good on all legal stages does not mean the stagelist has to change. Link is terrible on YS, but if I told you to take that stage out because it makes bomb-camping and tech-chasing invalid strategies, you'd laugh at me and tell me to use a different character on that stage. Believe it or not, I understand that player performance is partially based on character potential. I understood that when I chose to main Link. What, then, is the difference between my choice to main Link and your choice to not learn a second?

I fail to see how it is "unfair" to encourage players to learn a secondary character. I fail to see how it is completely unreasonable to expect good players to keep their main at peak potential and also have a competent second. Forcing players to learn THREE characters to deal with tons of random stages would be unreasonable, but good players should have no problem learning at least two characters.

"Overcentralizing" is an issue that has been brought up. Yes, a stage should be banned if it overemphasizes one strategy to the EXCLUSION of all others. We've discussed this, and someone said that KJ64 required players to use Fox, Falco, or Falcon (and honestly, all three of these characters make excellent seconds to use on stages other than KJ64, so that in and of itself is not a bad thing). But now I ask you: Once both players are using Fox, Falco, or Falcon, is the match still decided SOLELY by camping? Seriously, when was the last time you saw a Falcon ditto on ANY stage boil down to "one Falcon gave the other 10% and then they stood on opposite sides of the stage and naired for eight minutes?" Hyrule is and should be banned because even if both players use Fox, the match STILL comes down to circular camping. KJ64 should not be banned because other strategies are still relevant on it.

If anything, limiting the stage options to just six "overcentralizes" the game. If one or two characters are good on ALL legal stages on top of being good in almost all matchups, what reason would anyone have to learn any other character?

 

[Kal]

You're WAY overestimating low tier matchups. Ness CAN'T beat Sheik? That statement is laughable. It's also hilarious you put Pikachu on the list considering Axe beat M2K's Sheik at Zenith, and he ended up losing as Falco.

Do I even need to cite the difference between individual examples and any sort of theoretical probabilities attached? In other words, it's also hilarious that you mention Axe beating M2K's Sheik at Zenith, because I've seen [insert anecdote that agrees with my point of view].

Shroomed, while he still lost, showed it was certainly possible for him to win against M2K at Genesis. Sheik at the very least has to land grabs, and that in itself isn't some sort of guaranteed scenario. Ask any IC player. I feel like you must have never actually played this game to actually believe that Sheik vs. a low tier is even close to comparable to things like Hyrule/KJ64 stalling.

We're talking about brokenness here. No, I would not say that Sheik is as broken as Hyrule (this is obvious: Hyrule makes choosing Fox the only viable strategy). On the other hand, KJ64 allows for how many characters to be viable? And what do we mean by viable?

If you're going to tell me that the Sheik vs. various low-tier matchups are not bad enough to warrant a Sheik ban, that's fine. But then you're going to have to prove that sufficiently many matchups are bad enough on KJ64 to warrant its ban. Even if we grant you that only 8 characters become viable on that stage, you've made no argument for why that's sufficient to ban it.

My problem with arguing ideals is that its pointless at the end of the day. Make a ruleset that is more fair and we'll talk.

I find it very annoying when people QQ about how pointless discussions are, as though our discussions here will affect local tournaments throughout the country either way, or that we'll fix the economy by avoiding a discussion on ideals in particular.

It's absurd. Virtually all discussion is "pointless" at the end of the day. Dismissing it for that reason means you should just stay at home and watch TV. Preferably something easy to absorb, like Fox. I hear Seth MacFarlane has the same show running three times now.

Either you believe counter picks can be empirically judged as less fair than neutrals or you say that they can't be judged as any different than neutrals. You can't say the former and then say that a fair ruleset includes those stages in a tournament environment where players are expected to abuse the rules in any possible way in order to win. If you say the latter, I can only say to you to play the game more. Attend or host a tournament with those stages and play them against good players who are abusing the most gay (read: effective) strategies possible.

If you say the former, I can only say that you are a scrub and need to play to win. Read Sirlin's Playing to Win or just stop making excuses for yourself when you lose. Develop as gay (read: effective) strategies as possible on these stages.

 

[Cactuar]

Lmao. What are you guys even arguing about?

(Hint: Nothing important.)

 

[KishPrime]

Remember kids, if it's not important to Cactuar, it shouldn't be discussed on a public internet message board or else he will point it out.

 

[Strong Badam]

Lmao. What are you even talking about, KishPrime?

(Hint: Nothing important.)

 

[Beat!]

You're so predictable, FrameBad

 

[KishPrime]

Lmao. What are you even talking about, KishPrime?

(Hint: Nothing important.)

5 stars and counting!

 

[Divinokage]

Well one thing for sure is that only 6 stages balances the match-up in a very good way. If Brinstar was on, then I would win game 2 automatically almost. Foxes can try to run away but Ganon's uair covers the whole stage so they can't do **** about it. =P

 

[Strife]

I think people who have issues with this ruleset would have better luck making threads about it. Cactuar is a tyrant, you can't convince him of anything. Just try to convince the community that he's full of ****.

 

[Fortress | Sveet]

If you say the former, I can only say that you are a scrub and need to play to win. Read Sirlin's Playing to Win or just stop making excuses for yourself when you lose. Develop as gay (read: effective) strategies as possible on these stages.

The fact is that in a competitive environment such unfair strategies don't belong. Circle camping and similar extreme advantageous defensive strategies are close enough to unbeatable when executed correctly that the game is no longer has fair win conditions for both players.

 

[Acryte]

Ferrish, that wasn't directed specifically at you homie, just at people in general. Seeing as how noone can agree on anything. Like what fair means etc.

I agree with sveet there. The rules are basically made to promote fighting and attempt to discourage those kinds of strategies as best it can because noone wants to see that. If in basketball persay the rules allowed for some ultra lame strategy where some bigass dude was able to swat the ball off the rim everytime it was about to go in then they obviously would introduce rules to avoid those kinds of situations, like offensive interference and also goal tending. A major aim of the sport is to create rules that make the sport enjoyable for both players and fans.

Also Cactuar pretty much sayin how I feel about many of these arguments, I like when we are specifically discussin stages but when we start getting sidetracked with stuff that has no chance of changing ... idk man its kinda wasting the opportunity we have here to affect the tentative ruleset. My stance is still supporting CPs if they don't provide too unfair an advantage or too great an effect on individual stocks. Personally I'd rather concentrate on discussing the legitimacy of each stage in question vs something crazy like the illegitimacy of democratic process or something.

 

[KishPrime]

The fact is that in a competitive environment such unfair strategies don't belong.

Actually, so long as both players have the opportunity to circle camp within their range of choices (and they do), the one thing that you cannot question is that it is fair.

If you're going to argue against circle camping, you have to use one of these criteria:
-single-tactic gamebreaking effect leading to overcentralized metagame
-goes against spirit of the game
-not fun

I think that's about it, really. I hate it when people misuse the word fair. Something is fair so long as both players have the same opportunity, or so long as both players are subject to the same game conditions. An example of unfair conditions are starting spots on asymmetrical stages - though this particular example does not generally provide a meaningful effect.

 

[ShroudedOne]

Okay. Someone explain to me why, when determining a competitive ruleset, why fun should be a factor. Cause I don't see it, so perhaps someone can explain it in a way that makes sense to me?

 

[Strong Badam]

circle camping is not available to all players unless you assume they choose Fox, Falco, or similar characters. essentially forcing character selection even more than the game naturally does (only top 8 is really viable) because of ******** stages is a bad thing.


ShroudedOne: I like having fun more than not having fun.

 

[KishPrime]

circle camping is not available to all players unless you assume they choose Fox, Falco, or similar characters.

Yes, thus it is available to all players.

Character diversity is a spirit of the game/fun argument, not a fairness argument.

 

[Strong Badam]

i edited my post BRO

 

[KishPrime]

That's fine. It's a good argument under any of those criteria, for the most part. While "fun" and "spirit of the game" are not particularly objective criteria, they are certainly criteria one can use in this argument.

 

[Strong Badam]

Yeah, there's no way you're going to be able to objectively justify any ruleset without it being a terrible one in the eyes of like everyone.

 

[ShroudedOne]

So then how can you strive for one that is fair? (mind you, devil's advocate)

 

[KishPrime]

Yeah, there's no way you're going to be able to objectively justify any ruleset without it being a terrible one in the eyes of like everyone.

This isn't really a true statement. Plenty of games have objectively defined rulesets.

Unless you just mean for Smash. In which case I'd still disagree with you, but I agree with the premise that no ruleset will ever make everyone happy in a game with literally thousands of variables and player options.