The Brawl-Melee Debate: A Different View

[Yuna]

i also heard stale moves are good for making combos XD but people play this like melee and dont relize that ;p

Still not good enough. Stale moves also lessen hitstun.

 

[SLAYERCoLdKiLr]

I think this debate should be turned from what its on now, which seems to be why brawl should be taken away for melee.

AlphaZ had a great point. You can't tell the competitiveness of brawl while not having tournaments. And to anyone who argues this point just has a bias against brawl and this is why. I'm definitly one of those people for Melee above brawl, and I don't hide that fact while saying this. I believe though that brawl needs to have this kind of attention and trial and error period. Alot of people like brawl over melee, and now that it is the more popular and mainstream game, no one in the melee community can change that with a couple posts on smashboards on why melee is better than brawl to get it changed in tournaments.

Seriously, if they're are no brawl tournaments, then we totally give up a game that could have potential, not on a technical standpoint or "maybe they'll find a new glitch" or something like that, but just obtaining more skill than your opponents to get to the top. If it's bad people will see it for what it really is, if it's not then a bunch of melee players will stop playing melee and start brawl. Evo will have it's first brawl tournament and not just the smash scene, but every fighter scene will start to see its cons and pros, becuase the way melee went over at Evo, people won't have a problem seeing a difference in the two.

Melee players are pissed that the melee community is semi-dying, and they are right to feel troubled, cause I feel the same way. It would be the same if brawl came out after 64, then melee came out, going from defensive play in brawl to an offensive game. Instead of having this thread about which one should be the dominant game or which one has more skill, why not just everyone let brawl have as much time as it needs.

Brawl is a different kind of competitive than melee, but it still doesnt mean that it's not a competitive game. Things were installed in the game to deter competitive play but obviously people will find a way to make it competitive.

My final statement, this thread along with everyone who argues this is causing havok in the community. For **** sake, this is supposed to be a friendly community. Stop having this arguement over and over again. It's cool to talk about the differences in brawl(good or bad) because it's a better knowledge of the game. It's useful to talk about this.

This is Smash World Forums, Not Smash Melee World Forums or Smash Brawl Wold Forums. Remember that.

 

[P.E]

Probably the best posting I´ve read on this board.
Nice work, AlphaZealot.

 

[xatm092]

I think I only like Brawl more because I go back to Melee and I'm like "ZOMG the physics are so different! I can't remember how to play! Wow Marth's reach is insane!"

 

[Bobz]

if only brawl was a little faster across the board, and then it would be fun to watch matches again

great post alpha

 

[SiegKnight]

Oh, but there has! A new advanced tech was discovered recently. It's pretty complex, but most characters can do it. First, you press the 'A' button while standing still. Now, here's the tricky part: You have to press it again, and then one more time, all three in quick succession! Alternatively, you can hold the first press down, BUT DON'T RELEASE IT TOO SOON, otherwise you won't finish the combo. If you do it right, the effect will be three attacks firing off in a row which increase the combo meter in training mode! Many characters can even score 4 or more consecutive hits with this, and they all count toward the combo meter!

Seeing as I was the first to discover this, I have named this tech the "leaf combo." I think that the leaf combo is going to go far in competitive brawl. I know, this might be hard to take at first, and I'm sure it doesn't seem very believable. But it's real! You can really combo in brawl! Eventually everyone is going to be comboing in brawl like crazy, all thanks to the leaf combo.

this is the best post I've seen on the internet. probably not hard to be the best post on SWF, but its actually the best post I've seen... on the internet.

wtf.

 

[thumbswayup]

It was a very hilarious post.

 

[SiegKnight]

heh

BUT DON'T RELEASE IT TOO SOON

 

[Johnknight1]

Johnknight, you're a complete ******.

Talk about the negative Mr. Party Pooper.

Well if we're going to start nitpicking, your post was a tad short of being a motivational speech too.

I was merely pointing out how Johnknight spews out emotional bullcrap that's sure to appeal to Brawl noobs everywhere, all while adding absolutely nothing of worth to the actual conversation.

Also, is it your official job now to follow me around and make smart@ss comments wherever I post?

I'm just sick and tired of this endless debate, that basically gets us nowhere! Nowhere but the same crap OVER AND OVER AGAIN! If most of us spent half as much time debating this crap as we did digging for techniques, we'd have at least half a dozen techniques, guarenteed. You are the one who's being overly negative, and insulting people left and right, like you own the place. Basicall, all I stated was that I'm not planning on giving up on ANY of them anytime soon, and that more people should be like that. Tell me, what's so wrong with that? I might not have gone totally indepth, but I made a liable point. We can play multiple smash games, and advance at multiple smash games in unity, can't we=???

On another note, why can't we host more tournaments like the ones that host Melee AND Brawl. Those tournaments are totally revolutionary, and totally amazing. Since Melee and Brawl are bipolar opposites, seeing who performs the best in each game is quite intresting. In fact-let us extend a hand to smash 64. That way, we can have more intresting results, and bring out the best in people in each smash game. The way I see it, play the legendary series as a whole, or don't play it at all. We would basically end this stupid and seemingly never-ending debate, and we could advance on all three games. I mean, we should at least further try that with Melee and Brawl tournaments. Why not have constant competitions for all three smash games in one forum, instead of just one=??? We'd be a more united community, and we'd be far better off.

Also, did I say I favored Brawl? No. I said I like Brawl and Melee equally (thanks to Heavy Brawl ). But why must we look so bleakly at this situation? Is there anything wrong with liking all three games? So regardless if Brawl works out or not (and judging by the number of tournaments and their size, it's blowing Melee out of the water), we can always look for a solution. Like Heavy Brawl!

Also, don't forget that new Wii and GCN game editor ting. We can return tons of stuff. L-cancelling, wavelanding, dash dancing (to where it's actually USEFUL!), more hitstun, (WAVE DASHINGz!!!) etc. I think some people are going to get to work to completely editing Brawl for more technical, stragetic, and offensive depth, as well as to dimish (and destroy) tiers. We have got TONS of solutions if standard Brawl doesn't work out. So I wouldn't be so worried, negative, or afraid Brawl won't last very long competitvely. We've got a lot of options if we have to bail out on standard Brawl if we really need to, so we're basically set for a very long time. We could mod Brawl, combine it with a lot of stuff from Melee, and do a lot with it. Like give us the forbidden seven...hopefully!

Simple and sweet, we could easily have endless replay value soon thanks to all this game editing mumbo-jumbo stuff. O, and this "leaf combo" is t3h h@XX0rZ! I think for that post, you deserve to win the universe!

 

[SiegKnight]

Your passion and intention is appreciated, but your logic is pretty ********. Overall I'm not exclusive of everyone like most of the vainest community on the internet, Smash, is, so I do agree brawl and melee should be hosted under the same banner. The playstyle is so ridicolously seperate they won't ever replace each other even if Brawl became ridicolously complex all of a sudden; its just a naturally defensive game.

Although its an entirely different feeling from l cancelling everything and comboing like a psychopath in Melee, and getting a rushing momentum going, I actually enjoy playing Snake in Brawl over doing anything in Melee. More fun yet is that I prefer him over other characters in Brawl even more so but heh.

I like his psychological style, and the fact... He's Snake.

I at least play very diversively when I'm him, and I love it.

 

[SKnickers03]

great post...too bad its been expectedly fruitless

 

[MuraRengan]

**** AZ, did you post the same thing you posted on AiB? Or was thet the abriged version. Either way, I still see the same flaws in your logic as I did there.

 

[AlphaZealot]

Its the same, but AiB is a two part post.

 

[thumbswayup]

AZ, about the custom avatar again. You have to become a premium member to use a custom avatar? Do you have to pay to become a premium member? I've seen people who I'm almost certain do not pay for this site and have their own avatars.

 

[SiegKnight]

premium, mod, smash director

I think it sucks as I can't put this sig in my avatar

 

[Zankoku]

Moderators, people mods like, and former Premium members (as long as they don't change it after Premium is over) can have custom avatars, as well.

I think it costs $7 for a month of Premium.

 

[thumbswayup]

Ah, I see. Thanks.

Also how many tournaments does one need to hold in order to become a smash director?

 

[Yuna]

premium, mod, smash director

I think it sucks as I can't put this sig in my avatar

Smash Directors do not have custom avatars. I'm one and I can't change to a new custom avatar (though the one I uploaded while still a premium user is still in use).

 

[Rapid_Assassin]

Ah, I see. Thanks.

Also how many tournaments does one need to hold in order to become a smash director?

One. I've hosted 5 so far though.

 

[MorpheusVGX]

I like Brawl better for the following reasons ( in order or importance):

1. IT IS MUCH MORE BALANCED BY FAR. (Now that I see Brawl I despise Melee in terms of character balance). Sakurai did a splendid job with balancing 39 characters.

2. More characters.

3. More items.

4. More stages.

5. Stage builder.

6. Much more great songs.

Many of the things Melee Pros are complaining, were glitches. As such, they unbalance the game even more. Wave dash was the only glitch I liked. Wave shine was detestable. JC grab was cheap. Edge hogging was cheap too.

 

[ShadowLink84]

I like Brawl better for the following reasons ( in order or importance):

1. IT IS MUCH MORE BALANCED BY FAR. (Now that I see Brawl I despise Melee in terms of character balance). Sakurai did a splendid job with balancing 39 characters.

Which is why Marth still ***** near everybody.
Why Snake **** near ***** everyone.
Why Ganandorf and Captain Falcon are crap now.

2. More items.

New items I believe the number hasn't changed too drastically.

Many of the things Melee Pros are complaining, were glitches. As such, they unbalance the game even more. Wave dash was the only glitch I liked. Wave shine was detestable. JC grab was cheap. Edge hogging was cheap too.

L canceling had been in the game since 64.
Wavedashing was an abuse of physics it wasn't a glitch.
Glitches is Link's boomerang sending him to the top of the stage while he was tethering.
Glitch is Jigglypuff's FS lasting forever when the Eldin bridge is rebuilding

 

[Zankoku]

Haha. More balanced. Right.

I'm not even going to get into the whole glitch argument thing.

 

[ShadowLink84]

Ankoku who is that in your avatar?

 

[Zankoku]

It's Ciel, from Tsukihime/Melty Blood.

 

[ShadowLink84]

I did not recognize her o_o
Shame on me.

 

[MorpheusVGX]

Wow, so many responses in a short amount of time. Ok, wave dash was not a glitch. Still, the game is much more balanced and has more characters, stages, etc. No matter how much you complain, everyone is moving to Brawl. Overall, it is a better game. 5 years of Melee. It is time to move to something different.

I still don't get why you say Marth ***** everyone. I haven't seen a single tournament champ being a Marth player. Snake is not unbalanced. The thing is that new characters are getting more attention, and Snake is an interesting character. I've seen almost any character become deadly in the right hands. So.. do not blame balance... blame yourself.

C. Falcon a crap? Gosh.. you should research a bit more. Smash is not about your local gang. Go to the C. Falcon section and look for a C. Falcon Compilation Video and you will be scared of what Captain Knee is capable of. He is amazing.

In an unbalanced game, powerful characters are the most popular (ejem, Fox, falco, sheik, marth).

In a balanced game , popular characters are the most powerful (because people use them more and master them themselves and by seeing other players techs).

 

[Yuna]

1. IT IS MUCH MORE BALANCED BY FAR. (Now that I see Brawl I despise Melee in terms of character balance). Sakurai did a splendid job with balancing 39 characters.

O RLY?

2. More characters.

3. More items.

4. More stages.

5. Stage builder.

6. Much more great songs.

More is not necessarily better... especially not in terms of Competitive play.

Many of the things Melee Pros are complaining, were glitches. As such, they unbalance the game even more. Wave dash was the only glitch I liked. Wave shine was detestable. JC grab was cheap. Edge hogging was cheap too.

No... they... weren't. No matter how much you keep repeating this uninformed opinion for yourself, it won't magically change the facts.

The majority of the things you and others call "glitches" weren't glitches at all but meant to be in the game. Wavedashing was not a glitch. It was an unintended side-effect of several game mechanics working together.

Waveshining was not a glitch either since you've always been able to jump-cancel shines (even in Brawl). Wavedashing just allowed you to do more out of it than without it.

Jump-canceled grabs were cheap? How? Because some characters had faster grabs from a dash that way (and less lag in most cases)? How cheap! They suffered for this because the range was smaller, though.

Edgehogging was not a glitch. It is still in the game. It still works the exact same (edgehogging, that is), it's just been nerfed.

Still, the game is much more balanced and has more characters, stages, etc. No matter how much you complain, everyone is moving to Brawl. Overall, it is a better game. 5 years of Melee. It is time to move to something different.

More =/= Better. Numbers does not a good game make if the game itself is not good. So, the "more" argument is moot. Also, this is Competitive play we're talking about. Items are banned. More items = Inconsequential.

"More balanced", you say? The various infinites, chaingrabs, broken characters, tactics and camping say "Hi". It's at this moment just opinion which game is more balanced and nothing definite has been determined (yet).

Can you come up with any other valid argument besides the (at the moment) opinion-based "Balance Card"?

I still don't get why you say Marth ***** everyone. I haven't seen a single tournament champ being a Marth player. Snake is not unbalanced. The thing is that new characters are getting more attention, and Snake is an interesting character. I've seen almost any character become deadly in the right hands. So.. do not blame balance... blame yourself.

Because there haven't been many tournaments attended by many good people.

C. Falcon a crap? Gosh.. you should research a bit more. Smash is not about your local gang. Go to the C. Falcon section and look for a C. Falcon Compilation Video and you will be scared of what Captain Knee is capable of. He is amazing.

Captain Falcon is pretty crappt now. His Knee has been nerfed into infinity as has a lot of his other things. I've watched a few CF vids... they featured mostly escapable strings.

 

[Zankoku]

Still, the game is much more balanced and has more characters, stages, etc.

I still don't get this whole "balance" thing or whatever.

I still don't get why you say Marth ***** everyone. I haven't seen a single tournament champ being a Marth player. Snake is not unbalanced. The thing is that new characters are getting more attention, and Snake is an interesting character. I've seen almost any character become deadly in the right hands. So.. do not blame balance... blame yourself.

Marth has won two tournaments and placed top4 in no less than 11 tournaments. Snake has 14 TOURNAMENT WINS TO HIS NAME and 17 TOP4 PLACINGS. This is not just the result of "newer characters getting more attention." Snake is a good character. A very good one.

C. Falcon a crap? Gosh.. you should research a bit more. Smash is not about your local gang. Go to the C. Falcon section and look for a C. Falcon Compilation Video and you will be scared of what Captain Knee is capable of. He is amazing.

Meanwhile, I think I saw a Falcon place top4 in two tournaments out of the 42 tournaments I've gathered data from. I don't care about some stupid video, I care about results.

 

[NES n00b]

Wow, so many responses in a short amount of time. Ok, wave dash was not a glitch. Still, the game is much more balanced and has more characters, stages, etc. No matter how much you complain, everyone is moving to Brawl. Overall, it is a better game. 5 years of Melee. It is time to move to something different.

I still don't get why you say Marth ***** everyone. I haven't seen a single tournament champ being a Marth player. Snake is not unbalanced. The thing is that new characters are getting more attention, and Snake is an interesting character. I've seen almost any character become deadly in the right hands. So.. do not blame balance... blame yourself.

The first regional tournies (that I know of) were in late 2002 and the smash scene didn't really pick up till it was 2003 which was pretty close to 5 years ago, but I doubt you meant to do that. You most likely don't remember the game came out in late 2001 and is more close to 6/7 years.

JC grabs being cheap is laugable. How is this arguable? That people can spam grabs more? Cause then Sheik would have the best grabs by far as her dashgrab is the same lag as the JCed one but with more range. Anyone can do this technique easily so I dunno why this would be considered cheap.

Snake and Metaknight placing the highest is no accident. They are better characters and it is being shown more and more everyday. The game is not more balanced. Show me one instance of when Link won a tourney? How about Ganon or CF? Maybe Mario or Sonic? None of these characters are ever going to win a tourney ever (that is reasonably good). Mostly, Snake and Metaknight dominate the top placings while some other pretty good characters pop out sometimes (whoa, just like Melee!!!!!). Bum got 4th in MLG, KaMaster got 9th at FC and 2nd in that UCLA monthly (lost to Hugs....so close >_<). I doubt equivalent characters in Brawl could stand that good a chance.

 

[MorpheusVGX]

Why do I always feel like speaking with insolent brats in here?
You call tournaments absolute results?
What if the best players prefer using the same characters? Do you think tournaments rankings until now determine everything about characters potential? You are very wrong.

More for a game, makes it a better game if things are balanced and well put.

Yuna, you always with your wrong ideas about competition. This topic is not about non-item play (which you call competitive for some wrong reason). So Items are part of this game and makes it better or worse. More characters make competition more diverse and interesting, the same as items. But you deny that for your elitist view of 1 vs 1 non-item play.

 

[Zankoku]

Why do I always feel like speaking with insolent brats in here?
You call tournaments absolute results?
What if the best players prefer using the same characters? Do you think tournaments rankings until now determine everything about characters potential? You are very wrong.

Potential, potential, potential. Everyone throws that around, because they're losing in the present so they have to be engrossed in the future.

Brawl is potentially a better game than Melee.
A Luigi can potentially win a major tournament.
Garbage stocks can potentially get you a lot of money.

Why should I be interested in potential if it's not even being shown that there is any? Why should I value potential over present? Potential will not dictate fate, and I suggest you not presume it to do so.

 

[NES n00b]

Why do I always feel like speaking with insolent brats in here?
You call tournaments absolute results?
What if the best players prefer using the same characters? Do you think tournaments rankings until now determine everything about characters potential? You are very wrong.

How do you say we take measurements of character potential? By abstract ideas of what "balance" characters in hypothetical "what if their characters were more devolped." Then I say every character in Melee could beat any other character in the game because the game was really well balanced, but people just haven't discovered everyone's true potential yet. Prove me wrong without both game knoweledge and tourney results which show that both Melee and Brawl are not totally balanced games.

More for a game, makes it a better game if things are balanced and well put.

Ok? I dunno what this has to do with anything unless you are talking about Yuna's "if basic gameplay sucks then additions matter very little" (paraphrase) which is pretty true. You even say so in your post in a sense "balanced and well put." The characters are just as unbalanced as lots of other fighting games and alot of the stuff put into the game is not well put. How could one not see Dedede's chaingrabs against alot of characters for miles away when playtesting. Or how about infinite grabs by Marth against Lucas and Ness by just pressing A while holding R? Really, it was not a very well tested game.

Yuna, you always with your wrong ideas about competition. This topic is not about non-item play (which you call competitive for some wrong reason). So Items are part of this game and makes it better or worse. More characters make competition more diverse and interesting, the same as items. But you deny that for your elitist view of 1 vs 1 non-item play.

You must be a troll. This has nothing to do with anything and you are too much a stereotype of some casual scrub. Right down to the elitist comments and throwing out how items make the game better. I don't think I will respond anymore because of this.

 

[studly]

what the heck does he think he means by balanced...
its been a while since i played melee..but i dont freking remember it being as umbalanced a brawl....as i see..most of you agree

 

[Nobie]

Something bothers me about some of the posts in this thread.

Every so often, someone compares Brawl and Melee to paintings. They'll say that Brawl is like a black and white or grayscale image, while Melee is painting with color. And they use this as an example of why Melee is better than Brawl, because color is clearly better than black and white, right?

WRONG.

If you went up to ANY good artist of ANY variety (commercial, fine arts, design, architecture, comics, illustration, you name it) and said "color is automatically better than black and white" you would be LAUGHED AT.

And yet people use this already ridiculous analogy for things like the level of hit stun or the power of shields between the two games. In using such a poorly thought out analogy, all that's realized is exactly the points that AlphaZealot made with his original post, that the games are different and that some fundamentals have been replaced by others (general approach strategies versus character-specific ones, for example).

In conclusion, if you're going to use an analogy at least try to use a good one because all that happens is that it weakens your argument.

 

[Dark Sonic]

^^Well, technically color has much more potential than black and white could ever have. But that's not really the arguement, and I've actually only seen that stupid paint analogy used once.

Also, you're interpreting the analogy wrong. The analogy was not about the painting, but rather the amount of colors (options) available to paint with. More colors (options) allows for more complicated paintings (strategies and metagames) to be developed.

It's still a bad analogy, but meh...

 

[FeArTeHsMaSh]

I will say that, in general, people enjoy watching a faster paced game than a slower paced game.

I enjoy watching Melee over Brawl for that very reason.

MorpheusVGX, do yourself a favor and refrain from posting. You sound exactly like all the other scrubs that have had their arguments shut down since the discussions over Wavedashing.

 

[MorpheusVGX]

Brawl is way better than Melee. Period.

I will say that, in general, people enjoy watching a faster paced game than a slower paced game.

I enjoy watching Melee over Brawl for that very reason.

MorpheusVGX, do yourself a favor and refrain from posting. You sound exactly like all the other scrubs that have had their arguments shut down since the discussions over Wavedashing.

You can go to hell. I am tired of silly brats flaming my posts. I already understood wave dash was not a glitch. I liked wave dash. It's the only thing I really miss from Melee.

Brawl is a better game than Melee, it is new, it is competitive and fun, and everyone is moving to it. This thread is not worth my time. See ya guys.

 

[MorpheusVGX]

How do you say we take measurements of character potential? By abstract ideas of what "balance" characters in hypothetical "what if their characters were more devolped." Then I say every character in Melee could beat any other character in the game because the game was really well balanced, but people just haven't discovered everyone's true potential yet. Prove me wrong without both game knoweledge and tourney results which show that both Melee and Brawl are not totally balanced games.

Ok? I dunno what this has to do with anything unless you are talking about Yuna's "if basic gameplay sucks then additions matter very little" (paraphrase) which is pretty true. You even say so in your post in a sense "balanced and well put." The characters are just as unbalanced as lots of other fighting games and alot of the stuff put into the game is not well put. How could one not see Dedede's chaingrabs against alot of characters for miles away when playtesting. Or how about infinite grabs by Marth against Lucas and Ness by just pressing A while holding R? Really, it was not a very well tested game.



You must be a troll. This has nothing to do with anything and you are too much a stereotype of some casual scrub. Right down to the elitist comments and throwing out how items make the game better. I don't think I will respond anymore because of this.

Your mama is the troll, brat. I've had my differences with Yuna before. He thinks what he talks is the law. That items are not competitive. etc. Item play should not be discussed here, I agree. But he says "this is about competitive play, = no items. Wtf ?? Who said this forum is about 1 vs 1 no item battles? I am already tired of this crap.

 

[leafgreen386]

You can go to hell. I am tired of silly brats flaming my posts. I already understood wave dash was not a glitch. I liked wave dash. It's the only thing I really miss from Melee.

Brawl is a better game than Melee, it is new, it is competitive and fun, and everyone is moving to it. This thread is not worth my time. See ya guys.

lol cop out

So instead of just admitting that you can't win this, you decide you can have the "last word" by saying 1) something wrong, 2) something irrelevant, 3) something also wrong when compared to its predecessor, and 4) something completely objective, oh, and then 5) something wrong, as if it's all fact.

Brawl isn't "better" than melee, the same way checkers isn't better than chess. They're different games. They have similarities, but overall will draw different audiences.

No one will argue that brawl is new, but that doesn't mean a thing.

The only reason melee players play brawl is for the money. Brawl is less competitive than melee, and is likely to remain that way for a long long time. It's an inherently shallow game.

Brawl isn't "fun" to everyone. Many players find it excruciatingly boring, including myself.

And... the only people moving on to brawl are the nubs who have never played competitively in their lives. Melee pros are only moving on because they realize there's a lot of money to be made off of these nubs. Most prefer melee as a competitive game, and in fact many still do play melee.

So yeah... don't try to claim opinion as fact, or make obviously wrong claims, especially if you don't want people to respond to you.

 

[RDK]

Your mama is the troll, brat. I've had my differences with Yuna before. He thinks what he talks is the law. That items are not competitive. etc. Item play should not be discussed here, I agree. But he says "this is about competitive play, = no items. Wtf ?? Who said this forum is about 1 vs 1 no item battles? I am already tired of this crap.

Notice that 90% of the people who used SWF before the influx of Brawl idiots were competitive Smashers. SWF was the COMPETITIVE SMASH HUB of the internet. You joined late last year; how could you possibly familiarize yourself with what this entire community is about, especially with the trollish attitude you're displaying?

Your arguments suck, and you're an obvious troll. Get over yourself.

Also, people are not noticing important posts in this thread, which makes this scrub debate spin around in a hellish circle of idiocy, which is the main reason I steer clear of the Brawl Boards as much as possible now. I.E., oddly enough, Morpheus skipped right over this gem:

Potential, potential, potential. Everyone throws that around, because they're losing in the present so they have to be engrossed in the future.

Brawl is potentially a better game than Melee.
A Luigi can potentially win a major tournament.
Garbage stocks can potentially get you a lot of money.

Why should I be interested in potential if it's not even being shown that there is any? Why should I value potential over present? Potential will not dictate fate, and I suggest you not presume it to do so.