The Official "Should/Will Metaknight be banned?" Thread (LISTEN TO THE SBR PODCAST!)

[TL?]

Metaknight has no bad matchups. He has no even matchups. He completely dominates any character that is slow(ganon, ike, bowser), short ranged(jigglypuff, luigi, mario) or has a gimpable recovery(ness, lucas, ike, link, bowser, yoshi, mario, lucario, olimar). My suggestion is, have a few no metaknight tournaments and just see how that goes. Or maybe just make it so you can only be metaknight in 1 match out of 3.

 

[Yuna]

Yuna, the main issue here is that you do not care about the community, you care about what is logical.

I'm sorry, what? When did I ever say I do not care about the community. I said that doing something that is wrong for the wrong reasons is wrong, even if the community is better off for it because the only reason why they'd be better off for it is because of a choice the community has made, to either whine about Meta Knight or jump ship and main him, instead of simply getting better with other characters.

If we're just going to ban Meta Knight just for having no disadvantageous matchups despite him not really dominating tournaments as much as people seem to think, then we're doing something that is wrong for the wrong reasons.

It is bad for the community because:
1) It makes the community less credible.
2) It's something essentially wrong.
3) It's wrong to punish the Meta Knight players simply because people are whining about him and do not wish to play against him despite the fact that he's very much beatable (prove me wrong and I'll change sides).

You will never be proved wrong, simply because everyone agrees MK is beatable. But that's not why they want him banned.

Not everyone. In fact, many argue that his advantage is unfair or whatever.

Banning him due to popularity is bad. Meta Knight isn't really doing anything wrong, but because it's perceived as wrong and people are whining enough about it, it's OK to ban him? What will happen if (if) Marth or someone else rises to the same level? Another ban?

Why? Why ban not because it's a necessity but arbitrarily due to whining?

And yet, whenever someone says "MK is stagnating the metagame," you respond back with "But he's beatable."

He's not stagnating the meta game at all. The players are stagnating the meta game. No one is forced to switch to Meta Knight, they elect to simply out choice, despite the fact that there are several characters who stand very good chances at beating him. Instead of getting better as those, people go for Meta Knight.

We saw this in Melee (and in other fighters). People flock to the Top Tiers for an easy path to victory. So what. It will always happen. It's out of pure choice.

Banning him would be Scrubby behavior. An arbitrary ban because he's just too popular. And it sets a bad precedence.

You make points that are absolute fact that EVERYBODY sans ignorant people agree on, and act as if you've just proven that MK should not be banned.

Actually, you haven't been keeping up with the thread. Plenty of non-ignorant people have in some way disagreed with what I'm saying.

And, really, what am I supposed to do? Ignore the 290 people arguing the same inane things instead of setting them right? I argue against all arguments people throw at me.

Which is not the argument they presented. You dismiss their reason because it isn't logical. Yuna, at this point, anyone who believes MK should be banned since he's sucking the fun out of this game will not be convinced by you.

"He's sucking the fun out of the game" isn't really a good reason to ban him. Why is he sucking the fun out of the game, anyway? Because you have to face so many of him in tournaments? Here's a newsflash: Get better as your own **** character! Competitive play is not for everybody!

Competitive play involves money and people will do everything they can to win. If you dislike the rules, just quit. Don't demand they change because you're "no longer having fun". Competitive gaming is not about maximizing fun. Banning things to make things more "fun" is stupid.

Because if we're gonna do what, why not ban more things that make the game less "fun"? How about banning all of the various chaingrabs and locks? Certain characters are rendered unplayable, ever, due to random BS like Fox getting locked, chaingrabbed and whatnot by a large portion of the cast. I say ban all of those things against Fox! Then he'll be fun to play! Or something.

Only people who would be are those who are undecided and still think that people want MK banned because they think he's unbeatable. I.E. Those who are ignorant. Also, nobody except ignorant people believe 60:40 is hard.

Why can't I try to convince the ignorant? Why can't I try to enlighten them?

The fact of the matter is that very few people have ever, in this thread, presented the argument that "Let's ban Meta Knight simply because he's hurting the community". The vast majority of debaters have gone for the arguments you just declared inane. What am I supposed to do? Let them whine to their hearts content without opposition and wait for that elusive someone who presents your argument?

You just automatically assume that the only reason anybody would anyone want MK banned ever is because he's SOOO broken.

No I don't. What's up with this revisionist history? I've debated several people who brought up your argument. How is that not acknowledging they exist and that the argument exists?

You don't even live here in the United States. You've been here like, once. For only about a month and a half. You haven't paticularly grew up on our culture, how we are here. You've been on the messageboards, sure, but that doesn't really give you an impression of our culture, not really. Posts have no tone, no emotion.

So... since I don't live in the U.S., I have no right to be a part of this debate, is that what you're implying? Because, really, European Smash is almost the same as American Smash. Our communities are almost 100% in agreement with everything and Europe follows the SBR as well. Many Europeans (and Australians and whatevers) are a part of the SBR.

I'm a part of Smashboards, I play Smash Competitively, I have as much a right as anyone to debate the future of Competitive Smash.

What's so special about the American culture when it comes to Competitive gaming, anyway, at least when it pertains to this specific debate? What, Americans are more prone to whining and banning things for "sucking the fun out of things"?

So Yuna, I kindly ask you realize that nobody worth their salt believes MK should be banned STRICTLY because he's broken/overpowered or had 60:40 matchups across the board.

I'm sorry, when have I ever said anything that remotely sounds like "There are credible people who wish to ban Meta Knight strictly because he's 'broken/overpowered'"? Stop taking my words out of context and miscontruing them.

I realize this might be hard as I'm able to multitask both in real life and on message boards. A single post from me will contains replies to several people, some of them arguing entirely different points of view. This is in no way lumping them together as a single group, it is simply me not breaking forum rules by quintuple posting or whatever and merging replies together.

You can stay here and correct ignorance, but realize nobody who's not ignorant believes MK should be banned because he's over.

You should read my posts better instead of skimming a few of them and assume you know everything about me and what I think.

Oh, and as a little bonus: In this post I quoted, all you've talked about are the matchups statistics of certain characters from certain games. You haven't made a single point or inference as to what these mean.

I didn't? I specifically mentioned that having no disadvantageous matchups automatically means one needs to be banned. I also specifically mentioned that it doesn't even mean you have the best matchups in the game. Chun-Li has the best matchups in 3S, just like how Meta Knight doesn't have the best matchups in SSBB.

Your mistake here was reading one post that was a part of bigger picture (a conversation spanning several posts) and assuming that that was all there was to it, that one post. Obviously, after reading this one post (or rather two as you read the post I was quoting as well), you know everything that came before it.

And then you go on to talk about MK as if the person in the previous post actually SAID anything about him. Which he didn't.

I started the line of discussion by mentioning 3S and comparing it with SSBB. This other guy jumped in with more info about 3S. I elaborated and again mentioned how it's the same for SSBB. Your mistake was assuming these two posts were all there was to the conversation when there were, in fact, three posts involved.

 

[__V]

MK takes a huge piss over the meta-game.

Really, the only techs people look for at this point are ones to counter him. Is this not a problem?

MK has no counters, and cannot be countered by any character other than MK. If you beat a Meta-Knight with a character, good for you. This is not an argument.

MK cannot be edgeguarded. Unless we get some Ike players who can time Eruption PERFECTLY, no, he cannot be edgeguarded.

MK's edgehogging cannot be punished by any character. Not even another MK. He can camp indefinitely.

MK has wings. The only projectile that's remotely effective against him is fire breath. He can powershield and reach Falco as he's finished firing a 3rd shot, and then punish his ending lag.

Shuttle Loop has no weakness. The "it's weak at the top" argument is nonsense. A smart MK can simply wait to execute the attack. His glide attack out-prioritizes or cancels every other attack except for attacks with SA frames. His entire body transforms into one giant hitbox when he executes the glide attack.

Meta-Knight only has four punishable moves, and the moves are not necessary to his gameplay. If someone can counter these, the MK can simply stop using them.

Mach Tornado: Has very slight ending lag, and can be punished by almost every character.

Drill Rush: Same reason as above.

Dimensional Cape: Has ending lag, but the move sucks and is almost never used.

Fsmash: Start-up lag the can be punished, but few MK's use this attack when they're in a position to be punished anyway.


The only remotely legitimate weakness he has is that he's not very heavy. However, this is obviously purposeful. Because of his light weight, MK can't be combo'd or chased after an attack.

Meta-Knight is easy mode. As long as people can, they will use him.

 

[Gindler]

Metaknight has no bad matchups. He has no even matchups. He completely dominates any character that is slow(ganon, ike, bowser), short ranged(jigglypuff, luigi, mario) or has a gimpable recovery(ness, lucas, ike, link, bowser, yoshi, mario, lucario, olimar). My suggestion is, have a few no metaknight tournaments and just see how that goes. Or maybe just make it so you can only be metaknight in 1 match out of 3.

MK dominate yoshi? Yoshi gimpable recovery? Lucario easily gimped?

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=201961

There you go you can see MKs worst matchups. Note yoshi is one of them, even though it isn't even neutral he isn't dominated obviously. And lucario is actually a major pain to edgeguard.

 

[da K.I.D.]

yuna, ppl dont care what kind of precedent we set to ppl that dont play the game.

if we dont make rules to make things as fun and competitive as possible than nobody goes to tourneys and than there is no competitive scene.

i understand that youd rather quit brawl than ban Mk, but that reasoning biases and falsefies the majority of the logicthat you use

 

[Lord Exor]

3) It's wrong to punish the Meta Knight players simply because people are whining about him and do not wish to play against him despite the fact that he's very much beatable (prove me wrong and I'll change sides).

Yes, it's very wrong to punish those innocent Meta Knight players. All they're doing is abusing the system to gain a larger statistical advantage, that's not bad at all. They're just entrepreneurs doing whatever it takes to gain an edge on the market in the big, bad world of Smash. Smash is cruel, and in a world like this, everyone's in it for themselves. Everyone's out to get you. Don't trust anyone. Do whatever it takes to rise to the top!

Meta Knight represents the American dream, just like Bill Gates and Microsoft. Do whatever it takes to win! Monopolize the market! Those Meta Knights are breaking their backs to do what they do, and it is by sheer virtue of dedication and commitment that they have risen to where they are today!

 

[Yuna]

yuna, ppl dont care what kind of precedent we set to ppl that dont play the game.

But we would be setting a precedence for ourselves. Nobody cares about the people who don't play the game. We'd be setting a bad precedence for ourselves.

if we dont make rules to make things as fun and competitive as possible than nobody goes to tourneys and than there is no competitive scene.

I'm sorry, since when were rulesets ever written to be "as fun as possible"? What institutes "fun", anyway? Are chaingrabs and IC infinites "unfun" enough to ban? What about the various locks in the game?

What is so much "unfun" about Meta Knight, anyway, if you admit to him being quite beatable? The fact that many people choose to play as him, thus forcing the rest to play against a horde of Meta Knights? Wow, so we're banning him only due to popularity?

Or because he's boring to play against? You can say that about any number of characters. No really, what makes Meta Knight so "unfun"?

Also, what about Meta Knight limit the Competitive viability within Brawl? Give me an answer that isn't another way of saying "Because a lot of people choose to play as him".

Also, the rules have never been written to maximize "fun" or Competitive viability. No, they haven't. If that had been the case, we would've banned the Top Tiers in Melee since they rendered a great portion of the cast unviable in Competitive play. That way, by removing 4 characters, we would've received several others in Competitive play, thus maximizing Competitive viability.

The same thing can be said about Brawl.

i understand that youd rather quit brawl than ban Mk, but that reasoning biases and falsefies the majority of the logicthat you use

I'm sorry, what? Stop projecting. When did I ever say that? You see, the problem with talking out of your behind and claiming I've said stuff I never said is that I actually know what I've said and won't let it slide if someone claims I've said something I've never said.

 

[Yuna]

Yes, it's very wrong to punish those innocent Meta Knight players. All they're doing is abusing the system to gain a larger statistical advantage, that's not bad at all. They're just entrepreneurs doing whatever it takes to gain an edge on the market in the big, bad world of Smash. Smash is cruel, and in a world like this, everyone's in it for themselves. Everyone's out to get you. Don't trust anyone. Do whatever it takes to rise to the top!

With Meta Knight gone, there will be another character to be the most statistically viable. If people play as them, as they then abusing the system? Is it abusing the system to go with the statistically most viable choices in Competition? Is it abusing the system for professional teams to scout for the best players available?

Because, really, unless you can prove "Meta Knight is too good", you have no leg to stand on. It's not wrong to take the easiest way out when there's money involved. Honor is overrated in Competitive gaming.

Meta Knight represents the American dream, just like Bill Gates and Microsoft. Do whatever it takes to win! Monopolize the market! Those Meta Knights are breaking their backs to do what they do, and it is by sheer virtue of dedication and commitment that they have risen to where they are today!

You're clearly under the impression Meta Knight is unbeatable or at least very hard to beat. If not, then your entire argument fails.

 

[Lord Exor]

Except I never once made an argument, did I?

 

[Yuna]

Except I never once made an argument, did I?

Except you did. You argued that using Meta Knight for his matchups is "abusing the system" (thus, playing Meta Knight for his matchups must somehow be "wrong" since its some kind of "abuse") and implied they're "monopolizing" the scene somehow.

 

[Emblem Lord]

I'm late on this, but...

1) Wario is not better then Marth.

2) I'm not a ****. I just act like one because it's an easy way to be on the internet and it's fun.

Carry on.

 

[Lord Exor]

I didn't once say there was anything wrong with abusing the system though. Like I said, doing what it takes to win is just good business. Just good business.

 

[Genome Squirrel]

no need to attack lord exor, he was saying play to win with a hint of either sarcasm or hyperbole.
its hard to tell in forums

 

[Yuna]

I didn't once say there was anything wrong with abusing the system though. Like I said, doing what it takes to win is just good business. Just good business.

The sarcasm in your post was unclear. It could be interpreted either way. I apologize for interpreting it wrongly.

 

[Tenki]

Random aside:

Just like there may not be logical proof to the existence of certain things,
there may not be logical proof that MK should be banned.

thus, this may continue on as a neverending debate.

A never ending battle between
Pro ban and anti ban.​

 

[Snakeee]

My DDD had a FAR better record then his Zss vs Mks

3-0 with Fourte
1-0 with Omni
1-1 with Shadow
2-1 With Jman


Get ***** Snakeee

Um, I've beaten my brother (Shadow), and the one time I played against Forte and Omni I had dead close games. It doesn't matter because you lost to Inui's Meta and I 3 stocked his so that makes up for any lead you had on me

 

[Tyrael64]

There will be cake guys, there will be cake.

 

[da K.I.D.]

yuna,
1. i said fun AND competitive, as in both at the same time, if you are going to skim my words and paraphrase, ill call you on it just as fast.
you need to have a balence of the two things for there to be a competitive environment

2. i fairly certain that there was a point where you said that people should quit brawl if they want to ban MK (others have said this as well) because if you have to ban a character, the game isnt worth playing.

3. why do you keep bringing up melee, let me say this one more time...
if the top four in melee were one character with all of their strengths, we would ban him.
thats what MK is, the top 4 in melee combined into 1 character.
dont bring other games into this... i dont care about other games anymore, anything you say about SF:ST/3S or melee or GG, or anything else from this point forward will be ignored, its not valid becuase its not the same game, its not the same people, and its not the same situation.

4. if you want to talk about setting precedents for ourselves, go back and read over the edrees posts. lets talk about items, what about food, or fans is worse than MK in that they cant be in the game but he can.
banning a character is not some kind of sacred ground that we dare not tread upon. it should go through the same validation processes that items and stages go through. and, using that line of reasoning, MK is perfectly and throughly bannable

5 he takes away from competition, playing MK is a lot like playing any other character, but starting of at negative 30 damage. (dont say anything stupid about him being light) you just have an automatic advantage. forcing ppl to fight completely uphill for the entire tourney is anti competitive, and because of that MK is bad for the tourney scene of this game

 

[Yuna]

yuna,
1. i said fun AND competitive, as in both at the same time, if you are going to skim my words and paraphrase, ill call you on it just as fast.

It is my opinion that we should never ban things to make the game "more fun", ever. I did not skim and paraphrase. I was lifting out a portion of your argument, that "fun" should ever play a part in how the ruleset is formed.

you need to have a balence of the two things for there to be a competitive environment

No, not really. Competitive gaming is not about optimizing "fun", even if coupled with "Competitive viability". "Fun" should never play a part in how the Competitive scene is formed. Competitive gaming, while fun for most players, is not fundamentally about fun. It's about, you know, Competition.

2. i fairly certain that there was a point where you said that people should quit brawl if they want to ban MK (others have said this as well) because if you have to ban a character, the game isnt worth playing.

No, not really. I said that if Brawl is so broken we must do this and that and that, then maybe the game doesn't deserve to be played Competitively. Not at all the same thing as what you just said. Also, how the hell does what you just said translate into "I (Yuna) would rather quit Brawl than ban MK"?!

3. why do you keep bringing up melee, let me say this one more time...
if the top four in melee were one character with all of their strengths, we would ban him.

Melee Marth and Melee Fox are marginally worse than MK. Melee Marth in many aspects much less worse than Fox due to a lack of general counterpicks and gimping potential (of Marth) when compared to Fox.

You specifically said that the rules are written to make the game as "fun and competitive as possible" (i.e., maximize it). I specifically used the Top Tiers in Melee as an example for why this is false. Do not mix arguments. I'm perfectly capable of arguing several threads in the same reply.

I'm not arguing that banning MK means we should ban X and Y characters in Melee with the same logic (at least I didn't in the post you just replied to). I argued that with made-up version of how the rules of Competitive Smash are written, the Tops and several Highs in Melee needed to be banned... and so do many others in Brawl.

thats what MK is, the top 4 in melee combined into 1 character.

No, not really, no.

dont bring other games into this... i dont care about other games anymore, anything you say about SF:ST/3S or melee or GG, or anything else from this point forward will be ignored, its not valid becuase its not the same game, its not the same people, and its not the same situation.

Why can't we compare it to other games and communities? People say "Hey, unless MK is banned, everyone will start playing him and the metagame will stagnate since he has no bad matchups". I'm saying "No, past history shows that this isn't true at all... that is unless people just choose to play as Meta Knight instead of developing other characters, specifically those who stand a very good chance at beating him".

4. if you want to talk about setting precedents for ourselves, go back and read over the edrees posts. lets talk about items, what about food, or fans is worse than MK in that they cant be in the game but he can.

Because they are random. Even one single percent could decide the outcome of a game. And we want to limit randomness as much as possible. A single food item could change the outcome of the match due to nothing but a lucky spawn (not necessarily, but possibly). This would be bad.

banning a character is not some kind of sacred ground that we dare not tread upon. it should go through the same validation processes that items and stages go through. and, using that line of reasoning, MK is perfectly and throughly bannable

Why, really? Why is he "perfectly and thouroughly bannable"? I mean, let's compare him to item bans. Is he random? Does he randomize the results? Can a Meta Knight player randomly win against all odds due to nothing but sheer blind lucky from a lucky something spawn against which the opponent has absolutely no control?

Let's talk stages. Is Meta Knight so good he breaks the game and makes it unplayable, such as stages like Spear Pillar where at any given time, one of three Pokémon could appear and do some BS to severely cripple one side or both sides due to randomness?

Or is he just so friggin' good there's the odds are just tipped way, way, way in his favour, such as small stages with permanent Walk-Offs where you can just chaingrab someone off the stage from 0%? No, he is not. No, 60:40s are highly beatable (as some guy stated earlier, no one credible would claim a 60:40 isn't beatable and are not reason enough to for a ban). Meta Knight does not imbalance the game in such a way he has to be banned. He's just good, but he doesn't force you to play as him or lose, you still have several options.

So, really, how does MK really compare to item bans and stage bans?

5 he takes away from competition, playing MK is a lot like playing any other character, but starting of at negative 30 damage.

So does playing any character below High. The Tops and Highs take away a lot from Competition. Banning them all would pretty much open up the Competitive viability of a great many more characters. So, really, with this logic, we should ban them all. That way, there'd be no chaingrabbing or infiniting characters that would otherwise be perfectly viable.

(dont say anything stupid about him being light) you just have an automatic advantage. forcing ppl to fight completely uphill for the entire tourney is anti competitive, and because of that MK is bad for the tourney scene of this game

In Melee, unless you played as 2 or so specific characters (depending on who you're facing), Melee and Fox had the automatic advantage, hands down. So you were forced to either go Fox, Marth or one of the other two. This is highly anti-competitive as it forces people to fight competely uphill for the entire tourney, right?

And since when was 60:40 ever "completely uphill"?

 

[frdagaa]

I'm sorry, what? When did I ever say I do not care about the community. I said that doing something that is wrong for the wrong reasons is wrong, even if the community is better off for it because the only reason why they'd be better off for it is because of a choice the community has made, to either whine about Meta Knight or jump ship and main him, instead of simply getting better with other characters.

Do you know what that sounds like to me? It sounds like you're saying that if the community just stuck with their mains, the community would be better off. It sounds like you're saying that Metaknight is not a problematic character, and that a community without the "whining" or main switching would be healthy. These are points under serious contention.

While Metaknight is not quite broken, he is definitely a step above the rest of the cast. If you want to disagree with this I can't really stop you, but nearly all of the Smash community will acknowledge this. Simply being powerful, however, isn't really the problem. The problem is that his power differential from the rest of the cast is great enough to cause a significant movement towards Metaknight in order to stay at the most competitive. In Melee you had choices; Fox, Falco, Sheik, and Marth were all reasonably equal in power level. In Brawl you have choices, but MK really is just the best choice. People will abandon the community because their mains are less viable. Other characters will diminish. This isn't nearly as much of a choice as you make it out to be.

I think that the natural progression of games, as you have noted, is towards the most powerful character(s). Therefore, being a competitive community, of course the Smash community will trend towards Metaknight. Saying "Well, people could just not switch," is arguing against the nature of competitive gaming. That's a pretty foolish argument.

Your final sentence in that quote does have some merit, but not in a strictly anti-ban sense. Yes, the game would be better off if players got better with the other characters and developed their metagame to a point where there is more than one "best" choice. This is the key issue, though. Is that really possible, or will MK continue to dominate even if something new is discovered? Note that there's no reason to assume that something will be discovered that benefits the community in the way you describe. What your sentence implies - and I think this is correct - is that we need to continue trying to find new techniques and develop the other characters. However, that does not mean that the ban should not happen. It simply implies that the ban should not happen yet.

If we're just going to ban Meta Knight just for having no disadvantageous matchups despite him not really dominating tournaments as much as people seem to think, then we're doing something that is wrong for the wrong reasons.

It is bad for the community because:
1) It makes the community less credible.
2) It's something essentially wrong.
3) It's wrong to punish the Meta Knight players simply because people are whining about him and do not wish to play against him despite the fact that he's very much beatable (prove me wrong and I'll change sides).

1) How so? I'm honestly curious as to what about the ban makes the community less credible. We've shown a willingness to ban other things, such as stages and items, that are inherent to the game, just because we decided as a community that they ought to be banned. What's so different about deciding that a character ought to be banned?

2) This is a silly point. "It's bad for the community because it's wrong?" Are you being serious? You can't just say "It's bad because it's bad." That is a complete and total failure of reason. Explain WHY it is wrong, not just say "it's wrong because it's wrong."

3) Your statement, once again, straw mans the pro-ban side's argument. This is not even close to the first time that you've done this, so I'll try to state it a little more clearly.

MK is hurting the community. The reason that MK should be banned has nothing to do with whining. The reasons he should be banned are because of his dominating influence, because he's hurting the metagame, and because of the fact that both of these factors only appear to be increasing. By narrowing the scope of the competitive scene, both through his strong moveset and basic yet ridiculously strong strategies, MK seriously undermines the community. The community will shrink as players who main other characters switch to Metaknight and as fewer new players are able to even start to compete against tournament Metaknights due to his amazing amount of brick walls and cheap tactics (Planking is one of the main offenders). The pro-ban side argues that these factors, if they are decided to be negative for the community, are enough to ban a character. Complete brokenness is not, in our opinion, a prerequisite for being banned.

Metaknight is not unbeatable. That's not the relevant argument, so stop acting like it is. It's freaking EASY to find stupid arguments on either side. Please, go ahead and disabuse people of the notion that those stupid arguments have merit. However, don't act like that actually discredits the ban.

 

[ftl]

He's not stagnating the meta game at all. The players are stagnating the meta game. No one is forced to switch to Meta Knight, they elect to simply out choice, despite the fact that there are several characters who stand very good chances at beating him. Instead of getting better as those, people go for Meta Knight.

We saw this in Melee (and in other fighters). People flock to the Top Tiers for an easy path to victory. So what. It will always happen. It's out of pure choice.

"He's sucking the fun out of the game" isn't really a good reason to ban him. Why is he sucking the fun out of the game, anyway? Because you have to face so many of him in tournaments? Here's a newsflash: Get better as your own **** character! Competitive play is not for everybody!

Competitive play involves money and people will do everything they can to win.

Yuna, don't those quotes go against each other?

On one hand, you're telling people that instead of switching to MK, they should work on their own character.

On the other hand, you're saying that people who are competitive will do everything they can to win.

However, a big portion of the pro-ban argument is that in the current game, 'doing everything you can to win' necessarily involves maining MK, because he's far enough ahead of all the competition that maining anyone else is already giving yourself a disadvantage. Thus, anyone who's working on their own character instead of switching to MK is NOT doing 'everything they can to win'.

(Unless they're Azen.)

In a scene where the top character has some disadvantaged matchups, it's not automatically true that maining someone else is suboptimal - if, say, one or two characters countered MK, then maining those would give you an advantage against the hordes of MKs which would offset the disadvantage against other characters. (And then maining the counters of those characters would get viable too, depending on how frequently those showed up.)

In a scene where a couple of the top characters are all pretty close even if there's a best one, its not automatically true that maining the best character is the best idea for everybody, because if they're pretty close then individual styles might mean more than the difference between characters, and you'd want to main someone who fit your style of play closer. (i.e. 'main who you're best with'.)

In a scene where we're not sure who the top character is or who really counters who, maining someone other than the top character is viable if you think that character really SHOULD be at the top, but isn't because people aren't using him right.

The argument is that none of those are true, and that the metagame is being reduced to MK mains, 'scrubs' who prefer maining someone other than MK over winning more, and, of course, Azen.

Perhaps you don't see this scene as a problem. If that's the case, I don't think there's much that can be said to persuade you.

Perhaps you're one of the people who think that MK still falls under one of those categories (i.e. isn't far enough better than the characters after him so that he's strictly the best choice, or has counters, or one of those two will be true once more time passes.).

But do you really think that all those players who you're berating for choosing to switch to MK would really become better if they chose someone else instead? Remember, either way they're putting in the time to practice with whatever character, it's not like the choice is "EITHER play MK OR work to get better." The choice is between "Work to get better WITH MK" or "Work to get better with someone else." They're being competitive. They're doing everything they can to win, including picking the best characters. (Or, in this case, the best single character.)

Also, the rules have never been written to maximize "fun" or Competitive viability.

So what ARE the rules written to maximize? What are the guiding principles behind making rules for playing a video game competitively when it was originally designed for casual play?

There are many ways to make a game more competitive. A game with more characters is not necessarily more or less competitive than one with fewer. Making the game more "competitive" isn't an argument either for or against MK, in my opinion.

Competitive play is certainly far different than casual play. The things that are fun in casual play (random **** happening, people of lower skill level getting to win sometimes so they don't feel too bad) are no longer fun in competitive play, since they just become frustrating. But that certainly doesn't mean that nobody cares whether people enjoy themselves when playing competitively when making up rulesets.

Because they are random. Even one single percent could decide the outcome of a game. And we want to limit randomness as much as possible.

This is false. We do not want to limit randomness 'as much as possible'. We allow G&W and DDD, when they have attacks that are random (and can make a difference of much more than 1%). We allow stages with some random motion in them, as long as it's not too much. If we wanted to minimize randomness, we'd ban those. But there are other things that are more valuable than getting rid of small amounts of randomness.

 

[da K.I.D.]

gordos for the win
also ban turnips, because not only are they random but once they come out you still cant tell what they are if peach is turned around... so that makes it super random


yuna, the mindset that competitive gaming isnt meant to be fun is completely ludicrous. if the rules didnt preserve some form of fun, nobody would do it, nobody would go to tourneys, and there wouldnt be a competitive scene for the game in the first place.
your logic is bad.
stop saying that.
and i meant completelly up hill in the sence that the person will be playing uphill battles through out the entire tourney

 

[ShadowLink84]

fun is non-existent in a pure competitive environment.
Fun is present in this environment. if it was truly competitive we wuold have only 1 character, one stage, and evoke pure skill.

 

[Yuna]

Do you know what that sounds like to me? It sounds like you're saying that if the community just stuck with their mains, the community would be better off. It sounds like you're saying that Metaknight is not a problematic character, and that a community without the "whining" or main switching would be healthy. These are points under serious contention.

I'm not telling people what to do. I'm just saying: People are not forced to switch to Meta Knight. They choose to. They want the easier path, not because they cannot win otherwise, but just because it's easier. It's true for all fighting games and it won't stop being true even with Meta Knight gone.

While Metaknight is not quite broken, he is definitely a step above the rest of the cast. If you want to disagree with this I can't really stop you, but nearly all of the Smash community will acknowledge this.

No one has ever questioned this.

The problem is that his power differential from the rest of the cast is great enough to cause a significant movement towards Metaknight in order to stay at the most competitive. In Melee you had choices; Fox, Falco, Sheik, and Marth were all reasonably equal in power level.

Statistically, you could just stick with Marth and then maybe go Fox for 2 matchups if you felt like it. So, really, it was all about Marth and Fox.

In Brawl you have choices, but MK really is just the best choice. People will abandon the community because their mains are less viable.

With Meta Knight gone, Marth, using the same logic, will be the best choice. He will have the least amount of bad matchups (that is, none) while the rest all have several. Of course, he won't have the best matchups, but neither does Meta Knight.

Other characters will diminish. This isn't nearly as much of a choice as you make it out to be.

Yes it is. Because people can play other characters and still stand a reasonable chance of winning tournaments, even against Meta Knight. People just choose not. They are not forced to switch to win. They are choosing to switch for an easier path. This is just popularity.

I think that the natural progression of games, as you have noted, is towards the most powerful character(s). Therefore, being a competitive community, of course the Smash community will trend towards Metaknight. Saying "Well, people could just not switch," is arguing against the nature of competitive gaming. That's a pretty foolish argument.

I never said that people should do this or shouldn't do that. I said that people aren't forced to switch and, yes, people will gravitate towards the best because that's just how people are.

Your final sentence in that quote does have some merit, but not in a strictly anti-ban sense. Yes, the game would be better off if players got better with the other characters and developed their metagame to a point where there is more than one "best" choice. This is the key issue, though. Is that really possible, or will MK continue to dominate even if something new is discovered? Note that there's no reason to assume that something will be discovered that benefits the community in the way you describe. What your sentence implies - and I think this is correct - is that we need to continue trying to find new techniques and develop the other characters. However, that does not mean that the ban should not happen. It simply implies that the ban should not happen yet.

With everything we know now, while Meta Knight is the best choice (and, really, with him gone, with the same logic, Marth would be the best choice), he's not dominating the metagame in such a way people cannot beat him.

1) How so? I'm honestly curious as to what about the ban makes the community less credible.

I never said a ban in itself would make the community less credible. I said that a ban made for arbitrary reasons, without sufficient proof and reasoning and that is made simply to maximize "fun" and to prevent people from flocking "to the best" due to human nature would.

We've shown a willingness to ban other things, such as stages and items, that are inherent to the game, just because we decided as a community that they ought to be banned. What's so different about deciding that a character ought to be banned?

I already answered this in my reply to da K.I.D..

2) This is a silly point. "It's bad for the community because it's wrong?" Are you being serious? You can't just say "It's bad because it's bad." That is a complete and total failure of reason. Explain WHY it is wrong, not just say "it's wrong because it's wrong."

You must be new to the conversation as I spent a good 100 pages explaining exactly why it would be wrong.

3) Your statement, once again, straw mans the pro-ban side's argument. This is not even close to the first time that you've done this, so I'll try to state it a little more clearly.

It not even close to a strawman. It's me calling it whining as a put down.

Because, really, banning him because people switch to him and the rest just dislike facing so many MKs is giving into whining. You just took a quote out context.

MK is hurting the community. The reason that MK should be banned has nothing to do with whining. The reasons he should be banned are because of his dominating influence, because he's hurting the metagame, and because of the fact that both of these factors only appear to be increasing.

Yes, and the question is: How is he hurting the community? Is he limiting our choices? Is he forcing us to play as him? No. He's hurting the community because the community just elects to play as him. In other words, the community is hurting the community.

He's not hurting the metagame. How is he hurting the metagame? He doesn't even beat that many characters "that" badly, at least not any more than the rest of the Tops and Highs. He has several characters who stand pretty good chances (55:45 to 60:40) against him, so those characters are still perfectly viable as mains.

He's not hurting us for being too good. He's hurting us simply because the players themselves pick him for the easy way out. Tell me, can you name 10 Meta Knights who are dominating the tournaments, winning large numbers of them, preventing other characters from doing well?

He's "hurting" the community simply by being popular. Most of the Metas out there are not good enough to actually win tournaments or even place well, but since so many players aren't on that level, they will stare themselves blind at the number of Metas doing as well as them or better and automatically think it is unfair and hurting the community.

By narrowing the scope of the competitive scene, both through his strong moveset and basic yet ridiculously strong strategies, MK seriously undermines the community.

The same can be said about many characters. But they are still beatable.

The community will shrink as players who main other characters switch to Metaknight and as fewer new players are able to even start to compete against tournament Metaknights due to his amazing amount of brick walls and cheap tactics (Planking is one of the main offenders).

Or it won't. The reason why I bring up other games is to show that there are several games out there with a character like Meta Knight, yet their Competitive scenes didn't die out or start revolving around said characters. Their players just learned how to deal with that 60:40 matchup since a 60:40 isn't even that hard.

The pro-ban side argues that these factors, if they are decided to be negative for the community, are enough to ban a character. Complete brokenness is not, in our opinion, a prerequisite for being banned.

And I'm arguing the opposite and I'm perfectly prepared to agree to disagree on this, but I will still argue that it's not enough, at least in my opinion.

Metaknight is not unbeatable. That's not the relevant argument, so stop acting like it is.

Stop rewriting my posts in your head. I've argued that your reasons for banning MK isn't enough (IMO and in the opinions of many others). I've never said that your only argument is that he's unbeatable. I'm arguing that it should be the main argument!

I'm also arguing against people who clearly think that MK is somehow unbeatable. When I do so, turn the other cheek as I'm clearly not arguing against you or other people who are pro-ban but do not believe MK to be unbeatable.

When I point out that the reason why MK is dominating is not due to being "too good" but only due to "popularity", it is because, IMO, popularity is far from reason enough to ban a character.

It's freaking EASY to find stupid arguments on either side. Please, go ahead and disabuse people of the notion that those stupid arguments have merit. However, don't act like that actually discredits the ban.

I'm sorry, I haven't acknowledged that there are arguments on the pro-side I can only conceede to be true or agree to disagree on when? Unlike you, I don't lump people together or assume things. I don't assume that just because you're pro-ban, you must be pro-ban for the following reasons or if you argue against a single person, you must obviously be arguing against everyone on their side of the ban-fence.

Yuna, don't those quotes go against each other?

I don't see how.

On one hand, you're telling people that instead of switching to MK, they should work on their own character.

On the other hand, you're saying that people who are competitive will do everything they can to win.

I'm saying that people have a choice. I'm also saying that just because they're making the choice you feel is the "wrong" one does not mean MK should be banned. MK is just popular. MK is just better than the rest. Banning him for being popular just because the community is flocking to the best character would be stupid as there will almost always be a "the Best" unless the game somehow devolves into a game of rock-paper-scissors where no character is solid against pretty much everyone else and everyone has major counterpicks.

However, a big portion of the pro-ban argument is that in the current game, 'doing everything you can to win' necessarily involves maining MK, because he's far enough ahead of all the competition that maining anyone else is already giving yourself a disadvantage.

And these people would be wrong. He's not, at all, far enough ahead to be a necessity to win. There are several others who can compete and who have the talents to fight off the rest of the cast as well. Also, even if he's winning many tournaments, have you actually watched those finals? He's not winning them by huge margins. He's often winning them by comparatively slim ones, even against characters other than himself.

In other words, he's not at all unbeatable or a necessity to win. There are several characters who can go toe-to-toe against him.

Thus, anyone who's working on their own character instead of switching to MK is NOT doing 'everything they can to win'.

MK is the easiest path. But he's in no way the only path.

Stuff about scenes.[/b]
The current scene is problematic, but, IMO, not problematic enough to warrant a ban.

Perhaps you don't see this scene as a problem. If that's the case, I don't think there's much that can be said to persuade you.

It's a problem made by stupid choices. Name 10 Metas going around "dominating" tournaments.

Perhaps you're one of the people who think that MK still falls under one of those categories (i.e. isn't far enough better than the characters after him so that he's strictly the best choice, or has counters, or one of those two will be true once more time passes.).

Yes, as my above reply shows.

But do you really think that all those players who you're berating for choosing to switch to MK would really become better if they chose someone else instead?

I'm not berating them at all. I'm saying that they made a choice due to pure choice, not due to necessity. I'm berating the people claiming it's a necessity.

And that is not the question. The question is whether or not MK is so good you have to main him to win (at least that's the question in my mind). Whether or not some phantom player could choose someone else, like G&W, and do just as well is irrelevant as that would be random speculation.

Remember, either way they're putting in the time to practice with whatever character, it's not like the choice is "EITHER play MK OR work to get better." The choice is between "Work to get better WITH MK" or "Work to get better with someone else." They're being competitive. They're doing everything they can to win, including picking the best characters. (Or, in this case, the best single character.)

The human factor, different play styles, player psychology, etc., etc., etc. Why can Azen compete even with Mids and lower Highs? That's right, he's just that good and has great mindgames. Clearly, it's possible. Whether or not MK is easier to pick up is irrelevant.

The question should be: At the highest possible level of play, would pouring the same amount of time into MK as, say, G&W, result in a player loads better than the G&W? Because if the advantage is small, then it does not warrant a ban because, really, there will still be characters like that, characters who are "The Best".

So what ARE the rules written to maximize? What are the guiding principles behind making rules for playing a video game competitively when it was originally designed for casual play?

Creator intent is meaningless. Whether or not it was designed for Casual play is irrelevant.

The rules aren't written to maximize Competition, that much is obvious. The rules are written to create Competition, to provide a relatively "fair" ruleset that promotes Competition. But it is not written to maximize it, especially not according to the logic of "If we ban X character, these characters will become viable or at least more viable" because if we wanted to do that to maximize Competition, we'd ban several characters, such as DeDeDe and Falco because, really, their chaingrabs limit Competition greatly.

There are many ways to make a game more competitive. A game with more characters is not necessarily more or less competitive than one with fewer. Making the game more "competitive" isn't an argument either for or against MK, in my opinion.

I did not bring it up. I debated against someone who brought it up.

Competitive play is certainly far different than casual play. The things that are fun in casual play (random **** happening, people of lower skill level getting to win sometimes so they don't feel too bad) are no longer fun in competitive play, since they just become frustrating. But that certainly doesn't mean that nobody cares whether people enjoy themselves when playing competitively when making up rulesets.

The point was that the rules are not written to maximize fun or Competition or both.

This is false. We do not want to limit randomness 'as much as possible'. We allow G&W and DDD, when they have attacks that are random (and can make a difference of much more than 1%).

Fine, I forgot to add "Within certain limits". The fundamental difference between those two and items is that when it comes to characters, it's completely play-controller. You will know that if G&W is within range for Judgement, he could pull it out and possibly get a 9. You will know that every time DeDeDe tosses a Waddle Dee, he might instead throw one of those spike balls. With items, you will never know. They will spawn and help either side unfairly no matter what, unless you're psychic.

DeDeDe and G&W are also not inherently random to their nature. Items are. I didn't want to write out a full answer, so I wrote a concise one with a clumsy wording. I apologize.

We allow stages with some random motion in them, as long as it's not too much. If we wanted to minimize randomness, we'd ban those. But there are other things that are more valuable than getting rid of small amounts of randomness.

Items are random by nature and hugely so. Miniscule randomness is allowed if banning them would get rid of a big part of the metagame, yes. I apologize for my lazy earlier wording.

 

[Yuna]

yuna, the mindset that competitive gaming isnt meant to be fun is completely ludicrous.

Are you just unable to read or are you actually talking out of your tuchas as you go, expecting me to just accept your employment of revisionist history to totally rewrite what I write into strawmans so huge they can't possibly fit in your house?

When did I ever say anything that comes even close to that?!

if the rules didnt preserve some form of fun, nobody would do it, nobody would go to tourneys, and there wouldnt be a competitive scene for the game in the first place.

The argument was that the rules are, in opposition to what you believe, not, at all, written to maximize fun and/or Competition or an amalgation of both or whatever.

In fact, the rules aren't written to make the game more fun at all. If "making it more fun" comes at the cost of something like, say, Competition, then "teh fun" will be foregone.

your logic is bad.
stop saying that.

Your reading comprehension is bad (fact, not flaming). Stop skimming/badly comprehending what I write.

and i meant completelly up hill in the sence that the person will be playing uphill battles through out the entire tourney

So? Life isn't fair. Not all characters stand an equal chance of winning at all times, that's just life. If we wanted to prevent that from happening, we'd literally have to ban everyone 'til we only had characters who 50:50:ed each other.

 

[DADdedede]

true, but mk's mathcups are too good. if one character is played, and only one character, then he has to be banned. we dont only use one stage, but one character? mk is killing originality, in a sense, and that has to be stopped.

 

[brinboy789]

true, but mk's mathcups are too good. if one character is played, and only one character, then he has to be banned. we dont only use one stage, but one character? mk is killing originality, in a sense, and that has to be stopped.

we addressed this point about 570 pages ago.

 

[salaboB]

we addressed this point about 570 pages ago.

You say that as if the response actually disproved the key aspect of it.

MK's matchups have not been proven to not be too good.

 

[DRaGZ]

I'm going to continue posting these two points below with every new page that comes up until someone finally disproves them. This is the second time, btw.

There are two main points that anti-ban people are currently promoting over and over.

1. Meta Knight is beatable.

No one is saying he isn't beatable. Hell, even Akuma from ST, the archetype of a character that should be banned, is beatable.

Case in point, Akuma is only soft-banned in Japan. That means that the pros have simply decided not to play as Akuma because a character played at that high a level of play would ruin the game. However, this does not stop newbs from coming into tournaments and using Akuma. This happens, and they do well until a pro comes in and decidedly ***** them (I've seen a Balrog [Boxer] absolutely dismantle a scrubby Akuma with only a single direct hit from an air Hadouken out of the entire two rounds).

Point is, Akuma, the one character any decent fighting game player can agree on as a character that should be banned, is actually still used in tournaments in Japan and don't ever get far.

On the other hand, Akuma is not soft-banned in America because there is no concept of "soft-banning" in America. The American spirit is to be competitive, and to be competitive you use the tools you are allowed. In Japan, this is not necessarily the case because the pros are actually mindful of what the metagame needs to be enjoyable, not just competitive.

What does this mean? Meta Knight may be broken to an area near that of Akuma; he is at least miles ahead of many characters in terms of ease of use/risk vs. reward. Meta Knight will probably never be banned in Japan, because Japan has respect amongst the pros for each other (not just because of culture, but also probably because it's just a much smaller community). Meta Knight, if agreed upon to be broken, probably should be banned in America because we don't have such a concept.

And for those who contend that the brokenness of Akuma and his subsequent banning are far more quantifiable than Meta Knight and his ban, your misguided conclusion is based on two factors.

1. Akuma was inserted into a game where there was already a set metagame. People had already developed characters. These characters had their own metagames. There was a tier system already in place. Because of this, it was much easier to tell what a new character would do to the game, in this case, break it. This is also why it was much easier to accept a ban; Akuma was an external factor in everyone's minds, not to mention that he was unlocked rather than already available. Even if people had invested time in Akuma, they had also invested lots of time before in other characters. And since the ban itself came quickly enough, there weren't as many people *****ing about it because they could just go back to their old characters they hadn't abandoned for a long period of time. In the case of Meta Knight, he came with the game, there was no set metagame, thus nothing to compare him to. This is why Meta Knight's brokenness arose much more slowly and is more arguable.
2. Akuma was much more easily comparable to at least two other characters, Ken and Ryu. This not only made it much easier to see how much better than he was than these two characters (not only did he combine Ken's speed with Ryu's strength, but he also had an escape option, an air hadouken, and the most ridiculously powerful super ever), but it was extremely easy to pick him up and play if you were already familiar with a Shoto. This is why people were basically instantly good with Akuma; they already knew how to use his basic functions. On the other hand, Meta Knight works very differently from other Brawl characters, thus his metagame had to develop on its own. Again, this is why it developed slower and the brokenness became apparent much slower.

2. We don't ban things just because people complaing about them.

It's true. But, we have banned things just because it made it less competitive and fun, namely items and stages.

Edrees explains it much better than I do: http://allisbrawl.com/blogpost.aspx?id=5360

To put it simply from the way Edrees elegantly lays it out, we have banned items in the past just because they made the game less competitive and less fun. Technically, we could have contended with items and made them work, but we chose not to because people didn't want to.

Meta Knight ruins the foundational system of counterpicking in Smash has developed because it negates the need to main any other character but Meta Knight, i.e. it makes it less competitive and fun.

We've banned things, like items, for the very same reasons in the past. In other words, we have a precedent on how we have banned things: they were detrimental to the overall enjoyment of the game. It wasn't a matter of personal opinion, because there still were people who consider items to be fun, but rather of the opinion of what people was the best balance of competition and fun. To many, many people, Meta Knight fits those circumstances, and I have yet to see anyone tell me why we should suddenly go back on the precedent we have laid before (unless you would also like items unbanned as well).

And don't say we'll look like scrubs because we've banned Meta Knight. To many other communities, we already look like scrubs because we've banned items and stages. And quite frankly, who gives a **** about other communities? This is our own community, the Smash community. We don't need to care about other communities, let them do what they want, we'll do what we want.



And to be quite honest, if you can't disprove these two points, at least Edrees's point, then the entire argument this thread has made for the anti-ban side is completely null. The anti-ban side assumes that we've set a very high bar for banning Meta Knight and that he has not reached it yet. But the truth is, we've already had a precedent for banning something by a much lower bar, items, and Meta Knight has clearly reached and surpassed that bar.

 

[memphischains]

keep a number of how many times you have to repost that

 

[Yuna]

You say that as if the response actually disproved the key aspect of it.

MK's matchups have not been proven to not be too good.

Ummm... the burden of evidence is on you. You have to prove his matchupos are "too good".

Old stuff.

I just addressed all of that, albeit broken up in several posts throughout several pages.

 

[DRaGZ]

You actually didn't. All you did was mention the issue and then state something you already stated that disproves nothing. You're not as clever as you think.

 

[memphischains]

try witty. wit gets good responses

 

[TL?]

"Those who know what they're talking about and can have intelligent discussions talk,
Those who don't should just shut up and leave Smashboards." - Yuna

I'm pretty sure bring up the same flawed and invalid points does not constitute an intelligent discussion. You know what that means. lol kidding

Oh yeah, everyone read what DRaGZ said.

 

[Chevalier]

Well. I'm not entirely sure whether or not he will be banned, but it's good to see such an open discussion about it.

MK, is, as everyone posted, the better match up to almost anyone. Now, until the predicted loss of participants at tournaments and of interest in the game happens, he will, I think, remain unbanned. But once the loss recognized I would bet on it happening in a heart beat.

 

[Yuna]

You actually didn't. All you did was mention the issue and then state something you already stated that disproves nothing. You're not as clever as you think.

Or not. But since you're too lazy to read my posts, I'll actually reply to yours (yet again) in one fell swoop.

No one is saying he isn't beatable. Hell, even Akuma from ST, the archetype of a character that should be banned, is beatable.

No, we're not saying he's merely beatable. We're saying there are several characters who stand a reasonable chance of beating him. And by "reasonable", I mean 60:40, which is barely a disadvantage (55:45 counting as an even matchup for most credible people).

Akuma literally broke the game, being capable of locking his opponents down into being unable to punish, respond or do much of anything. He didn't have 60:40s.

Case in point, Akuma is only soft-banned in Japan. That means that the pros have simply decided not to play as Akuma because a character played at that high a level of play would ruin the game. However, this does not stop newbs from coming into tournaments and using Akuma. This happens, and they do well until a pro comes in and decidedly ***** them (I've seen a Balrog [Boxer] absolutely dismantle a scrubby Akuma with only a single direct hit from an air Hadouken out of the entire two rounds).

Bad players will be bad players. Your point is? Your misguided revision of what we're actually arguing is a strawman and you know it.

Point is, Akuma, the one character any decent fighting game player can agree on as a character that should be banned, is actually still used in tournaments in Japan and don't ever get far.

That's because Japan has this sense of "honor". They softban. But what would happen if one of their best players decided to screw honor and go for the money? That's right, they'd win, hands down.

On the other hand, Akuma is not soft-banned in America because there is no concept of "soft-banning" in America. The American spirit is to be competitive, and to be competitive you use the tools you are allowed. In Japan, this is not necessarily the case because the pros are actually mindful of what the metagame needs to be enjoyable, not just competitive.

Or they just have this misguided notion of that "honor" has a place in Competitive gaming. After all, they didn't start chaingrabbing 'til 2005 or whatever.

What does this mean? Meta Knight may be broken to an area near that of Akuma

Or not. I just had several people tell me no one credible would make this ridiculous argument. So at least two people just told you you're plain wrong on this. Three if you count me.

he is at least miles ahead of many characters in terms of ease of use/risk vs. reward.

Yes, because he's the best character in the game. Doesn't mean he's way ahead of everyone. He doesn't even have the best matchups in the game.

Meta Knight will probably never be banned in Japan, because Japan has respect amongst the pros for each other (not just because of culture, but also probably because it's just a much smaller community). Meta Knight, if agreed upon to be broken, probably should be banned in America because we don't have such a concept.

When are you going to start using actual proof and facts to back up your statements?

And for those who contend that the brokenness of Akuma and his subsequent banning are far more quantifiable than Meta Knight and his ban, your misguided conclusion is based on two factors.

Or not. Don't tell me what I think when you clearly aren't psychic.

Random BS.

I'm sorry, when did anyone ever make those BS arguments? Quote me a single person making them. If you can, I'll give you a pat on the shoulder. After that, quote me 5 people. Because you are clearly talking out of your tuchas.

I have never made those arguments (because I know them to be untrue) and I certainly haven't seen anyone make those ridiculous claims either.

2. We don't ban things just because people complaing about them.

It's true. But, we have banned things just because it made it less competitive and fun, namely items and stages.

"Fun"? You think items were banned because they weren't "fun"? Items were banned for restricting Competitiveness to an unacceptable degree.

To put it simply from the way Edrees elegantly lays it out, we have banned items in the past just because they made the game less competitive and less fun. Technically, we could have contended with items and made them work, but we chose not to because people didn't want to.

Or not. We dealt with items for 3 years. In 2004, the final nail in the coffin was smashed in and they were universally banned all over the globe. And I doubt "They're not fun" had anything to do with the ban or at least wasn't a deciding factor and just a secondary factor on the back burner.

3 years, that's plenty of time to content with items. Items are random and are by nature anti-Competitive.

Meta Knight isn't broken. No, you saying he is doesn't make it so. You used absolutely no facts to back yourself up, not even the oft-used "Well, he wins many tournaments!" argument.

Meta Knight ruins the foundational system of counterpicking in Smash has developed because it negates the need to main any other character but Meta Knight, i.e. it makes it less competitive and fun.

Counterpicking is not a fundamental necessity for Smash. We made it such. The Japanese don't counterpick, really. They play on a limited amount of stages and pretty much stick to one main each most of the time and it works like a charm.

The game wasn't programmed in such a way it's a foundational part of the game. We made it such through our actions. Just as easily, the game can be played without counterpicking. It's a choice, not a necessity, and that's what it comes down to.

People choosing to play Meta for the easier path to victory is just that, a choice, not a necessity, since there are several characters who stand quite reasonable chances of victory against him (55:45 - 60:40).

And there's that "fun" word again.

We've banned things, like items, for the very same reasons in the past.

We banned items for a variety of reasons that went deeper than just "not fun and uncompetitive".

You know what is uncompetitive? 1 grab from ICs and you die. 1 grab from Sheik and a large portion of the cast eachs a truck load of damage followed by quite possibly a fair that's either deadly or at least sets up for an edgeguard. Various locks and chaingrabs in Brawl.

Using the argument "If it limits the viability of characters", those things are "uncompetitive" and need to be banned.

Stop trivializing things and using blanket statements. We did not ban Items for the same reasons you want to ban Meta. The reasons were many and deep.

In other words, we have a precedent on how we have banned things: they were detrimental to the overall enjoyment of the game.

Yes, I'm sure that's what the SBR said in 2004. "Hey, items are detrimental to the enjoyment of Melee. Let's ban them!". It had nothing to do with the randomness of spawning, the unfairness of random spawns quite possibly changing the outcome of matches (even 1% is enough for that) and the fact that back then, containers could not be turned off and as we all know, containers can be explosive.

No, it was mostly "Not enjoyable!", I'm sure.

It wasn't a matter of personal opinion, because there still were people who consider items to be fun, but rather of the opinion of what people was the best balance of competition and fun.

Were you there? Is this the argument Edrees is making, that "fun" was one fo the deciding factors for banning Items and you're just paraphrasing him? In that case, was Edrees there? And if he was and is claiming "fun" was a major deciding factor, then I want others who were there to confirm this as all we'd have would be the word of one person.

And no, I did not read that thread. I only responded to what you yourself wrote. If Edrees enters this thread, then I'll debate him.

To many, many people, Meta Knight fits those circumstances, and I have yet to see anyone tell me why we should suddenly go back on the precedent we have laid before (unless you would also like items unbanned as well).

Using your arguments, we'd have to ban several more stages, ban several tactics, ban several characters (because with the entirety of Top and High gone, we'll gain many more Competitively viable character than the number of characters we would have lost) and then we'd had maximized Competitiveness and fun!

We ban things that severely limit, not to maximize.

And don't say we'll look like scrubs because we've banned Meta Knight. To many other communities, we already look like scrubs because we've banned items and stages.

We do? Name one community that thinks we're Scrubs for banning items and I'll go and tell them off, asking them how they'd like randomly spawning death traps in the middle of their games.

In fact, I want sources for this. Or are you just making things up again?

And quite frankly, who gives a **** about other communities? This is our own community, the Smash community.

Quite frankly, who used "We'll look bad in front of the other communities" as an argument?

But the truth is, we've already had a precedent for banning something by a much lower bar, items, and Meta Knight has clearly reached and surpassed that bar.

Explain to me again how Items and Meta Knight compare. I mean, how is MK random and can change the outcome of a match due to a lucky spawn?

 

[XienZo]

Using your arguments, we'd have to ban several more stages, ban several tactics, ban several characters (because with the entirety of Top and High gone, we'll gain many more Competitively viable character than the number of characters we would have lost) and then we'd had maximized Competitiveness and fun!

Is that neccesarily bad besides the "Oh noes, there goes my character, screw Smash" and the impossiblity of enforcing the ban on tactics?

 

[Yuna]

Is that neccesarily bad besides the "Oh noes, there goes my character, screw Smash" and the impossiblity of enforcing the ban on tactics?

It was just a statement. Whether it's bad or not depends on who you ask. But I view it as anti-competitive.

 

[ROOOOY!]

I'ma lay out what's happening as simple as I can.
Metaknight, no one can argue against this, is one of the easiest characters to play in the game effectively. When I say effectively, I mean actually playing him well, and just spamming the crap out of his overpowered attributes like Tornado. Now, these people who want to do well with Metaknight, whether they be good or spammy, go to tournaments, and beat people who are legit better than them because of the character, not because they're outplaying the opponent. As we know too, and it's pretty unrefutable, Metaknight has no counters and very few evens, so people can't counterpick him when they lose. These people get frustrated because they're losing against people provably worse than them, and so decide to pick up Metaknight too, simply because the only way to counter a Metaknight is with another Metaknight. It's only the people who are die-hard commited to their characters that aren't going to switch over to maining Metaknight. There on in, the scene is just going to get more stagnant and Metaknight crowded.
This is happening in most regions, question is, is it worth a ban?

My personal views are this :

- Metaknight is beatable. Best in game? Yes. Broken? No.
- The majority of the community want Metaknight banned.

But why do they want him banned? I believe most people have given up trying to find counters to Metaknight, and are tiring of losing against Metaknights that they are still outplaying. It's this reluctance that's turning people off their mains, and Brawl altogether in some of the more extreme cases.

While he personally does not merit a ban, a ban would probably benefit the majority, and so I believe Metaknight should be banned.

+1 diversity argument

 

[XienZo]

It was just a statement. Whether it's bad or not depends on who you ask. But I view it as anti-competitive.

Ah, I see. But why do you think its anti-competitive, is it the fewer characters to choose from, the people potentially quitting, or another factor?