This game NEEDS more hype.

[bloodpeach]

I will never be able to get hyped for pikachu dittos unless I see something crazy like shield-breaks or up-b ledge cancel combos.

Also, to get more hype, more things like this need to happen not just in pools, but in bracket:
http://www.twitch.tv/vgbootcamp/b/411216799 (1:44:55)

Gimr told me the stream blew up after that.

Sorry about that commentary =/
Should've hyped that waaaaay more.

 

[clubbadubba]

I think we should rethink the counter-pick rules. Probably the biggest reason that people end up doing pikachu dittos is that no one wants to get counterpicked. Whenever I do double blind picks, I always hesitate to pick falcon for fear of my opponent picking kirby. And then, whenever I have to pick my character first because I won the previous game, the same thing happens. The only time I ever feel safe going falcon is when I get to pick my character last and know for sure I won't be going up against a kirby. Which means in a best of 3 set its very likely I'll only go my main once, and pikachu twice, which really just sucks.

I got lucky at zenith because I knew my specific opponents weren't going to whip out a kirby, but as you get to higher levels of smash it seems everyone has a pocket kirby that would give most falcons nightmares. Of the top 6, all but stranded and kero have high level kirby's. Not only kirby's, but those 4 players can play almost the entire cast at a decently high level, which makes everyone counterpickable except for pikachu.

This isn't meant to hate on kirby at all, just saying that when people have to choose a character and be ready for every character their opponent could choose, we're going to get a LOT of pikachu because he has no bad matchups. And then if you're going against pikachu, pikachu will always be a top 3 choice, and that's going to lead to lots and lots of pikachu dittos. Maybe if people weren't so scared that by picking someone who isn't pikachu they'd get counterpicked and locked into a bad matchup we'd see some more exciting matchups take place.

 

[Yobolight]

Id be down for character lock for whole tournament.

The culture of counterpicking has the effect of limiting the development of difficult matchups.

Look at Japan and they have players with dedicated mains who play ridiculous matchups and still win.
Example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jxDW9PC3cIM

 

[Barbs Jr]

Id be down for character lock for whole tournament.

The culture of counterpicking has the effect of limiting the development of difficult matchups.

Look at Japan and they have players who play ridiculous matchups and still win

I think we have a lot to learn from the japanese. Just look at their SSB tourney success.

I think it was King Funk who said he went there and had a blast. Although I don't think we should play single elimination like those guys...

 

[Yobolight]

Since in America we love our double elimination brackets, we could institute character lock, but allow players the option to switch characters in the transition from winners bracket to losers bracket.

I do think it is unfair how everybody knows who people like Nintendude or Wizzrobe main so those players have the disadvantage of getting character counterpicked right from the beginning.

Character lock promotes the type of metagame that is fun to both watch and play.

 

[B-Town]

At a tourney like Zenith I think we'd still see a lot of pika and kirby if there was character lock. Like it or not, my best character is Kirby... If i had to choose 1 character for a tournament right now it'd be kirby. If I entered a tournament with the current rules, I really only use kirby as a last resort and try to win with my falcon or another character.

 

[DMoogle]

I'd LOVE a low tier tournament. People hate randomness in SSB, so I'm not sure if a random character tournament would work out. I'd play it though.

 

[Yobolight]

At a tourney like Zenith I think we'd still see a lot of pika and kirby if there was character lock. Like it or not, my best character is Kirby... If i had to choose 1 character for a tournament right now it'd be kirby. If I entered a tournament with the current rules, I really only use kirby as a last resort and try to win with my falcon or another character.

The idea of a character lock is to prevent a player from switching from Pikachu to Kirby whenever they see a Falcon player.
Pikachu > Kirby
Kirby > Falcon
Falcon >/= Pikachu

Through disallowing counterpicks, you make both Falcon and Kirby because you make Falcon more viable because the opponent cannot just select Kirby, and by extension make Kirby more viable because the increased number of Falcons. The increased number of Falcons make Fox more viable...etc

Another important aspect of the character lock in tournament is that it creates "dedicated mains", which make increases character variety as well as single character masters, which (aside from like Sheermadness and maybe a few others) doesn't really exist in the US.

 

[clubbadubba]

character locks is basically the same thing as a double blind pick, except for every game you play. I think a lot of people would pick pikachu just because they would never have a bad matchup.

 

[Yobolight]

Then a lot of people would pick Falcon in response....

If the Pikachu ditto matchup were to reach ubiquity then a Falcon player would have a distinct advantage over the other players.

I mean you don't have to take my word for it, the Japanese are doing something right, and it would be nice to determine exactly what it is and implement it over here.

 

[clubbadubba]

maybe... falcon barely has the edge vs pika on some stages and is worse on others. at best falcon/pika is slightly better than pika dittos, but you'd open yourself up to bad matchups, so there isn't a great reason to go falcon. would someone like nintendude char lock on mario, or would he use pikachu? Not so sure about that.

 

[asianaussie]

if we ban high tiers (ie everyone yoshi/mario and above) then every damn match will be hype, sans puff dittos

 

[Yobolight]

I think it would be cool if a TO tested the Japanese rule-set except for with double elimination. (DL only, character lock)

I mean I hate to use the same example twice in a row... but how many US Links know 0-death combos against Pikachu on Dreamland
http://youtu.be/jxDW9PC3cIM?t=3m35s

If we could get force players to learn "bad matchups" instead of taking an easy counter-pick then tournaments would be way more hype.

 

[asianaussie]

i dont think that combo is a good example, for several reasons

 

[Yobolight]

The exact combo doesn't matter, I am sure an equivalent combo in (U) that takes advantages of Link's different attributes would be serve the same purpose if someone were to develop it.

 

[clubbadubba]

Also from what I've heard (aka what sensei told me at zenith) the japanese version is more balanced overall, so character locks might have different end results.

 

[Battlecow]

So you think that character lock will make people pick pikachu LESS?

CP matchups are the only fun ones. It's not like people are CP'ing Pika, they're CP'ing AWAY from pika to body falcon mostly

What problems did CP'ing create at zenith?

The only thing character lock will do is reward people like me--pika mains who only use pika. Multi-char mains will vanish and you won't see multiple characters in a set

 

[clubbadubba]

I think the high number of pika dittos at Zenith was caused by counterpicking. When you pick first, you are likely to pick pikachu because he has no bad matchups so you don't fear the counterpick. I'm not for a character lock, but I wish there was some other way we could figure out to select characters that is fair.

 

[Yobolight]

It isn't like beating Pikachu with Kirby, Fox, Mario, Yoshi, etc.. is impossible. It is that it becomes increasingly difficult as you move down the tier list, but if you character lock people then you force them to learn the matchups that are difficult.

Sheermadness is an example of a player who has grown to enjoy the Pikachu matchup even though it is poor for his character, he didn't learn it over night it took practice.

You have to create an environment in which people feel attached to their character and can't press the escape button whenever they don't like a match up.

 

[clubbadubba]

Sure but by locking are you forcing people to learn bad match-ups or are you forcing everyone to pick pikachu so they don't run in to a bad matchup. Like I said, we could potentially see players like nintendude choose to character lock pikachu instead of mario because there are certain matchups he doesn't like with mario. I'm just not sure its a great solution. Maybe if players did a character lock for individual sets, AND it isn't double blind and the players somehow agree on a matchup that could work.

 

[Nintendude]

Personally, if I were to enter a character lock tournament with the intentions of winning it I'd pick Pikachu, because it's just simply the best decision. The only high tier matchup that I strongly prefer Mario over Pikachu is vs. Falcon.

 

[KnitePhox]

yo a random character tourney would be awesome if you can get 1 reroll each round, bottom 7 on tier list only

 

[MrMarbles]

the reason character lock works in japan is because from what i've heard, most don't believe in an absolute tier list, and they love they're mains. but its a completely different culture here in the US where people love being able to play MULTIPLE characters at a high level, and outperforming their opponents thru counterpicks. locking characters would ruin tourneys for a lot of players here

 

[clubbadubba]

yo a random character tourney would be awesome if you can get 1 reroll each round, bottom 7 on tier list only

so.... #7 is mario right?

 

[MrMarbles]

it should really be bottom 8. pika fox falcon and kirby are on another level but mario belongs in a low tier tourney imo

 

[clubbadubba]

you mean yoshi. mario is obviously already there cuz he's clearly #6

 

[B-Town]

Also from what I've heard (aka what sensei told me at zenith) the japanese version is more balanced overall, so character locks might have different end results.

Lets switch over to japanese version then!

 

[Nintendude]

So I thought of something else. One of the reasons this game isn't getting the same level of hype as other games is that it's somewhat dead outside of the Northeast. This means there's no regional rivalries or local heroes. Results at tournaments are fairly predictable and uninteresting. There's just a few isolated good players all over the place, a small scene in the Chicago area, and a larger scene in the Northeast. We've stepped it up big time over the past year and the results are apparent. When will other regions follow suit? When will the WC scene start attempting to mobilize their players more?

 

[Han Solo]

When ballin stops being sad and gets happy again.

 

[Battlecow]

yo nintenbitch why don't you shut the **** up and worry about your own region? MW will **** you the ****ing **** up

 

[clubbadubba]

Yo Midwest god BODIED at zenith. Is firo even MW anymore? Get on our level MW. Actually, get on level 1 first.

 

[Battlecow]

Yo Northeast got bopped at SWEET tho

 

[clubbadubba]

oh yea 5 of the top 8 is getting BOPPED.

Sensei > battlecow

kero/megavolt > han solo

stranded/valoem > everyone else you got.

WHERE'S THE BOPPING SON?

 

[Nintendude]

MW exposure is off the charts right now.

 

[clubbadubba]

more exposure than this

 

[Han Solo]

Firo is MW as far as I'm concerned until May 2014, Kero is better than me because pikachu, and Megavolt has next-level mindgames by bringing his girlfriend to tournaments.

 

[clubbadubba]

hahah **** i didn't get to meet his gf. I'm surprised you didn't throw more of a fit about it

 

[Han Solo]

I definitely asked some people where Megavolt was, but I didn't want to delve further than that for fear of making an internet thing too real.

 

[Kefit]

So I thought of something else. One of the reasons this game isn't getting the same level of hype as other games is that it's somewhat dead outside of the Northeast. This means there's no regional rivalries or local heroes. Results at tournaments are fairly predictable and uninteresting. There's just a few isolated good players all over the place, a small scene in the Chicago area, and a larger scene in the Northeast. We've stepped it up big time over the past year and the results are apparent. When will other regions follow suit? When will the WC scene start attempting to mobilize their players more?

Keep in mind that WC isn't exactly a single cozy place. I'd have to catch a plane, get a hotel room, and probably rent a car to attend a CA tournament, so in the end it wouldn't be that far off from simply flying across the country to an Apex or other NE event. I believe there was a fairly lively CA scene a few years ago, but most of these players have either retired, vanished, or moved on to other things. The only active player over here I know of who is at, near, or above my level is Isai, and I can't exactly just hop in my car and go play in a random tournament with him.

I'm not really sure what to do about this situation, to be honest. You can't conjure Smash talent out of thin air. I'm trying to revive the WC online scene, maybe that will be a good start.

 

[Nintendude]

I understand that WC is a gigantic region. What I suggest doing is going to smashfests and tournaments in your state, regardless of what games are being played. Show up with an n64 and some controllers and offer to teach people the game. Your local scene already has a TO that hosts 64 events (gimpyfish) so that makes it easier to maintain interest among the people you play with.

I also suggest making a facebook group. How can the scene keep in touch otherwise? The EC facebook group has over 100 people in it. Less than half go to tournaments, but for the rest of them that facebook group is there to keep them in the loop about smashfests and tournaments going on. The more people in the group, more people that will invite their friends. It's a great way to just get the word out in general.

Lastly, reach out to online players and find a way to integrate them into the console scene. I'm sure there are other online players in the Pac NW. Recently, EC has seen a boost from experienced veterans like A$, Fireblaster, and LD attending tournaments for the first time. At Apex we saw people like I Love Smash, Combo Blaze, etc. come out.

The process of growing a scene is self-perpetuating. The more people that are active, the more stuff just sort of happens on its own. The key is to just getting the ball rolling some how and to start small. You live in Washington, so don't even worry about Cali and the Southwest. Just see what kind of activity you can get going locally.