Time for a new ruleset?

[Adam M!]

Specifically in regards to stages, that is.

Today Plank released the stage ruleset for Pound 4, which is as follows:

*Pound* 4 Official Melee Stage List​

​

Neutrals 1v1:

FD
Yoshis
Dreamland
Battlefield
Fountain of Dreams


Neutrals 2v2:

FD
Yoshis
Dreamland
Battlefield
Pokemon Stadium


Counterpicks 1v1:

Kongo Jungle
Brinstar
Rainbow Cruise
Pokemon Stadium


Counterpicks 2v2:

Kongo Jungle
Brinstar
Rainbow Cruise

Basis of Decision:​

The Melee back room did a stage vote on both neutrals and Counterpicks. Both of the rulesets I, as the main TO, voted for are the ones that have the most support. I feel like this is a compromise between everyone, and I'm sorry to those who aren't happy because I can't please everyone. I want the results of this tournament to be as accurate as possible, so these are the legal stages.

• Pokemon Stadium: This stage is no longer a neutral for singles. The transformations in and of themselves would often result in entirely banned stages due to walls and such. Because the stage changes however, the stage is not banned, but I do not feel is neutral. However, in teams if a player is stuck in an infinite his teammate has the opportunity to help, which is why it is indeed neutral in teams (and to make a 5th stage since fountain isn't and this is the next best stage). The camera angles on the ledges are funky, and it's widely known space animals run wild on the stage.

Stage Striking will be in effect for the first match of the set. The player with the lower port will get to choose the first strike. Loser choses ban before next match.


One ban per player per set. To be chosen after loss.

Modified DSR: You cannot go back to the last stage you won in a set, unless agreed upon by the other player.


The player choice clause!:: If both players agree to a rule outside of my ruleset, feel free to play by that. If one player wants to counterpick Mute City and the other player is fine with that because they think it's a fair stage, then that is more than fine. However in the event the two players disagree, house rules stand.

Any questions please contact me via PM or AIM, but as of now the stage discussion here is OVER, and so please do not spam the thread with that. I'm trying to compromise best for everyone.

Personally, I feel this is a perfect combination of the fairest ruleset you could come up with while also comprimising with opposing viewpoints. Now that one of the biggest national tournaments in Smash history has taken the major step to pioneer a new ruleset, should we as regional areas start to do the same? Personally I think it would be great if we could finally grow past the point of Pokemon as a neutral and change our own rules to adopt this. I am hoping this thread can be used for such discussion. Tournament hosts ALWAYS have priority for whatever rules they deem fit, so I am especially hoping we can have tournament organizers chime in on their thoughts, like Hyuga, onski, Champ, neal, Game Clucks, etc.

 

[Lovage]

i was going to suggest that we switch to this ruleset in socal at least until pound 4, but i realize that only like 10 people are going from socal.

as for the ruleset in general i'd have to think about it, i think mute city should stay on though

 

[pockyD]

i've been campaigning for stadium off neutral for the longest time

that stage is ****ing stupid

that said, i'm unsure that, say, poke floats is noticeably less 'fair' than rainbow cruise is (even though i personally hate them both)... the decision to keep cruise/brinstar while eliminating floats/mute city should be examined

 

[sidefx]

lol @ pokestad not being a neutral

if anything, id say yoshi's would be the first candidate to remove from neutrals..


only neutrals is fd and dreamland. =D

 

[Adam M!]

i've been campaigning for stadium off neutral for the longest time

that stage is ****ing stupid

that said, i'm unsure that, say, poke floats is noticeably less 'fair' than rainbow cruise is (even though i personally hate them both)... the decision to keep cruise/brinstar while eliminating floats/mute city should be examined

i agree: cruise, brinstar, floats and city should all be banned.

i was playing cruise yesterday, marth (me) v sheik. and even though i like the stage, it's really ******** because really all you have to do is stay near the front of the moving stage and punish your opponent every time he has to follow the stage and jump on the platforms and such. toss in ridiculously janky kills from the side or in the air and it's mad dumb

and poke floats is ******** just for the stupid GLITCHES. i mean are you serious, how can you play on that stage with money on the line. not to mention the irregularity in getting your kills -- you can die off the top or the side at insanely low percentages, or tech slowpoke's tail or a bunch of other stuff and live to forever.

 

[Lovage]

floats has a bunch of dumb stuff such as falling through the seal pokemon for no reason
and slowpoke's face blocks every recovery because he has dumb collision

 

[Kouryuu]

I really like Planks ruleset.

 

[AzN_Lep]

psssh i like the dumb stages, well specifically for teams. tournaments can get stale on the same 6 stages and places like pokefloats and jungle japes make things a lot more fun, granted not necessarily more competitive. Pretty sure anyone at that last triweekly can vouch for this also. The teams matches on pokefloats were some of the most entertaining to watch and definitely the most fun to play

 

[ResidentWaffle]

I've always wondered why Onett is banned in teams, that stage is sooo fun.

 

[joeplicate]

foxes

learn your rainbow cruise

 

[pockyD]

we should use this at ncb!

 

[Vulcan55]

No Corneria?
No Mute City?

 

[DanteFox]

I'm all for banning corneria and especially green greens. but I think stadium should still be neutral. sure it favors the spacies, but not enough to make them a counterpick. otherwise by planks logic yoshi's should be a cp stage because marth is good on it. Then we'll be left with like 3 or 4 neutral stages depending on how far we decide to go with that logic.

edit: partially beaten by boback.

 

[pockyD]

it's not because it favors spacies, nor anything to do with the initial position/layout

it's because of the random transformation, 2 of which are completely horrible and 2 of which wouldn't qualify as "neutral" if they were the default position

so half the time, you're playing on something decidedly not even close to "neutral"

 

[DanteFox]

more like 1/3 of the time. that means that around 2/3 of the time it's neutral. I say we round down and keep it a neutral.

or round up, depending on what you're rounding lol

 

[Fly_Amanita]

I favor moving it to CP mainly because I want an odd number of starter stages, and of the sane options for doing this (removing a current neutral or adding DK64 to the list), removing PS is the one I find least objectionable.

 

[Deleted member]

Why does lower port stage strike first? Why not flip a coin or do rps?

 

[pockyD]

you should really rps for it anyway

it's pretty typical that lower controller port is better and stage striking second is better, so just RPS, then the winner chooses which of those two he wants

i mean the RPS determining the port is already in the rules anyway, so it's in there, just as a two-step process

 

[HyugaRicdeau]

PS, beyond the question of its balance, has the issue of being "different" from the other starter stages because of the transformations, as pocky points out. I think the first stage should be something that mostly tests fundamentals of the game.

As for banning certain CP stages, I think the Pound 4 ruleset is at least consistent with how much they are willing to let the stage itself be a factor in gameplay. What I would have a problem with is banning Mute but not banning Corneria or Poke Floats, for example. I personally would prefer a ruleset that keeps Floats/Mute/Corneria, but I'm not against experimenting with a more conservative ruleset. However...

For teams I think we should consider allowing 1 or 2 more stages. For some of the more offensive stages, a good part of their balance problems come from the fact that in some matchups, it's too easy for certain characters to play the camping game and win. In teams this is less of a problem, so I think for example Corneria is acceptable.

 

[SFAT]

floats has a bunch of dumb stuff such as falling through the seal pokemon for no reason
and slowpoke's face blocks every recovery because he has dumb collision

I laughed at this.

i've been campaigning for stadium off neutral for the longest time

that stage is ****ing stupid

Why not ban kirby? hohoho Just kidding. kirby r*pes.

 

[Atlus8]

only neutrals is fd and dreamland. =D

F**k yes! This person is f***en true!

i agree: cruise, brinstar, floats and city should all be banned.

So f***en true! OMG! This thread r@pes!

 

[joeplicate]

"The camera angles on the ledges are funky, and it's widely known space animals run wild on the stage."

I don't agree with this reasoning.

I think that stadium has become a point of pride for a lot of space animal players, and that people give too much credit to the advantages it holds for fox. Since PC Chris, I think a lot of people have pledged that PS is "their" level--think dope and rainbow cruise. When they get the chance to CP it they go berserk, because even if they lose the set, at least they keep their reputation of doing well on that stage.

I'm not saying it's a not a GOOD stage for fox, but I definitely believe that a lot of the advantages it gives him are overplayed. "Widely known" is a weasal word; space animals are objectively good on that level, but people also know they have a reputation for being good there.

People camp the transformations anyways; water is neutral, grass is nearly neutral, fire = 1 minute of short hopping behind the tree. When people get punished (and infinited), it's because they jumped the gun and challenged fox on his own territory. The only truly gay transformation IMO is the mountain stage, because you can't do **** to get away.

The transformations start at 1:15 in a match, last for 30 seconds, and then happen every 1:15 thereafter.
so that's
1:15-1:45
3:00-3:30
4:45-5:15
6:30-7:00

That's 2 transformations for most matches and 3 for the really long ones. 4 almost never happens.

Assuming people don't camp on pokemon stadium (no one does), you have 2 or 3 1/4 chances to get the ****ty bannable mountain level. This is the only thing I feel is really game breaking about the level, since it's gay PLUS you can't wait it out well. You'll be camping once or twice a match, on average.



Against fox, people will use their reset on stadium anyways; it always shows up as a counterpick in tournament sets. By removing corneria and putting PS under counterpicks, stadium will get banned, leaving Rainbow Cruise as the next logical "gay" CP.

What will come of this? Foxes are going to learn how to exploit cruise until they know it as well as stadium. All that's really going on is replacing stadium with cruise; a level that, instead of being campy and gay for 30-second intervals, is gay and campy the whole time. Then we'll get stadium back for counterpicks.

 

[killer tofu]

I dun care about ****


i just read brinstar and mute banned

and i approve

I'd gladly give up my ps neutral to get those other two outta here

 

[DJMirror]

@ Joe

The PS stage change every 1 minutes and 15 seconds? the transformaton last about 30 seconds? wow..I didn't know I'm such a noob =___=

Other then that I think this is really good for marth/sheik players now that they dont have PS, green green, mute city etc. Marth and Sheik will be good by this ruleset.

other then that

I think I'll give plank's new ruleset a try

say the upcoming Wintergamefest?


other then that i'll play on ps on friendlies only

 

[joeplicate]

it's not because it favors spacies, nor anything to do with the initial position/layout

it's because of the random transformation, 2 of which are completely horrible and 2 of which wouldn't qualify as "neutral" if they were the default position

so half the time, you're playing on something decidedly not even close to "neutral"

personally I think that the grass and water levels are somewhere in between neutral and CP, but nowhere near bannable.

the whole transformation cycle lasts for 1:45, and the stages are on in 30 second intervals

you're playing on transformations for 30/105 seconds, or 7/24, (exactly between 1/4 and 1/3)

assuming the transformation pick is random, you'll be playing on "decidedly not even close to neutral" stages half the time (fire, mountain)

so that's 7/48ths of the time


you're only playing on "bannable" stages for less than 1/6th of the total time

 

[pockyD]

Against fox, people will use their reset on stadium anyways; it always shows up as a counterpick in tournament sets. By removing corneria and putting PS under counterpicks, stadium will get banned, leaving Rainbow Cruise as the next logical "gay" CP.

What will come of this? Foxes are going to learn how to exploit cruise until they know it as well as stadium. All that's really going on is replacing stadium with cruise; a level that, instead of being campy and gay for 30-second intervals, is gay and campy the whole time. Then we'll get stadium back for counterpicks.

Stadium is a CP stage, just not a starter stage

Is your gripe more with removing corneria or something?

 

[joeplicate]

yeah, part of the reason why i felt moved to post was because PS doesn't seem bad enough to be in the "auto-ban" category

i know that it's still a cp

and i feel that kongo jungle is better for peach/sheik than rainbow cruise is for fox




@jason: yeah it took me like 2 minutes of looking at youtube matches

 

[Shroomed]

i started writing a post, and before hitting the reply button i read it

i realized that the post i was writing was basically saying brinstar/mute city and such are pretty easy wins for chars like peach/doc n crap vs spacies

so i think i was proving plank's point

BUT:

if mute and other stages are to be banned because it's so easy to get a win on it for certain chars, why the **** is rainbow cruise still on when like 9301758137493451780512315819 players play fox

if mute and crap is banned, so should floats and cruise ALONG with corneria

take all the stages from decent chars and only some stages vs spanimals? not cool

=(

 

[SuperRad]

brinstar is still on
so peach/jiggs/doc [i guess?] still have that
fox players have cruise

 

[Squidster]

That's 2 transformations for most matches and 3 for the really long ones. 4 almost never happens.

5 is right out.

 

[joeplicate]

brinstar and kongo
=
cruise and stadium

that's just about perfectly balanced in terms of gayness

 

[pockyD]

i started writing a post, and before hitting the reply button i read it

i realized that the post i was writing was basically saying brinstar/mute city and such are pretty easy wins for chars like peach/doc n crap vs spacies

so i think i was proving plank's point

BUT:

if mute and other stages are to be banned because it's so easy to get a win on it for certain chars, why the **** is rainbow cruise still on when like 9301758137493451780512315819 players play fox

if mute and crap is banned, so should floats and cruise ALONG with corneria

take all the stages from decent chars and only some stages vs spanimals? not cool

=(

i agree that it looks half-*****, but he also made a point out of saying that it was a 'compromise' of a stage system, so i guess that it was SUPPOSED to be half-*****

still, brinstar and rainbow cruise are the only particularly malicious stages in the full set, and very few characters have the option of using them both well (falcon and ganon?), so with your one stage ban, you can pretty much eliminate the 'unwinnable stage' thing

 

[joeplicate]

so with your one stage ban, you can pretty much eliminate the 'unwinnable stage' thing

that's actually something i really like about this system

 

[pockyD]

stadium isn't an auto-ban anyway; i think any floaty player in their right mind would likely still ban rainbow cruise before stadium assuming he thinks the fox/falco is likely to pick RC

for the most part, this set of stages just combats the whole brinstar+mute city and poke floats+rainbow cruise thing where the extreme stages seem to come in pairs, keeping you from dodging a certain type of stage

the whole stadium off of neutral thing just looks more radical than it is (it was off at the hub house tournament!) - with stage striking in place, removing/adding almost any stage (including icicle mountain or big blue) from/to the original 6 would have pretty minimal impact in practice

 

[Fly_Amanita]

I ban Stadium more often than RC against Fox. I hate that stage.

 

[pockyD]

but you probably would've banned stadium over poke floats as well though, right?

so it's not the ruleset that killed it

 

[joeplicate]

that's funny cause i like cruise against ICs much more :D

 

[Fly_Amanita]

@pocky: Definitely, but I know Floats like the back of my hand and I typically do better there than I do on most neutral stages.
edit 2: I wasn't claiming that RC is worse than Stadium for ICs against Fox, if that's how you interpreted my post.

I know Stadium really isn't that bad and I'm aware that I probably don't play on the stage properly. I still would like to see it moved to CP for my aforementioned reasons.

edit: @Joe: RC probably is worse than Stadium for ICs against Fox assuming both players know how to play both stages. I just don't mind moving stages that much since I know them pretty well since people always take me to them.

 

[Eggz]

no mute city? **** that

 

[Little England]

I think the biggest problem when it comes to picking legal stages is that there are no definitions for neutral, counterpick, or banned stages. I think if we can just make a list of rules of what should be allowed for neutral stages then counter pick stages, choosing them will come much easier.