Tournament Mode [1.1.0] Community Patch Notes

[Zapp Branniglenn]

This discovery was quite crucial, and it's amazing that we probably would have went on never realizing a change.

But can we lock down a consistent rate of reduction? We were playing with the numbers of 1.25 -> 1.0 and 1.5 -> 1.2 earlier. Assuming the modifiers never go down past 1.0 like we suspect, are they subtracting 0.3 from the modifier, or is there a proportional reduction for all modifiers? Like, say, 20%

We could just write the simple truth of "moves with a hitlag modifier have reduced (but not equalized) self shieldlag". But if there's a pattern, I can't see it. Falco's numbers have 2.0s and 2.5s. And we established that moves with electric properties don't share in this shieldlag reduction (get wrecked, Robin and Pikachu).

 

[LordWilliam1234]

On Robin:

Wind Jab Ender: Self shieldlag reduced by 4 frames, 17 -> 13.

Fire Jab Ender: Self shieldlag reduced by 3 frames, 11 -> 8.

Dash Attack: Self shieldlag reduced by 1 frame, 9 -> 8. (Matches opponent's shieldlag)

D-air (Levin): Self shieldlag reduced by 4 frames, 19 -> 15 (opponent shieldlag is 8 frames so it had a hitlag modifier on top of the default one electric attacks get)

His other Levin attacks were not changed.

...well, f-air did get a self hitlag increase of 1 frame, from 13 -> 14, but that's related to the damage increase, not this global change; the hitlag increase is consistent on both hit and on shield.

 

[FullMoon]

So defensive options were nerfed more than they seemed at first.

How significant are those hitlag changes though? When it comes to frames and stuff I still find it a bit hard to tell what's a big change and what's small.

 

[LordWilliam1234]

Depends on the character imo. For characters like Roy or Greninja, I don't think the change will have a huge impact. But for characters like Ryu and Marth, this change is very significant.

In Ryu's case the change makes his Collarbone Breaker (f-tilt strong) significantly better. You can no longer roll after the first hit; if you do you just get hit by the second hit. If you spot dodge, you avoid the second hit, but Ryu recovers before the opponent does so you can punish with d-tilt light and confirm into a Shoryuken.

 

[Zapp Branniglenn]

I was honestly surprised when I heard shieldlag was increased for the attacker only due to hitlag modifiers. That is just really unfair. Since moves with hitlag modifiers in Smash are really present because they're supposed to have that extra "oomph" when landed. It's an aesthetic effect that unfortunately screwed over a lot of moves and even entire characters like Ryu and Marth in Smash 4. Heck, isn't the very concept of hitlag modifiers (besides the electric effect) unique to Smash 4? What an amazing oversight.

For Ryu, his moveset having hitlag modifiers was only there to emulate the feel of street fighter 2's extremely generous hitlag window which helps people input more moves for a combo. And his release must have alerted developers that there is an issue with such moves. I still wish the issue were equalized rather than marginally alleviated, but since most of the highest hitlag attacks are multijab finishers, it only makes sense that moves like that be easily punishable on block, and they still are.

I think most Smash 4 players feel that blocking and shield options are all very exploitable and generous in Smash 4, so I'm happy to see any aspect of that taken down. The mark of a good Smash 4 player is how they play around these mechanics, but some options are just not reasonably punishable with a human's level of reaction time, or even character choice that isn't Shiek or Fox. Now if they could just tack on three frames of endlag to every roll...

 

[LordWilliam1234]

Now if they could just tack on three frames of endlag to every roll...

Even Samus'?

 

[Zapp Branniglenn]

Even Samus'?

Well I wouldn't want to play favoritism. Bowser has a bad dodge roll too, but that's because he only travels one Bowser's worth of length, not because of numbers (well maybe because of numbers too). As a Bowser main, I don't dodge roll ever because it does nothing for me. And he's a functional character without it. Samus isn't a bad character because she has a bad dodge roll, far from it.

 

[LordWilliam1234]

I just pointed out Samus' because her rolls are already the slowest in the game by quite a bit (I believe her roll is 40 frames, though I haven't frame counted for her yet). I think tacking on 3 frames of recovery on rolls is fine, I just don't think Samus is one that needs it (I think the next slowest roll is 32 frames).

Anyways I think I'm driving things a bit too far off-topic.

 

[Ffamran]

Could you check Lucario? He and Ryu have many hit lag modifiers from what I remember. As for the pattern thing, it probably won't make sense as Falco has hit lag modifiers of 1.3, 1.5, 2.0, and 2.5 for above 1.0 modifiers. He also has 0.0, 0.1, 0.5, and 0.8 hit lag modifiers on some moves. Also, I'm pretty sure his Nair and late hit of Side Smash have a 1.0 hit lag modifier, but they had self shield stun changes. Only Nair was changed in damage, but that was for the second hit in patch 1.0.8. Also, don't we call self shield stuff: frame advantage?

 

[Zapp Branniglenn]

Could you check Lucario? He and Ryu have many hit lag modifiers from what I remember.

Unless Aura is like eletricity in that there's a natural modifier, his frame data suggest that he has no modifiers above 1.0 besides Extreme speed hitboxes, and his double team counterattack.

I just pointed out Samus' because her rolls are already the slowest in the game by quite a bit (I believe her roll is 40 frames, though I haven't frame counted for her yet).

What an excellent standard. They should make dodge rolls as long as that. But really though, Once they start addressing her flaws as a character, then her dodge roll can be adjusted. My suspicion is that in the very early build of Smash 4 where we had the E3 invatational, she had a dodge roll that was normal and the playtesters were speculating her strengths based on that degenerate playstyle we see on For Glory with other characters.

 

[TTTTTsd]

So, these hitlag changes only apply to characters with modifiers huh? Damn Ryu's Collarbone Breaker is actually legit scary now wtf. That's insane.

I'd ask about stuff like Dr. Mario or Mario but I doubt those values have changed at all, would be interesting if they have but I don't think they have any hitlag modifiers outside of moves that you're not going to realistically land on shield frequently (Doc FSmash might have a modifier because of electricity perhaps)

 

[LordWilliam1234]

Could you check Lucario? He and Ryu have many hit lag modifiers from what I remember. As for the pattern thing, it probably won't make sense as Falco has hit lag modifiers of 1.3, 1.5, 2.0, and 2.5 for above 1.0 modifiers. He also has 0.0, 0.1, 0.5, and 0.8 hit lag modifiers on some moves. Also, I'm pretty sure his Nair and late hit of Side Smash have a 1.0 hit lag modifier, but they had self shield stun changes. Only Nair was changed in damage, but that was for the second hit in patch 1.0.8. Also, don't we call self shield stuff: frame advantage?

Falco's n-air only had a self shieldlag change on the final hit. Falco's f-smash has a hitlag modifier of 0.5 on the late hit and neither the strong hit or the weak hit got a self shieldlag change.

Frame advantage is a different thing entirely from self shieldlag. Unless there's more Smash terminology I'm not aware of.

Unless Aura is like eletricity in that there's a natural modifier, his frame data suggest that he has no modifiers above 1.0 besides Extreme speed hitboxes, and his double team counterattack.

Actually, he may have more than that. See here for his frame data at 0%, and here for his frame data with Aura. (Note that this is for 1.06 and doesn't include his customs yet)

His f-tilt, f-smash, d-smash, u-smash, and n-air all have at least a 1 frame difference between self shieldlag and opponent shieldlag at some point, so it's possible this global change affected those. So I'll check Lucario next to see.

 

[Ffamran]

Unless Aura is like eletricity in that there's a natural modifier, his frame data suggest that he has no modifiers above 1.0 besides Extreme speed hitboxes, and his double team counterattack.

Oh yeah, I forgot Aura was an element... Still, I thought Aura only affected Lucario from a mechanical standpoint of more damage on Lucario means more damage he can dish out while his hit lag modifiers were independent of Aura. Still, it doesn't hurt to check.

Falco's n-air only had a self shieldlag change on the final hit. Falco's f-smash has a hitlag modifier of 0.5 on the late hit and neither the strong hit or the weak hit got a self shieldlag change.

Frame advantage is a different thing entirely from self shieldlag. Unless there's more Smash terminology I'm not aware of.

Yeah, checked Dantarion's data dump and I missed that somehow... Falco's Side Smash has a hit lag modifier of 0.5 and a SDI multiplier of 0.3 and... Nair's last hit as is Fair's last hit is missing in the data dump. It used to be there... Well, that means I'll have to change some things...

As for frame advantage, going off of a KoF frame data spreadsheet, I have it separated by on-hit and on shield frame advantage. Shield stun and hit stun are separated as well. So, there's that. I don't have self shield stun, but I can get it through that six river shield stun calculator except for some other things since, y'know, the formula might have changed. (On shield) Frame advantage is the aftermath of self shield stun, right?

 

[LordWilliam1234]

(On shield) Frame advantage is the aftermath of self shield stun, right?

More or less. The long answer (you probably know how it works but I'll leave it here for everyone else as well):

On shield frame advantage depends on the move's endlag, self shieldlag, opponent shieldlag, and shieldstun. So in the case of Falco's jab ender, for example, it has 6 frames of opponent shieldlag, 9 frames of self shieldlag, and 2 frames of shieldstun. It has 34 frames of endlag. Since Falco's shieldlag is higher than the opponent's, that's the equivalent of adding 3 frames of recovery to the move (9 - 6), so we'll say that it has 37 frames of recovery. Subtract 1 frame the shieldstun (for the hitting frame which initiates shieldlag), then subtract the recovery from shieldstun (37 - 1), and we get -36. Shield drop is 7 frames so against a shield drop it would be -29.

If a move has less shieldlag than the opponent, add the difference to the shieldstun instead.

 

[icraq]

Gonna check through the rest of Ryu's frame data next.

did you get around to checking that? i was going to but i'd assume you would be more accurate than me.

also, if you're able can you figure out the landing lag on inputted shoryuken?

 

[LordWilliam1234]

did you get around to checking that? i was going to but i'd assume you would be more accurate than me.

also, if you're able can you figure out the landing lag on inputted shoryuken?

Ryu's frame data appears unchanged, aside from the general self shieldlag changes I noted.

Inputted Shoryuken's landing lag is 12 frames. See here for the rest.

 

[san.]

So the higher the hitlag, the more frames that were saved with this patch? I'm thinking of attacks with hitlag values of 3+ such as the final hit of Mii Gunner's fsmash.

Edit:

William is there anything thus far that doesn't prove

Attacker Hit Lag Modifier(modifier, context):
if context is shield && modifier >= 1.25: return modifier / 1.25
else: return modifier

And guessing by Roy's 1.30 still producing extra freeze ceiling[AHLM(X,Y) * HitLag(DMG)]

is what's going on right now?

Nevermind, this seemed to answer my question.

 

[Vipermoon]

I was honestly surprised when I heard shieldlag was increased for the attacker only due to hitlag modifiers. That is just really unfair. Since moves with hitlag modifiers in Smash are really present because they're supposed to have that extra "oomph" when landed. It's an aesthetic effect that unfortunately screwed over a lot of moves and even entire characters like Ryu and Marth in Smash 4. Heck, isn't the very concept of hitlag modifiers (besides the electric effect) unique to Smash 4? What an amazing oversight.

For Ryu, his moveset having hitlag modifiers was only there to emulate the feel of street fighter 2's extremely generous hitlag window which helps people input more moves for a combo. And his release must have alerted developers that there is an issue with such moves. I still wish the issue were equalized rather than marginally alleviated, but since most of the highest hitlag attacks are multijab finishers, it only makes sense that moves like that be easily punishable on block, and they still are.

I think most Smash 4 players feel that blocking and shield options are all very exploitable and generous in Smash 4, so I'm happy to see any aspect of that taken down. The mark of a good Smash 4 player is how they play around these mechanics, but some options are just not reasonably punishable with a human's level of reaction time, or even character choice that isn't Shiek or Fox. Now if they could just tack on three frames of endlag to every roll...

They had non-electric hitlag modifiers in Brawl (like Marth tippers) but I'm 99% sure they didn't exist in Melee (electric or not).

So the higher the hitlag, the more frames that were saved with this patch? I'm thinking of attacks with hitlag values of 3+ such as the final hit of Mii Gunner's fsmash.

Edit:



Nevermind, this seemed to answer my question.

Isn't Mii Gunner's Fsmash a projectile? In that case, he wouldn't get self shieldlag in the first place.

 

[san.]

Isn't Mii Gunner's Fsmash a projectile? In that case, he wouldn't get self shieldlag in the first place.

Nope, just a transcendent smash attack. Same with uair.

 

[Vipermoon]

Nope, just a transcendent smash attack. Same with uair.

I see.

 

[Shaya]

Hit lag modifiers were in Brawl, and likely the same in Melee...
Basically in Brawl we realised that tipper moves on Marth were artificially less safe early on. We considered at the time that this was on purpose to reduce HOW safe those moves were on shield, especially with the extra damage variables to it. It incentivised spacing arc attacks in such a way to get maximum range while still hitting with the sour spot for increased safety (this was a thing on our aerials, mostly).

As Marth was the only character with universal hitlag modifiers, yada yada.
Just about every nuanced design decision in Brawl ended up moving into smash4, likely through ignorance or not 'caring'. I'm sure we can all agree that the game was a Brawl engine port with alterations along the way.
The extent of Marth's nerfs may have been under the assumption that his hitlag modifiers weren't already making him several frames less safe, tacking on double landing lag, +2 ending frames on a lot of moves and you had something that was pretty dysfunctional in 1.04 (he could not afford to touch shield at all...).
Tipper down tilt should now actually be slightly safer than it was in Brawl with the hitlag change. IMO it should have never been less safe than it was in Brawl.



-

Zapp:
1.5 / 1.25 = 1.2
1.25 / 1.25 = 1.0

2.5 = 2.0

 

[LordWilliam1234]

Marth's tipper d-tilt is -6 vs a shield drop, -13 vs an OOS option/perfect shield now. Same with a tipper f-air, if you land as close to the ground as possible (this is including the landing lag reduction).

Side note, Shaya, is this gonna be added to the OP?

 

[Dantarion]

Why do you guys call it "self shieldlag"

 

[LordWilliam1234]

Why do you guys call it "self shieldlag"

That's just what I've been calling it. 'Cause the shieldlag you receive is different from the hitlag now (if you have a hitlag modifier > 1.0), and it's different from the shieldlag the opponent receives.

Is there a different term you'd use?

 

[Aunt Jemima]

Question, has Kirby's special moves been changed in how safe they are on shield? More specifically, has Hammer Flip or Stone changed?

 

[Ffamran]

Question, has Kirby's special moves been changed in how safe they are on shield? More specifically, has Hammer Flip or Stone changed?

Do they have hit lag modifiers? If so, then probably some change that hasn't been checked yet.

 

[Bribery]

Going by the 1.0.4 dump, Kirby's Hammers have hitlag modifiers > 1 so they were probably affected by this change too. Stone and its customs have hitlag modifiers less than 1. They're listed as "unknown substate" in the dump but it's pretty easy to decipher them based on their damage values.


Hammer Flip (uncharged)
Frame 11-11: 19% 60b/70g (KO@ 117%) 53° 1.2-Hitlag

Hammer Flip (fully charged)
Frame 11-11: 35% 60b/70g (KO@ 30%) 361° 1.5-Hitlag Fire

Hammer Bash (Side B2)
Frame 11-11: 21% 55b/70g (KO@ 104%) 75° 1.2-Hitlag
Frame 11-11: 18% 55b/70g (KO@ 126%) 75° 1.2-Hitlag

Giant Hammer (Side B3 - Uncharged)
Frame 11-12: 22% 60b/70g (KO@ 97%) 53° 1.5-Hitlag


Giant Hammer (Fully charged) - it's unblockable anyways so no point in checking for shield lag


Stone
Frame 1- 2: 18% 65b/70g (KO@ 119%) 70° 0.7-Hitlag

Grounding Stone
Frame 1- 2: 12% 65b/80g (KO@ 159%) 70° 0.6-Hitlag Bury Aerial-Target-Only
Frame 1- 2: 10% 50b/80g 70° 0.6-Hitlag Bury Ground-Target-Only

Meteor Stone
Frame 1-12: 12% 60b/100g (KO@ 171%) 270° 0.7-Hitlag
Frame 13-22: 10% 50b/100g (KO@ 216%) 270° 0.7-Hitlag
Frame 23-24: 8% 40b/100g (KO@ 277%) 270° 0.7-Hitlag

 

[A_Kae]

So, with that data, hitlag on shield should be this:

Hammer Flip (Uncharged) 14 > 12
Hammer Flip (Charged) 27 > 22
Hammer Bash (18%) 14 > 11
Hammer Bash (21%) 15 > 13
Giant Hammer (Uncharged) 20 > 16

 

[Patriot Duck]

Jigglypuff has only 2 moves with hitlag modifiers: bair and the final hit of dair. If it's not too much trouble, could someone check the new self shieldlag? I'm not experienced with counting frames.

 

[A_Kae]

Jigglypuff has only 2 moves with hitlag modifiers: bair and the final hit of dair. If it's not too much trouble, could someone check the new self shieldlag? I'm not experienced with counting frames.

By my calculations:

Bair: 12 > 10
Dair (Final hit): 12 > 10

 

[Centicerise]

Would it be safe to say all attacks like levin sword with an electric effect (and therefore high hitlag modifer) are noticeably safer on shield now?

 

[A_Kae]

Would it be safe to say all attacks like levin sword with an electric effect (and therefore high hitlag modifer) are noticeably safer on shield now?

Electric attacks without a hitlag modifier aren't affected by this.

 

[Blobface]

Attacks doing more damage increases hitlag regardless of attack, so I'm curious: if you boost a characters attack, do their attacks become safer on shield now?

I ask because if high hitlag on shield was given a general decrease, heavies would benefit extensively.

 

[Shaya]

Shield stun scales with damage as well.
And it's only for moves with modifiers blobface... hyper-majority of actions in this game are 1.0 modifiers.

 

[Shaya]

Also as an aside, this hit lag modifer thing also affects counters.
Marth has effectively lost the ability to use counter against Ness, Roy and Ryu's recoveries as they will no longer experience extended hit lag while Marth did not. I guess Marth's been compensated, but this hurts other counters in this game too.

 

[Zapp Branniglenn]

Also as an aside, this hit lag modifer thing also affects counters.
Marth has effectively lost the ability to use counter against Ness, Roy and Ryu's recoveries as they will no longer experience extended hit lag while Marth did not. I guess Marth's been compensated, but this hurts other counters in this game too.

How are self shieldlag and hitting a counter related? I've not heard of counters behaving like shields upon activation.

 

[Shaya]

Neither did I, but @ KuroganeHammer showed me the light at some point.

Anything that ignores shield in this game also ignores counters, they're relatively similar in implementation. You can't counter Mac's KO punch or most final smashes.

Confirmation bias of "hmm, I'm not getting these counter stocks from Roy/Ryu as easily as I was before... I guess they're angling better or something"... then an event in tournament where Ness got through in a way that would almost assuredly hit him before (a good 2 characters lengths from the ledge). Then discovery the hit lag mechanics have changed.

 

[KuroganeHammer]

This hitlag thing is important to me, but can someone explain to me specifically what's happening to the bonus hitlag modifiers on shields?

 

[Shaya]

This hitlag thing is important to me, but can someone explain to me specifically what's happening to the bonus hitlag modifiers on shields?

http://smashboards.com/threads/412130/page-28#post-20007555

Also Rosalina&Luma got uber stealth buffed this patch then lol.

 

[KuroganeHammer]

http://smashboards.com/threads/412130/page-28#post-20007555

I am a very simple man and have no idea what that is. Is hitlag on shield reduced by 20% when a move has a hitlag modifier of more than 1?