Pierce7d
Wise Hermit
- Joined
- Dec 20, 2006
- Messages
- 6,289
- 3DS FC
- 1993-9028-0439
Hey everyone. I just beat Super Paper Mario and Final Fantasy Tactics, so before I hop into my next single player project of beating Megaman, I missed you guys, so I came back to write another essay.
Before I get started, I just wanted to apologize another time for my commentary at Apex. I know that was a while ago, but I'm still disgusted by it. Seeing myself act like that changed me a lot as a person.
I'm not even going to promise to keep it brief, because we all know I suck at that. But enough with the preamble. Let's hop into it.
In the past, some topics I've covered are stage control, positioning, and advantage. I wanna tie a bunch of those concepts together with a discussion about the ledge. When I'm done, I'll see if I can dig up a bunch of my old essays, which will greatly help you understand this one better. I'll edit and link them here, and if you hadn't read them when I first released them, I recommend doing so.
Now, I've always impressed upon everyone that stage control is imperative to victory; however, it is important to note that the game does not revolve around the center of the stage. It revolves around the ledges.
We have now learned that despite the low amount of hitstun in this game, characters are capable of pulling off fantastic offensive strings once they can open their opponent up correctly. Falling into your opponent is likely to net them more hits. So regardless of whether you are hit up or away, you ultimately should move away from your opponent until you can reset to neutral.
Once your opponent has offensive advantage, they are going to try and press their advantage to maximize damage, and potentially net a K.O.. The ledge is key here, because of several reasons.
1) It grants a sizable portion of invincibility frames.
2) It provides a method of being able to go underneath your opponent.
3) It forces you to remain latched onto it for a small time.
4) It replenishes your mid-air resources, as if you had landed.
5) The range at which you are able to grab it from is remarkable.
6) Most characters have movement enhancing moves which can be canceled into the ledge.
Those are the 6 most important notes about the ledge, and when truly understood, can help you understand why the game revolves around the ledge.
In the vast majority of disadvantaged positions, negotiating your way to the ledge is the route of least peril. If you attempt to land, or perform a reversal, your opponent has the upper hand in being able to score more damage. This means that falling off the stage is the best way to minimize damage. Your opponent's ability to chase you off the stage and continue to apply pressure is usually decreased, (even if the opponent is Metaknight). They lose the ability to dash, and outside of Jigglypuff, no character in the game has high aerial mobility, coupled with favorable hitboxes and multiple jumps. (Due to Jigglypuff's utter lack of disjoints, it is questionable whether she has favorable hitboxes).
This means that once you drift off the stage after getting hit, your opponent's best option becomes to wait for you at the ledge. Due to the ledge mechanics, most characters should not get gimped or fail to recover if they retain their aerial jump. If you don't find this to be the case then either your character's recovery is terrible, or you are poor at recovering. Just in case is is the latter, I'll quickly go through how to properly recover low with most characters.
Fall away from the stage. When you are a reasonably safe distance from the threat, fall back towards the stage. After this, jump towards the edge. If you opponent is hogging it, wait a while before using a special move to grab it. Otherwise, just grab it immediately. Simple.
When one character is on the ledge, the game is at a technical stalemate. Refreshing ledge invincibility is relatively safe for many characters. While on the ledge, your odds of scoring a hit on your opponent who tries to approach you is very high. However, while on the stage against a hanging opponent, your odds of scoring a hit on your opponent who tries to approach you is also very high. Additionally, if you opponent grabs the ledge from you, you are likely to be able to safely recover onto the stage, and the roles will merely be reversed. Therefore, it is both players favor not to approach the other, and gameplay is frozen.
However, due to the timer, the player in the lead is granted the advantage. This is good, because it forces stalemates out of the game, and always grants one player an advantage. It also grants the advantage to the player who earned it, instead of randomly. The timer is actually a very important, excellent feature of the game. However, a new problem is posed. Most of the best stages in this game have a ledge at your back, and through your opponent. Gameplay would be very degenerative if a player could simply obtain a small lead, and then abuse the stalemate created via ledge mechanics to maintain/grow that lead until the timer ran out. This would negate the majority of the fight, and make the first hit far too important to get a proper analysis of skill. To circumvent this design flaw, the ledge grab limit was put in place. Despite many previous arguments, the ledge grab limit actually does a reasonable job at neutralizing the stalemate without any major influence on gameplay, outside of punishing a player for excessive ledge utilization.
The timer will award victory to the leader, if it expires, but the ledge grab limit with prevent the utilization of the ledge and the timer in combination to score victory. Basically, this boils down to, the ledge is now a disadvantaged position to be in, because you will be punished if you indefinitely remain on the ledge, and therefore are forced to recover onto the stay. This is good, because the ledge should be a disadvantaged position against someone on the stage, as it's the intermediate area between an opponent on the stage, and off the stage, and the midpoint for recovery.
An important note to observe is that grabbing the ledge from the opponent is usually a subpar option. Unless you can net a successful K.O. via edgehog, or hit the opponent from the ledge, it is usually unwise to grab it while they are recycling it. It grants them an opportunity to recover onto the stage, and this now puts you into disadvantage. Also, recovery moves are often high-priority, or fast and difficult to intercept. If you are already in the lead, the risk versus reward is typically not worth it.
Instead, you should wait at a range where you can react to your opponent's attempt to recover onto the stage, while not so close that your opponent can strike you from the ledge outside of your reaction time. This way, you remain in control.
And that's it for now! I hope you learned something about how to play Smash, and how the game works at a high level. Thanks for reading.
Before I get started, I just wanted to apologize another time for my commentary at Apex. I know that was a while ago, but I'm still disgusted by it. Seeing myself act like that changed me a lot as a person.
I'm not even going to promise to keep it brief, because we all know I suck at that. But enough with the preamble. Let's hop into it.
In the past, some topics I've covered are stage control, positioning, and advantage. I wanna tie a bunch of those concepts together with a discussion about the ledge. When I'm done, I'll see if I can dig up a bunch of my old essays, which will greatly help you understand this one better. I'll edit and link them here, and if you hadn't read them when I first released them, I recommend doing so.
Now, I've always impressed upon everyone that stage control is imperative to victory; however, it is important to note that the game does not revolve around the center of the stage. It revolves around the ledges.
We have now learned that despite the low amount of hitstun in this game, characters are capable of pulling off fantastic offensive strings once they can open their opponent up correctly. Falling into your opponent is likely to net them more hits. So regardless of whether you are hit up or away, you ultimately should move away from your opponent until you can reset to neutral.
Once your opponent has offensive advantage, they are going to try and press their advantage to maximize damage, and potentially net a K.O.. The ledge is key here, because of several reasons.
1) It grants a sizable portion of invincibility frames.
2) It provides a method of being able to go underneath your opponent.
3) It forces you to remain latched onto it for a small time.
4) It replenishes your mid-air resources, as if you had landed.
5) The range at which you are able to grab it from is remarkable.
6) Most characters have movement enhancing moves which can be canceled into the ledge.
Those are the 6 most important notes about the ledge, and when truly understood, can help you understand why the game revolves around the ledge.
In the vast majority of disadvantaged positions, negotiating your way to the ledge is the route of least peril. If you attempt to land, or perform a reversal, your opponent has the upper hand in being able to score more damage. This means that falling off the stage is the best way to minimize damage. Your opponent's ability to chase you off the stage and continue to apply pressure is usually decreased, (even if the opponent is Metaknight). They lose the ability to dash, and outside of Jigglypuff, no character in the game has high aerial mobility, coupled with favorable hitboxes and multiple jumps. (Due to Jigglypuff's utter lack of disjoints, it is questionable whether she has favorable hitboxes).
This means that once you drift off the stage after getting hit, your opponent's best option becomes to wait for you at the ledge. Due to the ledge mechanics, most characters should not get gimped or fail to recover if they retain their aerial jump. If you don't find this to be the case then either your character's recovery is terrible, or you are poor at recovering. Just in case is is the latter, I'll quickly go through how to properly recover low with most characters.
Fall away from the stage. When you are a reasonably safe distance from the threat, fall back towards the stage. After this, jump towards the edge. If you opponent is hogging it, wait a while before using a special move to grab it. Otherwise, just grab it immediately. Simple.
When one character is on the ledge, the game is at a technical stalemate. Refreshing ledge invincibility is relatively safe for many characters. While on the ledge, your odds of scoring a hit on your opponent who tries to approach you is very high. However, while on the stage against a hanging opponent, your odds of scoring a hit on your opponent who tries to approach you is also very high. Additionally, if you opponent grabs the ledge from you, you are likely to be able to safely recover onto the stage, and the roles will merely be reversed. Therefore, it is both players favor not to approach the other, and gameplay is frozen.
However, due to the timer, the player in the lead is granted the advantage. This is good, because it forces stalemates out of the game, and always grants one player an advantage. It also grants the advantage to the player who earned it, instead of randomly. The timer is actually a very important, excellent feature of the game. However, a new problem is posed. Most of the best stages in this game have a ledge at your back, and through your opponent. Gameplay would be very degenerative if a player could simply obtain a small lead, and then abuse the stalemate created via ledge mechanics to maintain/grow that lead until the timer ran out. This would negate the majority of the fight, and make the first hit far too important to get a proper analysis of skill. To circumvent this design flaw, the ledge grab limit was put in place. Despite many previous arguments, the ledge grab limit actually does a reasonable job at neutralizing the stalemate without any major influence on gameplay, outside of punishing a player for excessive ledge utilization.
The timer will award victory to the leader, if it expires, but the ledge grab limit with prevent the utilization of the ledge and the timer in combination to score victory. Basically, this boils down to, the ledge is now a disadvantaged position to be in, because you will be punished if you indefinitely remain on the ledge, and therefore are forced to recover onto the stay. This is good, because the ledge should be a disadvantaged position against someone on the stage, as it's the intermediate area between an opponent on the stage, and off the stage, and the midpoint for recovery.
An important note to observe is that grabbing the ledge from the opponent is usually a subpar option. Unless you can net a successful K.O. via edgehog, or hit the opponent from the ledge, it is usually unwise to grab it while they are recycling it. It grants them an opportunity to recover onto the stage, and this now puts you into disadvantage. Also, recovery moves are often high-priority, or fast and difficult to intercept. If you are already in the lead, the risk versus reward is typically not worth it.
Instead, you should wait at a range where you can react to your opponent's attempt to recover onto the stage, while not so close that your opponent can strike you from the ledge outside of your reaction time. This way, you remain in control.
And that's it for now! I hope you learned something about how to play Smash, and how the game works at a high level. Thanks for reading.
