Vectoring: The replacement to Directional Influence in Smash 4

[TTTTTsd]

I assume by new autocancel mechanics he meant aerials that autocancel are now much more frequent. Even BOWSER has them now. I really think VI will be something people will adapt to but calling it the death of the meta before it's even been fully explored is pretty silly, honestly.

 

[Ganreizu]

Brawl had no meteor cancelling either, so I'm not sure what you're getting at there. And IIRC you can only do ftilt and fsmash backwards out of pivots.

Just the fact that i haven't seen anyone surviving anything that forces you downwards off stage. Brawl might not have had meteor cancelling but i know you weren't absolutely ****ed if you got hit by an attack like that.

It was my understanding that pivots have a lot of IASA frames so you can do anything out of a pivot. Run backwards/forwards, walk forwards/backwards, jump, those attacks you mentioned, etc? Is that not the case?

 

[Big-Cat]

@ Strong Badam
Have you tested followups with VI (or whatever we're gonna call it) in mind? Do you think that there will be scenarios where adjusting to one direction will be better for one character over the other?

 

[TTTTTsd]

It's quite possible that weak hits will give you less range of motion than regular DI.

It's based on damage and knockback. The value of vectors is RELATIVE to the amount of KB a move already has. Thus, lower KB = less effect for VI. So do Mario's Utilt at like, 0%. You can do it again even if they VI. Low % combos that set up into high %s and edgeguards(at least with Mario) have been found to be possible. It's not a set amount of influence.

 

[C-SAF]

This assumes all Smash 4 players will be experienced enough in melee/brawl to know what DI is. DI was likely chosen as a name in the early days of smash because it had conveyance and was simple. We shouldn't stray from that line of logic, as it results in good names for mechanics.

The fact that to describe Vectoring, you have to build on someone's knowledge of DI, means the name "vectoring' is flawed and not accurately descriptive enough of its usage to the layman.

If new smash4 players go to one tournament, they will know what both DI and VI is. The fact that I did not know what Wavedashing, l-canceling, and SHFFL was when I started to get interested in more competitive melee only made me want to discover more.

And I had no clue what DI was either.

 

[Praxis]

It's based on damage and knockback. The value of vectors is RELATIVE to the amount of KB a move already has. Thus, lower KB = less effect for VI. So do Mario's Utilt at like, 0%. You can do it again even if they VI. Low % combos that set up into high %s and edgeguards(at least with Mario) have been found to be possible. It's not a set amount of influence.

I understand that part. What I'm saying is that if the relative values are low, it might mean combos are actually better than regular DI because they can't move very far in a weak hit. But if relative values are high, it'll be better than DI (and thus terrible for combos).

 

[Tagxy]

This is the most interesting question.


So, the big question on my mind now is how much influence this actually has.

If it's a moderate effect on strong moves, it might not even be noticeable on weak moves. It's quite possible that weak hits will give you less range of motion than regular DI. I'll need to test this and compare how far you can move with Mario's dthrow and DI left in Melee vs VI left in Smash 4.

If this is the case, it'll actually improve combo game a little.

I actually feel this is the case. People were already complaining that Smash 4 didnt have enough DI before they knew about this. The comparisons people have been making are quite silly, since its not so much the fact that the mechanic leads to less combos than normal DI would. Their real worry though poorly described is that the expectations based on what theyve already seen of smash 4's is now different. This is understandable, but as I mentioned earlier it was always too early to tell what "should" or "shouldnt" work, and as some may become more proficient at escaping combos in one way or another they will also become more proficient (i think especially once players become proficient with buffering on the gamecube controller).

 

[Chiroz]

On 2: There is absolutely no way recovering to the stage was nerfed from Brawl. It's definitely much easier to get back. The game actually pushes you up if you recover into the bottom of the stage as your sideways momentum gets transferred to upwards. Have you seen Diddy travelling under FD using only his up-B? And you can still ledgesnap mid attack and now you can do it through a ledgehogging opponent.

In Brawl, people could edgehog you and use the invincibility to hit you as you passed through them. That's actually one of the biggest fundamental pats of edgeguarding in Brawl. Completely gone now, doing this will let your opponent back to the stage.

Recovery is unquestionably buffed in this game.


On 4: The pivot tilts is nice, that's about all I've seen. What new auto cancel mechanics? Autocancelling was huge in Brawl and your main form of approaching with aerials.

It's much easier to stop your opponent from recovering than Brawl. I played it and it didn't seem as hard to just combo people out of the stage with Back-Airs with almost half of the cast. In Brawl 1 simple air dodge would stop the back-air chains, while in Smash 4 if you air dodge then your opponent can just back air you again out of your lag or even Falcon Punch you like Sky did to Shofu when he air dodged.

You need to look at the recovery game as a whole. Many more characters were given effective ways to try and stop recovering enemies. Plus you can now chain attacks outside of the stage and opponents can't just air dodge out of your chains without any thought into it as depending on what you are attacking with the air dodge might actually lag more than your aerial allowing you to hit him with another aerial.



4. You can pivot smash too with forward-smash or just up-smash like in brawl (I thought you could down-smash, you actually can't). By new auto cancel mechanics I am talking about the fact that almost every character has them, and they don't cancel "a certain distance" from the floor. They cancel whenever you touch the floor independently of when you started the move. You could star it right next to the floor and the lag is still cancelled. It allows for much faster and less obvious approaches. Plus with more characters having auto-cancelled aerials it has more characters with the ability to approach.

 

[TTTTTsd]

Well, if Mario hasn't proven it yet, the relative values seem pretty low. If vectoring down in the example provided changed 100 to 80 as a fraction or some sort of formula, then you can imagine it'll be exponentially lower if the value was initially 20.

 

[Praxis]

Just the fact that i haven't seen anyone surviving anything that forces you downwards off stage. Brawl might not have had meteor cancelling but i know you weren't absolutely ****ed if you got hit by an attack like that.

It was my understanding that pivots have a lot of IASA frames so you can do anything out of a pivot. Run backwards/forwards, walk forwards/backwards, jump, those attacks you mentioned, etc? Is that not the case?

My understanding is that only ftilt and fsmash work, and only in the opposite direction of your run. I've tried doing dsmash and other moves out of pivots in the Smash 4 demo and was unsuccessful. I wouldn't mind being corrected if I'm mistaken.

Brawl, you generally were screwed if you got hit with a spike, it just rarely happened because the game gave you so much leeway offstage that it wasn't worth it for your opponent to come after you offstage like that.

 

[TTTTTsd]

But yeah, in response to VI actually having less influence than DI at low %s, that's probably the case, either less or equal, because there are still true combos at lower %s. The people who say otherwise are pretty incorrect. It depends on the character you're against too, I suppose.

 

[Chiroz]

Brawl, you generally were screwed if you got hit with a spike, it just rarely happened because the game gave you so much leeway offstage that it wasn't worth it for your opponent to come after you offstage like that.

Which is one of the reasons I am saying Smash 4 recoveries were nerfed. There is actual offstage game instead of just waiting for your opponent to make it back. This is exactly my point. You don't have as much leeway or as much time to recover (faster fall speeds).

 

[TTTTTsd]

Also you can UpSmash out of turning. Pivot USmash is possible, DSmash IDK it doesn't work for me, but pivot tilts beyond crouching will probably work too.

 

[Praxis]

It's much easier to stop your opponent from recovering than Brawl. I played it and it didn't seem as hard to just combo people out of the stage with Back-Airs with almost half of the cast. In Brawl 1 simple air dodge would stop the back-air chains, while in Smash 4 if you air dodge then your opponent can just back air you again out of your lag or even Falcon Punch you like Sky did to Shofu when he air dodged.

You need to look at the recovery game as a whole. Many more characters were given effective ways to try and stop recovering enemies. Plus you can now chain attacks outside of the stage and opponents can't just air dodge out of your chains without any thought into it as depending on what you are attacking with the air dodge might actually lag more than your aerial allowing you to hit him with another aerial.



4. You can pivot smash too with forward-smash or just up-smash like in brawl (I thought you could down-smash, you actually can't). By new auto cancel mechanics I am talking about the fact that almost every character has them, and they don't cancel "a certain distance" from the floor. They cancel whenever you touch the floor independently of when you started the move. You could star it right next to the floor and the lag is still cancelled. It allows for much faster and less obvious approaches. Plus with more characters having auto-cancelled aerials it has more characters with the ability to approach.

Yeah, I do have the game (US demo, have had it since Friday), but it seems way, way easier to get back compared to Brawl. You can definitely combo people further out, but once they are not being combo'd they have a much easier time getting back. Lots of recoveries are very, very easy to use and hard to block. Once people are out of hitstun offstage, it's pretty tough to get them. You're more comfortable going out after them, definitely, but it's also a lot harder to get a kill out of it.

Also you can UpSmash out of turning. Pivot USmash is possible, DSmash IDK it doesn't work for me, but pivot tilts beyond crouching will probably work too.

Well, you could always usmash out of run in Brawl.

 

[Accelerator]

700+ replies deep, and people still don't get the difference between VI and DI. You cannot give them the same name because how to apply them, and what is actually occurring are entirely different.

I'm dying.

 

[Chiroz]

Yeah, I do have the game (US demo, have had it since Friday), but it seems way, way easier to get back compared to Brawl. You can definitely combo people further out, but once they are not being combo'd they have a much easier time getting back. Lots of recoveries are very, very easy to use and hard to block. Once people are out of hitstun offstage, it's pretty tough to get them. You're more comfortable going out after them, definitely, but it's also a lot harder to get a kill out of it.

I find it much easier to get a kill out of going after them offstage than it was in Brawl.

 

[Tagxy]

Nothing will ever achieve the level of Brawl recovering, lol. Although I enjoyed Brawls offstage game for what it was.

 

[Mr.Random]

Ignore. I jumped to conclusions.

 

[ScubaF_ingSteve]

I'm really interested in this, I want to see how it effects the meta

 

[TTTTTsd]

So excited to play this game until I saw this. With this mechanic this game is guaranteed to have no combos and return to a Brawl like state. If this was added intentionally, **** the developer who put this in the game. I know I'm overreacting but I can't stress how much this ruins the game! The game is GOING to have to be 2 stock (every game the stocks are decreasing so Smash 5 will be 1 stock). So upset man .

"No combos" when low % combos are still available? Did you read the thread? There was some dude that LITERALLY tested this with Mario and found that it only really has influence at higher %s

 

[DrakeRowan]

I don't like the term "Vectoring" for various reasons. I DO like the term Knockback Influence. It's similar sounding to DI while still being completely different. Plus, it also sounds cool.
- "Midwest KI!!"
- "K.I."
- "Kay Aiee"

 

[Monado Boy]

So excited to play this game until I saw this. With this mechanic this game is guaranteed to have no combos and return to a Brawl like state. If this was added intentionally, **** the developer who put this in the game. I know I'm overreacting but I can't stress how much this ruins the game! The game is GOING to have to be 2 stock (every game the stocks are decreasing so Smash 5 will be 1 stock). So upset man .

You're overreacting. The game will still have combos. I have to stress that we also don't know just how much this will affect the Meta Game as a whole, so who knows, it might end up even being a good thing.

 

[TTTTTsd]

No it's doom and gloom man!

I really feel like this warrants more investigations before people claim it's an issue. Then again something like this probably happened when people first discovered DI in Melee. Let it flow.

 

[Zek]

Smash 4 is a lot of fun guys, take it easy There will be plenty of time to figure out how competitively viable it is in the months after release. Most of the people in this thread have never played the full game at all, and even if they had it takes time for the metagame to settle.

 

[Mr.Random]

You're overreacting. The game will still have combos. I have to stress that we also don't know just how much this will affect the Meta Game as a whole, so who knows, it might end up even being a good thing.

Ok you're right. I guess we'll see.

 

[Rich Homie Quan]

So excited to play this game until I saw this. With this mechanic this game is guaranteed to have no combos and return to a Brawl like state. If this was added intentionally, **** the developer who put this in the game. I know I'm overreacting but I can't stress how much this ruins the game! The game is GOING to have to be 2 stock (every game the stocks are decreasing so Smash 5 will be 1 stock). So upset man .

Posts like these are exactly what isn't needed right now. Come back when this has been explored completely. More likely than not, combos will still be intact.

Sheesh.

 

[DakotaBonez]

I'm getting the impression from alot of people that DI has been completely removed, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Vectoring just sounds like DI + KI. (Directional Influence + Knockback Influence)

 

[Mr.Random]

Posts like these are exactly what isn't needed right now. Come back when this has been explored completely. More likely than not, combos will still be intact.

Sheesh.

Read post above yours. I know, just overreacted . Hopefully this WON'T ruin the game.

 

[Rich Homie Quan]

Read post above yours. I know, just overreacted . Hopefully this WON'T ruin the game.

It's probably won't, my man. No worries.

 

[Mr.Random]

Question. Is this only able to be done on the ground or in any state? If so you guys should test that next.

 

[TTTTTsd]

it's in any state, but again, the rate and how much it affects your trajectory is based on percentage. So if you try to Vector at low percents, you'll hardly go anywhere. It has arguably less influence than DI at lower percents.

 

[Shell]

I'm getting the impression from alot of people that DI has been completely removed, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Vectoring just sounds like DI + KI. (Directional Influence + Knockback Influence)

Strong Bad demonstrated pretty clear evidence that traditional DI is no longer present via his kill percent tests, which seem sound – do you have some evidence to refute that? Or just hearsay?

 

[Gardex]

Nothing will ever achieve the level of Brawl recovering, lol. Although I enjoyed Brawls offstage game for what it was.

I'd argue that most Smash 4 recoveries are better than their Brawl counterparts. Not only distance-wise, but also other factors, for example characters like Zelda and DDD can now grab the ledge much easier than before.(Not to mention the whole "cannot be edgehogged"-part)
Even pre-patch PM gives Brawl a run for its money

Agree on Brawl's offstage game being fun though.

@ Praxis fairly sure there's meteor canceling in Brawl, only it works differently(you need to jump after half of the hitstun is done, otherwise you have to wait until all of it is done, which usually results in death). Hell, the only reason some people still make a deal out of saying "brawl has no true spikes" is because you could meteor cancel all of them(except luigi's taunt)

 

[Mr.Random]

it's in any state, but again, the rate and how much it affects your trajectory is based on percentage. So if you try to Vector at low percents, you'll hardly go anywhere. It has arguably less influence than DI at lower percents.

When they said heavy characters got buffed they weren't kidding. Bowser, Dedede, and DK are the characters I'm concerned about. How long could they live say Fox's Up Smash which is a powerful vertical KO move at around 100-120%?

 

[TTTTTsd]

Heavy characters are pretty much gonna have to be KO'd horizontally and/or gimped. Thankfully us Mario mains aren't gonna have a probably with stuffing offstage recoveries and gimping people.

 

[DakotaBonez]

Strong Bad demonstrated pretty clear evidence that traditional DI is no longer present via his kill percent tests, which seem sound – do you have some evidence to refute that? Or just hearsay?

No I just wanted to hear what someone like you, who is more informed than I, had to say about vectoring replacing di.
Do you by chance have a link to strongbads vid?

 

[Rich Homie Quan]

Smash 4 was looking more offstage/gimp focused anyways.

 

[NotLiquid]

Heavy characters are pretty much gonna have to be KO'd horizontally and/or gimped. Thankfully us Mario mains aren't gonna have a probably with stuffing offstage recoveries and gimping people.

Vertical KO's feel like they're going to be dependent on how well the character can follow up in mid-air. I can see some characters like Mega Man and Sonic attaining vertical KO's relatively well due to how much they can cover with their Up B's.

 

[Texas Toast]

If it influences direction, I don't understand why we can't continue to call it Directional Influence. Air dodging in Melee and Brawl are vastly different, but still called the same thing because in both games you are dodging in the air. I don't think it will confuse newer players to the series/competitive scene based on that line of logic.

Vectoring doesn't really sound intuitive even if you're a Smash veteran. It sounds like I'm back in one of my math classes

 

[Lord Goomy]

If it influences direction, I don't understand why we can't continue to call it Directional Influence. Air dodging in Melee and Brawl are vastly different, but still called the same thing because in both games you are dodging in the air. I don't think it will confuse newer players to the series/competitive scene based on that line of logic.

Vectoring doesn't really sound intuitive even if you're a Smash veteran. It sounds like I'm back in one of my math classes

Because air dodging between Melee and Brawl was still mechanically the same. V.I. and D.I. are work completely differently. Calling them the same thing would only serve to create confusion.