What are your opinions on Customs Post-Evo 2015?

[Pheva]

But the problem is the execution. For one, aside from Palutena's, they all look crappy as volleyballs, as well as looking pretty lazy, but y'know, time flies, so they had to make them quick. And of course, by making them quickly, they are poorly balanced, even with today's balance patches. Custom moves are either better than the basic version, or just down right embarrassing. If a player finds out that he could just pick the basic set to win, or one particular custom move, then he'll never use another set, and everyone is gonna follow. So it's either the basic set, or just one set with the good move that is better than the basic one. Yeah.

I don't understand how custom moves are unbalanced. They do give alot of characters brand new options but none of them are straight up broken. Which ones specifically are the most problematic? I remember when people were raving about Dong Cyclone and Heavy Skull Bash, but come tourney time they seemed perfectly fine. Really they're no big deal at all.

I also don't feel like DLC characters require custom moves. With the arguable exception of Mewtwo, all the DLC characters are very well designed and can hold their own against the base game cast. Most characters have just one or two optimal custom sets anyway so its not like they're missing out on much. And Ryu and Bayonetta sure as hell don't need even more moves.

 

[MajorMajora]

Quite frankly I'm amazed people think they can balance a game with the ruleset. Not only are they:
A: Making extrapolations based on no concrete evidence, but they are also
B: Making extrapolations in a complex field they know nothing about, not to mention
C: Making extrapolations on something that is a huge shift in gameplay, not a simple tweak.

It is literally some people's job to balance these things, and they still get so much wrong people can complain about it to the moon and back. If you think we should at all make the decision of something this pivotal based on balance is not something I can take seriously until we have concrete evidence. The closest thing we have to evidence is that "However it changes balance, it doesn't ruin the game in any obvious way".

There are plenty of reasons to have customs. Don't get caught up in the nirvana fallacy, especially when it comes to something you don't know nearly as much about as you think you do.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Mario vs. Mewtwo is a matchup that gets incredibly worse in Customs. Mario gets incredibly free Uair juggle kill confirms in a matchup where he already solidly beat this character. Without them it's winnable but I'm pretty convinced Mario vs. Mewtwo with Customs on is a matchup where you will need to switch characters.

That's just one example I'm sure there's at least three or four more.

How exactly? The reasoning has to be due to Mario's custom special move options, or else the outcome wouldn't change much if at all.

Speaking of which, Wii Fit Trainer's Jumbo Hoop is a big nuisance for Rosalina in that it can easily leave her without a Luma; that move alone puts Rosalina at a disadvantaged state against Wii Fit Trainer.

 

[TTTTTsd]

How exactly? The reasoning has to be due to Mario's custom special move options, or else the outcome wouldn't change much if at all.

Speaking of which, Wii Fit Trainer's Jumbo Hoop is a big nuisance for Rosalina in that it can easily leave her without a Luma; that move alone puts Rosalina at a disadvantaged state against Wii Fit Trainer.

Mario gets kill confirms off of basically any grab at mid %s because of exploding jump punch and Scalding FLUDD is a non-reflectable disjointed grab setup that is also + on shield last time the Mario boards checked.

This does not help Mewtwo at all considering he gets Uair juggled pretty hard due to being floaty.

 

[MajorMajora]

Mario gets kill confirms off of basically any grab at mid %s because of exploding jump punch and Scalding FLUDD is a non-reflectable disjointed grab setup that is also + on shield last time the Mario boards checked.

This does not help Mewtwo at all considering he gets Uair juggled pretty hard due to being floaty.

We shouldn't base this decision based on us wanting certain characters to be better. Seriously ask yourself the following: If customs were on, would you want them off specifically so that mewtwo would be better off?

 

[TTTTTsd]

We shouldn't base this decision based on us wanting certain characters to be better. Seriously ask yourself the following: If customs were on, would you want them off specifically so that mewtwo would be better off?

I'd want them to ensure that the people who play these characters don't have to deal with inherently worse matchups outside of the fact that they lack access to something like this.

I think it creates a fundamentally uneven playing field regardless of whether it affects viability or not. You can feel free to disagree, their B moves could be as good as they want but not having access to Customs gives them theoretically less depth and diversity than the rest of the cast in a very arbitrary fashion.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Mario gets kill confirms off of basically any grab at mid %s because of exploding jump punch and Scalding FLUDD is a non-reflectable disjointed grab setup that is also + on shield last time the Mario boards checked.

This does not help Mewtwo at all considering he gets Uair juggled pretty hard due to being floaty.

I guess that answers my question then. It's funny how changing certain moves can potentially make things better or worse in a match-up.

 

[ぱみゅ]

But changing one -2 matchup into -3 doesn't really make Customs inherently bad.
Because at the same time, Mewtwo can face characters and play them exactly the same whether they choose a #1 or #3 Recovery Move, maybe just a bit of more awareness, but the gist of the matchup will still be there.

I mean, you can't call vaccines to be harmful for causing negative reactions on 0.001% of the population.

 

[MajorMajora]

I'd want them to ensure that the people who play these characters don't have to deal with inherently worse matchups outside of the fact that they lack access to something like this.

I think it creates a fundamentally uneven playing field regardless of whether it affects viability or not. You can feel free to disagree, their B moves could be as good as they want but not having access to Customs gives them theoretically less depth and diversity than the rest of the cast in a very arbitrary fashion.

So here you state your argument is not one of balance but one of depth. But, in this case, adding customs isn't taking anything away from any of the characters, it's just that it doesn't benefit everyone. It just benefits most people. So I guess the few people who play those characters might get... slightly disappointed? Seriously? That's a big enough concern to say we shouldn't play customs?

 

[TTTTTsd]

So here you state your argument is not one of balance but one of depth. But, in this case, adding customs isn't taking anything away from any of the characters, it's just that it doesn't benefit everyone. It just benefits most people. So I guess the few people who play those characters might get... slightly disappointed? Seriously? That's a big enough concern to say we shouldn't play customs?

I mean it's a personal reason that I'm not entirely for them, yes. I wouldn't even call it slightly disappointed, I was 100% FOR CUSTOMS when everyone had access to them but it just doesn't feel FAIR when some characters don't, regardless of how good their B moves are or are not.

I'm all for side events but I can't advocate for them as the primary way of play solely because they're not universal at this point and it's affecting 5 characters right now (3 of which are either solo viable and/or decent as of right now) and that gap will widen I imagine.

It's not my ONLY reason to be against them, I have a few more that I've stated in prior pages, largely in relation to regional specific rulesets (generally overseas stuff) among other things.

Also as I said it's not even about benefits, the DLC characters could have the world's worst customs known to man, Finishing Touch that does like 50% dmg but never kills, what have you, but if they had complete customs I wouldn't feel this way. It is, relative to the given playing field, in my perception, fundamentally unfair insofar as access to options. It's not that they don't have ways of upgrading or improving, it's that they don't have ACCESS to what this metagame is trying to promote, and for the people who do in fact play these characters, yes, that is incredibly discouraging.

 

[MajorMajora]

I mean it's a personal reason that I'm not entirely for them, yes. I wouldn't even call it slightly disappointed, I was 100% FOR CUSTOMS when everyone had access to them but it just doesn't feel FAIR when some characters don't, regardless of how good their B moves are or are not.

I'm all for side events but I can't advocate for them as the primary way of play solely because they're not universal at this point and it's affecting 5 characters right now (3 of which are either solo viable and/or decent as of right now) and that gap will widen I imagine.

It's not my ONLY reason to be against them, I have a few more that I've stated in prior pages, largely in relation to regional specific rulesets (generally overseas stuff) among other things.

Also as I said it's not even about benefits, the DLC characters could have the world's worst customs known to man, Finishing Touch that does like 50% dmg but never kills, what have you, but if they had complete customs I wouldn't feel this way. It is, relative to the given playing field, in my perception, fundamentally unfair insofar as access to options. It's not that they don't have ways of upgrading or improving, it's that they don't have ACCESS to what this metagame is trying to promote, and for the people who do in fact play these characters, yes, that is incredibly discouraging.

Everyone has access to the same options. Everyone has access to all the characters. And, even then, measuring 'fairness' as how many options you have seems like pretty irrelevant criteria. Why is that so important? The most I've heard from you is that is 'feels' wrong to a small percentage of players, which isn't exactly a good basis for a major ruleset decision.

And, as for your comments on balance, it seriously is not our decision how things are balanced and who/what is viable. The meta will handle itself. We should have customs so the largest number of options are available to experiment with and to make the game deeper, more interesting, and more lasting.

 

[Raijinken]

If fairness towards playerbase segments has become a ground for any sort of ruleset ruling, then I demand Sheik, Rosalina, Pikachu, and Mario be banned to side events so Zelda, Ganondorf, and Samus mains can enjoy the game on slightly more equal footing.

Or... I propose all characters with unique mechanics such as KO Punch, tome durability, puppet characters, Limit Break, and having two moves per input, be banned to side events, in fairness to the rest of the cast who lack these depth-enhancing mechanics.

See how silly that sounds? It's fine to feel slighted, ask anybody who plays the game, they all have opinions that may or may not be justified. It's a natural reaction to a perceived unfairness, but that doesn't make slighting a DLC main any worse than slighting a Mac main by having non-FD stages in the stagelist, or a Robin main by having Rosalina in the cast.

 

[TTTTTsd]

I mean, I'm not going to act like it's my only reason for not wanting to play with these on. It's just added to the pile.

Alongside the fact that there are no optimal Doc sets (2311 I would play in virtually every matchup but it unfortunately does not exist, most of Doc's sets were made around the time when people were trying to augment his recovery which has proven to be a problem not worth sacrificing Dr. Tornado or regular Up+B over, 1311 exists for specific MUs I guess but I lose the best reason to play Customs Doc should I go to a Customs event and that is Fast Pill + Breezy Sheet) and I have no idea where to throw input for that to change (would it be in the Summer sets thread? Is there even updated sets?). There's also overseas issues which I discussed earlier and got rebuttals that didn't really manage to change my mind or alter my way of thinking so that's still my stance on that issue as well. Perhaps scouting out TOs in Japan who would be willing to experiment would make this more regionally inclusive as that is a primary issue that I concern myself with when it comes to Custom Moves, and still probably my personal "elephant in the room". DLC characters are a footnote but a note nonetheless, doesn't really help matters I don't think.

I don't really have anything left to say on the matter. I'll end with this statement: Using blatant hyperbole like that stagelist example which is an ENTIRELY different situation in an attempt to make my personal opinion sound silly in a way that looks pretty condescending is not going to help me understand any better why these should or shouldn't be used. Never once have I directly knocked the legitimacy of the meta, I've only put out my concerns with it. I am sure it is very interesting, fun, and different, like any sort of option tweak in Smash, but I have my reasons for not wanting to play it and I'd prefer for it to at least LOOK like it's being taken seriously as I've attempted to express these opinions reasonably without being a jerk or using incredibly dumb arguments that you'll find on either side of this debate in more open social media.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I mean, I'm not going to act like it's my only reason for not wanting to play with these on. It's just added to the pile.

Alongside the fact that there are no optimal Doc sets (2311 I would play in virtually every matchup but it unfortunately does not exist, most of Doc's sets were made around the time when people were trying to augment his recovery which has proven to be a problem not worth sacrificing Dr. Tornado or regular Up+B over, 1311 exists for specific MUs I guess but I lose the best reason to play Customs Doc should I go to a Customs event and that is Fast Pill + Breezy Sheet) and I have no idea where to throw input for that to change (would it be in the Summer sets thread? Is there even updated sets?). There's also overseas issues which I discussed earlier and got rebuttals that didn't really manage to change my mind or alter my way of thinking so that's still my stance on that issue as well. Perhaps scouting out TOs in Japan who would be willing to experiment would make this more regionally inclusive as that is a primary issue that I concern myself with when it comes to Custom Moves, and still probably my personal "elephant in the room". DLC characters are a footnote but a note nonetheless, doesn't really help matters I don't think.

The moveset project exists pretty much exclusively as an EZ-bake logistics solution to trying to get what was, at the time of the project's creation, the most popular custom sets for each character loaded onto a system so that there would be minimal time spent between sets making new movesets. Just because the list for Dr. Mario doesn't include 2311 doesn't (or rather shouldn't, as long as the TO has half a brain) mean you can't make your own 2311 set. Hell, there's nothing stopping you from making a completely new custom moveset for every single game in a set, other than perhaps your opponent and/or the TO being mildly annoyed at you if either of them is the impatient type. On top of that, the preamble to the project explicitly suggests leaving the last two slots empty instead of filled for the express purpose of players having the freedom to use their own sets if their preferred set isn't already there. The only reason EVO used all 10 sets per character is because EVO explicitly banned on-site set creation in the interests of speeding things along, so there was no point in leaving any slots empty.

If your local scene has blindly adopted that EVO rule and doesn't allow players to make their own ad-hoc sets, then you have my sympathy, but that also means the TOs are being supremely stupid.

 

[TTTTTsd]

The moveset project exists pretty much exclusively as an EZ-bake logistics solution to trying to get what was, at the time of the project's creation, the most popular custom sets for each character loaded onto a system so that there would be minimal time spent between sets making new movesets. Just because the list for Dr. Mario doesn't include 2311 doesn't (or rather shouldn't, as long as the TO has half a brain) mean you can't make your own 2311 set. Hell, there's nothing stopping you from making a completely new custom moveset for every single game in a set, other than perhaps your opponent and/or the TO being mildly annoyed at you if either of them is the impatient type. On top of that, the preamble to the project explicitly suggests leaving the last two slots empty instead of filled for the express purpose of players having the freedom to use their own sets if their preferred set isn't already there. The only reason EVO used all 10 sets per character is because EVO explicitly banned on-site set creation in the interests of speeding things along, so there was no point in leaving any slots empty.

So they kinda ran it wrong then? Good to know, like I said I can only go by what I know about Customs and how the events work. At least that clears that much up. Thank you.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

So they kinda ran it wrong then? Good to know, like I said I can only go by what I know about Customs and how the events work. At least that clears that much up. Thank you.

If it's your TO that said you can't make your own sets then yes, they're doing it wrong. I'd poke them on Facebook or whatever their preferred method of communication is and try to have a conversation.

Also, I was slightly wrong, it wasn't the preamble but a numbered point below the sets. I've quoted it here for your convenience, emphasis mine:

2. The movesets are ordered in a general order of usefulness so users won't have to scroll down as much to use the absolute best sets. For Mii Fighters, the game will show sets in reverse order of creation; it is advised to make the Miis starting with Mii Gunner's last set and working backwards. Most importantly, the bottom two sets for every character are "optional" for any tournament that allows free uploading of movesets on the spot. The largest of tournaments like EVO are only going to allow the quickly selectable pre-sets and should be sure to fill up all 10 slots for every character, but most other tournaments can and probably should allow users to import their own movesets from their own 3DS consoles and may want to leave those two spots open to expedite that process. Imported sets should not be "signed" to indicate they are not sets installed by the TO.

The main project thread because why not.

 

[TTTTTsd]

If it's your TO that said you can't make your own sets then yes, they're doing it wrong. I'd poke them on Facebook or whatever their preferred method of communication is and try to have a conversation.

Also, I was slightly wrong, it wasn't the preamble but a numbered point below the sets. I've quoted it here for your convenience, emphasis mine:



The main project thread because why not.

It wasn't my TO but rather what I've heard about Customs tournaments and what I've known about them for quite some time. At the very least if I attend one I can feasibly run what I consider ideal on Doc. Kinda upset EVO didn't allow this although I can imagine since it was a supermajor the time constraints were likely real, even though Smash 4 got shafted with the anime morning timeslot (EVO was certainly....something for Smash 4)

 

[ParanoidDrone]

It wasn't my TO but rather what I've heard about Customs tournaments and what I've known about them for quite some time. At the very least if I attend one I can feasibly run what I consider ideal on Doc. Kinda upset EVO didn't allow this although I can imagine since it was a supermajor the time constraints were likely real, even though Smash 4 got shafted with the anime morning timeslot (EVO was certainly....something for Smash 4)

Yeah, EVO not allowing on-site set creation was justifiable given the sheer scale of the event. I don't think anyone really begrudged them that.

My dream is either a cheap "DLC" that just unlocks all customs on the spot or some advance in hacking that lets us trick the game into thinking they're all unlocked. If either of those happen, that would be huge.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

But changing one -2 matchup into -3 doesn't really make Customs inherently bad.
Because at the same time, Mewtwo can face characters and play them exactly the same whether they choose a #1 or #3 Recovery Move, maybe just a bit of more awareness, but the gist of the matchup will still be there.

I mean, you can't call vaccines to be harmful for causing negative reactions on 0.001% of the population.

That's quite true. Even though Rosalina messes up Samus and Jigglypuff quite badly with her custom specials, they don't exactly help her against someone like Meta Knight.

 

[PHP]

If you're losing a matchup because of character choice (with the exception of custom Palu because she becomes a pseudo rush down character with 1233) then that's your fault not the customs. If I use default Palutena against a meta knight and lose horrendously why would I use Palutena in that match up in game 2? I would switch it my secondary which is Marth who has a much better matchup than Palutena. Same goes for custom characters. If Mewtwo has a bad matchup against Mario, what makes you think custom Mario would be any different. This is why people have secondary characters. Using X character knowing that they have a bad matchup against Y character is completely on you. If you get bodied in a bad matchup that's not a reason to blame customs. It's clearly your character choice.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

If you're losing a matchup because of character choice (with the exception of custom Palu because she becomes a pseudo rush down character with 1233) then that's your fault not the customs. If I use default Palutena against a meta knight and lose horrendously why would I use Palutena in that match up in game 2? I would switch it my secondary which is Marth who has a much better matchup than Palutena. Same goes for custom characters. If Mewtwo has a bad matchup against Mario, what makes you think custom Mario would be any different. This is why people have secondary characters. Using X character knowing that they have a bad matchup against Y character is completely on you. If you get bodied in a bad matchup that's not a reason to blame customs. It's clearly your character choice.

You could also argue that a character's overall kit, which would influence the matchup ratio, includes the custom options at their disposal. A hypothetical custom with the property of "instantly kills Jigglypuff from anywhere on the map, does nothing to anyone else" would mean Jigglypuff mains better have a secondary for that character, even if that custom is literally never used otherwise. (It would also be hilariously broken but that's not the point.)

Extrapolating a bit, if a character does well against default Palutena but struggles with 1233 Palutena because Super Speed/Jump Glide/Lightweight shenanigans, then do they have an advantage or disadvantage against her?

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

If you're losing a matchup because of character choice (with the exception of custom Palu because she becomes a pseudo rush down character with 1233) then that's your fault not the customs. If I use default Palutena against a meta knight and lose horrendously why would I use Palutena in that match up in game 2? I would switch it my secondary which is Marth who has a much better matchup than Palutena. Same goes for custom characters. If Mewtwo has a bad matchup against Mario, what makes you think custom Mario would be any different. This is why people have secondary characters. Using X character knowing that they have a bad matchup against Y character is completely on you. If you get bodied in a bad matchup that's not a reason to blame customs. It's clearly your character choice.

Ironically, while Rosalina normally does okay against Wii Fit Trainer under default conditions, she actually struggles against her/him whenever she/he has the Jumbo Hoop custom special move.

Similarly, Rosalina's match-up against Pikachu seems to become more even with the allowance of the custom special moves.

 

[W.A.C.]

The biggest hurdles against custom moves are that they're obnoxious to unlock and DLC characters do not have custom moves. People who main DLC characters are at a MASSIVE disadvantage if customs are legal. I feel Sakurai's decision to not give the DLC characters custom moves pretty much killed the future of competitive customs, which absolutely sucks since I miss them a ton. Excluding half a dozen badly designed customs (Kong Cyclone, Hammer Spindash, Heavy Skullbash, etc), I think the game is way more fun with custom moves enabled because it brought so much diversity to the game. Many characters are considerably more fun with customs legal. I do wish more effort went into them though. Characters like Kirby could've been WAY more representative of his games with his custom specials.

 

[Raijinken]

The biggest hurdles against custom moves are that they're obnoxious to unlock and DLC characters do not have custom moves. People who main DLC characters are at a MASSIVE disadvantage if customs are legal. I feel Sakurai's decision to not give the DLC characters custom moves pretty much killed the future of competitive customs, which absolutely sucks since I miss them a ton. Excluding half a dozen badly designed customs (Kong Cyclone, Hammer Spindash, Heavy Skullbash, etc), I think the game is way more fun with custom moves enabled because it brought so much diversity to the game. Many characters are considerably more fun with customs legal. I do wish more effort went into them though. Characters like Kirby could've been WAY more representative of his games with his custom specials.

As someone who mostly plays Roy amongst my large list, I don't feel slightly disadvantaged against customs users. This becomes more and more true even of my non-DLC characters as time goes on and customs get fewer balance changes than defaults. With the relatively few exceptional characters who just have bad specials all around (Dorf for instance), customs are almost always, in my opinion, side-grade-esque enough that I don't begrudge Roy lacking them while Marth has them. Marth can get a counter that I like a bit more against a handful of characters, and an up-B with some tricks that make it... comparable to Blazer. Kirby can replace crummy Final Cutter with something a bit more like a really weak and shorter range LB Climhazard.

Basically, I don't feel slighted when playing DLC characters customs on, because I feel like their specials are already thoroughly reliable. On the other hand, I do feel slighted trying to play Ganondorf in defaults, because 3/4 of his specials are bad and the last one is okay-ish.

At any rate, I just really want a coin shop for customs. Not for my own use (unless I can get those last two random hats on my 3DS version to clear my challenge grid), but so that other people who do nothing but VS mode will be able to go unlock some painlessly.

 

[MajorMajora]

The biggest hurdles against custom moves are that they're obnoxious to unlock and DLC characters do not have custom moves. People who main DLC characters are at a MASSIVE disadvantage if customs are legal. I feel Sakurai's decision to not give the DLC characters custom moves pretty much killed the future of competitive customs, which absolutely sucks since I miss them a ton. Excluding half a dozen badly designed customs (Kong Cyclone, Hammer Spindash, Heavy Skullbash, etc), I think the game is way more fun with custom moves enabled because it brought so much diversity to the game. Many characters are considerably more fun with customs legal. I do wish more effort went into them though. Characters like Kirby could've been WAY more representative of his games with his custom specials.

Big hurdle #1: Powersaves. Bit of an initial investment but after that you have 'em.

Big hurdle #2: Playing Smash is a huge disadvantage to Zelda players. That does not mean we shouldn't play smash. It is not our job to monitor the balance of this game. So what if Mewtwo drops a couple spot on the tier list? That just means someone else shot up.

For the "terrible customs", the most I can say is, in order, Just air dodge, learn its spacing, pikachu still isn't as OP as Sheik so you have literally nothing to complain about, etc..

I guess my point is that most of these problems either have solutions or aren't actually problems.

 

[PHP]

I really don't think that DLC characters are at a disadvantage here. Yes, they have less options, but does that really mean they're less viable? Of course not! Yes, custom moves do affect matchup ratios, but one set is usually at a disadvantage against another character. Some characters don't even benefit from customs at all (Zelda, Marth to an extent, Diddy, etc). Kong cyclone makes Donkey Kong's up B annoying but that doesn't change the fact that he's combo food. The only thing that changes are the specials not the characters (bar Palutena)

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

I really don't think that DLC characters are at a disadvantage here. Yes, they have less options, but does that really mean they're less viable? Of course not! Yes, custom moves do affect matchup ratios, but one set is usually at a disadvantage against another character. Some characters don't even benefit from customs at all (Zelda, Marth to an extent, Diddy, etc). Kong cyclone makes Donkey Kong's up B annoying but that doesn't change the fact that he's combo food. The only thing that changes are the specials not the characters (bar Palutena)

I still remember the time when people thought that Zelda had an advantage against Rosalina.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I still remember the time when people thought that Zelda had an advantage against Rosalina.

To be fair, Din's Fire is uniquely annoying for her to deal with because she can't do anything to protect Luma from it.

 

[Raijinken]

To be fair, Din's Fire is uniquely annoying for her to deal with because she can't do anything to protect Luma from it.

A projectile that can't be utterly negated by an irritatingly quick and safe move is pretty nice, if nothing else.

Also, to the above, I love customs on Marth. Sure, side B options are useless, and neutral B is exceedingly situational/playstyle, but Crescent Slash is excellent (if you're not super deepgreedy about spiking near the ledge) and Iai Counter is almost always at least as good as default, and often better. He doesn't benefit as much from the variety of options as others do, but he gets some useful tools.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

I was experimenting on some bonus effects last night while trying out the following customization...

Considering how awful Little Mac's recovery is, receiving an improved mid-air jump can potentially help him out for recovering, but obviously, you can't have a bonus effect without altering your fighter's stats, and there's also the issue that without the increased speed, you'd have to resort to Glider equipment to improve Little Mac's air mobility, which imbalances the stats even further.

And of course, you're quite heavily dependent on that improved mid-air jump to recover, so if you don't touch ground or grab a ledge after using it, you're screwed.

 

[Steelballray]

A big Abu Dhabi tournament that's titled King of the Capital have decided to use customs in their next tournament. The date is undecided yet but it'll most likely be sometime during late January. It'll be streamed and I'll post the link for it if you guys want me to. Shall be interesting to see how it all unfolds.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

A big Abu Dhabi tournament that's titled King of the Capital have decided to use customs in their next tournament. The date is undecided yet but it'll most likely be sometime during late January. It'll be streamed and I'll post the link for it if you guys want me to. Shall be interesting to see how it all unfolds.

Please do.

 

[Lvl99Gamer]

A big Abu Dhabi tournament that's titled King of the Capital have decided to use customs in their next tournament. The date is undecided yet but it'll most likely be sometime during late January. It'll be streamed and I'll post the link for it if you guys want me to. Shall be interesting to see how it all unfolds.

This is what we need after all, more tournament's that allow customs so we can create a standard. I'm afraid we're at a stage where Customs is a delicate flower that can be crushed with a big wrong move though.

But here's hoping.

 

[Virion Steel]

Big hurdle #1: Powersaves. Bit of an initial investment but after that you have 'em.

Big hurdle #2: Playing Smash is a huge disadvantage to Zelda players. That does not mean we shouldn't play smash. It is not our job to monitor the balance of this game. So what if Mewtwo drops a couple spot on the tier list? That just means someone else shot up.

For the "terrible customs", the most I can say is, in order, Just air dodge, learn its spacing, pikachu still isn't as OP as Sheik so you have literally nothing to complain about, etc..

I guess my point is that most of these problems either have solutions or aren't actually problems.

A common trend in your posts is that, and forgive me if I paraphrase incorrectly, we are not supposed to monitor the balance of the game. Customs, for good or ill, change this balance that we are not supposed to monitor. Don't you think that monitoring is, as a community, our duty? The developers do not play this game to the extent we do. They do not play or host tournaments. Sakurai himself plays with items on and considers the game well and balanced with them. Yet we are almost unanimous in removing items from gameplay. Yes, the argument is that these are items, randomly spawning and dramatically game changing, and not custom moves, something static. The same principle (and argument) goes for stages that are banned because of balance issues. The precedent for maintaining balance has already been set, so why not ensure that the game is fair and balanced without a load of logistical problems and the issue of broken customs? Letting the meta evolve is not always the answer, at least not yet in Smash 4.

 

[Raijinken]

Any change in ruleset influences the meta, whether that's adding more specials, changing stagelists, changing stock/time, etc. It's not really apples to apples to compare one meta's state of balance to another when so many variables are different. While it's totally fine for us to aim for a different and hopefully better state of balance than that the game offers, it's a sad truth of competitive play across genres that things change more slowly when there are a lot of known influences. Balance patches and characters increase the variance (from a player knowledge stance), customs would do similarly. Compare the speed of meta progression late into any patch's lifespan versus the early stages of a new patch. Regardless of the game, people have to account for new things. From a winning stance, this is a barrier to continued victory (whether that's good or not largely depends on your competitive and design philosophy, some players like change and some don't, see Melee vs PM, Customs vs Non, balance patches vs none). There's no objectively superior option in that regard. Unfortunately, the more influential and outspoken players would rather only play their way than support growing a parallel scene with a different philosophy, such as customs.

 

[MajorMajora]

A common trend in your posts is that, and forgive me if I paraphrase incorrectly, we are not supposed to monitor the balance of the game. Customs, for good or ill, change this balance that we are not supposed to monitor. Don't you think that monitoring is, as a community, our duty? The developers do not play this game to the extent we do. They do not play or host tournaments. Sakurai himself plays with items on and considers the game well and balanced with them. Yet we are almost unanimous in removing items from gameplay. Yes, the argument is that these are items, randomly spawning and dramatically game changing, and not custom moves, something static. The same principle (and argument) goes for stages that are banned because of balance issues. The precedent for maintaining balance has already been set, so why not ensure that the game is fair and balanced without a load of logistical problems and the issue of broken customs? Letting the meta evolve is not always the answer, at least not yet in Smash 4.

Well, to avoid confusion, which there quite obviously is, allow me to set up a definition of balance: "The comparative levels of success to be found with using different characters in a competitive environment"
A perfectly balanced game would have all characters on equal ground. When I talk about "balancing the game" I'm talking about making changes, or deciding not to make changes, with the intent of having the game closer to 'perfect balance'.

There are a lot of things that are wrong with this sort of knight's templar way of looking at the changing the rules for balance, and a lot of those reasons can be summed up with the phrase "All I know is that I know nothing". It is literally some people's jobs to balance games. The idea that we, as a wild din of varied opinions, vocal minorities, and general lack of education in this field is ridiculous. You're pretty much saying "How hard can it be". The answer is very hard. I could go into details about all the ways we don't know how balancing works, but honestly I don't even know all the ways. Because I don't know how balancing works.

As a second problem with this mentality, take a look at this:

Now, I'm not saying this is super relevant content wise to the topic at hand, but it goes to show: what you thought about balancing the game is probably wrong. Most people, upon seeing this, are rather surprised by it, or don't even fully understand the concepts. And Extra Credits is only ever the most basic, surface level concepts in game design, glossing over details and intricacies.

If we try to make a game that is balanced as well as possible, we are setting ourselves up for failure. Not only because we have no idea how to balance a game, but how balanced a game is is not directly proportional to how healthy its metagame is.

We shouldn't not have customs because we have a hunch based on no actual knowledge of how game balance works that it will unbalance the game to such a dramatic degree that it has a drastically negative effect on the metagame. Not only does the only experimental evidence available go against this, it's an outrageous claim to begin with.

Having customs on, however, will give people more options to experiment with. it is a much less drastic leap to say that that will be healthy to the metagame. heck, we have evidence of it. When customs were beginning to get accepted as part of pre-evo hype, it was a time of experimentation and excitement, of the unknown. New character were seeing more play than usual, and even then the balance of the game wasn't greatly shifted.

"How it might effect balance" is one of the worst possible reasons to be against customs that I can think of.

 

[Lvl99Gamer]

Well, to avoid confusion, which there quite obviously is, allow me to set up a definition of balance: "The comparative levels of success to be found with using different characters in a competitive environment"
A perfectly balanced game would have all characters on equal ground. When I talk about "balancing the game" I'm talking about making changes, or deciding not to make changes, with the intent of having the game closer to 'perfect balance'.

There are a lot of things that are wrong with this sort of knight's templar way of looking at the changing the rules for balance, and a lot of those reasons can be summed up with the phrase "All I know is that I know nothing". It is literally some people's jobs to balance games. The idea that we, as a wild din of varied opinions, vocal minorities, and general lack of education in this field is ridiculous. You're pretty much saying "How hard can it be". The answer is very hard. I could go into details about all the ways we don't know how balancing works, but honestly I don't even know all the ways. Because I don't know how balancing works.

As a second problem with this mentality, take a look at this:

Now, I'm not saying this is super relevant content wise to the topic at hand, but it goes to show: what you thought about balancing the game is probably wrong. Most people, upon seeing this, are rather surprised by it, or don't even fully understand the concepts. And Extra Credits is only ever the most basic, surface level concepts in game design, glossing over details and intricacies.

If we try to make a game that is balanced as well as possible, we are setting ourselves up for failure. Not only because we have no idea how to balance a game, but how balanced a game is is not directly proportional to how healthy its metagame is.

We shouldn't not have customs because we have a hunch based on no actual knowledge of how game balance works that it will unbalance the game to such a dramatic degree that it has a drastically negative effect on the metagame. Not only does the only experimental evidence available go against this, it's an outrageous claim to begin with.

Having customs on, however, will give people more options to experiment with. it is a much less drastic leap to say that that will be healthy to the metagame. heck, we have evidence of it. When customs were beginning to get accepted as part of pre-evo hype, it was a time of experimentation and excitement, of the unknown. New character were seeing more play than usual, and even then the balance of the game wasn't greatly shifted.

"How it might effect balance" is one of the worst possible reasons to be against customs that I can think of.

Interesting way of looking at the whole discussion. From my point of view there's just so much to be gained from allowing customs that it's worth the effort of trying it out. As much as one could be against customs I don't think there's any reason to at least try it out competitively and see where it takes us right?

Even in the worst case scenario we could always decide to ban customs after that, it's not something that's irreversible. Even a heavily moderated list of moves/sets that are allowed could make a world of difference for characters that are doing poorly. I think one of the biggest problems is fear of change, misinformation and people who plainly can't be hassled to deal with the work involved to make this work (for instance I as a Luigi main wouldn't benefit from this at all) even though it could be incredibly healthy for the future of Sm4sh and people need to realise this and that it's worth the effort.

No one thinks Sheik should get any stronger than she is but does that mean the likes of Bowser can't benefit from this to move up a tier or two? We can always decide to allow only certain sets or ban the most abusive cases and thus, "equalize" the playing field for characters or even say screw it Sheik (or even my main Luigi!) get to use no customs at all, but we can only do this with cold hard data and not speculation.

It's something we need to agree on as a community though, all I can do as a simple smash player is advocate its benefits.

 

[Virion Steel]

Well, to avoid confusion, which there quite obviously is, allow me to set up a definition of balance: "The comparative levels of success to be found with using different characters in a competitive environment"
A perfectly balanced game would have all characters on equal ground. When I talk about "balancing the game" I'm talking about making changes, or deciding not to make changes, with the intent of having the game closer to 'perfect balance'.

There are a lot of things that are wrong with this sort of knight's templar way of looking at the changing the rules for balance, and a lot of those reasons can be summed up with the phrase "All I know is that I know nothing". It is literally some people's jobs to balance games. The idea that we, as a wild din of varied opinions, vocal minorities, and general lack of education in this field is ridiculous. You're pretty much saying "How hard can it be". The answer is very hard. I could go into details about all the ways we don't know how balancing works, but honestly I don't even know all the ways. Because I don't know how balancing works.

As a second problem with this mentality, take a look at this:

Now, I'm not saying this is super relevant content wise to the topic at hand, but it goes to show: what you thought about balancing the game is probably wrong. Most people, upon seeing this, are rather surprised by it, or don't even fully understand the concepts. And Extra Credits is only ever the most basic, surface level concepts in game design, glossing over details and intricacies.

If we try to make a game that is balanced as well as possible, we are setting ourselves up for failure. Not only because we have no idea how to balance a game, but how balanced a game is is not directly proportional to how healthy its metagame is.

We shouldn't not have customs because we have a hunch based on no actual knowledge of how game balance works that it will unbalance the game to such a dramatic degree that it has a drastically negative effect on the metagame. Not only does the only experimental evidence available go against this, it's an outrageous claim to begin with.

Having customs on, however, will give people more options to experiment with. it is a much less drastic leap to say that that will be healthy to the metagame. heck, we have evidence of it. When customs were beginning to get accepted as part of pre-evo hype, it was a time of experimentation and excitement, of the unknown. New character were seeing more play than usual, and even then the balance of the game wasn't greatly shifted.

"How it might effect balance" is one of the worst possible reasons to be against customs that I can think of.

Thank you for mentioning the Extra Credits video. I'm familiar with their work and the video in particular. Extra Credits is a great way to understand fundamental design theory.

I would like to address the mindset of "know nothing balance." The, and I quote, "knight's templar way of looking" is not at all what I had in mind. Due to the nature of Smash itself and the concepts of the roster, perfect balance will never be a reality. I understand that. However, I was simply giving you examples about calls made in the past that has balanced the game arguably for the better. To give you one of these examples, we do not play matches on 75M or Pilotwings because the stages (due to hazards, infinite combos, and a multitude of other factors) are simply not balanced. I do not believe such a decision has developed the metagame negatively or stalled it in any other way.

Now, I know this is a straw man. Stages are one thing, but custom movesets are a completely different beast. Suddenly a low-tier character becomes god tier with moves. Tier upsets and matchups become commonplace. I am not arguing against this at all, but I would much rather compete in a setting where customs and vanilla movesets are separated until further research is done. If custom move tournaments become the norm, so be it. That will be the natural progression of Smash 4 if such an event happens. I do not agree with the notion that balance solely lies in the hands of the developer. Yes, it is their job, but one can look at Smashboards or SSBWiki to see that clearly others have put their time and effort into studying the evidence behind the balance and comprehending it. Other people understand balance too.

Thank you for responding, but please remember not to insult someone while arguing with them or put words in their mouth. I took design theory courses and like to think that I have a grasp on the concept of game design. I simply have a differing opinion than you.

 

[MajorMajora]

Thank you for mentioning the Extra Credits video. I'm familiar with their work and the video in particular. Extra Credits is a great way to understand fundamental design theory.

I would like to address the mindset of "know nothing balance." The, and I quote, "knight's templar way of looking" is not at all what I had in mind. Due to the nature of Smash itself and the concepts of the roster, perfect balance will never be a reality. I understand that. However, I was simply giving you examples about calls made in the past that has balanced the game arguably for the better. To give you one of these examples, we do not play matches on 75M or Pilotwings because the stages (due to hazards, infinite combos, and a multitude of other factors) are simply not balanced. I do not believe such a decision has developed the metagame negatively or stalled it in any other way.

Now, I know this is a straw man. Stages are one thing, but custom movesets are a completely different beast. Suddenly a low-tier character becomes god tier with moves. Tier upsets and matchups become commonplace. I am not arguing against this at all, but I would much rather compete in a setting where customs and vanilla movesets are separated until further research is done. If custom move tournaments become the norm, so be it. That will be the natural progression of Smash 4 if such an event happens. I do not agree with the notion that balance solely lies in the hands of the developer. Yes, it is their job, but one can look at Smashboards or SSBWiki to see that clearly others have put their time and effort into studying the evidence behind the balance and comprehending it. Other people understand balance too.

Thank you for responding, but please remember not to insult someone while arguing with them or put words in their mouth. I took design theory courses and like to think that I have a grasp on the concept of game design. I simply have a differing opinion than you.

I have 2 problems with your argument.

1. You comparing the process for banning stages as the same for banning customs. First of all, the banning of stages took place over time and was due to results of experimentation. The ones that were eliminated immediately were eliminated due to objectively possessing qualities that, through previous experimentation, were unfit for competitive play. Either that or they shouldn't have been eliminated at all, but that's a whole other argument.

2. You completely ignoring the evidence. We ran customs. Nothing like you described happened. Villager was annoying but not broken (not to mention he's been nerfed since), WFT was viable-ish, DK was trouble to people who were ignorant, and we saw slightly higher placings for B tier characters overall. There were non of these upsets you described, and even then you've yet to describe how this would be a bad thing necessarily.

My source:http://shoryuken.com/2015/07/19/evo...argest-fighting-game-tournament-in-the-world/

 

[Lvl99Gamer]

I have 2 problems with your argument.

1. You comparing the process for banning stages as the same for banning customs. First of all, the banning of stages took place over time and was due to results of experimentation. The ones that were eliminated immediately were eliminated due to objectively possessing qualities that, through previous experimentation, were unfit for competitive play. Either that or they shouldn't have been eliminated at all, but that's a whole other argument.

2. You completely ignoring the evidence. We ran customs. Nothing like you described happened. Villager was annoying but not broken (not to mention he's been nerfed since), WFT was viable-ish, DK was trouble to people who were ignorant, and we saw slightly higher placings for B tier characters overall. There were non of these upsets you described, and even then you've yet to describe how this would be a bad thing necessarily.

My source:http://shoryuken.com/2015/07/19/evo...argest-fighting-game-tournament-in-the-world/

While I agree with your point 1 I do think the person in question agrees with your point 2 from what I've read, he doesn't seem opposed to customs as long as the available ones are heavily tested. That's just what I understood from his post anyways.

Personally, I'm not even sure if I'd give most of the B tier characters access to more than a single custom move, with some exceptions. (and a regulated ban list for broken sets naturally) or anything higher than B+ to any customs for that matter

I'm mostly in favor of custom moves for the ability to breathe life into currently weak characters, allowing them to compete on a competitive stage.