Whats with the camping?

[jwj442]

It's too early to define how the metagame will ultimately end up. Age of Empires 2 was a game that people initially decried as "Age of Buildings"; it had some of the strongest buildings ever in an RTS at the time. Many said that the super-powerful static defenses would make every game slow, full of town center spam, and ending in Imperial Age siege warfare. That's kind of how the very early metagame was.

Reaching the castle age quickly and hitting people with knights relatively early was developed early on as a way to combat this and deliver an early knockout blow. This was the "fast castle", and people tried to figure just what the ideal way to do a fast castle was and the best way to counter it. Eventually people started experimenting with Feudal Age rushes, something that initially was dismissed as not viable due to the powerful defenses (some freely given at the start of the game) and fairly durable villagers. But Feudal Rushing developed and became a viable and even dominant strategy.

With where the metagame ended up (or at least where it was when I stopped playing seriously a few years ago), Feudal warfare is not even "rushing" so much as where the fighting normally starts on most map types. And trying to do what would have once been considered a "fast castle" in 1v1 on most normal maps will just get you killed. Even Dark Age rushing is viable for a few civs, though quite risky. It's common for a 1v1 game to not even reach the Imperial Age.

Granted, Age of Kings did have an expansion and some patches. But those came after the Feudal Rush became popular, so it's somewhat moot for the point I'm making.

I'm not trying to draw a perfect analogy, Smash is obviously very different from Age of Empires. I'm just providing an example of a game whose metagame ended very differently from how people expected it to. I'm not saying the same thing will DEFINITELY happen with Brawl; it's possible that it will just spiral deeper into a campfest. But the metagame needs time to evolve.

 

[UltraDavidSRK]

QFT. (10 char)

Brawl is a fighting game. If I wanted to play a slow paced strategy game, I would.

I don't get why campers and spammers play. How can you get a reward for doing something that requires little to no skill? Do you get any sense of accomplishment for choosing Pit and mashing B?

You know why there aren't any sleeping tournaments? Because anyone can do it, it isn't hard to do, and it isn't compelling to participate in or spectate.

But you are playing a strategy game, that's what fighting games are. Fighting games, real time strategy games, some first person shooters, chess, these are all just different types of strategy games. Fighting games are just a genus in Family Strategy Game, and Brawl is just a particular species of that. I hope you haven't been playing Smash since your '02 join date, it would just be too sad if you've been playing for 6 years and still not figured out what kind of a game you're playing. If you've gone this long without having realized that, there's something either exaggeratedly casual or fundamentally wrong with the way you approach the game.

And not everyone can play keepaway, sorry. It's no less skill- or strategy-based than rushing down. Try it against a good player some time, I'm sure you'll lose.

 

[Popertop]

Nice example der.
I can't really say anything else that hasn't been said.
We might need to come up with a different rule set for brawl maybe...

 

[Sliq111]

But you are playing a strategy game, that's what fighting games are. Fighting games, real time strategy games, some first person shooters, chess, these are all just different types of strategy games. Fighting games are just a genus in Family Strategy Game, and Brawl is just a particular species of that. I hope you haven't been playing Smash since your '02 join date, it would just be too sad if you've been playing for 6 years and still not figured out what kind of a game you're playing. If you've gone this long without having realized that, there's something either exaggeratedly casual or fundamentally wrong with the way you approach the game.

And not everyone can play keepaway, sorry. It's no less skill- or strategy-based than rushing down. Try it against a good player some time, I'm sure you'll lose.

Dear arrogant *******. Kiss my ****. Shove your condescension up your ***. You don't know me, so shut your mouth about **** you are clueless about.

Also, I joined in 2005, and am completely clueless as to why it says 2002.

You see, I place 17th at Pound 3. Look it up. It was the last huge Melee tournament.

I have the competitive mindset. I'm not saying it isn't s legitimate strategy. I just think camping is lame, and I fail to see how doing it results in any sort of satisfaction. Everyone at the tournament is going to hate you. The best things done in life require effort. Do you know how good it feels to complete a difficult task? Really ****ing good. What about zipping up your pants? Nothing.

Camping is a lame strategy that is ultimately going to leave you in a bad position when everyone figures out how to get around it, and you spent all your time spamming and no time learning to actually fight, so when they do get around it you'll get your stupid *** stomped into the ground.

 

[En.Ee.Oh]

its not the best strat, its a strat that sucky people use to appear better. i dont have a problem beating hardcore campers but its just annoying and isnt fun. you arent smart, you arent clever, you wont beat good people. you just suck

greg didn't you main falcon? ROFL!


i started camping in melee because that was the new style, now camping is just fun



why is everyone complaining anyways rofl

compared to the west coast ( i never count the midwest seriously in anything smash) we've always been far more gayer playing and campy than they have


iono, all of tristate camps when they play except like chillin (but he gets ***** when he doesn't) rofl




lay down the tent *****z

 

[UltraDavidSRK]

And I definitely wish you'd shut up about things you don't know about, in this case, all competitive fighting games. This is the most basic thing about Brawl, Melee, or any other fighting game, that it's a strategy game, and for you not to have realized that is really sad. That mistake obviously informs how you think about playing rushdown vs playing keepaway; if you think of Brawl as merely about "fighting" and not as a competitive strategy game, you'll think of it as being just about punching your opponent and not as being about controlling your opponent's space and options. The good players recognize that it's really about the second, in which case you have to play to your character's strengths, and for some characters that means you'll have to play keepaway.

Edit: Heh, you edited your post bigtime. That's cool, although I guess I'll leave what I wrote up for other people who don't think intelligently about fighting games.

But to address the edited parts of your post, running away or playing keepaway takes a lot of skill to do effectively. It's not a lame strategy, it's a legitimate one, and right now it seems pretty effective in this game. If people figure out ways around it, that's great, people who play runaway/keepaway characters will have to adapt to new strategies and find new and better ways to play their style, and if they can't, that's fine, they'll adapt or drop out. I'm not tied to either playstyle, I just don't want you to think that one is inherently preferable to the other, because that's just not the case.

 

[JesiahTEG]

I was talking to EL the other day about camping with Snake. I disagreed that camping was better for Snake. I went to a tournament. Placed 7th. I could have placed 1st if I had camped. EL is right. I'm camping next time.

 

[Sliq111]

And I definitely wish you'd shut up about things you don't know about, in this case, all competitive fighting games. This is the most basic thing about Brawl, Melee, or any other fighting game, that it's a strategy game, and for you not to have realized that is really sad.

I never said it wasn't. I never said it wasn't important. But you see, what separates fighting games from RTS or turn based strategy games is the fact that your ability to control your character is as important as strategy. But you, being a monumental *******, assumed that I meant that fighting games have no strategy, and that you should do it in 2:04 with Ganon, no strategies, just fighting as hard as you can.

You don't need to have control over your character to sit across FD and mash B. It requires no tech skill, none at all.

That mistake obviously informs how you think about playing rushdown vs playing keepaway; if you think of Brawl as merely about "fighting" and not as a competitive strategy game, you'll think of it as being just about punching your opponent and not as being about controlling your opponent's space and options. The good players recognize that it's really about the second, in which case you have to play to your character's strengths, and for some characters that means you'll have to play keepaway.

I mained Jigglypuff. My whole game was spacing attacks to control the space around my opponent. Don't talk down to me. You are being an intolerable arrogant sonuva***** right now, and it is pissing me off.

Edit: Heh, you edited your post bigtime. That's cool, although I guess I'll leave what I wrote up for other people who don't think intelligently about fighting games.

I had originally not planned on responding legitimately to you because of your overwhelming hubris, but then I changed my mind.

But to address the edited parts of your post, running away or playing keepaway takes a lot of skill to do effectively.

No it doesn't. Play Pit, mash B, ?????, profit. Simple as that. Rolling and spot dodging are so quick now that reading what they are going to do and reacting doesn't cut it anymore, as they auto powershield EVERYTHING (auto-powershield is what happens when you do an action and hold r, and your shield comes out and powershields for you--i.e. if you roll and hold r, it brings your shield up, and powershields for you).

Bad people can do well with spamming, while good people can do amazingly with spamming. Regardless, spamming for the most part is easy as **** to do (in Brawl).

It's not a lame strategy, it's a legitimate one, and right now it seems pretty effective in this game.

I also think country music is lame. Do you like country music? Hey, look, we have a difference of opinion!

If people figure out ways around it, that's great, people who play runaway/keepaway characters will have to adapt to new strategies and find new and better ways to play their style, and if they can't, that's fine, they'll adapt or drop out. I'm not tied to either playstyle, I just don't want you to think that one is inherently preferable to the other, because that's just not the case.

Spamming effectively does not require a great deal of skill in this game. Maybe in others, but not this one.

I mean, you can be REALLY good at camping, but you can also be reallly bad at it, and even when you are bad at it, it is effective as ****.

 

[pockyD]

sounds like you two both think that camping is too good and yet are arguing just for the sake of arguing

 

[DRaGZ]

UltraDavid, I think you're forgetting a big piece of the picture here, and I think that's human-interface interaction.

Unless the game doesn't directly reward or punish you for poor input (like most board games, where putting down a piece faster than someone else is not an issue), physical dexterity matters a LOT. Even in RTS, your micro is INCREDIBLY important for being competitive. Starcraft is the PINNACLE of this: no matter how great your strategy is, a guy you can set up a ling rush in under five minutes will **** whatever puny crap you'll have set up by then.

Fighting games, of course, involve even MORE dexterity in command input, especially fighting games that demand difficult series of inputs to work efectively (try playing as Hugo in Third Strike, and you'll see).

Of course, strategy is NEVER out of the equation. In the case of fighting games, good strategy is inherently built into your inputs! Many strategies in fighting games implicitly cannot work without dexterous control.

 

[Sliq111]

sounds like you two both think that camping is too good and yet are arguing just for the sake of arguing

I'm really just pissed about him being so condescending. I just strongly dislike camping. I don't think it isn't a good strategy to use, I just don't like it. It isn't fun to do, and it isn't fun to fight against. At least until a way is found to get around it. But currently it appears that your options are extremely limited. I'm hoping that Brawl get's less campy in the future.

 

[Chexr]

Brawl is fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eZgKg8O-qc

 

[chillindude829]

Too lazy to read this whole thread, but I got 2nd at C3 this past weekend and didn't lose a single match other than to Azen. I don't camp that much with Fox or Dedede unless my opponent is camping, but I still do well.

 

[Emblem Lord]

^^^This.

No one is saying camping is unstoppable. Just a better strat then going aggro at THIS point in the Brawl metagame.

Although judging by Brawl's engine and how it gives no reward for aggression, I doubt Brawl will ever be anything more then smart camping.

 

[pockyD]

if you're clearly the better player, you can obviously overcome camping

but for close, tight matches, camping is pretty much the best strat at this point

 

[UltraDavidSRK]

I mained Jigglypuff. My whole game was spacing attacks to control the space around my opponent. Don't talk down to me. You are being an intolerable arrogant sonuva***** right now, and it is pissing me off.

Haha wow, looks like I hit a sore spot here.

Don't you realize that the way you played Jiggly was just a variation on keepaway? You limited your opponent's space and options with air and ground attacks, and I'm sure that was extremely annoying for your opponent. What's the difference between controlling your opponent from close/mid-range like that and and controlling your opponent from a distance? Why is one acceptable to you and the other so horrible?

Keepaway isn't necessarily best in Brawl, just look at the guy a few posts above this who got 2nd at C3 who says he doesn't camp that much. But it's true, like in most games it seems like keepaway can be an effective strategy in Brawl, and that means you've gotta come to grips with it. Or hope other people find ways to get in on keepaway players. Or quit, I guess.

And I think we're talking about different things when we talk about skill. Seems like when you (and Dragz) talk about skill, you're talking about skill with your hands, ie how fast and how accurately you can move your fingers, etc. I'm not talking about that at all, and actually I'm totally uninterested in that kind of skill; I learn it whenever I pick up a new game, but to me it's just the annoying price of admission to get into the awesome strategy underneath. When I talk about skill, I'm talking about mental skill, how well you understand what's going on in the game. From your point of view I can see how playing keepaway looks like it takes no skill, because you're right, press B is very easy. But it's not easy from a strategic point of view, because you have to make sure that when you press B you take into account all of your opponent's possible actions, like whether he could roll through and hit me, small jump over and hit me, hit me with his own projectile, dodge and make me waste the projectile I'd spent time charging up for, etc. There's a bunch of considerations that go into things like that. It's definitely not mindless.

By the way, I'm not sure whether keepaway will prove too good in Brawl, and I don't think anyone can be. Seems good right now, but who knows whether it'll still be effective in the future. I don't think I'm arguing with dudeface about whether keepaway is effective, I'm just trying to get him to think critically about the strategy in Brawl and other fighting games. It's weird to me to see someone claim that he plays a strategy game competitively while actively disregarding an important part of that game's competitive strategy.

Edit:

Brawl is fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eZgKg8O-qc

Do you not see the strategy in this? At the start both players are trying to damage their opponent and trick the other into something stupid; the Snake player forces the ROB player into giving up his position, and eventually knocks the ROB player off; after that the ROB player tries to use his projectiles to trick the Snake player into giving up his advantageous position, and eventually he does, and so on. There's a lot of very calculating play here, and it isn't even that keepaway-ish if you watch the game progress. These guys aren't just pressing B, they're taking a lot of possibilities into account and trying to force their game on their opponent.

 

[aho43]

Camping is a legitimate strategy like any other. However, it is ****ing boring. Breaking down camping is satisfying, but having to play a ton of people just roll spamming and running away and shooting **** at me gets old. The end result is the same, I win, after chasing them down and dair-utilting them over and over with fox, and waiting for a stupid roll + usmashing them.

Coming from melee and playing an aggro style its just depressing that this is where the game seems to be heading. Can we all agree that its ****ing boring? There can be a happy medium between playing aggro and strictly camping. Usually what people refer to as "playing smart." It seems that people are going heavily towards strictly camping as opposed to even try attacking at all even when there is an opportunity to get a good hit.

NEO, Brawl is devoid of all things sexy, except sheik. You'll be sad.

 

[hova]

i think most people missed a major part of Aho's first post... he beat the campers

i really don't think camping is an amazing strategy and better people will find a way to neutralize and punish it shortly

the speed of brawl combined with the camping, just makes matches extremely long. i'm not going to complain or argue about it

TA doesn't camp and the game is definitely a lot of fun when I play with them, but playing other people just bores me and playing with them feels like a chore and i refuse to even make an effort during a friendly match because it's ********

regardless, we'll figure it out and pioneer some rushdown tactics that you all can copy

 

[Emblem Lord]

I'm already trying to figure out rush down tactics. Only problem is only fast characters can really take advantage of them.

Oh well.

 

[peachori]

i think a lot of times people just camp and hope someone else makes a mistake that they can somehow use to their advantage
although i think its pretty stupid and bull**** and makes the game boring
but whatever it takes to win, right? lol

 

[aho43]

i think rush down right now involves alot of timing and knowing how to punish characters with super fast moves that they can do from sidestep/roll/shield. Having a reflector is handy too. I'd really like to see aggressive play advance to the point where people turn to that style of play as opposed to camping, edit: or at least some mix of both.

I don't see the higher level players camp as much, but many of the middle/crappier players in melee seem to have gone straight to camping.

 

[g-regulate]

NEO are you implying that i camp with falcon? me? the most aggro and instinctive falcon who often dies off the ledge going for kills?

i think everyone at the end of melees time had a certain level of camp, but there was so much speed and range in that game that you had to keep SOMEWHAT of a distance to avoid fatal combos.

i think what aho is talking about it is the guy who spams a projectile, rolls all around the stage, neutral jabs anything that gets close to him, and literally runs away from his opponent shooting anything he can.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Thing is aggressive play can't overtake defensive play simply because you have to work harder for no gauruntee of big damage. And you don't get to control the match by being aggressive.

Camping gives you a huge advantage compared to aggression in Brawl.

It's not even close.

There just isn't anything to be gained from playing rush down in Brawl.

Now I play Marth as my main. So if I go up agianst Snake, then yeah I have to rush down. Lucky for me Marth is fast and strong and he hits ****ing hard.

So I can get in there and do some damage. But that's pretty much it. Once Snake regains his footing, he controls the stage again and the process repeats itself and I'm eating damage from explosives here and there while I try to get in. Not to mention Snake and Marth have virtually equal range and Snake has crazy power on his tilts.

As of right now I consider that particular match-up even, since Marth's high mobility, high knockback and ability to gimp Snake's recovery even things out for him, but Snake still controls the stage with very little effort.

Also the high level players aren't camping...yet.

Once they accept that aggro yields no direct reward, they will start camping.

Or they will lose to campers and be phased out.

I mean Azen just won C3 by camping right?

Maybe he didn't aura sphere spam, but he played defensively/reactively and just punished.

He camped.

 

[Azen Zagenite]

=^_^=

I camped with forward smashes in Melee too

 

[Emblem Lord]

GG Azen.

You win the thread.

Close this mods.

 

[aho43]

azen is azen tho. and does it ways that make you feel stupid.

 

[thumbswayup]

forget camping, how about addressing stalling? in one of my tourny matches the fox i was playing got me to a higher percentage than him on the last stock with 20 seconds left and jumped off the edge and kept shining to kill time. bull**** coward technique i say. this once again provides evidence that 6 minutes is often NOT SUFFICIENT time for some matchups in brawl. thats especially true of sonic dittos and any match involving a pit. i did manage to spike that fox at the last second and win the set, but thats because i almost suicided jumping out there with diddy.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Camping is camping no matter who does it.

Alot of you are just used to melee where crazy rushdown is a powerful tactic although camping is still a bit stronger in melee too as it is in all fighting gmaes really.

Rushdown was so strong because of high mobility and speed and you could throw out walls of rapid fire aerials to close safely and once you landed you could go into dash dancing for pressure, and once you get a hit in it was GGPO.

I mean with Marth he literally can just do dash dance to dash cancelled d-tilt's then cancel those into more dash dancing into more d-tilts or fairs or nairs until he gets a poke and then grab form there and do w/e. You didn't have to concern yourself so much with safety with a character like that because of his speed and how hard it is to punish something like that.

Also the example I just made wasn't even really rushdown. It was camping, albeit aggressive camping. Using attacks and constant pokes to create a wall and they proceeding to combo when you get a hit in.

Although Marth could easily just jump at you with a shuffled fair and then dash away and you can't punish him.

I mean free shield pressure that you can't even really do anything about is so awesome right?

Melee had it's problems as well people, let's not forget.

 

[Rebel581]

Camping with shooting projectiles the entire match and running away isn't even smart camping. If you see people do that to you, they aren't good, or were playing dumb (sorry about that match aho, I think I was just playing stupid that match, but maybe I just suck at this game). Smart camping involves shooting the projectiles just to get the opponent close to you. I don't see any reason to run across the level so I can get hit, when I can let my opponent do the running. I feel it compensates for my lack of range with Pit when I can force the opponent into close quarters combat.

Unfortunately, for some strange reason, I did this in every match except the two that I lost. Instead of doing what was winning me the other matches, I just badly camped.

Sorry about that aho, hope for a better match next time.

 

[soap]

lolz at azen.

i saw that annoying guy talking about strategy, and i realized after playing brawl that alot of what i liked about melee was not just pure strategy but the fluidity and movement of the game and the smoothness you felt in combo rhythm kinda like you were learning the steps to a dance, then learning the real time application to make it smooth, may sound abit more shallow but that is a big part of what made it fun for me

 

[Azen Zagenite]

=^_^=

What are you guys arguing about anyway, lolz.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Running away to shoot people isn't smart?

Since when?

As long as you are effectively controlling the match, then do w/e IMO.

 

[MASAHIROx]

i just RAR...and then up tilt...

...

but true story playing campers is ****ing ******** and not fun. its just a way for people that have minimal skill to compete with people with much better skill. works in teams all the time.

****ing olimar

 

[Sliq111]

Haha wow, looks like I hit a sore spot here.

Don't you realize that the way you played Jiggly was just a variation on keepaway? You limited your opponent's space and options with air and ground attacks, and I'm sure that was extremely annoying for your opponent. What's the difference between controlling your opponent from close/mid-range like that and and controlling your opponent from a distance? Why is one acceptable to you and the other so horrible?

Keepaway isn't necessarily best in Brawl, just look at the guy a few posts above this who got 2nd at C3 who says he doesn't camp that much. But it's true, like in most games it seems like keepaway can be an effective strategy in Brawl, and that means you've gotta come to grips with it. Or hope other people find ways to get in on keepaway players. Or quit, I guess.

And I think we're talking about different things when we talk about skill. Seems like when you (and Dragz) talk about skill, you're talking about skill with your hands, ie how fast and how accurately you can move your fingers, etc. I'm not talking about that at all, and actually I'm totally uninterested in that kind of skill; I learn it whenever I pick up a new game, but to me it's just the annoying price of admission to get into the awesome strategy underneath. When I talk about skill, I'm talking about mental skill, how well you understand what's going on in the game. From your point of view I can see how playing keepaway looks like it takes no skill, because you're right, press B is very easy. But it's not easy from a strategic point of view, because you have to make sure that when you press B you take into account all of your opponent's possible actions, like whether he could roll through and hit me, small jump over and hit me, hit me with his own projectile, dodge and make me waste the projectile I'd spent time charging up for, etc. There's a bunch of considerations that go into things like that. It's definitely not mindless.

By the way, I'm not sure whether keepaway will prove too good in Brawl, and I don't think anyone can be. Seems good right now, but who knows whether it'll still be effective in the future. I don't think I'm arguing with dudeface about whether keepaway is effective, I'm just trying to get him to think critically about the strategy in Brawl and other fighting games. It's weird to me to see someone claim that he plays a strategy game competitively while actively disregarding an important part of that game's competitive strategy.

Edit:

Do you not see the strategy in this? At the start both players are trying to damage their opponent and trick the other into something stupid; the Snake player forces the ROB player into giving up his position, and eventually knocks the ROB player off; after that the ROB player tries to use his projectiles to trick the Snake player into giving up his advantageous position, and eventually he does, and so on. There's a lot of very calculating play here, and it isn't even that keepaway-ish if you watch the game progress. These guys aren't just pressing B, they're taking a lot of possibilities into account and trying to force their game on their opponent.

You are completely ******** and I won't be adressing you anymore. Not for what you say, but the fact that you ignore all the parts where I said it was a good strategy, just boring, and then spending this whole post telling me **** I already know, like the condescending ******* you are.

 

[pockyD]

but true story playing campers is ****ing ******** and not fun. its just a way for people that have minimal skill to compete with people with much better skill. works in teams all the time.

sounds like a reason to camp

just to clarify, i don't camp, hate camping, and hate brawl because of it (and get ***** because I don't camp), but how can you guys be bashing a strategy which, in your own words, allows someone to "compete with people with much better skill"? if someone's goal is to win by any (legal) means necessary, who are you to tell them that they can't? should they just go ahead and concede the match to you before playing just because you think you're better than them?

 

[Rebel581]

What are you guys arguing about anyway, lolz.

Azen's now my favorite person.

 

[Azen Zagenite]

=^_^=

I dunno about you guys, but I find it much easier to beat campers in Brawl than in Melee.

 

[KevinM]

Thats because you're the better camper

Azen is one of my favorite posters on SWF lol

 

[hova]

the issue is not having trouble beating campers or deciding if it's a good strategy (it's not). the issue is why did everyone go straight to camping? it really seems like everyone huddled together in a big group and decided that camping was the way to go

it's definitely the easiest thing to do if you can't think that hard, but there are definitely much better options. knowing that you'll win the match, but being forced to play a slow, drawn out match, where all you're opponent does is roll around and shoot things is really annoying.

similar to the stupid counterpick in melee; where you crush someone on the random neutral and know you'll definitely win on another neutral, but for the second match they go to poke floats, corneria, or jungle japes and just camp because that's the only way they can win; but at the same time the set is in the bag because of the last counterpick

it's just annoying and not very good. i just don't understand where the consensus that brawl=camp came from

 

[EnigmaticCam]

Azen's always been my favorite smasher period. I think his attitude toward competition should be what every smasher should look up to