"Why is this stage banned?" A Q&A regarding stage legality

[DMG]

I doubt you tested ledge options vs ledge options thoroughly. It pretty much translates to whoever goes to the ledge first will lose because your invincibility wears off first. There are a number of extra things that many characters can do that aren't possible on other ledges.

All of a sudden people care about ledge games being broken? If Pipes is banned, MK should be banned. And none of that "but people don't main stages" junk.

Grabbing the edge first is not a death sentence for planking. That would be as naive as saying Norfair doesn't allow planking because you can stand on a lower platform and be right next to them when they drop off.


Let's assume that it is an incredible disadvantage to grab the edge first however. I'm G&W, and you're someone else. I'm planking, you come along and grab the other edge a bit after I do. Now what? I'm supposedly at a strong disadvantage, even though I get to move off the edge first (still with the same invincibility as if noone was there) and the longer it took for you to grab the edge the bigger of a window I have to get away from you. If you take even longer, somebody can just complete a full loop (drop down, DJ/Upb back) before you can really cover both ledge areas with a hitbox at the specified window. What's the point of getting invincibility after I do, if it will also slow down your attempts at stopping me? It's already hard enough to time an attack that will stop them, or grab their edge at the key moment during regular planking when you have all the time in the world. The last thing you need is crunching that window down for the sake of being invincible. Obtaining invincibility tends to only help out people who are good at/against planking in the first place. Falco with invincibility is still butt at stopping it, where as Marth/G&W/MK/Pika/someone established can certainly improve from that.


If you grab the edge at the exact same time that I do, it tends to boil down to whoever has the best ledge game will still prevail. Other options will also come into play, like going back on stage purposefully if you think they can't punish you for choosing that either cause they have a bad "get back on" game or because your character tends to stuff a lot of options for people trying to get off the ledge and back onto the ground. Marth, G&W, MK, etc being the main culprits in that regard vs Pika/friends. It's a smaller version of the MK conundrum , where stopping his planking by taking the edge from him also opens the door for him to go onstage and in the near future return back to the edge and continue without harm.


If you want to put a stronger LGL on that, go for it. I'm not an advocate for making stage specific/entailing rules to try and redeem them, but it's true for a lot of stages that you can make them legal in a competitive setting IF you are willing to go completely out of your way to make rules against abusing any broken facet of the stage regardless of how enforceable the rules are. I would think it odd though that people would complain about a surgical rule like LGL, but be entirely in favor of slapping on stage specific LGL or "don't circle camp/run away/abuse X facet" kind of rules.

 

[Tesh]

I think you are wrong about planking because you always assume the guy planking will be smarter and have faster reflexes.

BUT, assuming you are absolutely correct and planking winds up being broken for Gnw, Pit, Marth etc. What other stage could reasonably be saved by placing a very clear and very enforceable rule that we ALREADY USE EVERYWHERE? Pirate Ship is probably the only one that could be saved by a clear "no rudder camping" rule, but even that would be harder to enforce than an LGL.

I'm assuming you must be pro-ban because MK is kept around by the same type of rule. So even if you don't agree with it, don't you think its at the very least plausible and enforceable as a way to keep the stage in the game? What if I told you that i "main" Yoshi's Island Pipes and that I might quit Brawl if it doesn't become legal soon?

 

[DMG]

None of what I said assumed that the planking person will be smarter/better at doing it. Most of what I have said is simply fact: If you grab the edge after I do, the game allows me to move from the edge before you do. If I grab the edge on frame 1, and you grab it on frame 10, we're both stuck for 20+ frames. I can move on 26+ frame, while you can't move until frame 36+. Being able to get off the edge before you do means I get to space myself further away from you so that you can't hover around me, and if the disparity of edge grab times is high enough I can simply regrab the edge anyways.


Or character differences. Falco for example: regardless of whether you think his player is better/worse than the planker, it's obvious that he doesn't have great tools to deal with planking. It wouldn't be a foolish claim to say "Falco gets boned regardless". Not every character has it as severe as that, but many of them do and the rest tend to be broken down into characters that are strong at/against planking (MK Marth G&W blah blah), characters that can deal with it under normal circumstances by abusing the windows found in regular planking, characters that can reasonably get through if small mistakes are made when planking, and then people who rely on those "Wtf are you doing" messups to have a chance.


That's just for regular, one edge FD/SV/BF/regular stage planking. When you introduce another edge to the equation, both sides (planking and anti planking) benefit but the extend that they are benefited is grossly disproportional. Think about it:

Characters that are good at planking, tend to obviously be better than other characters when it comes to ledge play right? You don't see Mario/Diddy/Olimar be considered candidates for strong ledge games over Marth MK G&W etc. Now, what do you think would happen if you introduced another edge close by? The more a stage focuses on ledge play, the stronger people like MK Marth etc get. Having another edge DOES give other characters a few more options, but it doesn't compare to what the planking characters get. It's kinda like having another edge multiplies the strength of regular plankers by, say 1.5, where as for the anti plankers it only amplifies their strength by 1.05 or 1.1. Both sides do get a boost, but it would be reasonable to assume that plankers would benefit more since adding another ledge favors exactly that: ledge play. Instead of having 1 "safe spot" to travel to over and over when planking, you get 2 safe spots to work with in a close area. While the anti plankers did get a side by side invincibility option, they also have the added burden of trying to stop a planker from going to 2 safe spots instead of just the regular one.


It's because of this, that I think it's not unreasonable to say that planking is even worse to handle on this stage. This is all theorycraft only: you've not even begun to delve into the practical implications that have arisen with the stage being legal. You could ask a good few of the Texas players who played with it a lot when it was still legal: Dphat, Me, Dojo, Zac, Infinity, etc. Matches on this stage tended to boil down into matchups like MK dittos, MK vs G&W, Marth vs G&W, and similar ones with fighting over the center ledges the bold focus of any real match. I can't speak for every region out there, but we definitely played on this stage extensively (even reserving it for random MM's only on that stage to this day) to the point where not even Xyro could look at it with a straight face. Out of all the "questionable" stages people bring up, this one in particular I can guarantee you something even stronger than a guarantee that it's not good for competitive gameplay, unless as mentioned earlier you want to go down the avenue of putting stage specific rules on to address their flaws. Which I probably will not agree with you when it comes to that, and we'll be left at a standstill either way.

 

[Tesh]

tl;dr grabbing the other ledge forces the other guy off the ledge because his invincibility wears off first. I'm going to concede this point because it doesn't matter anyway.

Do you think its okay to use an LGL to keep MK legal?

Do you think its okay to use an LGL to keep a stage legal?

Because both are made "not broken" by an LGL. The community already says its okay.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Tethers like Link, Toon Link, and Samus can let go earier if I recall, and Pikachu has less frames as well.

For Link, he's boned against planking, anyways because a mistake is a stock offstage usually.

 

[DMG]

Do you think its okay to use an LGL to keep MK legal?

Do you think its okay to use an LGL to keep a stage legal?

Because both are made "not broken" by an LGL. The community already says its okay.

I'm not the biggest fan of using a rule like that in those instances. It's one thing to have obvious "limiter" rules, like the CG % rule and the stalling/freezing/etc rules. But a LGL is pretty messy rule wise. IMO, it's too broad of a rule.


The edge is a problem for competitive gameplay, but only under certain circumstances with certain characters. A LGL targets every use of the edge, including non broken uses. It says grabbing the edge x number of times is broken. What it doesn't address is how you are using the edge, when you are grabbing it, why you are grabbing the edge, etc.


Imagine if Tornado was broken when used in certain situations, like it was completely broken as an edge guard but completely fine onstage. And our solution to deal with it was to limit tornado useage to 20 a match, regardless of where you did the move or what you did with the move. That's kinda what a LGL feels like.


If you use a LGL, it should only be on certain characters at max. Outside of the obvious MK, only people like G&W Marth Pika etc should even be considered. If we're going far enough to limit gameplay like this, I think we could take the time to compile a list of people who are problematic or potentially problematic on the edge and only slap a LGL on them instead of take the lazy approach of putting one on everyone. Putting one on everyone is basically admitting you're fine with overstepping boundaries for rules, and not taking the time to conform it to something reasonable that makes sense.


Red Ryu: Yeah those characters can move off the edge faster than others, at the cost of less total invincibility since characters who are stuck on the edge for longer also get invincibility for that "downtime". Getting off the edge faster however isn't that great of a thing for them: it means you have to time edge grabs differently than other characters, and in the end they would have the same off edge invincibility window to abuse as regular characters.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

If they Z-regrab they can regain invincibility frame, so they could regain more, but yeah your pretty much right on the other points.

 

[DMG]

Well yeah if you Z grab, but TL/Link/etc haven't been the best anti plankers to begin with. It would help you retime, but as far as getting the right attack out to beat everything else out, still gonna be a pain.

 

[Luckay4Lyphe]

guys why is hyrule banned. its like my favorite stage playing with my friends.

 

[infiniteV115]

guys why is hyrule banned. its like my favorite stage playing with my friends.

It's banned because in competitive play, you play with 3 stocks and an 8 minute time limit. Thus people tend to stall when they have a lead, just to increase their chances of winning. Hyrule is broken because of "circle camping" (essentially stalling/camping by running around in a circle, avoiding any confrontation with the enemy). So if you're facing, say, Fox, he could laser you once, then run around in a circle for almost 8 minutes and win. Of course he's not the only person that can circle camp effectively, and circle camping isn't the only reason this stage is banned. (Cave of life, perhaps too big, probably also some other stuff I don't know anything about) but circle camping is definitely the biggest problem and is ban-worthy alone in this case.

 

[Luckay4Lyphe]

Oh thanks for clearing that up. Since I main Pit I bet I could do that even more effectively than fox! Thank you for answering my question instead of using mod powers to give me a warning claim that I'm trolling like Red Ryu here did lol.

 

[Tesh]

I'm not the biggest fan of using a rule like that in those instances. It's one thing to have obvious "limiter" rules, like the CG % rule and the stalling/freezing/etc rules. But a LGL is pretty messy rule wise. IMO, it's too broad of a rule.


The edge is a problem for competitive gameplay, but only under certain circumstances with certain characters. A LGL targets every use of the edge, including non broken uses. It says grabbing the edge x number of times is broken. What it doesn't address is how you are using the edge, when you are grabbing it, why you are grabbing the edge, etc.


Imagine if Tornado was broken when used in certain situations, like it was completely broken as an edge guard but completely fine onstage. And our solution to deal with it was to limit tornado useage to 20 a match, regardless of where you did the move or what you did with the move. That's kinda what a LGL feels like.


If you use a LGL, it should only be on certain characters at max. Outside of the obvious MK, only people like G&W Marth Pika etc should even be considered. If we're going far enough to limit gameplay like this, I think we could take the time to compile a list of people who are problematic or potentially problematic on the edge and only slap a LGL on them instead of take the lazy approach of putting one on everyone. Putting one on everyone is basically admitting you're fine with overstepping boundaries for rules, and not taking the time to conform it to something reasonable that makes sense.


Red Ryu: Yeah those characters can move off the edge faster than others, at the cost of less total invincibility since characters who are stuck on the edge for longer also get invincibility for that "downtime". Getting off the edge faster however isn't that great of a thing for them: it means you have to time edge grabs differently than other characters, and in the end they would have the same off edge invincibility window to abuse as regular characters.

The CG% rule is designed to stop stalling, but its not fair to everyone anyway. Just like a castwide 40 LGL might be unfair to Ganondorf (he really needs to bide his time because of RCO lag) or Ice Climbers, a flat 300% infinite rule is also unfair. Some infinites build damage REALLY fast and don't waste minutes upon minutes getting to 300%. Look at Marth's Grab release on ness (his pummel is slowish and weak right?) and compare it to Ice Climbers damaging CGs (some variations do 20-30 percent per regrab). These don't spend the same amount of time doing 300% damage so limiting one after 30 seconds isn't fair if you limit the other for 3 minutes. These issues come up unfortunately and its not a huge problem apparently.

If the game kept track of tornado/shuttle loop/ dsmash uses and relayed it to us on the results screen, people would have tried to put a win condition on it back in 2008/09. We work with what we have and soem things are VERY easy to enforce even if not perfectly fair.

As far as the "lazy" approach, its sometimes just more effective. As far as YI:M, there is no reason anyone would even try to grab the ledges there more than 40 or 50 times without trying to stall. There is no such thing as recovery there. Sure maybe it would be fair to allow crummy characters to plank because its not good planking, but no one really cares about low tiers because they suck.

 

[napZzz]

Oh thanks for clearing that up. Since I main Pit I bet I could do that even more effectively than fox! Thank you for answering my question instead of using mod powers to give me a warning claim that I'm trolling like Red Ryu here did lol.

what an amazing mod imo

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

With your post count and experience in tournaments, I assumed you were trolling. Since most if not everyone who asks that is trolling.

My bad. /reverses warning.

what an amazing mod imo

I just wanna be friends with Minnesota people, Nappy. Why you hatin'

Also don't forget your controller, losing a match because of it sucks.

 

[T-block]

Dedede can chain grab Bowser up the slopes of YI:M. More to come.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Didn't CO18 say he could CG more than the 6 characters up slopes?

 

[Tesh]

I'm interested to see the list, but I don't think it really matters as far as stage legality.

 

[Raziek]

I'm with Tesh on that point.

If 'Don't get grabbed' is ok for having IC's infinites legal on EVERY STAGE, then there's no way CG'ing up a slope is gonna be banned.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Avoiding the character one of the shortest grab ranges, and isn't a problem if separated, is a long ways different from the one with the largest non tether grab range, that always happens no matter where you are when you mess up.

 

[Tesh]

*plays mk on rainbow cruise*
"don't get shuttle looped"
If MK cps rainbow cruise and you main the 70% of the cast that will likely get ***** for even going there against him, I would tell you to pick another character.

So assuming DDD can walkoff CG everyone heavier than Marth on this stage, you still could have picked MK and ***** him, picked pika and ***** him, falco, fox, olimar etc. and he won't be much use against them. And you chances would STILL be way better than facing MK on rainbow cruise with any character.

DDD potentially could **** some folks here, but it doesn't break the CP system like MK does. DDD will still lose to alot of characters on this stage.

 

[T-block]

I'm on the fence for Dedede's CGs on this stage. If it really were only those six, then I would be perfectly fine with the CG here. But if it's all the normal candidates, or close to it, I don't think "don't get grabbed" is reasonable when you're moving from ICs to Dedede =\

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

So do we let hard counters picks exist for people to have huge advantages.

Or do we remove them because they are too strong or over-centralize the game around those stages, interesting question.

 

[Tesh]

How exactly is getting grabbed worse than getting his with shuttle loop on Rainbow Cruise? Assuming you are playing Link, Bowser, DK etc.

Make a list of characters that get ***** by MK on RC.

Now make a list of every CGable character by DDD (for the sake of arguement I'm going to assme its all the normal ones).

Which list is longer?

Okay now ban that stage first.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Because a grab is a stock when facing a direction, always. At the other side, Fthrow is a quick KO pretty low % wise.

This is an auto ban on DDD for Lucario & Link. Both are gonna deal with Delfino and Cruise after that point.

 

[T-block]

Are you seriously going to play out that comparison? Getting hit by SL as Link on RC is nowhere near as bad as getting grabbed by Dedede as Bowser on YI:M. On RC, getting hit by SL is potentially devastating on one-third of the stage ._.

 

[Tesh]

Brinstar is auto ban against metaknight, then you have to deal with RC/Delfino/Frigate etc.

T-Block the whole 1/3rd of the stage is a bit....subjective there when comparing. You could argue that playing stupid on YI:M nets you 100% of you time being 0-deathed. Or you could factor in smart defensive play like you would in defense of RC. The fact of the matter is that you would still be at a major disadvantage against MK on the entire stage (assuming you can even catch him during certain parts), just like you would be if you camped the yellow blocks against DDD or played keep away.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Guess we should have Bridge of Eldin legal if we support the, "It's ok to have legal if you can ban it" argument.

Also playing keep away, is partly what the MU is for both Link and Lucario. Neither can play don't get grabbed game, because he's not Ice climbers where you can outspace them all day.

 

[Tesh]

I didn't say its okay to have it legal if you can ban it.

My stance is always and only "its okay to have it legal if we have worse things legal already".

Bridge of Eldin has walkoff camping, YI:M doesn't (except arguably somewhat possible for Olimar).

And its too ****ing big too.....

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

I don't think Cruise is worse than YI:M.

 

[DMG]

A lot of stages you are making the MK comparison to... I wouldn't agree on their legality 90% of the time. Brinstar and Norfair in particular I think it's a moot point to compare them to YI M or other stages since I would get rid of them anyways lol. RC is debatable. It's not necessarily really bad stage design, but being set up in a way that enhances MK's natural strong points.

 

[Coney]

Any other stage has ledges.

The Summit

 

[napZzz]

The Summit

saving the smirks, thanks for posting them

 

[Tesh]

A lot of stages you are making the MK comparison to... I wouldn't agree on their legality 90% of the time. Brinstar and Norfair in particular I think it's a moot point to compare them to YI M or other stages since I would get rid of them anyways lol. RC is debatable. It's not necessarily really bad stage design, but being set up in a way that enhances MK's natural strong points.

But, you don't make the stagelists do you? I wouldn't have Brinstar/RC/Norfair legal either. But its worth pointing out that if we do have them legal, we shouldn't ban milder stages.

 

[UberMario]

It's not reasonably predictable for some parts that have small hole you can't even plan for. You can accidentally fall through a hole that lasts less than a second between transformations 1-2.

Unless you are spiked (which would have resulted in a kill anyway on most stages), you could use a recovery, and bounce off the stage to get it back.

Predictable, sure but for any parts on this stage it's not reasonable.

Yes it is, the small gaps exist in specific areas, you can tell where they are coming up by looking at where the main platform is heading, well in advance. I believe that there are only two sections like that, the one between 1 and 2 that you mentioned, and then another AFTER the platform stops heading directly to the right. The rest of the track is pretty safe.

And the floor helps but no ledges is far worse and doesn't make up for it.

I beg to differ, it allows you to fight/DI back onto the stage, rather than being hunted down while you're down for the count. If you feel bold, you can also DI downward, and "fake out" a recovery once or twice to prevent the opponent from nabbing you on your way up, something you can't normally do for obvious reasons.

 

[Tesh]

If the stage had ledges in addition to hazards that bounce you back up to the stage (like brinstar) I might say "eh link and ganondorf might do okay there". But the lack of ledges hurts people recovering far more than the cars help.

Also you can't DI downwards on upward knockback.

For what its worth, I don't think people are even considering how bad MK will **** everyone without ledges. Its not even relevant that he won't be able to plank. He will just tornado across the stage or glide during the massive camp portions. Then he will punish extremely hard any time u get into a juggle. There will be no slipping past him to get to the ledge with Diddy Kong or Falco. No ledge teching mixups with Snake. And Pikachu won't be worth much without the option to grab the ledge. Yes the fact that MK will **** the hell out of everyone on this stage is a good reason for it to be banned.

 

[Luco]

I'm interested in a post made much earlier concerning mushroomy kingdom 2. If the person is high up, can't they just be punished with a big final smash, such as PK starstorm, or King DDD's war cry FS?

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Tournaments don't play with items. This includes Smash Balls. And MK2 has far more issues than just that.

 

[ぱみゅ]

People there dies when being hit by pretty much anything.....
Those FSes just make it much easier. Try uairs.
Also, try using a tournament standard ;D

 

[rurounikenshin]

Can someone please tell me what stages are not banned currently?

 

[ぱみゅ]

Smashville, Final Destination and Battlefield.
Everything else is apparently too much for the Smash community.