Laijin
Smash Hero
So I've been gone from the scene for about a year 1/2 and I return to find out the stage rulesets have been modified. Kongo Jungle 64 is no longer a legal counter pick and neither are Brinstar or Rainbow Cruise. What is this garbage? Is the community suddenly so scared of ANY stage hazards now? Even though the stages I listed barely have any stage hazards.
Those stages were perfectly fine. I don't want to go on a huge rant here, but I want a valid explanation as to why Pokemon Stadium is literally the only counter pick stage now because I'll be up front and honest about how I feel, this is pretty huge load of bull****.
And now for some of my favorite posts in the thread(to save you time from having to scroll through the thread):
And here is something different to think about that has been bought up a few times in this thread.
Those stages were perfectly fine. I don't want to go on a huge rant here, but I want a valid explanation as to why Pokemon Stadium is literally the only counter pick stage now because I'll be up front and honest about how I feel, this is pretty huge load of bull****.
And now for some of my favorite posts in the thread(to save you time from having to scroll through the thread):
This is ridiculous, in that a number of banned stages are perfectly viable in "competitive viability." There is no internal logic as to why the randomness of Yoshi's Story is preferable to the randomness of Brinstar - if anything, the randomness of Brinstar is easier to predict and handle, and 8-10 stages beyond what are available now were never proven to be significantly worse than what's on the current list. It is 100% the preference of the people in charge, which is always a blend of top players and TOs. If you want to get intellectual about it, one should generally try to keep the things that make a game unique rather than eliminate what we think shouldn't be in there. Not that you can't take the latter tactic, but then you're taking control over the spirit of the game.
This is how you define a ruleset with internal logical consistency: http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=308701
It has goals, key value drivers, and it follows the rules it sets up for itself. Is it perfect? No, but it gives a foundation for game theory discussion where everyone knows what the foundation is. The current ruleset has no such basis - it's simply an amalgamation of "what people want" and "no jank." If it has been defined somewhere, then I would like to see it.
Again, there's nothing wrong with that, but let's not pretend like there's anything intellectually pure about it.
I always viewed the stage list as another level of depth in melee. Knowing how to use a stage vs your opponent always seemed similar to knowing character matchups.
I feel like people overstate how winnable or unwinnable a matchup is, in the same way they overstate how much stages affect matchups. Countless matches in tournament are won by a person playing the character with the believed disadvantage, due to him either being a better player or having greater knowledge of the matchup (stage). I think you can use the same logic that most people in this thread have used about stages to say that you should ban characters to make the game more balanced.
The fact is most stages never reached a point where someone was consistently beating a much better player with more knowledge of the stage just because they were playing a specific character. To me that would be a broken stage, but it was mostly speculation, theory, and players not valuing stage knowledge that led to stage bans. This has always made me a little sad.
Disagree. Actually, disagree with almost everything you've said in this thread. Why is public expression in a grassroots community based on a forum considered an ineffective tool? Why are we garnering support from a very minor fraction of the player base? To further skew their influence? The competitive scene does not cater to a handful of players.
Why are the stages banned? We had them legal for years and they posed no threat to our tournament operations. Lots of players still want them legal, the abuse of them was extremely limited to pocket cases to the point of being negligible, they had no negative ramifications on our tournament logistics and offered no variance in results. This suggests that they are banned for the only good reason left: simply because some players do not want them legal. This is fine if the majority of the community agrees on this point, but that decision was made without consulting the player base at large.
Why is counter picking needed? This is a loaded question. Of course it's not needed, but it still shapes the face of what competitive play looks like. I would like for my game to not look like street fighter. I believe that additional stages test skill with real returns and margins for one to gain an advantage on the opponent. On this point, I feel that "Battlefield Only" is a particularly terrible idea for only testing players' abilities to waveland at a specific platform height, play to a specific subset of rules for edge games, eliminate other strategies with depth like chaingrabs, and so on. The addition of a counter pick system is one of my sources of the intricate depth that draws players to this game over alternative games.
I can keep going if you want, but it wouldn't really matter. The point is that sound logical arguments exist to keep the prior system and that dropping it was a matter of preference, a preference that was never really checked with any feedback to/from the community. This is not a decision that was particularly necessary.
And here is something different to think about that has been bought up a few times in this thread.
Both sides appear to be in a deadlock so Idk if we will come to a solution about freeing some unbanned stages but I feel the thread brought up another point that we seem to be more in agreement on which is the role of the neutral stages in relation to removing bans. This quote got me to start thinking a little bit differently.
A valid point. I want to extend this point into the relevance of neutral stages and question if such a thing actually exists in Smash. Through this analysis, maybe it will help both sides have a common ground so we start to resolve the "stage argument" regarding bringing back more stages:DoH said:My beef with the counterpicks is that with stage bans, the list becomes incredibly limited.... If the starter stages are as neutral and as winnable as they are articulated, then you shouldn't be able to ban them.
It seems that while reading through this thread what defines the quality of a stage (neutral/counterpick/banned) has been mixed up and is not consistent which leads me to believe that there is no such thing as neutral stages. Atm competitive smash matches are based around this qualification of "neutral vs counterpick" stages since every set must begin with 1 of the chosen 5 "neutral" stages. This begs the question, "What factors determines what makes a stage neutral or counterpick?"
The obvious first answer is one where the stage itself is of neutrality where it doesn't directly influence the match by "fighting back" with the players so to speak aka the moving stages or hazards. If one were to go by this definition of a neutral stage then it is proven by comparing FD to Stadium but it is disproven by comparing FD to Yoshis. If direct stage influence puts FD and Stadium in 2 different categories, then why are FD and YI in the same category? This is one inconsistency and is a point against the idea of neutral stages existing.
The second possible answer would be that stage layout plays a big factor in determining a stages quality in relation to matchups and a character's innate ability to exploit it. Example would be that Stadium is a CP because Fox dominates on that stage or that Hyrule/Great bay is banned because characters can exploit it by playing keep away. Once again, if you apply this to the "Neutral stages" you will see an inconsistency.
*If you compare FD to BF you will find that while both are labeled as "neutral" they are completely opposite of each other on the neutral spectrum depending on the match up. Case in point: IC does way better with platforms vs flat stage so in their eyes, FD and BF do not give them the same odds even though they are in the same category
*Compare Dreamland to Yoshis: Both Tri-plat stage however the size makes a huge difference on the MU. Case in point is Falcon who excels more in bigger stages or Peach whose longevity is reduced in YI vs DL.
So is there really such thing as a "Neutral" stage or is every stage actually better qualified as a CP? It would seem that the latter is the case.
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TL;DR: This analysis further validates DoH's idea that we should remove bans and maybe it will make us think differently about the current state of a smash set. Some further ideas to think about are:
-Should there be a list of Neutral Stages at all?
-Should we limit the first match of a set to a handful of 5 arbitrary, predetermined stages instead of limiting the stage choices on a MU by MU basis?
-What new stages can be added based on the perspective of all stages being CP to varying degrees?
-If both characters can equally exploit a stage that currently banned, should it still banned or should it be legal on a case by case basis?