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The "Coaching" Debate.

Pi

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The audience is kept out of sight and behind soundproof glass.

You and I share entirely different views on melee tournaments.

I see them as fast paced hyped up lots of **** happening both in the game and out of it, which is what they are currently

And you'd like for them to be in a soundproof room between player A and player B with no outside influences whatsoever.

You're going to have hype, trash talking, welcome and unwelcome advice coming from every direction. Learn to sift through that and make the decisions that you as a player think are the smartest. It doesn't matter if it's your boy who you've been playing with since '06, if he's telling you to stop rolling, or to punish this, you're not going to do it unless you think it's a smart decision. Whether you would have thought of that, or realized it, on your own, cannot be determined, ever. You can chalk wins up to coaching, but who's to say the outcome wouldn't have been the same if no advice had been given, in real time or between the match. It's still up to the player to decide what decisions to make.
 
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Nihonjin

Striving 4 Perfection
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And you'd like for them to be in a soundproof room between player A and player B with no outside influences whatsoever.
Horrible strawman. Nobody's asking for that.

You're going to have hype, trash talking, welcome and unwelcome advice coming from every direction.
Doesn't mean we have to accept that kind of behavior.


I don't know who's right, all I know is Amsah is right.

Learning to adapt, read your opponent, handle pressure, make less mistakes, and change play styles; those are all skills. Players should be punished for not having those skills.
Exactly.

Coaching is essentially relying on your friends to make up for your lack of skill and that shouldn't be accepted when you're competing in a singles tournament (especially when there is money involved).
 

Mahone

Smash Champion
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Even restricting it to this comes with far too many exceptions/controversies.

'Don't go down there jeff'
'Camp more'
'Stay grounded'
'Wait for the tech'
'Wait for the 2nd jump'
'Stop approaching with nair'
'Grab the ledge'
'Upthrow'
'Upthrow & wait for the 2nd jump'
'He's tech rolling away from you every time'
'He never spot dodges, grab more'
'Space aerials behind him and then shield and wait for his reaction'

At what point is it unacceptable.


Why don't we just hold our tournaments at hospitals and hold every match in the surgery observation room.
We can call our matches over the PA system and ride gurneys to and fro.
How was any of that controversial, all of those things are clearly coaching based on Amsah's well thought out definition.

Your argument is so bad, because you start off trying to use logic to explain why coaching should be allowed and then end like all of your posts with some ******** absurd to make us look like we don't like fun or something if we want a TOURNAMENT for MONEY to be as fair as possible.

The audience is kept out of sight and behind soundproof glass.

You and I share entirely different views on melee tournaments.

I see them as fast paced hyped up lots of **** happening both in the game and out of it, which is what they are currently

And you'd like for them to be in a soundproof room between player A and player B with no outside influences whatsoever.

You're going to have hype, trash talking, welcome and unwelcome advice coming from every direction. Learn to sift through that and make the decisions that you as a player think are the smartest. It doesn't matter if it's your boy who you've been playing with since '06, if he's telling you to stop rolling, or to punish this, you're not going to do it unless you think it's a smart decision. Whether you would have thought of that, or realized it, on your own, cannot be determined, ever. You can chalk wins up to coaching, but who's to say the outcome wouldn't have been the same if no advice had been given, in real time or between the match. It's still up to the player to decide what decisions to make.
Just because something is fun or hype, doesn't mean that it appropriate for the situation. While trashtalking can make the event a lot more fun for the people doing it, i have been on the other side of it countless times (because i play jiggs) and it has affected me and imo caused me it lose some games in the past.

I have learned to deal with it, but that doesn't mean i should have to, i think that trashtalking should also not be allowed, but back to the topic....

Coaching now might not be that bad, because people aren't abusing it fully, in the future however, if we make it legal, we could get some combinations like silent wolf mango, where you have extremely technical players who just have their coaches focus on tech patterns and recoveries etc. and tell the players exactly what to do.

I think that it is inevitable that our community will trash talk and hype **** up, because we need that kind of hype to motivate players to play. We aren't like SSF4 where the money is enough of a motivation to get good and stay good (i.e. mango), we need trash talk and hype and rivalries...

but i think that we need to realize that coaching is something very different from that
 

Pi

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An exaggeration, that 'you' have not been asking for, but I've seen it alluded too from others.

Tell ya what. All those opposed to 'coaching' can host their own tournaments where they dictate what is and what is not acceptable to say/show the players during a match. Police every match, hire people to police every match, whatever it takes. Let me know how that works out.

The honor system is moot here seeing as how there are players on both sides of the debate.

Or instead, y'all can get your own coaches, or just pay attention to what is being said to your opponent while you're playing as well, or just become better players and not need a coach and still win.

[Edit]
'we could get some combinations like silent wolf mango, where you have extremely technical players who just have their coaches focus on tech patterns and recoveries etc. and tell the players exactly what to do.'
I think you're severely overestimating the ability to hear, accept, and apply advice mid match. Which would be a skill in an of itself.

Aside from this, what is your stance on coaching between matches? What if coaching between matches leads to an overall victory for the set, is that ok?

If the problem the player is having is focusing on the match, his opponents habits, his habits, or how to counter those habits, what makes you think having to divide his focus between the match at hand and what his coach is saying is going to have such dire consequences for his opponent.

And if you want to theorize what coaching could potentially become, then why not speculate code speak between a player and his coach. Lets say in theory coaching did become banned, so a coach and his player come up with cues relevant to certain patterns him or his opponent are exhibiting.
'Watch the sky' meant to the player watch the 2nd jumps
'Right on' meant he's teching to the right
'Left open' tech to the left

etc. etc. etc. you can't police it, it's not gamebreaking, and it's not artificial skill. Coaching in essence is/should be used to better the player, not as a crutch.

At most I could see one player requesting the assistance/consent of a TO to have a neutral party police someone they felt was 'coaching' their opponent to victory.

But as it stands now I foresee no generic 'no coaching' rule being implemented.
 

X1-12

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@SWD:

How long must you stall for in order for it to be 'excessive stalling'? Its down to the TOs discretion, the same should be said for coaching. We don't have people to 'police' every match but how often do you see tourney results largely skewed by stalling?

Also for reference I believe coaching was banned at SNY last year and will be again at SNY2 this august
 

Mahone

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An exaggeration, that 'you' have not been asking for, but I've seen it alluded too from others.

Tell ya what. All those opposed to 'coaching' can host their own tournaments where they dictate what is and what is not acceptable to say/show the players during a match. Police every match, hire people to police every match, whatever it takes. Let me know how that works out.

The honor system is moot here seeing as how there are players on both sides of the debate.

Or instead, y'all can get your own coaches, or just pay attention to what is being said to your opponent while you're playing as well, or just become better players and not need a coach and still win.
What, come on man, im getting tired of this bull**** counterarguement ... GET URSELF A COACH THEN, thats not the point of the discussion, it's whether coaching is fair, if something is unfair, the answer isn't always to let both people do. Also, good coaches would whisper the stuff into the players ear so that you wouldn't here it, and saying "just become a better player" is probably the most overused ******** argument on smashboards...

Yes, if u have an unfair advantage, if i become significantly better i will beat you even with you having that advantage.... what's your point? Does that somehow make it fair?
 

Nihonjin

Striving 4 Perfection
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Tell ya what. All those opposed to 'coaching' can host their own tournaments where they dictate what is and what is not acceptable to say/show the players during a match. Police every match, hire people to police every match, whatever it takes. Let me know how that works out.
Based on this I can only conclude you're also in favor of people yelling derogatory slurs based on sexual orientation and/or ethnicity. Correct? Technically speaking it's a form of trash talking.
 

Pi

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Based on this I can only conclude you're also in favor of people yelling derogatory slurs based on sexual orientation and/or ethnicity. Correct? Technically speaking it's a form of trash talking.
'In favor of'? -.-

I see and feel coaching in a tournament match is the best way to become a better player since it's in a tourney match that you're most obvious weaknesses become apparent.

I do not use a coach myself, I have never asked anyone to coach me outside of a few friendlies, nor have I excessively coached one of my friends to victory.

My main argument is that it cannot, and should not, be restricted on a tourney wide scale. The con's associated with coaching are majorly opinion based and you'd be hard pressed to prove that coaching during matches skews results enough (if any) to warrant a strict restriction on it.

@Mahone. Don't blow what I've said out of proportion, it's a legit stance to take, but not one I was falling back on. Everyone has coaches available to them, just like everyone has training partners available to them. Having mango as a training partner is going to do far more for you than having him as a coach for 1 match only. Accessibility of training partners and coaches are dependent on many variables, be it where you live, how you come across as a person, what character you use, etc. etc. etc.
It's just another variable of many to factor in to each and every match of melee. And one that can be overcome, just as all matchups, stages, players can be overcome, by becoming a better player.

Also don't forget that I'm not the only one making ridiculously absurd suggestions to exaggerate my opponents stance.
 

Iron Dragon

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The crowd being separated from the players like at EVO.....oh look the SF community gets it right once again....and 6 years ago too. Friggin lol.
 

Pi

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I'd also like to state that there are no official EVO rules that say anything regarding coaching, and that I sincerely doubt that every match is held separate from the crowd. And the fact that this could hinder coaching is probably nothing more than a coincidence.
 

Mahone

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@Mahone. Don't blow what I've said out of proportion, it's a legit stance to take, but not one I was falling back on. Everyone has coaches available to them, just like everyone has training partners available to them. Having mango as a training partner is going to do far more for you than having him as a coach for 1 match only. Accessibility of training partners and coaches are dependent on many variables, be it where you live, how you come across as a person, what character you use, etc. etc. etc.
It's just another variable of many to factor in to each and every match of melee. And one that can be overcome, just as all matchups, stages, players can be overcome, by becoming a better player.

Also don't forget that I'm not the only one making ridiculously absurd suggestions to exaggerate my opponents stance.
I understand what you are saying, but i guess the difference is, i would prefer not to have any more variables in tournament play. Yes, it's true that if you lived next to mango and got to play him everyday, that also gives you an advantage against other people, it seems unfair to people who have no one to play against, and they will almost definately be worse because of their arbitrary location...

The difference i see however, is that you cannot control this, you can't tell mango he can't practice with his neighbor, or force him to play with that random guy who lives next to no one.

Coaching on the other hand is a variable we can control and imo should control.

Also, im not attacking you or anything, and i understand that there are many other people who share your opinion, i just think it would be better to not have comments about glass rooms etc. that are clearly not what we are saying because this just leads to derailing of the topic.
 

Nihonjin

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'In favor of'? -.-

My main argument is that it cannot, and should not, be restricted on a tourney wide scale.
Yes, you're in favor of derogatory slurs based on sexual orientation and/or ethnicity.
After all, we cannot dictate what is and what is not acceptable to say during a match.

The con's associated with coaching are majorly opinion based and you'd be hard pressed to prove that coaching during matches skews results enough (if any) to warrant a strict restriction on it.
Are you seriously questioning whether or not outside help can affect the course of a game..? :facepalm:

Me (previous coaching thread) said:
I'll pull out the same example I used a while ago. Have you seen my Pound 4 match against Jman?

Here

From the moment I started ledge camping, Jman was absolutely clueless on how to approach me or get me to leave the edge. He was dancing around shooting lasers until the moment he decided to just go for it and then I killed him immediately.

Here comes the fun part, Zgetto knows exactly how to handle a Sheik ledge camping, Adam and I have both done this to him so many times, he found ways around it. It's not something technically advanced, it's just positioning himself at a certain part on stage and I won't be able to camp anymore without the risk of losing my stock.

If Zgetto decided, hey you know what, I don't like Amsah, I want Jman to win, he could have calmly explained to Jman where to stand and what to do (it's not hard at all, but come up with this strategy takes a little creativity). If Jman then simply followed Zgetto's instructions, I would not have been able to continue my strategy and possibly would have lost.

In my opinion, if Jman won the match after that, I didn't lose to him, but to Zgetto, because without Zgetto he wouldn't have been able to keep me from camping and as we've seen in our actual match, he eventually died trying.

Now, my question to you is, how would you justify something like that?
So how would you?
 

Zodiac

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I dont know why people are talking about banning trash talking and or coaching. And for some reason they think they are similar. They aernt similar in any way, trash talking should always be fine, its part of the smash community and is usually done in good fun. Coaching on the other hand gives one player an unfair advantage they wouldnt have had in the first place if they do it during the match. If you give advice inbetween the matches its fine, but once that match starts no more coaching.. Yelling, screaming, hype, trash talk...go for it. do it all you want but no coaching during the matches.
 

-ACE-

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Amsah knows the deal.

**** coaching. This is a competitive game with money on the line. As mentioned previously, I also believe it's like an exam. Practice is up; it's time to see what you can do and you alone.
 

Stev

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Having a coach help inbetween matches is fine. While they're pointing things out, YOU still have to adapt to it. Your opponent should have to adapt back to you. This is no different than any playoff series in any other sport.
 

Pengie

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The difference between having Mango as your training partner and having Mango as your coach is that when he's your training partner it's up to you to actually apply what you have learned from him and know what to do in any given situation, whereas when he is your coach it takes the stress away from you. Think of it like this: having a great teacher clearly makes it easier to take a test however if you were allowed to ask that teacher questions about the test, then the whole point of the test would be invalid.
 

Pi

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@Mahone
A soundproof glass room would dictate a completely neutral environment, as far as outside influences go, but this is unreasonable to say the least. I just wanted to point out that I feel you're all misguided in thinking that the community as a whole is going to come together in favor of instating a rule to restrict coaching.

@Asmah, ty for the link I always enjoy seeing that.

As far as coaching having an immediate & noticeable effect on the course of a match, I'm saying it's been heavily exaggerated, and hard to prove.

Your example is very simplistic but potent, rare as it may be.
I still argue that as simple as you make it out to be, If zgetto, or m2k, or mango, or anyone had walked up to Jman and started telling him all you have to do is stand about this far away from the ledge, or right on the edge, or wavedash to the edge, and lightshield or shield, or bair, or ledgecancel this or whatever the strategy is, Jman having to apply something new to him could result in a worse situation than the one that played out (obviously not by much as it ended quite hilariously in a death.)
But counter-strategies like that one, as simple as they may be, if you're not use to them can turn out ineffective, or detrimental.

Though, I don't believe I can justify it entirely.
How can you 'justify' anything that effects the outcome of a match? Whether it's coaching advice, trash talking, damaged controller, noise or visual distractions, random stage selection, rulesets, barrels, Randall, wind. etc.

At least coaching has a beneficial aspect to it, Jman, in this instance, would be learning something he did not know before, becoming a better more adaptable player. It's not artificial, it's real and he's going to store that knowledge. And in order for Jman to receive coaching about that strategy.

And I still maintain that the lines between what is and what is not coaching are too thin to effectively police.

Is it or is not fair in a tournament setting? On one side of the coin you have MMA, on the other you have tennis. It comes down to how you view the smash tourney environment.
I see & enjoy a loud noisy MMA environment
If you see tennis, then that simply means we have different optometrists.
 

Mahone

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Is it or is not fair in a tournament setting? On one side of the coin you have MMA, on the other you have tennis. It comes down to how you view the smash tourney environment.
I see & enjoy a loud noisy MMA environment
If you see tennis, then that simply means we have different optometrists.
I will agree with you that the community will probably not be behind banning coaching, but i'd rather try to convince them than accept that things will never change.

Jman could have had that amazing learning experience after the match (and he probably did), so he would never make that mistake again, but it's not necessary that he learns it as it's happening. You learn from your loses, and i bet you will learn it a lot better if you lost because of it vs. you not thinking about it and then just doing what someone else tells you and winning.

Also, ya, basically that is what this argument is, do you see smash as MMA or as tennis, but this is a little to simple of an analogy, not sure what a better one would be.
 

Nihonjin

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@Asmah, ty for the link I always enjoy seeing that.

Your example is very simplistic but potent, rare as it may be.
I still argue that as simple as you make it out to be, If zgetto, or m2k, or mango, or anyone had walked up to Jman and started telling him all you have to do is stand about this far away from the ledge, or right on the edge, or wavedash to the edge, and lightshield or shield, or bair, or ledgecancel this or whatever the strategy is, Jman having to apply something new to him could result in a worse situation than the one that played out (obviously not by much as it ended quite hilariously in a death.)
But counter-strategies like that one, as simple as they may be, if you're not use to them can turn out ineffective, or detrimental.
"Jman might have screwed up anyway"

That's your big counter argument? Concession accepted.


How can you 'justify' anything that effects the outcome of a match? Whether it's coaching advice, trash talking, damaged controller, noise or visual distractions, random stage selection, rulesets, barrels, Randall, wind. etc.
Purposely interfering with matches
Coaching
Unplugging controllers
Blocking the view of (a) player(s)
Excessive trash talking in order to distract
etc
BANNED

Third party distractions
Trash talking
Crowds cheering
Visual distractions
etc
Regulated

Not random (or predictable enough)
Stage selection (Stage striking)
Randall
Wind
etc
Allowed

Uncontrollable
Damaged controllers
Earthquakes
What does this have to do with anything?

It's beneficial to Jman
And detrimental to his opponent. Which makes it unfair.

And I still maintain that the lines between what is and what is not coaching are too thin to effectively police.
I gave you a pretty clear line. If it's not advice or instruction, it's not coaching.

Is it or is not fair in a tournament setting? On one side of the coin you have MMA, on the other you have tennis. It comes down to how you view the smash tourney environment.
I see & enjoy a loud noisy MMA environment
If you see tennis, then that simply means we have different optometrists.
Awkward coin you have there.

One side of the coin you have outside influences creating an unfair advantage for one of the players.

On the other side you have two players fighting to the best of their abilities without help.

That's the issue. It doesn't have anything to do with Tennis or MMA.

Besides, unless you can provide the exact reasoning why MMA allows coaching during fights don't even bother bringing it up.
 

SSBMLahti

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Coaching is just as much as a distraction as it is a helper. No johns.

People should stop ****ing complaining.
 

CloneHat

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I always assumed it was common courtesy not to yell in someone's ear while playing a match, whether it be coaching or not, to either player. I guess some people are just too immature to keep silent in the presence of two people trying to play a video game.

Smash is a game based heavily around knowledge and experience. If you don't want the experienced player to have an advantage, just tell Sakurai and I'm sure he can find the right game for you.

Smash players surely deserve more respect than actors on MMA or WWE or any of these shows made purely for mindless crowd screaming.
 

Kason Birdman

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I would like to say yes I think it should be allowed. but the arguments I have heard are pretty nice. and I like the idea of only between matches and not during.. but honestly something like that is too hard to control.
 

KirbyKaze

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Make the players play on a stage or similar isolated (but not to the ludicrous extreme SWD brought up in his analogy or whatever) during bracket matches.

A stage (or similar) still enables hype will removing the presence of a personal coach. I do not find the comparison of 35 people screaming "DON'T GO DOWN THERE JEFF" and, say, Bam telling Pest (in French) exactly which way Unknown is going to tech very comparable at all. The crowd, being a crowd, is composed of a huge amount of people and therefore unless everyone is on the same "wavelength", it's very difficult to say important things in unison. Moreover, there is also the possibility of an opposing crowd that might be screaming things over the other mass of people. With so many unregulated shouting voices, conveying the details of a strategy becomes far more difficult than if you were capable of explaining it calmly to someone right next to you. It's also easier for the player to hurriedly say "I didn't catch that last bit" to the coach next to him, than it is for him to say that to a crowd of 100+ people.

If people feel that crowd-coaching is bad too then we can obviously delve into that, but honestly it feels like the crowd (generally speaking) is only capable of pointing out the most obvious things. Like, "DON'T GO DOWN THERE JEFF! YOU'LL PROBABLY LOSE!"

Pools to a small degree self-regulates the coaching thing, I find, in that there are a bunch of setups per pool in a single area so it's crowded with people playing their matches and the good coaches are also generally good players so they're busy doing their own pool.
 

Kason Birdman

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I think it would be kind of hard for a lot of tournaments to get EVERY bracket match set up on a stage and all of them completed on time though.
 

KirbyKaze

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iirc APEX did something like that. Well, I'm not sure of the stage bit. Bit I think Zhu said in interview all the matches happened one at a time when bracket rolled around.
 

Theftz22

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Excessive trash talking in order to distract
Not disagreeing with your argument, just wanted to point out that determining how much trash talking is excessive would be really hard to do.

In team sports, coaching is legit (coah is part of the team).
In 1 v 1, not really.

But enforcing it with large crowds will be extremely tough and too much enforcing rules on crowds will make you seem like a stiff. And I certainly wouldn't want to detract too much from crowd hype, it's one of the best parts of SSBM.
 

PB&J

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if i coached hbox and mango coached lets say dr. pp, who do you think will win..i still think hbox will win if hes a better player..hbox is just happy someone is rooting for him when the majority isnt..confidence booster

yeah dr.pp will have confidence but he always has people rooting for him..have you seen nc fans?
 

Pi

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"Jman might have screwed up anyway"

That's your big counter argument?
To the theoretical situation that didn't, and hasn't ever happened? Yes.


Purposely interfering with matches
Coaching
Unplugging controllers
Blocking the view of (a) player(s)
Excessive trash talking in order to distract
etc
BANNED

Third party distractions
Trash talking
Crowds cheering
Visual distractions
etc
Sketchy list.
Coaching in same category as unplugging a controller
Regulating what is an 'acceptable' level of trash talking
Visual distractions 'regulated'

At it's highest, I could see Coaching falling under Regulated. Which again, GL regulating that.


And detrimental to his opponent. Which makes it unfair.
In that theoretical scenario that has not been played out.

How bout I theorize a scenario whereby coaching advice, while sound, was misinterpreted/executed wrong costing a stock, but in the long run bettered the person as a player. Or how bout one where coaching didn't effect ****, and the match played out as it would have if nothing had been said.


I gave you a pretty clear line. If it's not advice or instruction, it's not coaching.
'calm down'
'he's got a stitch'
'he's got an extender'
'you got this'
'remember what i told you before'



One side of the coin you have outside influences creating an unfair advantage for one of the players.
Incorrect, as it's entirely possible for both players to have coaches. In which case it's entirely 'fair'.

That's the issue. It doesn't have anything to do with Tennis or MMA.
Are we not allowed to use analogies?

Besides, unless you can provide the exact reasoning why MMA allows coaching during fights don't even bother bringing it up.
I can't tell you the exact reasoning, because generally rule-sets only encompass what is not allowed during a match.

I can only speculate as to why it is allowed in some sports and not allowed in others. And I haven't exactly seen any rules quoted from other sports stricly prohibiting coaching. I've seen analogies to tests & chess, neither of which relate to smash as well as MMA does. And the only reason it was brought up was to counter the examples given to support banning coaching, which is more of a 'no talking at all' rules in both cases.

There are two sides of the coin, there are sports that disallow noise, and sports that say hey, make all the noise you want.

Just because on the screen, or in the ring, or on the court, it's 1v1, doesn't mean it should be isolated from outside influence in it's entirety. And to say otherwise is purely opinion.


@clonehat
I don't remember acting being brought up
And don't compare MMA to WWE
MMA is a legitimate test of mixed martial arts skill, stamina, smarts, brawn, training etc.
WWE is...well we all know what WWE is.
I respect any professional MMA, or any of the martial arts pro's, way more than any smash palyer. They are playing a deeper, more complex melee, in real life.
 
D

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I don't see much of an issue with the morality of coaching. It is unfair.

Instead, I see it laying in how to enforce anti coaching in a tourney, what constitutes coaching in tournies, and what grounds for which to enforce coaching in tournies.


Cheering/booing gives a marked statistical advantage in competitions. Cheering is unfair.

You could tell a crowd to stop cheering for their football team in a game based on that cheering helps a team's morale and gameplay. Its a well known fact that in professional sports, teams win more games at home than on the road.


Despite coaching, cheering, hype, or any advantage/disadvantage the crowd may give to the player(s), the better player should still prevail. If they did not win, they may not be better than the other player in that specific set or overall as a smasher.

The loss of the player in one instanced example doesn't matter as much as the overall consistency of the player.
 

themiii

Smash Rookie
Joined
Nov 28, 2007
Messages
20
if i coached hbox and mango coached lets say dr. pp, who do you think will win..i still think hbox will win if hes a better player..hbox is just happy someone is rooting for him when the majority isnt..confidence booster

yeah dr.pp will have confidence but he always has people rooting for him..have you seen nc fans?
I have to agree with the validity of the hbox situation.
I'm not quite sure on how effective a coach would be.
For instance, what advice would a coach give to the player?
I've seen the issue of the coach saying where the opponent would tech. How effective is this?
Even decent players should be sufficient on reading techs and switching up techs. Similarly, even decent players, let alone professionals, should be able to have the same intuition as any coach could.(knowing to wait for a double jump, shield pressure)
If I see a person struggle against shield pressure and don't try to use it to my advantage, then I wouldn't get out of pools. If I had a coach then I may get out of a pools but I'll be seeing losers brackets quite quickly because I wouldn't meet the threshold of skill against the other players.

I just believe that the player skill difference is much more important than anything that a coach can compensate. Especially in high level play, where the coaches would just be other high level players. This even creates a fallacy in itself, who the heck will coach Mango LOL.

Another note, coaching is not unfair.
everyone has access to a coach. saying it is unfair that someone has a better coach than you is like saying it is unfair cause someone beat you because they are better at melee than you.

And just because someone doesn't like analogies, if I vs kobe bryant 1v1 and I had a professional NBA coach coaching me, i'll still get 4stocked in basketball, nah meen?
 

Nø Ca$h

Smash Champion
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2,726
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Philadelphia PA
in my opinion, coaching should only be allowed if both players have a coach, but it should be banned in team matches.
 

Mahone

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Blacksburg, VA
And just because someone doesn't like analogies, if I vs kobe bryant 1v1 and I had a professional NBA coach coaching me, i'll still get 4stocked in basketball, nah meen?
I am getting sick of seeing this argument.

Just because coaching isn't such a huge advantage that it allows you to beat players far greater than you in skill does not prove its fair.
 

Ayatsuri_Rinku

Smash Cadet
Joined
Aug 18, 2010
Messages
36
i wouldn't say its unfair or an advantage or anything, considering the fact the reason you might be coaching someone is because they're losing in the first place. idk thats my thought on it.
 

forward

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Nov 18, 2004
Messages
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Posted from the other thread

Oops, didn't realize this one existed. Here is the post I made so let's continue the discussion here.

I would like coaching to be allowed in tournaments. From a spectators P.O.V. it would make the matches more entertaining because we'd see players adapting to strategies quicker and mixing up their play at what could be the highest level possible. I think that by banning coaching we are limiting the potential of this game.

Having a better coach may be an advantage but I don't think that any sort of testing has been done to say who the best coaches are or what makes the best coaches the best. Cactuar is not the best singles player but he is good and his coaching was good enough to help M2K win. I don't think anyone can say for certain that between two players who play 1v1 and one of them wins consistently over the other that that person would be a better coach than the other.

Coaching, as far as I know, has never been given a fair chance in tournament. It's unwise to ban something that has never been tested or used in a legitimate fashion. All items and counter-pick stages that are banned were tested under tournament play and it was afterwards that it was decided unsuitable for tournaments. There is no reason that coaching should not be given the same chance.

It would also be fun to explore the skill and depth required to be a good coach. It is a fair assumption to say that some coaches would be better than others and to become a better coach one must invest time and effort into improving in that area. The essence of competition is to push humans to their maximum potential, by banning coaching our potential is limited and is thus counter-productive to the spirit of competition.

Now I'm going to address an issue that has been brought up here and that is the difference between coaching and trash talking. The difference is that in society racial, sexists, and any sort of discriminating remarks are not accepted at all under any professional circumstances. School, work, volunteering and public service, anything that people have control over and can enforce rules they can and will enforce the rules that no such remarks be made. It is under this basis that all derogatory trash talking should be banned.

Nihonjin's point that in tournaments or money matches it should be between only two players competing against each other is an opinion and should be regarded only as such. If another person holds the view that the a singles match should be played between two players and their respective coaches it is equally acceptable to believe this.

To decide which one should be the tournament standard, objective and concrete evidence is needed. Accounts of coaching in tournaments have never been recorded in an orderly fashion and then analyzed to provide this evidence. It is on these grounds that coaching can not be banned.

Coaching is unique in that it is a natural evolution of the competitive community of smash. One might argue that if coaching can not be banned because it has not been tested that playing literal two on ones within the game in tournaments should not be banned because it has not been tested. It would be a valid argument except for the fact that there are no records of this ever happening in a tournament while coaching has come up time and time again.

My final opinion is that coaching should be allowed as a tournament standard, however, I am aware that I cannot objectively prove its merits and I thus point out that those who oppose coaching cannot objectively prove its demerits either. Under these circumstances the best route is to test out coaching in a tournament setting and decide from there the fate of coaching in tournaments.
 
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