Evo Brawl Rules Discussion

[Corner-Trap]

I'll go over this one more time. Even with items on, skill will still be a more dominate factor than luck. Random scrubs aren't going to make their way to the finals against more skilled opponents. But once it comes down to the final eight, luck is going to be a much more dominate factor. All the players are already evenly skilled, so there will be a lot more reliance on lucky item spawns to determine victors. So to everyone saying that players won't luck their way to the finals, you're right, but once it comes down to the finals luck will be a much more prominent force.

[Ryzol]

FFA is a terrible gamemode because it turns a combat game into a political game. In a FFA of 4 non-moronic players of unequal skill, the player who pisses everyone off the least will win. If a player is vastly superior to everyone else it is to his advantage to sandbag and play poorly until it becomes a 1v1, otherwise he will get gangbanged. Assuming they aren't retards you just don't win 1v3.

Friendly fire off might be viable for brawl. In melee it was off because double falco shl spam was very disgusting. Almost perma-lockdown. The other reason, which still applies to brawl is that it makes 2v1 too one sided, comebacks really aren't possible with friendly fire off.

[subt-L]

So to everyone saying that players won't luck their way to the finals, you're right, but once it comes down to the finals luck will be a much more prominent force.somethings gotta give.

it wouldn't be much fun if everyone who was evenly matched shook hands and called it a day. jokes.

luck is such an overused word in this thread. luck happens, but it happens alot more frequently if you are controlling the match anyways.

[Pimp Willy]

the fact is the match came down to a 2v1 that would've easily been the end of ike until an item pops up conveniently at ike's feet which results in a very quick and easy ko of diesuperfly (who was easily the best player in that match)

Just wanted to point out the sun spawned at Snakes feet, who decided it was more in his interest to dash back and use a guided missile, and who payed the price. And the term "better player" is subjective, since he obviously doesn't have much skill with items on matches.

Would Ike have won if it hadn't spawned? Most likely not. Did Ike win because it spawned? No. He won because Snake made 2 bad moves (ignoring the spawn, and dashing in to take the hit), and Pit decided blindly spamming arrows instead of dodging the sun was a better move. Therefore, it took both SKILL on ikes part, and bad choices on Snake and Pits part. That's not so bad, and actually brings MORE skill into the match IMO.

[Master Rift]

try having a bat thrown at you when your not looking, or let a random bomb-omb spawn right in the middle of 2 fighters (IT HAS HAPPEN AND BOTH EQUAL KO) I wont say its a luck thing but i will say that fight will almost be standing at the right place at the right time. I mean it does take timing to catch a thrown item at you but its easier on brawl than it was on melee. In an tourney like this people have something to prove, So it should be no items 1v1v1v1 on Final destination or battle field 5 stock 4min time (the Final 4) 5 stock no time/ no iitems

-IF items r allowed, plus make it so that items appear on low or medium.
Smash ball
The Fan
Beam sword
Star Wand
Superscope
Raygun
*Peach can pick out a beam sword/mr saturn even it the items are off. its happen to me b4.

[Reno K]

You want to make Brawl into Street Fighter, and I understand that because obviously Street Fighter is totally awesome. I love 1v1 strategy on a 2-dimensional playing field, I think it's super interesting, so believe me, I get why you'd want to play that kind of game. But I play that game all the time, I've been playing it since the early 90s and playing it competitively for most of a decade, and while I love it, I could also use something new. Brawl presents that chance.

Brawl offers the opportunity to play a very different type of game with new and unique strategy. Adding in items and most stages creates a lot of interesting strategy surrounding the control of neutral third objects, the control of unusual terrain, the requirement that you control as much of the stage as possible instead of just the space and options your opponent has access to, and so on. This is stuff that we can only get in Brawl, and I think it's a real shame that you want to get rid of it. Remember, Brawl is inherently random; even if you ban all items and random stages, lots of moves still have random results. There's also no need to maximize that randomness by keeping in Warioware and stuff, but in my opinion this inherent randomness militates toward treating this game in a fundamentally different way from how we treat Street Fighter by allowing randomness to the extent that it makes the strategy interesting and unique.

I don't know how well Melee did Street Fighter-style strategy because I never played it competitively, and while it may have done it just as well, it certainly did it no better. If that's the kind of strategy you want, just controlling your opponent's space and options, great, you have a dozen great games to choose from that are all about that, and I suggest you pick some of them up. But the strategy in Brawl with items/stages is fundamentally different; don't take that away just because you want to play Street Fighter.

You can break down a lot of games to just controlling an opponent's options and space (Catan, CS, hockey...). I don't think that's a fair assessment of what makes Brawl without items an attractive mode to play.

The reason I liked Melee, and the reason I like Brawl, was the system. There are enough differences in the game (the DI system, the extremely simple moveset that gets out of your way, the percentage system vs health bars, etc) that make it more fun than SF.

I also don't believe that the strategy with items in Brawl are fundamentally different. I think the differences are more about the specifics of what new items exist and maybe a change in behavior in some (has anybody tried the super-scope infinite?), but to say the fundamental strategy (control spawn point(s), bait opponent, abuse items that are better for your character and toss ones you can't abuse, etc) that existed in melee for items has completely changed in brawl seems naive.

The biggest changes are the Smashballs and the Dragoon (I consider assist trophies in the same category as pokeballs). They do bring a different strategy to using them, but as a special case; they do not change the fundamentals of the rest of the items.

[lamewadd]

that make it more fun than SF.


Oh, here it comes...

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

You can break down a lot of games to just controlling an opponent's options and space (Catan, CS, hockey...). I don't think that's a fair assessment of what makes Brawl without items an attractive mode to play.

The reason I liked Melee, and the reason I like Brawl, was the system. There are enough differences in the game (the DI system, the extremely simple moveset that gets out of your way, the percentage system vs health bars, etc) that make it more fun than SF.

I also don't believe that the strategy with items in Brawl are fundamentally different. I think the differences are more about the specifics of what new items exist and maybe a change in behavior in some (has anybody tried the super-scope infinite?), but to say the fundamental strategy (control spawn point(s), bait opponent, abuse items that are better for your character and toss ones you can't abuse, etc) that existed in melee for items has completely changed in brawl seems naive.

The biggest changes are the Smashballs and the Dragoon (I consider assist trophies in the same category as pokeballs). They do bring a different strategy to using them, but as a special case; they do not change the fundamentals of the rest of the items.

The problem is that you're under the impression that items were removed from Melee for the same reasons you're saying they should be removed from Brawl, which wasn't the case. In fact, the same argument we're holding right now was held then, and holds as true today as it did then. The ONLY reason items haters ever won was due to one item that could not be turned off without turning them all off. An exploding capsule could, and would rather often for something that is supposed to be random, spawn in the path of an attack. The problem was that this explosion could kill at relatively low percentages (80% was pretty much a death sentence).

From what I've seen in Brawl, these same explosions don't kill NEARLY as low of a percentage (really bad positioning and you might die on the smaller stages at 110%) and don't happen even a fraction of the times it happened in Melee (It'd happen about once every other match in Melee. I think I've seen it all of 4 times since launch). At this stage, not only does the exploding container have the ability to be turned off in this game, it doesn't seem to be nearly as detrimental of a factor as it was in Melee. That argument no longer holds water.

[COUM]

Basically anything that is random and can effect the game without necessarily having much to do with a players skill that CAN be removed SHOULD be removed.

you do not own the idea of what a competitive game 'should' be. furthermore, many competitive games, such as poker, fundamentally incorporate randomness into their design. are the results of those games less consistent than games without random factors? yes, but most would agree they're far more interesting games for including the randomness, and that justifies its inclusion. the people who want items in brawl are essentially accepting a degree of randomness in exchange for a game which they find more interesting than the one with randomness eliminated. that isn't anti-competitive, it's just a matter of preference.

[WraithGadra]

you do not own the idea of what a competitive game 'should' be. furthermore, many competitive games, such as poker, fundamentally incorporate randomness into their design. are the results of those games less consistent than games without random factors? yes, but most would agree they're far more interesting games for including the randomness, and that justifies its inclusion. the people who want items in brawl are essentially accepting a degree of randomness in exchange for a game which they find more interesting than the one with randomness eliminated. that isn't anti-competitive, it's just a matter of preference.

This right here is pretty good. To those of you who are anti-item because of randomness, are you willing to ban DeDeDe, Game and Watch, Luigi, and Peach?

If not, then both sides of the argument hold the same position, the only differing point is degree.

[lamewadd]

This right here is pretty good. To those of you who are anti-item because of randomness, are you willing to ban DeDeDe, Game and Watch, Luigi, and Peach?

If not, then both sides of the argument hold the same position, the only differing point is degree.

See, I already tried this, and while it's completely sound logic, they'll come up with an ill-thought-out retort like "but banning a character is more sever than baning items lol?" Which is silly. Since either way, the game would be, by their standards, totally non-competitive, either way.

[Shotokan Symphony]

I'll go over this one more time. Even with items on, skill will still be a more dominate factor than luck. Random scrubs aren't going to make their way to the finals against more skilled opponents. But once it comes down to the final eight, luck is going to be a much more dominate factor. All the players are already evenly skilled, so there will be a lot more reliance on lucky item spawns to determine victors. So to everyone saying that players won't luck their way to the finals, you're right, but once it comes down to the finals luck will be a much more prominent force.

This. I'm more surprised no one else among the ITEMS ON team had this realization.

[subt-L]

its funny when people look back at melee and see how skewed people's opinions are of random.

peach has a super ko turnip. it doesn't occur that much, and it even has a specific face for it. but it comes up, and people can get hit by it.

maybe peach is turned around so you can't see the face of the turnip. maybe you get hit by it after she throws it straight up into the air. there are ways to get hit by it.

and when it does, it's "random."

but really, its more of your point of view whether or not its "random" that you got knocked out by the ko turnip.

you know that there if there is a turnip in play, it has a possibility of being the ko one. while the other turnips almost serve as a distraction or annoyance, alot of people are willing to not enact a response that it is ALWAYS the ko one. most of the others people can take hits from, lose a low percentage and not worry about. yet everyone is suprised by the ko turnip almost everytime.

it can be argued across the board with all the random characters. everyone knows that luigi can headbutt you randomly from across the stage. everyone knows that g&w can own the shit out of you at super low percentages. yet it still always seems to catch everyone by suprise.

if you always expect the worst, anything less is what you should be suprised about. if i always expect a hammer to spawn just as i'm falling back to the stage, i'm alot better prepared for anything else that could pop up. not for everything, mind you, (that's why i like items... you can never be fully prepared, and the person with the weapon must be fully prepared as well to make the best of that weapon) but being aware and prepared for the worst case scenario is something that should be on everyone mind while playing any fighting game... "random" is, more times than not, saying that "i wasn't prepared enough" or "i wasn't aware enough."

[M3D]

See, I already tried this, and while it's completely sound logic, they'll come up with an ill-thought-out retort like "but banning a character is more sever than baning items lol?" Which is silly. Since either way, the game would be, by their standards, totally non-competitive, either way.

Strawman argument. No one reasonable has said that Brawl would be totally non-competitive with items. What we've said is that items off is the best tournament environment possible and that's how we think the game should be played. You exaggerations demonstrate how little you really understand this entire discussion and smash in general.

The difference between turning items off and banning characters is just that. Items are an option in the game that we prefer to compete with turned off for all the reasons we've listed. They are detrimental to determining which player deserves to advance based on their knowledge, skill and execution. Not using items at a tournament is merely turning off an option we feel is negative to the gameplay.

Removing characters from the tournament game would be actively banning something, which is something we attempt to do as little as possible. If the random elements of those characters were an option we could turn off, we could gladly do so. However, we're not willing to remove characters from the game for those random elements. Ultimately, we believe the game would be better if those things didn't happen but they are an annoyance we're willing to play with.

The difference between items and random character elements is like the difference between flipping a switch or tearing a light right out of the ceiling. They both accomplish similar tasks (removing randomness/reducing the light in a room) but one is a simple, painless change and the other is destructive and messy.

[WraithGadra]

Strawman argument. No one reasonable has said that Brawl would be totally non-competitive with items. What we've said is that items off is the best tournament environment possible and that's how we think the game should be played. You exaggerations demonstrate how little you really understand this entire discussion and smash in general.

The difference between turning items off and banning characters is just that. Items are an option in the game that we prefer to compete with turned off for all the reasons we've listed. They are detrimental to determining which player deserves to advance based on their knowledge, skill and execution. Not using items at a tournament is merely turning off an option we feel is negative to the gameplay.

Removing characters from the tournament game would be actively banning something, which is something we attempt to do as little as possible. If the random elements of those characters were an option we could turn off, we could gladly do so. However, we're not willing to remove characters from the game for those random elements. Ultimately, we believe the game would be better if those things didn't happen but they are an annoyance we're willing to play with.

The difference between items and random character elements is like the difference between flipping a switch or tearing a light right out of the ceiling. They both accomplish similar tasks (removing randomness/reducing the light in a room) but one is a simple, painless change and the other is destructive and messy.

That doesn't change the fact that the only difference between the two is degree. Either way, you are not allowing the use of elements within the game at whatever tournament these rules are enforced. As others have said, it's a matter of preference. Attempting to say otherwise is simply wrong.

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

That's all fine and dandy that you don't like them. That's sweet.

But opinions mean precisely dick here. You may prefer to play it one way, but its merely preference. This is being set up only removing what is a PROBLEM, not what is an "inconvenience". If you want items gone, you will have to prove that, without a shadow of a doubt, they all cause the game to be problematic. "Because I don't like them" isn't proof. If you don't like them, that's fine. Just don't try to dictate the law of the game under your beliefs. Provide evidence to back them.

[Keits]

Removing characters from the tournament game would be actively banning something, which is something we attempt to do as little as possible.

L

O

L


:rofl:

I know I banned myself from replying here but this was just WAY too funny.

[Shotokan Symphony]

That doesn't change the fact that the only difference between the two is degree. Either way, you are not allowing the use of elements within the game at whatever tournament these rules are enforced. As others have said, it's a matter of preference. Attempting to say otherwise is simply wrong.

It is NOT a matter of preference when one is genuinely player controlled, and the other is randomly generated and not controlled by the player.

If you genuinely believe that, your level of play will not go above "drunken frat house Smashing". This is fact, and if you try to tell a tournament level player otherwise, he and everyone around you have the right to laugh at you 'til they're blue in the faces.

[M3D]

Cyntalan, have you read any of the last 60 pages?

We've provided plenty of evidence that items are problematic. Smashers believe that tournaments are meant to measure the knowledge, skill and execution of the players involved. Items randomly distribute advantages unevenly, thus changing the outcomes of matches. The closer the two players are in skill, the more the results are changed by the presence of items. That violates the core principle of a tournament in the first place. That's been explained time and time again in this thread and elsewhere. I swear being on these forums is like talking to people who have their hands over their ears screaming at the top of their lungs.

It's more than a matter of preference. It's the BEST tournament environment possible. That's what Smashers are shooting for. We don't just want a tournament that "works," we want a tournament that fairly measures the abilities of the players. Items fail in that regard, so we turn them off.

[WraithGadra]

It is NOT a matter of preference when one is genuinely player controlled, and the other is randomly generated and not controlled by the player.

If you genuinely believe that, your level of play will not go above "drunken frat house Smashing". This is fact, and if you try to tell a tournament level player otherwise, he and everyone around you have the right to laugh at you 'til they're blue in the faces.

Player controlled or otherwise, it's still randomness, which is what many anti-item proponents rail so heavily against. The question is still one of degree, and if you are unable to agree with that, then you are blinded, plain and simple.

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

Cyntalan, have you read any of the last 60 pages?

We've provided plenty of evidence that items are problematic. Smashers believe that tournaments are meant to measure the knowledge, skill and execution of the players involved. Items randomly distribute advantages unevenly, thus changing the outcomes of matches. The closer the two players are in skill, the more the results are changed by the presence of items. That violates the core principle of a tournament in the first place. That's been explained time and time again in this thread and elsewhere. I swear being on these forums is like talking to people who have their hands over their ears screaming at the top of their lungs.

It's more than a matter of preference. It's the BEST tournament environment possible. That's what Smashers are shooting for. We don't just want a tournament that "works," we want a tournament that fairly measures the abilities of the players. Items fail in that regard, so we turn them off.

First of all, all I've seen here are "proof" over a specific item, not all items.

Second, the instances I've seen here have been, almost without exception, been pointed out how it could have been avoided.

Third, your OPINION is the best tournament environment is itemless. Our OPINION is contrary. Neither mean DICK. There's no proof showing that items truly ruin the game, just like there never was in Melee 'til enough people bitched about capsules.

Who knows? Maybe in the years down the road, it may show that items are still too much of a problem for Brawl and they'll be removed. We're in a new game, though, and the same exercises for determining what stays and what goes will happen, regardless of opinion based on a previous game in its series.

[Reno K]

From what I've seen in Brawl, these same explosions don't kill NEARLY as low of a percentage (really bad positioning and you might die on the smaller stages at 110%) and don't happen even a fraction of the times it happened in Melee (It'd happen about once every other match in Melee. I think I've seen it all of 4 times since launch). At this stage, not only does the exploding container have the ability to be turned off in this game, it doesn't seem to be nearly as detrimental of a factor as it was in Melee. That argument no longer holds water.

All exploding containers could be turned off in Melee as well.

The reason item haters won wasn't just because of exploding crates - it was because the perceived randomness was seen as detrimental to competitive play, there were a couple big name matches that many deemed to have poor endings due to items in the early days, and the tourney organizers eventually agreed that the removal was best for the competitive community and created the rulesets we use today.

Another reason was because, well, eventually the SWF people found the no-items metagame to be more fun. That's obviously not a good argument for why items should be banned from other tourneys, but it's a reason the ban came up for the SWF community.

[Keits]

Smashers believe that tournaments are meant to measure the knowledge, skill and execution of the players involved.

Aww fuck it.

But not the knowledge, skill, and execution of item use and defense.

Most people believe that tournaments are meant to measure who the best player at a certain game or challenge is on that day. By turning the vast majority of the game off (which IS a ban, like it or not, as they are ON when the game powers up), you are no longer testing who is the best Smash player that day. You are only seeing who is the best Smasher with items-off-stages-off.

So, why don't you prove it? Show up to some all-brawl tournaments and get destroyed by lucky scrubs. I'm certain that if you are as skilled as you say you are, you'll be winning the tournament with items on anyway, only eating a few 'random' deaths to 'wtf' moments that you would be PAINFULLY aware of had you been practicing the game as a whole. If there is money involved, i don't believe you'd throw a game just to prove a point based on silly preference, would you? :rolleyes:

Tournaments should NEVER be about what we prefer. They should be about testing the skill, knowledge, and execution of the players at the game with its features left intact until you can prove, without a shadow of a doubt, that something breaks the game.

And I mean BREAKS. Not something thats just unfair or gives an advantage.

All that said, I understand that people want to play a game they enjoy, so please continue to play your items-off version of brawl and please enjoy yourself. Please have major tournaments for it, as i know many are interested in this version. But PLEASE stop trying to turn the very few tournaments we have a shot at getting all-brawl in into your preference. Have some god damn respect for people who want to play the other way.

You dont see me on smashboards demanding that your items off events now become all-brawl. And you also dont see me threatening that I wont enter if its items-off. AND you certainly dont see me making shit up all the time like your side of the argument has. You have your reasons, our side has our reasons. Back up off our preference.

[Sample]

stop raping the word metagame !

[Shotokan Symphony]

Player controlled or otherwise, it's still randomness, which is what many anti-item proponents rail so heavily against. The question is still one of degree, and if you are unable to agree with that, then you are blinded, plain and simple.

What is random about using an obviously GOOD CHARACTER, who is in control of what he does? Even if the items he throws out are random, it's inherent to his character. Plus, he has a set type of items, with their own chances of happening. There's absolute randomness, and then there's controlled randomness. D3 having items is obviously the later.

[Sample]

There's absolute randomness, and then there's controlled randomness.


no there isn't, if it's controlled; it's not random.

[Keits]

stop raping the word metagame !

A-men to this.

What is random about using an obviously GOOD CHARACTER, who is in control of what he does? Even if the items he throws out are random, it's inherent to his character. Plus, he has a set type of items, with their own chances of happening. There's absolute randomness, and then there's controlled randomness. D3 having items is obviously the later.

You are very confused if you think items-on stages-on is absolute randomness. The winner is not decided randomly in brawl. Plain and simple. You are VERY aware that items will be spawning or the stage will be changing/moving, and you can take measures to capitalize on these things. This is not absolute randomness by any definition.

[COUM]

Cyntalan, have you read any of the last 60 pages?

We've provided plenty of evidence that items are problematic. Smashers believe that tournaments are meant to measure the knowledge, skill and execution of the players involved. Items randomly distribute advantages unevenly, thus changing the outcomes of matches. The closer the two players are in skill, the more the results are changed by the presence of items. That violates the core principle of a tournament in the first place. That's been explained time and time again in this thread and elsewhere. I swear being on these forums is like talking to people who have their hands over their ears screaming at the top of their lungs.

It's more than a matter of preference. It's the BEST tournament environment possible. That's what Smashers are shooting for. We don't just want a tournament that "works," we want a tournament that fairly measures the abilities of the players. Items fail in that regard, so we turn them off.

Care to address this post?:

you do not own the idea of what a competitive game 'should' be. furthermore, many competitive games, such as poker, fundamentally incorporate randomness into their design. are the results of those games less consistent than games without random factors? yes, but most would agree they're far more interesting games for including the randomness, and that justifies its inclusion. the people who want items in brawl are essentially accepting a degree of randomness in exchange for a game which they find more interesting than the one with randomness eliminated. that isn't anti-competitive, it's just a matter of preference.

[UltraDavid]

Smashers believe that tournaments are meant to measure the knowledge, skill and execution of the players involved.
So we at SRK, the best and most well-known fighting games site on the net, with player histories going back since, in many cases, before Smashers were born, don't know what tournaments are meant to measure. I've been playing fighting games competitively since before there was a Smash scene, you think I don't know what a tournament is? This is ridiculous, I feel like I've just kicked back an entire shot of liquid nonsense.

Items randomly distribute advantages unevenly, thus changing the outcomes of matches. The closer the two players are in skill, the more the results are changed by the presence of items. That violates the core principle of a tournament in the first place. That's been explained time and time again in this thread and elsewhere.This is just not right. Over the course of a tournament match, it's extremely, extremely unlikely that items will distribute advantages unevenly, except in cases where one player is controlling his stage, items, and opponent and the other is not, that is, except where one player is displaying better knowledge, skill, and execution. Having the results of a tournament match between players with similar skills will get overly skewed by items is also very, very unlikely; either each player will be controlling a sizable portion of the stage for a large portion of the time or neither player will get control of much of the stage at all, and as a result both will have access to a very large percentage of the available items. Who gets to the items will be determined strategically and very rarely randomly.

You can break down a lot of games to just controlling an opponent's options and space (Catan, CS, hockey...).
You're right. The vast, vast majority of strategic games are ultimately about controlling your opponent's space and options. Football, chess, Starcraft, team first person shooters, Street Fighter, Puzzle Fighter, etc etc. All of these games have radically different rules and tactics but very similar ultimate strategy. This is why Brawl with items/stages on is so interesting, because it's so different.

I also don't believe that the strategy with items in Brawl are fundamentally different. I think the differences are more about the specifics of what new items exist and maybe a change in behavior in some (has anybody tried the super-scope infinite?), but to say the fundamental strategy (control spawn point(s), bait opponent, abuse items that are better for your character and toss ones you can't abuse, etc) that existed in melee for items has completely changed in brawl seems naive.
I'm not saying that items/stages makes Brawl fundamentally different from Melee, the difference there is only in degree. I'm saying that Brawl with items/stages is fundamentally different from the vast majority of competitive strategy games because it forces you to incorporate the control of neutral third objects, of as much of the stage as possible (instead of just the portion of the stage around your opponent), and of advantageous stage positions, and it makes you consider new options like whether you should go for an item or for a kill, whether you should use a final smash now or after your opponent loses a stock, whether you should keep a very strong item as a threat or use it immediately, etc. We can't get this strategy anywhere else, and you guys want to ban it. That is crazy to me.


If you guys are looking for a game that doesn't have randomness, sorry, you're looking in the wrong place. Just, you've picked the wrong game to play. There are lots of very good fighting games that incorporate absolutely no randomness; go play them if you're looking for that kind of game. But for some reason you've chosen to be anti-randomness about a game that inherently has randomness, and I wish you'd stop trying to punish those of us who recognize that for your mistake.

[AzN_Skater]

The more I listen to anti items, the more I've come to realize that these players do not want to measure the skill of the players, but the tiering of the characters. Using and avoiding items is a skill in itself which is an inherent part of the design on Smash. By utilizing your knowledge of item use and defense, you ARE showing that you are more skilled than your opponent. And if you win by taking the items presented, than all the more power to you.

[Shotokan Symphony]

no there isn't, if it's controlled; it's not random.

Does d3 only have a set amount of items? Yes. Is there a set percentage of how often the items? Yes. Are the items all coming from him? YES. When he summons an item, does it appear randomly on a ledge, underneath him, or behind him? No.

Saying all randomness is one and the same discredits characters like Faust and Zappa in Guilty Gear.

[Shotokan Symphony]

The more I listen to anti items, the more I've come to realize that these players do not want to measure the skill of the players, but the tiering of the characters. Using and avoiding items is a skill in itself which is an inherent part of the design on Smash. By utilizing your knowledge of item use and defense, you ARE showing that you are more skilled than your opponent. And if you win by taking the items presented, than all the more power to you.

Dude, within five minutes of play, anyone will realize that going for the fan is a better idea than the last dragoon piece. That's not skill. That's common sense. And if it appears randomly behind your opponent, do you think it's a matter of skill that he gets it before you do?

[Shotokan Symphony]

Care to address this post?:

Randomness fuels the power of bluffing in poker. Bluffing in poker is an integral part of the game, but the weakness of your point is demonstrated in that there is nothing in Smash that parallels bluffing.

[UltraDavid]

That's not his point, as I'm sure you well know. His point was that pokers has a lot of randomness but is still an extremely popular tournament game, not even in spite of that randomness but because of it. Poker and Brawl both have a lot of randomness, but in both cases that randomness can be controlled. In poker it's controlled with good strategy, the ability to read people, and the ability to bluff, and in Brawl it's controlled by only allowing certain items, controlling as much of the stage as possible, and beating your opponent to good items when randomness comes. But again, how the games control for randomness isn't the point, it's that randomness does not make a game less competitive or less tournament-worthy and in some cases can make it even more interesting to play.

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

Randomness fuels the power of bluffing in poker. Bluffing in poker is an integral part of the game, but the weakness of your point is demonstrated in that there is nothing in Smash that parallels bluffing.

There's plenty. The second an item spawns, you have the choice of picking it up, or choosing not to to bait your opponent to go for it. You can pick up an item, and either use it, or toss it if they prepare for you to use it (eg picking up a ray gun and either shooting it at your opponent Fox or wait for the reflector to pop up and attack them by some other means). There's plenty of actions that can be performed both upon item spawn and after item collection that parallel bluffing.

[Shotokan Symphony]

That's not his point, as I'm sure you well know. His point was that pokers has a lot of randomness but is still an extremely popular tournament game, not even in spite of that randomness but because of it. Poker and Brawl both have a lot of randomness, but in both cases that randomness can be controlled. In poker it's controlled with good strategy, the ability to read people, and the ability to bluff, and in Brawl it's controlled by only allowing certain items, controlling as much of the stage as possible, and beating your opponent to good items when randomness comes. But again, how the games control for randomness isn't the point, it's that randomness does not make a game less competitive or less tournament-worthy and in some cases can make it even more interesting to play.

Except you're arguing that items are integral for tournament play, while I'm arguing they're not, because neither of you are controlling space if you don't have any idea where an item will come from. And only allowing specific items saps any fun factor the game would have had with items on in the first place.

[Sample]

Randomness fuels the power of bluffing in poker. Bluffing in poker is an integral part of the game, but the weakness of your point is demonstrated in that there is nothing in Smash that parallels bluffing.

Right, cuz I can't bluff that I'm going for an arial attack when in fact, all I want my opponent to do is block, so I can be in a better situation to grab him.

[Shotokan Symphony]

There's plenty. The second an item spawns, you have the choice of picking it up, or choosing not to to bait your opponent to go for it.
Ok, seriously. Think that situation out. How are you going to bait them? They know the item is closest to you, so they're going to go on the defensive. You standing there like an idiot waiting for a bait that will never come is just asking to be smashed, lasered, or outpoked.
You can pick up an item, and either use it, or toss it if they prepare for you to use it (eg picking up a ray gun and either shooting it at your opponent Fox or wait for the reflector to pop up and attack them by some other means).
Considering that the reflector counts as a physical attack and generally counters other physical attacks for free, "attacking by other means" is thrown out the window. And really, risking using a laser on Fox? He's safe as hell against lasers, even without shine, because, you know, he has lasers of his own that are faster.

[Shotokan Symphony]

Right, cuz I can't bluff that I'm going for an arial attack when in fact, all I want my opponent to do is block, so I can be in a better situation to grab him.

I'm talking about with items, smart guy. You know, the thing that you're arguing in favor of? Outside of items, there's always going to be some level of bluffing.

You're just arguing semantics to just be a twat.

[M3D]

You dont see me on smashboards demanding that your items off events now become all-brawl. And you also dont see me threatening that I wont enter if its items-off. AND you certainly dont see me making shit up all the time like your side of the argument has. You have your reasons, our side has our reasons. Back up off our preference.

The problem is that none of the scrubs here demanding that items are turned on are ever going to have to worry about it. You'll all be out before the tournament ever gets close to serious. It's the top players that will be hurt by your "yay! smash bros is fun!" ruleset when money is on the line and you guys have all left to play Marvel or 3S.

Also, to the nerd posting about how he's competed in tournaments for SO long, you really don't want to compare ePeens. You would lose in epic fashion.

[UltraDavid]

neither of you are controlling space if you don't have any idea where an item will come from. And only allowing specific items saps any fun factor the game would have had with items on in the first place.
The fact that you don't know where items will come from means that you need to control the entire stage, or at least as much as possibly can. To me this is one of the most interesting things about the strategy that items force you to play. And I don't know what you're talking about with the second part of that, allowing only some items, the ones that are conducive to strategic play, makes the game a lot more fun for me than playing with all (and no) items.

Also, to the nerd posting about how he's competed in tournaments for SO long, you really don't want to compare ePeens. You would lose in epic fashion.
The history of my scene is much greater and longer than the history of your scene. Don't tell us how to run tournaments.

[AzN_Skater]

I just don't get why Smashboards players won't just accept the game at face value instead of trying to turn it into a 'SF Clone' (for lack of a better term). The arguments just go around and around, I think the Evo organizers have enough theory to help them make their decision, it's just up to hard tournament data now. I was once anti item, but when you approach it from a different perspective, that just doesn't make sense.

[Shotokan Symphony]

The fact that you don't know where items will come from means that you need to control the entire stage, or at least as much as possibly can. To me this is one of the most interesting things about the strategy that items force you to play.
So it's interesting to see someone's strategy of doing the impossible thing and try to cover an entire stage get STUFFED when the space behind his opponent gets littered with items? That's interesting, alright, but it's not strategy, OR skill. It's a car wreck waiting to happen.
And I don't know what you're talking about with the second part of that, allowing only some items, the ones that are conducive to strategic play, makes the game a lot more fun for me than playing with all (and no) items.
I bring this up because the only things I see allowed at this point is lasers, spike ball, and the smoke bomb, items that have no real use except for some characters.

[Shotokan Symphony]

I just don't get why Smashboards players won't just accept the game at face value instead of trying to turn it into a 'SF Clone' (for lack of a better term). The arguments just go around and around, I think the Evo organizers have enough theory to help them make their decision, it's just up to hard tournament data now. I was once anti item, but when you approach it from a different perspective, that just doesn't make sense.

How is itemless smash ANYTHING like SF?

[Keits]

The problem is that none of the scrubs here demanding that items are turned on are ever going to have to worry about it. You'll all be out before the tournament ever gets close to serious. It's the top players that will be hurt by your "yay! smash bros is fun!" ruleset when money is on the line and you guys have all left to play Marvel or 3S.

Also, to the nerd posting about how he's competed in tournaments for SO long, you really don't want to compare ePeens. You would lose in epic fashion.


Oh fuck. I didnt realize that no one but you old melee players can be good at smash.

thats the most shortsighted egotistical retarded bullshit i've ever read. enjoy underestimating everyone.

[lamewadd]

You all know how I feel...but really, don't be comparing poker to Smash. They're just too different.

[The Pestazoid]

I wish you'd stop trying to punish those of us who recognize that for your mistake.

QUOTE BY ULTRA DAVID


I don't think you don't have any experience running/going to tourneys but have you played melee at tourney level? It sounds like you might not have with this comment about us making a mistake. Have you played against any decent player in your area probably not. If you did you would see why items and certain stages are taken off or put into random setting. The game has the option of having items off and certain stages off. If you were to put time and stock and all levels one this is what you would have. Exp my friend was playing a on-line tourney that SRK hosted with all items on all levels on. The meta-knight player decided to go to the new IC's level. He ended up killing my friend once then camped under the level knowing he would not get eaten by the fish but if he went down(he was playing Ike) he would have been eaten so he couldn't do anything about it. If you call running away something acceptable when there $5,000 on the line then I say you have a couple of screws loose in the head. We have more experience playing this series tourney style. If the tourney rules for SF4 were decided by smashers who probably never played the game at ALL I think the SF scene would be pretty ticked off about that. That's how me and a bunch of other people from smashboards feel and saying that we are making a mistake about the game is pretty rash and uncalled for.

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

Ok, seriously. Think that situation out. How are you going to bait them? They know the item is closest to you, so they're going to go on the defensive. You standing there like an idiot waiting for a bait that will never come is just asking to be smashed, lasered, or outpoked.

Explain to me that, upon having a situational advantage, why one needs to go offensive. The way I see it, by having control over the area around the item, you're at an advantage, but you haven't gained possession yet. Pick up the item, the opponent knows what's coming (or should, see point b below), and now has the choice of waiting for the inevitable, or attempt to take advantage of the situation and either force his opponent to take the item then punish for the time invested in doing so, or see if his opponent will now keep him from getting said item (the bait). All in the matter of a second or two, the bluffing here goes both ways, and yomi comes into play.

Considering that the reflector counts as a physical attack and generally counters other physical attacks for free, "attacking by other means" is thrown out the window. And really, risking using a laser on Fox? He's safe as hell against lasers, even without shine, because, you know, he has lasers of his own that are faster.

...my head hurts. Do you not understand the concept of an example? I provided that one as one of a thousand 'cause I thought it was one that even a 5 year old would comprehend. My mistake.

Fox's lasers vs. raygun... hmm.. he starts lasering, I chuck raygun at him. Because of the recovery on his gun, he'll not have the time to either reflect OR catch. Easy hit.

He thinks to reflect? either up/down arials/smashes/tilts in his face, or z-dump the item and grab him while he's under recovery from the reflector.

Again, just one of MANY examples. Making your opponent get twitchy over the block/dodge is a method of bluffing with your item in hand overall. There's a lot of power in not even using an item, or even picking it up. The fact that you can't see that is fairly sad.

[Keits]

You think runaway is not a viable way to win? Ouch, discredited 100%.

People are only allowed to win your way, huh?

[M3D]

The history of my scene is much greater and longer than the history of your scene. Don't tell us how to run tournaments.

You assume that A) Smash is all that people from our scene have ever played competitively and B) Being around for a long time makes your scene "greater" somehow.

And trust me, you could learn a thing or two from our scene and the players involved. Take me for instance:

I've been competing in video game competitions, including Street Fighter, since the early nineties. I've also played racers, shooters and strategy games at a high level stretching across multiple platforms and generations. I was one of the year-one staff members at Major League Gaming and helped set international standards for professional gaming competitions. I have personally directed more than 30 professional gaming tournaments across the country, including four national championships, three all-star games and the biggest Smash event in the history of the game, and ran or assisted with about a dozen grassroots events as well. I've played with, trained under and coached professional gamers across six titles. I've worked as a game writer and done freelance game design consulting, including work on how to balance multiplayer modes for games for the Xbox 360. I continue to work in the game industry and I am still heavily involved in the growing competitive Smash scene.

So don't tell me how to run tournaments.

Also, your "greater" scene that spans multiple series has about 40,000 fewer members than Smashboards and pulls in significantly less traffic and smaller turnouts on the local level. That's exactly why Brawl is replacing games you all want to play at Evo. Just because you've been playing Street Fighter for 20 years doesn't make you right about a game series we specialize in.

And that's all I have to say. Mr. Wizard is reading up on Smash in our Back Room anyways. You guys have fun playing with items.

[AzN_Skater]

My story for item-space control happens to be with the Dragoon (which is still a hotly debated item for exclusion).

My opponent and I are both over 100%. I have 2 pieces of Dragoon and the third one spawns on my half of Final Destination. Instead of picking it up and using it, I sit between the last piece and my opponent. Now he has a dilemma. Does he attack me head on to try to grab the last piece? Does he try to Smash me and swing the Dragoon to his advantage by grabbing the piece I drop AND the piece that's sitting on the ground? Does he attack me with range in order to draw me away from the item?

And I'm also left with decisions: do I grab that last piece and attempt a kill? Do I hold on and attempt to Smash him out so I can save my Dragoon for his next stock? Can I use that last piece as bait?

So many decisions and possible outcomes from just this scenario that test both players abilities to make good decisions. I don't know how this is a BAD thing to have included in the game.

[alphazealot]

If you guys are looking for a game that doesn't have randomness, sorry, you're looking in the wrong place. Just, you've picked the wrong game to play. There are lots of very good fighting games that incorporate absolutely no randomness; go play them if you're looking for that kind of game. But for some reason you've chosen to be anti-randomness about a game that inherently has randomness, and I wish you'd stop trying to punish those of us who recognize that for your mistake.

Wait, what? You realize Melee, without items, was one of the most successful fighting games. You can choose to play with them, or without them, it is not inherent either way but a determination based on analyzing the two ways of playing, as other have put, its actually preference.

I think even most of the pro-items people have noted that some matches are indeed won and lost because of random spawns. The contention (for pro items) is that this is just a blip and these occasional negative aspects are not enough to remove whatever added depth items may add.

I think it boils down to two thoughts:
-Items and the perception of the level of negativeness in relation to random spawns
-Items and the perception of the level of positiveness in relation to added depth

Strong belief in one will override moderate or light belief in the other.

There's plenty. The second an item spawns, you have the choice of picking it up, or choosing not to to bait your opponent to go for it. You can pick up an item, and either use it, or toss it if they prepare for you to use it (eg picking up a ray gun and either shooting it at your opponent Fox or wait for the reflector to pop up and attack them by some other means). There's plenty of actions that can be performed both upon item spawn and after item collection that parallel bluffing.

No there isn't. At no time in Smash can you bluff with material you don't have. Everything is apparent to both players on the screen at all times. You can trick people, maybe even make them believe you will do something that you actually have no intention of doing, and you can manipulate the on screen material to your advantage in different ways, but this is entirely different from pretending you have material that you actually don't have. Stop using the poker argument, especially since everyone has already admitted poker results often have anomalies and this is precisely the argument the anti-item crowd is using. If Smash with items is poker, you validate the arguments of random spawns influencing and skewing results. Unlike poker, we can remove most random aspects in Smash.

I'm not saying that items/stages makes Brawl fundamentally different from Melee, the difference there is only in degree. I'm saying that Brawl with items/stages is fundamentally different from the vast majority of competitive strategy games because it forces you to incorporate the control of neutral third objects, of as much of the stage as possible (instead of just the portion of the stage around your opponent), and of advantageous stage positions, and it makes you consider new options like whether you should go for an item or for a kill, whether you should use a final smash now or after your opponent loses a stock, whether you should keep a very strong item as a threat or use it immediately, etc. We can't get this strategy anywhere else, and you guys want to ban it. That is crazy to me.

Halo is a great game to explain some of the holes in this argument. In professional Halo, many games are actually won and lost due to the slight randomness of just the initial spawns (actually, later spawns can also cause problems, but this isn't the key point). These initial spawns occur at random but have a huge impact on the match, why? Because of the existence of neutral third objects, similar to items in Smash. The weapon spawns in Halo are like the item spawns in Smash. At the start of a match, because of random spawn points, your team may unjustly benefit and grab power weapons before the opponent, and with good teams, this usually amounts to an insurmountable lead (this frequently happens on battle creek). This aside, do pro items players believe a rocket launcher spawning next to me in Halo is exactly fair? I can avoid the rockets, I can do what I can to kill the opponent before I get killed or to just run away, but like items in Brawl, the use of the rocket launcher is obvious, easy, and has immediate effects. Items do not add some extreme new level of depth. You grab an item if its near you, sometimes you may have to subdo the opponent to do this, other times it will just spawn right on top of you. Grabbing an item quickly is almost always a better choice than not (sure, you shouldn't abandon edge guarding just to grab an item that you could you can grab after you kill the opponent, but this is common sense) as possessing an item immediately puts you at an advantage over the opponent. Saying that you can dodge/catch/what have you is an exaggeration of how often that actually happens (again, reference any of my youtube matches and see how often people actually catch my bananas). A player controlling an item holds the ability to control the opponents response, not the other way around. When you throw an item at a person, it creates an automatic opening if the opponent tries to face it down (catching, dodging), really, the best and only option is to run, but aside from throwing the item, most items also have secondary applications that prevent this(the actual use of each item) and these applications also put the itemless opponent at a disadvantage (see how long you can run away from my super scope, or how long you can prevent me from fan-infiniteing you, you can only delay so long). The point is simple, holding an item offers a moderate to heavy advantage over the opponent. Sometimes, you possess the item as a result of winning a battle or ticking the opponent. Other times, you possess an item because of luck. As a result, sometimes you hold an advantage for no other reason than luck. To some people, this seems acceptable, but tell that to a person like Matt Deezie, who lost out on money for no other reason than "luck" at TG5. Melee, without items, was immensely deep and the skill gaps between players was huge, arguing that removing items will dumb down game play is baseless, all previous titles have already shown itemless play to be successful and deep. Prove that item play offers something that improves on the level of depth, show me a video where items really do require extra skill beyond their obvious applications. For a community so bent on proving things, there has still been almost no real evidence brought to light in this thread that says: Hey, look at this match, clearly the added depth of items was a positive element not already present in itemless matches.

biggest Smash event in the history of the game

Eepppp. M3D, your behind the times a little, but your points are still valid. EVO World: 270 people. FCD: 256.

[lamewadd]

Prove that item play offers something that improves on the level of depth, show me a video where items really do require extra skill beyond their obvious applications. For a community so bent on proving things, there has still been almost no real evidence brought to light in this thread that says: Hey, look at this match, clearly the added depth of items was a positive element not already present in itemless matches.

You're missing something here.

The game is meant to have items.

It is YOUR job to prove to US that items ARE broken. Not the other way around.

Eepppp. M3D, your behind the times a little, but your points are still valid. No...no they aren't.

[UltraDavid]

I say "camping" (as Smashboards say) is just fine, of course. The thing is, though, that that's something items can address. Sitting in one area waiting for your opponent to come is less effective if very good items can spawn everywhere and probably won't spawn in the relatively small area controlled by your opponent.

I didn't play Melee competitively and neither did a lot of the guys here, but we are playing a lot of Brawl, and we're talking about a ruleset for a tournament that won't take place for a third of the year, and we're talking about a game that deals with items in a significantly different way from how Melee did. I think experience in Melee is very important for knowing how to exploit a lot of Brawl's systems and characters, but for items, I don't think it's all that persuasive.

M3D you're very, very unusual in the Smashboards community, and I'm sure you don't need me to tell you that. Most of your scene has experience with only one game and hasn't been playing in tournaments longer than half a dozen years, and the large majority of your scene is as scrubby as can be (if we're to believe the reason some members have put forth for why the Backroom exists). They haven't been around for the evolution of more than just one game, if they were even around for the evolution of Brawl, so it's hard for them to think about making serious changes in between games and thinking about how to adapt.

[alphazealot]

so your argument is based on diddy without items on. great. what was your point again? maybe you're saying we should ban diddy? maybe pan peach now? or are we simply talking about bananas that diddy pulls out of his ass any time he wants...

My argument was that there are tons of proof that a person with an item will succeed over the itemless player, not the other way around. The point is to disprove the people who claim the advantage is not that great when holding an item.

The game is meant to have items.

It is YOUR job to prove to US that items ARE broken. Not the other way around.

Any claim needs proof. Item switch was also meant to be in the game. How can you apply your argument to one but not the other.

M3D you're very, very unusual in the Smashboards community, and I'm sure you don't need me to tell you that. Most of your scene has experience with only one game and hasn't been playing in tournaments longer than half a dozen years, and the large majority of your scene is as scrubby as can be (if we're to believe the reason some members have put forth for why the Backroom exists). They haven't been around for the evolution of more than just one game, if they were even around for the evolution of Brawl, so it's hard for them to think about making serious changes in between games and thinking about how to adapt.

Smashboards is essentially devided into 3 tiers. Tier 1 are the people who come just to post because "Brawls is teh roxers". These are the people you and SRK like to stereotype. Tier 2 would be the majority of tournament players, ball park 4000 or so people and likely to increase significantly as Brawl picks up steam. Tier 3 would be the people in the backroom/mods, and these people are more the leaders (running tournaments, publishing things, working on projects, etc.) of the community. When talking about Smashers, you should be talking about tier 2 and tier 3, not tier 1. Every community has scrubs, annoying members, leeches, what have you. I could just as easily find posters on SRK (among every other video game forum) who have the same ignorances that you single out for identifying all Smashers.

This right here is pretty good. To those of you who are anti-item because of randomness, are you willing to ban DeDeDe, Game and Watch, Luigi, and Peach?

If not, then both sides of the argument hold the same position, the only differing point is degree.

I've responded to this before. We have mountains of data from Melee that the random aspects of Peach rarely influenced results. Sometimes you do see a Peach win by pulling out an obscene number of death turnips, and every time this happens these matches are regarded as an anomaly. Yet, through the thousands of Melee tournaments that took place, very rarely did a Peach player defeat a more "skillful" opponent because of the random factor associated with turnips. In other words, we have proof that the item randomness for some characters was negligable. We have the opposite proof for actual items. Things with characters could be different in Brawl, but all indications so far point to the random variables associated with character as once again being negligible. So, I suppose you are right, they are different degrees of random, one is tolerable because we already know that it is once in a blue moon that someone will win a match undeserving with Peach. We also know that items influenced matches far more often (and are present in every single match). This was what happened in Melee, and ignoring this history and hiding behind the argument of "its a new game" is ignorant. I would also like to point out, as someone else did before me, that character related items are very different from item spawns.

[M3D]

Eepppp. M3D, your behind the times a little, but your points are still valid. EVO World: 270 people. FCD: 256.

No I'm not. I just hosted the 1400-entrant online event this past weekend for Smashboards/Wifiwars. Even after a significant amount of DQ's it was still the biggest single event in the history of the series. The 2:00 time limit, default settings GameStop/Nintendo nonsense doesn't count either because those are tournament series, not a singular event. As far as live events go, my biggest event was about 180ish I believe, so I have been beat out by Evo World and FCD.

UltraDavid, the problem is that you are not arguing with the majority of the smash community, even if there are a huge number of random newbies out there. Me, and the other guys like me that have run national events, work in the game industry, played professionally, etc... those are the guys that have come to these conclusions. We all admit that Brawl is different, but it is not so different from the games we've played in the past that we're not still the best people to test this stuff and draw conclusions. Smash might be a fighter, but its still such a fundamentally different game from what you guys have played competitively in the past that you are lightyears behind us in understanding. A fresh perspective is always good, but a new release doesn't put you on our level in Smash anymore than Street Fighter 4 will put me on the level of the top minds at SRK.

[Shotokan Symphony]

Explain to me that, upon having a situational advantage, why one needs to go offensive.
If you see an opening that allows you to control the match, why WOULDN'T you go on the offensive? Why would you even NEED to be defensive? I'm explaining that if you went defensive, you lost whatever advantage you thought you had in the first place.
The way I see it, by having control over the area around the item, you're at an advantage, but you haven't gained possession yet. Pick up the item, the opponent knows what's coming (or should, see point b below), and now has the choice of waiting for the inevitable, or attempt to take advantage of the situation and either force his opponent to take the item then punish for the time invested in doing so, or see if his opponent will now keep him from getting said item (the bait). All in the matter of a second or two, the bluffing here goes both ways, and yomi comes into play.Jesus Christ. Where to start.
I'm going to punish him for taking an item that I have no chance of reaching to begin with? How, prey tell, if he's on the other side of the stage, near the item? It's a free grab for him, and I'm maybe half a stage closer to him, getting into his danger zone, if it's a fan? If it's a laser, we either end up sitting, and I wait for his laser to stop killing my guard while I try to roll safely, but I'm on the defensive the entire time. No one is at an advantage when an item appears near your opponent.

...my head hurts. Do you not understand the concept of an example? I provided that one as one of a thousand 'cause I thought it was one that even a 5 year old would comprehend. My mistake. You mean the same 5 year olds whining that they can't use fans or ba-bombs because they're overpowered? Do tell.

Fox's lasers vs. raygun... hmm.. he starts lasering, I chuck raygun at him. Because of the recovery on his gun, he'll not have the time to either reflect OR catch. Easy hit. Wow, that beats SHDL! Oh wait, IT DOESN'T.

He thinks to reflect? either up/down arials/smashes/tilts in his face, or z-dump the item and grab him while he's under recovery from the reflector. Given that Fox is going to be SHDLing your ass the entire time before you get close to him, that would be funny.

Again, just one of MANY examples. Making your opponent get twitchy over the block/dodge is a method of bluffing with your item in hand overall. There's a lot of power in not even using an item, or even picking it up. The fact that you can't see that is fairly sad.I see that the whole game of pickup/not pickup is entirely artificial and forced, as opposed to actually playing the game WITH THE CHARACTERS. The fact that you can't see that taking the game away from the characters is a bad thing, is also very sad.

[JeRon]

Items are too random and Smash Ball with certain characters are rediculosly cheap and unavoidable!

Items are designed to give the lesser skilled player a chance to comeback. Not that thats bad in a casual setting but in tournament it will yield less consistent results.
Thats my two cents. Im not on here to flame and all that nonsense everyone is entitled to they're opinion so please leave it at that.
I'll play any rules but Items will force me to switch from my main/best charcters to others that are more reliable with Smash Balls!
Thats all!

[Pimp Willy]

But we will welcome your input and decisions going into SF4 openly, you can easily join in on the forums and post your input and suggestions and debate with people on whatever you want.

On the contrary, we are expected to listen to some secret "backroom" club on how best is to play a game with NO view of the arguments that led to that decision? The fact this very thread exists here is a testament to the differences of our communities, since every random smashboarder can hop in here and give their two cents. Does it work vice versa? Can I hop into the backroom and give my arguments and debates? No.

Melee players are going into Brawl with the mindset of keeping things the same they were in Melee, instead of evaluating the game on its own merits. I am willing to bet there is a VERY small amount of melee players who even bothered to play the game with items and learn the ins and outs of how they work, how to counter them, etc. This is evidenced by the "top" melee players who reacted absolutely stupidly to items in last weekends Family Fun tournament, which was discussed earlier. So in this case, whos opinions actually hold more water in the items discussion, those who have ignored them since the game came out, or those who have embraced and disected them?

I have seen very little evidence that random items can completely win a match, only that it can shift the momentum a bit, and I find that acceptable to create a game that tests more skills and provides more interesting situations. The better players will still win with items on.

[Shotokan Symphony]

My story for item-space control happens to be with the Dragoon (which is still a hotly debated item for exclusion).

My opponent and I are both over 100%. I have 2 pieces of Dragoon and the third one spawns on my half of Final Destination. Instead of picking it up and using it, I sit between the last piece and my opponent. Now he has a dilemma. Does he attack me head on to try to grab the last piece? Does he try to Smash me and swing the Dragoon to his advantage by grabbing the piece I drop AND the piece that's sitting on the ground? Does he attack me with range in order to draw me away from the item?

And I'm also left with decisions: do I grab that last piece and attempt a kill? Do I hold on and attempt to Smash him out so I can save my Dragoon for his next stock? Can I use that last piece as bait?

So many decisions and possible outcomes from just this scenario that test both players abilities to make good decisions. I don't know how this is a BAD thing to have included in the game.
That's not a multitude of possibilities, that's you having a clear advantage over your opponent. All you had left to do was read his movements and gauge his reactions, but YOU had control of the match, NOT him. Considering that the item appeared randomly, but behind you, though, was random. How is this a good thing?

[Shotokan Symphony]

I have seen very little evidence that random items can completely win a match, only that it can shift the momentum a bit, and I find that acceptable to create a game that tests more skills and provides more interesting situations. The better players will still win with items on.

This whole statement is a living contradiction.

[lamewadd]

MyAny claim needs proof. Item switch was also meant to be in the game. How can you apply your argument to one but not the other.


This is true. But we're claiming that something should be kept as-is. You're the one trying to change it.

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

If you see an opening that allows you to control the match, why WOULDN'T you go on the offensive? Why would you even NEED to be defensive? I'm explaining that if you went defensive, you lost whatever advantage you thought you had in the first place.

You realize there's more to offense than just blitzkrieging your opponent, right? Stage control (and thus, item control) is an offense. You've put them at a disadvantage that'll only be exploited by maintaining that control. Charging your opponent isn't good because now they can evade. Taking your attention away from your opponent to grab the item might not be good either.

Jesus Christ. Where to start.
I'm going to punish him for taking an item that I have no chance of reaching to begin with? How, prey tell, if he's on the other side of the stage, near the item? It's a free grab for him, and I'm maybe half a stage closer to him, getting into his danger zone, if it's a fan? If it's a laser, we either end up sitting, and I wait for his laser to stop killing my guard while I try to roll safely, but I'm on the defensive the entire time. No one is at an advantage when an item appears near your opponent.

Here's the thing. He hasn't picked the item yet. Is he moving towards it? Is he ignoring it and coming after you? Is he waiting for you to make a move? In any of these cases, you can spin it to your advantage provided you make the right choices. Either force him to fight you and go after the item when you have the chance or need, or force him to pick up the item, then go from there.

Wow, that beats SHDL! Oh wait, IT DOESN'T.

Given that Fox is going to be SHDLing your ass the entire time before you get close to him, that would be funny.

Explain to me how I'm going to be afraid of stunless laser spam when I have superior weaponry in hand? I take the damage, you take the knockback. Most likely I won that trade.

I see that the whole game of pickup/not pickup is entirely artificial and forced, as opposed to actually playing the game WITH THE CHARACTERS. The fact that you can't see that taking the game away from the characters is a bad thing, is also very sad.

Why exactly does a third aspect to the game take away something? Because you have to focus on more than just your opponent? Ho noes. A new skill to learn. The item spawns, a change in strategy forms. The item's collected, a change in strategy forms. I fail to see where this is bad. If anything, it's more intuitive to have to constantly adapt to your situation, regardless of whether its your opponent that put you in it or an aspect outside your fight.

[lamewadd]

stuff he shouldn't have bothered typing because shotokan symphony's an idiot.

You shouldn't have bothered. Shotokan's an idiot. Soon he'll start talking about his crazy super scope infinites and how the Halberd cannon blasts you without warning.

[AzN_Skater]

That's not a multitude of possibilities, that's you having a clear advantage over your opponent. All you had left to do was read his movements and gauge his reactions, but YOU had control of the match, NOT him. Considering that the item appeared randomly, but behind you, though, was random. How is this a good thing?

Well, considering I worked hard and outplayed my opponent to obtain 2 of the 3 pieces of Dragoon must mean SOMETHING. That last piece was the culmination of my hard work, although yes, it did randomly spawn behind me. If I were not the better player in that match, I would not have had the 2 pieces and it would be irrelevant that the last piece spawned behind me.

[Shotokan Symphony]

Well, considering I worked hard and outplayed my opponent to obtain 2 of the 3 pieces of Dragoon must mean SOMETHING. That last piece was the culmination of my hard work, although yes, it did randomly spawn behind me. If I were not the better player in that match, I would not have had the 2 pieces and it would be irrelevant that the last piece spawned behind me.

It's abitrary, because none of it would've mattered until the 3rd piece appeared. If it appeared behind him and if he was far enough from you to not have to sacrifice his positioning, he could have gotten the piece safely. And that even depends on what characters you were using.

[Shotokan Symphony]

You realize there's more to offense than just blitzkrieging your opponent, right? Stage control (and thus, item control) is an offense. You've put them at a disadvantage that'll only be exploited by maintaining that control. Charging your opponent isn't good because now they can evade. Taking your attention away from your opponent to grab the item might not be good either. Except, no matter which stage you're on, you can't control it in its entirety. That's a poor analogy to item control, because items appear whenever, and where ever. Law of averages will reveal that if you stay in one spot for the majority of time, items will appear in other spots.

Here's the thing. He hasn't picked the item yet. Is he moving towards it? Is he ignoring it and coming after you? Is he waiting for you to make a move? In any of these cases, you can spin it to your advantage provided you make the right choices. Either force him to fight you and go after the item when you have the chance or need, or force him to pick up the item, then go from there. But you're already at the advantage because the item is NEAR YOU. It's in your control, until another, possibly more powerful item comes into play.

Explain to me how I'm going to be afraid of stunless laser spam when I have superior weaponry in hand? I take the damage, you take the knockback. Most likely I won that trade. Not if you're the one with high percentages. Either way, any character that has a laser as default usually has an advantage.

Why exactly does a third aspect to the game take away something? Because you have to focus on more than just your opponent? Ho noes. A new skill to learn. The item spawns, a change in strategy forms. The item's collected, a change in strategy forms. I fail to see where this is bad. If anything, it's more intuitive to have to constantly adapt to your situation, regardless of whether its your opponent that put you in it or an aspect outside your fight.

See above. Random spawning isn't strategy, and is NOT an apt description of skill.

[COUM]

Stop using the poker argument, especially since everyone has already admitted poker results often have anomalies and this is precisely the argument the anti-item crowd is using. If Smash with items is poker, you validate the arguments of random spawns influencing and skewing results. Unlike poker, we can remove most random aspects in Smash.

wow could you miss the point any more? just as you wouldn't want to remove the randomness from poker, nor do the pro-item crowd want to remove the randomness from brawl, because it adds to the game in other ways.

[lamewadd]

Wasn't alphazealot the one who said that if Poker players could remove the randomness from poker, they would?

[Reno K]

I am willing to bet there is a VERY small amount of melee players who even bothered to play the game with items and learn the ins and outs of how they work, how to counter them, etc. This is evidenced by the "top" melee players who reacted absolutely stupidly to items in last weekends Family Fun tournament, which was discussed earlier. So in this case, whos opinions actually hold more water in the items discussion, those who have ignored them since the game came out, or those who have embraced and disected them?

A lot of melee players didn't start out as tourney players - a lot of us played a bunch with friends before finding out about tournaments or advanced techniques.

I myself played with items on, 10 stock FFAs for 2 years, and also for fun at smashfests for the rest of the time. Here are some things I've figured out:
- fan fsmash broke shields instantly, unless it was power-shielded; kills jiggly instantly without ceiling
- star rod spikes horizontally, and ridiculously, even if you z-drop it
- peach with bunny hood can fly back and forth across FD with nairs and dairs, blanketing about 1/2 to 2/3rds the stage with hitboxs in a second.
- peach can cancel screw attack with float, so insta-float near an opponent to setup for a juggle
- super scope infinite (not hard to pull off at all)
- super scope shot banks off of slanted floors and shields with proper shield tilting
- all spawn points for most stages (you can learn all of them via AR as well)
- Entei can spike people on Brinstar put in the right location
- Giant Captain Falcon with bunnyhood can run faster than Big Blue: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWWEy8DiKIo
(Giant Fox's bunnyhood fast-walk will actually keep up with the stage perfectly)
- Poison and Super Mushroom effects go away the fastest when you don't do anything. When you start doing something the timer is paused a bit It lasts about 15 seconds unchecked, but can last a minute if you can do a repetitive action like Samus grapple against a wall.

I'm sure a lot of the smashboards community has learned more than I have about items. We're not exactly ignorant about items, and the reason we came to SWF in the first place is to learn more about a game we were dissecting.

[Shotokan Symphony]

wow could you miss the point any more? just as you wouldn't want to remove the randomness from poker, nor do the pro-item crowd want to remove the randomness from brawl, because it adds to the game in other ways.

You can bluff with cards. You can't bluff with an item that may or may not appear.

[Pimp Willy]

Yes, but have you played items in BRAWL? Because the video you linked was from Melee. What I'm saying is, melee players haven't bothered to play with items in Brawl, because they are just carrying over a dated ruleset from a different game.

We are talking Brawl in this thread, not melee.

[Reno K]

Yes, but have you played items in BRAWL? Because the video you linked was from Melee. What I'm saying is, melee players haven't bothered to play with items in Brawl, because they are just carrying over a dated ruleset from a different game.

We are talking Brawl in this thread, not melee.

Yes I have. We all have when the game first came out. I was merely giving a note that SWF players do not shun to learn all aspects of the game on their own.

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

Except, no matter which stage you're on, you can't control it in its entirety. That's a poor analogy to item control, because items appear whenever, and where ever. Law of averages will reveal that if you stay in one spot for the majority of time, items will appear in other spots.

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4938144
http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4937218

But you're already at the advantage because the item is NEAR YOU. It's in your control, until another, possibly more powerful item comes into play.

The game, in its current state of how items are set, spawns an item every 10-14 seconds, and dissipates in about the same. That means, at most, a 15 second point where we have two players that could either a) be too paranoid about each other to do a damn thing, or b) take a chance and work the situation in their favor. And that's being pessimistic. I'd say that time frame takes 5-8 seconds before action is made, tops, in the most paranoid of players. More often than not the decisions will be made actively within seconds, and the game moves on from there. At the absolute worst case scenario, what we've ended up is returning to what the game is like without the item in play at all, for at most 15 seconds.

Not if you're the one with high percentages. Either way, any character that has a laser as default usually has an advantage.

Considering that the reflector counts as a physical attack and generally counters other physical attacks for free, "attacking by other means" is thrown out the window. And really, risking using a laser on Fox? He's safe as hell against lasers, even without shine, because, you know, he has lasers of his own that are faster.

Which is it? Does Fox have the advantage or does the wielder have the advantage? The answer is neither. What we have is yomi.

See above. Random spawning isn't strategy, and is NOT an apt description of skill.

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4953277

You can bluff with cards. You can't bluff with an item that may or may not appear.

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4981480

Are we going in circles yet? I believe we are.

[Ceirnian]

Yes I have. We all have when the game first came out. I was merely giving a note that SWF players do not shun to learn all aspects of the game on their own.

Then why are people talking about unavoidable finals smashes that take off two stocks?

[COUM]

You can bluff with cards. You can't bluff with an item that may or may not appear.

thats nice but it has absolutely nothing to do with the point i was making

[HolyOrderChipp]

There have doubtless been good arguments against specific items. Now is the time to show that, for each and every item, the negative factors outweigh the benefits. Tell me how food is bad for the game. Convince me that Mr. Saturn needs to go. Show, and not with a single Youtube anecdote, that any particular item is detrimental to gameplay. Every time you do that, we'll remove an item. Actually, don't prove it to me. Prove it to Evo. Show MrWizard that any given itemis bad for tournaments, and I'm sure he'll happily remove it.

[Mert]

3 stock
No time limit
Stages pending
No Smash Balls
No Items

Please and thank you.

[Shotokan Symphony]

thats nice but it has absolutely nothing to do with the point i was making

If you're arguing for items, how does it have NOTHING to do with the point you're making??

[Giza]

Wow, that beats SHDL! Oh wait, IT DOESN'T.Fox lasers no longer push away thrown items so actually during his whole shorthop he is left wide open after he starts to fire his first laser. Just saying. But if he manages to land before the item gets to him then he could easily pull off a reflector.

[Shotokan Symphony]

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4938144
http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4937218
I don't see how this thing argues in your favor. In fact, it kinda proves that his momentum was ruined because of an item, and that the smart choice would have been to get off the bike in ANY situation. That was playing with very dumb odds. Once again, a poor as hell example of strategy.

The game, in its current state of how items are set, spawns an item every 10-14 seconds, and dissipates in about the same. That means, at most, a 15 second point where we have two players that could either a) be too paranoid about each other to do a damn thing, or b) take a chance and work the situation in their favor. And that's being pessimistic. I'd say that time frame takes 5-8 seconds before action is made, tops, in the most paranoid of players. More often than not the decisions will be made actively within seconds, and the game moves on from there. At the absolute worst case scenario, what we've ended up is returning to what the game is like without the item in play at all, for at most 15 seconds. What does this have to do with an item being next to you again?

Which is it? Does Fox have the advantage or does the wielder have the advantage? The answer is neither. What we have is yomi.
Not if you're the one with high percentages. Either way, any character that has a laser as default usually has an advantage.
Default, as in, the character will always have a laser no matter what. Fox, Falco, etc. Am I going to need some duplo blocks to point this out for you?

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4953277
Adaptability should NOT be randomly generated. It should be created by the player. Getting a winning item simply because it's next to you isn't adapting. It's the game feeling sorry for you.

http://forums.shoryuken.com/showpost.php?p=4981480

Are we going in circles yet? I believe we are.

YOUR sorry ass is, if you have to re-quote something I already replied to.

[Scamp]

Then why are people talking about unavoidable finals smashes that take off two stocks?

Because both sides have idiots posting along with people who actually put effort into the game.


Two things I'd like to say. Firstly, nothing will get solved by nit-picking. Nothing is broken if the defender plays perfectly. Likewise, everything is broken if the attacker plays perfectly. Any evidence can be countered by lack of skill, improper use, improper defense, and so on. But it's all theory fighter.

For example, you can beat Akuma in Super Turbo. You can also beat Gill in 3S. But they should still be banned.


Second, please stop comparing Brawl to elements of other games, especially poker. I know that this is a common thing to do, and a good way to get examples across. Heck, I just did it in my last paragraph with ST and 3S. But it's never really the same thing, and arguing over these things never directly applies to Brawl.

Besides, if one accepts comparisons to other games then I believe you should also throw out the argument that Melee is not Brawl. Because if any game is the most similar to Brawl, it's clearly Melee.

[Shotokan Symphony]

Fox lasers no longer push away thrown items so actually during his whole shorthop he is left wide open after he starts to fire his first laser. Just saying. But if he manages to land before the item gets to him then he could easily pull off a reflector.

Yup, not denying this.

[COUM]

If you're arguing for items, how does it have NOTHING to do with the point you're making??

the point is that randomness isnt necessarily to the detriment of the game if it adds factors that dont exist otherwise

thats the case for both poker and items-on brawl

[margalis]

We all admit that Brawl is different, but it is not so different from the games we've played in the past that we're not still the best people to test this stuff and draw conclusions.

The problem is there's no evidence you are actually testing anything. You are simply declaring.

How exactly have you tested the various items pray tell?

[Shotokan Symphony]

There have doubtless been good arguments against specific items. Now is the time to show that, for each and every item, the negative factors outweigh the benefits. Tell me how food is bad for the game. Convince me that Mr. Saturn needs to go. Show, and not with a single Youtube anecdote, that any particular item is detrimental to gameplay. Every time you do that, we'll remove an item. Actually, don't prove it to me. Prove it to Evo. Show MrWizard that any given itemis bad for tournaments, and I'm sure he'll happily remove it.

Arguing semantics is what got us bickering in the first place. :/

[margalis]

Can someone explain how the lightsaber is terribly broken?

[Giza]

Can someone explain how the lightsaber is terribly broken?A lot of character have absolutely no way to approach or counteract against someone who is holding a beamsword without just hoping that an item spawns near them. Therefore beamsword makes it so a player must rely completely on luck in order to do anything. The advantage is too automatic to the person that the beam sword spawned in front of in these cases.

Though it could be argued that you just shouldn't play with those shitty characters that need to rely on items to get passed the beamsword.

[CyntalanMaelstrom]

I don't see how this thing argues in your favor. In fact, it kinda proves that his momentum was ruined because of an item, and that the smart choice would have been to get off the bike in ANY situation. That was playing with very dumb odds. Once again, a poor as hell example of strategy.

What does this have to do with an item being next to you again?


I'm... just not gonna bother continuing this one. You aren't grasping it. You never will.

Default, as in, the character will always have a laser no matter what. Fox, Falco, etc. Am I going to need some duplo blocks to point this out for you?

Alright, I'll concede to misreading that. I just assumed it was what it was due to the rest of the inane bullshit However, I'll instead bring up a proper retort.

You're instead insinuating that all the various ways to deal with that situation from the item holder's viewpoint are totally true, yet totally invalid because the defender has something remotely similar in their arsenal by default? That makes less sense.

Adaptability should NOT be randomly generated. It should be created by the player. Getting a winning item simply because it's next to you isn't adapting. It's the game feeling sorry for you.


More things where I question your reading comprehension, but that is moot because it's your opinion and I could care less if you change or not.


YOUR sorry ass is, if you have to re-quote something I already replied to.

If you had noticed, that quote had your own within it that was exactly what you stated before. Lets recap.

You make a point that bluffing doesn't exist. I retort. You counter with detail. I counter with as much detail. Then you go back to your original point. How is this not cyclical?

[margalis]

A lot of character have absolutely no way to approach or counteract against someone who is holding a beamsword without just hoping that an item spawns near them. Therefore beamsword makes it so a player must rely completely on luck in order to do anything. The advantage is too automatic to the person that the beam sword spawned in front of in these cases.


Was that a serious answer?

You get a beamsword and the best Brawl player in the country is stuck with a character of your choosing and you're saying you'll beat them without getting hit?

Somehow I don't believe it.

[LordLocke]

The whole thread basically is boiling down to this-

Camp 1: "Not turning off items until we know they're broken. From actual results."

Camp 2: "The very idea of items and most of these stages are broken by principal."

Camp 1: "Proof?"

Camp 2: "Melee."

Camp 1: "Melee is not Brawl."

Camp 2: "Same problems..."

Camp 1: "In a different game."

Camp 2: "Items are random."

Camp 1: "For both players."

Camp 2: "Heh, whatever. Now I suppose you're going to want to leave all the stages on, too."

Camp 1: "... er, yeah."

Camp 2: "What the hell? Game's broken- we know it, but it has ways to be fixed!"

Camp 1: "Deal for now, we'll see if it actively skew results in competitive play."

Camp 2: "No. We already know shit's broke from past experience. Why waste time?"

Camp 1: "Not turning off items until we know they're broken. From actual results."

Camp 2: "The very idea of items and most of these stages are broken by principal."

Camp 1: "Proof?"

THIS MERRY GO ROUND SHALL NEVER BREAK DOWN!

Seriously, at this point, the only thing either camp can do is get some experience. Take the default rulesets, test it over a number of tournaments, and check results. Find the problems, tweak, and try again.

Less is not more- stripping the game of it's elements without even making a token effort to keep them is never good for the competitive life of a game. It's not like we need to rush to figure out where competitive Brawl best lies in a matter of months- it's not Tekken, it isn't going to have a new version out in two years- odds are, Brawl is all we're going to see for the next five to seven year, if then.

That said, elements in Brawl's default mix are bound to be busted. It's not the average fighting game- With Anyone is a pretty good example that default settings are not the way to go with this game. But knee-jerk overreactions and the abolishment of anything that's deemed "random" shows a huge lack of understanding of competitive gaming as a whole. It's like saying most of Halo's non-symmetrical maps are broken because someone spawns closer to the sniper, or that most competitive card games are complete garbage because there's absolutely no control over what cards are going to be delt- or at least no control over when you're going to draw your ways of taking control, in a game like Magic.

If you're on the side of keeping stuff on, that's great. Play the game, and I'm sure problems are going to come inbound. Some of you might totally swing the other way because of random spawning Deku Nuts in your attack costing you two stock in a competitive match, but maybe just removing Deku Nuts might remedy your problem. Or maybe you'll just need to stop charging random Ike F+Bs to stall the game and giving Deku Nuts a chance to spawn in your attack path.

If you're on the side of turning it all off, and you're confident you're in the right, that's great. Then I'm sure that, as we play the game, if you're that right, then results will appear to support your viewpoint, and the game will eventually evolve into no items/neutral stages only with an abolishment on Dedede and Climber chain grabs. However, you're going to have to bear with the rest of us for a little while who are interested in seeing if there isn't more to this big, huge, multi-faceted game that is SSBB before we go and turn off an entire element of the game, not to mention 33 of 41 stages.

(And remember folks- there's item imbalance... then there's item stupidity. Sending us videos where some player puts no effort into grabbing or using items then getting killed by the Super Scope he runs past three times when the Climbers pick it up and use one Climber to grab 'em while the other to charge it up isn't going to prove anything. Except maybe that the Ice Climbers have an exceptionally deep item game, and it'd really suck for them to get nerfed before they even had a chance to explore that facet of their character.)

[Giza]

Was that a serious answer?

You get a beamsword and the best Brawl player in the country is stuck with a character of your choosing and you're saying you'll beat them without getting hit?

Somehow I don't believe it.Like I said, it could be argued that the person shouldn't be playing with shit characters like Ganondorf. I am just stating what many people have said to me about why they don't want to play with beamsword. I still have beamsword on my item list.

[Gimpyfish62]

items are dumb lol

why is this even being discussed

[AzN_Skater]

items are dumb lol

why is this even being discussed

items are awesome lol

why is this even being discussed

[Zero-SR388]

Are Fox and Falco banned from Evo tourneys???
Because they both hav infinites that are unescapable...

[Hogosha]

Wait...do any of you who are disturbingly vocal even PLAY high-level Smash? Keits, I know for a fact you don't or you'd have taken my bet. And I sincerely doubt Lamewadd does. Reason I ask is, in the end, we have to take nothing BUT that high-tier tourney-level play into consideration when these rules are made.

[Gimpyfish62]

i play high level smash hahaha

items are seriously like dumb competitively

that wasn't a joke post i made up above

they are great fun, but competitively they make the game a joke.

[Shade]

items are dumb lol

why is this even being discussed

Because unlike everyone else, SRK doesn't ban anything in a game based on a previous title in the series, or without proper time, and studying done.

I don't know how many times someone has to say this before it sinks the fuck in.

[subt-L]

gannondorf can't wizard foot through beam sword?

[Giza]

gannondorf can't wizard foot through beam sword?Clashes. Which I guess gives it some potential.

[halfDemon]

Because unlike everyone else, SRK doesn't ban anything in a game based on a previous title in the series, or without proper time, and studying done.

I don't know how many times someone has to say this before it sinks the fuck in.

Fine. Base it on the current title. Items are even dumber and much cheaper in this game than Melee or 64. There should be no discussion: items off. TA on.

[SlikVik]

How about two tournaments. One with items and one without

[Wobbles]

It's not like "items on" means "EVERY item allowed." There's a reason you're allowed to switch certain items on and off.

I'm not going to be playing in any tournament with bob-ombs on, because there will always be the problem of them spawning in the middle of an attack and hurting you for what should have been an intelligent move. But the new air dodge and item grab system makes item throwing less unfair, and I could absolutely see certain items being relatively fair in tournament. Not many of them, but a few.

[Keits]

Jeron - Calipower said the same thing, but gave it a try. Now he thinks items are not so bad.


Wait...do any of you who are disturbingly vocal even PLAY high-level Smash? Keits, I know for a fact you don't or you'd have taken my bet. And I sincerely doubt Lamewadd does. Reason I ask is, in the end, we have to take nothing BUT that high-tier tourney-level play into consideration when these rules are made.

Flexing your e-peen as a "superior" player may be fun, but it doesnt help your argument. If you think that other people cannot become excellent at this game, you are more foolish than I though.

In the end, YOU have something to prove, and beating me in an items on money match only helps prove MY point. The (currently) better player wins. How about you stop talking trash and start running events to prove the results will be wildly variant with items and stages? And why are such "high level players" holding onto falsehoods like "2 stock loss to landmaster" and "items take gameplay away from characters"?

In the end, after preference fades away, the only FACT that matters is results. Run our ruleset and see for yourself.

2 stock, 3 minute (4 if you must...)
all items on medium ( turn off tomato and hear if you must...)
3 of 5 matches
first stage is random from all stages
loser may change character OR choose stage. stage is radnom if loser changes character.
no custom stages.

[Giza]

Fine. Base it on the current title. Items are even dumber and much cheaper in this game than Melee or 64. There should be no discussion: items off. TA on.Certain items are. :/ No doubt a large amount of them would have to be banned. Even though I assume they will eventually all (or mostly all) be turned off for some reason or another but I think the testing process should still go through regardless instead of just banning them right off the bat. It would be nice to make sure they need to be banned.

Like Wobbles said, bob-ombs need to be banned. As well as any other item that can explode right out of spawn.

[Gimpyfish62]

do we seriously need to watch somebody lose $1,000 before you will accept the fact that RANDOMLY SPAWNED ITEM DROPS can change the outcome of a match?

When things are as competitive as they are in Smash we shouldn't sit around and wait for tragedy to strike somebody then say "oh, turns out items ARE actually randomly spawned, my bad, sucks you lost $1k"

again, the frequency that the items will change the tide of a match completely is IRRELEVANT.

anything that is random and can effect the game without necessarily having much to do with a players skill that CAN be removed SHOULD be removed
how many times do i have to say that?

if items were on a timer, or perhaps they were visible (but you couldn't pick them up for a few seconds) before they dropped, or SOMETHING was different, they would be great and valid.

But as it stands, random spawn locations makes the items bad.

YOU DO NOT NEED A VISUAL EXAMPLE TO COMPREHEND THIS
RANDOM SPAWN LOCATIONS = BAD.

There is NO skill involved with an item dropping into your lap, USING the item takes skill, we all get that, but there is NO SKILL when you simply recieve an item without working to get it or attaining it, you can't even properly use portions of the map to ensure yourself to get items, because they are completely random.

The only way to ensure you get ALMOST all of the items is to be COMPLETELY decimating a MUCH worse player than you.

I seriously don't understand how this is a difficult concept.

[Wobbles]

We're not going to have Pokeballs or Assist trophies on, of course, because those are just so randomly over/underpowered that trying to strategically plan around them is useless. Bob-ombs, the new remote-mines, sticky-bombs, and exploding crates all can appear at random and punish people for attacking.

I'd be totally in favor of having Lip's Stick, Mr. Saturn, Homerun Bats, possibly beam-swords, and maybe a few others.

I am not a fan of final smashes, simply because they degenerate the flow of gameplay dramatically. Some are pretty much unavoidable KOs, some are horribly underpowered (DK... poor DK...) and mostly they give absurd rewards for a few frantic moments of play. Having one spawn as your opponent is off the level can give you a nearly insurmountable advantage. I don't see any strategic bonus to having final-smashes on, and a lot of drawbacks.

A few of the projectiles might be alright; ray guns are really freaking good, but I don't think they're quite broken. No spicy curry, period. Super scopes would be interesting; I've never really seen them used extensively in 1v1s...

I know I'm missing a bunch of items in here, but I'm just trying to get some discussion going. If we're going to have an items debate, we need to figure out which items would be interesting to have around and which ones wouldn't, rather than generalize "items are broken" and "items are le suck."

Edit: This is addressed to Gimpy. I don't think anybody who enters into a tournament knowing what the rules are has a right to complain when they don't work out for his advantage. Yeah, it would suck to miss out on a 1k first prize, but if you know that items will be on and you believe them to be random and add nothing to the gameplay, then why are you playing in the tournament with them allowed? If anything, such a dramatic instance would completely seal the debate once and for all.

With the right items list, however, I don't think such a thing would happen.

[Giza]

Sticky bombs, bob-ombs, deku nuts and exploding crates should be off. But I thought the new remote-mines don't explode until after the after set up so they don't really fall into the same category as the previous stuff.

[lamewadd]

It's not like "items on" means "EVERY item allowed." There's a reason you're allowed to switch certain items on and off.

I'm not going to be playing in any tournament with bob-ombs on, because there will always be the problem of them spawning in the middle of an attack and hurting you for what should have been an intelligent move. But the new air dodge and item grab system makes item throwing less unfair, and I could absolutely see certain items being relatively fai