TSON, while I think you're understating how good our zoners are right, we have even small stages that weaken their effectiveness (Yoshi's Island, WarioWare, Caste Seign), and frankly, they're all just have better layouts than Metal Cavern as competitive-stages.

And World Tournament favors the edgeguarder. The vast majority of characters are unsafe and predictable when they go to land on stage. So limiting recovery options/pattern just lead to countinuous punish on the opponent's recovery. They lack the option to fastfall below the ledge and mix-up the timing of when they'll rise with a mid-air jump, Up-Special, etc. Characters like Falcon, Marth, Falco, Sandbag, are just way to good at resetting edgeguard situation. They have poor recoveries to begin with to make up for their great on-stage presence, but the limited recovery options pretty much put the entire cast in the same boat as them now. Now they are in a much better position to take advantage of it.

Falco especially feels absurd. You can no longer dips below jump lasers during recovery. You don't get the room to fall down-towards the stage to make-up the air-space and mix-up on the ledge-recovering. So you have to pretty much eat his lasers as he frame-traps you get Nair/Bair'd off again easily to force the same situation: rinse and repeat. I played on it a lot some weeks ago when you were advocating for it's legalitimacy, just to greater understand for myself. I definitely see it becoming one of those stages that's always struck last, or gentlemen'd/unspoken-rule to never be played on (much like Dracula's Castle in v0.9b, because it overcenterlizing in nerfing much of the cast, and the handful of characters it benefits, it's going to be strucked anyway. It will be too niche and we're never going to see the stage get chosen. You have to remember we are hosting competitive, skill-driven events. While we want counter-picks to adjust MU factors for buffing weaker characters, challenge players' knowledge of stage, and ability to perform different playstyles on multiple stages, we don't want it to be to the point where it overpolarizing certain playstyles and marginalize the rest: something I really see happening on World Tournament. Besides, it really is just "lesser FD."


And Galaxu Tours: please don't try to push the idea of playing on a random layout stage. Platform layout importance in MU's are not to be undermined Fox gets a great recovery buff on one layout, Marth and swordsmen can shark you with Utilt on the long, low platform of another, Sonic can circle camp on another if he gets a layout with 3rd height. But please, don't make people gamble on a counter-pick...

I agree with what Zalo said, some of these stages just give way to much of a disbalance to some characters, especially top tiers.

That's where I take offense though because there is no other smash game that bans stages because "we have better options". You start with a large list and then you ban things that are overtly polarizing or fundamentally flawed after testing. Having an exclusionist mentality does no one any favors and we end up never testing half of our stages as we balance our game around the same 3 layouts spread across ten stages and then later on we wonder why our tier lists are the same as day 1. It happened in v0.9b, I don't see why we should repeat the same thing and look for different results, that's the definition of insanity. By not testing these potentially viable stages we're only limiting the meta because lord knows if we add them later no one will try them.

(Also my point wasnt that our zoners were bad we just dont have characters that cant do anything but zone)


Disagree. WT is notably something that should be tested more heavily but from my limited experiences, the characters that seemingly get better needed some help (Sonic, Pikachu, Kirby, BDee, BM, Peach, Jiggly, Tails, etc) with the exception of Falco... and the characters that seemingly get worse needed the stagelist to not be so helpful for them; overall it helps them way too much (Sandbag, Fox, Goku, Pacman, Luffy, etc). These are things that need to be looked at.


We never tested it in a competitive pretext so do we really know this as fact? I don't think adapting to recovering high is any different than adapting to closer blast zones or platforms or slopes personally, it follows the same logic and doesn't transform the game into something completely different like Bomb Factory or w/e other not-up-for-discussion banned stages we have.


You need to ask yourself - is randomness inherently polarizing? If your answer is no, why is there a stage banned with an assortment of legal layouts that are evenly distributed to benefit different members of the cast? The idealogy fail here is that we're banning things because we don't like them on paper, or because we think they're a certain way. Official titles ban things because they're PROVEN excessively polarizing, or because there's no WAY they can be positive. I just don't see that for the stages we're talking about. Someone who is more skilled will use their logic calculator to decide if the gamble on GTours is worth it or not. Someone who is more skilled will use facts and see if their opponent would benefit from going on WT. We should be inclusionary instead of exclusionary imo. The stages that prove to cause problems can be removed later.

"No one will pick this" isn't a good reason btw, because someone will and once that someone has a good grasp of the required stage and MU knowledge, others will too (see Smash 4 Duck Hunt)

They aren't walls; they're wall-like slopes

Compare those supposed "walls" to Hyrule Castle's left side wall. You'll notice that instead of the opponent bouncing back towards you like Hyrule Castle, or getting stuck, you get sent on the side platform immediately and can't be infinited; on rare occassions like semi-spikes (primarily on fast fallers at certain mid-percents) can you actually get sent there, but other than that, you can't. Also, unlike Hyrule Castle, you can't walk into it like a normal wall; you'll just walk into it like a slope. A simple testing of the stage's layout could easily validate this.

So please, tell me, how is the stage banned again? Is there any real reason why?

Edit: Doing some thorough testing with some possible main offenders for wall infinites, such as grab releases, Marth's Down Throw, and potential infinites yields no validation into the claims that Strife made above so far. In fact, testing shows the complete opposite, since it doesn't actually work on the stage whatsoever. Most of the things will end up putting opponents on the side platforms on the main platform, not into the walls or anything.

Metal Cavern: It's one of my favorite stages, so I'm gonna be stubborn and include it on future stage lists until it gets too polarizing, assuming that happens. I do agree with the BR that it could potentially be too small and too heavily favoring for characters with long reach, but I personally think that it should be tested a bit more to determine whether that argument actually holds up. Also, keep in mind that Project M has a very large number of "competitive" stages, and stages are occasionally rotated out to keep the list small, but still keep things fresh. I could very well see this happen for Metal Cave, especially considering that Warioware isn't much bigger but is still legal.

World Tournament: Trust me, having such a high lower blast zone will never go over well in tournament. Fast-fallers literally cannot get out of hitstun fast enough to avoid hitting the grass when knocked offstage, and any character with a Ken combo gains an easy zero-to-death, no matter how bad their meteor smash may be. Its meta will be completely out of whack with the rest of the game, so I can't see it being legal under normal circumstances. That being said, it would be cool to have a World Tournament... tournament, simply because it's so different that it would be very interesting to see where such a meta leads.

Galaxy Tours:
*Marth-favorable layout appears*
Fox player: Oh I'm sorry, my controller settings aren't right.
*ABZR, Fox player changes his controls ever-so-slightly*
*Back to Galaxy Tours, the Fox-favorable layout appears*
Marth player: What the hell.

Alternatively...

Marth player: All right, so the rules say to keep resetting until the original layout appears.
*Bad RNG occurs, causing bracket delays*

Don't even get me started on playing this online.

Everyone keeps saying this but your controls won't be fine and then suddenly be incorrect match 2+ after stage is picked LMFAO like its so obvious? No one would get away with that just DQ them and quit playing

It happens in the official games all the time, for non-malicious reasons. A lot of players use different control schemes for different characters, just ask any Snake player. The point is that it may be impossible to tell if it's a malicious act if done subtly, especially because a player is within their legal right to quit out of a game as long as no damage was inflicted. Online, it is very easy to "desynch" or "pick the wrong character" or whatever. It happens all the time in a legitimate fashion, so there is simply no way of knowing. If a real desynch happens mid-match, what happens then? It takes forever to set up a room and get a game going, especially if the players have connection issues or encounter the target test glitch. If the wrong stage gets loaded, those minutes of wasted time will really add up. If the players are forced to play whatever stage is randomly generated next, it's unfair for a player if the new layout is worse for their character, because a normal game would not have involved any layout switching. For a TO, there is no winning in the scenarios that this stage creates, so it is better to ban it and avoid the unnecessary drama that inevitably unfolds.

Let's consider something else now:

Why should we have these stages when this current stagelist is the longest stage list of any Smash game.

• Smash 64 has one stage (Dreamland)
• Melee has six stages (FD BF FoD YS DL PS)
• Brawl's varies, but is usually seven and can top at ten for super liberal lists.
• Smash 4 is the same, but usually is six. (BF FD SV T&C LC DL)
• SSF2 has a twelve stage stagelist.

Putting down these statistics could pose an argument that not only should the current banned stages stay banned, but even some current counterpicks should be banned as well, such as Saturn Valley for being one of the biggest stages on the list which may kill its viability in singles (but might be a great stage for teams).

We don't need the stagelist to be longer than it currently is.

Well, if you want to know why we could have some of these aforementioned "banned" stages, maybe it's because some of them were unfairly judged and prematurely canned before analysis dictated that there should be no reason in banning them in the first place. (Like a certain stage I just talked about above.)

TSON, idk if you realise this, but it seems like you're the only person (or one of few) who thinks there was a major issue with the 9b stagelist.

it also seems like you're one of the only people who wants the stagelist to be massive and have loads of weird s*** in it - why should we include every TECHNICALLY viable stage just so that they all get struck first in tournament, since nobody actually wants to play on this s***.

why not let the competitive community decide how we wanna play, even if it doesn't match up with your vision or opinions or w/e.
arguing a lost cause imo.

also, while I hate the stage, I agree that the wall argument for SSZ is just straight up wrong.

Did you just -

Did you just really tell people to quit playing the game? As a dev of the game? Are you serious?

Im gonna agree with Ermac on here though. Especially for people plying on controllers, they may require a different control scheme. And it is perfectly reasonable that some people may forget to change their settings inbetween matches, considering that some people legitimately tried to argue against Dracs because "people would forget to turn hazards on/off". Which btw is literally as much effort as picking SV in 0.9b, but Im rambling again.

Answer me this: Why should any legit major tournament run the risk of having to DQ player XY over being a grimy/lying/cheating bracket delayer? Or worse, DQ someone innocent that just happened to forget something on the wrong stage? Then you have the issue of desynchs, the game randomly freezing and whatnot, which by default results in a 80% chance of the rematch being played on an entirely different layout that may turn your very own counterpick being turned against you. Once you add the option to let us choose between layouts I will happily make a case for the stage as I love it to bits, but as of right now it would add may too many struggles and potential conflicts, and the stage is just not worth it imo. Not when we already have so many stages that are completely fine.



Also, the part where you said that we dont have zoners in this game is one of the most ignorant pieces of discussion I had to see. I guess that chars and whatnot are all agressive and rushdown heavy? Not to mention that you brought that up while making a case for Metal Cavern, which is literally the last place any zoner wants to end up on. I really hope that I missed something here, because otherwise you are just making a joke out of yourself with this kind of stuff.

@Skylar, I think TSON pretty clearly stated (twice) that he did not mean there are no zoners. But rather, the zoners that SSF2 Beta DOES have aren't necessarily complete zoning characters. Samus is actually more burst than zone because of her nonsense damage on CS and Fair. Most Beta characters in general form a gameplan around some bread-and-butter combo openers and stock finishers.

I do agree that Metal Cavern should not be done away with simply because other layouts are "similar but better". That's not necessarily abject fact. Especially when the current list has 3 "Battlefields", 2 of which are starters. Not to mention that Metal Cavern is actually quite different in layout to Castle Siege, Wario Ware, and Yoshi's Island. It seems silly to make such a comparison of very different stage layouts when Dreamland/Battlefield/Yoshi's Story is allowed to exist without question.

Regarding Galaxy Tours, if both players consent to the outcome and check controls before match start, it can be fine to introduce the risk and randomness. It's not hard to tell people, "If you pick this stage, you cannot exit." If everyone understands the expectation, there will be a clear response to deal with shenanigans.

Well, technically Chibi is a zoner without a real combo/punish game The character is literally only about keeping his distance and putting you in a bad spot, that being offstage or above him by winning neutral all the time. Not exactly much else he can do other than pray that people have s*** DI and dont know what a tech is.


The solution you offered still doesnt fix the potential problems that a desynch/game freeze or another bug that forces the match to be replayed has. If you simply replay the match, there is an 80% chance that you will get a different layout, and Im betting all the money in the world that a different layout can drastically alter the outcome of a match. There isnt really much you can do about that. Maybe force people to restart until they get the layout they had originally, but that would lead to bracket delays everywhere. Just for the record, I love GT. I really do. But until the devs add a way to let us choose a layout (or even just make one the default on hazards off or something like that) its not going to be a sensible choice for an online stagelist.

Because those games all had (with the exception of Smash 4) literally like 6+ years to test all of their stages to come to the current conclusionary stagelist and also have more stages not made with competitive play in mind. We waited two weeks and slashed 40+ stages without testing.


I'm being consistent in what I'm saying so I hope you guys read what I'm posting lol. Not trying to force a liberal stagelist on anyone or anything, merely just trying to broaden your guys' perspective in TESTING. Let's be smart about this. Whatever you guys want to keep after the fact I'll stand behind but immediately writing off 90% of the stagelist is good for no one. (also uhhh i hear you guys complain about the 9b stagelist super frequently what u mean)


"quit playing" aka "quit playing around as a TO and DQ people who are intentionally trying to abuse your rules"


That's their own fault, and I'm under the pretense that if you fail to do something that you bore personal responsibility to do once the set starts, you should only be able to reset if you and your foe agree. So if you want to change your controls after match 3, and you fail to do that before the match starts, you played yourself if your opponent thinks you're abusing. Very simple fix. And it's your own fault, not the other person's. That also solves tons of other bracket delay scenarios.


Sounds like you should start running locals lol. How many laggy people do you DQ?


How often would desyncs/freezes happen while playing on this particular counterpick stage? Willing to bet not often. If you instated a rule for resetting until you get the same layout again it probably wouldn't delay that much considering how rare the exact situation (albeit inconvenient). I bet in a larger tour you might see it happen one time if at all.


If devs do that then I bet money you guys will make one layout legal though which defeats the point of the stage rofl


memes lol
Samus, Pacman, Mega Man, Black Mage, and Chibi aren't ineffective in close combat. When I think zoner I think a character that has to keep at an arms length to stay alive. These characters are effective both up close and far away, while they may not be a Fox up close, they can deal with a stage like Metal Cavern really easily; some might even prefer it (I can see Samus being really good).

watching tson posting about stage lists is like watching a casual trying to justify items.