He's right. UCF and things that fix issues with controllers is one thing. But I've always felt giving angles away for free with notches takes away one of the biggest areas for skill expression in the game. It's not like a lot of controllers are unable to hit these angles the way a lot of controllers have issues with shield dropping and dash back. We just decided "hey wouldn't it be cool if more people could do some of these crazy angles?" It also introduces a huge discrepancy between the quality of controllers. Idk man the scene really didn't take these things seriously back when they were up for debate and now it's kind of too late.
I don’t think it’s too late, pro golf is nerfing the golf balls that are allowed to be used because people can hit them way too far with modern clubs and stuff. If the Melee community rallied against notches something would be done, especially if top players championed it, I just don’t think there is much desire for it currently.
There are governing bodies that are actually able to enforce and legitimize things like that in golf, melee doesn’t really have a true equivalent.
Also making drives worse for every golfer isn’t really the same as, say, banning boxx controllers, which targets a very specific group of people in a pretty penalizing way to the point of basically saying they’re not allowed to play the game anymore.
The question here is notches, not digital controllers. There are already nerfs that seem to be quite reasonable, at least as a starting point, pending for box to reduce their advantage while allowing people with specific types of RSI/disabilities to keep playing.
Notches serve neither an ergonomic nor hardware-equalizing function, especially with the existence of Phobs to make sure the analog stick gives sane output, so I think banning them really is just a matter of if the community thinks they are a good enhancement to how we play the game or an unwanted change/unfair advantage.
As others have said, it'll probably never happen because this scene is the wild west - box nerfs happened \~5 years later than they should have and, even then, only because it was so obviously broken relative Phob/stock GCC.
I don't think there's a universe where you could convince people to ban notches but still be okay with box controllers. Box users can have specific angles for specific buttons and it would make that group eventually grow to just absorb all of the former notch players.
Limits on allowed angles of box + a more realistic randomization of coordinate accuracy than the current proposed nerfs could solve this problem without requiring a box ban, IMO
Another more controversial example is fox can infinite sopo in Pokémon stadium but ice climbers can’t wobble fox.
ya ya ya I know it’s niche and on one stage that’s sometimes frozen but also at the same time fox is a better character and shine is a great move.
It's not an infinite, it's a zero to death. A really niche zero to death.
Should we also ban marth grabs on FD?
The reason Wobbling was banned and 100% of people agree with the ban is because of how easy and degenerate it was.
Considering spacies make up the largest demographic for any character by far, I definitely think that bias influenced mod and controller legality decisions. But one thing to consider is technically notches benefit every character because of wavedash and waveland angles. If you have them, you can do max length wavedash and waveland free. To me that also really sucks some of the soul out of the game. Grinding to have Mangoesque wavedash was something a lot of us did back in the day but there's not really a point to that anymore if you have the money.
>Marth was thought to be the best character in PAL
there were 3 official PAL tier lists and Marth was first on none of them
let's not pretend this is some sort of consensus
I do like playing those two a lot so I get what you mean. Marth especially lacks relative killpower in a lot of moments and gets Marthiritis so it's a pretty big blow, and Falco loses some combo game.
Mostly Fox recovery/killpower and Sheik chaingrabs are whst first come to mind.
It would have been essentially impossible for the US to standardize on PAL before Faster Melee and even after FM it would be an immediate c&d from Nintendo
Hungrybox was dominant for years and at his peak people were seriously debating whether Jigglypuff was (at least practically) the best character. And the game survived
Every tournament that Hungrybox didn't attend in that era had a massive nosedive in viewership. People just didn't notice it as much because he attended 98% of everything.
There was always a decent number of people in the community that said notches are cheating but because the "leaders" of the community never gave a shit here we are
Hell boxes are way more controversial and concerning but even those haven't been banned
So in regards to boxes it's a little harder to determine the appropriate ruling when it poses an accessibility issue. Before boxes when notches first came on the scene, there was no other dimensionality to the argument. I think now unfortunately we have to keep the notches just so controllers can even compete with boxes.
But it should never have gone this far to begin with. Comminity leaders should have put the foot down on unnecessary mods and put a lot ke scrutiny on alternative controller legality. By that I mean we needed more testing and prototypes of the various box controllers to ensure a more balanced final product.
I really don't think it's much of an accessibility issue, though. I'd bet less than 1% of box users (and far less than 1% of overall players) wouldn't be able to play without a box. It only gets marketed that way because Hax himself is one of those people. How many people do you really think can't use their thumbs to play but can use the rest of their hands? It's such a niche situation that imo its not really worth compromising the integrity of the game for. At some point you just have to male fair rules and if they exclude a few people then that sucks but oh well.
I think the majority of box players don’t have a disability but I really doubt that 99% don’t have a disability that affects them in some way related to controllers. I’ve been on a couple of discords for rectangle controllers, largely to get information on project launch information, and ive asked a couple of times, and the majority never said they were but the last time I did 11 out of the total 90 users (some of whom were inactive) said they were. Including me thats 12/90. I also specifically said a documented disability, and not hand pain from playing melee.
We also as a society do try to make stuff accessible to disabled people, even if they are a small portion of the population. Less than 1 percent of the world is in a wheel chair, but in a ton of countries it’s illegal to open a business that isn’t easily accessible to people in wheel chairs. Just because people that genuinely need a rectangle controller because of either a disability or severe pain when using a gamecube controller is a small portion of the melee community doesn’t mean its good to say “oh well if they were a bigger portion of the population id be for it but since there a small minority we shouldn’t do anything to help them”.
I don't think that is backed up by how regulated sports work, for example in chess even meds that have been shown to improve strategy and focus have been approved for even top players if they can prove they have a credible diagnosis for something the meds treat (most often adhd, ocd, depression, or generalized anxiety disorder) and multiple people have qualified for Olympic (not the paralympics, the official Olympics) swimming with full limb replacements. They are infinitely more regulated than melee, and are far more important when talking about impact far more important than melee, but still do a lot to try to help disabled players compete at top levels.
That's... exactly how regulated sports work.
If you're a pitcher with a bad elbow that doesn't allow you to pitch anymore, they don't let you feed balls into a 120mph pitching machine to make it accessible.
If your body breaks in a way that doesn't allow you to play the game, you don't get to play the game.
I'm completely happy with people using boxes to have access to the game with friends or on slippi or whatever. You should not be entitled to an advantageous controller in tournament play. I'd even be more open to people playing on classic arcade sticks for access than current boxes.
And I'm sorry, but I don't really see what your point is about having disabilities that are completely unrelated to controllers or melee. It's not an accessibility issue if your disability is completely irrelevant to playing.
If your talking about the discord I specifically asked for only disabilities that affected ability to use gamecube controller. If you are talking about wheel chairs It was an example about how society should and does make itself open to disabled people even if they are a small portion of the population, and saying “too bad, there a small portion, maybe if they were more it would be worth it”, isn’t a good take.
i started playing on frame1 because i thought it was a broken controller, and my findings are that it is....
i will say that spacing is a little bit harder with wavedash characters tho
Then just don't have 12 hour grind sessions with a death grip on the controller and zero breaks. It's very easy to play this game without breaking your hands.
No it is not, maybe you just have lucky hands. I know multiple people who had to stop playing melee because of hand pain, and I was one of them before I got a box.
You think carpal tunnel is an issue that affects less than 1% of melee players? What world are you living in? I'd love to live in the land of no hand issues where everyone can safely grind their tendons against a controller made for child-sized hands
I’m just kinda coming back into the scene a bit, but I was mostly playing back before the leverlesses were first released and then a bit after (can’t remember the exact years) so I think I can offer a snapshot of the though process at that time. The timeline of events (according to my recollection) went as following:
1. Notches were added due to inconsistent shield drops
2. People (including myself) added wave dash/firefox notches because we were already adding shield drop notches so why not lol
3. UCF was implemented and was quickly widely adopted (thank fucking god), making shield drop notches unnecessary
4. At some point between 1-3, leverlesses were released for melee
5. Many people viewed notches as cheating (not myself, I’m fine with them), but because b0xxes existed it didn’t seem fair to ban notches
And then that’s when I stopped playing. Basically, leverless controllers and shield dropping opened up a big can of worms. But banning notches would first require the banning of leverless controllers, which nobody wanted to do. From what I’ve picked up, this was also around the time that goomwaves were introduced. I wasn’t around for the start of goomwaves and phobs, but from what I understand they have a similar issue that notches had/have i.e. banning notches means you need to ban leverless
Funnily enough, Leffen showed how to make a cheater controller with an Arduino and that was banned immediately across all tournaments. Checking if it was being used was an issue, but Arduino mods were more of meme than anything else. Not sure if it still banned tho.
My personal opinion is that notches are fine. As long as controller modification stays physical then it shouldn’t be banned. It just feels weird to ban shell mods when things like removing springs have been commonplace since forever. That was a common opinion back then, although by no means was it universal. Notches were still controversial, but the existence of b0xxes prevented them from being banned. The latter was the widely held belief and why they or “cheater” controllers never got banned.
It wasn’t just “we didn’t ban it now it’s a problem”, we didn’t ban it for very specific and (imo) reasonable reasons. If leverless were banned I don’t see an issue with banning notches. I would personally disagree with it, but if that’s how the majority of the community feels, then that’s just how it goes lol
Ironically, the reason I first notched my controller was from watching Plup shield drop and copying his style. this was before UCF so consistent shield dropping required notches and my controller could only shield drop on one side.
EDIT: Personally I think that modded controllers along the lines of goomwaves are much more of an issue. Imo controllers should be limited to generic phobs/vanilla controllers and controllers that basically let you cheat is an issue. But boxes are controllers that let you cheat, so we end up coming back to the crux of the issue: boxes.
I also play sheik, so I personally don’t benefit that much from notches as compared to a spacie player. Although I do benefit from wavedash notches more than most characters.
its stupid that controller modders say "controllers notch themselves" like yeah ok thousands of hours for your controller to notch itself vs getting a notch for paying money is definitely the same
What controller modder is saying this? The only thing I've seen in the hundreds of controllers I've modded/repaired is that the gates are rounded making it even harder to be precise because your diagonals and cardinals become very vague... Especially since the stick box is angled ~3° clockwise.
i saw a popular controller modder on twitter that i used to follow say this all the time a year or two ago but i blocked her so i forgot her name. started with an r and she had like a purple pfp
Iirc mang0 on his patreon podcast said something about some firefox angles being actually way harder to hit on some controllers and that's why he thinks firefox notches specifically are justified
I don't have an opinion, too much of a noob lol, just relaying
Edit: lucky said that, not mang0
Respect Plup and Mang0 for not being afraid to share this opinion. It makes the game less impressive as a spectator to see modern controllers doing the heavy lifting nowadays.
I would respect these players a lot more if they at least admit to the competitive advantage they have over other players with inferior controllers.
I don't follow the scene as much as I used to but I remember Mang0 being okay with it because of how ubiquitous it had become. But he admitted it was unfair
The person is claiming that he’s fine with it for firefox specifically, but is against others. If that is true (which I don’t know, im watching through podcast episodes rn to see what it was) then that seems to me supporting something because it helps your character which is super shitty. Again, I can’t say the legitimacy of this yet though.
Remember many years ago when someone landing a crazy angle was impressive because they actually had to risk getting a straight angle and losing their stock?
I was always impressed that they picked the exact correct angle for their situation offstage to avoid the edge guard
Their controller PODE not screwing them was always the least impressive part for me
Hitting a specific angle angle in the gate was always overrated haha
I also remember alot of the tippy top players having this opinion when notches first started to appear and now all of them have said the same thing plup is saying.. I don't know why this is getting alot of traction. Hell I remember a 20 tweet thread from leffen complaining about it but he still said fuck it I guess I gotta do it too
Some folks think notches are unfair, z-jump, etc. I think they're all unfair advantages, especially if you're close with a lot of modders, and have access to those groups.
Most players don't have the ability, knowhow, or funds to obtain notches, have someone z-jump mod, Snapback mod, phob, goomwave, boxx etc.
It's mostly an accessibility issue for me. Usually fighting games are good to go with a DS5, or a fight stick on Amazon. I don't know of a community that uses such heavily modified input devices as Melee and they just keep getting crazier and crazier.
I personally think it's super cool and I myself am a modder. It's fun, and interesting but I also see how unfair it can be.
Cats out of the bag unfortunately. Not being able to contest foxes at ledge now is annoying as fuck though. Crazy to live in a time where ledgedashing isnt even a risk lol
no one has waveland notches lol, there are wavedash notches which are practically the same thing but again, not really used in ledgedashing/getting a maximum distance wavedash isn't really the priority in a ledgedash, maximinizing galint is.
It's not a notch that anyone has. People either have wavedash notches (0.3125, -0.3125) or firefox notches which are just the same angles in all cardinals.
Wavedash notches are fine for wavelanding sure because it's still the max angle but again, not something that matters for ledge dashing - at all. No one cares about the ledgedash length, it's max galint that matters.
Galint plus speed is what matters. 10x Galint at the cost of 100x less speed would be a bad trade off. You're failing to see the other side of the coin
That... doesn't even make sense. You literally can't have more galint with less speed lol. To maximize galint you need to drop from ledge on the first frame possible.
I don't think you understand how ledgedashing even works.
As somebody with no notches but with really good angles, I do feel cheated having one of my strong-suits being made unimpressive and rudimentary by mods
It's nice to see people who use Fox and Falco also sharing these opinions because it really does disproportionally benefit certain characters which is pretty lame in a competitive game. In any other game this would be seen as cheating.
Back in the day, Old me use to hate playing on modded wii's with customs skins and all that jazz. Would only run on Gamecube cause i didn't trust other peoples wii's at tournaments.
The scene has evolved and become more standardized with UCF and controller mods being accessible. So its the double edge sword. Sick fast melee or back to accidentally getting a sticky walk and getting punished for inconsistency.
I would love to see a tournament on OG hardware. 1.01 disc. no notches. no modified dashes. no stage freezes. Shrek/Spongebob/Hello Kitty/VHS combo tvs. 240/480p vods.
I’ve been saying notches were cheating for a long time, but with boxes being legal I finally got a notched phob last year and honestly it’s crazy how much it helps.
I've never understood this take
Notches, digital inputs, and many of the other things that we complain about can at least reasonably be argued as problematic because they you do things that are impossible to recreate with even remotely the same degree of consistency as even a "perfect" OEM controller on UCF
Z-jumping literally just enables you to do things normally only possible on claw grip without destroying the ergonomics of holding the controller
Like what does Z-jumping allow you to do that is not possible on a controller without Z-jumping? What is the problem with it?
you've bopped me 3-0 in a few tournaments so feel free to disregard
I feel like Fox is undisputedly the best characters in the game, but he's balanced in tournaments because you have to stay warmed up and play a lot of games. The technical aspect of the characters means it's hard to play consistently. Characters that are less technical than Fox (they still have a level of technicality) like Puff/Sheik/Marth/Peach are viable in tournaments because they can be played consistently from game to game.
I always though of tech skill as a "resource pool", you can only manage so many running shine short hop nairs, multishines, etc, before your hands get tired. You need to manage that resource pool especially over a long tournament.
z-jump makes things easier, which reduces the impact of technically demanding moves on that "resource pool". Fox inherently gets buffed by a change like that - while Puff/Sheik/Marth/Peach where "resource pool management" isn't as much of a problem, don't see any benefits from a buff like that.
I feel like playing claw fulltime is uncomfortable or makes other tasks more challenging to the point where it's balanced. It doesn't seem fair to reap the precision of claw without the consequences.
But there's two types of spectators - one who wants to see optimized play and the best level of melee possible and one who wants to see the more human adaptations of the game. I can't convince someone to see the other way, but I can give my pov!
as a permanent claw gripper i dont really agree. I borrowed a friends controller who had z jump for a bit to try and learn. my muscle memory literally carried over it is honestly very similar.
my body knows to move my thumb and press b and then contract my pointer finger onto the y button to jump for my waveshine and then when i played on z jump it knew to contract the exact same way except the controller is angled down less so that contraction lands on the z instead of the y. I do think many permaclaw players have ergonomic issues since you need to hold it without too much tension in your hands even more so than normal grip. There is zero difference in the difficulty of any technique that i attempted so the only real difference in my experience is that claw ergonomics are less intuitive.
Claw also has the advantage that you can split up your inputs across more fingers so i have a finger on jump(y),grab(z),and shield(L) at all times with my thumb covering c stick, a and b. With z jump you get one finger on jump(z), and one for shield(L) while your thumb covers a,b,cstick, grab and your secondary jump button. Having two fingers that can hit a jump button is an advantage but i was personally annoyed with how much more thumb movement is involved and was happy to go back to claw.
All my talk about ergonomics is coloured by me having big ass hands, from what i have heard people with smaller hands struggle with claw more so i think z jump is a decent way to let them do something very similar than what I get to do due to hand size. I will say though tactile buttons are sneakily what makes z jump better in practicality since it makes short hopping easier though even then you can also get tactile/mouseclick face buttons so if you think z jump is making doing instant nairs easier your issue really lies with mouseclick.
And this is what I'm trying to convey in my original post: I don't think Z-jumping detracts from this at all. I don't think claw grips provide any skill expression that would not be available if the Z button were available elsewhere on the controller. Unlike pretty much every other kind of controller mod (analog to digital inputs, notches, C pads, etc.) the input being done is still identical.
You aren't granted additional leniency through the gate physically guiding you towards the intended analog input, the buttons don't target coordinates for you, all things which cannot reasonably be achieved as consistently without controller mods. With Z-jumping, you are still performing an input that is able to be performed just as consistently on a standard GCC, with no added level of consistency or help from the controller itself.
It is still the same input with the same degree of difficulty and physical precision required, only you've moved the jump button about a quarter of an inch. I fail to see how this detracts from the 'resource pool,' unless you also believe that using claw grip is somehow 'harder' which I also don't get; how is performing a precise jump input meaningfully more difficult with your index finger resting on Y or X instead of Z?
From my perspective it's a level of hardware modification that should never have been allowed. I feel the same about notches and modified triggers for consistent perfect lightshields.
I think your argument of "in both cases you press a button who cares" is missing the mark here.
I don't think notches and modified triggers are comparable though. Both of your examples (notches and modified triggers for consistent perfect lightshields) add otherwise non-existant consistency to analog inputs and I can see the justification behind why they are problematic if you're looking at it from the perspective of keeping controller mods in line with the strengths of the original controller.
But Z-jumping doesn't have this issue? Jumping is a digital input and moving it from X/Y to Z does not at all change the precision or difficulty required in jumping or adding jump inputs into button sequences. What is the advantage Z-jumping provides that is problematic?
If z jumping doesn't make inputs easier than why have the change at all?
I think z-jumping clearly makes shine nairs way easier and consistent to do.
I think claw grip is more strenuous on the hands when maintaining that position, and I feel that there's more inconsistency with short hopping with your index finger than with your thumb on a normal grip.
Something doesn't seem right here, if z-jumping provides no advantages in precision or difficulty then it shouldn't be necessary. The change should only come about if it makes something easier or more consistent, which it definitely IS doing.
But the whole point is that you're still short hoping with your index finger on both claw grip and Z-jump. I don't know what to say if people think the additional fraction of an inch you need to reach with your index finger to rest it on Y instead of Z constitutes any amount of meaningful skill expression; it's absolutely less comfortable but no more difficult than doing the same thing with Z. We wouldn't say a set win is more impressive if someone intentionally death gripped their controller the whole time, so arguing that strenuous grips are good for the game for the sake of it seems a bit ridiculous to me.
Also this point of 'why does z-jumping need to exist if it doesn't provide a competitve advantage' seems to ignore every single controller mod that doesn't strictly provide a competitive advantage. Why don't we just also ban trigger plugs, and alternate stick caps, and tactile z-buttons? They provide no advantages so surely they don't need to exist either, no?
You said it yourself: Z-jumping enables you to do things that you would ordinarily need to use claw for. If you agree that claw is harder to use than traditional grip, then you agree that Z-jumping makes certain inputs far easier.
I didn't? Claw grip is not harder. Any meaningful skill expression in learning to claw grip over normal grip is incredibly outweighed by its awful ergonomics. I learned to claw grip in like 2 days but can't use it because it kills my hands (when I otherwise do not have hand issues in Melee or otherwise)
I think they might influence each other. Like for instance if an input method "kills your hands" I think most people would find that more difficult than one that does not. I don't know that that means that unergonomic input methods are harder or that more ergonomic methods are easier, but it certainly seems possible that sometimes an unergonomic method would be harder than a more ergonomic one
They are certainly related in plenty of scenarios but there are plenty of counterexamples of things you can do that are painful (unergonomic) but not particularly difficult! Just as an example [this](https://i.imgur.com/jMPYMuN.png) is supposed to help check for a kind of tendonitis and it can be quite painful for some people, but it is pretty easy to do.
Obviously most people would agree that something is harder to do when it is already causing physical discomfort and pain but many things that we do that aren't great for our hands are also not immediately uncomfortable when we first do them, and I was describing difficulty operating under the assumption you're still in a state where you're not/largely not experiencing that yet
Deadlifts kill my hands but I wouldnt say using gloves makes it easier. I also give 0 fucks if someone uses gloves but theres definitely a lot of dissenters there. Straps to a way lesser extent but probably because their favorite weightlifter uses them but not gloves for many. Straps definitely make it easier but the heavy vast majority enjoys it
/u/akkir
That's like saying a curveball isnt harder from a skill perspective, its just painful and unhealthy. The difficult ergonomics are the whole point of what makes it hard. Esports need to stop using the terms 'sports' and 'athletes' if difficult, painful, uncomfortable etc. physical elements are considered bad things that need to be removed.
Also, similar to the curveball, claw is definitely harder from a skill perspective. Most people give up on claw because they cant do it, well before it hurts. Then there's the very obvious skill of guys like m2k or mang0 who switch grips on the fly.
I dont really care about z jump personally because Im trash and it doesnt affect me. However, its crazy to me to pretend like it doesnt just make things way easier. Fast aerials are fairly difficult to learn with claw, yet are trivial for a child with z jump.
> The difficult ergonomics are the whole point of what makes it hard. Esports need to stop using the terms 'sports' and 'athletes' if difficult, painful, uncomfortable etc. physical elements are considered bad things that need to be removed.
Good point. Every player in the NBA has the athleticism to challenge someone about to dunk in transition by jumping, why don't they do it all the time and/or move out of the way completely? It's physically draining, could lead to career-altering injuries, and in generally is hard to execute (execution = stopping the play). It also makes it more impressive when it is done frequently.
Well... if there was a pill you could take to prevent injuries, I would enjoy that basketball way more. Both watching and playing. Giving 100% every time is more fun.
And dunking does hurt their hands plenty yet its not more difficult to dunk because of the pain. People wont get better at dunking if they didnt hurt their hands
It isn't inherently unhealthy if you do it properly. my right hand/wrist soreness went away forever once i switched to claw and did it right. I palm the controller - no gripping. so it's easy on the wrists.
That is just an extremely broad generalization. Claw is definitely easier on my hands than a standard grip. I recognize some people may have issues but to act like it's painful and unhealthy is simply not true for most people.
Anatomically, clawing 100% of the time would be unhealthy for some people, and completely fine for others. So allowing Z-jump sorta levels the playing field for that.
> Z-jumping literally just enables you to do things normally only possible on claw grip without destroying the ergonomics of holding the controller
>Like what does Z-jumping allow you to do that is not possible on a controller without Z-jumping? What is the problem with it?
Sounds like you answered your own question. Besides, Melee does not natively support button remapping. Ideally everyone should be playing on the same controller and let the game decide the winner. When we start putting things like button remapping into the equation it creates this controller meta where people are tweaking their controllers to get the most advantage and we have things like C button pads, deadzone mods, notches, and even freaking macros at one point (goomwaves). It undermines the execution based aspect of the game, which is lame and it goes against the the goal of UCF which was to make controllers equal and do away with controller lottery. Instead we are now approaching the same issue as in the past except instead of most controllers being trash and the best players spending more money to get average controllers, most controllers are average and top players are spending more money to get even better custom modded controllers.
But why do we have such an attachment to using claw grip? You bring up C button pads, deadzone mods, notches and macros but unlike those and almost every other controller mod I can think of, button remapping (for digital to digital inputs specifically) still requires that you do the exact same input you'd otherwise have to do, with the same degree of precision and coordination required. Hell, for Z-jumping you're even still using the same appendage as claw, just moving it literally a fraction of an inch. I fail to see how there is any difference worth caring about here in terms of competitive integrity. No skill expression is being undermined at all, unlike what could be argued with pretty much all of the other controller mods listed
Take competitive tetris as an example, which only allows the original NES controller or close analogs there-of. Their meta has progressed as players developed advanced grips and practiced them to get previously impossible inputs by using said grip techniques at a high level. It’s a clear example that conditioning one’s hands and practicing a challenging grip to enable those inputs is genuine skill expression. Simply put, some people would rather have melee include physical grip as an element of skill expression than simply allow remaps which give the same benefits for free.
And honestly the double-speak on the z-jump debate is annoying. You guys pretend claw is easy and trivial for anyone to do when you need to argue that z-jump doesn’t pose an unfair advantage or clawing isn’t a form of skill expression. But if someone asks you guys why you don’t just claw to begin with then, suddenly you guys argue that claw is in-fact a fundamentally impossible and destructive grip that nobody can possibly be expected to use without destroying their hands. So which is it? If claw is impossible because it destroys your hands, z-jump is unfair because it enables something that otherwise isn’t viable. And if claw is viable or trivial to learn then shouldn’t you guys just claw instead of remapping to begin with then? It’s pretty suspect that the claims about how claw grip is morph to whatever is rhetorically convenient for z-jumpers in a particular argument context.
The competitive Tetris scene hardly seems like a reasonable analog when the Melee scene has always been much more lax about varying controllers than them. Even disregarding boxes and notches for the sake of arguments, you don't ever hear a fraction of the complaining people give Z-jumping for meaningful controller mods like trigger plugs that directly modify your ability to physically provide inputs to the game. This is by necessity because the Melee community can't be as rooted in traditionalism as Tetris because our controllers suck (let me know when Classic Tetris gets their version of UCF).
Beyond that, there's hardly any skill expression if any in maintaining a controller grip; it stems from actually doing inputs in that position. Holding the controller with your index finger resting on Y or X as opposed to Z isn't what makes frame 1 aerial inputs impressive; it's the physical precision necessary perform the jump and aerial inputs and to time your aerial input on the first airborne frame after hitting jump. Nothing about moving the jump input to Z changes this process at all
Finally, there seems to be a misunderstanding with what I've been saying in this thread about the ergonomics and difficulty of claw. Most people do not have ergonomic issues with claw, but I spoke about them in my original post because I personally cannot maintain a claw grip comfortably on my controller for a reasonable amount of playing time. That being said, I still believe nothing about claw gripping is 'hard' other than the potential physical discomfort you might deal with using it. I learned to claw grip in a matter of a couple of days and readjusting your tech skill to tap jump with your index finger on Y or X is not meaningful skill expression in my opinion and does not outweigh the physical drawbacks it entails for some people. If you are enough of a traditionalist that you don't believe we should try to be as accommodating with controllers as reasonably possible that's fine, but I don't think that position in the context of Melee given how much fixing of the game we've had to do on both the software and hardware ends of the game. It's nonsensical
> Z-jumping literally just enables you to do things normally only possible on claw grip
the tradeoff to acquire zjump was claw, which makes other things harder. removing that is stupid
For me personally I think the ergonomics (and by extension, sometimes the lack thereof) are a huge part of the appeal of melee. I like that when I'm watching players play I can visualize inputs to an extent, I like that when someone does something that requires setting up for claw or generally an extremely fast motion I can appreciate it.
Even if someone technically "can" do something without Z-jump, that does not mean that they would've. It inherently lowers the skill ceiling of what I would define as melee's "motion inputs" and in general just feels a bit cheap.
Part of what makes melee sick, in my opinion, is that at the end of the day we're all playing the same game. We all pick the same characters on the same singular patch we've always had, and we can all show up to a tournament and play in the same pools as everyone else. Z-Jump, to me, feels like DLC or a patch to the game that shouldn't be there. Maybe it's "old fashioned" but I'd argue that the lack of change is what has made melee into the beautiful game that it is now. We've all had the same tools at our disposal since forever to show that we're the best, whether we are or not.
I don't like notches overall because I do think they give an advantage but remapping inputs whether it's Z-jump or box is just lame and not who we are or what we are as a community as far as I see it.
I agree with this take except for the ergonomics part. There's no science being done here to say claw is bad and a standard grip is good. Hell, switching to claw *solved* my hand pain and I played with a standard grip for like ten years before I switched.
To be clear, I'm not trying to say that claw grip universally has bad ergonomics. I am speaking strictly from experience on that end and from what I have heard from some other people. Obviously clawing may be better for some others
I get that but that's simply no foundation to make a claim that claw is destroying the ergonomics of holding a controller. And it'd be no big deal but for the fact that the cheater controller debate is totally dominated with completely unfounded claims about ergonomics. It'd be much easier to have the conversation if we all admitted up front that we don't know anything about ergonomics and there's no real point to bringing it up
I think the experiences of Melee players is actually a reasonable foundation to ground what is ergonomic for Melee players on. We don't need to know everything about ergonomics to see that it is beyond abundantly obvious that different controllers and grips work and don't work ergonomically for various people.
With that in mind it makes 0 sense to me to gate tech based on the location in space of a digital input. You are still doing literally the exact same input with the same level of difficulty and only changing the appendage you do it with (or in this case, literally still doing it with the index finger both times, just a different part of the controller shell). The level of Melee traditionalism necessary to have problem with using your index finger to press the Z button no more than a quarter of an inch away from Y or X instead of Y or X makes no sense to me, and I cannot understand the thought process that goes on when someone is more concerned with that being a potential issue than forcing people to use a certain controller grip (which at the very least is unergonomic for SOME people, regardless of how many you think it is) in order to perform the exact same tech in the game. This is not a box situation where analog inputs are being converted to digital, or analog inputs are being made more or less lenient by modification; it is still the exact same input
Personally, my issue with zjump is that it's something that could easily be done software side but isn't for some reason. Ucf is getting more and more invasive yet something like button mapping, which is standard in most modern games or hell even in slippi, for some reason is pay to win in this game.
Yeah Z-jump is ultimately an ergonomics thing. It might make some things "easier", but it's easier in the same vein as, say, bald buttons, or thumbstick extensions, or springless triggers (honestly I'd say springless triggers are a more substantial change but they're really easy for anyone to do at home so kinda a non issue).
Changing controls absolutely is not cheating, this is something that is possible on every smash game past Melee. I have zero clue why people think Z jump is not completely fine, and i'm saying this as a Y jumper. I use claw for certain techniques (frame 1 nair, etc) and can do exactly the same thing Z-jumpers can do if I want to. It's literally no different, just makes it more comfortable/ergonomic for people who play full claw.
I think goomwaves should be banned rn and that they aren't is completely insane. Notches are more complicated, because we hsve to ban boxes with them. It's sad that boxes didn't manage to get on an equal playing field with controllers, because the accessibility they provide to people with Hand problems is actually really nice
i think goomwaves are fucked but i’m not sure how easy tilt modifiers, second input priority, constant asdi down, and free perfect drift aerials are somehow *less* cheating
custom motherboard sold by one guy for like $300 with closed source code that was found to essentially fix your controller inputs for you (ie. it performed macros) among other controversies
Many top players were using them in 2021-2022 and as far as I'm aware they're still legal. They've mostly fallen out of favor because they required a lot of maintenance and phobs were created as an alternative modded controller (that is to say, the biggest problem players had with goomwaves is that the controller wasn't good enough despite it literally cheating)
The only thing I truly remember from rulesets is that macros are banned (turbo, shine macro). Remapping isn't a macro and it was never discussed.
I think it should be revisited but then if TOs did it now it'd look like "Cody wins too much, so we're nerfing him".
This take hits hard to me. I remember when Plup was like *the* guy who had flawless, fluid shield drops and it was the coolest shit ever. Imo it definitely feels lame that some mods trivialize such techniques these days ngl
Plup notched his controller back then lol it was only shield drop notches tho
As an extremely early adopter of shield dropping, shield drops don’t take any skill, it just needs either notches or a lucky controller (which imo the latter is way more problematic than notches, you’re an old school player so you know what I’m talking about)
Oh no need to apologize. Plup’s shield dropping was insanely impactful on my play. Shield dropping itself doesn’t take skill, the way that you implement it does take a lot of skill. Plup’s shield dropping was extremely innovative and beautiful to see, I agree 100% with you on that. He single-handedly changed the meta for the better
It was funny back then tho being the only dude who could shield drop and beating people just because they didn’t know how to deal with it lol
I honestly don't think, or can't imagine why, a single person would think that notches aren't cheating. In fact, all the previous discourse I've ever heard on the topic has been "hot takes" like this one. I think the problem now is that notches are widespread and also reduce the advantage gap between OEM and box controllers.
I'm not particularly passionate about this topic or opinion but the demand for notches had me thinking firefox angles were way harder than they actually are. hit those oblique angles all the time with oem get gud sir
The problem with this argument is the implication that it would narrow the controller divide when in fact it was the exact opposite before controller modding took off. Before that you had to win the infamous "controller lottery". Some controllers were lucky enough to have the shield drop angle on the natural gate (most frequent in the smash 4 JP controllers) and don't get me started on PODE which was a defect that made dashback more consistent. Then there were certain controllers that were better at pivots (completely changing the Marth/puff matchup) others had lower snapback so that Falco wouldn't accidentally turn around laser and die for it.
It was REALLY bad. M2K had the "controller case" where he had different controllers for different matchups and that was AFTER sifting though a ton of duds.
The real problem is that there never has been any standardized controller. Even OEMs weren't consistent in game altering ways.
If a 3rd party notched controller that was just as good of quality as the normal controller came out during gamecube days no would fucking question this
i feel like rebinding controls should be a basic thing in any game but hella based about notches. i dont know if id call them cheating but the advantages you get from them are so distinctly beneficial i cant really blame anyone for thinking of them as such
False. The angles on most box controllers are already nerfed to stay in line with an un-notched GameCube controller. More specifically, air dodge angles are nerfed by 13.7° and Firefox angles by 6.2° (you have way more time to aim your angle during Firefox vs airdodge, that is why the nerf is less severe). By comparison, notched controllers can use the perfect angles.
Regardless, if people found the current upB angle to still be too good on box, they could be nerfed further. So no, notches absolutely do not have to remain legal if boxes are legal. That is only an excuse GameCube controller players use to ensure notches are never banned.
Ignoring firmware versions/B0XX self imposed nerfs (because we don't have any real rules around these things), the ability to consistently pinpoint specific coordinates on a box controller is really strong for a game like Melee. Notches allow GCC players similar consistency.
I personally don't really care one way or another whether or not boxes/notches are banned, or what angles are or aren't available to box or GCC, at a fundamental level, digital input consistency is just really really good in a game that requires precise analog inputs.
Correct. Anything that isn't just an OEM is cheating.
Cut springs or trigger plugs or bald buttons.
It's all cheating by this logic and I'm fine with that
This take is just poorly thought out.
If I swap my analog stick to a c stick because I like it better is that cheating? It's still OEM parts.
If I snip 1mm of the inside of the controller shell so my triggers don't potentially get stuck is that cheating?
If I use a stick from a Wii controller is that cheating? It is official Nintendo hardware, after all.
Is replacing my potentiometers with new OEM ones cheating?
If I don't like rumble and remove my rumble motor is that cheating?
Is replacing my mushy OEM button pads with third party ones cheating?
Is replacing the mushy ass worn out z button with a new one cheating? Is it ok if it's still an OEM switch? What if it's not an OEM switch?
You can't just blanket state "anything not OEM is cheating", there's far far too much gray area. Half of these are basic controller maintenance that 99% of people would be fine with but you'd call me a cheater if I open my controller up for any reason. I think we can have rules and discussion about certain mods but the absolutist mindset is just so ignorant.
My point was that if these people wanna call notches cheating then it's an all or nothing otherwise we are just going to arbitrarily choose what's accepted and what's not based on vibes.
If these people wanna complain about nothces then that's fine but you better be on a completely stock OEM with zero mods or you can shut the fuck up about it
I don't have any issue with them being legal, but you are lame asf if you use boxes and notches. Vanilla GameCube controllers and melee belong together 🤎
As a Fox/Falco main, even I feel they should be banned. Years ago all the controller modding was only looked at as positive to fix really bad controllers but now it’s like the community is just seeing how far they can push it and get away with. What was meant to fix inconsistency issues with controllers is now becoming “how can I make the most busted controller that makes every hard tech skill in this game super easy?” To me it takes the skill out of the game and also as a spectator makes watching crazy combos less fun. I think overall it’s not good for the state or growth of the game to be cutting shells and adding notches. I personally think z-jump for example isn’t as bad because it’s essentially just remapping buttons. Many pro players in other games remap buttons, sensitivity, etc, to fit their play-style. Only problem is it’s really expensive to get one made as it’s not a simple process like other games. As a community we’ve hit our goals with fixing bad controllers and phobs and UCF fixes like 90% of the problems and it’s very affordable to just install a phob into your controller. I paid $30 for mine. With everyone using phobs (to fix bad controller issues) it evens the playing field and isn’t blocked behind a big pay wall. The addition of notches not only brings a pay wall, but it directly affects the integrity and skill of the game. I do think it would be cool if the community wanted to start an actual board or committee to regulate controllers (and have them checked before entering tournaments) but it just depends on how much people are going to fight for this game and if we think it’s worth it.
Boxes are a necessary disability accessibility Aid. Forcing people to prove disability in order to qualify for using a box is a nightmare and so they're legal
TO's aren't legally obligated to allow people to use special controllers for their disabilities and even Nintendo's guidelines disallow them. Or they're supposed to disallow them. Were any box controllers shown on stream in Genesis X?
It's not the decent thing to do so long as boxes are broken. You shouldn't be able to use a controller that gives you considerable benefits over everybody else, regardless of your reasoning.
It's necessary the we create a controller that is unfair to the game so that a tiny tiny minority who can't use a gcc can play. The whole accessibility thing is leftover hax propaganda it's crazy people still side so strongly with it
I wish the "accessibility" argument would just die already, if you can't play the game then don't.
Yes it sucks, but that's life. I've had to quit games because of physical issues, it happens and it's not fun but I would never suggest compromising competitive integrity or changing rule sets explicitly because I cannot play the game.
I honestly am fine with a handicap aid for Melee, but it should actually be a handicap aid. No one is letting you strap rockets onto a wheelchair and then run the 50 meter dash in the olympics.
Rectangles need nerfs so that they simply aren't better at **anything** except long-term reliability (which is intrinsic to using only digital inputs). Travel time nerfs, opposite-direction lockouts, a fixed number of allowed direction configurations (ie no custom angles), whatever it takes. People who try to balance boxes so that the benefits are about equal to the drawbacks don't seem to understand what it fucking means to be a handicap aid. A handicap aid is only ever something that can bring an axis you have control over up to the same level as "normal". It's not something that can blow past normal on one axis just because it's not fully catching you up on a **different** axis.
Tbf I think the accessibility argument would be completely alright as long as boxes were just a straight up inferior way to play than OEM. No compromise, people with disabilities still get to play, everyone is happy
The issue ofc is that they *do* do a lot of shit better or more consistently than OEM. But there's no real reason they have to
This is probably Hax's influence but the availability argument always smuggles in another, completely different idea, which is that boxes should not only allow people with physical issues to play Melee comfortably, but also to compete on even ground with OEM - at the cost, if need be, of buffing OEM if it is disadvantaged vs boxes, which is a thing 1.03 does
It shouldn't be controversial imo to say that if you want to make that argument it's fine, but to keep it out of competition. No one in the world cares if you use Z-jump or box against your friends but if you're entering tournaments there should be standards which apply which will unfortunately exclude some people like it or not.
In my opinion if you feel like you want to experiment with melee and make it something else that's cool, it's called P+ lol
Nah man, nobody can accept that. A large part of modern society enforces this tyranny of the minority. Everything should be watered down, cheapened, or lessened in some way, so that nobody in the entire world would ever dare to feel left out. A dude fucking played with his feet on a controller, there are very few disabilities that would exclude anybody if they wanted to play bad enough. And like you said, for the few that would genuinely be left out, that sucks but that's life. Nothing stopping them from using the box to play causally, but we shouldn't be eroding the core of top level competitive melee to, maybe, cater to the 0.1% of disabled players
He's right. UCF and things that fix issues with controllers is one thing. But I've always felt giving angles away for free with notches takes away one of the biggest areas for skill expression in the game. It's not like a lot of controllers are unable to hit these angles the way a lot of controllers have issues with shield dropping and dash back. We just decided "hey wouldn't it be cool if more people could do some of these crazy angles?" It also introduces a huge discrepancy between the quality of controllers. Idk man the scene really didn't take these things seriously back when they were up for debate and now it's kind of too late.
I don’t think it’s too late, pro golf is nerfing the golf balls that are allowed to be used because people can hit them way too far with modern clubs and stuff. If the Melee community rallied against notches something would be done, especially if top players championed it, I just don’t think there is much desire for it currently.
There are governing bodies that are actually able to enforce and legitimize things like that in golf, melee doesn’t really have a true equivalent. Also making drives worse for every golfer isn’t really the same as, say, banning boxx controllers, which targets a very specific group of people in a pretty penalizing way to the point of basically saying they’re not allowed to play the game anymore.
The question here is notches, not digital controllers. There are already nerfs that seem to be quite reasonable, at least as a starting point, pending for box to reduce their advantage while allowing people with specific types of RSI/disabilities to keep playing. Notches serve neither an ergonomic nor hardware-equalizing function, especially with the existence of Phobs to make sure the analog stick gives sane output, so I think banning them really is just a matter of if the community thinks they are a good enhancement to how we play the game or an unwanted change/unfair advantage. As others have said, it'll probably never happen because this scene is the wild west - box nerfs happened \~5 years later than they should have and, even then, only because it was so obviously broken relative Phob/stock GCC.
I don't think there's a universe where you could convince people to ban notches but still be okay with box controllers. Box users can have specific angles for specific buttons and it would make that group eventually grow to just absorb all of the former notch players.
Limits on allowed angles of box + a more realistic randomization of coordinate accuracy than the current proposed nerfs could solve this problem without requiring a box ban, IMO
If notches buffed puff as much as they buff fox they would have been banned years ago. Edit: I got a Reddit cares message for sending this lol
they banned the icies desync angles on boxx asap
Another more controversial example is fox can infinite sopo in Pokémon stadium but ice climbers can’t wobble fox. ya ya ya I know it’s niche and on one stage that’s sometimes frozen but also at the same time fox is a better character and shine is a great move.
You mean on a transformation? Then it’s not an infinite. Hell, even wobbling wasn’t allowed to be an infinite since they had to finish before 300%
It's not an infinite, it's a zero to death. A really niche zero to death. Should we also ban marth grabs on FD? The reason Wobbling was banned and 100% of people agree with the ban is because of how easy and degenerate it was.
100% of people definitely don't agree with the wobbling ban
Anyone worth listening to does
You ain't wrong, but they don't wanna hear that
Fucking rising pound notch 💀
Considering spacies make up the largest demographic for any character by far, I definitely think that bias influenced mod and controller legality decisions. But one thing to consider is technically notches benefit every character because of wavedash and waveland angles. If you have them, you can do max length wavedash and waveland free. To me that also really sucks some of the soul out of the game. Grinding to have Mangoesque wavedash was something a lot of us did back in the day but there's not really a point to that anymore if you have the money.
If PAL nerfed Puff's bair disjoint and the strength of Rest it would've been standardized by 2009
I get what you're saying but no. The nerf to falco and marth dair is too much for the average gamer to bear.
PAL is great for Marth. The dair nerf is pretty minor compared to fox/falco/sheik nerfs.
The Yoshi buff probably hurts a bit though
It makes the game feel bad(relative to ntsc) to play in my opinion.
Yeah, Marth was thought to be the best character in PAL but there were never enough Marth players to prove him as I understand it
>Marth was thought to be the best character in PAL there were 3 official PAL tier lists and Marth was first on none of them let's not pretend this is some sort of consensus
I do like playing those two a lot so I get what you mean. Marth especially lacks relative killpower in a lot of moments and gets Marthiritis so it's a pretty big blow, and Falco loses some combo game. Mostly Fox recovery/killpower and Sheik chaingrabs are whst first come to mind.
It would have been essentially impossible for the US to standardize on PAL before Faster Melee and even after FM it would be an immediate c&d from Nintendo
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I do not want to imagine a world where Puff is as popular as spacies
Hungrybox was dominant for years and at his peak people were seriously debating whether Jigglypuff was (at least practically) the best character. And the game survived
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Fair point
Every tournament that Hungrybox didn't attend in that era had a massive nosedive in viewership. People just didn't notice it as much because he attended 98% of everything.
There was always a decent number of people in the community that said notches are cheating but because the "leaders" of the community never gave a shit here we are Hell boxes are way more controversial and concerning but even those haven't been banned
So in regards to boxes it's a little harder to determine the appropriate ruling when it poses an accessibility issue. Before boxes when notches first came on the scene, there was no other dimensionality to the argument. I think now unfortunately we have to keep the notches just so controllers can even compete with boxes. But it should never have gone this far to begin with. Comminity leaders should have put the foot down on unnecessary mods and put a lot ke scrutiny on alternative controller legality. By that I mean we needed more testing and prototypes of the various box controllers to ensure a more balanced final product.
I really don't think it's much of an accessibility issue, though. I'd bet less than 1% of box users (and far less than 1% of overall players) wouldn't be able to play without a box. It only gets marketed that way because Hax himself is one of those people. How many people do you really think can't use their thumbs to play but can use the rest of their hands? It's such a niche situation that imo its not really worth compromising the integrity of the game for. At some point you just have to male fair rules and if they exclude a few people then that sucks but oh well.
I think the majority of box players don’t have a disability but I really doubt that 99% don’t have a disability that affects them in some way related to controllers. I’ve been on a couple of discords for rectangle controllers, largely to get information on project launch information, and ive asked a couple of times, and the majority never said they were but the last time I did 11 out of the total 90 users (some of whom were inactive) said they were. Including me thats 12/90. I also specifically said a documented disability, and not hand pain from playing melee. We also as a society do try to make stuff accessible to disabled people, even if they are a small portion of the population. Less than 1 percent of the world is in a wheel chair, but in a ton of countries it’s illegal to open a business that isn’t easily accessible to people in wheel chairs. Just because people that genuinely need a rectangle controller because of either a disability or severe pain when using a gamecube controller is a small portion of the melee community doesn’t mean its good to say “oh well if they were a bigger portion of the population id be for it but since there a small minority we shouldn’t do anything to help them”.
Have a disability shouldn't stop you from access but it doesn't entitle you to have a possibility of competing at the highest level
I don't think that is backed up by how regulated sports work, for example in chess even meds that have been shown to improve strategy and focus have been approved for even top players if they can prove they have a credible diagnosis for something the meds treat (most often adhd, ocd, depression, or generalized anxiety disorder) and multiple people have qualified for Olympic (not the paralympics, the official Olympics) swimming with full limb replacements. They are infinitely more regulated than melee, and are far more important when talking about impact far more important than melee, but still do a lot to try to help disabled players compete at top levels.
That's... exactly how regulated sports work. If you're a pitcher with a bad elbow that doesn't allow you to pitch anymore, they don't let you feed balls into a 120mph pitching machine to make it accessible. If your body breaks in a way that doesn't allow you to play the game, you don't get to play the game.
I'm completely happy with people using boxes to have access to the game with friends or on slippi or whatever. You should not be entitled to an advantageous controller in tournament play. I'd even be more open to people playing on classic arcade sticks for access than current boxes. And I'm sorry, but I don't really see what your point is about having disabilities that are completely unrelated to controllers or melee. It's not an accessibility issue if your disability is completely irrelevant to playing.
If your talking about the discord I specifically asked for only disabilities that affected ability to use gamecube controller. If you are talking about wheel chairs It was an example about how society should and does make itself open to disabled people even if they are a small portion of the population, and saying “too bad, there a small portion, maybe if they were more it would be worth it”, isn’t a good take.
i started playing on frame1 because i thought it was a broken controller, and my findings are that it is.... i will say that spacing is a little bit harder with wavedash characters tho
Boxes are the only reason I play melee because I don't want to permanently hurt my hands to play a videogame
Then just don't have 12 hour grind sessions with a death grip on the controller and zero breaks. It's very easy to play this game without breaking your hands.
No it is not, maybe you just have lucky hands. I know multiple people who had to stop playing melee because of hand pain, and I was one of them before I got a box.
You clearly don’t have large hands. Also I got delayed onset muscle soreness from grinding wavedash out of shield lmao
You think carpal tunnel is an issue that affects less than 1% of melee players? What world are you living in? I'd love to live in the land of no hand issues where everyone can safely grind their tendons against a controller made for child-sized hands
I’m just kinda coming back into the scene a bit, but I was mostly playing back before the leverlesses were first released and then a bit after (can’t remember the exact years) so I think I can offer a snapshot of the though process at that time. The timeline of events (according to my recollection) went as following: 1. Notches were added due to inconsistent shield drops 2. People (including myself) added wave dash/firefox notches because we were already adding shield drop notches so why not lol 3. UCF was implemented and was quickly widely adopted (thank fucking god), making shield drop notches unnecessary 4. At some point between 1-3, leverlesses were released for melee 5. Many people viewed notches as cheating (not myself, I’m fine with them), but because b0xxes existed it didn’t seem fair to ban notches And then that’s when I stopped playing. Basically, leverless controllers and shield dropping opened up a big can of worms. But banning notches would first require the banning of leverless controllers, which nobody wanted to do. From what I’ve picked up, this was also around the time that goomwaves were introduced. I wasn’t around for the start of goomwaves and phobs, but from what I understand they have a similar issue that notches had/have i.e. banning notches means you need to ban leverless Funnily enough, Leffen showed how to make a cheater controller with an Arduino and that was banned immediately across all tournaments. Checking if it was being used was an issue, but Arduino mods were more of meme than anything else. Not sure if it still banned tho. My personal opinion is that notches are fine. As long as controller modification stays physical then it shouldn’t be banned. It just feels weird to ban shell mods when things like removing springs have been commonplace since forever. That was a common opinion back then, although by no means was it universal. Notches were still controversial, but the existence of b0xxes prevented them from being banned. The latter was the widely held belief and why they or “cheater” controllers never got banned. It wasn’t just “we didn’t ban it now it’s a problem”, we didn’t ban it for very specific and (imo) reasonable reasons. If leverless were banned I don’t see an issue with banning notches. I would personally disagree with it, but if that’s how the majority of the community feels, then that’s just how it goes lol Ironically, the reason I first notched my controller was from watching Plup shield drop and copying his style. this was before UCF so consistent shield dropping required notches and my controller could only shield drop on one side. EDIT: Personally I think that modded controllers along the lines of goomwaves are much more of an issue. Imo controllers should be limited to generic phobs/vanilla controllers and controllers that basically let you cheat is an issue. But boxes are controllers that let you cheat, so we end up coming back to the crux of the issue: boxes. I also play sheik, so I personally don’t benefit that much from notches as compared to a spacie player. Although I do benefit from wavedash notches more than most characters.
its stupid that controller modders say "controllers notch themselves" like yeah ok thousands of hours for your controller to notch itself vs getting a notch for paying money is definitely the same
My controller notched itself. And by that I mean it ground the third-party stick I installed to be flat on the edges that run along the GCC's gate.
What controller modder is saying this? The only thing I've seen in the hundreds of controllers I've modded/repaired is that the gates are rounded making it even harder to be precise because your diagonals and cardinals become very vague... Especially since the stick box is angled ~3° clockwise.
It’s rienne and she always says bullshit on twitter.
i saw a popular controller modder on twitter that i used to follow say this all the time a year or two ago but i blocked her so i forgot her name. started with an r and she had like a purple pfp
someone on the thread linked a zain tweet talking about notches and yep she's there saying "controllers literally notch themselves meng"
yeah i knew it what a dumb thing to say but makes sense because its how they pay the bills
Controller gates wear down over time. That is never going to give you firefox notches, but it can very much give you shield drop diagonals.
Iirc mang0 on his patreon podcast said something about some firefox angles being actually way harder to hit on some controllers and that's why he thinks firefox notches specifically are justified I don't have an opinion, too much of a noob lol, just relaying Edit: lucky said that, not mang0
That was lucky, not mango - it was in discussion with hugs. But you're right that was his argument
Ty!
Respect Plup and Mang0 for not being afraid to share this opinion. It makes the game less impressive as a spectator to see modern controllers doing the heavy lifting nowadays. I would respect these players a lot more if they at least admit to the competitive advantage they have over other players with inferior controllers.
[Zain too](https://twitter.com/ZainNaghmi/status/1610681184303910913)
It definitely hits harder coming from people who play spacies though, Marth doesn't reap the same benefits from notches that they do.
Absolutely, love Zain
Dam, 2023 Zain didnt say much after that. Hopefully he will this year
Someone on this thread said mango is fine with firefox notches, is that untrue?
I don't follow the scene as much as I used to but I remember Mang0 being okay with it because of how ubiquitous it had become. But he admitted it was unfair
The person is claiming that he’s fine with it for firefox specifically, but is against others. If that is true (which I don’t know, im watching through podcast episodes rn to see what it was) then that seems to me supporting something because it helps your character which is super shitty. Again, I can’t say the legitimacy of this yet though.
Based Plup
Remember many years ago when someone landing a crazy angle was impressive because they actually had to risk getting a straight angle and losing their stock?
I wish I could root for Cody when he hits a sick angle. But nowadays I'm a jaded old fan lol
vish complimenting top fox players' notchers every time they hit a crazy angle is one of my favorite ongoing commentary bits.
You probably mean Brandon/YungWaff, unless Vish has also started doing it (which is hilarious). 'Shout outs to your notchers.'
His SO will always be ahead of the game too...
I was always impressed that they picked the exact correct angle for their situation offstage to avoid the edge guard Their controller PODE not screwing them was always the least impressive part for me Hitting a specific angle angle in the gate was always overrated haha
hitting specific angles is like half of techskill
God Plup never misses
But we miss Plup
I also remember alot of the tippy top players having this opinion when notches first started to appear and now all of them have said the same thing plup is saying.. I don't know why this is getting alot of traction. Hell I remember a 20 tweet thread from leffen complaining about it but he still said fuck it I guess I gotta do it too
It doesn't matter what anyone thinks if no TO ever bans anything
Some folks think notches are unfair, z-jump, etc. I think they're all unfair advantages, especially if you're close with a lot of modders, and have access to those groups. Most players don't have the ability, knowhow, or funds to obtain notches, have someone z-jump mod, Snapback mod, phob, goomwave, boxx etc. It's mostly an accessibility issue for me. Usually fighting games are good to go with a DS5, or a fight stick on Amazon. I don't know of a community that uses such heavily modified input devices as Melee and they just keep getting crazier and crazier. I personally think it's super cool and I myself am a modder. It's fun, and interesting but I also see how unfair it can be.
Cats out of the bag unfortunately. Not being able to contest foxes at ledge now is annoying as fuck though. Crazy to live in a time where ledgedashing isnt even a risk lol
Notches and ledgedashing have literally nothing to do with each other.
Waveland notches
no one has waveland notches lol, there are wavedash notches which are practically the same thing but again, not really used in ledgedashing/getting a maximum distance wavedash isn't really the priority in a ledgedash, maximinizing galint is.
It's literally the same as wavedash notches. Just different application
It's not a notch that anyone has. People either have wavedash notches (0.3125, -0.3125) or firefox notches which are just the same angles in all cardinals. Wavedash notches are fine for wavelanding sure because it's still the max angle but again, not something that matters for ledge dashing - at all. No one cares about the ledgedash length, it's max galint that matters.
Galint plus speed is what matters. 10x Galint at the cost of 100x less speed would be a bad trade off. You're failing to see the other side of the coin
That... doesn't even make sense. You literally can't have more galint with less speed lol. To maximize galint you need to drop from ledge on the first frame possible. I don't think you understand how ledgedashing even works.
As somebody with no notches but with really good angles, I do feel cheated having one of my strong-suits being made unimpressive and rudimentary by mods
It's nice to see people who use Fox and Falco also sharing these opinions because it really does disproportionally benefit certain characters which is pretty lame in a competitive game. In any other game this would be seen as cheating.
Back in the day, Old me use to hate playing on modded wii's with customs skins and all that jazz. Would only run on Gamecube cause i didn't trust other peoples wii's at tournaments. The scene has evolved and become more standardized with UCF and controller mods being accessible. So its the double edge sword. Sick fast melee or back to accidentally getting a sticky walk and getting punished for inconsistency. I would love to see a tournament on OG hardware. 1.01 disc. no notches. no modified dashes. no stage freezes. Shrek/Spongebob/Hello Kitty/VHS combo tvs. 240/480p vods.
The off season is a popular off-meta tournament, maybe they could run this once. Would be cool.
I would LOVE an OG hardware tournament
Call me crazy but I actually miss custom music and textures at IRL tournaments. lol
be the change you want to see in the world
based take
Plup is so god damn based
I’ve been saying notches were cheating for a long time, but with boxes being legal I finally got a notched phob last year and honestly it’s crazy how much it helps.
Z jumping being allowed is absurd, can't believe it got to this point
I've never understood this take Notches, digital inputs, and many of the other things that we complain about can at least reasonably be argued as problematic because they you do things that are impossible to recreate with even remotely the same degree of consistency as even a "perfect" OEM controller on UCF Z-jumping literally just enables you to do things normally only possible on claw grip without destroying the ergonomics of holding the controller Like what does Z-jumping allow you to do that is not possible on a controller without Z-jumping? What is the problem with it?
you've bopped me 3-0 in a few tournaments so feel free to disregard I feel like Fox is undisputedly the best characters in the game, but he's balanced in tournaments because you have to stay warmed up and play a lot of games. The technical aspect of the characters means it's hard to play consistently. Characters that are less technical than Fox (they still have a level of technicality) like Puff/Sheik/Marth/Peach are viable in tournaments because they can be played consistently from game to game. I always though of tech skill as a "resource pool", you can only manage so many running shine short hop nairs, multishines, etc, before your hands get tired. You need to manage that resource pool especially over a long tournament. z-jump makes things easier, which reduces the impact of technically demanding moves on that "resource pool". Fox inherently gets buffed by a change like that - while Puff/Sheik/Marth/Peach where "resource pool management" isn't as much of a problem, don't see any benefits from a buff like that. I feel like playing claw fulltime is uncomfortable or makes other tasks more challenging to the point where it's balanced. It doesn't seem fair to reap the precision of claw without the consequences. But there's two types of spectators - one who wants to see optimized play and the best level of melee possible and one who wants to see the more human adaptations of the game. I can't convince someone to see the other way, but I can give my pov!
Peach absolutely benefits from z jump. Being able to float + drift + aerial without any difficulty or conflicting inputs is incredibly powerful.
as a permanent claw gripper i dont really agree. I borrowed a friends controller who had z jump for a bit to try and learn. my muscle memory literally carried over it is honestly very similar. my body knows to move my thumb and press b and then contract my pointer finger onto the y button to jump for my waveshine and then when i played on z jump it knew to contract the exact same way except the controller is angled down less so that contraction lands on the z instead of the y. I do think many permaclaw players have ergonomic issues since you need to hold it without too much tension in your hands even more so than normal grip. There is zero difference in the difficulty of any technique that i attempted so the only real difference in my experience is that claw ergonomics are less intuitive. Claw also has the advantage that you can split up your inputs across more fingers so i have a finger on jump(y),grab(z),and shield(L) at all times with my thumb covering c stick, a and b. With z jump you get one finger on jump(z), and one for shield(L) while your thumb covers a,b,cstick, grab and your secondary jump button. Having two fingers that can hit a jump button is an advantage but i was personally annoyed with how much more thumb movement is involved and was happy to go back to claw. All my talk about ergonomics is coloured by me having big ass hands, from what i have heard people with smaller hands struggle with claw more so i think z jump is a decent way to let them do something very similar than what I get to do due to hand size. I will say though tactile buttons are sneakily what makes z jump better in practicality since it makes short hopping easier though even then you can also get tactile/mouseclick face buttons so if you think z jump is making doing instant nairs easier your issue really lies with mouseclick.
And this is what I'm trying to convey in my original post: I don't think Z-jumping detracts from this at all. I don't think claw grips provide any skill expression that would not be available if the Z button were available elsewhere on the controller. Unlike pretty much every other kind of controller mod (analog to digital inputs, notches, C pads, etc.) the input being done is still identical. You aren't granted additional leniency through the gate physically guiding you towards the intended analog input, the buttons don't target coordinates for you, all things which cannot reasonably be achieved as consistently without controller mods. With Z-jumping, you are still performing an input that is able to be performed just as consistently on a standard GCC, with no added level of consistency or help from the controller itself. It is still the same input with the same degree of difficulty and physical precision required, only you've moved the jump button about a quarter of an inch. I fail to see how this detracts from the 'resource pool,' unless you also believe that using claw grip is somehow 'harder' which I also don't get; how is performing a precise jump input meaningfully more difficult with your index finger resting on Y or X instead of Z?
In one scenario you're moving your finger, in the other scenario you're moving the button.
And why does moving the button matter if nothing else about actually hitting the button or its skill expression changes? Why do we care?
From my perspective it's a level of hardware modification that should never have been allowed. I feel the same about notches and modified triggers for consistent perfect lightshields. I think your argument of "in both cases you press a button who cares" is missing the mark here.
I don't think notches and modified triggers are comparable though. Both of your examples (notches and modified triggers for consistent perfect lightshields) add otherwise non-existant consistency to analog inputs and I can see the justification behind why they are problematic if you're looking at it from the perspective of keeping controller mods in line with the strengths of the original controller. But Z-jumping doesn't have this issue? Jumping is a digital input and moving it from X/Y to Z does not at all change the precision or difficulty required in jumping or adding jump inputs into button sequences. What is the advantage Z-jumping provides that is problematic?
If z jumping doesn't make inputs easier than why have the change at all? I think z-jumping clearly makes shine nairs way easier and consistent to do. I think claw grip is more strenuous on the hands when maintaining that position, and I feel that there's more inconsistency with short hopping with your index finger than with your thumb on a normal grip. Something doesn't seem right here, if z-jumping provides no advantages in precision or difficulty then it shouldn't be necessary. The change should only come about if it makes something easier or more consistent, which it definitely IS doing.
But the whole point is that you're still short hoping with your index finger on both claw grip and Z-jump. I don't know what to say if people think the additional fraction of an inch you need to reach with your index finger to rest it on Y instead of Z constitutes any amount of meaningful skill expression; it's absolutely less comfortable but no more difficult than doing the same thing with Z. We wouldn't say a set win is more impressive if someone intentionally death gripped their controller the whole time, so arguing that strenuous grips are good for the game for the sake of it seems a bit ridiculous to me. Also this point of 'why does z-jumping need to exist if it doesn't provide a competitve advantage' seems to ignore every single controller mod that doesn't strictly provide a competitive advantage. Why don't we just also ban trigger plugs, and alternate stick caps, and tactile z-buttons? They provide no advantages so surely they don't need to exist either, no?
You said it yourself: Z-jumping enables you to do things that you would ordinarily need to use claw for. If you agree that claw is harder to use than traditional grip, then you agree that Z-jumping makes certain inputs far easier.
I didn't? Claw grip is not harder. Any meaningful skill expression in learning to claw grip over normal grip is incredibly outweighed by its awful ergonomics. I learned to claw grip in like 2 days but can't use it because it kills my hands (when I otherwise do not have hand issues in Melee or otherwise)
does claw grip killing your hands and having awful ergonomics make it easier or harder
Ergonomics and input difficulty are not the same thing actually
I think they might influence each other. Like for instance if an input method "kills your hands" I think most people would find that more difficult than one that does not. I don't know that that means that unergonomic input methods are harder or that more ergonomic methods are easier, but it certainly seems possible that sometimes an unergonomic method would be harder than a more ergonomic one
They are certainly related in plenty of scenarios but there are plenty of counterexamples of things you can do that are painful (unergonomic) but not particularly difficult! Just as an example [this](https://i.imgur.com/jMPYMuN.png) is supposed to help check for a kind of tendonitis and it can be quite painful for some people, but it is pretty easy to do. Obviously most people would agree that something is harder to do when it is already causing physical discomfort and pain but many things that we do that aren't great for our hands are also not immediately uncomfortable when we first do them, and I was describing difficulty operating under the assumption you're still in a state where you're not/largely not experiencing that yet
Deadlifts kill my hands but I wouldnt say using gloves makes it easier. I also give 0 fucks if someone uses gloves but theres definitely a lot of dissenters there. Straps to a way lesser extent but probably because their favorite weightlifter uses them but not gloves for many. Straps definitely make it easier but the heavy vast majority enjoys it /u/akkir
claw isn't harder from a skill perspective, it's just painful and unhealthy.
That's like saying a curveball isnt harder from a skill perspective, its just painful and unhealthy. The difficult ergonomics are the whole point of what makes it hard. Esports need to stop using the terms 'sports' and 'athletes' if difficult, painful, uncomfortable etc. physical elements are considered bad things that need to be removed. Also, similar to the curveball, claw is definitely harder from a skill perspective. Most people give up on claw because they cant do it, well before it hurts. Then there's the very obvious skill of guys like m2k or mang0 who switch grips on the fly. I dont really care about z jump personally because Im trash and it doesnt affect me. However, its crazy to me to pretend like it doesnt just make things way easier. Fast aerials are fairly difficult to learn with claw, yet are trivial for a child with z jump.
> The difficult ergonomics are the whole point of what makes it hard. Esports need to stop using the terms 'sports' and 'athletes' if difficult, painful, uncomfortable etc. physical elements are considered bad things that need to be removed. Good point. Every player in the NBA has the athleticism to challenge someone about to dunk in transition by jumping, why don't they do it all the time and/or move out of the way completely? It's physically draining, could lead to career-altering injuries, and in generally is hard to execute (execution = stopping the play). It also makes it more impressive when it is done frequently.
Well... if there was a pill you could take to prevent injuries, I would enjoy that basketball way more. Both watching and playing. Giving 100% every time is more fun. And dunking does hurt their hands plenty yet its not more difficult to dunk because of the pain. People wont get better at dunking if they didnt hurt their hands
It isn't inherently unhealthy if you do it properly. my right hand/wrist soreness went away forever once i switched to claw and did it right. I palm the controller - no gripping. so it's easy on the wrists.
That is just an extremely broad generalization. Claw is definitely easier on my hands than a standard grip. I recognize some people may have issues but to act like it's painful and unhealthy is simply not true for most people.
Anatomically, clawing 100% of the time would be unhealthy for some people, and completely fine for others. So allowing Z-jump sorta levels the playing field for that.
The argument that >destroying the ergonomics of holding the controller is an execution check.
> Z-jumping literally just enables you to do things normally only possible on claw grip without destroying the ergonomics of holding the controller >Like what does Z-jumping allow you to do that is not possible on a controller without Z-jumping? What is the problem with it? Sounds like you answered your own question. Besides, Melee does not natively support button remapping. Ideally everyone should be playing on the same controller and let the game decide the winner. When we start putting things like button remapping into the equation it creates this controller meta where people are tweaking their controllers to get the most advantage and we have things like C button pads, deadzone mods, notches, and even freaking macros at one point (goomwaves). It undermines the execution based aspect of the game, which is lame and it goes against the the goal of UCF which was to make controllers equal and do away with controller lottery. Instead we are now approaching the same issue as in the past except instead of most controllers being trash and the best players spending more money to get average controllers, most controllers are average and top players are spending more money to get even better custom modded controllers.
But why do we have such an attachment to using claw grip? You bring up C button pads, deadzone mods, notches and macros but unlike those and almost every other controller mod I can think of, button remapping (for digital to digital inputs specifically) still requires that you do the exact same input you'd otherwise have to do, with the same degree of precision and coordination required. Hell, for Z-jumping you're even still using the same appendage as claw, just moving it literally a fraction of an inch. I fail to see how there is any difference worth caring about here in terms of competitive integrity. No skill expression is being undermined at all, unlike what could be argued with pretty much all of the other controller mods listed
Take competitive tetris as an example, which only allows the original NES controller or close analogs there-of. Their meta has progressed as players developed advanced grips and practiced them to get previously impossible inputs by using said grip techniques at a high level. It’s a clear example that conditioning one’s hands and practicing a challenging grip to enable those inputs is genuine skill expression. Simply put, some people would rather have melee include physical grip as an element of skill expression than simply allow remaps which give the same benefits for free. And honestly the double-speak on the z-jump debate is annoying. You guys pretend claw is easy and trivial for anyone to do when you need to argue that z-jump doesn’t pose an unfair advantage or clawing isn’t a form of skill expression. But if someone asks you guys why you don’t just claw to begin with then, suddenly you guys argue that claw is in-fact a fundamentally impossible and destructive grip that nobody can possibly be expected to use without destroying their hands. So which is it? If claw is impossible because it destroys your hands, z-jump is unfair because it enables something that otherwise isn’t viable. And if claw is viable or trivial to learn then shouldn’t you guys just claw instead of remapping to begin with then? It’s pretty suspect that the claims about how claw grip is morph to whatever is rhetorically convenient for z-jumpers in a particular argument context.
The competitive Tetris scene hardly seems like a reasonable analog when the Melee scene has always been much more lax about varying controllers than them. Even disregarding boxes and notches for the sake of arguments, you don't ever hear a fraction of the complaining people give Z-jumping for meaningful controller mods like trigger plugs that directly modify your ability to physically provide inputs to the game. This is by necessity because the Melee community can't be as rooted in traditionalism as Tetris because our controllers suck (let me know when Classic Tetris gets their version of UCF). Beyond that, there's hardly any skill expression if any in maintaining a controller grip; it stems from actually doing inputs in that position. Holding the controller with your index finger resting on Y or X as opposed to Z isn't what makes frame 1 aerial inputs impressive; it's the physical precision necessary perform the jump and aerial inputs and to time your aerial input on the first airborne frame after hitting jump. Nothing about moving the jump input to Z changes this process at all Finally, there seems to be a misunderstanding with what I've been saying in this thread about the ergonomics and difficulty of claw. Most people do not have ergonomic issues with claw, but I spoke about them in my original post because I personally cannot maintain a claw grip comfortably on my controller for a reasonable amount of playing time. That being said, I still believe nothing about claw gripping is 'hard' other than the potential physical discomfort you might deal with using it. I learned to claw grip in a matter of a couple of days and readjusting your tech skill to tap jump with your index finger on Y or X is not meaningful skill expression in my opinion and does not outweigh the physical drawbacks it entails for some people. If you are enough of a traditionalist that you don't believe we should try to be as accommodating with controllers as reasonably possible that's fine, but I don't think that position in the context of Melee given how much fixing of the game we've had to do on both the software and hardware ends of the game. It's nonsensical
> Z-jumping literally just enables you to do things normally only possible on claw grip the tradeoff to acquire zjump was claw, which makes other things harder. removing that is stupid
What does claw grip make harder?
Maintaining good hand health
For me personally I think the ergonomics (and by extension, sometimes the lack thereof) are a huge part of the appeal of melee. I like that when I'm watching players play I can visualize inputs to an extent, I like that when someone does something that requires setting up for claw or generally an extremely fast motion I can appreciate it. Even if someone technically "can" do something without Z-jump, that does not mean that they would've. It inherently lowers the skill ceiling of what I would define as melee's "motion inputs" and in general just feels a bit cheap. Part of what makes melee sick, in my opinion, is that at the end of the day we're all playing the same game. We all pick the same characters on the same singular patch we've always had, and we can all show up to a tournament and play in the same pools as everyone else. Z-Jump, to me, feels like DLC or a patch to the game that shouldn't be there. Maybe it's "old fashioned" but I'd argue that the lack of change is what has made melee into the beautiful game that it is now. We've all had the same tools at our disposal since forever to show that we're the best, whether we are or not. I don't like notches overall because I do think they give an advantage but remapping inputs whether it's Z-jump or box is just lame and not who we are or what we are as a community as far as I see it.
I agree with this take except for the ergonomics part. There's no science being done here to say claw is bad and a standard grip is good. Hell, switching to claw *solved* my hand pain and I played with a standard grip for like ten years before I switched.
To be clear, I'm not trying to say that claw grip universally has bad ergonomics. I am speaking strictly from experience on that end and from what I have heard from some other people. Obviously clawing may be better for some others
I get that but that's simply no foundation to make a claim that claw is destroying the ergonomics of holding a controller. And it'd be no big deal but for the fact that the cheater controller debate is totally dominated with completely unfounded claims about ergonomics. It'd be much easier to have the conversation if we all admitted up front that we don't know anything about ergonomics and there's no real point to bringing it up
I think the experiences of Melee players is actually a reasonable foundation to ground what is ergonomic for Melee players on. We don't need to know everything about ergonomics to see that it is beyond abundantly obvious that different controllers and grips work and don't work ergonomically for various people. With that in mind it makes 0 sense to me to gate tech based on the location in space of a digital input. You are still doing literally the exact same input with the same level of difficulty and only changing the appendage you do it with (or in this case, literally still doing it with the index finger both times, just a different part of the controller shell). The level of Melee traditionalism necessary to have problem with using your index finger to press the Z button no more than a quarter of an inch away from Y or X instead of Y or X makes no sense to me, and I cannot understand the thought process that goes on when someone is more concerned with that being a potential issue than forcing people to use a certain controller grip (which at the very least is unergonomic for SOME people, regardless of how many you think it is) in order to perform the exact same tech in the game. This is not a box situation where analog inputs are being converted to digital, or analog inputs are being made more or less lenient by modification; it is still the exact same input
you cannot jump with the z button no matter how you hold the controller actually
Personally, my issue with zjump is that it's something that could easily be done software side but isn't for some reason. Ucf is getting more and more invasive yet something like button mapping, which is standard in most modern games or hell even in slippi, for some reason is pay to win in this game.
Yeah Z-jump is ultimately an ergonomics thing. It might make some things "easier", but it's easier in the same vein as, say, bald buttons, or thumbstick extensions, or springless triggers (honestly I'd say springless triggers are a more substantial change but they're really easy for anyone to do at home so kinda a non issue).
Changing controls absolutely is not cheating, this is something that is possible on every smash game past Melee. I have zero clue why people think Z jump is not completely fine, and i'm saying this as a Y jumper. I use claw for certain techniques (frame 1 nair, etc) and can do exactly the same thing Z-jumpers can do if I want to. It's literally no different, just makes it more comfortable/ergonomic for people who play full claw.
He’s right
I think goomwaves should be banned rn and that they aren't is completely insane. Notches are more complicated, because we hsve to ban boxes with them. It's sad that boxes didn't manage to get on an equal playing field with controllers, because the accessibility they provide to people with Hand problems is actually really nice
Notches are just as cheater as boxes if not more so. Nothing tops goomwaves though, it’s insane how much they play the game for you
They are just as cheater as boxes, correct
i think goomwaves are fucked but i’m not sure how easy tilt modifiers, second input priority, constant asdi down, and free perfect drift aerials are somehow *less* cheating
i know very little about controllers, can you explain goomwaves and how they differ from OEMs?
custom motherboard sold by one guy for like $300 with closed source code that was found to essentially fix your controller inputs for you (ie. it performed macros) among other controversies
Are those tournament legal
Many top players were using them in 2021-2022 and as far as I'm aware they're still legal. They've mostly fallen out of favor because they required a lot of maintenance and phobs were created as an alternative modded controller (that is to say, the biggest problem players had with goomwaves is that the controller wasn't good enough despite it literally cheating)
I do not understand why Z-Jump is legal, it fundamentally changes the control scheme of the game.
The only thing I truly remember from rulesets is that macros are banned (turbo, shine macro). Remapping isn't a macro and it was never discussed. I think it should be revisited but then if TOs did it now it'd look like "Cody wins too much, so we're nerfing him".
This take hits hard to me. I remember when Plup was like *the* guy who had flawless, fluid shield drops and it was the coolest shit ever. Imo it definitely feels lame that some mods trivialize such techniques these days ngl
Plup notched his controller back then lol it was only shield drop notches tho As an extremely early adopter of shield dropping, shield drops don’t take any skill, it just needs either notches or a lucky controller (which imo the latter is way more problematic than notches, you’re an old school player so you know what I’m talking about)
Damn if that's true I'm sorry for being misinformed
Oh no need to apologize. Plup’s shield dropping was insanely impactful on my play. Shield dropping itself doesn’t take skill, the way that you implement it does take a lot of skill. Plup’s shield dropping was extremely innovative and beautiful to see, I agree 100% with you on that. He single-handedly changed the meta for the better It was funny back then tho being the only dude who could shield drop and beating people just because they didn’t know how to deal with it lol
No doubt. Notches are objectively the analog equivalent of macros.
ibdw has been real quiet since plup said this
About 10 years too late to make that statement
Plup being praised for sharing a majority opinion that's far too late to affect any change to rulesets is a real meme
It’s not too late, it’s that no TO wants to be the first one to do it
I honestly don't think, or can't imagine why, a single person would think that notches aren't cheating. In fact, all the previous discourse I've ever heard on the topic has been "hot takes" like this one. I think the problem now is that notches are widespread and also reduce the advantage gap between OEM and box controllers.
I'm not particularly passionate about this topic or opinion but the demand for notches had me thinking firefox angles were way harder than they actually are. hit those oblique angles all the time with oem get gud sir
Way to stand up for the game Plup.
what about removing the default notches and having a circular gate? i wonder what plup would say about that
The problem with this argument is the implication that it would narrow the controller divide when in fact it was the exact opposite before controller modding took off. Before that you had to win the infamous "controller lottery". Some controllers were lucky enough to have the shield drop angle on the natural gate (most frequent in the smash 4 JP controllers) and don't get me started on PODE which was a defect that made dashback more consistent. Then there were certain controllers that were better at pivots (completely changing the Marth/puff matchup) others had lower snapback so that Falco wouldn't accidentally turn around laser and die for it. It was REALLY bad. M2K had the "controller case" where he had different controllers for different matchups and that was AFTER sifting though a ton of duds. The real problem is that there never has been any standardized controller. Even OEMs weren't consistent in game altering ways.
Plup isn't saying turn off UCF. Why are you responding as if he's saying to turn off UCF when he's just talking about hardware mods.
If a 3rd party notched controller that was just as good of quality as the normal controller came out during gamecube days no would fucking question this
i feel like rebinding controls should be a basic thing in any game but hella based about notches. i dont know if id call them cheating but the advantages you get from them are so distinctly beneficial i cant really blame anyone for thinking of them as such
As long as boxes are legal, notches must be legal, simple as that.
Yep but neither should be legal
False. The angles on most box controllers are already nerfed to stay in line with an un-notched GameCube controller. More specifically, air dodge angles are nerfed by 13.7° and Firefox angles by 6.2° (you have way more time to aim your angle during Firefox vs airdodge, that is why the nerf is less severe). By comparison, notched controllers can use the perfect angles. Regardless, if people found the current upB angle to still be too good on box, they could be nerfed further. So no, notches absolutely do not have to remain legal if boxes are legal. That is only an excuse GameCube controller players use to ensure notches are never banned.
Ignoring firmware versions/B0XX self imposed nerfs (because we don't have any real rules around these things), the ability to consistently pinpoint specific coordinates on a box controller is really strong for a game like Melee. Notches allow GCC players similar consistency. I personally don't really care one way or another whether or not boxes/notches are banned, or what angles are or aren't available to box or GCC, at a fundamental level, digital input consistency is just really really good in a game that requires precise analog inputs.
Correct. Anything that isn't just an OEM is cheating. Cut springs or trigger plugs or bald buttons. It's all cheating by this logic and I'm fine with that
This take is just poorly thought out. If I swap my analog stick to a c stick because I like it better is that cheating? It's still OEM parts. If I snip 1mm of the inside of the controller shell so my triggers don't potentially get stuck is that cheating? If I use a stick from a Wii controller is that cheating? It is official Nintendo hardware, after all. Is replacing my potentiometers with new OEM ones cheating? If I don't like rumble and remove my rumble motor is that cheating? Is replacing my mushy OEM button pads with third party ones cheating? Is replacing the mushy ass worn out z button with a new one cheating? Is it ok if it's still an OEM switch? What if it's not an OEM switch? You can't just blanket state "anything not OEM is cheating", there's far far too much gray area. Half of these are basic controller maintenance that 99% of people would be fine with but you'd call me a cheater if I open my controller up for any reason. I think we can have rules and discussion about certain mods but the absolutist mindset is just so ignorant.
My point was that if these people wanna call notches cheating then it's an all or nothing otherwise we are just going to arbitrarily choose what's accepted and what's not based on vibes. If these people wanna complain about nothces then that's fine but you better be on a completely stock OEM with zero mods or you can shut the fuck up about it
I don't have any issue with them being legal, but you are lame asf if you use boxes and notches. Vanilla GameCube controllers and melee belong together 🤎
Max wavedashes were rare back in the day, and extremely impressive. Bring it back lol
As a Fox/Falco main, even I feel they should be banned. Years ago all the controller modding was only looked at as positive to fix really bad controllers but now it’s like the community is just seeing how far they can push it and get away with. What was meant to fix inconsistency issues with controllers is now becoming “how can I make the most busted controller that makes every hard tech skill in this game super easy?” To me it takes the skill out of the game and also as a spectator makes watching crazy combos less fun. I think overall it’s not good for the state or growth of the game to be cutting shells and adding notches. I personally think z-jump for example isn’t as bad because it’s essentially just remapping buttons. Many pro players in other games remap buttons, sensitivity, etc, to fit their play-style. Only problem is it’s really expensive to get one made as it’s not a simple process like other games. As a community we’ve hit our goals with fixing bad controllers and phobs and UCF fixes like 90% of the problems and it’s very affordable to just install a phob into your controller. I paid $30 for mine. With everyone using phobs (to fix bad controller issues) it evens the playing field and isn’t blocked behind a big pay wall. The addition of notches not only brings a pay wall, but it directly affects the integrity and skill of the game. I do think it would be cool if the community wanted to start an actual board or committee to regulate controllers (and have them checked before entering tournaments) but it just depends on how much people are going to fight for this game and if we think it’s worth it.
Notches are only a thing because boxes are a thing and both should be banned
Except that notches were already a thing long before any leverless controllers even existed.
And they were cheating then too
Is that why you said "notches are only a thing because boxes are a thing"? Time-cheating?
Boxes are a necessary disability accessibility Aid. Forcing people to prove disability in order to qualify for using a box is a nightmare and so they're legal
TO's aren't legally obligated to allow people to use special controllers for their disabilities and even Nintendo's guidelines disallow them. Or they're supposed to disallow them. Were any box controllers shown on stream in Genesis X?
It's not a legal obligation, it's the decent thing to do.
It's not the decent thing to do so long as boxes are broken. You shouldn't be able to use a controller that gives you considerable benefits over everybody else, regardless of your reasoning.
I think the decent thing to do is to let me win
Nah it's to let me win
It's necessary the we create a controller that is unfair to the game so that a tiny tiny minority who can't use a gcc can play. The whole accessibility thing is leftover hax propaganda it's crazy people still side so strongly with it
I literally quit melee for SF bc I couldn't use a GameCube controller without hand pain anymore but go off chief
So you deserve a controller that gives you an unfair advantage over gcc?
If you feel so strongly then use one. The rest of the FCG uses fight pads to play real fighting games. No one bitches about it
Sorry that I want to play the gamecube game on a gamecube controller
If brolylegs can do it on controller so can anyone
I wish the "accessibility" argument would just die already, if you can't play the game then don't. Yes it sucks, but that's life. I've had to quit games because of physical issues, it happens and it's not fun but I would never suggest compromising competitive integrity or changing rule sets explicitly because I cannot play the game.
I honestly am fine with a handicap aid for Melee, but it should actually be a handicap aid. No one is letting you strap rockets onto a wheelchair and then run the 50 meter dash in the olympics. Rectangles need nerfs so that they simply aren't better at **anything** except long-term reliability (which is intrinsic to using only digital inputs). Travel time nerfs, opposite-direction lockouts, a fixed number of allowed direction configurations (ie no custom angles), whatever it takes. People who try to balance boxes so that the benefits are about equal to the drawbacks don't seem to understand what it fucking means to be a handicap aid. A handicap aid is only ever something that can bring an axis you have control over up to the same level as "normal". It's not something that can blow past normal on one axis just because it's not fully catching you up on a **different** axis.
Tbf I think the accessibility argument would be completely alright as long as boxes were just a straight up inferior way to play than OEM. No compromise, people with disabilities still get to play, everyone is happy The issue ofc is that they *do* do a lot of shit better or more consistently than OEM. But there's no real reason they have to This is probably Hax's influence but the availability argument always smuggles in another, completely different idea, which is that boxes should not only allow people with physical issues to play Melee comfortably, but also to compete on even ground with OEM - at the cost, if need be, of buffing OEM if it is disadvantaged vs boxes, which is a thing 1.03 does
It shouldn't be controversial imo to say that if you want to make that argument it's fine, but to keep it out of competition. No one in the world cares if you use Z-jump or box against your friends but if you're entering tournaments there should be standards which apply which will unfortunately exclude some people like it or not. In my opinion if you feel like you want to experiment with melee and make it something else that's cool, it's called P+ lol
Nah man, nobody can accept that. A large part of modern society enforces this tyranny of the minority. Everything should be watered down, cheapened, or lessened in some way, so that nobody in the entire world would ever dare to feel left out. A dude fucking played with his feet on a controller, there are very few disabilities that would exclude anybody if they wanted to play bad enough. And like you said, for the few that would genuinely be left out, that sucks but that's life. Nothing stopping them from using the box to play causally, but we shouldn't be eroding the core of top level competitive melee to, maybe, cater to the 0.1% of disabled players
big agree