Crusade Back Room

[perfecthell4]

Hey Dev's and fans, I'm coming here as a fan of both SSBC and SSF2, and a part of the Smash Flash Back Room, current Trial Member. I believe a Back Room is something that should be strongly considered by the users here. The Back Room would post Tier lists, Stage Legality Lists, Tournament Rule Sets, Advanced Techniques, discuss match ups, combo's, etc. etc. It would provide a place for the more experienced players to gather and discuss the competitive and strategic side of Crusade, the publicly posted information would help less experienced players to develop their skills, and would help the overall development of the game.

Tier Lists, Match Ups, and general character discussions would help in the balancing for Dev's. Advanced Techniques and competitive stage discussion could potentially help find bugs and the broken aspects of certain characters and stages. The only part of this I could see not benefiting the game as a whole is the Tournament Rule Sets, assuming the game will not have online playability. If it will, then Tournaments will certainly be an important part of the games community.

As a SFBR Trial Member with fairly significant competitive smash knowledge, I would be able to start the Crusade Back Room, however I do believe the task could be better suited in another user's hands. However, the user would have to prove himself competent in smash knowledge, and most importantly, an active user who could effectively moderate the forum.

Reason's I could be the above mentioned user: I am incredibly active, a brief look at the SFBR forum will show this. It took me less than a week to bring myself into the Top 20 posters list there, and not because of useless, high quantity posts simply to achieve that. I am very active and dedicated, and believe I could effectively moderate a small forum, like that one. I also have competent smash knowledge, enough to tell who belongs in a Back Room and who does not. Against me starting this, there are certainly other users with more smash knowledge than my own, or who could best me in a match.

I am not here to press myself as the moderator of a new forum, I am here to suggest the opening of a Back Room, and to offer to start it if desired. However, I would gladly step back and let somebody else start it, then apply for a membership later. That I would leave up to the Dev's. I wouldn't recommend anyone start the Back Room without approval from the Dev's both to my idea, and to the user starting it. With that said, if the Dev's like this idea, I would recommend testing a user before allowing them to begin your Back Room, including myself.

[Dettadeus]

Well, I guess I'll be the first to comment here. Unless I get ninja'd while writing this.
This forum is pretty much the "Crusade Back Room", spread across a multitude of boards. There's a board for discussion of each confirmed character, and ATs can be and have been discussed there, for one.
As we do not have a good way to do multiplayer due to the fanbase being spread out far and wide, I'm the only one who's attempted to organize a tournament (which is currently in progress) and I based my ruleset off of Brawl's standard ruleset created by the Back Room. Since most things are the same between the games, I would presume we would just use the same ruleset and modify the stage portion to add in any new stages deemed legal.
We do have something of a tier list discussion thread, and I've made something of a tier list through trial, error, many matches, and input from other users (although I do not yet have numerical placements; I just have the "top, high, mid, low" part). The problem, of course, with making a tier list is that characters are being buffed and nerfed with each new version, and Falcon8r (the coder of Crusade) has already confirmed my suspicions of my tier list being entirely screwed over when the next demo comes out (presumably soon).

I'm not opposed to the idea of a Back Board, so to speak, but I'm not exactly sure how it would work here. Back Room boards usually have user restrictions, as I recall, and I don't know if that's possible on this forum. If it does end up being just an "open forum" type of back room, then that defeats the purpose of its existence, as well as the fact that, as I stated, this forum as-is does the same thing.


Also, some things on who would moderate such a board:
Well, you logged off about 5 or 10 minutes after writing that post. You could at least wait until someone comments.
According to your definition of such a person, I would be the perfect moderator, since I'm on all the time and know a ton about the game. But I don't think the devs would hand over that kind of power to me so I could moderate a single board, and again going back to my point of whether or not the forum is even capable of doing that.

[perfecthell4]

To be honest, this forum is not like a Back Room. As a member of both the mcleodgaming forum and the SFBR, this forum much more closely resembles the mcleodgaming forum. The discussions across all threads here are extremely casual, and very little metagame progression can be seen. I understand where you are coming from though, yes, individual character threads are present here, and stages are discussed, but not at all in a similar fashion to what I'm talking about. The type of forum I am suggesting would be one in which almost every post comes in paragraph form, rather than a single sentence. Also, these members would dedicate their time to the competitive side of things, and accurate tier lists could be made, posted from a trusted source. The posts in this forum (save for a few) do not resemble back room style discussion, or function. As for how it would work, it would not be a board here, but on a separate forum, like the SFBR is. The functions of a Back Room are performed here, but only on a very minimal, and extremely casual, basis. A group of pro's studying this game inside and out could only help it's progress. If desired, and first with SFBR mod permission, I could post an example post and reply series of 2 or 3 posts from the SFBR, from old threads no longer used for privacy reasons, to show the post quality I am referring to.

[Dettadeus]

I see what you're getting at now. You're saying that we'd have a separate forum with approved members to discuss all of this stuff?
That makes slightly more sense, but unless the devs want to hand control of an entire sub-forum to another user, they'd have double the work on their hands, which would probably slow progression of the game itself. And like I said in my above edit, I don't think they'd be willing to hand over that power to another member to spare themselves the extra work.

[perfecthell4]

This is why i suggest testing the member first. No power is being handed over here, this is just a group of users having their own discussions. In the SFBR, Cleod9 himself is nowhere to be found, and only 2 or 3 Dev's are there, but as members themselves, not moderators, and only pop in occasionally to provide helpful information. It is run by user's who are not involved in development.

[Dettadeus]

Mar 27, 2011 22:41:55 GMT -5 perfecthell4 said:

No power is being handed over here, this is just a group of users having their own discussions.

Well, one person has to be the admin and, as I've seen a few times myself, moderation of users and discussion is a must. What I'm saying is that if the devs don't want to do it themselves, they'd have to let another member moderate for them, which does entitle them some power. Yes, your "testing the member" idea could work, but I've seen people in positions of power go crazy and mess things up; this has happened very recently, in fact. And these are the types of people you'd never expect to do these types of things.

But whatever the outcome, it's still up to PhantomVII, Falcon8r or Werekill to decide whether or not to go through with something like this.

[GoldenYuiitusin]

I'd be willing to do it. In my times in power in other forums, I have not abused it.

However, my actual lack of leadership skills (I may be TOO soft) may hinder this, so I may need pointers on how to govern over this Back Room.

Oh, and I'm not involved in Development. I have thrown around an idea of two that was used (having Angelglory as the announcer, for example), but I haven't directly worked on the game.

[El Maiz]

This sounds like a good idea, but most of the things, like Tiers and Metagame, will change fast as new versions are released.

[DGN]

I honestly don't really think this is necessary.
All the reasons mentioned above, of course, but the character matchups and tier list can already go to the SSBC general Discussion.
General Character Discussion would go in, obviously, general character discussion.
Plus, at the time, this is a thread, and if there was somebody new to the forum, they would have no idea what a Smash Back Room is; heck, just today, thanks to you I learned what it is.

I think it'd be helpful if you put a poll up.
"Do you think it'd be good to place in?
Yes
No
Don't really care"

[perfecthell4]

I'm not sure I'm really getting across the true function of a Back Room yet. Yes, this forum does what I'm talking about, but only on the most basic level. Most users here would be completely lost if right now I delved into a Ryu vs. Mach Rider matchup. It's the few users who could actually follow the technical terms who would get to be a part of the CBR. Yes, Tier lists would change as new game versions came out, but the same happens in the SFBR, and there is no problem keeping up. No, it is not a necessity, but it will certainly prove helpful, and on the other hand, can't really do any harm. I think a poll is a good idea, but most importantly, I'm waiting for dev response. Poll will go up now.

[Werekill]

Mar 28, 2011 14:28:46 GMT -5 perfecthell4 said:

I'm not sure I'm really getting across the true function of a Back Room yet. Yes, this forum does what I'm talking about, but only on the most basic level. Most users here would be completely lost if right now I delved into a Ryu vs. Mach Rider matchup.

Exactly. I hate having to argue WHY Pika's bair in Brawl is terrible when it's completely obvious; most arguments against me are because it hits more than once. >_<

The BR sounds like a great idea, but until this community expands more, it won't be too large. I'll make a group/private board, and I guess I'll head it up unless anyone has any objections?

[perfecthell4]

I actually think it's best if a dev runs it, I just figured as someone stated before, that it would be a hassle considering the work load already on the team. An application process is a must, and as an example, look at how the SFBR does it: smashflashbackroom.englishboards.com/

An initial application, and if the application is good, a public Q&A for a more in-depth analysis of the applicant. Important qualities looked for: Smash competitive knowledge, as applied to both the original series and this game, communication skills (no tl;dr's), and active users who will contribute useful posts, often

Also, I would recommend the back room be a full size forum. There needs to be a multitude of different threads, just like this forum. One for each character, stage discussions. advanced techniques, general discussion and rules, etc. etc. I would be happy to help in any way with the creation of this forum, and can provide tips from the SFBR on what kind of threads are needed

[Werekill]

Mar 28, 2011 15:11:10 GMT -5 perfecthell4 said:

I actually think it's best if a dev runs it, I just figured as someone stated before, that it would be a hassle considering the work load already on the team. An application process is a must, and as an example, look at how the SFBR does it: smashflashbackroom.englishboards.com/

An initial application, and if the application is good, a public Q&A for a more in-depth analysis of the applicant. Important qualities looked for: Smash competitive knowledge, as applied to both the original series and this game, communication skills (no tl;dr's), and active users who will contribute useful posts, often

I actually don't have much of a workload; I'm the "pr" guy, so I just run the forums, advertise, settle sprite issues, contact people, etc. I've also been involved with the project since the beginning (the devs are good irl friends of mine), so I give suggestions and such.

So yeah, if I was doing this, it would really help. I have the ear of the other devs (literally, haha), so I can pass along any balance issues directly and get a quick reply, etc.

Applications would work... I'll think of how to set up a system.

Mind if I wait to start all of this? I need to finish some projects for other forums before I begin something else.

[perfecthell4]

I definitely think applications are a must, otherwise it wouldn't be any different from this forum here. Members need to really know what they are talking about. You can test me of course as you see fit, but I have a good knowledge base of competitive smash, and could be very helpful in getting things running, and am more than willing to do so. Of course, you can begin this whenever you have the time, no rush

[Werekill]

Exactly; we need decent people in there.

So yeah, I'll get started on this when I can.

[El Maiz]

First person to go in there should be Detta.

I'd also volunteer. I main a few underused characters, so I could greatly help with Toad and Megaman.

[perfecthell4]

I think all users need to apply, no matter their reputation here. High level of activity or dedication is in no way equivalent to competitive knowledge. I don't know who the mentioned user is, but the user should certainly be tested first.

@werekill: On that note, who will be deciding if applicants make it or not? I don't know you or your experience at all, do you have the competitive knowledge I'm talking about, or a more casual level? There should also be no bias towards any applicants, each new applicant should be treated as if you never heard the name before, with the only exception being the game dev's. In this forum there are two SFBR members, myself and Maxmatsu. We could both be reputable sources for how an application process should take place, and making sure the applicants really are qualified, and in my case, unbiased towards the other users here. This is not to say you are not qualified for the job, I wouldn't know whether or not you are. But to help the process along, if needed, there are two members here already determined to be qualified. I'm interested in finding out how much you yourself know about a Back Room and competitive smash

[El Maiz]

Dettadeus is Moton An.

And just look at my post count. You can tell that I'm never online.

[perfecthell4]

The point still stands. All users need testing before acceptance, including myself and Max despite being accepted already elsewhere. Which is why I ask Werekill of his experience, we can't just let anybody in, that would defeat the purpose. Only the absolute top level players, and most knowledgeable players, would get in. Post count is a good quality for an applicant, but only if you know what you are talking about, and those posts come in paragraph form when on the character threads (in the BR at least). High level of activity is only helpful when it is quality contribution.

[El Maiz]

I... realize that.

I was just answering who I meant by Detta and that I was active.

I doubt that I'd be in.


Besides, we have, like, six really active members.