Tournament rulesets (SSBB): Difference between revisions

:''This is the ruleset for ''Brawl''. For other rulesets and general info on tournament legal settings, see [[Tournament legal]].''

'''Tournament legal''' describes the rules and settings that are accepted for use in competitive ''Smash'' [[tournaments]] by the American and Canadian Smash communities. In ''Brawl'', the competitive community is extremely divided on what constitutes a proper ruleset (particularly about the legal stagelist), and many players in the community have been vehemently opposed to attempts to create a standardized ruleset from the [[Brawl Back Room]] and [[Unity Ruleset Committee]]. So unlike ''Melee'' and ''Smash 4'', there is no "standard ruleset" that is consistently seen across all ''Brawl'' tournaments. While the general format remains the same (3 stock, no items, no [[broken]] stages), the specific rules of ''Brawl'' tournaments differ from tournament to tournament.  

*Banning {{SSBB|Meta Knight}}: Usage of Meta Knight in any capacity is not allowed in the tournament. If a player chooses random and gets Meta Knight that way, they will be required to restart the match as a different character. This rule is implemented either due to the TO believing Meta Knight to be [[broken]]/overcentralising, wanting to host a tournament that presents something different, or just to appease the tournament's attendees. The rule's usage varies greatly from region to region as Meta Knight's legality is one of the most controversial and divided subjects in the ''Brawl'' competitive community; Meta Knight is commonly banned in regions such as Texas, but is usually not banned in the [[Tristate Area]], for example. On the whole though, Meta Knight is usually not banned nowadays in more significant tournaments.

*The Gentleman Rule: The most basic form of the rule dictates players may play on any stage, including banned stages, if all players in the match agree to it. While rarely actually used to play on banned stages (as even if a player wanted to play on a banned stage, it's highly unlikely the opponent would agree to it), the rule is often used by players in game one of sets to bypass stage striking (by a player suggesting a starter stage to just go to, typically [[Smashville]], which the opponent then agrees to or refuses and stage strikes). The rule also sees frequent use when a player faces off against a player of a much lower skill level (and usually much younger), where the player allows the lower skilled player to choose any stage they want to play on, whether as a sign of courtesy and/or the player not seeing their opponent as a threat and thus not caring about the stage chosen. The rule is near universally seen, and even if the rules don't explicitly allow it, players often enact the rule regardless of if it's written in the rules or not. While TOs usually don't impose any restrictions on the Gentleman Rule, they may occasionally explicitly disallow banned stages from being played on at all regardless of the rule.

*The Colorblind Rule: During doubles matches, if either team has {{SSBB|Lucario}}, {{SSBB|Sonic}}, or the {{SSBB|Pokémon Trainer}} on their team, a player on either team can invoke this rule to choose the team colors of their team and the opposing team, so that they can more easily discern team colors between them. This rule is implemented due to the subtle color differences in those characters' team palette swaps that can make it difficult for players to discern them between a teammate and opponent in the heat of a match. Also, while the use of [[texture hack]]s is often discouraged in tournaments, it's acceptable to use simple full color texture hacks on these characters' team palettes to make their color differences obvious. The colorblind rule sees universal usage.

*The Suicide Rule: If a match ends by both remaining players losing their last stock at the same time due to a suicide move (such as by {{SSBB|Bowser}}'s [[Flying Slam]] and {{SSBB|Ganondorf}}'s aerial [[Flame Choke]]), then the initiator of the suicide move is considered the winner of the match regardless of what the results screen says, and no tiebreaker is played. In the past this rule was just used with the aforementioned Flying Slam and Flame Choke suicide finishes, but the rule has since then been used for all suicide KO moves. This rule is implemented as it is generally seen that the player initiating a suicide move had the advantage at the match's end, and the fact the game's inconsistent handling of suicide KO moves is considered unfair and nonsensical (such as, Flying Slam can result in Bowser being declared the winner by the game in a last stock suicide KO, while suicide Flame Choke can result in Ganondorf being declared the loser). While the rule is often used, it's not universal, as some players maintain that the winner of the match should be what the game declares.

*Banning of Scrooging: The act of [[scrooging]] (where a player glides underneath the stage to the other side) is often limited or banned in tournaments, especially those that keep Meta Knight legal, due to its capacity to easily stall time. The rule will either forbid Meta Knight from scrooging twice without landing on the stage inbetween, or ban any use of scrooging altogether.

*Banning of certain infinites: While tournament keep the usage of zero-deaths and infinites legal, some tournaments will ban certain infinites/zero-deaths deemed to be too powerful and easy to use, such as {{SSBB|King Dedede}}'s standing infinite chain throw and {{SSBB|Marth}}'s zero-death chain grab release on the PK kids. While more common in the past, such rules are rarely seen nowadays in tournaments outside some fringe locals, and tournaments generally make it clear that all infinites and zero-deaths are legal. The only rule against infinites that tournaments typically run is that a player can't continue one well beyond KO percentage (usually listed as 300%).

*Air Time Rule: Instead of using a ledge grab limit, tournaments may try to limit planking (and air camping) by using an Air Time Rule. The rule dictates that if a match goes to the time, the end of match statistics are viewed to see how long each player was in the air, and the player with the greater air time is declared the loser regardless of remaining stock and damage. While the rule is common in Japan and Mexico, the rule doesn't see real usage elsewhere, as players in other countries heavily criticise the rule (for things such as heavily favoring ground-based characters, overriding the game's usual time out ruling, and the fact it can reward victory to a player who was clearly outplayed while no real planking (or even camping) was going on), and instead vastly prefer using a ledge grab limit to limit planking.

The team that initiates the stage-striking procedure is always the team that did not initiate the controller port selection. If there is a dispute over who does which, then either rock-paper-scissors, a coin flip, or seeing which player gets the higher number from [[Judge]] ingame, will determine it - the winner gets to choose whether they wish to pick ports or start the stage striking.

The following three stages are common counterpicks that are seen legal in most tournaments, though especially restrictive stagelists may ban them. Noteworthy is that many consider {{SSBB|Meta Knight}} too powerful on these stages, and so Meta Knight-banned tournaments tend to keep these stages universally legal (as the main reason for banning these stages is Meta Knight's prowess on them). In tournaments that keep Meta Knight legal, the TO may opt to ban one or two of these stages (thus allowing players opposing Meta Knight to use their stage ban on the remaining stage to prevent Meta Knight from exploiting it, while still allowing the stage to be used in other matches). Alternatively, the TO may state that Meta Knight is banned on the remaining stage(s) (thus allowing Meta Knight ''users'' to use their stage ban on it, to prevent their opponent from choosing it and forcing them to change characters).

Pokémon Stadium 2 is perhaps the most disputed stage in ''Brawl'', with the competitive community's views on it sharply divided. While it is almost never seen legal in more stage conservative regions such as the Tristate Area, as many players in these regions see it on the level of many universally banned stages, it often sees usage in more stage liberal regions such as the midwest and Canada, where it is seen as a perfectly fine and neutral stage, and some TOs, who vehemently support it, will keep it legal.

The following stages are never seen in major tournaments nowadays, and are almost never seen even in locals. Some smaller tournaments though may have one or some of these stages legal, whether to experiment, or the TO being inexperienced/having a more liberal definition of what constitutes a legal counterpick.

The following rules are commonly seen in tournaments, though TOs may opt against implementing one or some of them however.

*Intentional forfeiting, match fixing, splitting, and any other forms of bracket manipulation is not allowed and punishable by the TO.