Smash 4 Stage Builders Guide Part V - sections I - L

(I) Avoiding Bad Glitches

Clipping is not always your friend. Making a solid structure with an open center can only be done by using two separate pieces, and you can make some really cool structures this way. However, if you’re not careful, you can unintentionally make something that players can get trapped inside of, with no means of escape. This is a good time to remind you that if there are any places where people may get stuck, you will need to test that stage with a 4-player match, to see where the initial spawning points are for all four players to make sure that no one is trapped just from their initial spawn.

Here’s what little I know. Below you can see how the above structure is constructed.

The trouble seems to be largely, if not solely related to slopes. When a character does a move that propels them upward with force, like Mario’s up B, and they hit a sloped surface with that move, then they seem to be able to move through any solid object that should be impeding them; see below. At least that’s how it seems to me. Another miiverse user pointed that out, but I didn’t think at the time to take down their name to give them credit. I believe it was Caque, Mordecai or TANtheMAN but I can’t recall for sure so I’ll just link to all three.

Caque – https://miiverse.nintendo.net/users/kurmatron

Mordecai - https://miiverse.nintendo.net/users/vandeneynden

TANtheMAN - https://miiverse.nintendo.net/users/Zeldafan01

I’m no expert on this subject and it really requires it’s own guide, which I am not qualified to make. The trick is to look closely at any structures that seem to be causing players to get trapped, and don’t just change it until the problem is gone, but try to figure out why this is happening, so that you can avoid it a little easier in the future. And don’t forget to share your findings with the rest of us.

One solution is to create a one-way exit, like the one seen below.

With the above construction it is almost impossible for a character to enter the box using the slight gap at the top center, but if they happen to clip into the box, they can easily jump out thanks to this one-way exit that is similar to our Pie Slice Glitch in terms of function.

(J) Cannons

Ah cannons, one of the most obnoxiously overused items in the stage builder. If you get online to check out stages submitted by others, you will inevitably find dozens of stages that look like cannon fields. Cannons can be fun, but man are they over used, and so often are they poorly thought out.

(1-J) Each Character Fires Differently: The size and weight of each character is different, so their trajectories when fired from a cannon will vary as well.

I’ve done some testing, and from what I can tell, Villager might be the lightest in terms of how far he is fired from cannons, but Captain Falcon is unquestionably the heaviest. In order to test this I fired each character from the following set-up to measure their vertical height using a small cannon.

Each square tooth on the vertical measuring stick is two blocks and each tooth on the furthest right wall is 10 blocks, to make measuring easier. Since the characters are spinning in a ball when fired, I used the center of their mass as a measuring point. See Mario below. If two characters of vastly different sizes end up going the same distance, the larger one will appear to have gone further, just because of the larger mass, so I thought that measuring the centerline would be more accurate.

The center of Mario’s mass is right at the top of the 22nd block so he gets a measured height of 22. The range for all fighters was 20 to 23, no one scored higher or lower than that. The measurements aren’t terribly accurate since one grid block is a fairly large unit to try and get an accurate measurement with, but really what we’re looking for is the lightest and the heaviest character to see who should be test fired from cannons during stage testing.

For the Horizontal distance I used the following set up.

For this one I waited until after the character had landed, and was lying still on the ground, to measure their centerline. For humans, or human-like characters I measured right at the waistline, and for ball types like Kirby or strange shapes like R.O.B. I just tried to measure their halfway point from top to bottom.

All but one character traveled approximately 31 blocks with only the slightest variation in distance. Here’s a close up of the cannons positioning.

The arrow in the picture above is pointing to the place where Captain Falcon was shot. I then raised the cannon by one pixel and he was fired onto the upper surface, but he only traveled about 30 blocks. Not only does this show him to be the heaviest without rival (since no other character need the cannon raised in order to hit the main floor, and since he traveled a full block shorter than all the others), but it also shows that the heavier a character is, the lower they fire from the barrel, at least when it’s positioned to fire horizontally.

After testing an early version of the cannon setup in my stage Mystery Box, only one character landed on top of the pedestal after being fired from the right cannon, and that was Jigglypuff, leading me to believe that Jiggs is the lightest. So instead of using Villager try testing with Jigglypuff to represent the lightest character possible.

Mystery Box - https://miiverse.nintendo.net/posts/AYMHAAACAAADVHkPIGeVsw

(2-J) Cannons and Walls: A common technique is to place a cannon sticking out of a wall, to shoot you through to the other side, (or sometimes to shoot you into a solid mass as an alternative means of clipping). This can be troublesome due to character sizes and weights causing them to not fire through, or to get stuck in some instances, with no means of escaping. I did some testing to try and find out what works, and what doesn’t.

Ceilings and Floors: For this and the vertical wall tests I used the small cannons. I may end up testing these same setups with the large cannons one day, but this took SO long, I just can’t imagine doing it again any time soon.

It is important to note that Grid Shifting can affect your results if you attempt to re-create this. This setup was done on a structure that occupies the true grid space; Grid Shifting has not affected it. I fired every character (including the June 2015 DLC released fighters) from the top and bottom of each cannon. Cannons (1), (2), (4) and (5) were placed with the grid on, while (3) and (6) were placed with the grid on and then shifted up and down one pixel respectively with the grid off. Cannon (3) is the same as (2) except that it was shifted up one pixel, and (5) and (6) are the same except that (6) has been shifted down one pixel. To be clear, we are looking for a cannon position that hinders no one. Below is an image of the setup I used to test for this.

Cannon (1) left 34 characters unable to shoot through from the bottom; Peach was the only fighter to actually get stuck indefinitely, this is because she is so floaty that she doesn’t fall fast enough to avoid reentering the cannon automatically. Cannon (2) left 11 characters unable to shoot through after entering the bottom, and 13 characters would end up at the bottom when entering from the top; that means that two characters (Samus and Zero Suit Samus) could enter from the bottom and be fired through the floor, but if they entered from the top they would end up at the bottom and fall to the ground. Cannon (3) was not usable by anyone from the bottom, and Captain Falcon ended up at the bottom when entering from the top, further solidifying him as the far-and-away heaviest character. Cannon (4) and (5) posed no problems for any character from either direction. Cannon (6) posed no problems for anyone when being entered from below, but no one could enter it from above.

These results show that there is no way to place a small cannon facing up into a ceiling or floor without causing problems for some members of the cast; never do this unless you put a break in the wall for the fighters to go through. And this also shows that small downward facing cannons placed with at least one grid block’s worth of the cannon protruding from either the ceiling or the floor will not be troublesome for anyone.

Vertical Walls: For vertical walls I used the setup below. Again, Grid Shifting is not present in the setup below, but if you have any shifting in your stage you will want to accommodate for that.

No one could enter cannon (1) from the right side of the wall, since it was not protruding and only R.O.B. could be shot through the wall from the left side of cannon (1). All characters could enter (2) and (3) from either side.

These results show that having a small cannon sticking out from a wall by one grid block on either side should be enough for all characters to use the cannon without issue.

If you need to angle a horizontally facing cannon at all, then you will either need to test fire it with all characters, or else put a break in the wall to be safe.

Below is a shot of the wall above without the cannons, to illustrate what I mean.

The down side to this is that using two or more pieces to form a wall will take up more of your stage weight. If you need the weight, you can put them in a solid wall, but you will need to test fire it with each and every character. And, if you’ve tested it with all but one fighter and the very last person gets stuck, you need to adjust it and go back through all the other fighters again. It’s outrageously tedious. Testing with Villager and Captain Falcon might be enough (and maybe Peach for good measure), but I really can’t say for sure.

(3-J) Cannon Respite: Cannons can also be a safe haven from certain swarming items like bees or chickens and probably lots of other hazards such as Pokemon and Assist Trophies. Just enter and don’t press the launch button, so you can stay in a little longer. If a character initiates their Final Smash however, you will no longer be able to enter a cannon, so try jumping in just before they do so! You could place cannons that don’t seem to be of any use, which would actually be for safe haven. ; )

(K) Random Notes

(1-K) Sudden Death Bomb Drops: During sudden death, the bombs that spawn to end the stalemate will not spawn in a space that is only 5 grid blocks high. You might want to create at least one of these 5 high areas to allow sudden death participants a place to hide or fight without fear of being bombed, or you could intentionally raise structures to 6 blocks or higher to allow bombs to spawn anywhere; the choice is yours!

(2-K) Checklist For Stage Testing: Here are a few things to test each stage with.

(1) Are there areas that could trap people? If so, try at least one 4-player match to check for spawning points, and do testing for unwanted clipping on that structure as best you can.

(2) Be sure that your edges are at least 2 blocks away from the Blast Zone if you want Hotheads and Bombchu’s to function properly. Also, test these two items on all surfaces, as some constructions can hinder their movement, especially Hotheads.

(3) Test Cannons with Villager and Captain Falcon (and maybe Peach) at least.

(4) Make sure that bottom solids have enough space within the sight zone, and away from other solids for Ness’ PK thunder recovery.

(5) Test Greninja’s Shadow Sneak ability all over the stage, anywhere that you have slopes and conjoined pieces.

(6) Test Megaman’s Buster Shot on any slopes that you want him to be able to clear.

(7) Check for areas where Sudden death bombs will not be able to drop and alter to suit your playstyle. These will not drop in a space that is 5 blocks tall or less.

(3-K) Miiverse Presentation: Simply posting a stage to miiverse is nice but it is also very lacking in details. The name, size and music should be automatically posted with your stages, but they’re not so you’ll have to type it into the post yourself, or into a comment of that post. I always include the name, and if I was inspired by someone else or if it is a remake of someone else’s stage, I’ll include their info in this initial post, as well as the size of the stage, the soundtrack, and I will also post the following “If you see the phrase “Show all comments (_)” below this post, click it to see the details from the beginning.” This is because when a post receives more than 20 comments, the earliest are hidden from view unless that button is pressed, meaning that many could potentially miss some of the info about your stage, if they happen not to see that button.

Also, the image shown in a standard miiverse stage post is a pulled back full view from the side, which will not show off your work properly. You may want to take one or more screen shots of your stage and post them in the comments. I’ll walk you through how to do that in just a second, but first I want to also suggest that you may want to take snapshots of specific features of your stage to post along with an explanation of how to use those features, when necessary.

To write a comment with a snapshot, onto an existing post, simply press pause during a normal match or while testing in stage builder (does not work in Training mode) and set up your snapshot how you like it. Then click the Home button in the center of the bottom of your Wii-U game pad. In the bottom of the menu that comes up, tap the miiverse icon in the lower left (the three green people silhouettes; you will need to set up a miiverse account first). Once that screen has loaded click the User Page in the top left, and from that menu the Activities button in the center of the screen. Now find the post for the stage you’re trying to write a comment on, and click it (be sure to click the text body and not the picture). Then click the Comment button in the lower right. In the upper right you will see an icon that looks like a simple illustration of a mountain range with a sun, and a circled + icon; click it to add your pic, but don’t forget to type in a description!

For an example of how I do this you can see the original version of my stage Dragon Slayer.

https://miiverse.nintendo.net/posts/AYMHAAACAAADVHj8MME9PQ

(4-K) Spawn Algorithm by Ethan Sarik: For this one I am just going to link his imgur post, and the reddit post. Both have the same images and information, but I recommend the imgur version, because you can see the images while you read.

Here’s the imgur version - http://imgur.com/a/63SGv#0

And here’s the reddit version - https://www.reddit.com/r/SmashBrosStages/comments/3d36o0/testing_the_spawn_algorithm/

For his profile link and a description of his work, see (3-Z) 13.

(5-K) Wafer: A wafer is what I call the thinnest solid platform possible. You start by drawing one straight line with the grid on or off; it doesn’t matter, just as long as it is straight. It can have slopes and angle changes, but that will make things much more difficult. For my example I’ll be making a straight, 2 block long wafer starting with the grid on. In step (1) I draw my first line with the grid on. In step (2) I tap a point that creates a very sharp angle under the first line, drawing this angle above your first line will not create a wafer.

In step (3) I have tapped out a straight line that ends at exactly the same distance that my top line does. As soon as you lift your stylus the shape will auto finalize. In (4) you can see that the sharp angle is gone and you have a nice looking wafer that is solid. If the angle in step (2) is not sharp enough, the angle will remain, and you will not get a wafer.

(L) Anomalies

(1-L) Phantom Grab: I noticed on my stage Ricochet Rocket in the area that I call the box, that while standing on a moving platform, and grabbing someone within grab range who is standing on another mover; if they start to drift away from you while they’re stuck in your grasp, the grab will not be broken, but the characters will be separated. In the picture below you have Mario holding Gannondorf.

The picture below shows the distance that they were separated when the grab finally auto broke. I was controlling both characters, so Ganon wasn’t struggling to break free, he was just sitting there.

And finally we see Mario pummeling thin air (Ganon takes no damage).

If you initiate a throw before the grab breaks, the opponent will auto snap to you, and the throw will be performed normally.