I had alot of free time so I decided to make this long read just for the fun of it. I'm curious to hear everybody's opinion. Please discuss in a peaceful manner. Lastly, keep in mind it is not my intention to offend anyone.


1) Air Humping 

The Conduct In Question: A player gets the kill and then does random attacks while their opponent is being revived back to the stage. Often times they're aerials. 

Why It's Unsportsmanlike: It's highly comparable to showboating after getting a touchdown in football. 

Why It's Unnecessary #1: After getting the KO, the most logical choice is to go to the edge of the stage to defend yourself while waiting for your opponent's temporary revival invincibility to cease. If not then you risk getting hit, which offers no advantage at all. 

Why It's Unnecessary #2: You'd be better off using taunts. They're designed for taunting, after all. 

Why It's Unnecessary #3: It's a psychological disposition; if an opponent who normally air humps suddenly doesn't, it shows fluster. And since fluster leads to excuse mode, you can take advantage of them by capitalizing on slips or lag. However, people who don't air hump aren't exposed to this disposition because they don't follow the pattern. 

My Personal Experience: I've had perhaps three ladder matches where my opponent air humped while at high damage percentage only to get KO'd by me because they fled to the edge too late or decided to roll instead of flee. In one instance it led to me winning the set. 


2) Lagscuse 

The Conduct In Question: After an occurrence of lag after a match, the loser of it will bring up the lag in their challenge chatbox with the opponent. 

Why It's Unsportsmanlike: The loser of the match discredits the winner's victory, ignoring the fact that nobody enjoys lag. 

Why It's Unnecessary: When there's lag, both players experience it, not just a single player. If this weren't true, then it'd mean one player would be playing at a different time than the other, since lag essentially slows down the game for one player more than the other; which is impossible. So why complain about something that your opponent experienced equally as much as you? 

My Personal Experience: I've had different occurrences of hearing lagscuses from my opponent. In most cases the lag I felt was nothing more than typical WiFi speed while my opponent was beaten mentally. But keep in mind, legitimate bad lag does not count as a lagscuse.


3) Tier Eyed 

The Conduct In Question: The player using a character lower on the tier list than their opponent, wins the match. The opponent, now in a fume, then seemingly rapidly presses start on his controller and decides to not show back up at the challenge chatbox. 

Why It's Unsportsmanlike #1: It's a childish attitude that makes the set less fun for everybody involved. 

Why It's Unsportsmanlike #2: Being a sore loser is the definition of unsportsmanlike, especially if you are unaware you're being sore. 

Why It's Unsportsmanlike #3: Not being present at the challenge chatbox to discuss the next match is basically against the rules, because you're supposed to choose a stage and also cause it's inconsiderate to your opponent. 

Why It's Unnecessary #1: Your opponent will usually give you a rating below 5, letting others who checkout your match history know you're a sore loser. 

Why It's Unnecessary #2: Viewing matches in a 'Tier Eyed' perspective is detrimental to your growth as a Brawler cause Brawlers who can't enjoy the game for its fun can never become really good. 

My Personal Experience #1: During the first match of a set with my opponent, I beat MetaKnight with Ganondorf. My opponent then completely disregards the chatbox and I got stuck going to his stages without being able to ban or choose my stages. My opponent wins match 2 and 3 thus winning the set, and to top it off he added a 'gg' in the chatbox despite how poor of a sport he was.

My Personal Experience #2: I've witnessed players in the singles ladder chatbox publicly complain of their opponent not reporting on the match, or match histories with disputed outcomes. A majority of these cases are Tier Eyed scenarios.

1 Match 3 the opponent CPs MK just to win. It's smart but bugs me unlike other character CPs. This isn't about sportsmanship; it's more a personal dislike.
2 When someone plays a character who wrecks in unplayable lag by spamming (Sonic, Ike, Snake's Ftilt, G&W's Dsmash [I'm guilty of this], Lucario's roll and Fsmash, and others) and won't cancel the match, even in terrible lag.

(side note: lag can differ for each player because servers have to send data back and forth which slightly influence lag spike timing. A few other factors can slow one side down but it's usually their fault and very rare. For the most part, both people will feel the lag and should agree to quit if it's a problem. Rather than john about it afterward.)

3 When people complain that I used a mid tier (Wolf) instead of Link. G&W I can see being broken in lag. Even using Wolf the MUs are usually 0 or -1 for him. My Link's by far my best and I play no high tiers. Lag makes Link practically unusable too. Playing different characters is not a cop-out and makes me no less of a Link main.

*predicts this thread will ignite soon* I probable shouldn't keep up with it or I'll end up debating something(s) lol.

So why complain about something that your opponent experienced equally as much as you?

depends on their char (oli and ike r better in lag then certain chars)

also depends on how well each person can abuse the lag with the char

I have to admit, I'm pretty surprised everybody is posting in a peaceful manner. I expected way more hate.

lol @ air humping- I had no idea thats what players were doing. lol

Btw couldn't lagcuse be johning, although lag abuse is horrible to play against. Especially if you have a character that sucks in lag like marth, link, lucas, ness, insert rest of cast.

The only thing I think is disrespectful is when I taunt, and then my opponent hits me. Its not like I taunt right in the middle of the fight.

I have my right taunt set to say "2pro" in case I see something cool. I think it's just down right disrespectful to hit me after I give up my invincibility frames to compliment you on your play. :l

To be honest, the only time I would "airhump" is when the red balloon comes along in Smashville. It's an opportunity to refresh an attack

lol I know I'm not the only one to hit that balloon. It just has to be hit.

Your argument against the Tier Eye is well defined. 

I encountered the "tier eye" players once too often cause I use Jigglypuff. I had some troubles with them with some declaring to cancel the match after the first round, Some who refuse to return to chat and announce the changes of the rounds, some who are just plain rude due to their lost, and even one who totally disregard the previous round all together when I won the set...and declare to despite me if I don't play him again in another round.

On one of a similar case, I decided to SD my stock because they went to Nofair without my knowledge or content and changed from Pikachu to Meta knight after he winning the previous round making my counterpick invalid or ignored. The opponent never comeback and when I check on the chat, and the opponent declared that he won. Of course I wanted to dispute it, but I have nothing to prove my case.

Which is why I started to use a capture device on everyone of the ladder matches and if possible Camstudio to record the chat and will not play another ladder match unless both are recording well...sadly

The "air humping" bit is just whiny and illogical.

What exactly is unsportsmanlike about a player using those few seconds of inactivity to have fun and loosen themselves up? For "showboating", there's nothing wrong with a little celebration; the player is not insulting/disrespecting you.

Unnecessary point #1: This is both wrong and whiny. Fleeing to the edge is not always the best choice, and doing so would leave you easily predictable. Not to mention, why do you care the opponent does not do what you deem "the most logical choice"? Each player has their own ideas and strategies, and expecting them to always conform to yours is ridiculous.

Unnecessary point #2: It's preposterous you would claim they would be better off using a taunt, and contradicts your previous assertion that a player shouldn't risk getting themselves hit. Last I checked, taunts leave the player completely immobile and completely vulnerable for a long period. On the other hand, "air humping" keeps the player mobile and use actions that still allow them to react, as well as allow them to use attacks that nearly always take less time to complete than taunts. If you're going to complain about players "risking getting hit", do not say they're better off using something that leaves them far more vulnerable.

Unnecessary point #3: "Psychological disposition" is there all the time, regardless of if a player "air humps" or not. Players are not computers.

If anything, you would be the unsportsmanlike one for insulting players based on something they do during gameplay.

@ Omega Tyrant: Your debate against Air Humping's unneccessary point #2 is pretty decent. However, you missed the point. I debated that it's better for a player to go to the edge and taunt, rather than the player air humping in the middle of the stage. Only situation this is false is if your opponent weilds a long distance projectile.

Your debate against its first point is not as good. It's tough to argue that risking a hit while your opponent is invincible offers any consistent advantage. Your making yourself look bad.

It seems you don't mind showboating to begin with. Is that to say you admit air humping is showboating?

In response to your fine argument of psychological dispositions being there regaurdless of air humping; I believe they exist in certain places more so than others. If psychological dispositions were equal, then it'd be as mechanical as CPUs.

I did mention it wasn't my intention to offend anyone. But I somehow offended you. Is that cause you're an air humper? Lagscuser? Tier Eyed?


@ Koric: That's one awful experience, it's actually the worst I've ever heard here. I can't believe someone would be such an @ss like that.

Personally, previously in my ladder experiences, an opponent would goes MetaKnight match 1 and go on to win the match, and then the opponent would use a different character match 2 and match 3 cause they'd feel more confident in winning the set. Well lately, and it is painful to do this, I've been countering MetaKnights(who do this) with MetaKnight cause I just got tired of losing to inferior opponents. Some have gotten 3stocked against MetaKnight even though they use him.


@ Striker_X: That's more along the lines of a sleezeball.

Bumping this

Just so you know, I find that the AiB forums are generally dead. If you want more opinions you should make a blog. Here are my opinions since I have some free time right now.

1) Air Humping: A lot of people do this not as a taunt, but just to practice tech skill/loosen up. I've never heard that doing random aerials as being offensive until now, so I wouldn't call it unsportsmanlike. I think that's a commonly accepted opinion, since if people did consider it offensive, less people would do it (I would hope). You'll see top players doing it and no one makes a big deal out of it. I feel that taunts are more offensive since they are actually taunts. If someone gets killed for air humping it's their fault and lol. Same thing goes for going to the edge and taunting.

2) Lagscuse: Lag sometimes does affect the match though. Some people even lag boost since they play better in lag. You could say that playing in lag in itself is a skill, but not one that would really get you anywhere offline (which arguably matters more). I guess the issue here is that "legitimately bad lag" is subjective. If you played offline your whole life, even a green connection feels sluggish. So you will encounter people blaming lag even with a "normal" wifi connection. I usually just report if there is lag or not whether I win or lose.

3) Tier Eyed: Your description is oddly specific. But yes, rage quitting while not reporting who actually won is unsportsmanlike no matter what characters were played against, so I wouldn't specify it to low tiers. It mostly happens when someone with a low score beats someone with a high score. Also, sometimes people are on Wiinet and are unable to come to that chatroom conveniently so they counterpick through tags (sometimes they don't even know the rules of counterpicking and don't do it). It may not be a Tier Eyed situation as you describe.

And it's possible to offend people even if it wasn't your intention to. I would say that you aren't helping by accusing Omega Tyrant of being one of the above descriptions, heh.

Foodies, your post pretty much sums everything up. I still wanna offer some insight from my perspective however.

1) When it comes to air humping, some players only do it to goof off, usually the younger Brawlers as such whom have weaker attention spans. I prefer the method of gathering my mind, just waiting on the edge clearing all my frustrations if any. Practicing tech can be useful for completing the moves or combos better, but it's mechanical and lacks soul. Not that it matters, and honestly I can't find a correlation of why, but players who type "gl hv" in the chatbox have the highest probability of air humping. Perhaps air humpers who type that in the chatbox are the ones who air hump to practice while the ones who don't type it and air hump are usually the showboaters.

2) Lagscuses are an issue but they're so well known that... Kind've a non issue at this point. Basically you summed up lagscuses well and there's no need to cover any more of the topic.

3) My tier eyed definition is highly accurate, however. But you did cover a part I forgot to, in which a lower rated player causes a higher rated player to rage. I've seen this from, heck, even between really low rated players who should care less about rating. And I've experienced tons of tier eyed situations in my time with ladders. One tier eyed opponent gave me a report-score critique of 3 along with "Edge hogs too much" even though I was using Ganondorf.

Bump

lol gannon there r no johnz vs gannon

I completely agree that those 3 things are one of the most unsportsmanlike actions in a match.