Yes, I'm encouraging them to use cheap, uninteresting, and over-rated moves so that they understand that they are not all-powerful. That's step #1: Learn the move. Step #2: Understand the move. When you understand the move and where it's weaknesses are, then you'll understand how to abuse those weaknesses and thus counter them. If someone were to just try facing a shovel over and over, they'd learn very little besides moves that don't work. It's tough to explain in my own words, but I think that the article Playing To Win sums up how this is more effective than simply saying "shovel is lame, let's all not use it and it will forever be shunned upon." The only difference is that he uses the example of Tossing in Street Fighter as a replacement for the Toribash Shovel.

Also, there is no thing as "taking away skill." There is skill deterioration, but in this case your "normal" skill deteriorates while your "shovel" skill is drastically enhanced. I'm going to cover this in my guide, now that you bring it up.


It's good that you'd beat most who try to shovel. The more people who can kick the ass out of shovelers means the less effective the shovel becomes and a more even playground the game becomes.


That underlined statement is in Playing To Win. I highly recommend you read the first 2 paragraphs under "Introducing... the Scrub"


And this is exactly the goal I'm setting with this guide.


I'll be sure to cover the next thing as well.

----- Now that that's finished... -----

If anyone feels like posting replays of moves that you feel effectively counter shovels, I'll put them to the test and figure out how effective they are. You don't need to list how to do it like I do with my moves (contract x, extend y, etc.), but replays will work.

Oh, and you can perform them in single player against a dummy if you feel like it.