Skateboarder is a fun phighter in Phighting.
But with the way they work, the map you play on has a huge effect on how you play. Which map is the best one? The answer, is Iron Cafe.
So basically, there’s a multitude of reasons as to why Iron Cafe is objectively the best skateboarder map. First off, is the fact that it’s always conquer, which while on it’s own doesn’t mean much does pose a huge bonus with the conquer point surrounding a PERFECT ledge. You need to spend barely any time outside of the point when trickspamming, and that’s really useful in super intense games.
Why doesn’t Space Knights count? It has MULTIPLE ledges inside of the point such that you don’t even have to leave it to do tricks! Well, the answer is that they’re pointing the wrong way. With the way they’re situated, it is EXTREMELY hard to trickspam effectively compared to maps with the ledges pointing outwards from the point, because once you start moving fast, turning around and then doing a trick is a lot harder than tricking and turning around in the air, not to mention most players are closer to the edge, thus making it easier to hit them.
When the ledges point inwards, you can easily miss the next ledge and fly out of the point, losing precious speed as you turn around. Also, the blue sphere kind of gets in the way visually sometimes, and the ledges are uneven. Why is the ledge so perfect in Iron Cafe? Because it does 3 things, those being the aformentioned being within the point, pointing away from the point, and finally, being non-punishing. The first two things have already been covered, but the final point is something that may need an explanation. The thing about Iron Cafe’s ledge is that it’s a slope, which serves one extremely useful feature: If you miss the circle, you lose barely any speed from skating back.
In SFOTH, if you miss the ledge, you either fall down lower than an M2 can boost you or worse, straight up fall out of the map. Both of these outcomes are not very good, especially when you start moving extremely quickly from trickspamming, which is bound to happen.
The forgivingness of the Iron Cafe circle makes it extremely great to trickspam on, since you not only can trickspam extremely easily and quickly, but even recover from mistakes fast. KOTH has the problems of the ledge being outside of the circle, being difficult to recover from a mistake, and two of the four ledges just being plain annoying to trick on, as the slope is minor enough that you need to be moving fairly fast to trick off. NTW does pretty good with the ledge, but if you fall off, you need to go to a trampoline (we all hate those) to recover, and if you’re moving too fast while using one you might even just bump into the tower later on in a match. Skatepark has too many walls and things that get in the way, and no real ledges you can trickspam off, thanks to the walls. Underground war has the same issue, though slightly easier to trickspam.
Banlands has a few issues with it, those being that the ledges are uneven, making it more difficult to trickspam consistently, the ledges are unforgiving, meaning that often if you miss a ledge, you just fall off and die, and one more huge issue, is that there’s too many obstacles in the way. A big issue with maps is when they have all sorts of stuff near the main chokehold that you can easily run into, causing you to lose a TON of speed. While possible to trick off of, it’s still not helping in the long run. Another issue is that there’s all sorts of ledges high up for ranged phighters to snipe from, which while possible to reach, aren’t easy and can also be hard to stay on due to being small, which is a threat several other maps contain as well that lowers how good they are.
There’s one other huge bonus that Iron Cafe provides, that no other map does, and that’s that you can trickspam ANYWHERE. EVERY part of the map can be easily accessable via a trick and there’s ledges EVERYWHERE. Not to mention said ledges are not only extremely easy to trickspam off of but there’s also usually something on either side of them, catching you if you speed too fast. Due to these reasons, and even more, Iron Cafe simply is just the best map for skateboarder in Phighting, with no contest.
