Historical rulesets

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There have been a number of rulesets used over the years for tournaments playing the Super Smash Bros. series. Procedures for stage-striking, life-stealing, double blind picks, and third-party/modified controllers are some issues addressed into rulesets. Occasionally, rules have banned certain characters, most notably Meta Knight from Brawl.

Tournament Go 3 ruleset

• 3 stocks
• Items set to "Medium"
• Best of 3 sets
• Winner has to keep their character, loser is permitted to select stage and character
• Team attack set to "On"
• 1v1 bracket double elimination

Apex 2009 ruleset

SSBM

General rules

• 4 stocks
• 7 minute time limit
• Items are set to "Off".
• Wobbling is prohibited.
• Freezing glitches, such as the freeze glitch and Soul Stunner, are prohibited.
• Stalling is not allowed.

Stages

Singles stage list

Starter	Counterpick
Yoshi's Story	Corneria
Fountain of Dreams	Rainbow Cruise
Battlefield	Jungle Japes
Final Destination	Green Greens
Dream Land	Mute City
Pokémon Stadium	Brinstar
	Congo Jungle
	Poké Floats

Doubles stage list

Starter	Counterpick
Yoshi's Story	Congo Jungle
Pokémon Stadium	Corneria
Battlefield	Rainbow Cruise
Final Destination	Jungle Japes
Dream Land	Green Greens
	Brinstar

• Dave's Stupid Rule: A player or team may not counterpick to the stage they last won on.
• No stage can be played twice in a row.

SSBB

General rules (singles & doubles)

• 3 stocks
• 8 minute time limit
• Items are set to "Off" and "None"
• Stalling is banned.
• Infinite chain grabs must end at 300%.
• The initiator of a suicide wins in case of tie.
• Controls must be set before the match begins.

Stage list (singles & doubles)

Starter	Counterpick
Smashville	Battleship Halberd
Battlefield	Pokémon Stadium 1
Final Destination	Castle Siege
Lylat Cruise	Delfino Plaza
Yoshi's Island	Frigate Orpheon
	Rainbow Cruise
	Brinstar

Brawl+

General ruleset

• 4 stocks
• 8 minutes
• Items are set to "Off" and "None"
• Stalling is banned.
• Infinite chain grabs must end at 300%.
• The initiator of a suicide wins in case of tie.
• Controls must be set before the match begins.

Stage list

Starter	Counterpick
Smashville	Battleship Halberd
Battlefield	Pokémon Stadium 1
Final Destination	Castle Siege
Pokémon Stadium 2	Delfino Plaza
Yoshi's Island	Frigate Orpheon
WarioWare, Inc.	Rainbow Cruise
Luigi's Mansion	Brinstar
	Lylat Cruise
	Jungle Japes
	Norfair
	Pictochat

See also

• Tournament rulesets

External links early historical rulsets

64

• The Official 64BR Recommended Ruleset (Jan 18, 2011)
• Early 64 competitive recommended ruleset (May 2nd, 2009) (archived)

Melee

• MELEE-FC3 (Second Melee supermajor) (July 10th-12th, 2005) (archive)
• MELEE-FC1 (Established the base ruleset adapted for the MLG tournaments and the scene as a whole) (July 9th-10th, 2004) ((archived)
• Game Over (Earliest major with items off) (January 10th, 2004) (archived)
• Tournament Go 5 (August 2nd-3rd,2023) (Archived)
• Tournament Go 4 (First Melee major) (January 19th, 2003) (archived)
• Meleepalooza (One of the earliest recorded ruleset) (October 15, 2002)