Halberd

The Halberd (, Battleship Halberd) is a stage introduced in Super Smash Bros. Brawl and returning in  and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate as a familiar stage. It is Meta Knight's airship featured in Kirby Super Star, used for combat. It was first unveiled at E3 2006. In Ultimate, is fought here for his unlock battle.

Stage overview
The stage begins in a hangar, which then opens up, letting Meta Knight's airship take off. Any players still on the floor of the hangar at this time will be KO'd, as the takeoff speedily drops the hangar through the bottom blast line. A platform rises from the center, taking the characters with it. It then proceeds to float around in the sky, with the Halberd flying in the background. One minute into the match, the platform lands on the Halberd itself, in front of the Combo Cannon, a boss from Kirby Super Star that interferes by locking on to one player with 3 attacks. The main cannon shoots a blast of energy which hits multiple times, dealing heavy damage and strong knockback. The arm swings back and forth for a few seconds, and then extends out to snipe a player, dealing weak horizontal knockback in Brawl, and very strong diagonal knockback in Ultimate. The giant cannon shoots powerful cannonballs which explode on impact, dealing heavy horizontal knockback in Brawl, and moderate vertical knockback in Ultimate. The platform rises above the ship after a while, and returns to the bridge later again. The platform never revisits the hangar. The process repeats until the match ends.

The Combo Cannon
The Combo Cannon is a weapon onboard the Halberd. It comes with a beam cannon, a cannon that shoots cannonballs, and a large mechanical arm. It is one of the main hazards of the stage. Unlike in the original game and its trophy description, the arm doesn't hold on to players, but instead collides with them, doing damage and knockback.

Ω forms and Battlefield form
In Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, the Ω form features a flat platform with similar designs to the normal platform which orbits around the Halberd. Characters can no longer pass through the platform from below. The shipyard is never seen as the platform starts in midair and never lands on the deck of the ship. Star KOs can occur here.

In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, the Ω form and Battlefield form are set on a similar platform to SSB4's Ω form that is resized and reshaped to match and, respectively. The three soft platforms of the Battlefield form resemble the soft platform of the normal form.

Hazards Off
With stage hazards turned off in Ultimate, the Combo Cannon does not attack the fighters in any way. The main platform still goes through its usual cycle.

Origin
This stage is from Kirby Super Star. In the sub-game , Meta Knight attempts to take over Dream Land using an airship known as the Halberd. In order to stop Meta Knight, Kirby must infiltrate the airship and destroy it from the inside. The Halberd in Smash is loosely based on its appearance in Super Star, though it has a more streamlined design, which would become the basis of its design in later Kirby games.

At the beginning of Revenge of Meta Knight, a cutscene is shown that depicts the Halberd flying out of a hangar, similarly to the beginning of this stage. The cutscene also depicts the Halberd flying over the ocean at sunset, which serves as the basis for the stage's backdrop.

As Kirby is destroying the Halberd, he comes across the ship's main artillery, the. As its name implies, the Combo Cannon has two barrels: one that fires cannonballs, and another that fires lasers. It also has an arm that will try to grab Kirby. In this stage, the main platform lands in front of the Combo Cannon. The Combo Cannon has retained its ability to fire cannonballs and lasers, but the arm does not grab players as it did in Revenge of Meta Knight; rather, it will extend and damage players.

In Brawl
This stage is usually a counterpick in most tournaments, because while the Combo Cannon's weapons are generally easy to see coming and have strategic merit, they have extreme power and can turn around a match with no effort by the opponent. The unusually low ceiling also gives an advantage to characters whose best KO moves deliver vertical knockback, such as, , and. Fittingly, however, also gains a significant advantage here, as the main platform of the Halberd allows sharking underneath the stage, occasionally leading to the stage being banned from tournaments.

In Smash 4
Halberd was once again included in major rulesets as a counterpick in the early stages of the Smash 4 metagame. However, the unusually low ceiling and sharkable main platform were still present, and more characters other than gained an advantage over other characters without good vertical finishers or aerial mobility. Coupled with the stage hazards being able to be taken advantage of, Halberd has been banned in major rulesets since MLG World Finals 2015.

In Ultimate
Halberd is often banned in Ultimate for similar reasons it was banned from Smash 4, even with the ability to turn stage hazards off.

Update history
 3.1.0
 * Halberd's on-screen appearances and revival platforms locations have been changed.

Role in the Subspace Emissary

 * See also: Battleship Halberd Interior, Battleship Halberd Exterior, Battleship Halberd Bridge

The Halberd is being commandeered as the mother ship for the Subspace Army during the story. It also engages in an Arwing twice and the Great Fox once, grabbing onto the latter with the Combo Cannon as the Halberd crashed into The Glacial Peak. In all these cases the Halberd was too much for its attackers. It is used to drop off Shadow Bugs. While under the control of the Subspace Army, it is piloted by a group of Shadow Bug duplicates of, which afterwards coalesce into Duon. Near the end of the story, Meta Knight regains control of the ship and picks up the other protagonists. The ship is later destroyed when it attempts a direct assault on the Subspace Gunship. Despite this, it still appears in The Great Maze.

It was later revealed in a post on the Smash Bros DOJO!! website that at some point prior to the start of the game, the Subspace Army stormed the Halberd and captured it. During the fight, Meta Knight was distracted by King Dedede, which allowed the Subspace Army to steal the ship. It is during this incident that King Dedede learns of Tabuu's true motivations. This is what prompts him to construct the Dedede Brooches later. According to the DOJO post, this was originally supposed to be shown in a cinematic, but the scene had to be cut due to time constraints.

Spirit
The Halberd appears in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate as a Legend-class support spirit. It can only be purchased at Funky Kong's Shack.

Glitch
There is a glitch on this stage that involves going "inside" the solid platform on the second portion of the stage (when the flying platform lands on the front of the ship). It is mainly a stalling technique, and it can be performed using Drill Rush or Aether. It is possible to jump back out, or get hit by an attack that knocks the staller up far enough. This technique is obviously heavily discouraged in competitive play, though the large difficulty of performing it and it being extremely situational makes it a pretty minor problem, along with the fact that it can only be done until the stage moves on from that portion.

Trivia

 * The Halberd, Pirate Ship, Luigi's Mansion, and Corneria are the only stages in Brawl to have their own trophies.
 * The Halberd and Combo Cannon trophies only appear in the 3DS version of SSB4 despite the fact that they only appear otherwise in the Wii U version of SSB4.
 * If the laser targets a character that uses the Dragoon, the crosshairs strangely move towards the screen until not visible.
 * The Halberd's 3D model from Brawl is used in the CG cutscenes of  for the Nintendo DS. Interestingly, the model is not properly rigged, so the extending arm of the Combo Cannon appears in its bind pose.
 * The Halberd's appearance in this stage is similar to how it initially appears in the Subspace Emissary; it is surrounded by dark red clouds, and odd sounds emanate from it on occasion.
 * In SSB4 and SSBU, the instead serves as the backdrop of the stage (It replaces the dark clouds below the ship in SSB4’s part).
 * When the laser is being aimed in Brawl, one can see Meta Knight's insignia at each of the four corners after it locks on to a player.
 * In addition, the 'W' on the 'Warning' sign at the beginning of the stage is an upside-down Meta Knight insignia.
 * In Ultimate, the following Assist Trophies cannot appear on this stage: the Moon, Andross, Nikki (due to the dark background obscuring her drawings). Additionally, Marshadow cannot be summoned on this stage.
 * Nightmare, Devil, and the Squid Sisters can only be summoned on the stage's Battlefield and Omega forms, with the addition of Marshadow as a Poké Ball Pokémon.
 * In Brawl's, Halberd will always be played on for Stage 5, as Stage 5 features opponents and allies from the Kirby universe. Halberd is the only Kirby stage eligible in Classic and All-Star modes, as the only other Kirby stage in Brawl is Green Greens, which is a Melee stage, and thereby excluded from use in Classic and All-Star modes.