Stage striking

Stage striking is a common procedure seen in most tournaments the various games of the Super Smash Bros. series. Stage striking involves all players in the match taking turns on deciding which stages will not be played on for the first match of a set. Players often alternate between each other to eventually decide on one stage that they will start their set on.

The process for stage striking starts off with players deciding who strikes the first stage, often via a game with a random outcome, such as a coin flip or by playing rock-paper-scissors. All tournaments for all games generally feature five legal, starting stages, with the winner of this random game being able to strike one legal stage of their choice. After this, the loser of the random game is allowed to strike two stages, and the winner then strikes one last stage. The one remaining stage is then used as the first stage for the set.

Stage striking is not performed for other matches in the set; instead, the winner of the previous match selects their character, the loser then selects their character in response, and the loser is then able to pick any legal or counterpick stage, provided any variants of Dave's Stupid Rule allow for the selection. Stage striking can be skipped by invoking the Gentleman's Clause, provided the tournament has such a ruling.

As only one stage is legal in Smash 64, Dream Land, stage striking is no longer a common practice at Smash 64 tournaments, though it was previously featured in older, less restrictive rulesets for the game.