| TruckOSaurus said: Okay my turn to ask a stupid question... what the hell is a counter-pick stage? |
The first stage in a set is chosen randomly from a list of "neutral" stages. They are generally accepted to give no character a significant advantage, and are devoid of almost any randomness. After the first stage, the loser gets to pick the next one if the stage is not out right banned. Any stage that is neither banned, nor neutral is considered a counter-pick since the loser of the first match can choose it to gain some advantage.
Most tournaments are at least this restrictive. It can easily be a lot worse. The stages are banne because they either give a significant advatage to certain characters or play styles. Some are just banned because they are too random and interfere with the technical fighter aspect of Brawl to a severe degree.
I think I know what laser lock is. I think the way it is performed is by having Falco trap a character on the ground with a short hop and laser blast to keep them from standing up. The idea is once they hit the ground they can't get back up until they have a stupidly high percentage and are as good as dead.
