I agree that the drones on Metropolis roof are pretty dumb, but I disagree that they're proof that ALL interactibles are bad, irredeemable, and should be disabled in tourney forever. Even when i'm on the receiving end of them, I like the idea that they skew the paper math on matchups (as long as they don't skew it TOO badly). They're usually little more than fun toys to me as an Aquaman player (and occasional annoyances like Deathstroke on the Atlantis valves), but I wonder if I might feel differently about them if I played a different character. While banning interactibles might help me in certain matchups on stages, it might also hurt me in certain matchups that I might have swung a different way with a wisely deployed interactible. I think it's kinda short-sighted to say we should throw ALL of that away, instead of simply pressing for change on the DUMBEST aspects of the system.
The more elegant solution, I think, is to ban Metropolis in tournament and pressure NRS to nerf the drones or otherwise alter the dumb nature of the rooftop interactible game. I think this pressure could easily be created by a consensus among notable TO's to officially ban Metropolis; NRS will naturally grimace at an element of their game they thought they was cool being banned for being too stupid ("aw c'mon man, how you gonna ban Superman's place of residence from our awesome DC throwdown?"), and will want to tweak it ASAP to please those dissatisfied players.
I don't think this is an unfair or illogical special-case solution. After all, tons of people banned Batgirl when she first came out, and no other characters, simply because there was little proof at the time that NRS had successfully identified and hotfixed everything that was broken about her. If there's a single nail in a sturdy house sticking out to an unreasonable point, you hammer it down. Simple as that.
I don't think it's a slippery slope thing either. I think very few other stage elements create such radical changes to matchups as the Metropolis roof drones. We don't automatically become Smash by banning one stage (insert hygiene joke here). Hell, even crusty old SF4 has kinda moved in this direction as of late. How many matches have you seen where the finals are nothing BUT that boring ass training stage just for the MINOR performance boost (in terms of being able to quickly render stuff on-screen) it offers to the game?
Let me just end this by saying that I don't think interactibles need to go away, but I agree interactibles need to change. They are an interesting mechanic, but some of them definitely need to give a little. I think many (maybe most) of them should do less damage. I think a fair chunk of them should actually be blockable. I think that stupid dumpster needs to be either blockable or a 1-use-only in the hands of gadget characters. EDIT: Same deal with the valves on Atlantis. They should be 1-use only so that baiting them is actually a risk rather than a minor inconvenience to the defender. I think you'd lose very little of the utility these interactibles can provide if you change some of them along these lines.
EDIT: But on-topic, I would accept the stage selection rule Dizzy proposed. People already have to learn how to fight on stages besides their favorite anyway, going with the random-stage rule wouldn't really change that dynamic. Luck of the draw is fair enough.
