A stick is used by placing it on a flat, sturdy surface. Your entire left hand controls the directional stick, while your entire right hand controls all the buttons.

This is very different for a control pad. It is naturally used by using only your thumbs on the face buttons; your left thumb to control directional pad and toggle stick and your right thumb to push the X, Square, Triangle and Round buttons, while your index and middle fingers push the two left and right shoulder buttons.

Since you only have your thumb to push the X, Square, Triangle, and Round buttons, this makes any move requiring a two-button input significantly harder. Of course, you can use the rest of your fingers to push the the buttons like you would on a stick, but that would throw the control pad off balance since you're not holding it the right way; only your left hand is actually holding the control on the left side, while your right hand is pushing down on the buttons on the right side. Because of this, players should be allowed to use the shoulder buttons to map it to any move that requires two or more buttons.

There is absolutely no advantage with playing with a control pad. Configure or no configure, most players would rather use a stick if they have the choice.

To solve this problem, I suggest that anyone who has a stick should share it with everyone during the mock tournament this week.