Official 4BR Tier List v1.0 - Competitive Impressions

[Das Koopa]

There are 8 tournies I'm documenting this weekend. Here are the Top 16 results for each, compiled:


Battle Arena Melbourne 8 (May 13th-15th) (Australia) (260 Entrants) (Category 2)

Spoiler

1st: Mr. R
2nd: Abadango ,
3rd: 9B
4th: Umeki
5th: Waveguider ,
5th: Ghostbone , ,
7th: Jaice , , ,
7th: Jezmo
9th: Extra
9th: Earl
9th: Nikes
9th: MM
13th: Boozer
13th: Poppt1
13th: Elegant ,
13th: Duon

LEVEL UP EXPO (May 14th-15th) (Las Vegas) (172 Entrants) (Category 2)

Spoiler

1st: Nairo
2nd: VoiD
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Scatt ,
5th: Tyrant ,
5th: Saiki
7th: K9
7th: Falln
9th: FOW
9th: Xzax
9th: Z ,
9th: Doomlion
13th: Lycan
13th: Calculus
13th: JK
13th: Horse

TLOK 1K May (May 14th) (Dallas-Fort Worth) (136 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Cosmos
2nd: Aerolink
3rd: JaySon
4th: Johan
5th: Awestin
5th: Karna
7th: BC
7th: Sethlon
9th: P2P With Gibus
9th: YelloRello
9th: Dakpo ,
9th: Sassy
13th: Weegee
13th: Hakii ,
13th: BB SM Army
13th: iiGGy

Battle of BC (May 14th) (British Columbia) (133 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Anti , ,
2nd: Big D , ,
3rd: Len ,
4th: Locus
5th: Captain L
5th: Angis ,
7th: Masai
7th: Firefly
9th: Focus , ,
9th: Ty
9th: Choi
9th: Iris Z
13th: Mono
13th: Lief
13th: BSM
13th: Cadence ,

Deluge (May 14th) (Midwest) (117 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Zinoto
2nd: Tyroy
3rd: Nite
4th: Ned
5th: JJROCKETS
5th: Ksev
7th: MVD
7th: Demitus .
9th: Komota
9th: H-Man
9th: Katakiri ,
9th: Dan
13th: Darkshad
13th: LCC JDB
13th: Yoshi Kirishima ,
13th: Shel

Gwinnett Brawl May (May 14th) (Georgia) (115 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: TheReflexWonder ,
2nd: Fatality
3rd: LordMix
4th: Copycat
5th: Gadliel
5th: Limbs
7th: Loco
7th: OrcatheHuman
9th: FlaminRoy
9th: Hyper
9th: Neos
9th: P2W Doom Bot
13th: KDK
13th: Micaelis
13th: Wrath
13th: Newk

GoTE 4 the Kids 2016 (May 14th) (Florida) (94 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Prince Ramen
2nd: 8BitMan
3rd: JaK
4th: Prodigy
5th: Degree of Fear
5th: Cashmere
7th: Purple Guy
7th: Riot
9th: Rideae
9th: Ewok41 ,
9th: EvilGoku
9th: Static Manny
13th: BlueBeast
13th: Kazu
13th: Wingey
13th: Poltergust

Smashadelphia (May 15th) (Philadelphia) (128 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: James ,
2nd: LingLing
3rd: Apple
4th: BlazingPasta
5th: Hooded
5th: GWJ
7th: Seagull Joe
7th: 6WX
9th: Crowdingmovie
9th: C3PO
9th: Ninja
9th: BC Luck
13th: Daenerys
13th: Odon
13th: Ten
13th: Redeemer Z ,

Cannot assure 100% accuracy on FlaminRoy, EvilGoku, Dakpo, Hyper, or StaticManny.

-FlaminRoy used Sheik some a couple of months ago; This may be outdated.
-EvilGoku seems to use a lot of characters, but Youtube VODs indicate he primaries Ganondorf.
-Hyper seems to use Falcon. Can't totally be sure.
-Static Manny/All Might may have used Roy and not Sonic, but VODs indicate he's mostly stuck with Sonic in the last month.
-Dakpo uses ZSS but not in the Twitch VODs for the tourney in question, only Luigi.

Only included GoTE because it's juuuuust shy of my 96 minimum and includes several noteworthy players.

Bonus question: What were Gwinnett's custom rules? A 1111 Mii Brawler getting 5th at a tourney with a few of Florida's better players would be something noteworthy.

 

[Dee-SmashinBoss]

So......Peach doing enough to convince people she's at least a possible threat?
I mean seriously, LingLing and Umeki are awesome.
I just now remembered in Brawl, Nicole use to be one of the best Peach's right?
Sadly Idk if she plays sm4sh for the new and improved Peach...

Oh well......Peach getting results though
That means she is doing stuff amiright? *raises hand for some random high-5*

 

[Goombo]

This Kirby stuff sounds like a classic bait to me.

At least after the

Landing hit of Dair can frame sync to set up an even frame on shield

-part, coming from Lavani herself (just read the Frame Syncing Thread if you still don't get it), you should know something is really wrong here.

 

[DungeonMaster]

The hitboxes aren't *that* huge...the real issue is with that Frame 4 hitbox at the beginning. That thing is really silly.

Compare to Samus' Up-B:

This is a good game, even a great game, but some of the decisions made are insane.

 

[|RK|]

How is Kirby +1 on any of the characters you mentioned?

He's probably even with Sheik based on KG vs Mr R. Can't see him doing better than -1 against any of the others. Why would he beat Cloud? Or Rosa?

There might be some results I'm not appreciating in which case feel free to correct me but this sounds like very optimistic theorycraft. An even MU with Sheik and a plethora of -1s does not a top 20 character make.

And MikeKirby vs Void. Everyone mentions KidGoggles vs Mr R, but everyone forgets that MikeKirby almost beat Void. Game 5 wasn't even as close. MikeKirby was far ahead but died to a stage spike at about 50%.

 

[Luco]

BAM 8 was amazing. One of my favourite weekends ever (I'm not gonna stop being salty about not doing better for a while though ;_; ).

The way I see things as of now, Australia's best sit just below the level of Umeki-tier players, who themselves appear to sit a tier below Mr R and other top players. The gap looks bad when mr R 2-stocks our good players, but I don't think it's actually a particularly unbreachable gap (we have issues with semi-linear gameplans which I think we'll be fixing over the next couple months).

Greninja mains get to look forward to Wave using him now. Tbh his Greninja game vs Umeki was even closer than his WFT games, and he almost landed a killing Fair in the midst of it that would have netted him the set win. It was pretty hype to watch.

The other really interesting match came a LOT earlier in bracket. I didn't get to see the set, but Poppt1 went 2-3 vs Umeki. Everyone was really surprised when they saw the bracket result.

 

[Routa]

Bonus question: What were Gwinnett's custom rules? A 1111 Mii Brawler getting 5th at a tourney with a few of Florida's better players would be something noteworthy.

If I remember correctly they have Guest XXXX. I remember seeing Limbs using Helikick, but my memory doesn't want to cooperate with mii (Ha! Pun).

 

[Browny]

Btw, I was watching part of BAM8's top 8 and noticed that during the Bayo vs. Olimar match, GhostBane never used Witch Time when he had Pikmin on him and Olimar was right next to him. Was Ghost not aware of it or is it some type of gentleman's agreement there?

Hes on this forum often, and he very rarely uses witch time regardless of anything. You'll often see entire sets without using it once.

The way I see things as of now, Australia's best sit just below the level of Umeki-tier players, who themselves appear to sit a tier below Mr R and other top players. The gap looks bad when mr R 2-stocks our good players, but I don't think it's actually a particularly unbreachable gap (we have issues with semi-linear gameplans which I think we'll be fixing over the next couple months).

No, there is still a BIG gap between umeki and mr.r.

Did you see what mr.r did to aus' 4 best players in the crew battle? single handedly dismantled them all. Thats a big jump from someone like umeki who only won 3-2 vs arguably aus' 3rd best player.

I wish aussies were more honest about their skill level. Its OK to admit that our isolation from the rest of the world will affect the level of skill we can achieve.

 

[aεrgiα]

This Kirby stuff sounds like a classic bait to me.

At least after the

-part, coming from Lavani herself (just read the Frame Syncing Thread if you still don't get it), you should know something is really wrong here.

while that definitely stood out to me as well, i wrote it off as being meant in the same way that bowser jrs dair interacts with shields on landing as i believe there is a similar mechanic at work there too :/ but i dunno that post did indeed seem a bit suspect in terms of content...

Spoilers: I do think that ConCon is very optimistic with his MU chart in a lot of regards. And, while he placed a few characters as even that are probably in Luigi's favor still (Pika and Mario still come to mind. And the Falco MU is definitely better than only a slight advantage for Luigi), he placed a lot of characters in places that are very optimistic for Luigi. Hell, he has no right placing Greninja anywhere on the list, much less in Luigi's advantage. He even admitted once on Twitter: "I have yet to play a good Greninja". Other than that, ConCon seems to be an Esam level optimist for his character. This is the amazing MU spread I'd expect Pre patch Luigi to have. The more I look at the MU chart, the more things I want to correct. Perhaps it's better if I stop bringing it up.

Moving on, Lucas is weird and there aren't a lot of Top Lucases and Luigis duking it out. The most we have to go on, I believe, are the games between Pink Fresh and Boss. Iirc (not completely clear on the exact record) they went back and forth in games and we're pretty even. Either that or I'm remembering wrong. The thing with Lucas is that, while his neutral can be very oppressive, it's still definitely not Sheik levels of oppressive and it feels like Luigi always has at least something. That, and the fact that Lucas is a floaty (as in, Luigi can use his more damaging combos early) means that if Luigi gets the chance, he can run away with the lead early on. Edgeguarding is risky against Lucas, but possible. And it obviously leads to good reward. If anyone who mains Lucas wants to chime in and give their side to the fight, then be my guest. I know I've heard about a lot of these footstool combos and other very damaging combos that Lucas can put out, but I'm unaware of how reliable they are on a floaty like Luigi. I'm hesitant on placing an exact opinion on the MU since I'm personally not too familiar with it, but it seems closer to even than anything else. But take what I say with a couple grains of salt

well as ive said i personally struggle with the mu so while id love to chime in, i dont think im the best person for it, but footstool combos do work on luigi, and if the luigi doesnt know how to sdi, then the nair -> nair -> uair also works on him, for a decent 43% but i cannot say how easily luigi can sdi out of nair :/ (please sakurai, i dont care about anything else, but make nair link properly TT_TT ) but more so than the combos (because lets face it luigi beats everyone except for bayo in terms of combos) id think its the zair and the down b along with pk fire which are a pain for luigi to deal with, id be curious to know how safe luigis traction makes a well spaced fair though :/ but i think even sounds like a fair judgement to me

also about bayo, it may be unpopular but recently, especially with all the anti off the top tech (sdi up and di'ing the abk's) the most important for a 0-death seems to be fair 1 as ive yet to see anyone get out of it, though id be interested to see whether fast fallers (or potentially everyone) can get out of it with di down... or maybe im just out of the loop for anti fair 1 tech and its just people not reacting properly

Edit:

sick of these awful MU charts. At this point there are like ten different characters including Luigi, Bowser, and Pikachu that lose ~5 matchups.

while i do agree at the very least it gives us things to discuss outside of the usual, though more realistic mu charts would probably be even better for discussion, just thought id point it out

 

[Diddy Kong]

Zinoto is probably the best Diddy outside of ZeRo now. Many would've probably said the same before, but it's still great to see JJRockets and MVD scoring high as well with Diddy alone. And there where times with people claiming Diddy wasn't solo-viable.

Mr.R is good at keeping Sheik relevant as well, props for that. Speaking of Sheik, even though Saki absolutely MASACARED that Diddy player, I still don't think Diddy loses that matchup outside of SV. Even pre-patched Sheik had Diddy as one of her "worst" matchups (closest to even). No way Diddy loses this -2 as I saw in that one document.

In my humble, personal, and non-tournament-competitive opinion, Diddy only loses to Cloud and Rosalina, with Pikachu, Mario, Luigi, Mega Man and Olimar being 'annoying' matchups which force us to play differently. Villager to, but only when he Pockets our Banana, otherwise we beat him solidly.

 

[Shady Shaymin]

Zinoto is probably the best Diddy outside of ZeRo now. Many would've probably said the same before, but it's still great to see JJRockets and MVD scoring high as well with Diddy alone. And there where times with people claiming Diddy wasn't solo-viable.

Mr.R is good at keeping Sheik relevant as well, props for that. Speaking of Sheik, even though Saki absolutely MASACARED that Diddy player, I still don't think Diddy loses that matchup outside of SV. Even pre-patched Sheik had Diddy as one of her "worst" matchups (closest to even). No way Diddy loses this -2 as I saw in that one document.

In my humble, personal, and non-tournament-competitive opinion, Diddy only loses to Cloud and Rosalina, with Pikachu, Mario, Luigi, Mega Man and Olimar being 'annoying' matchups which force us to play differently. Villager to, but only when he Pockets our Banana, otherwise we beat him solidly.

Add peach and fox to that list. Diddy's got some matchup issues imo.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

When people say bayo is easy to play, I'm kinda at odds with it. Sure, it's easy to do her combos and witch twist and witch time conveniently eliminates possible options in CQC, so you can make some decisions without much worry in opposition, but with so much of her game heavily unexplored, I feel like she's gonna be another brawl mk situation where she becomes difficult to efficiently use in the mist of the higher levels of comp and everyone will know the MU exceedingly well if she's getting used as mic as the data shows.

 

[warionumbah2]

Das Koopa Katakiri used to beat Darkshad.

 

[Megamang]

I thought DI down+away (or one or the other if you are further in either direction, ie if you are down enough just hold down) saved you from bayo's fair combo resets. I've personally never been Bayo'd after her fair hits. The most that happens is a divekick, but the same down and away DI means she won't have a followup on the divekick, IME.

I've always thought that Bayonetta would be optimized to have horizontal combos. This is because, if you don't have a move that beats nair cleanly with no trade, you are essentially screwed offstage. Someone like Puff can airdodge stuff, but anyone with not great air mobility literally can't not get hit with nair if she falls at about your speed especially. And then if you are below the stage with a hitbox recovery, Witch Time destroys your recovery, and if you don't have a hitbox you'll not have an answer to dair, or just another nair. If you ascend great distances with your recovery then you can eat some nairs and eventually go high, but you're still taking an excessive amount of damage and also going high against Bayonetta can be a lethal decision.

All this is to say, I want to see that gif of the australian bayo with horizontal combos, because I want to start figuring out if I can get thru it as megaman because they are by far the bigger threat IMO. SDI upwards has been working for me for quite a while, as we discussed in this thread a few weeks ago. Witch Time is the real threat, since it really destroys Crash Bomber/Leaf Shield (usable but risk/reward is pretty heavily against you). I'd like to see more RAR Witch Time (it allows you to use the 'dodge' motion to fall backwards onto projectiles), it can net you stupid early kills for something like Megaman firing a pellet or greninja shooting a shurikan, at a burst range significantly better than falling backwards enough that you'd definitely catch lots of people offguard.


EvilGoku was very confident he could 'destroy' me with his Lucario after a set vs his Ganon, so I guess that is his character he has the most confidence in. But it appears he is training his Ganon based on his usage ratios. This isn't a great metric (Hey guise dabuz mains 15 characters now, including a mewtwo that bodies me for free on stream ;_; ) but its something I thought I could add that might spark someone to tell you for sure, or even get a response from him. However, Lucario is considered a decent answer to Megaman.... and I tend to agree. Megaman having a little trouble killing is quite troublesome vs Aura. AS eventually goes thru EVERYTHING and makes megaman approach, something he is not used to in almost any MU.

Megaman also usually feels quite safe in his shield, because leaf shield and OOS metal blade are amazing buttons. But vs Lucario, he actually feels quite threatened fairly frequently. Early on, Mega's heavy weight gets him combo'd pretty damn hard. I believe due to his weight he actually can get uthrow uair kill confirmed at the correct stages, but this may not be true. Regardless, it sucks being thrown upwards because if you waste your jump vs high damage Lucario, he gets a really easy shot with AS on a landing megaman (again negating leaf shield when it should be most effective) and airdodge is obviously a risky choice, dair doesn't do much and neither does leaf shield. Then, once the low damage game is up, Force Palm can straight murk you for like no reason at all, that move scales with Aura something fierce and will leave you scratching your head as you fly off the screen at 50%.

And again, racking damage with pellets kinda blows when his projectile starts beating all of yours.

On the other hand, I think an optimal approach to the MU is favorable for mega, just extremely lame. Focused on not taking ANY damage at all to give you some leeway when he has high aura, Megaman is content to just win the game having done 75% and taken 20%, simply tacking on damage constantly with leaf shield and OoS metal blade behind a very defensive, shielding based game.

Honestly, if im a stock up and there is less than 2 minutes left, it might be better to just play run away. No reason to let him get aura, then kill you off of something like uthrow fair uair -> hit an Aura Sphere -> Uthrow Uair kill at ~40%. All while you fire 2% lemons at him hoping to scare him away.


And then people would blame megaman for that playstyle, when its like 'bruh, this freakin aura dog basically has the smash version of FE counter and kills me for touching him at all!'

 

[Mr. Johan]

Das Koopa Dakpo did use Zamus for a game against Army.

Hakii also used Samus. It may have just been against me for that one set though.

I just now remembered in Brawl, Nicole use to be one of the best Peach's right?
Sadly Idk if she plays sm4sh for the new and improved Peach...

She used to play Zamus in this game, but she's gone back to Peach since it just feels more natural for her.

Source: played against her in pools at Tloc 1K. It was a nice chat about character affinity and loyalty.

 

[ARISTOS]

I'm now convinced that diddy has a pretty serious problem vs zoning, especially at high percents. That set vs peach was hard to watch. It could just be that diddys need to step up their rushdown game.

Add peach and fox to that list. Diddy's got some matchup issues imo.

isn't beating at all, that MU is probably Peach's worst

Though there is still a ton of labbing to do

 

[Ulevo]

isn't beating at all, that MU is probably Peach's worst

 

[Piipp]

There are 8 tournies I'm documenting this weekend. Here are the Top 16 results for each, compiled:


Battle Arena Melbourne 8 (May 13th-15th) (Australia) (260 Entrants) (Category 2)

Spoiler

1st: Mr. R
2nd: Abadango ,
3rd: 9B
4th: Umeki
5th: Waveguider ,
5th: Ghostbone , ,
7th: Jaice , , ,
7th: Jezmo
9th: Extra
9th: Earl
9th: Nikes
9th: MM
13th: Boozer
13th: Poppt1
13th: Elegant ,
13th: Duon

LEVEL UP EXPO (May 14th-15th) (Las Vegas) (172 Entrants) (Category 2)

Spoiler

1st: Nairo
2nd: VoiD
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Scatt ,
5th: Tyrant ,
5th: Saiki
7th: K9
7th: Falln
9th: FOW
9th: Xzax
9th: Z
9th: Doomlion
13th: Lycan
13th: Calculus
13th: JK
13th: Horse

TLOK 1K May (May 14th) (Dallas-Fort Worth) (136 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Cosmos
2nd: Aerolink
3rd: JaySon
4th: Johan
5th: Awestin
5th: Karna
7th: BC
7th: Sethlon
9th: P2P With Gibus
9th: YelloRello
9th: Dakpo
9th: Sassy
13th: Weegee
13th: Hakii
13th: BB SM Army
13th: iiGGy

Battle of BC (May 14th) (British Columbia) (133 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Anti , ,
2nd: Big D , ,
3rd: Len ,
4th: Locus
5th: Captain L
5th: Angis ,
7th: Masai
7th: Firefly
9th: Focus , ,
9th: Ty
9th: Choi
9th: Espeon CH
13th: Mono
13th: Lief
13th: BSM
13th: Cadence ,

Deluge (May 14th) (Midwest) (117 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Zinoto
2nd: Tyroy
3rd: Nite
4th: Ned
5th: JJROCKETS
5th: Ksev
7th: MVD
7th: Demitus .
9th: Komota
9th: H-Man
9th: Katakiri
9th: Dan
13th: Darkshad
13th: LCC JDB
13th: Yoshi Kirishima ,
13th: Shel

Gwinnett Brawl May (May 14th) (Georgia) (115 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: TheReflexWonder ,
2nd: Fatality
3rd: LordMix
4th: Copycat
5th: Gadliel
5th: Limbs
7th: Loco
7th: OrcatheHuman
9th: FlaminRoy
9th: Hyper
9th: Neos
9th: P2W Doom Bot
13th: KDK
13th: Micaelis
13th: Wrath
13th: Newk

GoTE 4 the Kids 2016 (May 14th) (Florida) (94 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Prince Ramen
2nd: 8BitMan
3rd: JaK
4th: Prodigy
5th: Degree of Fear
5th: Cashmere
7th: Purple Guy
7th: Riot
9th: Rideae
9th: Ewok41
9th: EvilGoku
9th: Static Manny
13th: BlueBeast
13th: Kazu
13th: Wingey
13th: Poltergust

Smashadelphia (May 15th) (Philadelphia) (128 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: James ,
2nd: LingLing
3rd: Apple
4th: BlazingPasta
5th: Hooded
5th: GWJ
7th: Seagull Joe
7th: 6WX
9th: Crowdingmovie
9th: C3PO
9th: Ninja
9th: BC Luck
13th: Daenerys
13th: Odon
13th: Ten
13th: Redeemer Z ,

Cannot assure 100% accuracy on FlaminRoy, EvilGoku, Dakpo, Hyper, or StaticManny.

-FlaminRoy used Sheik some a couple of months ago; This may be outdated.
-EvilGoku seems to use a lot of characters, but Youtube VODs indicate he primaries Ganondorf.
-Hyper seems to use Falcon. Can't totally be sure.
-Static Manny/All Might may have used Roy and not Sonic, but VODs indicate he's mostly stuck with Sonic in the last month.
-Dakpo uses ZSS but not in the Twitch VODs for the tourney in question, only Luigi.

Only included GoTE because it's juuuuust shy of my 96 minimum and includes several noteworthy players.

Bonus question: What were Gwinnett's custom rules? A 1111 Mii Brawler getting 5th at a tourney with a few of Florida's better players would be something noteworthy.

Didn't Reflex leave Georgia? I can't remember if it was Twitter or Facebook, but I remember seeing him talking about he just moved in somewhere in a state other than Georgia? I may just be stupid.

 

[Phan7om]

Dair>Footstool, while appearing gimmicky, is legit, cannot be SDId (QC method does nothing), and is a disgustingly safe edgeguard option.

It isnt true. If the opponent does anything other than jump at the correct timing, they get "phantom footstooled".

 

[LancerStaff]

Compare to Samus' Up-B:

This is a good game, even a great game, but some of the decisions made are insane.

I don't see what's particularly wrong with it. Unlike Bayo's it actually has a decent amount of horizontal hitboxes on start-up. Bayo's is disjointed upwards mostly to match the animation, and also leaves half her body unprotected. Samus's hitboxes look weird but work fine... If they really wanted the move to match the animation exactly you'd probably lose the horizontal range for something that's still easy to challenge from above and below.

 

[mackejn]

If I remember correctly they have Guest XXXX. I remember seeing Limbs using Helikick, but my memory doesn't want to cooperate with mii (Ha! Pun).

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1w1gZjt2xY7ARo1kA47h-rq-5b9p-IK7ROkg-sNt5wU0/mobilebasic

Think that's the rule set. Looks like customs were allowed as long as the user didn't slow down the tournament with them.

 

[KamikazePotato]

Compare to Samus' Up-B:

This is a good game, even a great game, but some of the decisions made are insane.

Keep in mind the version you posted doesn't take interpolation into account. The hitboxes in practice are somewhat bigger than that. Still a lot smaller than Bayo's though.

I think the issue isn't primarily with hitboxes - it's that Samus' puts her into a freefall state and Bayo's...doesn't.

 

[Ulevo]

I have yet to do this, and I am interested in the discussion it will bring. Inevitably other Meta Knight's will contribute their thoughts as well:

Characters are not ordered in their respective rows. I do not have enough competent match up experience for the characters not in the chart at the bottom, so rather than attempt to guess I am leaving them out for now.

Characters are labeled according to how likely they are to do well. i.e. Diddy Kong is likely to be 6:4 in favor of Diddy, but could potentially be 5:5.

A general overview:

Luigi: Really hard to combo efficiently while Luigi obtaining 60%+ is not uncommon. Fireball controls neutral space and ruins dash grab, dash attack, perfect pivot and fox trot spacing. Forward air and other aerials also challenge Meta Knight's air game really well. Can also be difficult to edge guard if Luigi recovers low. Meta Knight needs to be very careful in this match up regarding risks because a missed Shuttle Loop means an early kill from Super Jump Punch, and it is easier to miss the 2nd hit due to his weight and fall speed. Meta Knight can kill Luigi with the ladder however and if he obtains a lead it is difficult for Luigi to get it back without large risks.

Diddy: Diddy's low profile with rolls and general movement make it hard to air camp and Up Smash is risky. Forward air is a very difficult move to challenge as well. Banana controls the ground space and changes how dash attack, dash grab, perfect pivots and fox trots have to be used. If Meta Knight accidentally picks up a banana, it can also cost him a combo or a kill. Meta Knight has effective ways to steal the banana easily and can use it to his advantage almost as well as Diddy can. He also has an easier time avoiding Diddy's banana traps because of mid air jumps. If Diddy ever gets caught off stage at the wrong time there is a good chance he will die instantly.

Cloud: A patient Cloud charging limit holds a lot of options; on a per hit basis, Cloud is stronger, and Meta Knight approaching limits his options while also creating a mix up that usually favors Cloud. If Cloud is ever holding on to Limit Cross Slash, this becomes very stressful as Meta Knight dies very early if Cloud guesses correctly. Cloud does not deal well with Meta Knight's pressure game if he lands a confirm, and like Diddy, will die very early if ever caught off stage if the Meta Knight's edge game is optimized.

Ryu: Ryu on a per hit and per confirm basis does more than Meta Knight, and kills substantially earlier. Ryu is hard to edge guard if he holds onto his jump due to the priority on TSRK and rising Tatsu. He is heavy and is hard to kill vertically. Where Ryu struggles is his poor ground speed and poor air deceleration, requiring him to commit to approach options that can be easily baited out.

Sonic: I feel as though Meta Knight has a lot of reactionary options for dealing with Sonic's approaches, but I have yet to fully lab them due to the sheer rarity of the character. Relatively easy to combo and edge guard for Meta Knight, but difficult to catch. This one I am unsure about, feel it might be 5:5.

Characters in the 0 or 5:5 tier generally have advantages against Meta Knight that are equally met by equivalent or worse disadvantages. Mario's frame data is much better and raw knock back on most of his potent kill options are stronger, while also having a projectile to zone and allow for set ups, but he is easily combo'd, his kill confirms are not as consistent, and he does not have the mobility or burst options Meta Knight does. Zero Suit has a safer neutral when playing on the defense but has to commit a lot harder than Meta Knight to make something happen, and she is prone to being baited as such. They both have very damaging options and both struggle to kill later, with Meta Knight having the edge in that regard but with Zero Suit having a safer overall recovery. Fox is like Mario in that his frame data and neutral flexibility is greater but he has to deal with disjoints. While he can keep up with Meta Knight's mobility and burst options, he is probably the easiest character in the game to wreck off stage. Sheik was only 6:4 in favor of Sheik pre-patch because she had the luxury to camp and not take risks at the ledge until kill percent where she could opt for a kill confirm (NOT a 50/50). Post-patch, she no longer has guaranteed kills and struggles in this respect. The reduction of range on the forward air matters a lot, and she is less annoying at higher % with the Needle Storm range reduction. If it were not for the fact that she is so dominant in neutral this would be 6:4 in Meta Knight's favor. The fact that a sub-optimal Tyrant can keep up with VoiD on Smashville repeatedly I think attests to this. Greninja loses this match up with the exception that Shadow Sneak's hit stun cancel which prevents Meta Knight from safely using his combo kills, leading to a game of attrition which favor's Greninja via Water Shurkin. Otherwise he is similar to Zero Suit in that he requires risks to get much done and has a very exploitable recovery. Corrin, Marth and Lucina are in a similar case where the sheer disjoint range they have, along with their K.O. power, means that while Meta Knight can usually win more consistently this is often offset by the fact that he will randomly die at 60%. In Corrin's case, Dragon Lunge needs to be respected at all times because it covers the area where Meta Knight needs to go for a sweet spot dash attack. Meta Knight has a difficult time escaping from the space of control in any of these three cases.

In the 4:6 category, generally these characters are combo fodder, can be killed via ladder, are easy to edge guard, are slow and prone to being camped with a lead, or subjected to all of the above. I feel Mewtwo likely has the easiest time overall, and Olimar if he has a lead with Purple Pikmin, but these are in Meta Knight's favor.

6:4-7:3 category, these characters are either terrible in their own respects or get dominated by the ladder kill and die really early to regular confirms while also having issues with speed and disjoints.

7:3 row, there is no reason a Meta Knight should ever lose these with proper play.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Diddy only loses to Cloud and Rosalina [...]

Add peach and fox to that list.

Diddy doesn't actually lose any of those matchups, especially not Peach.

 

[Big-Cat]

Keep in mind the version you posted doesn't take interpolation into account. The hitboxes in practice are somewhat bigger than that. Still a lot smaller than Bayo's though.

I think the issue isn't primarily with hitboxes - it's that Samus' puts her into a freefall state and Bayo's...doesn't.

You can't compare moves side by side. It has to do with the entire character as a whole.

 

[Luco]

Hes on this forum often, and he very rarely uses witch time regardless of anything. You'll often see entire sets without using it once.



No, there is still a BIG gap between umeki and mr.r.

Did you see what mr.r did to aus' 4 best players in the crew battle? single handedly dismantled them all. Thats a big jump from someone like umeki who only won 3-2 vs arguably aus' 3rd best player.

I wish aussies were more honest about their skill level. Its OK to admit that our isolation from the rest of the world will affect the level of skill we can achieve.

And yet funnily enough Umeki really held his own vs Mr R in their matches. It was a 3-0 but each individual game was decently close.

The funny thing about skill gaps is they look a LOT larger than they are when people don't know how to deal with certain tactics / knowledge. With only a little bit of respect to my own pride, I can tell you for sure if I knew even just a little bit more about Jezmo as a player or even Diddy Kong I would not have gotten 3-stocked in crews hahaha. But, alas, he had the knowledge (+MU advantage), and I didn't, so although I can go head to head with MM who can put up a fight vs Jezmo, I got dismantled.

It's also REALLY relevant that Australia has no top Sheik mains. We're known for our low tier heroes but we don't have a top level Sheik, we don't have a top level Mewtwo, we DO have a top level bayo but tbh 9B and Ghost play really differently.

I'm not trying to say that with said knowledge our top players would have beaten or gone even with Mr R. But I do think the pessimists (including myself) who said it was a heck of a gap were frankly incorrect, at least in terms of scale, and there are clear reasons for that and definable goalposts we can set coming out of this tournament and we need as a whole community to take advantage of that in order not to fall behind to the point we did in Brawl where M2K came over and continuously 3-stocked ALL of our PR/top 5 players with ease.

 

[Djent]

Karisuma 7 videos are starting to go up here. They're primarily crews, but apparently they also held a genuine 3 vs. 3 side event after I went to sleep.

These formats aren't great for matchup knowledge, but at the very least Raito / Takera / kept is a team of 3 up-and-coming players who you should definitely keep an eye on.

 

[Illuminose]

Diddy still loses to Rosa. Zinoto vs Dabuz is pretty much the only instance of a top Rosa losing this matchup. Kirihara beats Nietono and Ryuji, Dabuz beats Nietono/MVD/Zinoto (in the past), Angel (in the past), even Xaltis has wins over MVD despite skill gap. Most of these sets don't even look close. All evidence points toward Zinoto beating Dabuz as an anomaly, and people should start treating it that way. Diddy is not good at killing/getting past Luma and gets bodied offstage (worse than other matchups). GP hurts banana play though there's definitely some counterplay to that. He doesn't have a particularly easy time getting in on Rosa either.

Diddy also almost definitely has slight losing matchups to Cloud, Pikachu, and Mega Man, pretty much by consensus (including Zinoto's own matchup chart). Low result sample size for Cloud and Pikachu makes those matchups more difficult to judge results-wise, but we have Kamemushi's fairly dominant win against Nietono supporting his loss to Mega Man. Diddy also has slight losing matchups to Luigi (Zinoto literally nearly lost to Shel at Deluge) and Olimar. We're looking at like 5-7 -1 matchups.

Compare this to other top tiers. Bayo arguably has no losing matchups, but for the sake of argument we can say she has a -1 to Diddy Kong and potentially Mega Man. Cloud has a -1 to Bayo and possible -1 matchup to Sheik. Sheik has a -1 to Rosa and possibly Sonic.

Even if a couple of those Diddy matchups are actually even, Diddy still objectively has worse matchups than Bayo, Sheik, or Cloud. This is why Diddy is not the best character in the game, or even really contending in my opinion. I personally put him at 4th best atm.

 

[C0rvus]

Saying Meta Knight goes even with Sheik now is a pretty bold and unfounded claim tbh. We still lose neutral. I think some clarification on that one would be appreciated.

Also I've come to find that Luigi isn't that hard to combo when you know. I watched a recent Ito v ConCon set and wow, Ito really put the damage on Luigi. Conversely, I think Mario has a slight edge and I think we do fine against Luigi. Many players who are better than me say we beat him pretty cleanly as well.

Bayonetta definitely strikes me as a losing match. Maybe with the new DI discoveries it gets better, but I feel that in this one, Bayo is thrilled to have such an easy time navigating neutral compared to her actual even matchups. I could be approaching it wrong, but thought I'd share anyway.

Fox is a loss fer sher. I am pretty confident in that one. Being able to wreck him off stage hardly makes Meta Knight special.

I've also heard the Mega Man MU is pretty even and Corrin is debatably a slight loss. I'm no veteran Knight so this is mostly my limited experience and hearsay from better players. But noone else decided to respond, so here I am!

 

[Diddy Kong]

Add peach and fox to that list. Diddy's got some matchup issues imo.

Peach definitely loses badly to Diddy. Many experienced Peaches even claimed it was one of their worst matchups. F Air basically zones everything out that Peach has. Popguns also have fun utility against her, and it's frustrating for her to deal with.

Fox can be nasty, but Diddy can be equally nasty to Fox. It's a very high paced matchup, and I doubt it's anything less than even. Both characters beat each other up badly.

 

[Meru.]

That matchup isn't Peach's worst at all. I have always been skeptical about MK having a solid advantage (even before the patch) against her but post patch I'm pretty sure its just even.

Peach definitely does not beat Diddy though lol, Diddy and Bayo are probably her worst matchups (but they're just slight disadvantages).

 

[Ulevo]

That matchup isn't Peach's worst at all. I have always been skeptical about MK having a solid advantage (even before the patch) against her but post patch I'm pretty sure its just even.

Peach definitely does not beat Diddy though lol, Diddy and Bayo are probably her worst matchups (but they're just slight disadvantages).

Considering Peach dies at 16-18% from a confirm regardless of what you do, she's slow and she does not have very good answers to full hop forward air in mid range and float is dangerous against mid range up smash, I doubt this.

 

[BunbUn129]

Ulevo

M2 should be moved up into the 0 tier. MK's neutral is centered on his grounded options and he lacks range, making Shadow Ball camping and M2's overall spacing quite annoying. The ladder is only reliable with enough rage on MK, but MK dies relatively early due to M2's high kill power with fair and his kill throws, so MK shouldn't be able to abuse rage very much, though MK's own great KOing ability allows him to keep up. While MK has the better disadvantage state, on a per-confirm basis they hit roughly just as hard. His multi-jumps make it easier for him to avoid Shadow Ball landing traps, and with M2 generally having a harder time landing, I believe MK has a slight edge in overall damage racking. I just can't see how this could be in MK's favor, though, given how difficult it can be for him to approach a good M2.

Edit: Also as mentioned above by corvus, Sheik is not a 0-tier MU for MK. Her neutral is still quite oppressive, and she racks up damage better than him not just because MK has weaker combo set-ups at mid-percents, but because while MK's disadvantage is very good, Sheik's is probably even better with her faster aerial mobility and aerials (she actually has a combo-breaker). MK's only notable advantage is KOing, but even with the ability to abuse rage and KO Sheik with DA -> SL at 60%, getting a good Sheik to that percent can be quite difficult.

 

[Ulevo]

Ulevo

M2 should be moved up into the 0 tier. MK's neutral is centered on his grounded options and he lacks range, making Shadow Ball camping and M2's overall spacing quite annoying. The ladder is only reliable with enough rage on MK, but MK dies relatively early due to M2's high kill power with fair and his kill throws, so MK shouldn't be able to abuse rage very much, though MK's own great KOing ability allows him to keep up. While MK has the better disadvantage state, on a per-confirm basis they hit roughly just as hard. His multi-jumps make it easier for him to avoid Shadow Ball landing traps, and with M2 generally having a harder time landing, I believe MK has a slight edge in overall damage racking. I just can't see how this could be in MK's favor, though, given how difficult it can be for him to approach a good M2.

I admit there is a good chance this is 5:5.

Saying Meta Knight goes even with Sheik now is a pretty bold and unfounded claim tbh. We still lose neutral. I think some clarification on that one would be appreciated.

Really I think I gave all the clarification I needed. The main aspects of the match up that made it one sided before were nerfed to quite a degree of significance. Sheik really struggles to kill characters that have multiple jumps because her kill traps fail to work when the optimal solution is to jump away. Meta Knight could not do this before, he died to a grab. Forward air receiving a range reduction is really big because it means Sheik cannot space against shield nearly as safely, and it is harder for Sheik to challenge forward and down air. Meta Knight did not lose very much from the patch in this match up. And again, I think the evidence regarding Tyrant and VoiD is pretty clear. Watch recent sets of Ito and see how he plays. He is significantly more optimized than Tyrant is whenever he gets a confirm or read, yet Tyrant is still managing to take sets off of arguably the best Sheik? What exactly do you need me to justify here.

Also I've come to find that Luigi isn't that hard to combo when you know. I watched a recent Ito v ConCon set and wow, Ito really put the damage on Luigi. Conversely, I think Mario has a slight edge and I think we do fine against Luigi. Many players who are better than me say we beat him pretty cleanly as well.

Luigi cannot be hit by dash attack to Mach Tornado at any %. Down throw to up smash also fails, though dash attack to up smash works at 0%, which is a mere 15%. Down throw, forward air, Shuttle Loop works at some %, others it does not and will be combo broken. The best options in this match up are laddering him at the correct % but outside of these %'s you are not getting extended damage the way you are in most match ups because Luigi floats away from the initial confirm and counters with neutral air.

The damage you get in the match up is not trivial, it's usually around 20%~. It just pales in comparison to what Luigi can do.

Bayonetta definitely strikes me as a losing match. Maybe with the new DI discoveries it gets better, but I feel that in this one, Bayo is thrilled to have such an easy time navigating neutral compared to her actual even matchups. I could be approaching it wrong, but thought I'd share anyway.

I could be wrong about Bayo. She may definitely be 6:4 for Bayonetta.

Fox is a loss fer sher. I am pretty confident in that one. Being able to wreck him off stage hardly makes Meta Knight special.

I think it makes quite the significant difference. Meta Knight has more kill power than Fox in this match up on and off stage, and unlike Fox, Meta Knight does not lose to shield. It could be 6:4 at top level given how fast Fox is combined with his neutral options but it is super swingy.

I've also heard the Mega Man MU is pretty even and Corrin is debatably a slight loss. I'm no veteran Knight so this is mostly my limited experience and hearsay from better players. But noone else decided to respond, so here I am!

There are very few good Megaman's so I feel that match up is up in the air at this point. I agree Corrin could be 6:4 for Corrin, though I have yet to optimize against Corrin personally.

 

[Yikarur]

All evidence points toward Zinoto beating Dabuz as an anomaly

Thats the most decent result though.

Diddy is not good at killing/getting past Luma

Money Kick alone is the go to way to get rid of Luma and it's not a weak option.

Diddy also almost definitely has slight losing matchups to Cloud, Pikachu, and Mega Man, pretty much by consensus (including Zinoto's own matchup chart).

The MU chart is outdated. He does not lose to Cloud at all. Thats already pretty clear by results alone. It's indicating a +1 MU because everytime I see a top Diddy playing a Cloud the Cloud gets bodied, but can manage to get some lucky kills from his design and is maybe able to win from that somehow. Diddy's playstyle is the natural counter to Clouds playstyle.

Diddy also has slight losing matchups to Luigi (Zinoto literally nearly lost to Shel at Deluge) and Olimar. We're looking at like 5-7 -1 matchups.

Luigi is just weird to play against but I don't really see where Luigi has an advantage. Luigi is just not a good character overall while Diddy is amazing. Why should Diddy lose that MU?

Even if a couple of those Diddy matchups are actually even, Diddy still objectively has worse matchups than Bayo, Sheik, or Cloud. This is why Diddy is not the best character in the game, or even really contending in my opinion. I personally put him at 4th best atm.

I don't think he loses any MU tbh while Bayonetta loses to Diddy at least. Thats why I'd put Diddy at first, Sheik and Bayo at tied second and then there is a tier gap to other characters. I don't know where to put Cloud. He is lacking at top level play.

 

[bc1910]

I have yet to do this, and I am interested in the discussion it will bring. Inevitably other Meta Knight's will contribute their thoughts as well:

Greninja loses this match up with the exception that Shadow Sneak's hit stun cancel which prevents Meta Knight from safely using his combo kills, leading to a game of attrition which favor's Greninja via Water Shurkin. Otherwise he is similar to Zero Suit in that he requires risks to get much done and has a very exploitable recovery

I don't agree with any of this.

Shadow Sneak's hitstun cancel isn't as good against MK as it is against ZSS. It only works when MK hits with a certain part of the shuttle loop and doesn't work at all if MK has rage. It's only relevant about half the time and even then, you're usually flipping a coin.

Greninja wins this MU with or without the hitstun cancel. Shurikens give MK a hard time in the neutral which he's already not amazing in, although I maintain MK's neutral is much better than most give it credit for. His recovery is not exploitable, it has fast travel speed with good mixup capabilities and his massive double jump does a lot of the work by itself (no offense, but thinking Greninja has an exploitable recovery is often a sign that someone hasn't played a competent one). Greninja doesn't really take heavy risks now, the various buffs have culminated in making him a fairly safe character with high reward off simple neutral conversions. The grab and dash attack startup buffs have also made MK's dash attack unsafe on Greninja's shield at any range, as you can reverse dash attack if he goes behind and grab if he stays in front, both of which lead to high reward.

This isn't me blindly defending Greninja, there are around 12 characters that he could lose to which I will accept arguments for, but MK isn't one of them. I appreciate you put this as 0, but since you said he loses the MU without SSHC that's basically what you're saying. Not to mention, this was always considered an evenish-good MU for Greninja, so there's no reason why he'd lose or go even now that he's been buffed and MK has been nerfed hard. I would call this 55:45 Greninja.

Incidentally, how good is the ladder combo against Mewtwo now if he SDIs properly? If the ladder is still very reliable I can see MK beating Mewtwo, but I can't see it otherwise.

 

[Radical Larry]

There are 8 tournies I'm documenting this weekend. Here are the Top 16 results for each, compiled:


Battle Arena Melbourne 8 (May 13th-15th) (Australia) (260 Entrants) (Category 2)

Spoiler

1st: Mr. R
2nd: Abadango ,
3rd: 9B
4th: Umeki
5th: Waveguider ,
5th: Ghostbone , ,
7th: Jaice , , ,
7th: Jezmo
9th: Extra
9th: Earl
9th: Nikes
9th: MM
13th: Boozer
13th: Poppt1
13th: Elegant ,
13th: Duon

LEVEL UP EXPO (May 14th-15th) (Las Vegas) (172 Entrants) (Category 2)

Spoiler

1st: Nairo
2nd: VoiD
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Scatt ,
5th: Tyrant ,
5th: Saiki
7th: K9
7th: Falln
9th: FOW
9th: Xzax
9th: Z
9th: Doomlion
13th: Lycan
13th: Calculus
13th: JK
13th: Horse

TLOK 1K May (May 14th) (Dallas-Fort Worth) (136 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Cosmos
2nd: Aerolink
3rd: JaySon
4th: Johan
5th: Awestin
5th: Karna
7th: BC
7th: Sethlon
9th: P2P With Gibus
9th: YelloRello
9th: Dakpo
9th: Sassy
13th: Weegee
13th: Hakii
13th: BB SM Army
13th: iiGGy

Battle of BC (May 14th) (British Columbia) (133 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Anti , ,
2nd: Big D , ,
3rd: Len ,
4th: Locus
5th: Captain L
5th: Angis ,
7th: Masai
7th: Firefly
9th: Focus , ,
9th: Ty
9th: Choi
9th: Espeon CH
13th: Mono
13th: Lief
13th: BSM
13th: Cadence ,

Deluge (May 14th) (Midwest) (117 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Zinoto
2nd: Tyroy
3rd: Nite
4th: Ned
5th: JJROCKETS
5th: Ksev
7th: MVD
7th: Demitus .
9th: Komota
9th: H-Man
9th: Katakiri
9th: Dan
13th: Darkshad
13th: LCC JDB
13th: Yoshi Kirishima ,
13th: Shel

Gwinnett Brawl May (May 14th) (Georgia) (115 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: TheReflexWonder ,
2nd: Fatality
3rd: LordMix
4th: Copycat
5th: Gadliel
5th: Limbs
7th: Loco
7th: OrcatheHuman
9th: FlaminRoy
9th: Hyper
9th: Neos
9th: P2W Doom Bot
13th: KDK
13th: Micaelis
13th: Wrath
13th: Newk

GoTE 4 the Kids 2016 (May 14th) (Florida) (94 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: Prince Ramen
2nd: 8BitMan
3rd: JaK
4th: Prodigy
5th: Degree of Fear
5th: Cashmere
7th: Purple Guy
7th: Riot
9th: Rideae
9th: Ewok41
9th: EvilGoku
9th: Static Manny
13th: BlueBeast
13th: Kazu
13th: Wingey
13th: Poltergust

Smashadelphia (May 15th) (Philadelphia) (128 Entrants) (Category 1)

Spoiler

1st: James ,
2nd: LingLing
3rd: Apple
4th: BlazingPasta
5th: Hooded
5th: GWJ
7th: Seagull Joe
7th: 6WX
9th: Crowdingmovie
9th: C3PO
9th: Ninja
9th: BC Luck
13th: Daenerys
13th: Odon
13th: Ten
13th: Redeemer Z ,

Cannot assure 100% accuracy on FlaminRoy, EvilGoku, Dakpo, Hyper, or StaticManny.

-FlaminRoy used Sheik some a couple of months ago; This may be outdated.
-EvilGoku seems to use a lot of characters, but Youtube VODs indicate he primaries Ganondorf.
-Hyper seems to use Falcon. Can't totally be sure.
-Static Manny/All Might may have used Roy and not Sonic, but VODs indicate he's mostly stuck with Sonic in the last month.
-Dakpo uses ZSS but not in the Twitch VODs for the tourney in question, only Luigi.

Only included GoTE because it's juuuuust shy of my 96 minimum and includes several noteworthy players.

Bonus question: What were Gwinnett's custom rules? A 1111 Mii Brawler getting 5th at a tourney with a few of Florida's better players would be something noteworthy.

There are some very noteworthy characters in these results. We can see that some characters are becoming more prevalent as time goes on. I've noticed that other than Link and Samus, we have Palutena, Zelda and Ganondorf starting to slip through the cracks. Heck, we even see King Dedede! And hey look, Palutena made first in a tournament; well, I better rethink my hypothetical tier list after seeing all of these results.

 

[paperchao]

Watching James vs apple was pretty interesting, as james' luigi was utilizing banana against apples diddy to good effect, even getting banana to shoryuken to completely turn the tide of the match one game. One thing to note is that luigi seems to out damage diddy in the matchup, forcing diddy to not leave any openings at all, just my take of how the set played out.

 

[Ulevo]

I don't agree with any of this.

Shadow Sneak's hitstun cancel isn't as good against MK as it is against ZSS. It only works when MK hits with a certain part of the shuttle loop and doesn't work at all if MK has rage. It's only relevant about half the time and even then, you're usually flipping a coin.

Greninja wins this MU with or without the hitstun cancel. Shurikens give MK a hard time in the neutral which he's already not amazing in, although I maintain MK's neutral is much better than most give it credit for. His recovery is not exploitable, it has fast travel speed with good mixup capabilities and his massive double jump does a lot of the work by itself (no offense, but thinking Greninja has an exploitable recovery is often a sign that someone hasn't played a competent one). Greninja doesn't really take heavy risks now, the various buffs have culminated in making him a fairly safe character with high reward off simple neutral conversions. The grab and dash attack startup buffs have also made MK's dash attack unsafe on Greninja's shield at any range, as you can reverse dash attack if he goes behind and grab if he stays in front, both of which lead to high reward.

This isn't me blindly defending Greninja, there are around 12 characters that he could lose to which I will accept arguments for, but MK isn't one of them. I appreciate you put this as 0, but since you said he loses the MU without SSHC that's basically what you're saying. Not to mention, this was always considered an evenish-good MU for Greninja, so there's no reason why he'd lose or go even now that he's been buffed and MK has been nerfed hard. I would call this 55:45 Greninja.

Incidentally, how good is the ladder combo against Mewtwo now if he SDIs properly? If the ladder is still very reliable I can see MK beating Mewtwo, but I can't see it otherwise.

Meta Knight cannot ladder Mewtwo and kill him on Final Destination or Battlefield with DI without rage. It might be possible on Town & City, or maybe with Battlefield platform assists.

Also, Greninja will die to a fall off neutral air if he fails to tech, or Meta Knight can fish for the 2F on Hydro Pump with forward smash with no risk. If Greninja opts to go over it, Greninja is eating a punish. What other options does he have? Shadow Sneak? If Greninja is ever below the stage line, even with his double jump, he's in trouble.

 

[Illuminose]

There is no way Diddy loses 0 matchups. He at the LEAST loses to Rosa, but there are multiple other matchups that both Diddy mains and players of those characters agree Diddy loses. Yikarur your opinion is running on bias and low evidence overall, which isn't exactly good to form competitive opinions...

Also Mr R and Void's results rival that of any Diddy player. Diddy has a better high/mid level presence because he's easy af to play but top level results indicate Sheik is better.