Official 4BR Tier List v1.0 - Competitive Impressions

[soniczx123]

add on the fact that he has random invincibility on all of his good moves, is almost twice as fast as marth(iirc), and gets 17-20% or a stock for connecting a spindash
he'd be so much more tolerable if spring and spindash alone didn't have invincibility.

Spin Dash wouldn't work if it didn't have invincibility. It would lose to everything.

 

[FeelMeUp]

Spin Dash wouldn't work if it didn't have invincibility. It would lose to everything.

give it super/heavy armour instead of flat out saying "no" to anything that wants to interact with it?

 

[Piipp]

Zard results bring a tear to this guy's eye.



Hopefully its a sign of things to come.

But yeah, for such a disliked character, Sonic is getting a lot of use.




Kind of brings up a question I have...

Is Sonic the new Rosalina? Many moons ago, she was "the campy character" who got just as much hate. Has that title passed to Sonic or did he just join her ranks?

And if so, who outcamps the other?

Imo, having to play a Sonic that plays in the most "viable" way, is way more annoying than that of Rosaluma.

To me, Rosa is more of a pest. Having to deal with Luma all the time is frustrating, but I feel like I'd rather lose to a Campy/Pesky Rosa, rather than lose by a Sonic whose intention is to time me out.

 

[Kofu]

Rosalina and Sonic camp in different ways. Rosalina is better at dealing with projectiles and disjoints, whereas Sonic is better at baiting approaches and overwhelming characters that have bad to middling mobility.

There's obviously some overlap (both tend to give heavies a very hard time) but Rosalina tends to wall you out as opposed to Sonic's strategy of bait-and-punish.

 

[thehard]

Adding on to "the list", shoutouts to shield-cancelable spin dash and the fact that you can hold it forever.

 

[soniczx123]

Adding on to "the list", shoutouts to shield-cancelable spin dash and the fact that you can hold it forever.

You can't shield cancel after a certain point of the charge.

give it super/heavy armour instead of flat out saying "no" to anything that wants to interact with it?

It's only in the initial hop anyway. After that it loses to everything, so it requires strict timing.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

I don't think most people understand how Sonic works.

Komorikiri does and that's why he's still the best Sonic by a fair margin. The main difference I see between him and non-japanese Sonic players is that his usage of Spin Dash, while still ample, is a lot more specific and calculated. He'll charge the move when he's just outside of the opponent's burst/punishment range and then either cancels it [when it's better to remain safe] or goes for the Spin Dash [when he sees an opening]. By using it very accurately he can apply tons of pressure on the opponent while not commiting to anything - just outside of punishment range, just close enough to have the opponent guessing. Other Sonic players tend to fail to do either one or the other when they use Spin Dash so oftentime they get punished, whiff a lot more often, or have to play defensive because they can't keep up the pressure.
As a result Sonic is seen as a lame and annoying character because many players have to resort to abusing Spin Dash or running away - except that's not actually ideal Sonic gameplay. Komorikiri typically does not use Spin Dash in other situations other than the one I pointed out above and instead plays Sonic as if he were an actual character. He uses Sonic's entire toolkit and leaves Spin Dash to be used at the right opportunity. The rest uses Spin Dash at every opportunity and leave the rest of his toolkit to be used only in specific situations.

That way he does make a lot of matchups that are supposedly hard for Sonic look pretty free. Case in point would be his two sets against Japan's best Peach:

Look at how easy he makes it look to beat the best Peach 4-0 just like that!

 

[Dee-SmashinBoss]

Wasn't it Umeki who was the best Peach?

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Umeki may have been better than Kie at some point but not now. He's very impressive because of his technical play but his results aren't actually that great. Kie's done a lot more recently.

 

[Wintermelon43]

Obviously this won't be 100% accurate, but what I find interesting is, if we take the top list as a "standard" japanese tier list that's representative of their meta, there are more characters in the high tiers, where as an "american" tier list has a lot more characters in those low tiers, does that mean Japan has advanced the meta of these characters more, or has America developed the counter meta more? Or do the regions just look at tiers very different?


Characters not included in the Japanese list are: Charizard, Link, Falco, Shulk, Wii Fit? (Not enough Data on how they do in Japan?)

Not included in American list is Wario? (Oversight?)


For the most part, despite what people like to say are drastically different metas, there is a general idea of how strong each character is, even if the results are vastly different (Compare Their ZSS, Marths, and Fox's to ours in results).


Also, notable differences (2 tiers or more) between these lists are the placings of

Lucario (Higher in Japan), Olimar (Higher in Japan), Duck Hunt (Higher in Japan), Game and Watch (Higher in Japan), Lucas (Higher in Japan)

Pikachu (Lower in Japan), Ike (Lower in Japan), Kirby (Lower in Japan)

A lot of these are obvious, but at the same time, it's probably funny because chances are japanese players look at Ike the same way we look at duck hunt, a character we they know is good, but have next no one using them and showing off their skills at top level despite videos from multiple players to study and copy from. It makes me wonder what would happen if one of our top players of an underrated character, such as Esam for Pikachu went to Japan, would we see more Pikachu's popping up and doing well there as some sort of confirmation bias of how good the character is? Bring their best Lucas here, what happens? I was actually expecting drastically different lists.


I know this is random, but I know the top Japanese Olimar and Duck Hunt players in Japan posted their matchup charts and they had some abysmal (-2 or -3) matchups but are still considered great, so does this mean Japan favors results more than ttheory due to the inconsistency of their tournament placings do they value overall spread more than solo viability determined by matchups against more more common characters? (Which would explain why characters which really dominate some matchups and get wrecked in others such as duck and Olimar)


Does anyone know what the stage picking rules in Japan are? (number of stages, how striking works, ect.)

Oops, I figured I forgot some characters, I'll add them in now.

And yeah, Japanease use results more than theory.

 

[verbatim]

Komorikiri: Best Sonic.

Addendum:

 

[ARISTOS]

I don't think most people understand how Sonic works.

Komorikiri does and that's why he's still the best Sonic by a fair margin. The main difference I see between him and non-japanese Sonic players is that his usage of Spin Dash, while still ample, is a lot more specific and calculated. He'll charge the move when he's just outside of the opponent's burst/punishment range and then either cancels it [when it's better to remain safe] or goes for the Spin Dash [when he sees an opening]. By using it very accurately he can apply tons of pressure on the opponent while not commiting to anything - just outside of punishment range, just close enough to have the opponent guessing. Other Sonic players tend to fail to do either one or the other when they use Spin Dash so oftentime they get punished, whiff a lot more often, or have to play defensive because they can't keep up the pressure.
As a result Sonic is seen as a lame and annoying character because many players have to resort to abusing Spin Dash or running away - except that's not actually ideal Sonic gameplay. Komorikiri typically does not use Spin Dash in other situations other than the one I pointed out above and instead plays Sonic as if he were an actual character. He uses Sonic's entire toolkit and leaves Spin Dash to be used at the right opportunity. The rest uses Spin Dash at every opportunity and leave the rest of his toolkit to be used only in specific situations.

That way he does make a lot of matchups that are supposedly hard for Sonic look pretty free. Case in point would be his two sets against Japan's best Peach:

Look at how easy he makes it look to beat the best Peach 4-0 just like that!

Who said this was hard for Sonic?

Peach only beats the Sonic if they are dedicated to abusing Spin Dash. Too many of Peach's moves beat it out straight up.

 

[HoSmash4]

Komorikiri also beat Kirihara (Japans best Rosalina) 2-0 at Umebura FAT. Even Rosalina is doable for Sonic.

Note that Kirihara, who is going Evo is projected to play Hyuga really early and came off winning a local smash meetup taking 2 sets off Abadango. He is regarded as one of Japans best players.

 

[verbatim]

Does Kirihara have any experience against Sigma or any of the other Japanese Toon Links? The matchup isn't as bad as I'd imagine most people picture it.

 

[ShadowGuy1]

It is Sonic's 25th birthday, and the results this week with smeared blue by our god, the blue blurr. EVO is still messed up tho. And about that Kirihara and Hyugs thing, I know Kirihara has faced Sigma, but idk about Hyuga against a good Rosa

 

[verbatim]

He teams with Dabuz frequently.

Also, it is now the year of the Hedgehog. Imagine if more Sonic's place in top 32 at EVO the year without customs.

 

[soniczx123]

He teams with Dabuz frequently.

Also, it is now the year of the Hedgehog. Imagine if more Sonic's placed in top 32 at EVO the year without customs.

What if he wins EVO with 2 other Sonics in top 8?

 

[Sinister Slush]

Spoiler: Impact (July 9th) (South) (147 Entrants) (Category 1)

1st: Trela
2nd: Espy
3rd: Jerm ,
4th: GrimTurtle
5th: Megafox
5th: KJ
7th: Illusion
7th: Whiteout
9th: Joker
9th: Haipe
9th: Gnes ,
9th: Whispy
13th: SaSSy
13th: Walter
13th: WeeGee
13th: Solace/Deluxemenu

Man I was so close to getting into top 16...
Maybe next time.

People also like to pretend Kamu-

You shall address Corrin as Corrin :^)

Don't forget Yoshi.

It's half true cause you're certainly not seeing Yoshi players getting top 6 where payouts usually are for big regionals unless the TO is kind or more than 129 entrants so they do top 8 instead.
Either way, yeah they maybe hovering around top 8/16 area but out of the big tournaments documented just now there was 1 Yoshi main that made it on the lists while having a secondary used. Samus was up there more than Yoshi with 2 solos, let that sink in.

 

[meticulousboy]

Let me ask you guys an interesting question. Which kind of character would you believe to be better and thus higher on a tier list: one that is heavily reliant on reads (Ike, possibly Samus), or one with a better frame data on certain moves (Ness)?

 

[SaltyKracka]

Let me ask you guys an interesting question. Which kind of character would you believe to be better and thus higher on a tier list: one that is heavily reliant on reads (Ike, possibly Samus), or one with a better frame data on certain moves (Ness)?

Frame data. No ifs, ands, or buts.

"Reads" is code for "being better than the other player" and a character that's heavily reliant on your being so much better than the other player that you can consistently predict their actions isn't much of a character.

 

[DE235]

Can anyone provide the link to Impact?

 

[meticulousboy]

Frame data. No ifs, ands, or buts.

"Reads" is code for "being better than the other player" and a character that's heavily reliant on your being so much better than the other player that you can consistently predict their actions isn't much of a character.

Well, that's true. Granted, being heavily reliant on reads does mean that stocks can be taken much more prematurely. Imagine getting killed by the back hit of Ike's dsmash because Ike read a ledge roll, though. Sure, timing is more strict with Ike, but it pays off.

 

[JustSomeScrub]

Frame data. No ifs, ands, or buts.

"Reads" is code for "being better than the other player" and a character that's heavily reliant on your being so much better than the other player that you can consistently predict their actions isn't much of a character.

Ehhh I don' think it's that simple.

Take Brawl Sheik for instance. The character had fantastic frame data but was considered mid tier at best. Due to issues like terrible kill power (even moreso than now) and a very exploitable recovery. Frame data isn't everything.

On the other hand you had Snake who was terrible on paper. Really bad Smash attacks (for traditional uses) and laggy aerials, very limited aerial mobility in general. But made up for it with ridiculous range and power on his tilts, a great grab game and some of the best most versatile projectiles in all of Smash among other things. He was much more read based than you'd expect from a top tier but he had the tools and weight to make risk/reward in his favour.

In the case of Smash 4 Ike versus Ness it's really debatable which character is better. They place similarly at stacked tournaments. Ness's frame data is way better but lacks Ike's range and disjoints. So he's much more prone to getting zoned out.

 

[ARISTOS]

Let me ask you guys an interesting question. Which kind of character would you believe to be better and thus higher on a tier list: one that is heavily reliant on reads (Ike, possibly Samus), or one with a better frame data on certain moves (Ness)?

Depends on the reward received for the read.

 

[Illusion.]

Can anyone provide the link to Impact?

https://smash.gg/tournament/impact/details

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Ehhh I don' think it's that simple.

Take Brawl Sheik for instance. The character had fantastic frame data but was considered mid tier at best. Due to issues like terrible kill power (even moreso than now) and a very exploitable recovery. Frame data isn't everything.

On the other hand you had Snake who was terrible on paper. Really bad Smash attacks (for traditional uses) and laggy aerials, very limited aerial mobility in general. But made up for it with ridiculous range and power on his tilts, a great grab game and some of the best most versatile projectiles in all of Smash among other things. He was much more read based than you'd expect from a top tier but he had the tools and weight to make risk/reward in his favour.

In the case of Smash 4 Ike versus Ness it's really debatable which character is better. They place similarly at stacked tournaments. Ness's frame data is way better but lacks Ike's range and disjoints. So he's much more prone to getting zoned out.

Snake had amazing ground game to the point that his air game almost didn't matter. Ftilt Utilt, Jab, Grenades, Usmash, Uair, and Bair really made his frame data good. He didn't have to rely on reads, but he could and get massive reward from it, so he had both.

A good example of a character w/o good frame data that relies on reads is ganondorf and we see how he ends up in every smash game (in melee, he had decent frame data thanks to L canceling). This is basically a textbook example.

 

[SaltyKracka]

On the other hand you had Snake who was terrible on paper. Really bad Smash attacks (for traditional uses) and laggy aerials, very limited aerial mobility in general. But made up for it with ridiculous range and power on his tilts, a great grab game and some of the best most versatile projectiles in all of Smash among other things. He was much more read based than you'd expect from a top tier but he had the tools and weight to make risk/reward in his favour.

...Terrible on paper?

We are talking about the same Snake, right? I might agree that he looked terrible at a glance, but Brawl Snake was exactly the opposite of terrible on paper. Let alone talking about the aerial mobility of a character with b-reversed grenades and all of his other shenanigans.

And I'd start disagreeing about whether or not Snake was a read-based character with his vast array of mobility and projectiles (yes, his tilts were projectiles) but that would involve thinking back to Brawl and how Brawl was played and I'd rather stay sane if it's all the same to you.

Anyways, in the dichotomy between frames and reads (which is what the question was about, remember) frames win.

Well, that's true. Granted, being heavily reliant on reads does mean that stocks can be taken much more prematurely. Imagine getting killed by the back hit of Ike's dsmash because Ike read a ledge roll, though. Sure, timing is more strict with Ike, but it pays off.

Ike's current power isn't tied up in reads, though. It's predicated on his range, safety with auto-canceled aerials, and ability to combo off of his grabs to get kills.

 

[meticulousboy]

Ike also has the kill power of a heavyweight without the combo food mantra going for him. Remember that he has Utilt that can KO reliably from a simple roll read towards him. Ness has a quicker Utilt, but it lacks the KBG necessary to KO from one read. All in all, I just wonder what most people opt for.

 

[Thinkaman]

Another way of putting it was that if the numbers were weighted such that an exclusively read-based character was evenly matched against someone with incredible frame data at top level play, there would be zero reason for the 99% of players below that level to play anyone except the "read-based" character.

Aside: No one in Smash 4 is exclusively read-focused. Ganon is one of the most read-heavy characters in any fighting game ever, offering insane reward for predicting exactly what the opponent will do in a wide variety of circumstances, but still does have some broader gameplay.

A true read-only character would look like Ganon, but with low damage throws, no uair, no dtilt, slower flame choke, slower bair, and 1.5x damage on everything such that he kills Bowser with 2 f-smashes. It'd be super obnoxious on all sides.

 

[JustSomeScrub]

...Terrible on paper?

We are talking about the same Snake, right? I might agree that he looked terrible at a glance, but Brawl Snake was exactly the opposite of terrible on paper. Let alone talking about the aerial mobility of a character with b-reversed grenades and all of his other shenanigans.

And I'd start disagreeing about whether or not Snake was a read-based character with his vast array of mobility and projectiles (yes, his tilts were projectiles) but that would involve thinking back to Brawl and how Brawl was played and I'd rather stay sane if it's all the same to you.

Anyways, in the dichotomy between frames and reads (which is what the question was about, remember) frames win.

Ike's current power isn't tied up in reads, though. It's predicated on his range, safety with auto-canceled aerials, and ability to combo off of his grabs to get kills.

B-reverse grenades were not a get out jail free card. Even with that he was more prone to getting juggled than any other top tier by far. And Snake's air mobility was not good, he couldn't chase in the air well. Bair and uair had fast startups but more cooldown compared to most good aerials thus being much bigger commitments.

Edit:

I'm not suggesting Snake was as read based than Ganon btw, just more than what you'd expect from a top tier. More importantly, he was rewarded more with successful reads.

 

[MushroomKiller]

It's half true cause you're certainly not seeing Yoshi players getting top 6 where payouts usually are for big regionals unless the TO is kind or more than 129 entrants so they do top 8 instead.
Either way, yeah they maybe hovering around top 8/16 area but out of the big tournaments documented just now there was 1 Yoshi main that made it on the lists while having a secondary used. Samus was up there more than Yoshi with 2 solos, let that sink in.

I was more referring to his results overall. I'm too lazy to dig it up, but I believe at one point during CEO week (or near that time) there was a slew of Yoshi results, and for sizable tournies, too. No Top 5 position, if I recall correctly, but quite a few Top 12s and definitely some top 16s.

Imho people are really sleeping on Yoshi at the moment. I never believed the character was Top 10 even in the early 3DS days, but I still think he's a solid top 20 character (albeit towards the lower end), and just needs that "one really good player" to prove his worth. I've watched a lot of Wall videos and can only imagine the potential of that character if played in the hands of an even more skilled player (no disrespect to The Wall, of course, but I only consider him a low-high level player at best).

Hopefully EVO will give the dino a new opportunity to shine.

 

[Pudgetalks]

I was more referring to his results overall. I'm too lazy to dig it up, but I believe at one point during CEO week (or near that time) there was a slew of Yoshi results, and for sizable tournies, too. No Top 5 position, if I recall correctly, but quite a few Top 12s and definitely some top 16s.

Imho people are really sleeping on Yoshi at the moment. I never believed the character was Top 10 even in the early 3DS days, but I still think he's a solid top 20 character (albeit towards the lower end), and just needs that "one really good player" to prove his worth. I've watched a lot of Wall videos and can only imagine the potential of that character if played in the hands of an even more skilled player (no disrespect to The Wall, of course, but I only consider him a low-high level player at best).

Hopefully EVO will give the dino a new opportunity to shine.

I dont feel like yoshi is a terrible character either. Tbh I feel like yoshi puts you (the yoshi player) in these bad situations where you can win a lot of the time by just pushing buttons and not really training mind games. A lot of yoshi's in my country have this problem where they thrash the mid level players but the second they have to play an opponent with good mind games/good movement they get destroyed. This is also not helped that no one takes the character seriously and never practice the matchup. I think thats why we see alot of top 16's but basically 0 top 8 placings.

 

[MushroomKiller]

I dont feel like yoshi is a terrible character either. Tbh I feel like yoshi puts you (the yoshi player) in these bad situations where you can win a lot of the time by just pushing buttons and not really training mind games. A lot of yoshi's in my country have this problem where they thrash the mid level players but the second they have to play an opponent with good mind games/good movement they get destroyed. This is also not helped that no one takes the character seriously and never practice the matchup. I think thats why we see alot of top 16's but basically 0 top 8 placings.

Why wouldn't you train mind games with Yoshi? Egg lay follow-ups, Egg Toss combos, Jab 1 > reading your opponent's DI, teching approaching Fairs etc. are some of Yoshi's many tools that require the Yoshi player to have some strong mental fortitude, good reads, and ability to mix up his combos and condition his opponent.

It's why it's a little annoying when people are like "lol Yoshi no skill". I'll concede that the character has a low skill floor, but he definitely has a higher skill ceiling than what most people assume him to have.

 

[Deleted member 269706]

Ike also has the kill power of a heavyweight without the combo food mantra going for him. Remember that he has Utilt that can KO reliably from a simple roll read towards him. Ness has a quicker Utilt, but it lacks the KBG necessary to KO from one read. All in all, I just wonder what most people opt for.

ex-Ike main here, not sure where you get the idea that he's not combo food. Both when I played him and now that I've switched, I've always seen him as someone who gets comboed pretty hard. His heavy-weight status and above average fall speed causes him to take a lot of dmg at low percents and continued to be juggled at mid/high percents. He has no reliable option to get him out of constant pressure other than airdodge. His fastest aerial option is frame 7 and it only hits behind him. Nair and dair are the only aerials he have that hit below him, and are VERY punishable on whiff. It's true he's not as screwed as Bowser or DK, but he still definitely gets comboed harder than your average character.

 

[Mr. Johan]

There was one word of advice for new Sonic players in the Brawl days that I think still holds water today: Play sets while not using the B button for anything other than Spring to recover. It was meant to teach the Sonics that Spin Dash, while a crux of his movekit, wasn't the correct option 100% of the time. Sonic would then become used to how to foxtrot, simply move, the range of his tilts, what he can do with SH OoS, etc. After becoming accustomed to Sonic's regular kit, then Spin Dash could be incorporated to fill in the holes.


While Spin Dash is much better in this game, with a faster Side B hop and Down B offering some braking tricks (Though ASC is gone, may this double hit double priority optimally 52% sequence rest in peace </3), the advice still applies. You'd be surprised what SH Uair can sneak into and what Dtilt can beat. From there, use Spin Dash to force and punch holes when the time is right.

Spin Dash is a baiting and punishing tool foremost. Approaching and offense come second.

 

[meticulousboy]

ex-Ike main here, not sure where you get the idea that he's not combo food. Both when I played him and now that I've switched, I've always seen him as someone who gets comboed pretty hard. His heavy-weight status and above average fall speed causes him to take a lot of dmg at low percents and continued to be juggled at mid/high percents. He has no reliable option to get him out of constant pressure other than airdodge. His fastest aerial option is frame 7 and it only hits behind him. Nair and dair are the only aerials he have that hit below him, and are VERY punishable on whiff. It's true he's not as screwed as Bowser or DK, but he still definitely gets comboed harder than your average character.

Unlike Bowser, DK, and Charizard, Ike does not have as many hurtboxes as the ones listed. In short, Ike is not as easy to hit as, say, DK. That was what I meant by combo food. But I get what you mean as well.

This goes to back to the debate: he is lightweight, but has a lot of hurtboxes because of his height.

But let's focus on now.

 

[Y2Kay]

There was one word of advice for new Sonic players in the Brawl days that I think still holds water today: Play sets while not using the B button for anything other than Spring to recover. It was meant to teach the Sonics that Spin Dash, while a crux of his movekit, wasn't the correct option 100% of the time. Sonic would then become used to how to foxtrot, simply move, the range of his tilts, what he can do with SH OoS, etc. After becoming accustomed to Sonic's regular kit, then Spin Dash could be incorporated to fill in the holes.


While Spin Dash is much better in this game, with a faster Side B hop and Down B offering some braking tricks (Though ASC is gone, may this double hit double priority optimally 52% sequence rest in peace </3), the advice still applies. You'd be surprised what SH Uair can sneak into and what Dtilt can beat. From there, use Spin Dash to force and punch holes when the time is right.

Spin Dash is a baiting and punishing tool foremost. Approaching and offense come second.

There's a similar thing in the greninja community as well.

A lot of new main's have a hard time getting used to having to not rely on shield. So I tell a lot o new shinobi to just cut off their shield buttons for a whole play session. Utilizing movement and spacing to protect yourself more than shield is the name of the game with gren, and that exercise forces you to do that.

 

[Nu~]

Y2Kay
I'm curious...

What is Greninja's gameplan overall? From what I've gotten in my short time of actually taking a closer look at the character, he seems to be focused around tricky movement and maximizing punishes when you successfully fool the opponent... but I'm not fully sure.

What draws people to the character?

 

[Mr. Johan]

A Greninja here at my scene enjoys the crisp movement Greninja can pull and just how well the frog can play neutral with foxtrot and then reap maximum reward when he catches you off guard once. It's a neutral you have to respect.

Problem is, he doesn't main Greninja anymore. He uses Diddy instead, because how Greninja can play neutral and move and punish, Diddy can play and move and punish better.

 

[Nobie]

I think Smash players are so used to "read-based" characters being inherently disadvantaged by the various games' engines that many assume that they're inherently inferior to other types. After all, what hope does Captain Falcon in Melee have when Fox exists (insert Hax quote here)?

But it's possible for a read-based character to thrive in a fighting game. Kazunoko took Yun in Ultra Street Fighter IV to a Capcom Cup victory last year.

In Smash, I think there's a recurring belief that reads are synonymous with "swag" when in fact it can be thought of just another skill to hone. If a player or character is successfully rewarded for honing that skill, then that's a step in the right direction. We still haven't achieved it yet, but at least this version of Ganondorf is getting closer.

Ideally, I think a read-based character should be one who not only gets rewarded for successful reads through damage, but by creating further situations that give the read-based character a greater chance of further success. Let's say that two characters are in a rock-paper-scissors situation and the read-based character wins that exchange. What should happen is that either the character gets an additional option, or the opponent loses an option. And on and on it goes until the opponent is able to reset back to neutral.