Character Competitive Impressions

[Paper Maribro]

So. Um. Maybe I'm behind the times or just don't understand things the way everybody else does (possible). But I've heard it said multiple times that Pac-Man would be top tier/the best character in the game with a good grab. But I don't see it. Top tier, maybe, but he doesn't feel good enough have his only real weakness be his grab. Don't get me wrong, he's a great character. Bonus Fruit is like three moves in one, his recovery is safer than it looks at first glance, and Fire Hydrant is just absurd for escaping juggles and setting up traps. His normals have a lot more priority on them than one would think (I have a sneaking suspicion that his limbs are invincible when attacking) and are generally low lag. His smash attacks are relatively safe, too. But nothing about him in general just screams "wow, this character's great!" Can some

His OoS options would be way too strong with a good grab. Being able to Z-drop a 15% item which also doubles up as a kill move when he wants to use it as such and a strong grab game because of all his decent throws?

Let me quote A2Z on this one

Pac-Man is an item generating character who would very clearly break the game with a normal grab due to his combined ability to limit approach options and punish from many angles. Him having a tether grab is not an accident.

As has already been said by myself and BSP, Pac-Man (outside of his grab) is a very safe character. If you gave him a good grab as well, he would have options for every situation imaginable.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

His OoS options would be way too strong with a good grab. Being able to Z-drop a 15% item which also doubles up as a kill move when he wants to use it as such and a strong grab game because of all his decent throws?

Let me quote A2Z on this one



As has already been said by myself and BSP, Pac-Man (outside of his grab) is a very safe character. If you gave him a good grab as well, he would have options for every situation imaginable.

lol i swear even his dash attack is quite safe on shield kinda annoying.

 

[Paper Maribro]

lol i swear even his dash attack is quite safe on shield kinda annoying.

Yes and no, the thing is, if you shield drop at the end of the dash attack, he can ftilt straight out of it. I have caught so many people by doing this. It isnt entirely safe, but it is quite good.

 

[Asdioh]

Haha, reading that "is no accident" quote is cool because I really do think the people that designed this game really understand competitive play. The game's not perfectly balanced (and patches can help that!) but they made a LOT of right decisions.

Yes and no, the thing is, if you shield drop at the end of the dash attack, he can ftilt straight out of it. I have caught so many people by doing this. It isnt entirely safe, but it is quite good.

You sure? I feel like I can Dsmash Pacman's dash attack, I know it has very low ending lag, similar to Brawl Diddy Kong, but it feels quite punishable if you have the timing down.

 

[Paper Maribro]

Haha, reading that "is no accident" quote is cool because I really do think the people that designed this game really understand competitive play. The game's not perfectly balanced (and patches can help that!) but they made a LOT of right decisions. You sure? I feel like I can Dsmash Pacman's dash attack, I know it has very low ending lag, similar to Brawl Diddy Kong, but it feels quite punishable if you have the timing down.

The Dash attack is quite a long move and is punishable, yes, but the ending animation is really fast and shield dropping is dangerous. Not going into shield and punishing it would be doable, though I havent been punished for using his DA very often.

 

[Nobie]

The cape or Power Thrust

While we could talk about his normals, and the 16% up air or whatever. To make a long story very short.
Swordfighter has a Cape. The only other viable cape effect I can recall is on Mario & Doctor Mario.
Unlike the Marios however he is disjointed. No other disjointed character brings that specific ability to the table.

Personally I feel his counter is pointless because if you want to use a counter on a disjointed character you have Shulk, Ike, Marth, and Paletuna or even (d)pits custom 2 upperdash.

I've just been messing around Mii Swordfighter a bit so I can't say I have even semi-solid experience with the character, but I feel like one of their issues is that they have a bunch of good attacks that are all stacked into their specials in such a way that you can't use them all at once. Like if the character had Cape AND Power Thrust? That would be pretty sweet. It would make Mii Swordfighter a solid punishment character due to Power Thrust being basically a somewhat better Falcon Kick (aside from damage) which I could see being good for punishing landings, and Cape being Cape, but alas you have to choose, and neither of those are the default. Default Swordfighter just feels kind of incomplete as a result.

Trying out different Mii sizes, I noticed that taller Miis have longer Power Thrusts, which might also factor in deciding size stats.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Pac-Man's dash attack is NOT safe, its ONLY safe on the LAST hit, you can punish in between all 3 of the other hits.

 

[BSP]

His OoS options would be way too strong with a good grab. Being able to Z-drop a 15% item which also doubles up as a kill move when he wants to use it as such and a strong grab game because of all his decent throws?

Let me quote A2Z on this one



As has already been said by myself and BSP, Pac-Man (outside of his grab) is a very safe character. If you gave him a good grab as well, he would have options for every situation imaginable.

To add onto this, it's pretty easy to pressure Pac-Man's shield because of how terrible his grab is. Unless you attack it with a really laggy aerial or mispace horribly, he won't be able to grab you out of shield 90% of the time, and the punishment for him missing is usually huge. So he feels like a fish out of water in pressure situations.

He also can't throw in grab as a mixup when he's rushing you down, leaving sitting in shield as a pretty safe option unless Pac-Man is right on top of you. So his aggressive game suffers a lot from it too.

Pac-Man's camp game would be ridiculous with a normal grab. A normal grab + Trampoline is a broken combination. Consider that Trampoline forces you airborne in order to approach whoever is behind it. Trampoline in itself is a broken move, but it's hard to see because Pac-Man's grab is just so God awful.

Just imagine if Diddy could place trampolines between himself and you. Trampoline removes all of your grounded approach options. This leaves you reliant on aerials. What option beats aerials 100% of the time? Shield. What's usually a pretty safe and rewarding option after shielding an aerial? Grab.

If Diddy had a setup like:

[......................trampoline............................................you.......................]

I don't know how you would stop him from shieldgrabbing you every time you tried to approach.

Now replace Diddy with Pac-Man in this situation, but with a normal grab. He could reliably shieldgrab you every time you jumped over, and if you didn't, he'd have hydrants and keys coming your way.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Except Pac-Man has up b, nair, and fair OoS. You dont pressure his shield, you get to his shield, force him to gtfo, then pressure him as he tries to gain back stage control.

 

[BSP]

That last part would be much harder to do if, at any point in trying to pressure him, he could throw out a grab without fear of getting hit by a charged smash attack in retaliation.

Also, if he had a normal grab, how would you get to his shield without exposing yourself to getting shieldgrabbed? He could try to OOS you with something, or just wait till you land and grab you for sure.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Oh Im not disagreeing with that, if Pac had a normal grab he'd be insane, I was just saying Pac is just fine at dealing with shield pressure itself, its just dealing with getting back to neutral after escaping shield pressure thats hard for him.

 

[BSP]

Ok, but Nair and Up B will only hit if you're right on top of him, which spaced aerials would avoid. Fair could work, but it does 5%. I guess that's better than nothing though.

Having a Key in hand removes this problem, but it takes a while to get.

 

[Z'zgashi]

The amount of damage doesnt matter, the fact that he has the options to deal with it is what matters. He could do no damage at all with his OoS options and they'd still be fine. All he NEEDS to do is have a way out of the situation and not take or minimize damage to himself so that he can work towards getting back to what he really wants to do and zone.

 

[Kofu]

His OoS options would be way too strong with a good grab. Being able to Z-drop a 15% item which also doubles up as a kill move when he wants to use it as such and a strong grab game because of all his decent throws?

Let me quote A2Z on this one



As has already been said by myself and BSP, Pac-Man (outside of his grab) is a very safe character. If you gave him a good grab as well, he would have options for every situation imaginable.

First a quick question about the key: how do you get to the point where you can Z-Drop it? I don't play Pac-Man (as you've probably surmised from my naivete about how a good grab would help him tremendously) but I'm not sure how you just drop it/throw it to where you can regrab it. With some of the fruits I could see but not the key.

Anyway, I'm trying to refute the argument about how a good grab would make his OoS options "way too strong" but I don't really have a way to do so. I'm not sure they'd be overpowered but it would certainly be solid. Sitting in shield is only one part of the game, though, and while I'm sure this would help one of his weak points I don't see it putting him in the same group as characters like Diddy, Pikachu, Sonic, and Sheik who generally have no trouble getting in and, with the exception of Diddy, can generally escape if disadvantaged. (Anecdote: If we take Shaya's analysis if the strongest characters in the game having good grab games, and I agree with that, Pac-Man probably would be a lot better.)

Bringing up BSP's theoretical "Diddy with a trampoline" scenario... he already kind of has that in bananas. A trampoline would be loads better because:
1. You HAVE to jump to avoid it unless you're Wario (or maybe if you have a roll long enough to roll over it, IDK if that even works though).
2. You can't remove it by grabbing it or reflecting it.
Those are HUGE points but he still has something that restricts the opponent's actions. If I remember correctly, there was a hypothetical Diddy scenario where he had a banana in front of him, a banana in hand, and shooting peanuts relentlessly. Funnily enough, I don't think anyone ever found success by using the strategy. This partially fails because it's heavily reliant on stages devoid of platforms. Adding platforms allows maneuverability to get around ground-based camping. It also fails because camping without long-distance projectiles doesn't apply enough pressure on the opponent to win a match. Sure, you'll eventually force the opponent to approach because you're getting occasional hits in, but I feel that that sort of camping is more tiresome for the camper than the foe. I think Pac-Man is hard to camp but his own camping game doesn't have much pressure either. By the same token, ROB is hard to camp but he's not spectacular at it himself because (without customs) he can't spam lasers and the gyro isn't something you can throw out and hope to work in neutral.

The talk about him having a tether grab to balance his camping game is interesting, though. Thinking about it, practically all characters who have tether grabs can pressure the opponent from a distance. Link, Toon Link, Samus, Villager, and Pac-Man all have either a consistent projectile game or tools.that heavily disrupt the opponent (ZSS is the exception here, IDK why). I can't say if it's a deliberate design choice or not, since, at least for the Links, Samus, and Villager, using what they do to grab makes sense given their source material. Pac-Man's doesn't, necessarily, but I think him grabbing normally might look a little funny.

Just my... a little more than two cents (probably about a quarter tbh). Maybe I'd have a different opinion/viewpoint if I played a Pac-Man who knew what they were doing. None have used the trampoline to hinder my approach, to give you an idea. But I still think he's a solid character, I just need more experience against him.

 

[Paper Maribro]

snip

Its risky as all hell, but you charge the key, jump off stage, fling it at the side wall and use an aerial/air-dodge to catch it. The reward can be tremendous, however, as Z-dropped keys can also launch hydrants, on top of everything else that has already been stated.

Giving Pac the same throws with a non-tether grab would also give him a great mixup tool when he feels like playing a bit of rushdown. His down throw combos into dash attack at lower percents, up throw can kill off a high platform, forward throw can lead into a short hop key at kill percents and back-throw is a kill throw and can be used to tech chase with Side-b.

It is true that we are only looking at Pacs camping through a fairly narrow lens, but he does have a long range projectile; Galaxian, Key, Orange, Melon and Apple all travel a fair way. He also has the ability to lay the trampoline anywhere on the stage, he absolutely is not restricted by the shape of the stage as to where he can lay it. So he is incredibly adaptable to many different stage layouts and sizes.

In this case (I have very little experience with other tether grab characters), I really feel as though his tether grab is 100% a balancing tool. I honestly believe Pac-Man would break the game in his current state with a good grab because he can just punish and control you in so many different ways. He would have far too many options with a good grab and the only way to really balance would be to make him stupidly weak, i.e. all his attacks do about 1 or 2% and he cannot kill you till you reach 300% damage (little bit of an exaggeration but still).

 

[Z'zgashi]

Anyway, I'm trying to refute the argument about how a good grab would make his OoS options "way too strong" but I don't really have a way to do so. I'm not sure they'd be overpowered but it would certainly be solid.

Here's why it'd be OP. Pac has one of, if not THE best stage control of any character as well as the zone tools to reliably rack up damage, he has some of the most threatening and highest damage dealing projectiles as well as ways to screw with your positioning and approaches in order to force you into situations you dont want to be in, and if he also had a reliable way to get stage control back after losing it (aka if he could shield grab and throw them offstage to allow him stage control and to set up again) hed be amazing. Not to mention trampoline forces an aerial approach, and grabbing landings is one of the easiest ways to get grabs. You'd almost never be able to get in on Pac, you'd always have to be weary of keys since he can screw with your positioning with the fire hydrant without even risking anything whatsoever, even if you want to go in on him he can force you to the air, and he'd just be able to zone and control stage infinitely if played correctly. Only reason Pac isnt practically unstoppable is because he cant reliably catch landings with anything that can force you to go back through the zone gauntlet, and he actually has to work pretty hard once you force him to reset since he has to get control of some stage and he does have to set up a bit.

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Think of the kinda stage control Diddy has right now, only multiply that by a metric ****ton. That is Bizarro!Pacman, OP by virtue of having a vanilla grab.

Smooth Criminal

 

[Sinister Slush]

I really am glad Pac-man has such a horrible grab and can't punish landings like most characters can, otherwise a statement made in the previous page would be true with him being somewhere around top tier.

 

[NairWizard]

Here's why it'd be OP. Pac has one of, if not THE best stage control of any character as well as the zone tools to reliably rack up damage, he has some of the most threatening and highest damage dealing projectiles as well as ways to screw with your positioning and approaches in order to force you into situations you dont want to be in, and if he also had a reliable way to get stage control back after losing it (aka if he could shield grab and throw them offstage to allow him stage control and to set up again) hed be. Not to mention trampoline forces an aerial approach, and grabbing landings is one of the easiest ways to get grabs. You'd almost never be able to get in on Pac, you'd always have to be weary of keys since he can screw with your positioning with the fire hydrant without even risking anything whatsoever, even if you want to go in on him he can force you to the air, and he'd just be able to zone and control stage infinitely if played correctly. Only reason Pac isnt practically unstoppable is because he cant reliably catch landings with anything that can force you to go back through the zone gauntlet, and he actually has to work pretty hard once you force him to reset since he has to get control of some stage and he does have to set up a bit.

This guy pretty much nailed it.

In my own words, since I was asked:

Pacman really wants to play the zoning game. Key + hydrant + trampoline gives Pacman a hilarious, potent long-range game that not even Villager can match without customs.

What's the best counter to zoning? Being up close. What's the best way to force someone out of close range? A throw. Pacman with a grab would just toss you away whenever you got close. Endless pain, seriously.

 

[Z'zgashi]

What's the best counter to zoning? Being up close. What's the best way to force someone out of close range? A throw.

And to continue on this chain:
What's the best way to get a grab? Punish a landing. What's one of the best ways to catch a landing? Force an aerial approach.

What does Pac-Man do? Force you to make an aerial approach.

Tbh, giving Pac a bad grab was a necessity, with the playstyle and zone dominance Pac has, a normal grab would break him and I can guarantee you, this character would be arguably even better than Diddy. If Pac also had a reliable kill confirm on top of it, he'd be unarguably best imo.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Only way to fix that if Pac was given a good grab at the start was either give him the grab he has today or massively lower the damage on all his zoning tools.

 

[FlareHabanero]

Pac-Man's current grab isn't even that horrible like people exaggerate. It can ignore side stepping and has above normal range, which gives Pac-Man a few niches in that regard.

 

[Shaya]

S:
A:
B: (unordered)

1. Diddy is the strongest force in the meta right now, he is the easiest to pick up and has some of the single best moves in the game. We all know down throw up air/forward air being guaranteed at any point is extremely centralising and not many characters have anything similar, while also attaining the mobility specs and zoning tools required to deal with everyone. Maybe not the best character in the game, if you are capable of avoiding the grabs.
2. Sheik's fair "nerf" was more like a buff, now chaining to off stage for even longer, which easily combos into rar bair for a metric ton of damage, risk of bouncing fish and being off stage against sheik. She has the best recovery, it is practically untouchable and is of an extreme length. She may struggle in killing, she's also technically a lot harder than most, but Sheik is definitely still a beast that most of the cast cannot handle.

Call S tier the Meta Knight Halves. Sheik has the frame data of MK, while Diddy has the range and cheese / kill power.

3. Ness is probably the closest to claiming the third spot. Easy to play due to amazing priority, speed and combo-ability of most aerials and ground moves. Ends games very easily with back throw. The transcended multi hitting disjoints kinda reminds me of Meta Knight. Pretty much competitive against every character, overtuned to beat a majority easily and his hard match ups aren't anywhere near counter levels (they just likely can gimp him easier than most).
4. Pikachu is ESAM, but no one can deny the general bat **** mobility, combo-ability and tools Pika has. More effort than Sheik, with cooler effects but similar rewards. All dat potential. Having issues with a match up or two but doing fine against every other competitive threat.
5. Rosalina is showing signs of weakness and she may continue to trend downwards. However her kit is still amazing in terms of range, speed and utility and most characters still seem to struggle to even breach her. The change to her Luma in grab stun completely reshaped the meta and changed a match up like Diddy firmly in her favour prior to the patch to quite the opposite, the best grab characters are now her enemy, and that's what shapes the top tiers. She may have a brawl-dedede like effect on the game, but is still a lot more option rich and will likely retain that separation of ability around.
6. ZSS is awkward, Sheik outclasses her in just about every way but range, but the speed difference is so disgusting it doesn't really favour her at all in the meta. She may not have the best top tier match ups but right now her kit and numbers are all in the top areas of the cast. When there aren't better options out there, she'll become insanely more popular. She could still go down though.
7. Sonic was someone I'm still fearing, but at the very least his throw game isn't at the level of Diddy and shielding restricts a lot of sonic's options in pressure. He could become the replacement to diddy in the meta post-nerfs due to mobility and grab ability, but the rewards for other characters are just firmly better than Sonic's is right now, but out of everyone I think Sonic is the most likely to climb.
8. Yoshi is falling out of popularity and spot light by most people, suffering much like ZSS, Sonic or Pikachu, there are better characters than them available with usually easy learning curves. While Yoshi has great frame data and shield set ups, he still lacks the grab ability Diddy has. Eggs are very daunting for most of the cast to deal with Yoshi's risk/reward skew is really crappy for other characters to match up with.
9. Lucario, my early days enemy, king of 3DS. With better spacing precision available to opponents, Lucario has become much less threatening on the WiiU, and the nerf to his recovery has definitely had a noticeable effect on one's ability to punish Lucario for making mistakes, something he was almost immune to early on. But some eternal truths about range hold him back, actually being a hard character to find a kill outside of frame traps and lives life on the wire looking for the sweetspot percent for comboing and killing while also not being one easy hit away from dying. With a mechanic that allows him to come back against Sheik (although he mostly loses otherwise) and the weight to survive Diddy down throw uair long enough to get in a killing hit, aurasphere plows through projectiles and moves; their kill power otherwise is low and this allows him to shine in the meta. Match up wise he has a lot of risk against those who can kill at around 100%, but I don't know whether he actually truly loses to any characters lower than he is.

~
My B tier are characters which I've seen do well/be competitive in somewhat consistent ways, other characters could be better or they may be overhyped/worse. Shulk and Villager are sneaking in; Villager having polarising match ups with many. Mario is growing on me as actually a really solid creature - his mobility specs are amazing and that's all that really matters, good hitboxes that allows him to compete with some of the best on an even playing field. Is greninja still good? I've heard of some Japanese results that show he's still competent but I'm not sure. The pit's have all the tools, great range, but lack dominating tactics or easy kill set ups, but they can take on Diddy Kong and that's practically all that is necessary to be relevant.

 

[Luco]

So... it's all praise Pac-man time?

Exploding hydrants is a fun thing to learn about on the fly. No really. <3

Something to consider - Villager can also force an aerial approach with counter timber in particular, and you'll notice his grab is similarly sub-par. Diddy does this too, to a lesser extent with bananas; so many peeps will approach diddy from the air. His grab is... not compromised.

You know what might be the way to tame diddy? Giving him some startup/cooldown on his grab. But I digress, and I don't really like talking about what patches will do for him when they haven't been announced quite yet.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Some opinions of mine compared to your list Shaya:

Ness/Rosalina seem a bit high imo, Fox > Lucario, Pit/DP/Mario imo arent that great and are mid tier at best, and Robin is a bit too high. Also, I dont think Falcon is the top of high tier, but he might be around there, honestly not sure on my opinion on him, just he feels too high lol.

Also, where dat Wario at yo

 

[Spirst]

Some opinions of mine compared to your list Shaya:

Ness/Rosalina seem a bit high imo, Fox > Lucario, Pit/DP/Mario imo arent that great and are mid tier at best, and Robin is a bit too high. Also, I dont think Falcon is the top of high tier, but he might be around there, honestly not sure on my opinion on him, just he feels too high lol.

Also, where dat Wario at yo

To be fair, he did say that B tier was unordered. The positioning of any in there could be shifted.

 

[Vengeance_NS]

Wario is bottom tier that's why he's not listed wario sucks stinks.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Well then in follow up to that:

Falcon I dunno is he high tier? Im honestly not sure lol, Ive surprisingly played/seen very little Falcon, but I feel like if he IS high tier hes around the bottom of it prob.

Robin isnt high tier, he's high mid. Pls.

 

[Vengeance_NS]

Also luigi should be on ur Btier. He's acombo machine. Just like Diddy 1 dthrow racks up damage. Luigi is really good in this game.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Imo Luigi is prob like a C Tier, he's still just way too slow and has too hard of a time getting in to be high tier imo. Totally makes up for a lot of it with his bat**** insane combo game, but... dat speed, or lack of it, iits just too much.

 

[Shaya]

Also, where dat Wario at yo

I need to see more to affirm it. I can believe the tools, but I haven't seen the action yet.

Falcon I dunno is he high tier? Im honestly not sure lol, Ive surprisingly played/seen very little Falcon, but I feel like if he IS high tier hes around the bottom of it prob.

Robin isnt high tier, he's high mid. Pls.

I came back because they came up in a conversation with xzax and zero and I also thought more about her match ups towards top as well (issues with both top tiers) which made me want to take them out of there, which I did.
Falcon seems competent against Diddy Kong, maybe will not make the cut.

Also luigi should be on ur Btier. He's acombo machine. Just like Diddy 1 dthrow racks up damage. Luigi is really good in this game.

Let me see him against the top 3 characters. I've watched Boss and seen him a good amount of times to know how potent the throw game is. Not necessarily enough, but we'll see. I'm not sold on who or what is B tier, there may be others.

 

[Z'zgashi]

Okay well here's a quick list I threw together based off my current opinion. The further down the list you go, the more Im not 100% sure on the order, but I think at least the tiering is correct:

S: (Top Tier)
A: (Upper High Tier)
B: (Lower High Tier)
C: (Upper Mid Tier)
D: (Mid Tier)
E: (Lower Mid Tier)
F: (Low Tier)
G: (Bottom Tier)

And if its still too early to post full lists then yall need to get with the times man, games been out like 3 months or something now.

 

[Shaya]

Making lists is about conversation. If I have to ask about every thing you've said about your list because you haven't explained it then it's more of a nuisance than a positive.

But Eh, I guess we're getting there with time in.

 

[Z'zgashi]

I would go through and explain every single placement, but it just takes too long when all I want to do is throw out a quick opinion to get feedback with. Will definitely give details on anything anyone is curious about, but I dont know what people will disagree with me most on and dont know what priority explanations would be, and like I said, doing all of them takes WAY too long lol.

Ye

 

[Tainic]

I'm mostly with you for S/A, I'd say Fox and Yoshi are a bit higher. (imo yoshi is top5 worthy but it's just my opinion.) The rest if placed well.

I'm kinda ok with B Tier even if I think Greninja got so hurt by the patch he doesn't belong there.

C, I'm not sure if Gunner belongs here but whatever, game goes for Ike.

I'll do the rest quickly : Imo Marth and Pit are far better than you give them credit for : Marth still has a good spacing game, excellent aerials, his real problem imo is that the High Tiers are mostly characters that really pressure him a lot thus making his Spacing Harder. Same goes for Pit, he has to be higher, he has a good combo game and can edgeguard a large portion of the cast with no risk involved. (Imo Dark Pit is 2 or 3 places below because the Arrow changes really matters on some matchups where going offstage would be putting yourself at risk. (such as when having to challenge ZSS' down B.)) Imo Marth/Pit are B tier, but take my opinion with a grain of salt.

Lucina deserves to be a lot closer to Marth, she is technically inferior but still.

100% with you on Luigi's ranking, he has a ****ton of potential and people finally begin to realize it.

Dedede, Jig, Bowser are a tad too low, Dedede was, and still is a defensive behemoth despite the patch nerfing him, he is in my opinion a really extreme character : His matchups either are **** or really good, thanks to the traps his side b can permit. Jig has a good combo game, she is hands down the best edgeguarder and Rest is a very, very good punish. (I heard DAir > Rest is a combo, I'll have to check when I get the wii u version.) Bowser neither is a defensive behemoth or a combo master, but his attacks are decently fast and absurdly powerful, making his punishes good, he is relatively mobile and his attacks have a large hitbox, enabling him to space a bit, he is far from being top (He is comboable, some attacks are very punishable and his vertical recovery is far from being the best.) but imo he isn't so low.

Jr. should be higher too, his Side B is the move that makes a Jr. player good : It's good for mindgames, it starts comboes, it makes him overall very mobile and applies pressure. His Down B is a good tool for stage control (Like throwing a koopa on Smashville's platform essentially denies an important part of the stage from your opponent.) He really is BEEFY so that's good. His real problem is the actual killing, without a read with a Smash/Up B or a Bair edgeguard it's really hard to kill with Junior, besides his attacks can be punished if whiffed. but really he isn't that low.

DK/G&W are good to me, we need people to show how good they truly are.

Doc really has an underdeveloped metagame, so is the meta of most of the chars in F/G, so I wont give my opinion bout em.


Also just a question : What makes Pikachu so good ? I haven't faced a good Pikachu yet so I really dunno what's the deal with him. (And I suck with him as well so I can't see for myself.) I have the impression that having next to no kill potential (Correct me if I'm wrong, really dunno what I'm talking about.) really hinders him.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Not even Yoshi bias but I still think Yoshi should be a spot or two higher on Shaya's list. I'm still hesitant on putting Mii Brawler so high on there as well

 

[Nocally]

Personally I think Pikachu is just outside the top 5. Pikachu is a character with very few weaknesses, His potential is definitely of a top tier character, with only his power, weight and reach hindering him (sometimes these things are beneficial as well)

But I think Yoshi and Ness is above Pika, unless you get them offstage in an unfavorable position where you can gimp them. Haven't seen any good Yoshi´s yet though, so I could be wrong about him.

 

[Z'zgashi]

I'm mostly with you for S/A, I'd say Fox and Yoshi are a bit higher. (imo yoshi is top5 worthy but it's just my opinion.) The rest if placed well.

Fox I do think could possibly be higher, I could actually see both Yoshi and Fox over Ness for example, its just Ness has been getting insane results practically everywhere so I cant really reasonably find it in myself to drop him any lower. As for Yoshi, the main reason I dont have him higher is because I just straight up think Ness/Brawler have better top tier match ups than Yoshi, mainly just because Yoshi gets somewhat bodied by Sheik. While I think Brawler/Ness/Fox/Yoshi/Rosy are all roughly similar ranking wise, I think Yoshi has the worst match up of all of them in that Sheik MU, and Fox just has more disadvantages than the other 4. ZSS I feel like is definitely the straggler of A tier, but is only behind by a VERY slim margin.

I'm kinda ok with B Tier even if I think Greninja got so hurt by the patch he doesn't belong there.

I actually think I might be overrating Gren a bit still, just that nair > follow ups and his disjointed smashes are still all fantastic, so I feel like is still really solid.

C, I'm not sure if Gunner belongs here but whatever, game goes for Ike.

Gunner is crazy good, I really wish someone could show her off so people know what I mean, but with Mii's being scrutinized with possible bans and the fact that Brawler is just so good, she's rarely played. I honestly could even see Gunner going higher, but I actually really like where I have her currently. As for Ike, Ike has huge damage output and TONS of small 2-3 hit combos off practically every hit. Add in a solid foosties game, kill confirms, and really solid poke options, so long as he isnt heavily outmaneuvered or zoned, he's super strong, literally.

I'll do the rest quickly : Imo Marth and Pit are far better than you give them credit for : Marth still has a good spacing game, excellent aerials, his real problem imo is that the High Tiers are mostly characters that really pressure him a lot thus making his Spacing Harder. Same goes for Pit, he has to be higher, he has a good combo game and can edgeguard a large portion of the cast with no risk involved. (Imo Dark Pit is 2 or 3 places below because the Arrow changes really matters on some matchups where going offstage would be putting yourself at risk. (such as when having to challenge ZSS' down B.)) Imo Marth/Pit are B tier, but take my opinion with a grain of salt.

The Pits just feel... A bit lacking to me. I mean, they arent bad, they just lack damage output, kill options, and they seems just a tad too lacking in most match ups from my experience. And as for which character is better, Ive heard DP is slightly better from the majority of sources and Ive seen more results from DP, but regardless the differences are really miniscule so I still feel theyre pretty interchangeable. I feel like the two of them are more a flex option for Pit/DP mains to play both and have small differences for match ups preferences more so than totally separate characters since theyre just so similar.

And Im gonna combine the Marth stuff with Lucina in the next part.

Lucina deserves to be a lot closer to Marth, she is technically inferior but still

Marth and Lucina are two characters that I took a REALLY long time to get an opinion on, I had no idea what I thought about them for a long time, and ended up playing tons of games as them to figure out what I think, and imo Marth feels a bit lacking, but not awful. He's very similar to Bowser actually (who I go into more detail on in the link in the next part), while he has great defensive options, good disjoints, etc, and he has good offensive options as well, but the problem is he really lacks any way to actually get in, and he lacks a way to force an approach to take advantage of his defensive options as well. As for Marth v Lucina though, Marth is leaps and bounds better, and its very VERY noticeable. Marth has better combos/follow ups/traps thanks to the lower knockback on non tippered moves, Marth does more damage when you DO tippered moves, Marth is safer on block, Marth has more range, and Marth kills earlier. Marth just has better traps, more options with the tipper options, and is straight up safer, whereas Lucina just straight up has less options and is FAR more vulnerable. I really do think the differences make Lucina a ton worse.

Dedede, Jig, Bowser are a tad too low, Dedede was, and still is a defensive behemoth despite the patch nerfing him, he is in my opinion a really extreme character : His matchups either are **** or really good, thanks to the traps his side b can permit. Jig has a good combo game, she is hands down the best edgeguarder and Rest is a very, very good punish. (I heard DAir > Rest is a combo, I'll have to check when I get the wii u version.) Bowser neither is a defensive behemoth or a combo master, but his attacks are decently fast and absurdly powerful, making his punishes good, he is relatively mobile and his attacks have a large hitbox, enabling him to space a bit, he is far from being top (He is comboable, some attacks are very punishable and his vertical recovery is far from being the best.) but imo he isn't so low.

I actually play D3/Bowser (or used to with D3 up until like 2 weeks ago lol), and imo characters with extreme match ups generally arent as good competitively. They're cool pockets, but you cant take tournaments with just them since theyre so easily countered, and since a tier list is ranking competitive viability, I dont think a character who gets bodied by so many characters like D3 can be anything higher than where he is. D3 is just too unreliable of a character is all (this is the same reason WFT is so low just FYI). Bowser I made a post on earlier here and I explained it pretty well: http://smashboards.com/threads/character-competitive-impressions.367669/page-177#post-18110062 Jiggs, ehhhhh, Idunno, she just seems lacking to me. She's easily one of the characters Im the least knowledgeable on, but I dont see her going much higher. Maybe over Mario/Pit/DP, but thats really it. I dont have much to say on her, could be totally wrong about her.

Jr. should be higher too, his Side B is the move that makes a Jr. player good : It's good for mindgames, it starts comboes, it makes him overall very mobile and applies pressure. His Down B is a good tool for stage control (Like throwing a koopa on Smashville's platform essentially denies an important part of the stage from your opponent.) He really is BEEFY so that's good. His real problem is the actual killing, without a read with a Smash/Up B or a Bair edgeguard it's really hard to kill with Junior, besides his attacks can be punished if whiffed. but really he isn't that low.

Ive played against a ton of BJ, and I just think he's too gimmicky. His projectiles are too slow and predicable to reliably force an approach, his combos, while good, are difficult to start without specific set ups or reads, and he's real slow without side b, which due to how reliant on it he is, ends up being just a bit too choreographed. Also, the fact that shield can body side b is huge, since, unlike Sonic who can cancel his dashes into shield, and therefore grabs, BJ cant really pressure shields with anything, he has no safe approaches on shield, and he cant force approaches due to his slow projectile game. Mecha koopas are his saving grace, since theyre real good, but theyre all he really has outside of kart mix ups.

Also just a question : What makes Pikachu so good ? I haven't faced a good Pikachu yet so I really dunno what's the deal with him. (And I suck with him as well so I can't see for myself.) I have the impression that having next to no kill potential (Correct me if I'm wrong, really dunno what I'm talking about.) really hinders him.

Pika has low kill power, yeah, but he has easy confirms off his BnB. He's also crazy safe on block, he's a combo monster, he has TONS of traps, he has an amazing projectile, and his offstage game is scary good. I honestly have no idea why he's so under played, but I guess Pikachu has never been a very popular character in any game (I mean, even in 64 where he's the best, compare the number of Pika mains to Melee Fox and Brawl MK mains lol) and has always been a character with a small following, so Idunno, guess no one likes the mouse lol.

 

[~ Gheb ~]

I think Ike should be in the same tier as Shulk.

 

[Z'zgashi]

I also just realized I failed to put Rob on my list, so I fixed that.

And Shulk > Ike imo cuz Monado Arts is like, lets take Ike and then give him the ability to alter his stats at will for whatever situation. He's like Ike but with different combos and more options. Also, Shulk's up b OoS is OP as ****, especially in Smash mode, Ike doesnt have anything even close to as fast and long range as that out of shield, and Shulk's up b also kills stupidly early.