Character Competitive Impressions

[Antonykun]

I thought BThrow killed, does it not?

it kills at 160% while Villager's kills at 130%

 

[Nu~]

it kills at 160% while Villager's kills at 130%

But does your forward throw lead into a key kill? Or down throw into a jab lock?

 

[RedBeefBaron]

I want this thread's opinion on a couple of things. This is just a sort of poll based entirely on opinion, so I don't want to start a flame war or anything but maybe facilitate some discussion. Which characters, in your opinion, have the best:

Neutral game?
Punish potential?
Gimping ability/edge guarding?
Grab game?
Mindgames?
Special moves?
Aggro playstyle?
Defensive playstyle?

Neutral: No surprise here really. Godlike frame data, mobility, and needles kind of speak for themselves. Shiek's kit allows her to force an approach and wreck people as they try to get in.

Punish: Aside from the obvious beating you'll take if he gets a grab at low %, up-B and upward angled f-smash will destroy you if you're open for a second at higher %. Mobility is an issue here but i think he has enough combos and raw power to make up for it. Honorable mention to for her quick but risky rest. Bair catches people in the air really well too.

Edgeguarding: Gonna say because of how comfortable he is offstage, although is really, really scary to recover against too. Reverse uair and run off fair are both insane off stage and dair will kill you offstage at 0%. aren't bad either.

Grab game: Assuming we're saying the ability to land grabs . Peels set them up and his entire kit seriously pressures the shield, setting a lot of grabs up without much trouble.

Mindgames: , no question. Kind of ties in with the grab game issue, Diddy's entire playstyle revolves around using the fear of peels to trap the opponent into a grab or a combo. B-reverse down b lobs a peel over the opponents head from mid range which falls and traps while he waits for a reaction licking his chops. Even if he can't tilt with a banana in hand anymore he can still use aerials by z-dropping followed by an immediate aerial, which can also catch the peel when done correctly at the apex of a jump or short hop. Monkey flip is a deliberate mind game by design. He can confuse and trap his opponent as a means of getting in so well that apparently the only way to make it fair is to completely butcher the damage and knockback on just about everything he has. (Not even sarcasm, lol.)

Specials: , no question. Thunderjolt is an incredibly versatile projectile, allowing Pikachu to camp and approach at the same time. Thunder is a full screen vertical chase that can kill and lead to followups. QA is the best individual button in the game, allowing pikachu to recover for free, hit and run safely, and reset to neutral easily. Much more can be done with QA but those are the basics. The only lackluster special is the side B but with customs on heavy skull bash is a brutal burst kill move that the opponent has to respect at all times.

Aggro: Great footspeed, great jab, best dash grab which leads to more damage, great dash attack, brutal advantage that leads to great damage at best and a knee to the chest if he baits an air dodge or you screw up. Side b and down b punish hard from across the stage.

Defense: Walls people for several days until Luma dies, then runs for 14 seconds before walling people for several more days. Down b shuts down projectiles. Towering behemoth of defense.

 

[Trifroze]

Best and worst areas eh?

Shamelessly starting with my own main, Falcon probably has the best advantage as well as punish game considering his speed, follow-ups, damage output and kill potential. He's the fastest character in the game to get in on the opponent at mid range, does 20-40% off of a single grab on average, has in my opinion the best uair in the game after 1.0.6 to juggle, KO and condition airdodging, and moves like fair and dair to punish airdodging hard which he has no trouble forcing because of his uair chains. Sheik or Mac can dash attack the opponent really fast as well, but they don't get much off of that. Moreover, what is Sheik going to do to an opponent who whiffs something in front of her or lands with lag? Someone like Ganondorf, Mac or Falcon gets pretty much a guaranteed kill in those situations after 80-100% while Sheik simply lacks any tool to do the same.

Falcon also somewhat rightfully has the worst disadvantage in the game. He gets comboed 2nd hardest in the entire cast just behind Dedede, while having a more linear recovery and dying earlier. The result of Falcon's weight, size, fall speed and gravity puts him well beyond Bowser, DK and Ganondorf in that regard. Lacks defensive aerials as well.

Sadly he might also have the worst specials, although up b is a decent move despite grab armor being gone as it beats out almost any hitbox and gives Falcon a safe recovery as long as he isn't forced to recover straight below the opponent. It can also be used for pretty good platform pressure. However, while side b would be a good punish move especially in rage you'd rather always go for JC usmash in those scenarios. Side b in any other scenario is just plain unreliable and unsafe. Falcon Punch is plain useless competitively and down b is meh, and he has some of the most useless if not the most useless customs in the game. I might actually say DK has the best specials. They're all really useful, although side b probably the least so, and he also has some of the best customs.

On the positive, I think Falcon might have the best normals in the game though along with the likes of Luigi, Diddy, Ganondorf and Sheik. Zelda for worst maybe? Honestly don't know, not enough experience with all the low tiers yet.

Grab game is a toss between Luigi, Ness, Diddy, Falcon and Meta Knight in my opinion. They all have either strong follow-ups or kill throws/setups. Throw Pikachu, Sheik and Mario close behind. The worst grab game goes to anyone who lacks both kill and combo throws. I might say Yoshi because he fits that category while also having a slow and short range tether grab.

Lastly Sheik for best neutral. It's kinda ridiculous for one character to have such speed and good normals combined with an actually good projectile like Sheik's. Rosalina has her meatshield and disjointed hitboxes to wall out most characters really well, but she is vulnerable to zonebreakers and characters that can kill Luma easily so I'd consider her second. She seems to be able to handle the 13.5 seconds without Luma just fine. Worst neutral, no idea again, but might go to Ganondorf. Fastest attack is 8 frames, among the shortest grab ranges in the game if not still the shortest, second slowest on the ground and among the slowest in the air, and he's the tallest character in the game. Dtilt, DA and his aerials are good in neutral though so I'm not sure.

 

[Purin a.k.a. José]

I was thinking about something weird today. It happens with TLink and ZSS (Never noticed with Sonic): Sometimes, their Down Air is slower. Like, those normally have a fall speed like Falcon Kick's, but sometimes behave like Link's Down Air. Just wondering: Is it random or it has a circunstance for it?

 

[Loota]

I feel like Lucario's neutral has been really downplayed right from the very beginning but can't really blame people for thinking so. It kind of feels and looks weak until you really understand how his quick and lagless moves, combined with excellent mobility in foxtrots and b-reversals play part in it and grant him options to be unpredictable and safe at the same time while still applying genuine pressure by the sheer existence of options, especially AS. It's just the damage output of single moves at low% that is really underwhelming but on the other hand, they're really good at linking into other moves or grabs at that point too.

Lucario in general has many viable options out of a shorthop in neutral:
- Nair has a really good disjoint especially when taking it's nonexistant landing lag into account, making it safe to throw out at any point of a shorthop. Safe on shield when spaced correctly.
- Fair isn't as good at covering yourself but it autocancels easily and gives the chance to use AS afterwards either for shooting (duh), baiting or b-reversing.
- His rather good aerial speed makes B-reversing ASC into opponents a serious threat as it quite reliably combos into grab, dair or upsmash and it gets only better at higher aura. ASC -> shield -> JC usmash is real, safe on shield and it traps for kills stupidly well, it demands respect.
- He's rather floaty so that makes his SH airdodges especially useful. He's easily able to do a nair, dair or b-reversed AS afterwards. He can also jump after it to do a spaced dair afterwards, and the jump itself may already trap them for the dair if a footstool occur which is common.
- He is able to do an immediate, frame one Force Palm grab upon landing.
- Any aerial he manages to connect has high chances to lead to a followup depending on the situation, especially after nair.

There's his options from a shorthop but his ground game is no joke either. His extremely good foxtrot and short running animation flows really well with his quick tilts (of which ftilt and dtilt are relatively safe to throw out for pressure), DA and AS which all gives the opponent reasons to respect it. Lucario excels dancing around mid range where his DA is able to connect so that he can bait his opponents and punish any commitments with DA, AS (preferably fully or almost fully charged) or even a grab. Dtilt comboes into DA, grab or fair depending on the situation which all have followups of their own. AS is, unsuprisingly, also keeping him afloat vs. other projectile campers and forcing approaches.

So, his ground game combined with his short hop game makes it really hard for me to see his neutral to be one of the worst, let alone as atrocious as I've seen people saying it is. It's quick, unpredictable, contains some really safe options and it all even gets better with aura. He eventually gains that absurdly long FP flame and that gorilla sphere which cannot even be shielded two times in a short period of time or you'll be seeing stars.

As for customs, Lucario's neutral doesn't gain much from them (though if your opponent isn't familiar with Snaring AS, he will be hoo-hah'ing his controller after the match) but the aura sphere variations give him some niche usage in some matchups (and on another note, I hear that Glancing Counter gets him off of Fox's jab infinite). For example, Snaring AS supposedly makes Olimar's life miserable and Piercing AS makes it actually possible to outcamp Rosalina against Shooting Star Bit.

EDIT: I didn't even remember to mention Double Team, which sounds a bit strange, but is a really helpful asset to have against slow and predictable projectile users which there are many (Luigi and Villager for example). It's practically completely safe to use as Lucario slides really far after activation, the invincibility lasts for an eternity and you can decide the direction yourself to choose the optimal way. It makes it dangerous using these projectiles against Lucario as it is a kill move too.

 

[RedBeefBaron]

Can we talk about megaman? This is like the one matchup that I'm completely stumped on. He just camps on the ground with jab and projectiles while stuffing any approach with his godlike aerials and out of shield options. He has both great aerial mobility and high weight with a good recovery for some reason, he racks damage easily while killing early and he also has a great grab. What is the game plan against this character, what are his weaknesses and who does he lose to? I play Diddy, Luigi, and Pikachu.

 

[Shaya]

I was thinking about something weird today. It happens with TLink and ZSS (Never noticed with Sonic): Sometimes, their Down Air is slower. Like, those normally have a fall speed like Falcon Kick's, but sometimes behave like Link's Down Air. Just wondering: Is it random or it has a circunstance for it?

You're still in momentum from your knockback. I believe jump->dairing will negate this at least.
It was like this in Brawl for most of those Inazuma kicks.

(and this is how you should act out in tournament with them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcoMQ2ubyKs)

 

[Trifroze]

I was thinking about something weird today. It happens with TLink and ZSS (Never noticed with Sonic): Sometimes, their Down Air is slower. Like, those normally have a fall speed like Falcon Kick's, but sometimes behave like Link's Down Air. Just wondering: Is it random or it has a circunstance for it?

Yes, you have to use the down air after being hit by an attack, right out of hitstun. It works with attacks that first pull you back and then start moving in the opposite direction. From what I understand it's because the game doesn't allow you to have normal aerial movement during that time, only momentum cancellation or boosting by holding left/right, but it does allow you to perform actions like jump, airdodge or aerials. So attacks like ZSS' and Toon Link's dair can be done and while they force your character to move, the game doesn't allow proper movement during the short period of time after hitstun resulting in the moves acting strangely.

Falcon's custom side b 3 has some really wonky physics with this, giving him the best horizontal recovery move in the game by a glitch. That is actually how I found out about the mechanics behind this phenomenon, although in this specific case it needs to be done about 0.5 seconds after hitstun for maximum effect. I suppose this is because the move considerably pulls you back at first and then sends you forward, so you need to time the backwards pull into the movement restriction window but in a way that the forward momentum starts when aerial movement becomes available again.

 

[Asdioh]

I wanna see that in action!
(The move seems pretty bad compared to default otherwise)

 

[Trifroze]

I wanna see that in action!
(The move seems pretty bad compared to default otherwise)

 

[Nidtendofreak]

How reliable/consistent is that to pull off? I could see it becoming the default Side B option for Falcon if its reliable: not like that move gets used for offence that much.

 

[san.]

Same as pika's glitchy custom heavy skullbash propelling him the same way.

 

[Locke 06]

The momentum "bug" out of hitstun/tumble is also what makes Beat able to bypass its laggy startup.

I'm assuming it's designed to get rid of momentum braking by moves that make you stand still. Just tested with Lucario's down-air and it will normally halt your momentum, but it keeps going. You can abuse it with Lucario by jump>DAiring out of hitstun to get some weird vertical boost. Villager's Lloid is another one that I can think of.

 

[RedBeefBaron]

Yes, you have to use the down air after being hit by an attack, right out of hitstun. It works with attacks that first pull you back and then start moving in the opposite direction. From what I understand it's because the game doesn't allow you to have normal aerial movement during that time, only momentum cancellation or boosting by holding left/right, but it does allow you to perform actions like jump, airdodge or aerials. So attacks like ZSS' and Toon Link's dair can be done and while they force your character to move, the game doesn't allow proper movement during the short period of time after hitstun resulting in the moves acting strangely.

Falcon's custom side b 3 has some really wonky physics with this, giving him the best horizontal recovery move in the game by a glitch. That is actually how I found out about the mechanics behind this phenomenon, although in this specific case it needs to be done about 0.5 seconds after hitstun for maximum effect. I suppose this is because the move considerably pulls you back at first and then sends you forward, so you need to time the backwards pull into the movement restriction window but in a way that the forward momentum starts when aerial movement becomes available again.

Pikachu's heavy skull bash custom does this too, and has the added benefit of clearly being better than the default anyway. It's very easy to do if you just mash side b as soon as you get launched.

Edit:'d

 

[Trifroze]

How reliable/consistent is that to pull off? I could see it becoming the default Side B option for Falcon if its reliable: not like that move gets used for offence that much.

It's very easy, although getting the absolute optimal boost that basically slides across any stage if you land with it will take a bit of getting used to.

 

[Meru.]

I feel negative today.

Negative time means ZELDA TIME!!!

Neutral?

ZELDA. Worst character in the game at approaching but she also gets easily overwhelmed by fast, aggressive characters. Great!

Advantage?

ZELDA. While perhaps not the worst she's down there. Can't chase people in the air at all, actually just can't chase in general awful combo's, has to hope someone airdodges into her. If you get hit by her just go away and you'll be safe since she's is so bad at chasing.

Disadvantage?

ZELDA. No doubt about it! While she may not get comboed as hard as some fatties her air defense is ATROCIOUS. She is floaty, has no decent aerials to defend herself and everything she may do to get her opponent off of her is super laggy (like Nayru's Love). Now add being light to the equation. Being hit as Zelda is the worst thing ever. (But at least she has a good recovery.)

Jab?

ZELDA. While having little lag, it comes out on frame 11 and does nothing more than tickling the opponent. Probably not the absolute worst though since you can get a grab or dash attack of it at low % and it's somewhat safe.

Tilts?

She doesn't have the worst ones but hers aren't anything special either.

Smashes?

Not a contender. Her Fsmash and Dsmash are both very decent. Usmash is ass.

Aerials?

ZELDA. She has no aerial game whatsoever.

Default Specials?

While Din's Fire and Phantom are likely top 5 worst default specials in the game, Nayru's Love and Farore's Wind have saved Zelda from being a contender in this category.

Customs Specials?

ZELDA. Phantom Strike is the only thing that's convincingly better than Phantom and even then it's still not that good since it's still Phantom.

Edgeguarding?

She does well at edgeguarding. Yay Dair.

Recovery?

Good.

Defensive play?

Ehh it's not the greatest but also not the worst.

Offensive play?

ZELDA. Awful at approaching or just hitting the opponent in general.

Kill options?

If the opponent plays smart she can have considerable problems getting the kill, especially when there's no room for UpB, Fsmash or a random Dash Attack. You either kill you opponent at like 50% or at like 170%.

Rage?

lol Farore's.

 

[HeroMystic]

http://www.twitch.tv/smashstudios

Mr. CC(Luigi) vs Zen(Mario)

Winner gets to take on ZeRo in Grand Finals.

 

[Antonykun]

Negative time means ZELDA TIME!!!



ZELDA. Worst character in the game at approaching but she also gets easily overwhelmed by fast, aggressive characters. Great!


ZELDA. While perhaps not the worst she's down there. Can't chase people in the air at all, actually just can't chase in general awful combo's, has to hope someone airdodges into her. If you get hit by her just go away and you'll be safe since she's is so bad at chasing.


ZELDA. No doubt about it! While she may not get comboed as hard as some fatties her air defense is ATROCIOUS. She is floaty, has no decent aerials to defend herself and everything she may do to get her opponent off of her is super laggy (like Nayru's Love). Now add being light to the equation. Being hit as Zelda is the worst thing ever. (But at least she has a good recovery.)


ZELDA. While having little lag, it comes out on frame 11 and does nothing more than tickling the opponent. Probably not the absolute worst though since you can get a grab or dash attack of it at low % and it's somewhat safe.


She doesn't have the worst ones but hers aren't anything special either.


Not a contender. Her Fsmash and Dsmash are both very decent. Usmash is ***.


ZELDA. She has no aerial game whatsoever.


While Din's Fire and Phantom are likely top 5 worst default specials in the game, Nayru's Love and Farore's Wind have saved Zelda from being a contender in this category.


ZELDA. Phantom Strike is the only thing that's convincingly better than Phantom and even then it's still not that good since it's still Phantom.


She does well at edgeguarding. Yay Dair.


Good.


Ehh it's not the greatest but also not the worst.



ZELDA. Awful at approaching or just hitting the opponent in general.


If the opponent plays smart she can have considerable problems getting the kill, especially when there's no room for UpB, Fsmash or a random Dash Attack. You either kill you opponent at like 50% or at like 170%.



lol Farore's.

You sound like me with Swordfighter.
Anyways if EVO Swordfighter is the worst character in customs meta than dayum is the customs meta really balanced

 

[Blobface]

Mario vs Luigi is always fun. So much red and green!

 

[Yonder]

http://www.twitch.tv/smashstudios

Mr. CC(Luigi) vs Zen(Mario)

Winner gets to take on ZeRo in Grand Finals.

3-0 Mr.ConCon. Those ending matches were close though!

 

[Locke 06]

Game 1: Pivot grabs are life.

 

[HeroMystic]

2 - 2 Zero vs ConCon!

Wow, Concon did the bracket reset!

 

[Yonder]

HOLYYYY GOOOOOOOOD LUIGI CON CON SO PROUD!

The ZSS goes SS Sheik and kills Concon. Oh well still an acomplishment to be the first person ever to beat Zero in a set! I bet Zero is going to switch to Sheik more often and drop Diddy now thanks to the patch, Sheik is undisputed #1

 

[Quickhero]

Welp. If anybody has doubted this now. Luigi vs Sheik is quite the bad match-up for the former. :\

 

[Blobface]

Concon did his best, but ZeRo's Sheik was just too much.

 

[Yonder]

Welp. If anybody has doubted this now. Luigi vs Sheik is quite the bad match-up for the former. :\

Take rage into consideration. Zero's rage, he's probably fuming for losing for the first time ever.

 

[HeroMystic]

Zero switched to Sheik and then obliterated ConCon. It wasn't even close.

 

[Asdioh]

I get home and read this hype, then tune in to a 2 stock involving an SD, and it's over. :|

So yeah luigi does wel against diddy and poorly against sheik, I hear!

Edit: I don't buy sheik being undisputed number one at all. If she had reliable kills as strong as luigi, then yes definitely. I would even say zss is more likely to be better than sheik at this point.

 

[Yonder]

I get home and read this hype, then tune in to a 2 stock involving an SD, and it's over. :|

So yeah luigi does wel against diddy and poorly against sheik, I hear!

Edit: I don't buy sheik being undisputed number one at all. If she had reliable kills as strong as luigi, then yes definitely. I would even say zss is more likely to be better than sheik at this point.

I think ZSS's grab holds her back too much tbh. Her neutral isn't as good as Sheik's needles either.

 

[Shaya]

Sheik undisputed no.1?
Diddy vs Luigi match up not being in Diddy's favour seemed very feasible post patch. Even if he's still one of the best in the game it didn't mean he would come out with the same spread as before.
Who knows what complications Sheik would have now it isn't as Diddy centric.

But yeah, just so it's obvious, ZeRo has worked on Sheik since WiiU came out bar the 3 week spread before Apex. It isn't some out of no where "omg sheik so broken look how easy it was for him" scenario.

Sheik has a fast, long ranged, safe on shield move and Luigi has negative out of shield options against safe moves (think Marth in Brawl). His mobility issues also get exploited by Sheik.

 

[HeroMystic]

Sheik also shuts down characters better than ZSS ever could.

 

[Cool]

I don't know man, Sheik's looking pretty good.

 

[Emblem Lord]

I get home and read this hype, then tune in to a 2 stock involving an SD, and it's over. :|

So yeah luigi does wel against diddy and poorly against sheik, I hear!

Edit: I don't buy sheik being undisputed number one at all. If she had reliable kills as strong as luigi, then yes definitely. I would even say zss is more likely to be better than sheik at this point.

Except basically everyone ZSS beats Sheik beats harder. Shiek doesn't need to DO stuff. She can stand there and just be reactive to 99% of anything anyone does. Not even getting into needle play which forces virtually the entire cast to approach.

 

[RedBeefBaron]

Except basically everyone ZSS beats Sheik beats harder. Shiek doesn't need to DO stuff. She can stand there and just be reactive to 99% of anything anyone does. Not even getting into needle play which forces virtually the entire cast to approach.

Still kind of confused as to why needles were untouched in the patch. I definitely felt like that was the only thing that needed to be addressed on Shiek. A character like that shouldn't have a top tier projectile that forces approaches that easily.

 

[Yonder]

Anyone else think D throw to cyclone is kind of like a new, weaker version of the hoo hah? It definitely kills earlier off the top and is almost as easy to land. I kill with it as early at 80ish on light characters [it wrecks Mewtwo, Kirby, slow fallers, other light weights]. Mrconcon used that and up smash the most in his set for kill moves. As a fellow Luigi main, D throw to tornado is by far his best kill set up. For fast fallers who this is harder to set up on, I find immediately fast falling a nair right after they slip out helps secure the kill.

 

[RedBeefBaron]

Anyone else think D throw to cyclone is kind of like a new, weaker version of the hoo hah? It definitely kills earlier off the top and is almost as easy to land. I kill with it as early at 80ish on light characters [it wrecks Mewtwo, Kirby, slow fallers, other light weights]. Mrconcon used that and up smash the most in his set for kill moves. As a fellow Luigi main, D throw to tornado is by far his best kill set up. For fast fallers who this is harder to set up on, I find immediately fast falling a nair right after they slip out helps secure the kill.

It is extremely good. It's harder to avoid with air dodging because of the duration of the active frames and the way you can manipulate Luigi's vertical movement in unpredictable ways while doing it. I've been getting into Luigi lately and I have to say I'm quite impressed.

 

[Luco]

Oh the Dair stuff is really funny. I've been hit as ZSS and Tlink before and just sat in the air only moving horizontally for like 2 seconds whilst using Dair. It's a fun glitch, nice to see it has some purpose now.

 

[TriTails]

Pre-Patch:
Diddy is probably the #1
Sheik is probably the #2
Luigi does okay against Diddy and Sheik (General consensus).

Post-Patch:
Diddy is probably the Top 5
Sheik is probably the #1
Luigi does well against Diddy but does bad against Sheik.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Sheik undisputed no.1?

Well, after the nerf to Diddy and the angel's singing making his Uair not kill people till 140-170%, I'd imagine Sheik is now number 1.