Character Competitive Impressions

[Ulevo]

Ah man. This tier talk with customs on is going to take ages.

That said, I expect Palutena to do well at EVO.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Doesn't the regrab mechanic forfeit any possibility of chain-choking in this game?

In any case, tech options are weaker in this game, despite being harder to set up. Dash Attack, Dtilt and Ftilt are all viable when techs are missed and when they tech roll or in place. This lets him cover a set of options instead of just one.

Not at all. You can literally grab people after Flame Choke if they tech in place.

 

[Teshie U]

Not at all. You can literally grab people after Flame Choke if they tech in place.

Wow, I've never had it work for me. Thats strange because being grabbed is supposed to make you 100% immune to any grabbing about like 1 second or so.

In any case, I'd much rather take the dtilt/dash attack and the resulting aerial than risk them escaping from my grasp.

 

[Vincent21]

Real talk, does this basically mean that going forward we can assume customs for all character discussion? Because if I'm being frank, I can't see customs fading away quietly after EVO unless something goes horribly wrong.

I honestly think we should just develop both discussions. I mean you COULD say do it just because there is totally possiblity for something at EVO to go horribly wrong and get everyone to regret the decision to open the proverbial Pandora's Box (I wouldn't bet money on it, but at the same time I at least expect some move(s) to be broken. Like I'm pro customs, but I also strongly believe they were not designed for standard play and that the team legit expected them to have nothing to do with competitive play, ergo the need to farm them and the default of them being off. There is no way the team could get so lucky as for all of these to be accidentally balanced. The question is where the weak link is, not if it exists.). But instead, I'll say do it because it'll give us a legitimate idea of how strong the design behind this Smash was, give us info to compare against the pre-patch version of the game, and ultimately tell us whether we should fear or love any future patch announcements.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Wow, I've never had it work for me. Thats strange because being grabbed is supposed to make you 100% immune to any grabbing about like 1 second or so.

In any case, I'd much rather take the dtilt/dash attack and the resulting aerial than risk them escaping from my grasp.

Command grabs may be exempt because reasons. I'm fine with it personally since not everyone has a command grab in the first place, gives them something of a niche if they can pull it off.

 

[Blue Ninjakoopa]

Holy Hell.

Meta Knight moved so fast, the sound couldn't even keep up with him.

 

[etecoon]

I feel like both of the posts you quoted laid it out pretty clearly that dtilts were free if sideB couldn't be teched. Meaning, not in this game.

Not seeing the problem, a lot of characters have guaranteed combos out of grabs. Also have not seen it kill at "stupid percents", it's a solid kill move but not ridiculously so. Sonic, the fastest runner in the game that can punish things from across the stage, has kill throws. Ness also has an easier time scoring grabs. Ganondorf killing you with flame choke to dtilt wouldn't be that bad

Will have to concede that I'm probably just being a scroob about flame choke though...with the exception that I still think it's easy enough to react to even with the nerf to spot dodge, but the way it works after you get hit with it isn't as bad as I thought

 

[David Viran]

I honestly think we should just develop both discussions. I mean you COULD say do it just because there is totally possiblity for something at EVO to go horribly wrong and get everyone to regret the decision to open the proverbial Pandora's Box (I wouldn't bet money on it, but at the same time I at least expect some move(s) to be broken. Like I'm pro customs, but I also strongly believe they were not designed for standard play and that the team legit expected them to have nothing to do with competitive play, ergo the need to farm them and the default of them being off. There is no way the team could get so lucky as for all of these to be accidentally balanced. The question is where the weak link is, not if it exists.). But instead, I'll say do it because it'll give us a legitimate idea of how strong the design behind this Smash was, give us info to compare against the pre-patch version of the game, and ultimately tell us whether we should fear or love any future patch announcements.

When they released the 1.04 balance patch they balanced custom moves also. They have to have some ideas of how those moves are supposed to be balanced.

 

[Teshie U]

When they released the 1.04 balance patch they balanced custom moves also. They have to have some ideas of how those moves are supposed to be balanced.

I also expect they won't allow the more absurd glitches to stay.

Command grabs may be exempt because reasons. I'm fine with it personally since not everyone has a command grab in the first place, gives them something of a niche if they can pull it off.

That can't be the case, I've definitely seen Trela attempt to regrab people with Nosferatu, only to have it fail.

 

[Saturn_]

I'm trying to get good at the game and now my focus on fundamentals is meaningless because I need to grind customs now.

 

[Pyr]

That can't be the case, I've definitely seen Trela attempt to regrab people with Nosferatu, only to have it fail.

Could just be that the timer starts on the frame the grab connects instead of the "throw." It has a 16 frame startup, so I can see a 44 frame animation between the grab and the manliness that drops everyone to their backs.

I'm trying to get good at the game and now my focus on fundamentals is meaningless because I need to grind customs now.

fun·da·men·tal
ˌfəndəˈmen(t)əl/
noun
plural noun: fundamentals

1. a central or primary rule or principle on which something is based.

Na. You're good. You just have more options now.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

I'm trying to get good at the game and now my focus on fundamentals is meaningless because I need to grind customs now.

The CPU is halfway decent for learning what is and isn't reliable/safe since they have such impeccable dodging skills. Turn up the difficulty in Classic and aim for the wrenches on the roulette and you should start raking them in at a decent clip.

 

[Vincent21]

When they released the 1.04 balance patch they balanced custom moves also. They have to have some ideas of how those moves are supposed to be balanced.

What kind of changes were those (if there is a data dump somewhere a link would be very appreciated)? I mean if we're just talking like edge-case removal I would remain unconvinced. But specific balance changes would be interesting to see.

 

[Pyr]

What kind of changes were those (if there is a data dump somewhere a link would be very appreciated)? I mean if we're just talking like edge-case removal I would remain unconvinced. But specific balance changes would be interesting to see.

http://smashboards.com/threads/3ds-community-patch-notes-v1-0-4-engine-changes-to-di.378404/

Ex: See Charizard. Only one I remember off the top of my head.

 

[Saturn_]

fun·da·men·tal
ˌfəndəˈmen(t)əl/
noun
plural noun: fundamentals

1. a central or primary rule or principle on which something is based.

Na. You're good. You just have more options now.

I learned matchups that have radically changed now, like DK. Now all that time is wasted because every character gets to be a special unique little snowflake.

 

[NairWizard]

I'm trying to get good at the game and now my focus on fundamentals is meaningless because I need to grind customs now.

If it's between grinding customs and learning fundamentals, I would take learning fundamentals every single time.

You won't beat high-level players by having more customs. You will beat them by having better fundamentals.

 

[Smooth Criminal]

I learned matchups that have radically changed now, like DK. Now all that time is wasted because every character gets to be a special unique little snowflake.

qq

Fundamentals > every other aspect of the game

Smooth Criminal

 

[Antonykun]

I learned matchups that have radically changed now, like DK. Now all that time is wasted because every character gets to be a special unique little snowflake.

You say it like it's a bad thing. :/

 

[Pyr]

I learned matchups that have radically changed now, like DK. Now all that time is wasted because every character gets to be a special unique little snowflake.

Matchups are not fundamentals. Fundamentals are more general. Something that applies regardless of your character or theirs. CHARACTER fundamentals are what you're thinking of. Really, they didn't change much. 10 minutes of learning tops.

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Heaven forbid we have to learn stuff!

I mean, it ain't like we live in an age where information is right at our fingertips if we really want it. Not at all. Oh, but I guess we can't multitask, either!

Smooth Criminal

 

[Vincent21]

http://smashboards.com/threads/3ds-community-patch-notes-v1-0-4-engine-changes-to-di.378404/

Ex: See Charizard. Only one I remember off the top of my head.

So, the changes I found when I ctrl+f'd the word "custom" were as follows:

Spoiler

CHARIZARD

DRAGON RUSH (Custom side B)

DAMAGE : 15% ⇒ 11%

[Zero Suit]

Paralyzer -

- Blast Shot can now be fired before it is fully charged, but incurs normal landing lag (was way lower before )

- Spreading Shot now deals 10% damage (up from 6%) and lasts long enough for ZSS to get a follow-up (wore off before ZSS could even move before, weird)



Boost Kick:

- Impact Kick now properly absorbs the target so that the final hit connects properly

- Lateral Kick now allows ZSS full aerial movement during special fall



Plasma Whip:

- Whip Lash got the same buff as normal side-b: less animation time, so safer on block and more follow-ups.



Flip Jump:

- Low Flip travels faster across the field (?)

There was exactly one direct custom change. To Charizard. Perhaps an edge case, perhaps not. As for Zero Suit, a lot of this sounds quality of life, and the blaster shot changes were universal (which can be read later in the thread I pulled this from). Those are changes that probably would've/should've been made regardless. Plasma Whip was buffed in the same way the standard was, etc.

The changes noted are very minor so I'm not entirely sold on the idea they balanced customs with competitive intent. However that's a moot point, because I still believe you need to play them to know if they're even reasonable in competition to begin with. I'm just saying they're unlikely to be a universally postive change. Like say 80/20 or 90/10. I'm betting there will be baggage along with the growth, ya know?

I learned matchups that have radically changed now, like DK. Now all that time is wasted because every character gets to be a special unique little snowflake.

I would bash this like everyone else, but despite knowing in my head customs are a good thing, I can help but feel similarly annoyed. I am a legitimately lazy man. I barely make enough time to play competent Smash as it is, and the hopes I did have of going to events and doing alright come from living in SoCal (already close to a lot of strong scenes) and getting into a new game that was both balanced and simple.

Then the simple part dropped out from underneath me and others. It's a good change, but I feel ya. The game could've just started us off with all this new content and this wouldn't be a thing. But that's how it rolls I guess.

 

[NairWizard]

Gotta say one thing. As cool as this is, a lot of people are gonna be awfully disappointed when they realize that customs don't actually fully balance the game, and Diddy Kong and Sheik will still be prevalent and winning tournaments. Better balance =/= complete balance. Best to keep that in mind.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

So real talk about custom movesets. Are people going to be talking about preferred sets for characters here too? I know it has come up a few times in this character viability discussion and I always enjoy it when it does, but I need to know if I need to monitor this topic for discussion on that or if people are going to filter it into the project topic to tell me "hey, this character really should have this moveset".

---

The main custom reworked in 1.0.4 was Dragon Rush; it used to do more damage, but they nerfed it a fair bit (it's still the best Charizard side-B, just less absolutely insane than it was at 3ds launch). I should stress that Dragon Rush was pretty OP before so that was clearly an intention to bring it in-line on the balance.

---

But yes, fundamentals are what's key. I just like customs because a lot of them let me emphasize my stuff; I can play higher level footsies with Luma Warp. Rosalina is still the same fundamental character, just... better able to let me express my ability in the game. I feel that way with a lot of customs honestly; it's not that I want to play a different game, just a more complete one.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

There was exactly one direct custom change.

Shulks Extreme Speed and Extreme Buster were modified, and it was spoken of such in the thread.
It wasn't solely Zard, but Shulks customs were not codified in the OP. Technically Decisive Speed was also changed as well as Decisive Buster, but thats due to them sharing the same drawbacks as default.

 

[Nabbitnator]

Gotta say one thing. As cool as this is, a lot of people are gonna be awfully disappointed when they realize that customs don't actually fully balance the game, and Diddy Kong and Sheik will still be prevalent and winning tournaments. Better balance =/= complete balance. Best to keep that in mind.

They'll do well but hopefully this will make it just that much harder to win.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

Shulks Extreme Speed and Extreme Buster were modified, and it was spoken of such in the thread.
It wasn't solely Zard, but Shulks customs were not codified in the OP. Technically Decisive Speed was also changed as well as Decisive Buster, but thats due to them sharing the same drawbacks as default.

What about Hyper Speed/Buster?

 

[Ultinarok]

Customs on?

I find this mainly exciting because it means low-tier characters like Doc and Zard will get a new lease on life and may get more representation. I also like that it will slow the development of a tier list considerably, so we can continue to believe that every character has untapped potential and we will pay less attention to our character's ranking. There must be nothing worse than knowing your main is less capable than others despite your dedication. The dream continues as long as fresh, exciting things like customs are introduced.

I'm pumped.

 

[Kofu]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VzC4VcPRY4#t=420

my g&w.
p.s. broke keyboard so no more shaya posts

Thanks for posting this, it was interesting. I found your lack of jab and ftilt unusual, I assume you save them to help kill. What I liked most about your gameplay was how you threw out Chef projectiles to limit options. It's something I want to work into my game.

Around desynch was lame and the commentary was awful... Not knowing Jigglypuff is the lightest character? Come on now. Plus Rosalina being heavy but that qswas mentioned before.

 

[ChronoPenguin]

What about Hyper Speed/Buster?

Extreme/Hyper same thing.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I'm trying to get good at the game and now my focus on fundamentals is meaningless because I need to grind customs now.

I really have no sympathy for whining about a free excuse to try out every single character in the game in All Star. Seriously, I have to question if you are actually trying to get better at anything.

It took me about one month to complete all the challenges, and I wasn't exactly super focused on it. That's not a lot of time, to be frank.

Gotta say one thing. As cool as this is, a lot of people are gonna be awfully disappointed when they realize that customs don't actually fully balance the game, and Diddy Kong and Sheik will still be prevalent and winning tournaments. Better balance =/= complete balance. Best to keep that in mind.

Don't worry, my hopes were never that high. Minus custom Mario clearly being slept on.

 

[Road Death Wheel]

Customs on? ima have to start working on my third main then. Bowser ima comin for ya.

 

[Pyr]

Don't worry, my hopes were never that high. Minus custom Mario clearly being slept on.

To be completely fair, I think most of the characters are being slept on custom-wise for the most part right now. That's going to change really REALLY soon, but still.

 

[Nairo]

I think in that case its more about the player then the character.

I don't think thats entirely true because if she was as bad as people claim than I wouldnt be beating a high level player such as nietono or going to game 5 with false etc with such a bad character. Even if its just me I still got pretty good enough results to show that she isnt bottom 3 for sure or at least better results than some characters who arent seen at all lol (if you base it off results/MU of course).

 

[A2ZOMG]

I don't think thats entirely true because if she was as bad as people claim than I wouldnt be beating a high level player such as nietono or going to game 5 with false etc with such a bad character. Even if its just me I still got pretty good enough results to show that she isnt bottom 3 for sure or at least better results than some characters who arent seen at all lol (if you base it off results/MU of course).

I feel like even you have room to improve Zelda, which in a way impresses me because your spacing is impeccably good. Then there's various Up-B tech which I haven't really seen you use such as delayed ledge sweetspotting or ledge canceling which are also really useful.

 

[Nairo]

I feel like even you have room to improve Zelda, which in a way impresses me because your spacing is impeccably good. Then there's various Up-B tech which I haven't really seen you use such as delayed ledge sweetspotting or ledge canceling which are also really useful.

Yeah of course! Everyone has room to improve their character still! It is too soon to think any character has hit a limit already. I dont do the delayed ledge sweetspotting a lot but I have done it before but I should do it a bit more. As for the ledge cancel its ok but id hate to SD by barely mis spacing it. Once I learn to pretty much always get then I will but I feel like it wouldnt be THAT much of an improvement but hey I can be wrong!

 

[Vincent21]

I'm still intensifying over here on that knowledge drop on Robin I was supposed to get from you when said question was passed along @ Nairo my hopes were officially raised and everything

 

[Makorel]

@ Nairo what do you think of Dark Pit/Pit's customs? I've seen people say they're not much better than the defaults but I feel like there's a lot of potential in Control Arrows and Impact Orbitars; Control Arrows because of how you can throw out a hitbox almost right next to Pit and then basically be free to do anything and Impact Orbitars because of their edge guarding, ledge guarding, gimping and edge setup capabilities.

 

[Conda]

I don't think thats entirely true because if she was as bad as people claim than I wouldnt be beating a high level player such as nietono or going to game 5 with false etc with such a bad character. Even if its just me I still got pretty good enough results to show that she isnt bottom 3 for sure or at least better results than some characters who arent seen at all lol (if you base it off results/MU of course).

Good points. This kind of stuff always gets people wondering though - if a great player could get far with Zelda, does that mean Zelda's characteristics are helping that player along the way, or does it mean the player is doing well despite using Zelda? Is the character making success EASIER or HARDER?

We'll probably never really know. Many players use lower-tier characters and can get far, and people will always wonder if the character would be as effective if other players were more used to fighting them. Unfamiliarity can sometimes make a character seem more viable/effective than they will be in the future once players become more experienced with the matchup. This is why tier lists take time to unravel. We may feel sometimes that low-tier characters hold a player back from higher placements at tournaments, but there is a chance that the character is actually very viable and having more players who are dedicated to them would make us realise that.

A character may lose effectiveness as people become very experienced with how to deal with them, which is when players may find themselves performing better with a more effective character. By 'more effective character', I mean characters that are still difficult to defeat even when you understand how to fight them inside-and-out.

Characters that don't partially rely on 'unfamiliarity' to get by are the ones that time will show are more potent threats. You see this all the time in competitive games as the metagame develops and certain strategies drop in effectiveness while others remain effective. Once players come to understand how to fight each character, that's when we'll see how viable each character truly is.


---

On another topic, Dabuz posted this about Rosa and Olimar with customs-on:

"Customs legal for Evo? I suggest no one lets me on stream if they want to see anything but a snoozefest~"

"No but real talk, Rosa and Oli with Customs, broke as **** GG everyone <3"

 

[Nocally]

Not seeing the problem, a lot of characters have guaranteed combos out of grabs. Also have not seen it kill at "stupid percents", it's a solid kill move but not ridiculously so. Sonic, the fastest runner in the game that can punish things from across the stage, has kill throws. Ness also has an easier time scoring grabs. Ganondorf killing you with flame choke to dtilt wouldn't be that bad

Will have to concede that I'm probably just being a scroob about flame choke though...with the exception that I still think it's easy enough to react to even with the nerf to spot dodge, but the way it works after you get hit with it isn't as bad as I thought

I agree with you that Flame choke is easy enough to react to, and doesn´t every disjoint move beat it anyway?

 

[Teshie U]

Good points. This kind of stuff always gets people wondering though - if a great player could get far with Zelda, does that mean Zelda's characteristics are helping that player along the way, or does it mean the player is doing well despite using Zelda? Is the character making success EASIER or HARDER?

We'll probably never really know. Many players use lower-tier characters and can get far, and people will always wonder if the character would be as effective if other players were more used to fighting them. Unfamiliarity can sometimes make a character seem more viable/effective than they will be in the future once players become more experienced with the matchup. This is why tier lists take time to unravel. We may feel sometimes that low-tier characters hold a player back from higher placements at tournaments, but there is a chance that the character is actually very viable and having more players who are dedicated to them would make us realise that.

A character may lose effectiveness as people become very experienced with how to deal with them, which is when players may find themselves performing better with a more effective character. By 'more effective character', I mean characters that are still difficult to defeat even when you understand how to fight them inside-and-out.

Characters that don't partially rely on 'unfamiliarity' to get by are the ones that time will show are more potent threats. You see this all the time in competitive games as the metagame develops and certain strategies drop in effectiveness while others remain effective. Once players come to understand how to fight each character, that's when we'll see how viable each character truly is.


---

On another topic, Dabuz posted this about Rosa and Olimar with customs-on:

"Customs legal for Evo? I suggest no one lets me on stream if they want to see anything but a snoozefest~"

"No but real talk, Rosa and Oli with Customs, broke as **** GG everyone <3"

Pretty sure everyone was already bored watching Dabuz on stream anyway.