Work In Progress Competitive Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage Character Rankings (Outdated)

[ItsRainingGravy]

MAJOR TOPIC OVERHAUL! READ THE OP, AND THE POST BELOW!

Current Discussion (Updated September 25th): Post #418

We are currently discussing how the characters rank in the ADVANTAGE state!

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Current Neutral Rankings: Post #261

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Reading the Graphs

Please note that the graphs are not EXACTLY based on a performance level. Instead, it is based upon where they rank in comparison to the other 54 characters in the game. Additionally, for the ☆ Star Rating, 10 characters can be in there instead of 5...as of right now anyways. Once more characters are added to the roster, I will add a ★★★★★★ Star Rating to help split the rankings up more evenly. OR...I could go ahead and do that if enough people want me to~

For more information about the graphs and stars, read the rules below~


How to Grade the Three States

Neutral: The character's ability to control the pace of the match when neither character is in the Advantage or Disadvantage state. This includes stage control via projectiles, footsies for both offensive and defensive purposes, and overall mobility options. General "safeness" also applies here. Also, take note that things such as OoS options, SHAD options, and quick aerials...while also applying for the Disadvantage state, can also apply here as well.

Advantage: The character's ability to capitalize on the opponent's Disadvantage to help win the match. This includes combos, strong KO options, KO confirm setups, edgeguarding options, frame traps, and the ability to continue to apply pressure on your opponent to keep them in the Disadvantage state for as long as possible...or make them lose.

Disadvantage: The character's ability to recover from a bad situation, either by active or passive means. Actively, it includes a character's OoS Options, quick aerials (such as Nairs to break combos), how good their dodging abilities are (both on the ground and in the air), or other special moves such as counters or moves with super armor. Passively, it includes a character's natural attributes to escape bad situations without direct player input. This includes a character's weight, size, "floatiness", and other factors to help prolong their ability to survive until high damages, or help escape combos. Either way, actively or passively, a character's Disadvantage state is the character's ability to recover from a bad situation in order to not lose, so that they can hopefully reset back to Neutral and change the pace of a match.

Spoiler: Current Rules of this Topic (READ THIS)

Spam Rules/Warnings

1) TIER LIST/BALANCE PATCH DISCUSSION SHOULD BE KEPT TO AN ABSOLUTE MINIMUM, ESPECIALLY EARLY ON. THIS TOPIC'S MAIN PURPOSE IS TO TALK ABOUT HOW WELL CHARACTERS PERFORM IN THE THREE PRIMARY STATES OF PLAY (NEUTRAL/ADVANTAGE/DISADVANTAGE). FAILURE TO ABIDE BY THIS IS CONSIDERED SPAM IN THIS TOPIC. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

2) I SAW YOU ROLL YOUR EYES. READ RULE #1 AGAIN YOU TWIT. PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

3) ADDITIONALLY, DON'T JUST POST GRAPHS WILLY-NILLY WITHOUT DETAILED EXPLANATIONS FOR THE CHARACTERS. THIS WILL BE CONSIDERED AS SPAM.
Discuss the characters with reasonable and educated posts, and at a moderate pace as opposed to all at once. In other words, please discuss only a few characters at a time. Doing so will help reduce a lot of potential clutter in this topic. Thank you in advance!

4) Please explain your reasonings behind your posts. Something like "I think Dankey Kang's Advantage is five stahs" with nothing else to explain it is not only going to be considered as useless information, but also probably going to be treated as spam. When posting, always write out full, detailed explanations to back up your claims. Doing so will make your opinions be held in much higher regards by everyone, and make things a lot easier for the mods in particular.

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How This Topic will Work

1) Every couple of months or so, we will be discussing one of the three primary states of the game. The Neutral, Advantage, or Disadvantage state. During this period of time, we will be discussing how the 55+ characters in the game stack up to eachother in that respective state, to help determine what their "stats" are in comparison to eachother. These stats will be represented visually by the use of "stars" (or other visual symbols). For more information about these stars, please read the section below this one.

2) When discussing characters, you may attribute one (or all) of their three states using stars. Such as my Pit example provided below. You don't necessarily have to do this, but it is highly recommended that you do, because it serves greatly as a visual aid and for quick and easy comparison purposes. The reason behind this is that we will eventually be comparing one character's stars with other characters' stars, to help find consistencies/inconsistencies in debates/opinions and to help form more cohesive data on how the characters function competitively. Additionally, since we will be using a graph for each of the three states, it will provide a quick means to know where to place the characters on the graphs. For more information about these stars and the graphs, please read the section below this one.

3) Once I feel as though that enough discussion has been made for a particular state, we will move on to the next. Once we cover all three states, I will post the results for all the three graphs, before going through the whole process again. This is because changes in the metagame, and balance patches can easily cause characters to shift placements on the graphs. For more information about the graphs, please read the section below this one.

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How the Stars/Grading System will Work

1) Here is the default character template for you to work with:


(<-- Character image goes here)
Neutral: ★☆
Advantage: ★☆
Disadvantage: ★☆

Explanation for Neutral:

Explanation for Advantage:

Explanation for Disadvantage:

(During or after your explanations on one or all of the character's three states, you may include other characters to compare with your character with to help prove your point. Or any other data such as frame data, tournament results, etc. It's up to you.)


2) The stars in more detail:

★ = 1 Star. Which is 2/10 in value.
★★★★★ = Maximum Star Value. AKA 10/10 in value.
☆ = 1/2 Star & Minimum Star Value. Is 1/10 in value.


3) How the stars are currently valued in the graphs:


★★★★★ = 1st-5th Place.
★★★★☆ = 6th-10th Place.
★★★★ = 11th-15th Place.
★★★☆ = 16th-20th Place.
★★★ = 21st-25st Place.
★★☆ = 26th-30th Place.
★★ = 31st-35th Place.
★☆ = 36th-40th Place.
★ = 41st-45th Place.
☆ = 46th-55th Place (Will add another star once more characters are added to the roster)

or

★★★★★ = Top Tier (High).
★★★★☆ = Top Tier (Low).
★★★★ = Above Average (High).
★★★☆ = Above Average (Low).
★★★ = Average (High).
★★☆ = Average (Low).
★★ = Below Average (High)
★☆ = Below Average (Low).
★ = Bottom Tier (High).
☆ = Bottom Tier (Low).


4) Although not necessary, you may use colors with the stars to further help visual indication. Don't get too crazy when doing this, though. Just use the following colors provided below:

★★★★★
★★★★☆
★★★★
★★★☆
★★★
★★☆
★★
★☆
★
☆

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How to Grade the Three States

Neutral: The character's ability to control the pace of the match when neither character is in the Advantage or Disadvantage state. This includes stage control via projectiles, footsies for both offensive and defensive purposes, and overall mobility options. General "safeness" also applies here.

Advantage: The character's ability to capitalize on the opponent's Disadvantage to help win the match. This includes combos, strong KO options, KO confirm setups, edgeguarding options, frame traps, and the ability to continue to apply pressure on your opponent to keep them in the Disadvantage state for as long as possible...or make them lose.

Disadvantage: The character's ability to recover from a bad situation, either by active or passive means. Actively, it includes a character's OoS Options, quick aerials (such as Nairs to break combos), how good their dodging abilities are (both on the ground and in the air), or other special moves such as counters or moves with super armor. Passively, it includes a character's natural attributes to escape bad situations without direct player input. This includes a character's weight, size, "floatiness", and other factors to help prolong their ability to survive until high damages, or help escape combos. Either way, actively or passively, a character's Disadvantage state is the character's ability to recover from a bad situation in order to not lose, so that they can hopefully reset back to Neutral and change the pace of a match.

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Other Rules and Information

1) Eventually, @SmashCapps will make a graph that will follow along with this topic. Stay tuned for details!

2) As this topic progresses, more rules could be added over time. Periodically check the OP to see if anything has been changed since you have last been here.

Spoiler: Original Post (Outdated)

Hello everyone! Welcome to my (experimental) project. In this topic, much like its "Competitive Viability" brothers, we will go over how characters stack up to eachother within a competitive tournament setting. However, this topic is going to do something a bit different from what you guys are used to...

As you can guess by the title, this topic's primary focus is dedicated towards the Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage states of the game: The three primary states in almost all fighting/competitive games. For those of you who don't know what these three states are, here is a link explaining the Neutral. It's got a video included that I highly recommend watching, as well. As for what the "Advantage" and "Disadvantage" states are, it's pretty simple. The "Advantage" state means that you either knocked your opponent off of the stage, are comboing the opponent, are grabbing the opponent, or are in any position where you have the upper hand or "Advantage" against your opponent. "Disadvantage" is the inverse of that, and usually means that you are either off of the stage or the opponent is racking up damage against you. And while in the "Disadvantage" state, you are trying your best to reset the flow of the match back to "Neutral", and then trying to exploit your opponent's weaknesses to further proceed to being in the "Advantage" state yourself.

Most of you know what these three states are however, so I won't dwell on it for too long. Instead, I will now be going over the "Rankings" part of the topic, which is this topic's second primary purpose. Essentially, we will be grading characters like this:




Neutral: ★★★
Advantage: ★★★
Disadvantage: ★★★


Please note that these aren't what Pit's "stats" actually are. Rather, this is merely just a visual example to show what this topic will do~



But yeah. We are pretty much doing that. But with every character. HOWEVER, it isn't a matter of just posting random stars with little to no reason to besides your own opinions. Rather, we will reach these conclusions through discussions, the use of explanations, comparing and debating different opinions, using known information (such as frame data and tournament placings), and ultimately (and hopefully) eventually reaching a point where most people's opinions are pretty much agreed upon about the character(s) in question for us to mark it down as "data". And once we gather enough data, we can begin to form a rankings system for how the characters stack up to eachother in regards to the three primary states of competitive Smash Bros.

With that out of the way, how do we get there? And how do we start this topic off? Below is a compiled list of rules that this topic will follow:

Spoiler: Previous Rules of this Topic)

Spam Rules/Warnings

1) TIER LIST/BALANCE PATCH DISCUSSION SHOULD BE KEPT TO AN ABSOLUTE MINIMUM, ESPECIALLY EARLY ON. THIS TOPIC'S MAIN PURPOSE IS TO TALK ABOUT HOW WELL CHARACTERS PERFORM IN THE THREE PRIMARY STATES OF PLAY (ADVANTAGE/NEUTRAL/DISADVANTAGE). FAILURE TO ABIDE BY THIS IS CONSIDERED SPAM IN THIS TOPIC. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

2) I SAW YOU ROLL YOUR EYES. READ RULE #1 AGAIN YOU TWIT. PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

3) Please explain your reasonings behind your posts. Something like "I think Dankey Kang's Advantage is five stahs" with nothing else to explain it is not only going to be considered as useless information, but also probably going to be treated as spam. When posting, always write out full, detailed explanations to back up your claims. Doing so will make your opinions be held in much higher regards by everyone, and make things a lot easier for the mods in particular.

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How This Topic will Work

1) Every couple of days/weeks or so, I will be posting a list of about ~10 characters for you guys to discuss. During this period of time, you can ONLY talk about these characters. This is to reduce clutter, and keep the topic progressing/on track. For the 10 characters that I listed, talk about how well they perform in each of the three areas of play. Discuss, and debate about their Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage states. And once I feel as though enough discussion has been done for those 10 characters, we will then move on to the next 10. Simple, right? ~

2) When discussing characters, you may attribute their three states using stars. Such as my Pit example in the OP. You don't necessarily have to do this, but it is highly recommended that you do, because it serves greatly as a visual aid and for quick and easy comparison purposes (and is another focus of the topic). The reason behind this is that we are comparing one character's stars with other characters' stars, to help find consistencies/inconsistencies in debates/opinions and to help form more cohesive data on how the characters function competitively. For more information about these stars, I will explain them in more detail further down this list of rules.

3) Once we go through the beginning phase of the topic (systematically going through the cast 10 characters at a time), I will then open the floodgates for ALL character discussion. I know that many of you would like to jump into this immediately, but please stay patient until we get through the initial phase of this topic! I will update the OP when you can talk about anybody you like. Trust me, it is the part I am most excited for, too. lol

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How the Stars/Grading System will Work

1) Here is the default character template for you to work with:


(<-- Character image goes here)
Neutral: ★☆
Advantage: ★☆
Disadvantage: ★☆

Explanation for Neutral:

Explanation for Advantage:

Explanation for Disadvantage:

(During or after your explanations on the characters three states, you may include other characters to compare with your character with to help prove your point. Or any other data such as frame data, tournament results, etc. It's up to you.)


2) The stars in more detail:

★ = 1 Star. Which is 1/5 or 2/10 in value depending on how you grade it. Preferably 2/10, however.
★★★★★ = Maximum Star Value.
☆ = 1/2 Star & Minimum Star Value.


3) How the stars are valued during the initial phase of this topic:

★★★★★ = Top Tier
★★★★☆ = Almost Top Tier
★★★★ = Above Average
★★★☆ = Slightly Above Average
★★★ = Average
★★☆ = Slightly Below Average
★★ = Below Average
★☆ = Poor
★ = Very Poor
☆ = Bottom Tier

Additionally, if you desire, you may simplify your posts by removing all "☆" star answers listed above. Though only do this during the initial phase of this topic.


4) How the stars are valued during the second and subsequent phases of this topic:

★★★★★ = 1st-5th Place
★★★★☆ =6th-10th Place
★★★★ = 11th-15th Place
★★★☆ = 16th-20th Place
★★★ = 21st-25st Place
★★☆ = 26th-30th Place
★★ = 31st-35th Place
★☆ = 36th-40th Place
★ = 41st-45th Place
☆ = 46th-55th Place (I could separate 51st-55th place if necessary)

During this and any following phases, please be careful about omitting any "☆" star answers. Because, from this point onwards, all 55+ characters will be "netted together" by the use of these stars. Only use plain "★" star answers from this point onwards if you feel as though your characters' traits are within those respective categories.


5) Although not necessary, you may use colors with the stars to further help visual indication. Don't get too crazy when doing this, though. Just use the following colors provided below:

★★★★★
★★★★☆
★★★★
★★★☆
★★★
★★☆
★★
★☆
★
☆

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Other Rules and Information

1) Eventually, @SmashCapps will make a graph that will follow along with this topic. Stay tuned for details!

2) As this topic progresses, more rules could be added over time. Periodically check the OP to see if anything has been changed since you have last been here.

In short: This topic's intended goal is to look at how the character's fair competitively...but by using a different angle of approach. For the "Competitive Impressions" topics, they use a (Character X vs Character Y) system of debates and discussions to reach such conclusions. This topic is similar, but uses a (Character X's N/A/D vs Character Y's N/A/D) format instead. Where "N/A/D" stands for "Neutral/Advantage/Disadvantage".

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Also, I would like to give a special mention to @Blobface, who made a topic extremely similar to mine a few months back without me realizing about it until I was about ready to post this topic, lol.


Anyways, here are the first characters for you guys to discuss:



As you might've guessed, it is the 11 perceived weakest characters from the Viability Survey v1 | Competitive Impressions topic~


Anyways, you may begin posting If anyone needs any help, let me know~

 

[LancerStaff]

I started writing before your second post. Pretty big post here... Hope you don't mind if I put it out there so it doesn't go to waste.

Spoiler

Pit's actually got a great neutral. All his aerials AC out of a SH, and the important ones can either be FF'd significantly, Fair, Bair and Nair, or has little aerial endlag, in Dair. With range that competes with Marth, that's a pretty big deal. Pit also has great dash options. Dash grab is great, and his dash attack is excellent since it's a pretty big disjoint, pokes through the bottom of shields easily, and is safe on shield if spaced properly.

Then there's his arrows... Pit's like Shiek in the sense that his arrows beat almost everything. Pit's goal is to shoot over (or under) everybody else's projectiles while either being out of range or simply jumping over it. Jumping and shooting is pretty important for Pit because that shaves off about ten frames of endlag. Shiek directly beats out projectiles, Pit dodges projectiles and counters with his own. Pit's probably a ★★★★, ★★★☆ at worst in neutral.

In disadvantage onstage, Pit's probably more average. He has a bunch of jumps, isn't particularly big, and his floatyness snuffs out more combos then it puts him into. His aerials aren't incredibly reliable for escaping though, since there's some startup on most. Nair is frame four and has a good sized hitbox though.

In disadvantage offstage, most characters can't really do anything. Pit's arrows stop most conventional follow-ups, his Fspecial's super armor lets him close the gap to the ledge easily, and between his jumps and how far his Uspecial reaches he stalls out most characters to the point where it takes a very hard read and precise spacing to even get a light hit in. Only a handful of characters can do anything to him offstage, really. More in the ★★★ to ★★★☆ range for disadvantage overall.

Advantage onstage is again average. Dthrow combos for days, Dair combos into itself and then into Uairs, Uair itself is a massive disjoint horizontally and vertically and beats out almost every other aerial action besides airdodges. (Good spacing beats out things from Wizard's Kick to Shulk's Dair.) When you do land, you have to be careful against him or he'll get another grab/Fspecial and you're back in disadvantage again. His advantage onstage is less about being extremely punishing and more about keeping you there.

Advantage offstage however is great. Arrows wreak havoc on tons of character's recoveries, Fair and Bair have ton of reach and their own different advantages, and Dair does a ton if you hit, spike or not. He can go impossibly deep too. Overall advantage I'd say is ★★★ to ★★★☆.

Quick note on Dark Pit... He trades neutral for offstage advantage. Arrows can't be used as creatively and aren't really any more rewarding. His neutral in customs off is more at ★★★, customs on is basically equal to Pit. Offstage Dark Pit is more like a ★★★★★ against the right character. His Fspecial has SA, can be recovered from, and does 9% much like Pit's does, but his launches quite strongly at an angle rather then up. The type of character Dark Pit would be fighting will be dead if they got hit by it.

In customs, the biggest thing they collectively get is Dark Pit's Fspecial plus good arrows. But compared to what everybody else gets, I'd say they get a half star in advantage when used as a pair in customs.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

I started writing before your second post. Pretty big post here... Hope you don't mind if I put it out there so it doesn't go to waste.

Nah you are completely fine. Sorry I didn't post my second post sooner actually XD

But yeah, your post is excellent! This is the exact kind of quality post that I am looking for. And at worst, you can probably just repost your post whenever the discussion moves on to Pit/Dark Pit if you would like to. lol

 

[Steelballray]

Great thread, man. I think the format should Neutral, advantage, disadvantage, since usually talk about neutral is going to lead to the advantage state but having to think about advantage THEN go back to neutral is kinda tideus.. Also I don't think Stars are all that practical. I am sure many users are mostly on via their phones and having to copy the stars to notes then paste them back on thread isn't all that practical and one mistake in the copying/pasting process will result in whole posts getting deleted. That's just my two cents.

Anyways, I'll start taking about King DeDeDe since hes the character im most familiar with out of the list.

Advantage: big guy ain't guy much in the ways of combos, but he does get decent grab follow ups out of D-throw. He also get to throw a gordo in your head if you're off stage to make your life harder. He got decent running speed but not good enough framedata to keep much pressure going. Although his damage is better than average so its understandable that he isn't supposed to be in advantage state for more than just 3-4 hits at best. His finishing abilities are decent-ish. Bair backs up some serious killpower and down smash is very fast and can be used to bait opponets because of how low its endlag is. Dash attack kills very early but it shouldn't be hitting unless your opponent makes a very punishable mistake. I guess inhale off stage is a thing too? Since he got jumps and a good recovery to be able to use it without much fear of killing himself.

Neutral: Well, he got gordos, even though he can get punished heavily for them if he isn't careful, but it does deal 14% on hit and can keep an opponet busy and guessing since the trajectory of where to throw them can be altered and he can aim them up so they boune in place making a wall. His running speed is good and so is his dashgrab. He cannot approach from the air (maybe with nair) F-tilt is good at stopping an opponent running at you and it comes out not too slow. Just fast enough to catch people if you time it it right. D-tilt is fast and covers a good distance and has a nice priority so I guess its a good move to pick up the pace and catch someone by surprise. If the opponent keeps flying above u-tilt is good and so is upsmash and nair. Inhale also can be good if the opponent doesn't have enough moves with good priorty to beat it. His jabs arent that good since you can SDI and sometimes even dodge or shield between the second and third hit.

Disadvantage: well, his body is big so unless you give him enough room to nair he won't be breaking any juggling strings. I think his disadvantage state lies in the opponent sticking extremely close to him. Close enough for DDD to not be able to be able to use F-tilt to releave some pressure. Although he does have a very damaging combo breaker in nair and can mess opponents up if they aren't being precise with their combos he also can't be really gimped so you arent going to get much by taking him out of the stage. All in all I think that Fast pushy characters like Fox and Sonic will destroy him in one go while everyone else will just do decent to good, but the guy is still heavy and can't be killed easily.

That's all I have to say about him. I'm no DDD main so take it all with a grain of salt and please correct me if I'm wrong.

Advantage:★★★
Neutral:★★☆
Disadvantage:★★

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Great thread, man. I think the format should Neutral, advantage, disadvantage, since usually talk about neutral is going to lead to the advantage state but having to think about advantage THEN go back to neutral is kinda tideus.. Also I don't think Stars are all that practical. I am sure many users are mostly on via their phones and having to copy the stars to notes then paste them back on thread isn't all that practical and one mistake in the copying/pasting process will result in whole posts getting deleted. That's just my two cents.

Hmm good points. I think I will definitely swap the placement of Advantage and Neutral sometime soon.

As for the Stars, I didn't consider that, since I use a laptop. However, while the stars might not be too practical on phones...I still think that they (or at least some sort of visual symbol) are a good thing to have. Especially during the later phases of this topic, where people can easily gloss over and compare data by seeing these visual symbols for the characters. Even so, if this becomes a problem for most people, I will see what I can do to try to resolve this as well.

Thanks for the suggestions! If anyone else has their own, let me know!


And your post about D3 is pretty solid, too. Though I do question his running speed a little, but that's only because I haven't looked at the running speed comparison data in a little while lol

 

[DungeonMaster]

I'll bite.


Neutral: ☆
Advantage: ★★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★★★★

Explanation for Neutral:
No consistent game plan or basic pattern, every matchup is different and very specific matchup knowledge is paramount to determining success.
Homing missile fails to zone any but a handful of characters and is not safe on hit, let alone shield, bad startup.
Z-air is ackward (but essential).
Safe on shield moves (b-air, f-tilt, up-tilt) require razor precision to be so.
Hurt box being right beside tiny hitboxes means low priority and trades when poking going poorly.
No actual (unavoidable) setups or traps from missiles or bombs.
Firing charge shot in neutral is often a recipe for disaster as game designer has made reflectors/absorbers/counters disproportionately strong.
Counter example: ZSS can get tons of mileage against 90% of the cast by just SH nair, SH z-air, paralyzer and fishing for grabs with significant and easy to execute traps and frame advantage priority. Apply pattern = win in basic play.

Explanation for Advantage:
Massive damaging combos, tech chases.
Samus combos for 25+ damage trivially and the largest combos and strings deal 60, 70+ damage with numerous 2 steps doing 30, 40 damage.
A missed tech on meteor smash up-tilt or d-air can be trivially converted to 31% damage with up-smash in a broad range.
Charge shot at 16 frames true combos into almost all starters.
Grab game requires technique but can lead to considerable damage. (65 after 2 grabs no CS included, just basic up-air and follow up moves)
Everything in her aerial arsenal allows her to follow up and true combo the opponent in the air after they are lauched out of her many combo starters (just about every move can be one) with transitions between up-air, b-air, f-air, d-air, charge shot and up-B to follow opponent DI (even reverse CS).
CS is the best tech chase in the game. Projectile moves at just the right speed to cover essentially every option. Dash-attack and grab/pivot grab likewise at low percents.
Samus produces tech chases out of huge selection of her moves, z-air, f-tilt, f-smash (sour), n-air, b-air sour, d-air sour, d-smash sour even ledge getup and getup attacks.
Combination of slow and fast startup aerials means reflexive airdodge by opponent during combos can be anticipated and punished (often severely), f-air will often outlast air-dodges all together.
Aerial pursuit is very respectable, landing lag can be efficiently hunted with grab, CS. Offstage game is very respectable with multiple kill options. Best and strongest trump options in game (tether trump meaning guarantees).
Multiple shield break options. Multiple pokes possible one shield pressure is on. Broken shield can mean instant death at extremely low percent with dirty bomb combo.
All she's missing are decent frame traps and less situational kill confirms. The ease of predicting and executing the combos and appropriate follow ups requires practised skill, it's real but the developers have not made it easy.

Explanation for Disadvantage:
Floaty, avoids combos better than most and benefits more than average from (game wide weak) SDI.
Extremely heavy, can take a lot of punishment.
Up-air at frame 5 and whole body active hitbox is an efficient low percent combo breaker.
Respectable off-stage recovery. Bombs, invincible fast hitbox up-B. Tether mixup.
Difficulty landing, can only be mitigated with bombs and losing stage control.
Can pre-emptively cancel air-dodge with z-air.
I weight floatiness as more of an advantage than landing, fast fall speed means the opponent is guaranteed combo damage, floatiness means damage is NOT guaranteed even if strings are easier.

This character needs a fix to hitboxes/hurtboxes, less endlag in places (missiles in particular) and she could become the originally intended heavyweight juggernaut she should be.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Excellent posts so far

Just as a simple, and early example on how this topic will work more in the future (based on the minute amount of data/opinions gathered so far):


From @ LancerStaff


Neutral: ★★★☆ to ★★★★
Advantage: ★★★ to ★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★★★ to ★★★☆


From @ Steelballray


Neutral:★★☆
Advantage:★★★
Disadvantage:★★


From @ DungeonMaster


Neutral: ☆
Advantage: ★★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★★★★



From this basic example, we can quickly and easily determine the characters' strengths and weaknesses amongst eachother. Assuming the data is correct, of course. And if it isn't, we can find inconsistencies/debate about it, form a discussion around the supposed inconsistencies, and work our way towards fixing these things until we reach a (mostly) agreeable solution.

We can also use this to determine how character matchups COULD potentially play out...and compare it to how matchups are actually playing out at tournaments and the like. If the data here doesn't match the data that tournaments are producing, we can either conclude that our data is wrong and needs more fixing, or the characters at the tournaments simply aren't being played optimally or are the result of some other issues (such as matchup inexperience). Either way though, debating and discussing these things might not only be fun, but can potentially be helpful and insightful for both posters and tournament players alike.

Let's try some example matchup theories based upon this~


vs

Pit wins this one because he outclasses D3 in every category. Not only is Pit's Advantage state better, but his superior Neutral allows him to capitalize upon this even more. And there's not much that D3 can do about hit because of his poor Disadvantage state. And even if D3 is in the Advantage, Pit's superior Disadvantage state is going to trump D3's Advantage state in a fair amount of situations. From this, we can conclude that this is an uphill batle for D3. This matchup example is extremely simple, but I am pretty sure that most people expect this kind of result anyways. So, at least in terms to the victor, the data matches.


vs

This matchup could potentially be closer than the D3 matchup, due to Samus's far improved Disadvantage state in comparison to the King, but her extremely abysmal Neutral state will probably seal her fate in this matchup. When Samus is in the Disadvantage state, the pace of the match could sway in either character's favor, though it may slightly favor Samus due to her floaty nature and her Uair. That, and she has the ability to take more punishment than Pit in the long run. And if the player has mastered Samus, her Advantage state could do a pretty solid number against Pit. However, Pit's Disadvantage state is still good enough to shake Samus off a good portion of the time. And to top this off, Pit's Neutral allows him to not only keep Samus out and prevent her from doing that amount of damage to him too often, but also it allows him to yet again dish out a solid amount of damage a lot more consistently than Samus can do to Pit. Plus, thanks to Pit's reflective specials in Down B and Side B, and his fantastic projectile, he definitely has the edge against Samus. So again, Pit wins. Though this matchup is expected by most, too~


vs

Now here is where things get a bit more interesting. While D3 has a better Neutral than Samus, Samus still wins this fight, simply due to Samus's Advantage being able to greatly capitalize D3's poor Disadvantage, while the inverse is also in her favor thanks to her solid Disadvantage being able to survive D3's Advantage state. Plus, I'd also wager (and pretty much know) that Samus's Zair can be a huge pain for D3 in particular, due to his slow mobility stats and large size. So, with hindrances to both his Advantage and Neutral against Samus, while also having limited tools to help stop Samus's incredibly potent Advantage state, Samus wins this matchup.



This is, of course, me just talking about how the data provided alone could translate into an insight on how the matchups in the game could potentially play out. Again, this is of course assuming the data provided is true enough to follow through with what I said. And if anything I said wasn't true, people can debate about it and discuss it further, to help the data become more and more accurate over time. The more data that is provided, the more consistencies/inconsistencies can be found, (hopefully) leading towards a focused discussion on the characters and their matchups. Based upon how well their Neutral, Advantage, and Disadvantage states are in comparison to eachother

 

[Raijinken]

Welp, here're my two cents on the good Doctor.


Neutral: ★★★
Advantage: ★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★☆

Explanation for Neutral: In neutral (with slight variance based on customs on versus customs off, maybe add a half star for on), Doc strikes me as pretty average. He has a decent projectile (a bit faster with Fast Capsule), a reflector to deal with enemy projectiles, and while he isn't particularly nimble, he's mobile enough to maneuver. He has decent throws (not as great as the red hat version), pretty good read punishes, etc.

Explanation for Advantage: I'd give him a tad above average here. He's clearly not the combo powerhouse that regular Mario is, but he's got a handful of good followups to throws, tilts, and dash attack, very strong kill moves when timed properly, and so on.

Explanation for Disadvantage: I'm still convinced the only character with a worse recovery is Little Mac. He's not very good at turning a disadvantage into an advantage, either, partially due to his poor offstage game. Against some characters he may be able to beat something out and buy some space with an uair or bair in some cases, but aside from that, you've gotta be really careful about getting taken offstage. Super Sheet won't stall you, either, making his mixup game extremely limited (essentially limited to using Dr. Tornado out of a jump for a tad bit of height while holding a hitbox).

 

[wedl!!]

adv: ★★★☆
neutral: ☆
dis: ★
ganon's main draw is the fact that he hits like a truck, but he also moves like one and gets juggled like one. this shows in his abysmal neutral (probabl the worst in the game), where he is entirely dependent on getting reads/punishes to do anything, as his horrible mobility and lack of safe pokes/a good grab outside of his telegraphed side-b force him to. playing ganon is dependent on beating a player, not the character, and at a high level it becomes more difficult to do that. however, when he can get in, he does work. his moves are huge and hit really hard, and his edgeguarding game is something to be reckoned with. he just has to be careful when pushing his advantage, however. he's a fastfaller+heavy+big bodied, so he's easy to rack up damage against. if he doesn't get edgeguarded, he becomes difficult to kill and builds rage, making him more threatening. he can't really reset to neutral that well (unless he gets a dair/down-b/whatever else on you), and if you capitalize on this you'll take his stock easily.

in summary, ganon kills you faster than you kill him, but it's easier for you to kill him unless he's reading you hard. generally, fast characters who dominate the neutral (i.e: basically every top/high tier) are his bane, but characters (players i think is the best way to put this, considering he doesn't really win mus) who don't really pressure him that hard or exploit his many weaknesses that well are pretty much free.

(i hope this isn't too rambly :/)

 

[ぱみゅ]

Here's my shot at it

Neutral: ★★★☆
Advantage: ★★★★
Disadvantage: ★★

Neutral: ★★★
Advantage: ★★☆
Disadvantage: ★★

So, both have virtually the same moveset, and movement, so their neutral should be the same, right?
Their overall safety is about the same, Marth is statistically better frame-wise, but range makes it kind of trivial, imo.
But Falchion's tipper is scary, it deals huge damage and therefore knockback so opponents usually do not challenge the tipper unless they have the pressure/mobility option to go inside its range and punish/trade (in these few cases Lucina does a better job keeping opponents away), otherwise they risk to die at ridiculously low percentages. Without the tipper, opponents are more confident to approach/rush down Lucina. The risk to get hit is the same, but the punishment is not.
Furthermore, Jab is a prime spacing method for both given the low committing, and both can combo Jab1 > Fsmash, but it's kind of obvious who gets the most reward out of it.

Now, Marth has a lot of combos, WITH the tipper, low % combos are devastating and deal tons of quick damage, and WITHOUT the tipper the knockback is low enough to follow up in most cases. Lucina gets none of that, her knockback feels pretty much fixed out of her combo range, with all her moves, at any %... it's kind of sad.
Both apply crazy pressure, but Marth tends to step back a little to adjust to tipper spacing, usually missing some opportunities, and Lucina miiiight be better at that... except Marth's reward is worth it.
Also, both have the Shield Breaker option. Lucina rushing down has more chances for it and has a plus because opponents are more confident to shield against her aerials, compared to Marth whose moves they'd rather avoid completely. But yeah, Marth's reward for landing just one is much bigger.

As for disadvantage, both are the same imo. Both suffer against good pressure/rushdown, both get juggled crazy easy, both are light, both have "good" recoveries and "good" OOS options, both are bad at flailing and keeping the opponent away, both have a Counter that is good if landed, risky otherwise. Marth's tipper is NOT a factor at disadvantaged state.

And that's pretty much it.

NEXT, I'll try

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Another early example for you guys. This time, in the form of a question:

Based upon what @ Raijinken & @ wedl!! said, both Dr. Mario and Ganondorf have the same advantage, while Dr. Mario trumps Ganondorf in both the Neutral and Disadvantage states.

What is interesting about this is that, from what I have seen, most people think that Ganondorf is better than Dr. Mario competitively. And not only that, but they see Ganondorf as having much more reward (aka Advantage) than Dr. Mario. This is one such example of an "inconsistency" that I mentioned earlier.

So, in your opinion, do you see this as the data being wrong? Or are people's conceptions about Ganondorf's reward a little exaggerated?


Personally, I am not really pointing a finger in either direction~ However, what I wanted to show is that this is another way you could use this data. Because the data is so easy to see and compare, one can spot things such as this, and determine if there is a problem or not. Or, in the case of there not being a problem, it just means that Ganondorf simply just has the same (or at least similar) overall reward from his Advantage state in comparison to the good Doc

 

[Raijinken]

Another early example for you guys. This time, in the form of a question:

Based upon what @ Raijinken & @ wedl!! said, both Dr. Mario and Ganondorf have the same advantage, while Dr. Mario trumps Ganondorf in both the Neutral and Disadvantage states.

What is interesting about this is that, from what I have seen, most people think that Ganondorf is better than Dr. Mario competitively. And not only that, but they see Ganondorf as having much more reward (aka Advantage) than Dr. Mario. This is one such example of an "inconsistency" that I mentioned earlier.

So, in your opinion, do you see this as the data being wrong? Or are people's conceptions about Ganondorf's reward a little exaggerated?


Personally, I am not really pointing a finger in either direction~ However, what I wanted to show is that this is another way you could use this data. Because the data is so easy to see and compare, one can spot things such as this, and determine if there is a problem or not. Or, in the case of there not being a problem, it just means that Ganondorf simply just has the same (or at least similar) overall reward from his Advantage state in comparison to the good Doc

In this case, I'll contribute my thoughts on Ganondorf.


Neutral: ★★★
Advantage: ★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★

Explanation for Neutral: The main difference in mine and @ wedl!! 's analysis of Ganon's neutral, I think, is the fear factor. Much like @ ぱみゅ discussed about Marth, and like many elsewhere feel about Ike, I believe there is a real reason to fear approaching Ganondorf. This is obviously very matchup-dependent, but any character who lacks safe approaches (or good projectiles to force that approach) really has to respect the Dorf's punches and kicks. He won't often get the best combos, but even a slight opening can open up a very dangerous series of tech chase punishes, which can tack on the percent and kill outright. He's also dangerous to approach aerially, with the speed and power of a quick up-smash, OoS or not. And of course, while choreographed, he has a command grab, giving him yet another punish/chase tool that leads into more tech chasing.

Explanation for Advantage: In this case, I would generally consider his advantage comparable to Doc's. He's perhaps more dependent upon tech-chasing than Doc, but gets vastly more reward as well. Unless your character has a safe way to land or a very good air-speed to get away with, one knock up and they risk taking a pseudo 0-death. Of course, there are numerous matchups where this flat-out won't work.

Explanation for Disadvantage: Especially without the threat of Dark Fists, Ganondorf's recovery is unimpressive, he's heavy and jugglable, and he has very few options that are quick enough to take advantage of a break in a non-true combo to free some space. Uair can work to a degree, but even his recovery mixup is scarcely useful if your opponent has a stock lead.

That said, personally, I believe both Dorf and Doc are rather under-rated. Both depend far more heavily on a punish and read game than Mario and Captain Falcon, and that tends to mean they aren't as easy to perform with against skilled players. I think they both have great potential largely limited by their terrible disadvantage states, which is very easy to enter against most of the "top tier" cast.

 

[san.]

Neutral: ★★★★☆

Gunner has the option of playing incredibly safe. His fair is a projectile with 9-12 frames of landing lag. Super missile is nearly safe point blank on shield. Bair has generous autocancel frames. Overall, he can keep throwing stuff at you with little worry to himself. Many of his projectiles deal damage or can confirm into more damage. Against other projectile users, he can opt to use shine or psi magnet to hamper their projectiles while retaining his best projectiles.

Utilt has a lot of range and comes out on frame 5 so it's difficult to challenge. He also has a good grab.

Advantage: ★★☆ (was ★☆ prepatch)

Overall, it's decent but pales in comparison with a lot of the cast.

Grab game has low reward. Dthrow->nair works at very low %. Dthrow->uair works at middle %s if they don't DI behind him. Lack of easy throw combos is a huge demerit.

Combos: Gunner has combos out of fair, landing nair/bair, missile, and bomb drop (and grenade if you're using it). Damage racking is good, but kills need slight reads. Aerials don't really combo into each other in the air, so you have to back off after a nair or bair. Landing with nair or bair however does combo into things. You can maintain strings with good fair usage. Gimping is decent with upB1's buff, longlasting nair with low cooldown, and fair. Uair kills pretty easily up top and fsmash/dsmash kill pretty easily at the edge. Usmash connects if you don't have momentum on release and have decent power.

Kill combos: Missile->charge shot, fair->charge shot, missile->cannon uppercut, missile/bomb drop->uair

Outside of uair, gunner has to commit quite a bit to kill, otherwise you'll be trapping opponents into your smash attacks or gimping.

Disadvantage: ★★☆

No quick aerials to get out of strings, the largest offense. Gunner has to use global options or fair/nair to get out of strings.

He can get out of landing/juggling traps somewhat easily with his mobility, bomb drop, and possibly with upB1 as well (launches a projectile below with relatively little landing lag). He can cover his recovery with missiles and bomb drop as well.

Overall, it's pretty meh. Gunner has decent weight which is nice. This may be ★★★ depending on how you look at it.



So, gunner can get hits easily and rack up damage, has to commit for the real damage/kills, and gets punished pretty hard for messing up.

 

[RayNoire]

Neutral: ★★
Advantage: ★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★☆

Neutral: Dtilt is gr8 and Nair is okay. Most everything else is a commitment. Having such a poor dash/shield grab really hurts. We do force approaches very well though.

Advantage: Mewtwo has good landing traps in Shadow Ball, Disable, Usmash, and Fsmash, and frame traps in Utilt and Bair. Fair kills offstage and Nair and Bair gimp, while Dair is one of the more powerful spikes. He racks up damage well and kills early if things go his way. His weakness is in covering the ledge; neither Dtilt nor Dsmash reliably hits on the ledge, and Nair covers options reasonably well but isn't too threatening.

Disadvantage: He doesn't land. Ever. Confusion can shift momentum but is too laggy to not react to, while Teleporting to the ground is death unless the opponent is super-heavily committed to an option. B-Reversed fully charged Shadow Ball can work but isn't free either. He can recover, but it doesn't matter that much since he is the worst in the game at getting off the ledge, thanks to his hurtbox and bizarrely absent invincibility frames.

 

[LancerStaff]

Nah you are completely fine. Sorry I didn't post my second post sooner actually XD

But yeah, your post is excellent! This is the exact kind of quality post that I am looking for. And at worst, you can probably just repost your post whenever the discussion moves on to Pit/Dark Pit if you would like to. lol

Everybody seems to be overrating their characters, heh. I was afraid of putting Pit too high and getting shot down. I'll wait for when it's Pit's turn and see what everybody else does before I reevaluate the scores.

Actually, it might be a good idea to determine the best and worst of each to make some benchmarks before moving onward. Because IMO (not bashing anybody in specific) we're kinda all over the place.

 

[Zorcey]

Neutral: ★★★★
Advantage: ★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★★

Neutral: Peach's Neutral Game is what I love so much about the character. You truly have some stellar options here, such as Turnips for pokes and zoning, and then Dsmash and Ftilt to punish rushdowns. Utilt and Nair are useful too, being decent anti-airs to dissuade attacks from above. Of course, despite her excellent defensive options, any character with a better Neutral Game than Peach will always stomp her, as she lacks safe approaches.

Advantage: Peach does decently when in an Advantageous state. She has some fairly reliable throw combos, and good follow ups to tilts. You can wall-of-pain with Bair, and Fair is very deadly if you can read an airdodge. Turnips are again incredible here for edge guarding and some more zoning. Peach's lack of mobility is really what holds her back in this state.

Disadvantage: Peach's worst state by far. She is heavy and floaty and slow - a delicious meal for any combo-heavy character in the game. What keeps Peach from being made total garbage by the problems she has in this state is her Float, an excellent tool for escaping the enemy's clutches. DI'ing offstage and Floating back is generally Peach's best option here, as landing is incredibly difficult for her.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Everybody seems to be overrating their characters, heh. I was afraid of putting Pit too high and getting shot down. I'll wait for when it's Pit's turn and see what everybody else does before I reevaluate the scores.

Actually, it might be a good idea to determine the best and worst of each to make some benchmarks before moving onward. Because IMO (not bashing anybody in specific) we're kinda all over the place.

It's fine actually XD I anticipated this anyways, lol. Since this is an experimental topic that takes a different approach...it is going to be a little rough/sloppy for the first couple of weeks. But once this topic starts getting more posts/data to compare, things should smooth out a little in the long run.

If anything, I am just happy that people that are posting in my topic/are supporting this new idea!

Also for the last thing that you mentioned, I had that in mind already (With help from the mods!). For every 10~ character I post/that we go over, after we collect data for all of those characters, we begin to compare them with eachother and see how it looks. And once we make some tweaks to make it look a bit better (doesn't have to be perfect however), I will introduce the next 10~ to the list, and then we repeat the process until we reach all 55 characters. And once that is done, people can comment on whatever they like, since I feel as though discussion will pick up once all of the characters have been integrated using this system.



Anywho, here are the results for day one!

Spoiler: Neutral Rankings

★★★★★ :
★★★★☆ :
★★★★ : ()
★★★☆ : ()
★★★ : ()
★★☆ :
★★ :
★☆ :
★ :
☆ : ()

Spoiler: Advantage Rankings

★★★★★ :
★★★★☆ :
★★★★ :
★★★☆ : ()
★★★ : ()
★★☆ :
★★ :
★☆ :
★ :
☆ :

Spoiler: Disadvantage Rankings

★★★★★ :
★★★★☆ :
★★★★ :
★★★☆ : ()
★★★ : ()
★★☆ :
★★ :
★☆ :
★ :
☆ :

Neutral is pretty evened out. Advantage is pretty high. And Disadvantage is pretty low. Funny how that turned out, lol

Oh, and characters in parenthesis have multiple rankings for them. I will change how this looks in the future (since it would look UNFATHOMABLY messy), but for now it is fine since there isn't too much data yet.

 

[Raijinken]

I'm personally interested in seeing, once the "bugs" are worked out of this analysis system, what the general trends are for neutral, advantage, and disadvantage. I'm largely interested in seeing if there is any correlation between these stats, character "viability", and popular playstyles (for instance, if a poor disadvantage stat mandates defensive play to a greater extent than a strong advantage state tends towards aggression).

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Interesting project. Looking forwards to characters I can actually say something about.

Not sure how I feel about what's been posted so far th and though. The numbers for Gunner and Doc by @ san. and @ Raijinken look on point but I'm not convinced about stuff related to Peach, Pit, DDD though. Reasoning:

* Peach's neutral having **** looks suspiciously high. If we assume the super powerhouse characters like Sheik, Fox or Pikachu to have ***** in neutral then there has to be at least one more tier between them and Peach where characters with powerful but not overpowering neutral games fit in, such as: Meta Knight, Yoshi, Ness and others. So I'd say *** for Peach's neutral would be more accurate. Her advantaged state might be **** instead of *** though because she can juggle, ledgetrap and edgeguard pretty well and deal a lot of damage in the process. Peach is not a noteworthy threat in neutral to almost any character but she can be kinda scary once you're in the air or on the ledge against her. Swapping her around her numbers for neutral and advantage might be an idea worth thinking about.

* Pit shouldn't have **** in neutral for the same reasons as Peach. I don't see why he shouldn't have **** in disadvantage though, I think his strong disadvantaged game is his main selling point and what sets him apart from the average mid tier character. Pit is a character that has manageable matchups against pretty much every character, including the top tiers, and the fact that he can actually somewhat evade and play around the monstrous damage output that a character like ZSS busts out in her advantaged position is pretty much his saving grace because his neutral and advantaged state [while solid] aren't powerful enough to let him compete. It's his multiple jumps, good recovery and the fact that he basically has a shield in midair that gives Pit his niche.

* DDD's neutral game in contrast is a bit better than ** would imply. His jab is good, his ftilt is good and they can actually put on a good deal of pressure if he uses them on your shield while a Gordo bounces up and down just in front of him. Dthrow -> fair is also very solid damage. I'd rate his neutral game even higher if it weren't for his massive hitbox but I think *** isn't actually wrong for him. It's his poor advantaged state that really holds him back and I think *** is too high for him. He just isn't mobile enough to be a threat to somebody who's off the ground most of the time.
DDD wins games by consistently outplaying the opponent in neutral, he doesn't combo or edgeguard you to death.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

I'm personally interested in seeing, once the "bugs" are worked out of this analysis system, what the general trends are for neutral, advantage, and disadvantage. I'm largely interested in seeing if there is any correlation between these stats, character "viability", and popular playstyles (for instance, if a poor disadvantage stat mandates defensive play to a greater extent than a strong advantage state tends towards aggression).

Same here! I want to try to make a connection between what is perceived, with what is actually going on at tournaments. And if there are any "sleeping giants" amongst the roster that people might be missing. I feel as though once this topic picks up more steam, it can hopefully answer some questions for us whilst raising new ones~

Interesting project. Looking forwards to characters I can actually say something about.

Not sure how I feel about what's been posted so far th and though. The numbers for Gunner and Doc by @ san. and @ Raijinken look on point but I'm not convinced about stuff related to Peach, Pit, DDD though. Reasoning:

* Peach's neutral having **** looks suspiciously high. If we assume the super powerhouse characters like Sheik, Fox or Pikachu to have ***** in neutral then there has to be at least one more tier between them and Peach where characters with powerful but not overpowering neutral games fit in, such as: Meta Knight, Yoshi, Ness and others. So I'd say *** for Peach's neutral would be more accurate. Her advantaged state might be **** instead of *** though because she can juggle, ledgetrap and edgeguard pretty well and deal a lot of damage in the process. Peach is not a noteworthy threat in neutral to almost any character but she can be kinda scary once you're in the air or on the ledge against her. Swapping her around her numbers for neutral and advantage might be an idea worth thinking about.

* Pit shouldn't have **** in neutral for the same reasons as Peach. I don't see why he shouldn't have **** in disadvantage though, I think his strong disadvantaged game is his main selling point and what sets him apart from the average mid tier character. Pit is a character that has manageable matchups against pretty much every character, including the top tiers, and the fact that he can actually somewhat evade and play around the monstrous damage output that a character like ZSS busts out in her advantaged position is pretty much his saving grace because his neutral and advantaged state [while solid] aren't powerful enough to let him compete. It's his multiple jumps, good recovery and the fact that he basically has a shield in midair that gives Pit his niche.

* DDD's neutral game in contrast is a bit better than ** would imply. His jab is good, his ftilt is good and they can actually put on a good deal of pressure if he uses them on your shield while a Gordo bounces up and down just in front of him. Dthrow -> fair is also very solid damage. I'd rate his neutral game even higher if it weren't for his massive hitbox but I think *** isn't actually wrong for him. It's his poor advantaged state that really holds him back and I think *** is too high for him. He just isn't mobile enough to be a threat to somebody who's off the ground most of the time.
DDD wins games by consistently outplaying the opponent in neutral, he doesn't combo or edgeguard you to death.

Very good points for the characters I actually agree with most of them.

Besides when the topic gets to discussing all 55+ characters, the thing I look forward to the most in regards to this topic is people debating and discussing the data that was provided. Such as how you did. For right now though, I am waiting for more data to be collected. But once we collect data for all 11 perceived bottom tier characters (plus Pit & Marth since people wrote about them lol), we can move on to the next step of discussing these now 13 characters; The debating process for them, before moving on to the next set of ~10 characters.

Everything you said will be taken into consideration once this happens though


-----------------------------------------------------------------


Here are the characters currently lacking data:



Once we have data on these four characters, we can begin the first phase of character debates! And once we are done with that, I will introduce the next ~10 characters!

 

[Zorcey]

Peach's neutral having **** looks suspiciously high. If we assume the super powerhouse characters like Sheik, Fox or Pikachu to have ***** in neutral then there has to be at least one more tier between them and Peach where characters with powerful but not overpowering neutral games fit in, such as: Meta Knight, Yoshi, Ness and others. So I'd say *** for Peach's neutral would be more accurate. Her advantaged state might be **** instead of *** though because she can juggle, ledgetrap and edgeguard pretty well and deal a lot of damage in the process. Peach is not a noteworthy threat in neutral to almost any character but she can be kinda scary once you're in the air or on the ledge against her. Swapping her around her numbers for neutral and advantage might be an idea worth thinking about.

I'm gonna disagree that Yoshi and Ness have a better Neutral Game than Peach. MK most certainly doesn't - his Neutral is pretty bad actually. Also keep in mind that ★★★ is indicative of an average Neutral Game, as stated in the OP. I think above average is more descriptive of Peach's Neutral, she just has better options than the majority of the characters.

As for her Advantage Game, you have to consider that Peach has a very difficult time stringing even at mid percentages - you'll usually have to read your opponents air dodges. That combined with her underwhelming speed makes her lose many follow up opportunities, and leaves you fishing for straight-up kill moves to end stocks.

 

[wedl!!]

adv: ★★★
neutral: ★★★☆
dis: ★★★★☆

wii fit is a bit of a tricky character: her kit is about playing defensive and going super hit-and-run with her fast pokes (ftilt comes to mind) and great projectile game with sun salutation and header. being able to heal with such a fast-charging projectile only adds to the strengths of her runaway game. rating her advantageous state was difficult, because she lacks a strong grab game, but she has hard hitting moves (namely fair, uair, etc), nair setups and deep breathing's bs factor (like seriously this move is insane). her disadvantaged state is one of the best in the game due to a lot of characters struggling to combo her (she's a floaty midweight) and beat her offstage (planking with projectiles, up-b making her incredibly difficult to edgeguard).

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

WFT seems a fair amount higher than what I would've anticipated. But I am pretty unknowledgable with the character.

I do know that Sun Salutation is a pretty amazing move though. 5% even when uncharged, can be charged in the air, and travels at a slow but moderate pace is pretty generous for a standard projectile tbh. It's only held back by its lack of power at later charges in contrast to Charge Shot or Shadow Ball.

In particular, her Disadvantage state seems a bit higher than I would expect it to be, when certain characters can weave around and beat her unorthodox hitboxes. Though her Neutral seems okay because of SS and Header.


Also, in regards to the last three characters (), if no data is presented by tomorrow or so, we can go ahead and start debating the data for the characters that have already been finished. Since usage for those characters is pretty rare, and I want this topic to keep progressing at a fair pace~

I do know of one person who knows a lot about Swordfighter though... @ Antonykun



If you know anybody that can provide more data on certain characters, page them here to see if they can help!

 

[DunnoBro]

Neutral: ★★★★
Adv: ★☆
Dis: ★★☆

Duck hunt has a superb neutral, one that can even contend with the likes of sheik, pacman, and most characters without burst breakthrough options like spindash or DUMB dash grabs like falcon/luigi which let them bypass his neutral game.

He wins neutral easily and often, but he can win neutral 10x times vs most top tiers and still lose. But he can't keep them out of neutral via combos and advantageous pressure. So he just keeps playing the neutral. Once it's time to kill for either player, he falls apart. He doesn't punish aggressive kill set-ups very hard, and he has no safe kill set-ups of his own. So even if he won neutral so well he's <40% and they're over 100%, he HAS to make risks to secure the stock. These risks are neither very reliable or easily translated into stocks, so comebacks aren't too hard for a defensive option with a good punish game. (especially with rage and the natural mindset players have when far behind)

His advantage and disadvantage aren't quite as bad as the stars may indicate. He almost ALWAYS has a correct option. trick shot to cover recovery, pigeon to cover landing, sh gunmen to pressure during an approach... The issue is there's no reason to fear this as they don't translate into stocks very well.

A lot of people remark about how fun he is to watch, how different each match is... But that's just a testament to how bad he is. Every stock is a miracle from GodKing Sakurai earned through some hairbrained set-up or mistake on the part of the opponent.

His neutral would be 5 stars if he could punish rolls/spot dodges/air dodges/whiffs effectively, but he can't. All he can do is pivot grab/jab.

 

[Raijinken]

Advantage: ★★★★☆
Neutral: ★★
Disadvantage: ★★★

Advantage: Short of a handful of characters with a strong ability to contest, Puff's got great tech/offstage chasing/wall of pain options. She has early kill moves, and plenty of maneuverability.
Neutral: She has one shield-damage move (Pound) and a lot of maneuverability, but... that's basically it to help her in neutral. Spacing bair/fair is all she can do with much safety until the enemy commits to something.
Disadvantage: She dies early to kill moves, but is hard to combo for the same reason. I think that balances out, in general. Also lots of jumps, and Pound stalls midair briefly.

 

[Antonykun]

neutral: ★★★
advantage: ★★★☆
disadvantage:★★

Swordfighter's neutral is fine, think little mac button but overall worse but with a projectile/good grab, stay on the ground and make good use of the tilts and jabs.
Swordfighter's advantage is great because he can threaten with up air at any point and his tools in neutral allow him to be always able to threaten with up air (or down air if they're off stage) once he reaches to the advantage state.
Swordfighter's disadvantage on stage is whether or not he can get away with down air offstage he's really exploitable

 

[Sykkamorre]

I'd actually like to put my two cents in about ganon's disadvantage state.

It's not quite as bad as most people say, primarily due to Nair and special cancelled fair. Nair is fast, has good hitboxes and can easily lead into combo's if it's not respected.

The fair thing is something of a rarity but definitely has it's uses, especially for catching over eager players going after a punish after what seems to be a whiffed fair.

 

[DunnoBro]

I'd actually like to put my two cents in about ganon's disadvantage state.

It's not quite as bad as most people say, primarily due to Nair and special cancelled fair. Nair is fast, has good hitboxes and can easily lead into combo's if it's not respected.

The fair thing is something of a rarity but definitely has it's uses, especially for catching over eager players going after a punish after what seems to be a whiffed fair.

He has an awful air dodge and one of the only truly gimpable recoveries in the game. Definitely one of the worst DAs in the game.

I wouldn't say his DA state is 1/5 though since the lowest should be mac at .5, and ganon's DA is much better than his at least.

 

[Xeze]

Neutral: ★★★
Advantage: ★★★☆
Disadvantage: ★★☆

Neutral: Mario has a solid neutral game. He possesses a good mobility, combining both ground and air speed, has a projectile to force approaches, a reflector to deal with opposing projectiles and has strong OoS options like Up-B, SH n-air or JC u-smash. However, he lacks range in his moves. Thus characters with good disjoints beat Mario in neutral, specially if they can powershield or jab through fireballs.

Advantage: Mario is known for his great combo game. A grab means some combos and strings that can rack up damage fairly quickly with u-air, n-air, b-air and up-B. D-tilt and D-air are also good combo starters. Offstage, Mario can pressure with FLUDD and Cape, as well as n-airs and b-airs. Out of a ledge trump the options are either b-air right away or get on stage and go for an F-smash or restart the combos with d-tilt or u-tilt (it hits people grabbing the ledge without invincibility). The reason why I don't rank Mario higher than this is because he doesn't have any guaranteed setups. Most of his KOs com from u-smash/f-smash reads or, at high percentages, back throw near the ledge or d-air/u-air near the top. He possesses some setups like d-throw -> u-air -> f-air near the ledge or d-tilt -> read -> pivot JC u-smash, but the percentages where they work depend on character and rage.

Disadvantage: This is where one of Mario's weaknesses kicks in. Offstage, his recovery is pretty linear. If you hit him out of his second jump, he is dead. Moves that trade with his up-B also do the trick. On the other hand, Mario possesses a frame 3 n-air to escape combos. He has some trouble landing and gets juggled by some characters, therefore I think it justifies the ranking I gave.

 

[san.]

neutral: ★★★
advantage: ★★★☆
disadvantage:★★

Swordfighter's neutral is fine, think little mac button but overall worse but with a projectile/good grab, stay on the ground and make good use of the tilts and jabs.
Swordfighter's advantage is great because he can threaten with up air at any point and his tools in neutral allow him to be always able to threaten with up air (or down air if they're off stage) once he reaches to the advantage state.
Swordfighter's disadvantage on stage is whether or not he can get away with down air offstage he's really exploitable

I would rate 50/0 swordfighter something along this as well. Neutral is slightly above average but close enough to 3 stars. Advantage is anywhere between 3.5 and even 4 stars depending on the size of the character.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

I wouldn't say his DA state is 1/5 though since the lowest should be mac at .5, and ganon's DA is much better than his at least.

I wanted to make a quick note about this in particular.

While characters can be close to eachother in terms of their ranking, there can still be fairly noticeable gaps in their performance. This is because, in the later stages of this topic, rankings will be based on a character-by-character measure as opposed to a performance measure. As of right now, the stars are based upon a performance measure. But once we start getting into the nitty-gritty, it will be based upon where Ganondorf stands in comparison to the rest of the cast. So he could still rank 1/5, even if his Disadvantage state is leagues above someone like Little Mac. Though for right now, people don't have to worry about this, lol

Also, I am very tempted to just open the floodgates right now, since there's now 4 characters with rankings even though the topic wasn't on them yet~





I still want to keep it to the characters we are still on. Because, although it makes things go at a slower pace, it also helps us reduce a little bit of clutter. I don't really mind when someone posts data (the more the merrier!), but I also want to keep the topic as focused as possible before we move on to the next set of 10~ characters. Apologies.

...but if enough people want me to go ahead and just allow every character, I might consider it. But I know that it might hurt this topic in the long run, so I want to try to avoid that.

SO, for now at least, try to stick to the characters in the second post. Thank you!


(Your data will still be added in the rankings btw since I'm not really strict/I do really appreciate this data lol)

 

[Macchiato]

Neutral: ★★
Advantage: ★★★★
Disadvantage: ★★☆

Explanation for Neutral:
Zelda's main gameplan is to space her dtilts and get grabs to rack up quick damage.
Zelda does have some safe moves that can lead to combos or good positions require only a decent amount of good spacing
Din's Fire fails to zone due to it's slow speed, small hitbox, and how telegraphed it is. Phantom Slash is decent at zoning due to it covering a big space in front. It does have to be charged and have slow endlag.
Most Hitboxes are disjointed and unclankable helping her beat multiple moves and gives her good priority

Explanation for Advantage:
Amazing edgeguarding tools, great kill power.
d-tilt hits below edges edgeguarding many recoveries and preventing them for grabbing the ledge.
d-air is very long lasting and strong gimping at low percentages. It is very easy to land due to the big sweetspot. It has good priority trading or beating most recoveries.
n-air can gimp opponents or stage spike using the back hitboxes.
Din's Fire while avoidable can force win/win situations by making them either airdodge or get hit.
Phantom Strike can cover every ledge option and cover horizontal recoveries. It kills very early offstage.
Teleport Canceling can help give edgeguarding mix-ups.
The Elevator is a very scary move. It can punish oos or laggy moves. it comes out quick on frame 9 and kills at very ridiculous percents. This gives her the most kill power in the game. It is also reliable for many situations.
She has many set-ups like Falling n-air - u-smash/elevator, d-throw - u-air, d-tilt - u-air.
Her kicks kill very early and are good oos options making opponents double think after hitting your shield.
They are many set-ups into u-air and it is very disjointed and kills early.
Her f-smash is hard to punish and both up and forward smashes are very long lasting.
d-smash while killing later, are very fast moves beating out many moves in start up.

Explanation for Disadvantage:
Floaty, avoids combos better than most and benefits more than average from (game wide weak) SDI.
Nayru's love intangibility comes out on frame 5 and whole body active hitbox is an efficient low percent combo breaker.
Amazing off-stage recovery. Unhittable while recovering and both ends have hitboxes.
Difficulty landing, can only be n-air and nayru's love.
Many oos options such as b-air, farore's wind, nayru's love, d-smash.
This character needs a fix to Din's Fire to properly force an approach or needs an approach like SH kicks in brawl.

 

[DunnoBro]

Also, I am very tempted to just open the floodgates right now, since there's now 4 characters with rankings even though the topic wasn't on them yet~

My b I can't read im just a cute doggy

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Alright! We have enough data for the first phase of debating! A bit more characters than I expected, but that is fine lol~

As of right now, adding new characters to the list has been locked until we reach a solid consensus on the 11 characters mentioned below.

During this time, please don't post data for any NEW characters. Though data for the current characters is fine. However, if you do accidentally post data for a new character, I won't discredit it~

Anywho, here is the updated list. Let the debates begin!



Characters so far:

Spoiler: Neutral Rankings

★★★★★ :
★★★★☆ :
★★★★ :
★★★☆ :
★★★ : ()
★★☆ :
★★ :
★☆ :
★ :
☆ : ()

Spoiler: Advantage Rankings

★★★★★ :
★★★★☆ :
★★★★ :
★★★☆ :
★★★ :
★★☆ :
★★ :
★☆ :
★ :
☆ :

Spoiler: Disadvantage Rankings

★★★★★ :
★★★★☆ :
★★★★ :
★★★☆ :
★★★ :
★★☆ :
★★ :
★☆ :
★ :
☆ :

See a character too high? A character too low? Or an error on my part? Post your thoughts about it! Make sure to give a detailed analysis on why you think a character should be higher/lower though. And although not exactly necessary, it would be extremely helpful if you also posted how many stars they would move up/down on the list, or post what rank you think that they should be in.

Leave no rock unturned! Discuss as many of these characters on the lists as you like! The purpose of this phase is to try to make these lists as accurate as humanly possible. Even if the conclusions reached aren't perfectly agreed upon, the arguments presented that are the most "sound" will take the cake; otherwise, majority "vote" wins. And if need be, I will discuss the results with the moderators/anyone qualified (high ranking tournament player who posts here) to further sharpen the accuracy of these lists.

The debating process will last until I feel as though no more progress can be made, or discussions slow to near stagnation. Once that happens, the debating process will be over, and then I will post the updated results along with the next ~10+ characters so that we can move on.


Anywho, keep the debates civil and on-topic. And most importantly, have fun!

 

[Shaya]

I don't think Samus' advantage is grand at all. If advantage is meant to mean "single instance of reward only", then just say "Rewards" (and even under that consideration they're significantly worse than others with multiple rewarding actions with set ups). Because otherwise Jiggs and Samus, both only have high rewards on highly niche moves with little to no true set ups into them doesn't deserve more than minimal rating of advantage.

Lucina's advantage is not that much worse than Marth's really...

And I don't think it's a good idea to have Marth/Pit/Mario mixed in here yet, we should see a steady inclination of values... Mario having [below] average in all 3 categories thus far is laughable considering he's significantly more viable than anyone else rated thus far.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

And I don't think it's a good idea to have Marth/Pit/Mario mixed in here yet, we should see a steady inclination of stars... Mario having below average in all 3 categories thus far is somewhat laughable considering he's significantly more viable than anyone else rated thus far.

Fair enough. I will remove those three then (until this phase of debating is over anyways). Only added them since the data was already there~

What about DHD & Peach?

 

[Shaya]

Oh, I'd say Peach shouldn't be included yet either.

And duck hunt *somethingsomething*.

 

[DunnoBro]

I think it might be helpful to discuss the absolute best/worst in each respective field to get a sort of placeholder for perspective.

It'd also likely generate more... enthusiastic debate when conversing the "best/worst" in a category.

 

[ItsRainingGravy]

Got it! Everything should be fixed now. Back to the original 11, lol

Okay, now discussions can begin! Apologies for the slip up on my part. Once we reach the later stages of the topic, these kind of things won't happen~

The data for the characters that were removed will be re-added after this current phase of debating is over. Unless the original posters change their mind, and provide new/edited data for said characters.