I disagree with how 3.5 approached balance.

[Thane of Blue Flames]

@Shell nailed it imo

that said, if we have issues, the PMDT is still open to suggestions, correct? i've found a couple small ones already

Yo Umber.

Thoughts on 3.5 Marth?

 

[Kneato]

Buffing characters up to top tier doesn't actually work well in practice. Trust me, we've tried.

Ultimately it created some of the most well-salted / hated characters in Project M, possibly in Smash. Nobody wants more 2.6 Ivysaurs or 2.1 Sonics, or 3.0 Mewtwos etc.

Usually the way that characters get up to SS tier is that they have some technique or combination of techniques that bends the Rules of Smash. It's often some combination of disproportionate risk vs reward and unprecedented mechanics that tend to ignore Smash fundamentals.

If you aim juuust a little lower than SS tier, more like A-B tier, all of a sudden it's significantly easier to make everyone good while maintaining good design that's in touch with those basic design principles & gameplay fundamentals. Even though you don't get quite the same rush of "OMG my character is godlike with unlimited potential" you also aren't playing against 40-some other characters that are (subjectively) annoying to fight, and chances are people will enjoy playing against you quite a bit more, too.

The net result is that a game built around ~A-B tier balance is just much more fair and fun for everyone to play in the long run, even if it takes a little personal adjustment to your own character in the short term.

With that said are there some characters that were low tier as of v3.5 that maybe didn't get enough help? Possibly. With the huge number of balance tweaks and overall nerfs to recoveries, move safety, and burst movement we really wanted to see how these characters would fall within the context of these global changes before piling more buffs on top, since the theme of the update was crafting a leaner & more fair experience.

Let me start off by saying I agree with Shell's reasoning/explanation here. This patch was focused on design fundamentals and it seems that rather than taking each character and saying "Ok he's too weak/strong, what can we do to fix him?" the PMDT instead focused on the overarching design choices that were causing many of the issues, such as excess recovery and movement, and made cast wide changes to fix them, regardless of each character's perceived tier. Hence why everyone was nerfed, yet everyone still ended up closer in balance than last patch.

However, I do think some of what Draconis is saying has some worth. When the next patch rolls around, I do hope to see a more direct approach to individual character balance based on how they perform between now and then. As an example, I think Dedede could benefit greatly from some very minor buffs. And that's really what most low tier character's need. Because the balance in PM is that much closer than any other smash game, a total overhaul isn't required for practically any low teirs. Just a few small buffs can push most into the realm of viability.

 

[Deleted member]

Yo Umber.

Thoughts on 3.5 Marth?

i hate the dead zones on fsmash, fair, and front hit of dair. that said, one of my play group friends @EmptySky00 is covering that right now with me via skype.

i also think roy's dtilt IASA is too good in tandem with everyone else's sucking.

currently i don't see a good reason to pick marth when you can pick roy and play the exact same while solving all of marth's major issues. thats my stance on marth atm.

at least MK isn't strictly better than marth anymore via the same general skillset.

 

[Thane of Blue Flames]

i hate the dead zones on fsmash, fair, and front hit of dair. that said, one of my play group friends @EmptySky00 is covering that right now with me via skype.

i also think roy's dtilt IASA is too good in tandem with everyone else's sucking.

currently i don't see a good reason to pick marth when you can pick roy and play the exact same while solving all of marth's major issues. thats my stance on marth atm.

at least MK isn't strictly better than marth anymore via the same general skillset.

Roy is strictly worse at edge-guarding though. Risk too high, fair not good enough and his bair is useless for this purpose. His conversions into kill moves are as bad/DI dependent/unsafe as Marf's and so his ability to tack on damage quick doesn't ultimately solve the core Marth/Roy issue.

They're hovering close to each other and have similar MU spreads, but have clear divergences and shine in areas the other doesn't. But I suppose we'll see.

 

[Kneato]

i hate the dead zones on fsmash, fair, and front hit of dair. that said, one of my play group friends @EmptySky00 is covering that right now with me via skype.

i also think roy's dtilt IASA is too good in tandem with everyone else's sucking.

currently i don't see a good reason to pick marth when you can pick roy and play the exact same while solving all of marth's major issues. thats my stance on marth atm.

at least MK isn't strictly better than marth anymore via the same general skillset.

If you try to play Roy how you would play Marth, you are probably going to SD a lot.

Marth can actually go off stage for gimps and spikes. Roy's spike is a ton harder to land and he's got those fancy concrete shoes.

 

[Deleted member]

the whole goal of marth/roy edge guards is to simply hold position until you get the kill. marth and roy have somewhat different tools to do it but both are about equally effective vs better players. marth slaughters worse players but idc about them. as roy if you edge guard with uncharged flare blade a lot you will get KOs much faster than marth can vs good DI and more clever opponents.

damage doesn't matter for these characters, the sooner you internalize that they are purely 100% position based the better off you will be

sheik is the same way hint nudge wink, thats why all of our sheik players are ass

 

[Anonistry]

sheik is the same way hint nudge wink, thats why all of our sheik players are ***

I think that was an "OH SNAP"?

 

[Deleted member]

I think that was an "OH SNAP"?

not really, sheik is just really misunderstood because of the melee downthrow. it's like everyone else got the memo that PM is a different game other than sheik and fox players, and the fox players are only that way because they don't have to change how they play. sheik is defensive, reactive, very precise, and requires a lot of MU-pecific knowledge. she's still quite good, but thats a tall order no sheik player has filled yet, including me, but i think i'm closer than everyone else is anyway.

 

[foxygrandpa]

My only problems with version are roy's dtilit still being dumb and ganon's dthrow.
I thought it was pretty understood that dthrow chaingrabs are dumb. I don't understand why he kept his on some characters.

 

[Anonistry]

My only problems with version are roy's dtilit still being dumb and ganon's dthrow.
I thought it was pretty understood that dthrow chaingrabs are dumb. I don't understand why he kept his on some characters.

Shhhhhh, you'll rustle the jimmies of those who want his T-rex arms gone for better dchain.

 

[Wolf_]

I honestly don't see how anyone could argue against this update, I fully support these changes, some characters were far too silly and that needed to be addressed

 

[Eisen]

3.5 doesn't feel so much as a balance patch as it does a "destroy the stupid" patch.
Balance comes later, right now we have to make sure every character has a solid design that has no tools to obtain easy wins.

Holy ****, you worded it so clearly and perfectly I can't not quote this. I might even put it in my signature.

What I'd add to that is that, from my understanding, 3.5 was to eliminate characters whose moves "did the work for them". There are a few characters who still have this problem (Falco still needs a laser limit and Fox needs a little more endlag on upsmash and upB, thanks), but for the most part/from what I've seen, 3.5 accomplishes that goal pretty well.

And while I don't agree with you, OP, I respect what you're trying to say and understand your concerns, and definitely appreciate the non-flaming nature of the thread.

 

[SpiderMad]

Falco doesn't need a laser limit when they generally do 1%, and half the casts got reflectors/absorbers

I'm fine (as you can be) with the top tiers being Melee. They're combo-able and learning how to beat them transfers to and between Melee. And like others mentioned, the PMDT will pry start rebuffing characters; and or might keep throwing pellet nerfs at Fox.

 

[Zujx]

I get where your coming from but, it's really to early to tell.

You also have to remember that is balance is a balance if you know what i mean

When you nerf a mechanic or a number of top tier characters
that also, means changes may or may not have to affect the lower characters as well so they don't just shift to the new top tier

Look at some of the most popular games out these days they aren't perfectly balanced either even even though they have payed staff dedicated to do it. It's a lot harder to balance a game than just what seems most obvious.

 

[Roxas215]

I just want to know what the hell they were thinking changing zss grab. That just makes no damn sense and it cripples her now in certain mus

 

[Hinichii.ez.™]

actually, icies are good now, again.
puff even though she wasent touched it doesnt mean she still sucks, with mostly everyone getting their recovery nerfed gives her a better spot in my opinion, though some offensive touches wouldnt been bad either.

Puff and ic still trash
Do not confuse

 

[Fortress]

Everything needs to be re-examined, since there are so many global changes in 3.5. For example, like you said, Puff was considered among the worst in 3.0, but now that recoveries are generally much worse, Puff has much better match-ups against a ton of characters

This response best-fits anything I had to say. On the surface, it does look as if characters who already struggled only got more taken away from them, but when you step back and really take a look at it, what they had taken away is what the whole cast had taken away; simple, rewarding, powerful recovery options. With the whole cast being easier to kill many of the cast members who struggled in the past are going to see their offensive tools shine. ROB was generally considered to be one of the lower characters, because of his recovery, but his onstage game was always fairly well-rounded and powerful. Now that everybody's easier to kill, I'm sure characters like this are going to see some major improvements.

Not only should we view 3.5 from the perspective of 3.5 and not 3.02, 3.0, etc., we should give it some time to develop before we pass judgement. It's been nearly a year since 3.0, and the game saw some major developments in the roster (for better or for worse) in that time, and the same applies here.

I just want to know what the hell they were thinking changing zss grab. That just makes no damn sense and it cripples her now in certain mus

Not the place to discuss specific characters, but my guess is that it was made that way to make her less punishable on whiff and have her followups generally be more rewarding. The slower side-special, the fact that it doesn't combo to uSpecial anymore, it all fits better in the theme of 3.5; playing against the other player not playing against their character. The benefits of moves like ZSS side-special are still there for the most part, but with things like the added startup you really have to consider the drawbacks before committing to that option. 3.5 plays more like your traditional fighter in where you actually have to think about what you're going to open up your offense with, and play more of a movement-focused game and actually baiting your opponent into a weak position rather than throwing out moves until they hit.

 

[Angell]

I just want to know what the hell they were thinking changing zss grab. That just makes no damn sense and it cripples her now in certain mus

As a ZSS main, I laughed pretty hard reading this.

All I can say is lol no.

Maybe in some mu's but in most other this is a MAJOR buff

 

[DMG]

My only problems with version are roy's dtilit still being dumb and ganon's dthrow.
I thought it was pretty understood that dthrow chaingrabs are dumb. I don't understand why he kept his on some characters.

I prefer Ganon's Dthrow CG to Mario/Link/most regular Uthrow CG's because reacting to DI properly is arguably harder due to the unique angles his throw has. Since he's also kind of slow, I think I'm ok with it. They gave him a knockback increase to make the CG not last as long (this was maybe 2.6 or 3.0? Mario also got this treatment awhile ago, was made even stronger this patch), maybe strengthen that increase a tad further to limit the CG some?

I mean yeah it's lame sometimes, but I wholly prefer Ganon being able to CG MK/Diddy/Lucas/****ing beastly characters til (just guessing maybe 50-60%?), over figuring out how he can deal with them in neutral if he doesn't have insane punishes left. I wouldn't want to give Ganon some "Falcon-speed dash-glide-kick" that also breaks shields just to deal with those characters, or whatever crazy tools you'd have to start giving Ganon to really compete with strong chars like dat.

 

[Roxas215]

As a ZSS main, I laughed pretty hard reading this.

All I can say is lol no.

Maybe in some mu's but in most other this is a MAJOR buff

No it's not. She can shield grab now.. Yes that is a buff. But at the expense of having her paralyzer becoming useless which is the sole purpose of her offensive gameplay? Not a trade i would vote for.

I main zss too. I hate this new version.

 

[Fortress]

No it's not. She can shield grab now.. Yes that is a buff. But at the expense of having her paralyzer becoming useless which is the sole purpose of her offensive gameplay? Not a trade i would vote for.

I main zss too. I hate this new version.

You hate change and having to learn how to adapt. The changes in this version of the game promote leading into your options and reading the other player more than any other version. You can't expect to just throw out a paralyzer blast and get something off of it now. You have to actually know when it's going to be effective and when you should, instead of just defaulting to 'shoot it whenever I have the opportunity'. 3.5 strongly promotes smarter play, and learning how and when to use your new tools is going to be part of that. Paralyzer isn't useless, you're just going to have to actually work to find your chances to take advantage of it.

 

[trash?]

I said this in a post on social, but: unless you're one of the top-tiers, your changes likely didn't come in the name of balance at all. this patch was very explicitly based around the realization that hey, maybe it's for the best that you don't set certain potentials too high, lest you end up in scenarios where recovery is painless and combos/gameplans are more cookie-cutter than not.

this is more balanced than 3.0, but that's mostly a side effect from being less ridiculous overall

 

[DMG]

I still want Captain Falcon to have huge, basically Halloween Costume "Padded" Muscles like Melee.

 

[IronChar]

as someone who loves MK's style of play all around, I remember when PM 2.6 came out and MK was the only character updated- hated it so much compared to brawl MK that I switched it out.

after having and getting used to 3.0 I saw how fun it could be to use PM MK, downstabs and dimension cape tactics added elements and it just became fun to run around with the fast sword moves.

we play cause its fun right?

well, first impressions are a *****, but really I'm totally torn of how 3.5... isn't even fun anymore because all of the characters gotten worse including MK, Its one thing to adapt and work on gameplay... but **** if I were serious about competing now, I' just start over with the easiest character who still have the gimmicks and start sweeping in tornys... but then thats not fun at all its a compromise

waiting for the bug fix version (and some tournament vids on youtube of high level 3.5 play) and how it'll be different. it'll be weird to see the metagame get changed every year or so- we could never do this with melee or brawl in the past.

 

[MechWarriorNY]

Two words for this entire topic, across this site.

Why are people even allowed to make threads like this after a certain amount of obligatory ones?

 

[Roxas215]

You hate change and having to learn how to adapt. The changes in this version of the game promote leading into your options and reading the other player more than any other version. You can't expect to just throw out a paralyzer blast and get something off of it now. You have to actually know when it's going to be effective and when you should, instead of just defaulting to 'shoot it whenever I have the opportunity'. 3.5 strongly promotes smarter play, and learning how and when to use your new tools is going to be part of that. Paralyzer isn't useless, you're just going to have to actually work to find your chances to take advantage of it.

You get nothing off a quick charged blaster. NOTHING. And now you cant cancel out of charged blaster. Who the hell is going to get hit off a charge blaster when u cant move?

Im all for "Adapting" I play sheik as well. Im all for "Smarter play" Neither of these have nothing to do with making a core part of zss moveset now useless. And in exchange to be able to "Make your opponent respect your shield?" Seriously? Zss speed alone allows her to maneuver enough to not be in those situations.

Zss wasn't winning any majors. She was in no ones top 5. What the hell is the reason for this?

Please name me one projectile in this game that is worse then blaster now. I can't think of a single one.

 

[skellitorman]

Please name me one projectile in this game that is worse then blaster now. I can't think of a single one.

Final Cutter

 

[CORY]

it'll be weird to see the metagame get changed every year or so- we could never do this with melee or brawl in the past.

you understand that this is a beta version. we're mass playtesting a beta version of this game. the metagame doesn't need to stabilize over a decade, and once a year shuffling of things isn't terrible, especially since in this case a lot of that shuffling would be due to overall design/system/mechanics changes.

yes, some characters got legit nerfed. hard. they were most likely really really dumb. the many of the changes (nerfs, in this case) are universal to characters that would have a trait like that because said trait is probably really good and needed to be tweaked down.

 

[Fortress]

Please name me one projectile in this game that is worse then blaster now. I can't think of a single one.

Luigi's Fireball, Yoshi's Egg, Samus's uncharged Power Beam, Kirby's Final Cutter, Squirtle's Bubble, Sonic's Spring, and Snake's cigarette.

Think smarter.

On the topic of thinking smarter.

Zss wasn't winning any majors. She was in no ones top 5. What the hell is the reason for this?

Quit looking at ZSS from 3.02's perspective (and other versions, for that matter). They are, for all intents and purposes, obsolete. Think of 3.5's environment. Would a dash-cancellable move with as absurdly high hitstun as Zero Suit's have fit the environment? One of the overarching goals of 3.5 is to tone down 'burst movement' options to really make players think about their options and choices before whipping them out and hoping for some Hail Mary hit.

Rewind to 2013. No, ZSS wasn't placing well in tournaments, because in the environment she was in, nearly everybody outclased her in terms of kill power, and an overly powerful recovery game. She always had amazing combo potential, but the recovery game of (nearly) the entire cast around her lead to an extremely unrewarding experience. Fast forward to 3.5, where the recovery game has been dialed back, more Melee mechanics introduced, and a focus on edgeguarding strengthened. Zero Suit's going to carry just as strong a combo game as before, but she's also strongly going to benefit from the fact that edgeguarding in general is much more rewarding. Her style of play is going to be viable in this build.

You and players thinking like you need to quit looking only as far as "X move on Y character was nerfed to the ground, this character is no longer usable, why would PMDT even do that, such a stupid decision, they clearly have no idea what they're doing", and look at the game as a whole around that character and their style of play. Example: Zero Suit never saw major improvement and advantage in tournament because of her blaster and its properties, so what does that tell you? If you guessed "because the problems reached deeper than ZSS and her toolkit" then you are 100% correct. Taking away this option takes nothing from the character who could not find success to begin with. If anything, the environment around this character only strengthens them. Put on your thinking caps, and quit looking at this game one move at a time, and examine the bigger picture before passing judgement on a development team that clearly has a better idea of what they're doing than you and players like you do.

 

[Roxas215]

Luigi's Fireball, Yoshi's Egg, Samus's uncharged Power Beam, Kirby's Final Cutter, Squirtle's Bubble, Sonic's Spring, and Snake's cigarette.

Think smarter.

On the topic of thinking smarter.



Quit looking at ZSS from 3.02's perspective (and other versions, for that matter). They are, for all intents and purposes, obsolete. Think of 3.5's environment. Would a dash-cancellable move with as absurdly high hitstun as Zero Suit's have fit the environment? One of the overarching goals of 3.5 is to tone down 'burst movement' options to really make players think about their options and choices before whipping them out and hoping for some Hail Mary hit.

Rewind to 2013. No, ZSS wasn't placing well in tournaments, because in the environment she was in, everybody outclased her in terms of kill power. She always had amazing combo potential, but the recovery game of (nearly) the entire cast around her lead to an extremely unrewarding experience. Fast forward to 3.5, where the recovery game has been dialed back, more Melee mechanics introduced, and a focus on edgeguarding strengthened. Zero Suit's going to carry just as strong a combo game as before, but she's also strongly going to benefit from the fact that edgeguarding in general is much more rewarding. Her style of play is going to be viable in this build.

Only one you listed with any merit was Luigi's(Which i admit i overlooked. Zss blaster is better then luigi's fireball). Clearly i was talking about "b" move blasters. How the hell did final cutter. Bubble and sonic's spring get into this? Smh. And yoshi's eggs are really good. Wth??

I agree with what u said in the 2nd paragraph. Zss always had amazing combo game. But she couldn't kill reliably. All of her grabs could be di to not get hit by her bair. And they still can. Nothing changed with that. Being able to mixup with blaster allowed better kill options.

There are plenty of characters in this game who has just as good if not better combo game then zss ON TOP of having easier ways to kill then zss.


Now granted this is probably 2 soon for all this. Im def going to keep playing zss. Im just really upset at the changes and the session i had today i was losing mu's i was winning in 3.02.

 

[Fortress]

Only one you listed with any merit was Luigi's(Which i admit i overlooked. Zss blaster is better then luigi's fireball). Clearly i was talking about "b" move blasters.

Clearly you were talking about any projectile, since that's what you said you were talking about when you said "name one projectile worse than paralyzer".

How the hell did final cutter. Bubble and sonic's spring get into this? Smh. And yoshi's eggs are really good. Wth??

You never specified in what context you meant 'good projectile'. Good for killing? Setting up combos? Ending a combo? Approaching with? Cleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeearly I was just pointing out how arguments you have are held together by some spitballs and twine. On top of that, how often do you use Spring and the Final Cutter beam as actual attacks on their own? How often do you see that?

I agree with what u said in the 2nd paragraph. Zss always had amazing combo game. But she couldn't kill reliably. All of her grabs could be di to not get hit by her bair. And they still can. Nothing changed with that. Being able to mixup with blaster allowed better kill options.

You know what good players do when their options get changed? They deal. Lab up. Get gud. They don't whine and complain about how they no longer have X option since it's not important in the slightest. This is now, 3.02 is old news. Find what works now, quit whining about what you used to be able to do. All that matters in tournament now is what's possible in the current version. Nobody who's going to win any 3.5 tournaments are going to do so by whining about and wishing they had their old options back. Learn to deal.

There are plenty of characters in this game who has just as good if not better combo game then zss ON TOP of having easier ways to kill then zss.

I never said ZSS had the best combo game, or the most airtight, or the most kill options. You don't need to bring up that there are other characters that do, since it's obvious that ZSS isn't at the top of her character class. You're missing the point, which is that characters like ZSS that struggled before will find success now since edgeguarding hard will be more rewarding for characters like ZSS who lack straight up kill power.

Now granted this is probably 2 soon for all this. Im def going to keep playing zss. Im just really upset at the changes and the session i had today i was losing mu's i was winning in 3.02.

Frankly, you're losing matches that you were winning in 3.02 because you're playing them like they're in 3.02. Learn to deal.

Please keep trying to argue with me that the recovery nerfs across the board are not going to help Zero Suit, because you're clearly made of the right cut to do this.

 

[Bazzeltroff]

Honestly, I am just mainly disappointed by the LACK of mewtwo nerfs. I still deem him op, by keeping many things I thought were OP in. Still has the best powershield, Nair is still eextremely overpowered, forward air still comes out extremely fast and STILL breaks comboes. Mewtwo CAN STILL GRAB FROM BEHIND HIM. Still has 2 kill throws that didn't get nerfed. Tail attacks can still be spammed. I could care less about the hover out of teleport. Keep that, but reduce those things slightly and I believe he wouldn't be OP anymore. What really sucks is my character, Diddy Kong, got completely nerfed to the ground. So now I stand no chance against the still OP Mewtwo... Sigh... I'm probably just bad. I just needed to rant. Maybe there's something I'm doing wrong?

P.S. THEY EVEN NERFED DIDDYS UP THROW!

 

[LunarWingCloud]

After playing it for a while, even at first really disliking the nerfs to my favorite characters, I have but one request: nerf spacie recovery. I don't think that Fox, such a solid character to begin with, can ledge-snap with his side-B, while a character such as Pika, who already had his QAC nerfed and made much more difficult to use, cannot ledge-snap with Side-B.

Otherwise I don't mind the changes as much as I initially did, now that I've toyed round with it a bit.

 

[Bleck]

Would a dash-cancellable move with as absurdly high hitstun as Zero Suit's have fit the environment? One of the overarching goals of 3.5 is to tone down 'burst movement' options to really make players think about their options and choices before whipping them out and hoping for some Hail Mary hit.

unless you're Fox, apparently

 

[Fortress]

unless you're Fox, apparently

Quiet, you.

 

[Bleck]

I should specify that I do basically agree with everything Fortress is saying, though.

 

[MechWarriorNY]

So, what's the debate now, then?
Or is this just a convenient thread for whiny scrubs to vent their wangst in, with the legitimate stuff addressed?

 

[jtm94]

I disagree with everything I previously thought.

This version is really good go play it. Characters that people think are bad are still dumb, just not still broken. Sonic, Olimar, Kirby, Link, Yoshi Olimar, Diddy, Mewtwo all still have amazing hit confirm true-combos you just have to be creative now instead of going for the same old dumb stuff.

 

[Chosenl]

I find the nerfs in this update to be completely fair. The characters considered to be OP because of gimmicks and such are still really amazing. There weren't a lot of buffs, but I don't think that's needed because the global nerf is taking care of "low-tier" characters by nerfing great characters. Sure, there's a lot of people wondering "why did ____ get nerfed when they're bad already?!" People need to stop trying to play 3.0 on 3.5 relearn their characters and match ups. It's too early to complain about anything.

 

[Bleck]

Characters that people think are bad are still dumb, just not still broken.

what if I think Bowser is bad