Tier List Speculation

[DMG]

Running shield or spotdodge might help with that. I don't remember how much momentum carries over with Sonic when he does it though. Also dash -->shield is way good if you want to stop on a dime

 

[Frost | Odds]

Running shield is amazing in theory, but sonic's grab range is so tiny that in practice he can't actually punish very effectively OoS -- you gotta WD in and grab or fair OoS or something; and those options are so slow that they're hardly punishes at all. His Usmash is probably his worst move too, which is probably the bigger reason that (unlike fox), this strategy isn't actually that great in practice.

Like I said, I'll keep playing -- just pessimistic atm. There's a serious problem if I'm totally convinced that Bowser is a better character than anyone.

 

[mimgrim]

Running shield is amazing in theory, but sonic's grab range is so tiny that in practice he can't actually punish very effectively OoS -- you gotta WD in and grab or fair OoS or something; and those options are so slow that they're hardly punishes at all. His Usmash is probably his worst move too, which is probably the bigger reason that (unlike fox), this strategy isn't actually that great in practice.

JC Grab more with Sonic.

 

[didds]

a guy I know plays sonic and beats me so I'm pretty sure he's still good. you probably just don't spin enough.

 

[PlateProp]

It's fixed x.x. We just need to release the bug patch. You have no idea how badly I want that patch released lmao.

Give bugfix patch already so I can actually learn ICs then

 

[Chesstiger2612]

Running shield is amazing in theory, but sonic's grab range is so tiny that in practice he can't actually punish very effectively OoS -- you gotta WD in and grab or fair OoS or something; and those options are so slow that they're hardly punishes at all. His Usmash is probably his worst move too, which is probably the bigger reason that (unlike fox), this strategy isn't actually that great in practice.

Like I said, I'll keep playing -- just pessimistic atm. There's a serious problem if I'm totally convinced that Bowser is a better character than anyone.

Did you know you can try WD OoS->DACG (Sonic is the only character able to do that except for G&W iirc). Dash attack comes out faster so you can punish any attempt to escape from shield and the grab follows immediately after. Still has some weaknesses but it is a nice option.

 

[Frost | Odds]

@ Chesstiger2612 That's pretty cool. I'd ask about gatling combo, but it probably doesn't work due to how slow that usmash is >.>

 

[Chesstiger2612]

@ Frost | Odds
G&W and Sonic can also Gatling Combo, but Sonic's combo isn't really a combo (against bad DI it can be).
I'm still sad that Falco, Jiggs, Wario and Ivy don't have the GatC anymore.

 

[steelguttey]

IT'S

NO

USE

ITS NO FF****ING USE AHAHAHAA

ARIN WINS

anyway

yea sonic is dumb and will never be in between **** and ridiculously op. his moveset is just so volatile and dumb.

 

[DMG]

They took out Gatling for those characters, or do you just mean it's hard to land them anymore? Cause I did Wario Gatling on M2K's shield last time I remembered

 

[Chesstiger2612]

They took out Gatling for those characters, or do you just mean it's hard to land them anymore? Cause I did Wario Gatling on M2K's shield last time I remembered

Are you sure that was in 3.5? Either it is removed, or my game is bugged, or I can't land one out of 20 tries which would be weird because I get almost everyone with G&W and Sonic.

 

[DMG]

Are you sure that was in 3.5? Either it is removed, or my game is bugged, or I can't land one out of 20 tries which would be weird because I get almost everyone with G&W and Sonic.

Was 3.02 now that I checked. THE PLOT THICKENS!!!

@ Strong Badam @Magus you are the wizards

 

[steelguttey]

im nearly positive senor game and watch still has a gatling combo

speaking of gw he probably has the dumbest punish game rn

"youve been smacking me around all game but if i get one grab or oos up-b oh boy youre gonna have some fun"

fast fallers vs gnw is the silliest thing

 

[Soft Serve]

im nearly positive senor game and watch still has a gatling combo

speaking of gw he probably has the dumbest punish game rn

"youve been smacking me around all game but if i get one grab or oos up-b oh boy youre gonna have some fun"

fast fallers vs gnw is the silliest thing

Yes, I landed a dtilt, they are right above my head now in a second of hitstun.
yes, I landed a dtilt. ****, I hit the sour spot, oh wait wolf is off stage and I can just dtilt again when he recovers

Gnw is the hypest. Shouldn't have a frame 1 up hitbox though, make it frame 2 or 3

 

[Strong Badam]

Was 3.02 now that I checked. THE PLOT THICKENS!!!

@ Strong Badam @Magus you are the wizards

you can def gatling with g&w, haven't checked with sonic in 3.5

Magus's Smashboards is Magus420.

 

[DMG]

He means non G&W or sonic chars. He gets it with them already, but not the others like captain flaco or wartio

 

[Frost | Odds]

hmmm, frame perfect blast attack OoS is frame 8, hits at jab distance frame 10. anyone further, you're looking at 11 or 12. Marginally faster than fair oos, which hits frame 13-15, depending on how tall your opponent is, but not nearly as long range and probably doesn't have as solid followups.

Will experiment with this more.

It also has 2 frame perfect timings required (after the jump and canceling HA into BA), which, like pimpin', ain't easy.

 

[Badge]

I believe DACUS timing got shifted to be one frame earlier from frame 3&4 (for Lucas/5 frame jumpers) to 2&3. This makes it impossible to gatling combo with characters whose DA hits after frame 3 and thus characters like Ivy and Wario, whose DA hits on frame 4, now can't gatling combo anymore.

Testing in Debug Mode didn't work for me, because it seems to not recognize different attack inputs on consecutive frames as different (it seemed like a 1 frame timing), but the above is definitely the case in Dolphin frame advance.

 

[Chesstiger2612]

im nearly positive senor game and watch still has a gatling combo

@ Frost | Odds
G&W [...] can also Gatling Combo

Sometimes I feel like no one reads my posts (no offense)...
But it probably happens to everyone once in a while that they repeat or their post gets repeated.

 

[DMG]

Sad Panda Face

 

[Hylian]

I thought the pivot glitch was really cool
You can pivot ftilt as a spacing option and it looks swag

It's not a pivot glitch, it happens every time they turn around. It's also not cool.

One of the most important tools for an IC player is WD -> jab grab and WD -> jab dsmash. You cannot WD -> turn around jab which prevents both of these options in many situations :/. The glitch also causes nana to just die sometimes because you tried to turn around to get away from the ledge.

 

[Ningildo]

It's not a pivot glitch, it happens every time they turn around. It's also not cool.

You know what else ain't cool? Your Up-B falling apart.

I really hope that Ice Climbers aren't the only ones getting bug fixes...

 

[Hinichii.ez.™]

You know what else ain't cool? Your Up-B falling apart.

I really hope that Ice Climbers aren't the only ones getting bug fixes...

They aren't.

 

[PJB]

So this is my first attempt at a tier list. Im very new to the scene but wanted to give making my own list a shot. My list is fairly heavily weighted by my views on each characters neutral games. I believe this is the most important factor in determining a character's overall strength vs. the most balanced cast in a smash game. However, neutral is of course not the only factor i considered when ranking each character. I think all characters except those in low tier are tournament viable. Appreciate any and all advice.

Top Tier:

High Tier:

Mid High Tier:

Mid Tier:

Mid Low Tier

Low Tier:

 

[JayTheUnseen]

So this is my first attempt at a tier list. Im very new to the scene but wanted to give making my own list a shot. My list is fairly heavily weighted by my views on each characters neutral games. I believe this is the most important factor in determining a character's overall strength vs. the most balanced cast in a smash game. However, neutral is of course not the only factor i considered when ranking each character. I think all characters except those in low tier are tournament viable. Appreciate any and all advice.

Top Tier:

High Tier:

Mid High Tier:

Mid Tier:

Mid Low Tier

Low Tier:

Uh-oh,@DrinkingFood

 

[jtm94]

Last I tried with Falco and he still has gatling combo, but I may be thinking I did it in 3.5, but may have actually been 3.02.

Boostgrab with GnW is amazing.

Gatling combo really isn't that true, you can DI his dash attack pretty far and is only really true for maybe DK and Bowser? Sonic's isn't too bad, but why use gatling grab when he can JC grab with SideB? Or just jump? Or attack? Or just roll through shield?

Why are people so bad at SDIing or even DIing GnW throws and uairs?? I've had so many people tell me my stuff is free and I inform them that SDI and holding a direction instead of rolling your face across the controller will get you out of it, but I like free combos. Even on fastfallers upthrow DId hard left and then uair DId hard left leaves you pretty far away unless you preemptively guessed they were going to DI that way.

It's also hard to follow upthrow with UpB directly because hard DI means you have to get a max horizontal UpB sometimes and that's only consistently possible by using the c-stick to input the direction after you input UpB.

I wish I could combo ROB and Luigi, it makes me sad. Actually Sonic gives me a lot of problems too, but he's soooooo bad right, I'm probably just no good.

 

[Deleted member]

Top Tier:

High Tier:

Mid High Tier:

Mid Tier:

Mid Low Tier

Low Tier:

This actually isn't a bad list, I like this a little bit more than some of the other things I see on here

Move zelda up to mid high tier
Move zss to high tier
Move yoshi to high tier
Move lucario to top tier
Move marth to high tier or mid high tier
Move mewtwo to high tier or mid high tier

Why are people so bad at SDIing or even DIing GnW throws and uairs??

^^ Agree. Once I started DI'ing dakpos U air really hard to a direction that he can't commit to, I take like 50 less %.

 

[PJB]

Thanks for the input. Some explanations for the character changes you mentioned:
-Zelda is the character I know the least about, I could easily see her being better than I said
-zss I'm torn on, kind of think she's a weaker falcon but I could be off base there.
-yoshi is very good, I strongly considered putting him and g&w in high tier
-marth/mewtwo in my opinion are still very strong overall, and I think they have the ability to win against any character. This was my criteria for a character making top tier

 

[Deleted member]

Thanks for the input. Some explanations for the character changes you mentioned:
-Zelda is the character I know the least about, I could easily see her being better than I said
-zss I'm torn on, kind of think she's a weaker falcon but I could be off base there.
-yoshi is very good, I strongly considered putting him and g&w in high tier
-marth/mewtwo in my opinion are still very strong overall, and I think they have the ability to win against any character. This was my criteria for a character making top tier

Marths marth syndrome is significantly more relevant in PM, and his overall conversions out of non grab moves are worse than roy since roy can press the d tilt button.

Mewtwos neutral game isn't nearly as commanding in 3.5, making him not top tier. He's now a giant floaty sack of hurtbox, so you can hit him and not have to worry about teleport hover nair. His tail is even shorter! Hooray!

 

[PootisKonga]

Why is Bowser so low

 

[PJB]

Fair points, marth syndrome is a big issue with more characters than spacies/puff/peach/sheik. And yeah most people dont agree with me on mewtwo lol I just think that character still has tremendous potential.

As for bowser, I think that while he definitely improved a lot, he's still bottom tier. Like, in a matchup of two players with even skill, how can bowser possibly beat a sheik or falcon? (Among others)

 

[Deleted member]

Why is Bowser so low

Bowsers neutral game sucks, and if you press the purple button that says "Z", you win.

 

[TreK]

I just found out you could have a "newer than XX/XX/XXXX" search feature in the Smashboards ranking
It always pissed me off that 3.0 results were mixed with 3.5 results, I couldn't take away anything from it.
It's only in the character ranking so far, so we can't really have a proper power ranking, but maybe we can figure out a proper tier list at least.

I felt like sharing it here because, well, I figured I wasn't the only one who didn't know about it.

So yeah here's a bit of fun trivia now that I can compute the stats again. Remember, those are stats, based on real events where **** happens. It's not reliable in the slightest but it's interesting to look at nonetheless :
-Fox has twice the amount of tourney wins as any other character in 3.5, despite only being 8% more popular than Ganondorf, the second most popular character.
-Except for Jiggs (and do you count ICs ?), the top Melee characters are all top10 in PM at the moment in terms of tourney wins.
-ZSS is 7th in terms of tourney wins. I swear it's not Europe's fault.

Here are the top five win rates : the amount of tourney wins divided by the amount of top 16s.
-Peach : 25%
-ZSS : 23%
-Fox : 21%
-Ike : 20%
-Toon Link : 18%
Note : TL is a lot less popular than those other characters. Basically if you're not Lunchables you're probably not contributing much to TL's win rate lmao.

And here are the win rates among the ten most popular characters in 3.5 so far :
-Fox : 21%
-Ganondorf : 12%
-CF : 11%
-Marth : 8%
-Sheik : 13%
-Roy : 5%
-Mario : 11%
-Falco : 12%
-Ike : 20%
I'm surprised at Roy. I thought he'd be a better bet than that.

 

[Deleted member]

-Toon Link : 18%
Note : TL is a lot less popular than those other characters. Basically if you're not Lunchables you're probably not contributing much to TL's win rate lmao.

-Roy : 5%

Wow, I'm flattered that I'm basically carrying toon link into being a top character

also srs? I would think sethlon (and partially me) make roy a LITTLE bit better than this.

 

[PMS | LEVEL 100 MAGIKARP]

Like I think the wins/top 16 statistic kinda skews roys results a bit, given that he is really popular, a lot of kinda above average players use Roy (players who might legitimately have no chance of winning) but then lose to roy's many weaknesses

whereas all the ganon players never make top 16 lmao

 

[Hylian]

Wow, I'm flattered that I'm basically carrying toon link into being a top character

also srs? I would think sethlon (and partially me) make roy a LITTLE bit better than this.

You should play ZSS more to show that she isn't garbage >_>. Believe in the ZSS that believes in you!

 

[JOE!]

Can we talk about that ike rating lol. 1% less than Fox.


Also, what's with everyone putting zard really low?

 

[steelguttey]

Mid Low Tier:

are you fking kidding me

 

[_A1]

Just saying, the 1st minute of that commentary is pretty much why PM exists

I don't get it. To me it just sounds like Scar and Mango are saying/implying that Samus is a slow, lame, boring, hype-killing character.

 

[JOE!]

I don't get it. To me it just sounds like Scar and Mango are saying/implying that Samus is a slow, lame, boring, hype-killing character.

Pretty much by saying "He's seen what melee has to offer with Falco and Sheik", they pretty much sweep Samus under the rug as if she shouldn't even be considered as a melee character. Many of us here preferred characters that unfortunately just could not compete in the long run in melee, thus why projects like this exist.