MELIA
Leader of the High Entia, master of ether. Melia's playstyle revolves entirely around her elemental system, in which she can summon elementals to give herself buffs and discharge them to inflict damage and debuffs.
Melia is a fragile character without her elementals, so proper management is crucial to playing Melia well.
Attributes
Jumps: normal amount (one midair jump)
Walking speed: slow (on par with Zelda)
Running speed: slow (on par with Link)
Jump height: lacking (on par with Robin)
Air speed: mediocre (on par with Ness)
Fall/fast fall speed: screw this gonna make it exactly Shulk's
Weight: semi-light (on par with Palutena)
Specials
Neutral Special: Summon Elemental - this is Melia's signature move and basically makes her as a character. There are eight summons: Wind, Ice, Flare, Earth, Aqua, Bolt, Copy, and Reflect.
Pressing B once will bring up four elementals around Melia, pressing a direction will choose one.
Pressing B a second time will bring up the other four elementals, again, pressing a direction will choose one of them.
Pressing B a third time will get rid of these and allow Melia to move again.
illustration:
So for example if I press B then Up I summon Wind elemental
if I press B-B-Forward I summon Earth elemental
etc.
Melia will not be able to move, but pressing shield will also cancel summon selection.
Upon summon, Melia will say "Summon ___" and make a pose that can be canceled into other things similarly to Shulk's Monado Arts. Additionally, a colored orb will appear around Melia's head to indicate the summons she currently has equipped.
You can have 3 summons at a time. First summon will appear above Melia, second summon in front, third summon behind.
Summons have a cooldown before they can be summoned again. Copy will summon the last elemental you summoned regardless of cooldown, but Copy also has a cooldown.
Each summon has special effects but I'll go over those later.
Side Special: Spear Break - Melia pokes forward with her staff, pressing B again will cause her to do a dropkick. The dropkick knocks opponents away from her at a very low angle, potentially causing tripping. Moderately high endlag on the dropkick and very punishable on whiff, but successful connect puts Melia in an advantageous position.
First hit: Spear poke. 4%, high hitstun but low knockback, moderate shield damage.
Second hit: dropkick. 7%, semi-spike angle OR trip.
Up Special: Burst End - Melia raises her staff in the air and releases a yellow ether field around her that lifts her up slightly. Does not put Melia into helpless mode. On the ground, Melia does not rise. slowish startup
Initial hit: 6%
subsequent hits: 2%. trapping though
Down Special: Elemental Discharge - Melia discharges her most recently summoned elemental.
Each summon has a special effect that I'll go over later.
Normals
Neutral A: Melia swings forward with her staff twice, then does a quick stab. Pretty standard
First hit: 3%
second hit: 4%
last hit: 4%
Ftilt: Melia does a swipe with her staff. slightly disjointed
11%
Utilt: Melia does an overhead sweep with her staff. slightly disjointed. Hitboxes both in front and behind, may not catch low crouches (Kirby, WFT, Jigglypuff, G&W, etc)
8%
Dtilt: Melia does a quick poke with her staff on the ground. slightly disjointed.
6%
Dash attack: Starlight Kick - Melia does a dropkick similarly to her Side-B, however it knocks opponents up and has less lag
8%
Smashes
Fsmash: Melia stabs forward with her staff, any summoned elementals swirl around the tip to do extra damage.
15% (staff hit)
lingering elemental damages afterwards (discussed below)
Usmash: Melia raises her staff upward, summoned elementals pop up briefly.
13% (staff hit), very low knockback but decent hitstun
elemental pop up beyond the staff afterwards, discussed below
Dsmash: Melia bombards her feet with three blasts of ether. Similar to Lucas's. Elementals affect damage.
first hit: 5% base, varies based on third elemental.
second hit: 6% base, varies based on second elemental.
third hit: 10% base, varies based on first elemental.
Aerials
Nair: Melia swings her staff in front and behind her. similar to Toon Link
front hit: 6%
back hit: 6%
landing lag: 14 frames
Fair: Melia does a large swipe in front of her with the staff. similar to Robin's
11%
landing lag: 23 frames
Bair: Melia swings her staff behind her and summons ether from the tip of it. Multihit
3%, 1%, 1%, 1%, 5% (last hit launches)
landing lag: 21 frames
Dair: Melia swings her staff downwards. Basically Palutena's
9%
landing lag: 24 frames
Uair: Melia extends her staff upwards, any summoned elementals swirl around the tip of it.
3% on staff hit, little knockback
elemental damages: discussed below
landing lag: 13 frames
Grabs & Throws
Grab: fairly fast. Melia reaches out with her hand and grabs the opponent.
Pummel: slow pummel, she drives the staff into the enemy. summoned elementals each do damage as well
1%
Fthrow: Melia bats the opponent away with her staff.
6%
Bthrow: Melia tosses the opponent backwards, similarly to Marth's
5%
Uthrow: Melia tosses the opponent upwards and sends three ether orbs after them (think Falco's or Fox's)
initial throw 5%
Ether orb 1: 1%, depends on first elemental
Ether orb 2: 1%, depends on second elemental
Ether orb 3: 2%, depends on third elemental.
Dthrow: Melia slams the opponent to the ground and unleashes ether on them. dependent on summoned elementals
base damage: 5%
Elemental Effects
Each elemental has several effects in moves and on Melia. Each elemental also has a way they act when used in Melia's smashes, Uair, uthrow, and dthrow
Wind: increases Melia's speed. puts her on par with Charizard's run speed and adjusts air speed and walk speed similarly
General attributes: a weak elemental, but fast and has slight windboxes
Discharge: she sends it down, making a weak explosion at her feet with 1-2% but propels her upwards. Includes slight windbox on sides and bottom and large windbox above.
Fsmash: 1% damage
Usmash: 2% damage
Dsmash: 4%/4%/7% damage
Uair: 3% damage
Pummel: +0.5%
Uthrow: 0.5%/1%/1%
Dthrow: +1%
Flare: increases the strength of Melia's ground attacks (not including grab/throw), with a 10% multiplier
General attributes: medium speed with good damage and high launching power
Discharge: medium speed projectile with explosion. 11% damage and good launching power
(note: these percentages do not reflect the strength increase)
Fsmash: 3% damage
Usmash: 4% damage
Dsmash: 7%/7%/12%
Uair: 6% damage
Pummel: +2%
Uthrow: 2%/2.5%/3%
Dthrow: +3%
Bolt: increases the strength of Melia's aerials and her throws with a 10% multiplier
General attributes: fast, good damage and moderate kill power
Discharge: fast projectile, approximately the speed of Robin's Thunder. does 9% on impact
(note: these percentages do not reflect the strength increase)
Fsmash: 3% damage
Usmash: 4.5% damage
Dsmash: 6.5%/7%/12%
Uair: 5% damage
Pummel: +2%
Uthrow: 2%/2%/3%
Dthrow: +3%
Aqua: Melia heals 1% every 2 seconds.
General attributes: slow, weak, lacks kill power but heals Melia
Discharge: pretty slow projectile (speed of Lloid Rocket) that has high-ish hitstun. 4%, heals Melia for 3%
Fsmash: 1% damage, heals Melia by 1%
Usmash: 1% damage, heals Melia by 1%
Dsmash: 3%/4%/6% damage, heals Melia by 2%/2%/4%
Uair: 2%, heals Melia for 1%
Pummel: +0.5%, heals Melia for 1%
Uthrow: 0.5%/1%/1%, heals Melia for 0%/1%/1%
Dthrow: +0.5%, heals Melia for 2%
Earth: Melia is heavier (on par with Lucario)
General attributes: slow, lacking kill power, but does lots of damage
Discharge: slow projectile that does 13%
Fsmash: 4%
Usmash: 5%
Dsmash: 7%/8%/13%
Uair: 7%
Pummel: +3%
Uthrow: 3%/3%/4%
Dthrow: +3.5%
Ice: Melia takes less damage by 10% (this makes her artificially heavier)
General attributes: medium speed, average damage, freezes on impact (similarly to Judge 8)
Discharge: medium speed projectile, does 7%. Freezes for a somewhat short amount of time
Fsmash: 2%
Usmash: 2%
Dsmash: 5%/6%/9%
Uair: 4%
Pummel: +1%
Uthrow: 1%/1.5%/2%
Dthrow: +2.5%
Copy: copies the previous elemental.
Reflect: basically Reflection. Melia has a reflect status on her (similarly to a Franklin badge) that cause projectiles to be reflected at a 45 degree angle with 1.2x multiplier
General attributes: average in everything, but turns opponents around instead of dealing knockback and reflects projectiles (1.0x multiplier in attacks)
Discharge: medium slow, large projectile that reflects other projectiles with 1.4x multiplier directly back. deals 6% damage and has a Cape effect. reflecting a projectile will not make it disappear
Fsmash: 2.5%
Usmash: 2%
Dsmash: 5%/5%/9%
Uair: 3.5%
Pummel: +1%
Uthrow: 1%/2%/2%
Dthrow: +2.5%
Interesting things
Melia's pummel can do 10% damage with 3 Earth elementals, or 7.7% with 2 Earth and 1 Bolt...
Similarly Melia's Dsmash can do 28% with 3 Earth elementals, or 30.8%/29.7% with 2 Earth and 1 Flare...
balanced out of course by lackluster attributes