Official 4BR Tier List v1.0 - Competitive Impressions

[TheGoodGuava]

This is wrong. Any mistake means she eats an utilt lock. She cannot down b out. She will bat within and Ryu can just keep going. Divekick abuse is dangerous as Ryu has Shoryuken.

Bair and d-tilt? Ryu can clock her in the jaw for that. Hard jab, light f-tilt which is intangible at his foot, and hard utilt which has upper body invincibility all crap on her bair. D-tilt gets outpoked by Ryu's d-smash and his own hard dtilt.

She does win the match. She is a force to be reckoned with. But Bayo trying to just space moves against Ryu does not work. She beats him through sheer risk vs reward and the consistency of her reward. Blow for blow they will just go back and forth.

Still Ryu has all the tools to win the footsie game.

I mean a Ryu that actually has a REAL ground game which most of you have never seen and never will see.

There, from a probably a much better Ryu player than me

I would still argue that a skillcapped Ryu wins vs a skillcapped Bayo but that's a whole different level of play

 

[~ Gheb ~]

Recently there's been a substantial improvement in Marth's results that has gone somewhat unnoticed. He doesn't have one specific top level player capable of hitting the big time but between Pugwest, False, Mr E and Fuwa the amount of semi-impressive results has increased over the last few weeks.

The readjustment of the tipper hitbox of fair is a big deal, I think. It feel a lot easier to land sweetspot hits with it now. That gives Marth an ability that he severely lacked up until now: getting "random" kills out of "random" situations with a move that can be used in neutral and doesn't require any elaborate setups to be effective. Especially when rage becomes part of the equation that move can be really dangerous to get hit by, something that wasn't really the case before the patch where it was kind of inconsequential. It's also a buff that Lucina didn't receive so the gap between these two characters must've increased.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Took awhile but Marth is now what he is supposed to be.

An emperor (c wut i did thar?!) of footsies/neutral.

Extremely oppressive buttons combined with good mobility which gives him dominant space control. His reward is moderate, but his risk is just...so damn low. Great whiff punish game with Dancing Blade. Dolphin Slash gives him a fast punish out of blocking if someone spaces something poorly on his shield.

He can now play his air to ground trap game much better with more consistent results. And his edgeguarding is solid and scary.

A complete character with defined pros and cons, whom excels at the fundamentals of the game.

 

[Ghostbone]

This is wrong. Any mistake means she eats an utilt lock. She cannot down b out. She will bat within and Ryu can just keep going. Divekick abuse is dangerous as Ryu has Shoryuken.

U-tilt lock isn't real because SDI

She's not divekicking into Ryu, she's divekicking to the ground to reset the situation whenever she wants.

Bair and d-tilt? Ryu can clock her in the jaw for that. Hard jab, light f-tilt which is intangible at his foot, and hard utilt which has upper body invincibility all crap on her bair. D-tilt gets outpoked by Ryu's d-smash and his own hard dtilt.

All of those options are punishable (much more so than bayo's are punishable) and baited out by empty hop mixups or waiting.
Ryu's ONLY option is to whiff punish bayo. Bayo can both poke and whiff punish Ryu with higher reward. His neutral is garbage in comparison to hers.

She does win the match. She is a force to be reckoned with. But Bayo trying to just space moves against Ryu does not work. She beats him through sheer risk vs reward and the consistency of her reward. Blow for blow they will just go back and forth.

This statement doesn't make sense, blow for blow bayo wins because her reward is higher. She both outspaces Ryu, and gets higher reward from her tools than he does. There really aren't any redeeming factors for Ryu as even if he gets close she witch twists out, and if you shield she'll divekick and reset the situation.

Still Ryu has all the tools to win the footsie game.

I mean a Ryu that actually has a REAL ground game which most of you have never seen and never will see.

Sounds like magical theory land Ryu that doesn't actually exist tbh.

 

[Smog Frog]

special thing to note about v:

focus attack armor is f1. he can focus attack on any witch twist followup and get his own combo.

 

[FullMoon]

I was actually wondering about Marth myself since I did notice that he does seem to be doing pretty damn well lately.

He really came a long way since the release of the game.

 

[Amadeus9]

special thing to note about v:

focus attack armor is f1. he can focus attack on any witch twist followup and get his own combo.

Aka he can get read for using it and still get hit

 

[Emblem Lord]

U-tilt lock isn't real because SDI

She's not divekicking into Ryu, she's divekicking to the ground to reset the situation whenever she wants.

All of those options are punishable (much more so than bayo's are punishable) and baited out by empty hop mixups or waiting.
Ryu's ONLY option is to whiff punish bayo. Bayo can both poke and whiff punish Ryu with higher reward. His neutral is garbage in comparison to hers.

This statement doesn't make sense, blow for blow bayo wins because her reward is higher. She both outspaces Ryu, and gets higher reward from her tools than he does. There really aren't any redeeming factors for Ryu as even if he gets close she witch twists out, and if you shield she'll divekick and reset the situation.

Sounds like magical theory land Ryu that doesn't actually exist tbh.

Nah. Just a player that recognizes the value of being grounded and isnt seduced by Ryus potential for huge damage. I mean..how many Ryus have you actually SEEN play grounded footsies consistently an entire match?

Exactly.

Ryu can follow her SDI. Just like how Bayo can follow her opponents DI in her own combos.

As far as footsies go, well thats what you call yomi. This beats that but loses to this, but that is unsafe block while having huge reward but this...and so and so forth.

As long as the two chars being matched up have options that let them counter play, then their neutral exchanges will remain dynamic and they can go back and forth.

Its when one char has a dominant option(s) that the other CANNOT fight such as Brawl Marth fair vs uhhhh half the brawl cast, that you have one sided footsie/neutral interactions where there is little to no counter play and you can make a concrete statement that the lacking character DEFINITELY loses neutral.

Ex/ Ryus SH cross up fair can lead to footstool 0 to death combos and is a counter option to Bayo dtilt as well as being very safe on block. Counter play to that is Witch Time or her disjointed utilt. Both can lead to combos. Counterplay to both of those is empty SHFF and lead into dtilt combos or utilt combos.

And so and so on.

 

[Ninety]

9th: Rizeasu , ,

A man after my own heart. Remember when the Japanese thought all FEs were **** tier? Which ended up getting us buff after buff, so I ain't complaining.

I still can't fathom who among the dev team thought Ike's sword wasn't big enough yet.

 

[Xandercosm]

A man after my own heart. Remember when the Japanese thought all FEs were **** tier? Which ended up getting us buff after buff, so I ain't complaining.

I still can't fathom who among the dev team thought Ike's sword wasn't big enough yet.

I dunno about you, but from my experience, the FEs really were **** tier before the buffs.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Does the lack of whiff punishing (not exactly nonexistent, but much less emphasized) contribute to a more free-form game? Been thinking about this when I read Emblem Lord 's posts and watched some fighting games.

I wished we had a thread to discuss how game mechanics affect a game's appearance and feel at the high level and w/e.

 

[FullMoon]

Robin was probably the best FE character on release which should say something about how they were doing.

Granted, I always thought Robin was a pretty solid character but even he needed some buffs.

 

[Goodstyle_4]

Nasubi and Reflex are basically the entirety of the Wario-meta right now. Glad Sheik got mega-nerfed because Nasubi almost dropped Wario for her.

 

[Fatmanonice]

Holy salt! Man, the comments for this week's Smash Conference have been vicious.

I admit, it was kind of painful to watch when so much of it was the same combo over and over again. It's like I mentioned the other day about mid levels players taking down top level players with Bayo and top level players not wanting to touch her with a 20 foot pole because of how hilariously skewed things would become if more jump on the Bayo bandwagon. Also, watching the videos of this tournament, I didn't realize that Witch Twist could kill you off the side if you DI'd too much. Talk about a Catch 22. With as salty as people are getting, I definitely wouldn't be surprised if another patch came before EVO. Also, bit of a side note, Mew2King decided to play Mewtwo this week so there's some decent footage of that in this tournament.

 

[sedrf]

https://www.twitch.tv/gooshigaming
The Michigan arcadian is on today with 200+ memebr(from michigan,illinois,and ohio)
Also GUMS with 100+ members featuring new England's best is on to:https://www.twitch.tv/gameunderground
TCg will be on soon on:

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Holy salt! Man, the comments for this week's Smash Conference have been vicious.

I admit, it was kind of painful to watch when so much of it was the same combo over and over again. It's like I mentioned the other day about mid levels players taking down top level players with Bayo and top level players not wanting to touch her with a 20 foot pole because of how hilariously skewed things would become if more jump on the Bayo bandwagon. Also, watching the videos of this tournament, I didn't realize that Witch Twist could kill you off the side if you DI'd too much. Talk about a Catch 22. With as salty as people are getting, I definitely wouldn't be surprised if another patch came before EVO. Also, bit of a side note, Mew2King decided to play Mewtwo this week so there's some decent footage of that in this tournament.

I really hope bayo isn't thrashed. That would be such a tragedy

 

[Rizen]

I was on the sidelines but Bayo's proving to be an easy win top character. Nerfs seem justified.

 

[Nobie]

It's weird to me to see "Bayonetta can poke Ryu and all Ryu can do is whiff punish" when the COUNTER to poking is supposed to be whiff punishing. Bayonetta can do this thing that gives her an edge, and all Ryu can do is the very exact thing that's meant to defeat what Bayonetta can do!

Watching @Trela beat that Bayonetta at that weekly last week, I think it's clear how threatening Ryu's ground game can be to Bayonetta. At one point, his opponent did something simple like stick out a limb. I think it was a down tilt. Trela instantly shoryukened it and took Bayonetta's stock right there.

Maybe Bayonetta still has the advantage in that matchup, but that is a scary place to be for her character. Also, while Witch Twist is way less risky than Shoryuken, SRK beats it straight up. When Ryu has a tool that can just defeat her most reliable (only) quick attack option, I can't imagine the fight being too in her favor.

 

[Ninety]

I dunno about you, but from my experience, the FEs really were **** tier before the buffs.

Fair enough, but the perception persisted past several buffs. I remember Japanese tier lists putting Ike in low tier well into 1.1.1 or so.

 

[Nidtendofreak]

I really hope bayo isn't thrashed. That would be such a tragedy

Oh, she'll probably be ripped apart. Too much public outcry too fast.

Gonna make the Luigi nerf look tame and minor.

 

[Y2Kay]

I think the balance team have learned from the greninja scenario to be more careful how they nerf characters.

 

[Nidtendofreak]

I think the balance team have learned from the greninja scenario to be more careful how they nerf characters.

Didn't the Luigi nerf happen after the Greninja one though?

 

[Radical Larry]

Didn't the Luigi nerf happen after the Greninja one though?

They're going to nerf Gre-I mean, Bayonetta, harshly next patch around.
And if we follow the dev team's pattern, it's this:

Buff FE characters, Nerf FE characters, Nerf Top Tiers, Heavily Buff Ganondorf to an always unsatisfied and ungrateful amount of people, Heavily Buff Link the same way, keep Jigglypuff the same, Buff Mewtwo, keep Olimar and other characters people don't know how to play against the same, keep Villager the same, Nerf or Buff Greninja and massively buff Ganondorf even more!

That's what the pattern really is sometimes.

 

[TTTTTsd]

The readjustment of the tipper hitbox of fair is a big deal, I think. It feel a lot easier to land sweetspot hits with it now. That gives Marth an ability that he severely lacked up until now: getting "random" kills out of "random" situations with a move that can be used in neutral and doesn't require any elaborate setups to be effective.

I actually think more Marths should be using the increased power AND reduced recovery on Ftilt to secure kills more often now. I think in practice it's arguably as safe when spaced well, and pretty ridiculous honestly. It's a very effective stock cap and basically a mini Smash attack now, it serves the same purpose Roy's does: kills a good deal later but is so much safer than FSmash that it's worth it usually.

 

[bc1910]

Didn't the Luigi nerf happen after the Greninja one though?

Yes, but they only nerfed the tools that were clearly problematic and they gave him some nice compensation buffs.

They didn't nuke half his moveset and his ****ing hurtbox when only one, arguably two moves were actually problematic.

I'd say they'd learnt from their mistakes by the time it was Luigi's turn to get nerfed. Luigi's nerf was way tamer than people usually make out, as were both of Diddy's.

 

[Dinoman96]

They're going to nerf Gre-I mean, Bayonetta, harshly next patch around.
And if we follow the dev team's pattern, it's this:

Buff FE characters, Nerf FE characters, Nerf Top Tiers, Heavily Buff Ganondorf to an always unsatisfied and ungrateful amount of people, Heavily Buff Link the same way, keep Jigglypuff the same, Buff Mewtwo, keep Olimar and other characters people don't know how to play against the same, keep Villager the same, Nerf or Buff Greninja and massively buff Ganondorf even more!

That's what the pattern really is sometimes.

By "massively buff Ganondorf more" you mean "they'll just keep making random changes and not actually fix any of his real core issues woo woo woo", correct?

 

[Blobface]

Holy salt! Man, the comments for this week's Smash Conference have been vicious.

I admit, it was kind of painful to watch when so much of it was the same combo over and over again. It's like I mentioned the other day about mid levels players taking down top level players with Bayo and top level players not wanting to touch her with a 20 foot pole because of how hilariously skewed things would become if more jump on the Bayo bandwagon. Also, watching the videos of this tournament, I didn't realize that Witch Twist could kill you off the side if you DI'd too much. Talk about a Catch 22. With as salty as people are getting, I definitely wouldn't be surprised if another patch came before EVO. Also, bit of a side note, Mew2King decided to play Mewtwo this week so there's some decent footage of that in this tournament.

Is there any tournament footage of someone successfully DIing Bayonetta's combos, as in consistently escaping after 2 or so moves?

 

[TTTTTsd]

By "massively buff Ganondorf more" you mean "they'll just keep making random changes and not actually fix any of his real core issues woo woo woo", correct?

Ok wow.

Having a good jab and a move he can throw out relatively non-commitally (which was added THIS UPDATE) is something he has not had EVER, not even since LAUNCH did he have this. I guess it can be hard to notice Ganon's buffs since compared to Bowser and DK they're not as drastic but they've all added up to this point to form a much more formidable character than he was before all of these patches, honestly.

Ganondorf HAS been buffed pretty significantly tbqh, alongside extensive damage increases and even less endlag on a burst mobility option that he can now kill confirm off of even more reliably.

Like all they have to do now is tune his grab reward and he'll probably be decent if he's not already, dunno. I want to see more of him with his slick new jab.

 

[adom4]

Ok wow.

Having a good jab and a move he can throw out relatively non-commitally (which was added THIS UPDATE) is something he has not had EVER, not even since LAUNCH did he have this. I guess it can be hard to notice Ganon's buffs since compared to Bowser and DK they're not as drastic but they've all added up to this point to form a much more formidable character than prior, honestly.

Ganondorf HAS been buffed pretty significantly tbqh, alongside extensive damage increases and even less endlag on a burst mobility option that he can now kill confirm off of even more reliably.

Like all they have to do now is tune his grab reward and he'll probably be decent if he's not already, dunno. I want to see more of him with his slick new jab.

It's not his first good buff either.
Dair hitbox shift, D-smash not being garbage, landing lag reductions in the 1st patch & in the Dair patch, he's still not that good but saying he didn't get good buffs is just lying.

 

[Blobface]

Ok wow.

Having a good jab and a move he can throw out relatively non-commitally (which was added THIS UPDATE) is something he has not had EVER, not even since LAUNCH did he have this. I guess it can be hard to notice Ganon's buffs since compared to Bowser and DK they're not as drastic but they've all added up to this point to form a much more formidable character than prior, honestly.

Ganondorf HAS been buffed pretty significantly tbqh, alongside extensive damage increases and even less endlag on a burst mobility option that he can now kill confirm off of even more reliably.

Like all they have to do now is tune his grab reward and he'll probably be decent if he's not already, dunno. I want to see more of him with his slick new jab.

Wizkick is still a undertuned for it's risk, successful Flame Chokes (air and ground) could have 3 frames shaved off for more consistent followups across the cast, and as you said his grab reward needs tuning, but that's really it. He needs a few things still, but he's immeasurably better than he was at launch.

 

[TTTTTsd]

It's not his first good buff either.
Dair hitbox shift, D-smash not being garbage, landing lag reductions in the 1st patch & in the Dair patch, he's still not that good but saying he didn't get good buffs is just lying.

He's a kill throw + actual good combo throw away from being pretty good honestly. Shift D-Throw's angle inwards (if it went straight into Nair that'd be literally perfect, that'd do like 20+) and like, give him a kill throw (B-Throw, U-Throw, even F-Throw) and he'll be gucci honestly. Going by the trend of the patches assuming they continue, one of these may end up happening. Who knows?

Also another thing is that they extended the range of Jab very slightly (it didn't even need this) and Flame Choke's grab box got pushed outwards quite noticeably (2 units!) meaning it is better at techchasing than it was before.

Also I think Wizkick is fine as is considering how his new DA is. 12% lets it blow through what it needs to (mostly) and it kills at like, 120-130% with good positioning. I think any earlier would be a little insane, personally, considering it moves and lingers for a long time and the KB is consistent on every hitbox.

 

[Kofu]

It's not his first good buff either.
Dair hitbox shift, D-smash not being garbage, landing lag reductions in the 1st patch & in the Dair patch, he's still not that good but saying he didn't get good buffs is just lying.

Not going to lie, the DSmash buff kind of messed with my head. After playing him in Brawl where his DSmash was crap (and still was when Smash 4 came out) seeing a killing DSmash is pretty nuts.

But yeah, Ganon's had some really nice buffs.

 

[sedrf]

Esam lost to captain zack's peach.
Apparentley esam said he has a peach issue
edit: at tgc

 

[bc1910]

Pikachu just has issues in general.

 

[Y2Kay]

Pikachu in his self is an issue. Unless you're easily edge guarded by him, you'll feasibly stand a chance if you play it smart with rage.

Pikachu's lack of reliably ways to kill will keep him upset prone.

 

[Wintermelon43]

Esam lost to captain zack's peach.
Apparentley esam said he has a peach issue
edit: at tgc

Wow, Mario and Peach must acctually love each other. Mario taught Peach his tricks aganist Esam's Pikachu

Edit:Now that I think of it, did Esam go Corrin at all?

 

[S_B]

Gonna make the Luigi nerf look tame and minor.

Luigi is still an excellent character, though.

He's just not as redonk as he was with the guaranteed Dthrow followup.

Pikachu just has issues in general.

This is directed at everyone: remember that the goal of the ongoing balance is to place all characters on even footing. We can't use where the top tiers are now as an example of what they need to balance the game around because odds are those characters are going to come down still.

Pikachu just has issues in general.

Pika is fine, so long as we're not comparing him to top tiers which will likely still be toned down.

If anything, he's still exceedingly strong against most of the middle of the pack.

 

[Megamang]

I hope the plan is to bring the general power level down, that sounds nice.

Prepare your pallets for lemons.

 

[Yikarur]

Lower Powerlevel is boring. The game's powerlevel is already really low overall. They should just buff everyone at this point that needs buffs and maybe fix 1-2 mediocre things about good but not good enough characters.
There is nothing more amazing than exploring new stuff thanks to frame data buffs. I want those at least once.. (buff Yoshis ftilt pls )

 

[Megamang]

Just lower the power level of the super characters, then there is room for reasonable frame data buffs on the lower half of the cast.

Basically just Bayo at this point is a little silly, perhaps mayyyybe some landing lag for Cloud (he gets to space with all 5 aerials lol) but he does have a weak ground game I feel people aren't exploiting enough.