Official 4BR Tier List v1.0 - Competitive Impressions

[DunnoBro]

Just the man I was looking for.

Is Pika vs Duck Hunt really 7:3, as ESAM says?

At high level, sounds about right. Neutral is fine, killing and comboing is fine too... But nairing his recovery is free, even if i tech bair pika can regrab the ledge before me and ledge drop nair (sometimes if QA hits me while he's regrabbing I can't grab the ledge again for another second and bad bad things can happen) And jolt is an easy cover-all option to reset almost endlessly.

Essentially, imagine why pika edgeguards rosa so good. Next, cut rosa's upb speed over half. Finally, take away any meaty disjoints pika might have to respect while edgeguarding. There's no mix-ups, no options really. Either take your hits to try recovering high or hope they react wrong. (most of DHD's standard recovery options are punishable on reaction by pikachu)

I'll keep saying it till they fix it, duck hunt's biggest issue by far is his recovery. It might not be the worst, but it is the most raw braindead exploitable. Fox can keep shinespiking me till I die or recover high to get usmashed, not even little mac has to deal with this ****.

He already kills better than a character like him should imo

 

[Illusion.]

Eh.

We lose to Sheik, Diddy, ZSS, MK, Fox all in the 40-60 range most likely.

Meaning the top/high tiers we go even or beat are Ryu, Pika, Sonic, Village, Ness, Rosa.

This is false on a lot of levels.

We lose to Sonic, it's not even.

MK is even.

We definitely do not lose to ZSS.

We lose to Sheik, Fox, and Diddy, but -2? Don't know about that.

 

[Y2Kay]

This is false on a lot of levels.

We lose to Sonic, it's not even.

MK is even.

We definitely do not lose to ZSS.

We lose to Sheik, Fox, and Diddy, but -2? Don't know about that.

He was talking about Ike.

 

[Nidtendofreak]

This is false on a lot of levels.

We lose to Sonic, it's not even.

MK is even.

We definitely do not lose to ZSS.

We lose to Sheik, Fox, and Diddy, but -2? Don't know about that.

You do know I was talking about Ike, yes?

 

[Radical Larry]

Do you think that Zelda and Jigglypuff are on a tier on their own? This is not a rethoric question, I genuinely want to know Your opinion.
Also, I don't think Falco is bad at all, in fact I don't think anyone is really bad, but I see him as a bottom 10 character, therefore very close to bottom tier.

Falco? A bottom 10 character? Please tell me you're joking right?
Falco doesn't have his lasers anymore, but jeez, bottom 10?

Falco is a character who's at least a middle or even a hidden high tier character in this game; he doesn't have the best mobility, but neither does Luigi and he's still higher than Falco at the moment. Falco has the tools that can make him a potential high tier due to:

-Some of the best frame data in the game, including F4 B-Air, F2 Jab, F3 N-Air and F5 F-Tilt.
-Stunning kill potential with many of his attacks, such as D-Air, B-Air, F-Air and all of his Smashes.
-Arguably one of the best edge-guarding abilities in the game thanks to B-Air, F-Air and N-Air, as well as D-Smash.
-Some of the best ledge getup punishing within the game via U-Smash.
-Some of the best combo games out there with U-Throw and D-Throw, like U-Throw > B-Air > B-Air!
-Great KO setups from U-Throw into U-Air.
-Arguably one of the top five recoveries in the game due to his jumping height, Falco Phantasm and Fire Bird.
-Ledge meteor Phantasm.
-An unpredictable B-Air. You can't predict when it's going to come up due to its high speed, so it will hit you like a truck.

Now he does have his disadvantages such as:
-Light weight.
-Fast falling speed.
-Low mobility.
-Lack of decent projectile.

But they are negligible when you see a good, professional Falco go against you. Falco doesn't necessarily depend on MU inexperience on the opponent, but he does take advantage of opponents who can't fight against him. Now he also doesn't have tournament showcasing due to the lack of a player base (sadly, a lot of really good characters lack representation), but he's nowhere near bottom fifteen, or even bottom twenty-five. (I'll post an MU chart and explanation later today when I have more time.)

 

[Illusion.]

You do know I was talking about Ike, yes?

....

I'm an idiot

 

[zzmorg82]

Falco? A bottom 10 character? Please tell me you're joking right?
Falco doesn't have his lasers anymore, but jeez, bottom 10?

Falco is a character who's at least a middle or even a hidden high tier character in this game; he doesn't have the best mobility, but neither does Luigi and he's still higher than Falco at the moment. Falco has the tools that can make him a potential high tier due to:

-Some of the best frame data in the game, including F4 B-Air, F2 Jab, F3 N-Air and F5 F-Tilt.
-Stunning kill potential with many of his attacks, such as D-Air, B-Air, F-Air and all of his Smashes.
-Arguably one of the best edge-guarding abilities in the game thanks to B-Air, F-Air and N-Air, as well as D-Smash.
-Some of the best ledge getup punishing within the game via U-Smash.
-Some of the best combo games out there with U-Throw and D-Throw, like U-Throw > B-Air > B-Air!
-Great KO setups from U-Throw into U-Air.
-Arguably one of the top five recoveries in the game due to his jumping height, Falco Phantasm and Fire Bird.
-Ledge meteor Phantasm.
-An unpredictable B-Air. You can't predict when it's going to come up due to its high speed, so it will hit you like a truck.

Now he does have his disadvantages such as:
-Light weight.
-Fast falling speed.
-Low mobility.
-Lack of decent projectile.

But they are negligible when you see a good, professional Falco go against you. Falco doesn't necessarily depend on MU inexperience on the opponent, but he does take advantage of opponents who can't fight against him. Now he also doesn't have tournament showcasing due to the lack of a player base (sadly, a lot of really good characters lack representation), but he's nowhere near bottom fifteen, or even bottom twenty-five. (I'll post an MU chart and explanation later today when I have more time.)

This right here. If he were to receive a slight speed buff then he'll be perfect.

 

[Amadeus9]

Somebody has to be bottom 10. Who would you put below Falco? Be honest. 9 characters is pushing it a little, imo

Being bottom 10 doesn't necessarily mean you're outright bad in this game, keep that in mind.

 

[Jamurai]

What are people's thoughts on where Corrin is at right about now? People talk about Bayo and Cloud (and Mewtwo) so much that this topic seems cast aside in the corner. I thought the general consensus was that he/she is definitely above average and probably high tier. I haven't really followed how much the nerfs last patch affected him/her. Corrin may be slow but he/she is also a wall of large disjoints with a threatening projectile. Also what are his/her results like so far?

 

[Nidtendofreak]

Somebody has to be bottom 10. Who would you put below Falco? Be honest. 9 characters is pushing it a little, imo

Being bottom 10 doesn't necessarily mean you're outright bad in this game, keep that in mind.

For fun I took a poke at this.

In no order I'd say Zelda, Palutena, Mii Brawler, Mii Gunner, Mii Swordfighter (because trio stuck with 1/1/1/1), Palutena, Jigglypuff, Dog Hunt Dog, Little Mac all for sure. That's 9. After that its a mix up between Charizard, D3, Dr.Mario, Falco, Ganondorf, and Samus for the next set of spots.

Falco to me is bottom 15.

 

[Nobie]

What are people's thoughts on where Corrin is at right about now? People talk about Bayo and Cloud (and Mewtwo) so much that this topic seems cast aside in the corner. I thought the general consensus was that he/she is definitely above average and probably high tier. I haven't really followed how much the nerfs last patch affected him/her. Corrin may be slow but he/she is also a wall of large disjoints with a threatening projectile. Also what are his/her results like so far?

Corrin IMO can't possibly be lower than high-mid tier. When you have crazy disjoints that stay out for a long time, a useful projectile, insane killing power (tipper F-Smash, Dragon Lunge), a difficult to gimp recovery (albeit lacking in range), good frame data in terms of attack speed, one of the strongest counters in the game, AND kill throws, you are pretty much the complete package. All of these make up for lack of mobility in spades, though I'd like if people more familiar with Corrin could chime in on how Corrin does against other swordsmen.

Speaking of swords, Abadango mentioned in his AMA that he considers Roy EDIT: his least favorite character to play (whoops read that wrong before).

@Fox Is Openly Deceptive I noticed in your Link down throw ratings that quite a few high tier characters are in there. Do you think that Link is better than a lot of people perceive, or is he so lacking in other areas (like getting the grab) that even the reward he gets from down throw isn't enough to make up for it?

 

[Pancracio17]

thats two palutenas, and id add ganon and falco to that bottom 10
edit: forgot about roy, add that to the bottom 10 and take out falco

 

[teddystalin]

Speaking of swords, Abadango mentioned in his AMA that he considers Roy the most fun character to play. The fact that he doesn't use Roy probably indicates that he doesn't think Roy is viable, though if Roy ever gets buffed then perhaps we might see another character change from Aba.

Did he? According to this, he said that Roy was his least favorite character to play. On the other hand, Void chimed in that he thinks Roy is badly underrated and that there's at least 1 MU where he would use Roy over Sheik. He was coy about saying which one.

 

[Tizio Random]

Speaking of swords, Abadango mentioned in his AMA that he considers Roy the most fun character to play. The fact that he doesn't use Roy probably indicates that he doesn't think Roy is viable, though if Roy ever gets buffed then perhaps we might see another character change from Aba.

Actually he said he is HIS least favourite character to play.
On the topic of Falco and other low Tier, I think everyone has potential and good traits in this game, really. Being bottom 10 is not bad but someone has to be. Also, I count Mio with all the sets because here in Europe we use them this way, so Brawler and Gunner skyrocket in viability.

EDIT: 'd

Did he? According to this, he said that Roy was his least favorite character to play. On the other hand, Void chimed in that he thinks Roy is badly underrated and that there's at least 1 MU where he would use Roy over Sheik. He was coy about saying which one.

I can bet my money on it that it is the Rosalina match-up.

 

[Nekoo]

I'm not the only one who can't do an order when people say ''Who are the bottom 10'' ''Who are the top 10 mid tiers ?"
I mean The middle/low/bottom tiers don't have an enought big gap to make an order. At least for me.

Except for Puff.

Puff will alway be last.

Poor Puff...

 

[Browny]

Falco? A bottom 10 character? Please tell me you're joking right?
Falco doesn't have his lasers anymore, but jeez, bottom 10?

Falco is a character who's at least a middle or even a hidden high tier character in this game; he doesn't have the best mobility, but neither does Luigi and he's still higher than Falco at the moment. Falco has the tools that can make him a potential high tier due to:

-Some of the best frame data in the game, including F4 B-Air, F2 Jab, F3 N-Air and F5 F-Tilt.
-Stunning kill potential with many of his attacks, such as D-Air, B-Air, F-Air and all of his Smashes.
-Arguably one of the best edge-guarding abilities in the game thanks to B-Air, F-Air and N-Air, as well as D-Smash.
-Some of the best ledge getup punishing within the game via U-Smash.
-Some of the best combo games out there with U-Throw and D-Throw, like U-Throw > B-Air > B-Air!
-Great KO setups from U-Throw into U-Air.
-Arguably one of the top five recoveries in the game due to his jumping height, Falco Phantasm and Fire Bird.
-Ledge meteor Phantasm.
-An unpredictable B-Air. You can't predict when it's going to come up due to its high speed, so it will hit you like a truck.

Now he does have his disadvantages such as:
-Light weight.
-Fast falling speed.
-Low mobility.
-Lack of decent projectile.

But they are negligible when you see a good, professional Falco go against you. Falco doesn't necessarily depend on MU inexperience on the opponent, but he does take advantage of opponents who can't fight against him. Now he also doesn't have tournament showcasing due to the lack of a player base (sadly, a lot of really good characters lack representation), but he's nowhere near bottom fifteen, or even bottom twenty-five. (I'll post an MU chart and explanation later today when I have more time.)

You're judging Falco in a vacuum. Every character looks amazing if you list what they are good at while conveniently forgetting that there is 57 or so other characters in the game, where many of them are better than Falco in almost all of those things you listed.

I mean really, falco having 'some of the best combo games out there' would only be true if you took out a solid 75% of the cast. Plenty of characters have more damaging combos that use literally one move over and over or dthrow autocombos.

Falco, like a lot of the characters in this game fail quite hard in one very important aspect of gameplay... He cant force the opponent to do anything. His approaching and shield pressure is below average and he has possibly the worst projectile in the game to make up for this. When the opponent has a % lead on falco hes in a lot of trouble. His defensive tools are really good though, but its not enough.

Compare him to the likes of Sheik, Megaman, Cloud, Toon Link. They all have very different neutral games and a great mix of offensive pressure that force you to do something, anything, before their pressure becomes too much and now you're playing their game. Falco just cant do this at all.

I want to see a high level match of falco vs villager. I suspect it would be very painful.

Seriously, he can have the best frame data, stunning kill potential, combos, KO set ups and all this good stuff but it doesnt matter when the enemy decides "I'm not going to let falco get near me, because he has nothing to force me to get in cqc range" and that's all it takes.

 

[Hippieslayer]

Falco isnt good at all. He does not have good ko ability because shield beats everything and unlike fox he doesnt have the movement to get past that. Listing his pros one by one in a vacuum wherein they arent considered alongside his weaknesses doesnt result in an accurate picture of his actual capabilities. A bunch of good moves and attributes do not necessarily result in a good character.

Halfassed range, bad horizontal movement speed and a grab that cant be converted into a KO neuters his KO moves. Its easy to see Falco coming, he cannot pressure you enough to react prematurely by forcing you to guess what hes going to do like a faster character might. He has to get close, does so slowly, and his killing moves more or less lack disjoint and suffer poor range. Meanwhile his grab doesnt convert into KOs and is furthermore weakened because he doesnt have the movement speed required to land it a lot. The result is shield beats most everything. Falcos option coverage is highly lacking and his own options are easily limited.

To add onto this his neutral sucks for similar reasons. Approaching with aerials doesnt really work due to speed and range lacking. He cant effectively zone out other characters because he has a large deadzone at the distance where his laser is still highly punishable but his other moves bar side-b (not safe) cant be used at this range. He has to play a guessing game thats not in his favor because most all he does is punishable. And to top it off laser is underwhelming even when it hits and he isnt punished for it.

His only horizontal burst options are side-b, and dash attack. At a slightly closer range he can dash grab. With down-b he has a move that does come out fast and has range, but in turn its weak and laggy. This means he loses hard to persistent zoning.

He does have combos. And he is probably a tough matchup for the characters which cant zone him or which are forced to approached by him. But these are likely a minority of the cast. When it comes to the relevant part of the cast a wast majority can pwn him because of the aforementioned weaknesses of his. His game plan is defunct. Yes he looks really cool when he is able to wreck opponents who fail to play the MU right or commit the mistake of disrespecting him. Doesnt make him good.

Falco does not have what it takes to be a hidden high tier. There is no hidden potential that will make his neutral work and let him score kills. His flaws are too fundamental to be overcome.

He has combos which can cause a lot of dmg, but he has to win a guessing game thats skewered against him to land them because of his neutral. He does have stronk moves that kill but he cant land them. Meanwhile he is light, a fastfaller, and has a bad recovery. Hidden high tier my ass.

Oh and his edgeguarding is overrated because its risky for him to go offstage even if you are able to consistently tech. Dair has crap startup too. Its not a good ko move wtf. He can put out hitboxes in a dangerous fashion because of his vertical burst enabling some scary offstage presence. But again its still risky. Dsmash at ledge can be dangerous tho.

Still, Falco is not good.

 

[Shaya]

Bottom 10 likely consists of the characters most left behind and those just not meant to be universally great but are still fat heavy hitters.

I'd say going by some indeterminate logic, bottom 10 are:


while everyone else is at least mid to high mid, OR potentially high tier!
This just in: "How dare you say Shulk is bottom 10... have you seen my range?"
"How dare you say King Dedede is bottom 10... have you seen... FOR GLORY?"
"How dare you say Falco is bottom 10... have you seen that frame data?"
"How dare you say Jigglypuff is bottom 10... haven't you seen Bayonetta die at 0% to one? BROKEN"

If Roy is a bottom 10 contender then bottom 10 should be more like bottom 20.
A good thing, really.

When we were trying to figure out character viability, we originally were trying to consider the poles of top and bottom with arbitrary limits based ultimately around a 'feel'.
Blame meeeeeeeeeeee
But many a low tier hath been buffed the **** out of since then. Mewtwo, Marth, Lucina, Robin, Charizard, Bowser, Wii Fit - they are hard for us to consider as bottom contenders rather than the threatening demeanour they have now, furthermore you have a lot of changes tallied over onto DK, Ganondorf, Link, Palutena, Kirby, Ike, Samus and Zelda.
Of course Ike but we all thought he was competent/mid tier after the first 5 rounds of buffs.

 

[sedrf]

https://twitter.com/SS_S_C_B/status/722076831159988225
Komorikiri released a cloud mu chart:

Almost sheik tier lv of mus

 

[Nobie]

Speaking of Falco, I had no idea until I looked it up but he has the fastest Reflector in the game (comes out Frame 1, actual hitbox comes out Frame 5).

http://kuroganehammer.com/Smash4/Reflectors

 

[Radical Larry]

Sometimes I don't see the negative aspects of Falco because they just aren't there in practice. In theory and paper, Falco seems like a bad character, but unless you spend time playing the character and use him in a tournament, the result is that he can topple down a lot of characters pretty easily; I should know because I can actually win with him in tournaments so far.

https://twitter.com/SS_S_C_B/status/722076831159988225
Komorikiri released a cloud mu chart:

Almost sheik tier lv of mus

Oh Japan, you manage to make your emo **** boys look like they're the best characters in the game when in fact, all of those "good" MUs are, if in practice, very bad for Cloud. I've explained before that Samus is a bad MU for Cloud at a 40:60 in Samus's favor, but holy hell, Cloud is not even this good. If he was this good, then he'd be or or even /(PM's Entire History)

I don't even think Cloud's that good with MUs and I play the character very well!

 

[Deleted member]

https://twitter.com/SS_S_C_B/status/722076831159988225
Komorikiri released a cloud mu chart:

Almost sheik tier lv of mus

So, a top Cloud player thinking Mewtwo is even? That's very pleasant to hear. Surprised he thinks is also even though, considering Cloud usually has the advantage in neutral.

 

[bc1910]

Greninja vs Fox is even. There's plenty of high level evidence for it now.

Greninja's worst MUs in order are Sonic, Sheik and Diddy. Cloud, Ryu and ROB don't feel good but are probably more like difficult evens.

Eh.

We lose to Sheik, Diddy, ZSS, MK, Fox all in the 40-60 range most likely, wouldn't be surprised if Bayo wasn't there as well. And then Cloud and Mario are 45-55.

Meaning the top/high tiers we go even or beat are Ryu, Pika, Sonic, Village, Ness, Rosa.

Losing 8, even or winning 6 in that range ain't exactly claiming we win all of the important MUs. If you think Corrin and Mewtwo are high tier (no way Corrin is, Mewtwo I don't think has the results yet at the major level but will probably end up there given enough time) the ratio becomes 8 Losing:8 Even/Winning

We're still saying we lose more than we win with for the important MUs.

Genuinely the first time I've heard an Ike player admit to losing any MU besides Sheik, but thanks for the explanations.

 

[Browny]

Sometimes I don't see the negative aspects of Falco because they just aren't there in practice. In theory and paper, Falco seems like a bad character, but unless you spend time playing the character and use him in a tournament, the result is that he can topple down a lot of characters pretty easily; I should know because I can actually win with him in tournaments so far.



Oh Japan, you manage to make your emo **** boys look like they're the best characters in the game when in fact, all of those "good" MUs are, if in practice, very bad for Cloud. I've explained before that Samus is a bad MU for Cloud at a 40:60 in Samus's favor, but holy hell, Cloud is not even this good. If he was this good, then he'd be or or even /(PM's Entire History)

I don't even think Cloud's that good with MUs and I play the character very well!

Now I remember who it was I was actually replying to, reading this post is my punishment for not checking who I was replying to and knowing I should have let them go.

 

[Radical Larry]

Now I remember who it was I was actually replying to, reading this post is my punishment for not checking who I was replying to and knowing I should have let them go.

But the thing is, I really like the somewhat hypocritical logic against Falco, saying that he can't force opponents to approach...

...when the same damn thing applies to a current high tier known as Luigi!

No seriously, if you think about it, Falco and Luigi share some qualities with each other; they can't force their opponents to approach, both have poor aerial mobility, both have amazing combo ability and kill power, and both can easily get punished with their attacks and both are very great at recovering. So you tell me, where is the logic in saying that Luigi can be a high tier who literally can't force opponents to approach him in any damn way, but Falco automatically has to be a bottom ten character despite nearly being the same exact thing?!

No seriously, I want to hear an explanation to that. I really want to know how Luigi can still be considered a high or upper middle tier, but Falco has to be one of the bottom of the barrel characters, despite the two having very similar aspects, just one has a slower and less ranged projectile than the other, that doesn't help near as much at stopping!

I call this hypocrisy because you say one character like this can't be good, but we already have a character that's nearly the same that's already that high up and good!

 

[MistressRemilia]

Komo's MU spread is pretty legit, there's one thing that baffles me though...

What is Lucario doing in Even matchups?
I mean, i'm not a Lucario main, but what i've heard about this matchup is not pretty:
Said to be Lucario's worst matchup and judged as a -2 by some Lucario mains.
I'd like to know Komorikiri's reasoning on that.

 

[LancerStaff]

...Why in the world is Dark Pit's MU with Cloud better then Pit's? I'd buy it if customs were on, but that's a no.

Electroshock hits him offstage at a decent angle for how powerful it is but arrows do a ton in the MU.

 

[BunbUn129]

Falco's issues in Smash 4 are further proof to the importance of mobility in these games. Falco has some neat tools in his arsenal:

-a frame 4 bair that kills and has little landing lag
-a frame 7 d tilt that deals 13%, leads into combos and KO's
-frame 3 nair with good duration and knockback
-the fastest (?) usmash in the game at frame 7, and deals 16% and KO's a bit later than Fox's, while not having too much ending lag (~30 frames)
-decent grab game: pummel is fast, down and up throws are combo-starters, and back throw is a KO throw, along with up throw depending on rage and stage positioning. (It would be a good grab game if he had a KO set-up off a throw).
-highest initial jump

Like Dr. Mario, Falco's main issue isn't his actual kit, but that these tools are stuck on some bad mobility stats; a 1.47 dash speed and 6-frame jumpsquat in particular. A character can have really good tools, but that doesn't really matter if they can't easily put themselves in a position to use them. Falco doesn't have a reliable way to force approaches and is highly susceptible to being lamed out. Falco's most reliable way of getting things started is if the opponent unnecessarily commits to unsafe options. He lacks KO confirms and his only safe KO move, bair, has a small hitbox, and combined with his space animal physics and recovery, this means he often gets punished harder than he can punish.

He isn't bottom 10 or bottom 15 because he's atrocious or whatever (he isn't atrocious), it's just that someone has to be. He's one of those characters who started out as "okay" but then slowly lost ground with the introduction of the newer DLC characters and more meaningful buffs to others, along with reliable KO set-ups becoming more important. Falco's issues really show themselves against patient and reserved defensive play, and people generally being too aggressive is one of the driving points behind the results that he has.

Fixing Falco is as simple as giving him a 1.6 or 1.7 dashing speed (and a shorter jumpsquat, but that hasn't been done in any patches), or making his lasers an at least decent projectile.

 

[FullMoon]

Fixing Falco is as simple as giving him a 1.6 or 1.7 dashing speed (and a shorter jumpsquat, but that hasn't been done in any patches), or making his lasers an at least decent projectile.

Didn't they buff Samus' jumpsquat in a patch or am I remembering it wrong?

Anyway, on the topic of MUs I still don't think Fox is an even MU for Greninja, even if so far the results have been good for Greninja, I think Fox just overwhelms Gren pretty badly

 

[BunbUn129]

Didn't they buff Samus' jumpsquat in a patch or am I remembering it wrong?

Anyway, on the topic of MUs I still don't think Fox is an even MU for Greninja, even if so far the results have been good for Greninja, I think Fox just overwhelms Gren pretty badly

They apparently increased her jumpsquat between Brawl and Smash 4 (4-frame to 5-frame), but I'm not aware that they changed it in one of the patches.

 

[Radical Larry]

Look, I wouldn't mind having Falco get a mobility buff (I want Link or Ganondorf to get it more than Falco), but his 6 frame squat at least allows him to set up into that RAR B-Air. Literally the more frames you got for jump squat, the better you can RAR in this game. That being said, I wouldn't mind a small buff of mobility, but nothing drastic at least.

If we have a 1.1.6 or 1.1.7, if at all the latter, then surely they're going to change some mobility. And by the way, mobility is not important if you're using someone like, I don't know, Ryu or Villager or even Corrin, who are all top or high tiers for many separate reasons not including mobility...

And then you have Little Mac and even Roy on the opposite end of the spectrum.

Oh, and I forgot to add Luigi in for the characters who apparently don't need mobility to win, despite him and Falco being on opposite ends of the tier list and yet nearly the same in concept. It might not even be Falco's mobility that's the problem if Luigi, a similar-in-concept character, can be high tier, so it must be something else that is completely unrelated to mobility.

 

[Browny]

First of all, Luigi aint looking high tier right now.

Secondly, Falcos combos are not even remotely as good as Luigis which he can confirm into off multiple moves which is kind of a big deal. Falcos combos mostly rely on his grab but thats not too good on a slow character. Luigi leads into it from nair, fireball and grab itself.

That's related to something I was saying earlier about how people derided mewtwo because he had no dthrow combos. Mewtwo sets up his combos via jab, nair, fair and dtilt. Having 4 separate options to initiate a combo is much more effective than having a single one. Watch a character like Ike. He has really good and useful combos from his dthrow that keep working until kill %, but sometimes its difficult to get a single grab per stock.

A good combo character should have;
1) Multiple, or at least 1 reliable way of initiating them
2) Do decent damage from it, and it continue to work past say, 40%

Falco is really lacking in that regard.

 

[BunbUn129]

Look, I wouldn't mind having Falco get a mobility buff (I want Link or Ganondorf to get it more than Falco), but his 6 frame squat at least allows him to set up into that RAR B-Air. Literally the more frames you got for jump squat, the better you can RAR in this game. That being said, I wouldn't mind a small buff of mobility, but nothing drastic at least.

If we have a 1.1.6 or 1.1.7, if at all the latter, then surely they're going to change some mobility. And by the way, mobility is not important if you're using someone like, I don't know, Ryu or Villager or even Corrin, who are all top or high tiers for many separate reasons not including mobility...

And then you have Little Mac and even Roy on the opposite end of the spectrum.

Well, yeah, having bad mobility isn't a viability-killer, but characters like Villager and Corrin have effective long-range games to make up for their slow movement, while Ryu's high reward is enough to mitigate his mobility issues.

Little Mac's and Roy's mobility is not all that good. Both of them have bad dashing and aerial accelerations.

Browny Falco can start combos off of u tilt, d tilt, d throw, and u throw, so he isn't completely lacking in combo potential. But, sure, starting at 50% those combos are ruined by basic DI.

 

[Amadeus9]

You can't seriously be trying to spin having a long jumpsquat as a positive quality, can you? And that line of reasoning doesn't even make sense. I've never heard anyone complain that MK's rar bair is too hard.

Honestly, dude.

 

[Emblem Lord]

As far as Greninja vs Ryu goes I am of the opinion Greninja wins slightly. Tho the only high level Frog I played in the match or who seems to really understand it, is Venia. We sparred quite a bit a few months back and he felt it was close.

idk he seemed to imply it was even at the time. I tend to go with my gut, just because well....I'm usually not wrong on metagame/match-up analysis and predictions.

 

[BunbUn129]

The only benefit brought about by a longer jumpsquat is that it makes it technically easier to jump-cancel usmash, RAR, and short-hop in general. However, the tighter timing required for a shorter jumpsquat is easily overcome by a small amount of practice (except in Melee with frame-3 jumpsquats, ugh), and at that point it should be obvious that a shorter jumpsquat is inherently better.

 

[R3D3MON]

But the thing is, I really like the somewhat hypocritical logic against Falco, saying that he can't force opponents to approach...

...when the same damn thing applies to a current high tier known as Luigi!

No seriously, if you think about it, Falco and Luigi share some qualities with each other; they can't force their opponents to approach, both have poor aerial mobility, both have amazing combo ability and kill power, and both can easily get punished with their attacks and both are very great at recovering. So you tell me, where is the logic in saying that Luigi can be a high tier who literally can't force opponents to approach him in any damn way, but Falco automatically has to be a bottom ten character despite nearly being the same exact thing?!

No seriously, I want to hear an explanation to that. I really want to know how Luigi can still be considered a high or upper middle tier, but Falco has to be one of the bottom of the barrel characters, despite the two having very similar aspects, just one has a slower and less ranged projectile than the other, that doesn't help near as much at stopping!

I call this hypocrisy because you say one character like this can't be good, but we already have a character that's nearly the same that's already that high up and good!

I was thinking about this too, but people thinking Luigi is a high mid tier is a misconception mostly because Luigi is not really a high mid tier if you actually look at tier lists and results in general. People are still carrying stigmas from the pre-patch days (which is why Luigi is likely one of the most overrated AND underrated character in all of Smash's history).

Luigi and Falco are both characters with good CQC and combo potential but terrible ability to force kills, inability to force approaches (and approach), and generally lacking neutral (compounded by lack of mobility). I think Luigi is a better character than Falco overall in Smash 4 because Luigi has a better neutral than Falco: Luigi overall out-buttons Falco because Luigi has a jab that actually connects properly and is frequently used for mixups (although Falco does have better tilt options than Luigi), Luigi has a much better projectile than Falco, and Luigi's smash attacks have more practical applications compared to Falco. Luigi also has a much more potent throw combo game compared to Falco, and Luigi's falling aerials (uair and nair) have more applications than Falco's aerials (however Luigi mains shouldn't be trying to force combos with falling aerials since Luigi's aerials doesn't have much range :/). Also Luigi has a much more consistent and potent edgeguard move (down-b semi spike), and Luigi has a slightly better time offstage because he has more options than Falco for mixups and confusing opponents.

In general Luigi is a better character than Falco because he has more consistent/practical options in several important areas of competitive gameplay (neutral, edgeguarding, and advantaged state). And of course the character who really out-buttons and has much more options than both Falco and Luigi is Ryu, which is why he is in the high tier region. The people still saying that Luigi is high/mid-high tier refuse look at results and basically base all of their opinions on the results of Con Con.



Browny I think you meant Ike's u-throw, not d-throw since d-throw isn't very reliable after low %s (as other Ike mains have mentioned in this thread a few pages back). Also Ike has various options to start combos (not just from grabs), which range from falling fair and nair to d-tilt. Falling aerial combo starters are great for Ike since he is a walking disjoint.

 

[Radical Larry]

BunbUn129 Falco's ability to combo is a pretty decent thing, and yeah, DI can seriously hurt it at mid-percentages, but his U-Throw > B-Air can last long after just 50% if you time the B-Air just correctly. B-Air is also something people can't seem to predict when recovering from above (not even in tournament matches have I missed a well timed B-Air). As for jumpsquat, I like having longer jumpsquats for at least some reason, but I guess you and others are right, they can be learned upon by using other characters and utilized just as well with them.

Falco has consistent ways to lead into combos, and that can be explored if I can make at least some sort of combo video (but sadly, my Smash Bros. front cover got scratched up, so I'm unable to do it...until I get a new game), or at least someone does. Falco doesn't need just simply grab as his only option, he can even set it up from his F-Tilt and into Dash Attack at mid-percents if you really want to get harsh.

And you were mentioning their accelerations, while I normally aimed for their just speed overall. Roy's aerial acceleration is negated when you jump the opposite direction, like other characters, and is reset, so you can say Roy's aerial acceleration doesn't matter if he has his second jump; it does matter when he doesn't, unless he can use his recovery move, which also resets acceleration.

I was thinking about this too, but people thinking Luigi is a high mid tier is a misconception mostly because Luigi is not really a high mid tier if you actually look at tier lists and results in general. People are still carrying stigmas from the pre-patch days (which is why Luigi is likely one of the most overrated AND underrated character in all of Smash's history).

Luigi and Falco are both characters with good CQC and combo potential but terrible ability to force kills, inability to force approaches (and approach), and generally lacking neutral (compounded by lack of mobility). I think Luigi is a better character than Falco overall in Smash 4 because Luigi has a better neutral than Falco: Luigi overall out-buttons Falco because Luigi has a jab that actually connects properly and is frequently used for mixups (although Falco does have better tilt options than Luigi), Luigi has a much better projectile than Falco, and Luigi's smash attacks have more practical applications compared to Falco. Luigi also has a much more potent throw combo game compared to Falco, and Luigi's falling aerials (uair and nair) have more applications than Falco's aerials (however Luigi mains shouldn't be trying to force combos with falling aerials since Luigi's aerials doesn't have much range :/). Also Luigi has a much more consistent and potent edgeguard move (down-b semi spike), and Luigi has a slightly better time offstage because he has more options than Falco for mixups and confusing opponents.

In general Luigi is a better character than Falco because he has more consistent/practical options in several important areas of competitive gameplay (neutral, edgeguarding, and advantaged state). And of course the character who really out-buttons and has much more options than both Falco and Luigi is Ryu, which is why he is in the high tier region. The people still saying that Luigi is high/mid-high tier refuse look at results and basically base all of their opinions on the results of Con Con.



Browny I think you meant Ike's u-throw, not d-throw since d-throw isn't very reliable after low %s (as other Ike mains have mentioned in this thread a few pages back). Also Ike has various options to start combos (not just from grabs), which range from falling fair and nair to d-tilt. Falling aerial combo starters are great for Ike since he is a walking disjoint.

Actually, this is a pretty good argument and explanation of things.

 

[Y2Kay]

As far as Greninja vs Ryu goes I am of the opinion Greninja wins slightly. Tho the only high level Frog I played in the match or who seems to really understand it, is Venia. We sparred quite a bit a few months back and he felt it was close.

idk he seemed to imply it was even at the time. I tend to go with my gut, just because well....I'm usually not wrong on metagame/match-up analysis and predictions.

I think greninja slightly wins the match up as well. I think the mobility difference, and Shurikens really make a difference.

How much does greninja's multi hits matter? Fully charge Shurikens, up air, Bair, and up smash cut straight through focus attack.

But it seems like everyone and their mom thinks that having a few multi hits Mars the Rui match up even.

 

[BunbUn129]

BunbUn129 Falco's ability to combo is a pretty decent thing, and yeah, DI can seriously hurt it at mid-percentages, but his U-Throw > B-Air can last long after just 50% if you time the B-Air just correctly. B-Air is also something people can't seem to predict when recovering from above (not even in tournament matches have I missed a well timed B-Air). As for jumpsquat, I like having longer jumpsquats for at least some reason, but I guess you and others are right, they can be learned upon by using other characters and utilized just as well with them.

And you were mentioning their accelerations, while I normally aimed for their just speed overall. Roy's aerial acceleration is negated when you jump the opposite direction, like other characters, and is reset, so you can say Roy's aerial acceleration doesn't matter if he has his second jump; it does matter when he doesn't, unless he can use his recovery move, which also resets acceleration.



Actually, this is a pretty good argument and explanation of things.

When it comes to aerial mobility, aerial acceleration matters more. A character's ability to adjust their movement and change directions is more vital in practice than the ability to travel through the air quickly. Mewtwo, Ryu, and Roy have very good air speed, but their overall aerial mobility is below average due to their aerial acceleration, and in the latter two cases, their aerial movement is further hindered by their high gravities and falling speeds. In particular, Ryu's poor aerial acceleration makes his jumps highly committal. And your point about Roy being able to reverse double-jump to maneuver through the air is meaningless because it applies to everyone else.