Xandercosm
Smash Lord
I think there is a reason why there are sometimes complaints about seemingly irrelevant moves (like you were saying in the case of R.O.B.'s reflector). There are moves in this game that belong to perceived "weak" characters such as Link's barrage of projectiles, or even Zelda's ladder Up-B that do not make the character they belong to overpowered, but are overbearing in their own right. While I may disagree, I would not be surprised by someone complaining about Zelda's Up-B ladder when considered in a vacuum. It is a move that launches an opponent to the blast zone and then has a finisher that can kill earlier than 70% in some cases. This move alone doesn't save Zelda from her position as a low-tier, however, by itself it could be considered overbearing."Solo-viability" has this implicit compound-ambiguity that more or less prevents any consistent or meaningful discussion of the concept in any concise, comparative way. It simply means something too different to everyone.
No, this isn't an invitation to tell us all what your definition is. Don't make me make this a red topic, I swear...
Anyway, we had a bunch of posts about buffing, nerfs, and balance. Consider me #triggered, so everyone is in for a mod-splaining.
The big secret is to not think about character balance in terms of power level like how you discussed your favorite Dragon Ball Z characters in middle school, but about differentiation. Or the characters', in the term Sakurai uses, dynamic range.
Take Ness. One of the big defining traits about Ness is that Ness has great throws. The best throws, especially b-throw.
If Ness b-throw was the same as every other character, that would be lame. All the characters in the game would be the same in that way. Why even have Ness in the game?
On the other hand, what if Ness b-throw instantly killed any character at 15% damage? That would be really stupid, and it doesn't have anything to do with power level! Even if every character had something that powerful, a 15% insta-kill b-throw would still be incredibly stupid.
So an under-tuned b-throw is bad, and an over-tuned b-throw is bad the opposite way. Logically, there exists* some ideal intermediate value between the two that gives us the best compromise of giving Ness a tool that is simultaneously unique and empowering to his character identity, without degenerating gameplay to where Ness consists only of that move.
*Sometimes a game mechanism can be flawed in its design such that no middle ground exists to be found, but in this context we can regard that as somewhat rare. This applies to very, very few moves that exists in Smash 4 1.1.6.
Once we understand this, buffing and nerfing isn't that complicated or a valid source for ideological consternation:
Why do we only consider it? Because often times, if we are seeking to improve a weak character that is experiencing problems, more of the same medicine that isn't working in the first place might not solve the problem. (Sometimes it can! But usually alternative solutions that still fit within the characters creative space are needed.)
- When a unique trait exceeds its optimal value, we bring it down.
- When a unique trait falls short of its optimal value, we consider bringing it up.
A lot of really silly people like to bring up Melee as some sort of grand refutation of balance as a virtue; this crops up about once every two months or so.
All I'll say is that Melee's high level play has only survived because of the reasonable balance that exists solely in the Fox/Falco/Marth/Sheik/Puff microcosm, and the handful of viable matchups select high-tiers have against those. Melee would not still be relevant if it consisted entirely of Fox dittos, and I don't think anyone would claim otherwise. Brawl was poisoned by having a single outlier character, even though his standard deviation from the rest of the cast as a whole was less than than the top five Melee characters.
It's foolish to act like Melee's balance is anything but terrible, and it's equally foolish to act as if Melee has survived in spite of that balance. The less dramatic truth is that the balance within the top-tier subset of Melee that is played competitively is simply good enough.
IN CONCLUSION: The only moves in Smash 4 that "exceed their optimal value" to define their character, and probably warrant a small nerf, are Limit Cross Slash and maaaybe Ryu cheese--which is exactly what Shaya was already saying. An argument could be made for DK/Bowser throw combos, but I'm having trouble being sympathetic. (Contrast with Luigi, whose crap was far more egregious and antithetical to his design.)
Given that future patches appear unlikely and will not be based on discussion in this thread, I would advise not wasting time on such thoughts here.
That, in my opinion, is why certain moves are complained about and become synonymous with being "annoying". It's also the reason why any character can have a property that is annoying, regardless of viability. For example, sometimes I feel that Marth's tipper can be a bit overbearing, despite the fact that Marth is a mid-tier character (for the purposes of this example). His Smashes are relatively fast, hard to punish, and can kill at 40% if sweetspotted. So, hypothetically, I could complain about a move like that being annoying and that could hold no matter where Marth is on the tier list.
So, I believe that is why there have been discussions, such as that one about R.O.B.'s reflector, where people complain about a move in a vacuum, not taking into account the character's core viability.
