Official 4BR Tier List v1.0 - Competitive Impressions

[Das Koopa]

ESAM emphasized on several occasions that things weren't in order and they were sectioned off. Pikachu wasn't his #1 at all.

Can people at least watch the videos before they spread misinformation?

 

[Vyrnx]

Sheik's ledge snap also can avoid the 2 frame, or has a disjointed, invincible on start-up hitbox. G&W also has a big disjoint on up-b, intangible for a long time (5-13), and if you get hit it sends you flying because of 60 BKB/80 KBG. Quick Attack has neither, so it's easier to punish in general.

I also never said go off-stage, just 2 frame. Free damage, and some characters can set up for kills off it like Fox.

I see 2 frame punishes don't matter for G&W but do for Pikachu. You also said, when comparing the two characters, that G&W's has intangibility, but you just said you wouldn't go off stage vs Pikachu, so why does that comparison matter? But whatever.

Hitting Pika during 2 frame gives him back his DJ, which combined with the ability to go on stage, under the stage (or wall jump on DH), and stall, makes what you are saying impossible given the number of options Pika has off stage. And platforms just give him more.

Pretend like literally all of Pika's options don't exist or just ignore them, place him in a totally one dimensional world where he has one good option and only bad other options, like jumping to the ledge, which is exactly what your description was, and what you are describing would still be impossible. No player can 2 frame every time because the timing is incredibly strict. But even that doesn't matter because it would be giving in to your argument that Pika has only one good recovery option, up b to the ledge, and that is absurd.

How in the world is Pika susceptible to, "free damage," when recovering? I guess everyone but Sheik and MK are just extremely exploitable off stage, ZSS just has to tether to the ledge and then you can hit her for free damage, and her vertical recovery range just sucks, Villager, you can just pop his balloons, punish Bayo's side b on reaction, wait for Dedede to ledge snap and then spike him.

People try to make out every character's recovery as bad, except teleports because in the land of comparisons characters with teleport recoveries will never have to go low or anything, but the thing that we've known since release and that still holds true is that many characters have very good recoveries. Surprisingly enough Pika actually has a pretty good recovery (how is this argument happening rn).

The reason why this bugs me so much is because of this thread's attitude towards Pikachu, and this discussion of Pika's bad recovery just confirms it.

Off the top of my head, the discussions that stick out are,

Random user: "Pika might be pretty good (gives old reasoning)."
Mod replies: "Let's please never discuss Pikachu EVER again."

"Pika won Combo Breaker."
Someone replies the next day: "Pikachu is on life support."

"Pikachu doesn't struggle in this MU (doesn't say anything that implies anything about uthrow thunder)."
"Why? And please don't say uthrow thunder."

"Pikachu has a very good recovery."
"Exploitable. 2 frame him, free damage."

This isn't made up, if these posts weren't so scattered over the last 6-8 months I would find them and quote them.

The issue is that many of the good writers in this thread are on the, "Pika isn't good," side, and since nobody really understands Pika well enough to refute them, everyone else is just bandwagoning and make absolutely awful posts about Pikachu all the time, which is why Pika discussion happens so much. Pika bandwagoning fills the thread with bullcrap to the ceiling, and then when someone says something, the actual good writers/players put in their two cents about Pika being overrated/Pika discussion is bad (followed by the inevitable, very stupid, "Waitin for Pika to become a RED TOPIC, give me likes in the spare time tho" from one of the bandwagoners). And then this cycle continues and the attitudes perpetuate, which drives out any of the few people who know a lot about Pikachu.

The only way the thread would have valuable discussion about Pikachu would be if someone who knows what they are talking about from the other side of things chipped in, like A10thehero, but why would they, when this thread is so full of garbage when Pikachu gets brought up?

Pikachu discussion shouldn't even be a bad thing. It's not wasting time with a character that isn't relevant. Pika has proven time and again to be relevant, and his relevancy will only increase when Esam goes to some of the big tournaments during summer that other top players are at (which he hasn't really been doing lately). He's an interesting high tier with a lot of unique tools and has a very important person repping them successfully.

 

[Emblem Lord]

If you don't want to disrespect people you shouldn't call them delusional.

The video is very markedly advertised as HIS OPINION. I might not agree with some of them, but I can at the very least listen to his explanation and understand why he has those opinions.

See here is the thing...his reasoning flies in the face of pikas overall results and what he has shown in these past two years.

He also glossed over Pikas weaknesses but over inflated the weaknesses of other top level chars.

How can anyone ignore that?

I agree with ALOT of what ESAM says about the community. He thinks the community is a bunch of weaklings.

So do I.

He thinks the community would rather cry then train hard and get stronger.

So do I.

He feels patch culture is bad for the community.

So do I.

But when it comes to Pika, boy oh boy I feel he always has on the rose tinted glasses. And I actually agree with a good chunk of his list and the part about Pikas recovery being damn good.

 

[Nidtendofreak]

Hitting Pika during 2 frame gives him back his DJ, which combined with the ability to go on stage, under the stage (or wall jump on DH), and stall, makes what you are saying impossible given the number of options Pika has off stage. And platforms just give him more.

I was going to stay out of this discussion, but its strictly speaking not impossible to heavily punish Pika while he's recovering. 2-Framing with Ike's Eruption or ZSS's Down B Spike are death sentences at the right percents as examples. Sure a few other characters have moves like that. Or a true combo if say Fox has one off of a 2 Frame unto Usmash (I think he does?).

And even if you can't kill him off of the 2-Frame... if you're hitting him you are in fact still getting free damage on him. Which is what Mario766 was saying.

Pika's recovery is pretty good to be sure, but it ain't impossible to punish it. You're slightly overselling it. And I do mean slightly, no sarcasm there.

 

[ShadowGuy1]

Esam, this tier list is almost as bad as Event Hubs. First you putas a potential #1 or also known as top 4, when literally the tier below it says MU struggles. PIKACHU LOSES LIKE 40-60 TO MARIO. Yes Esam has been placing well recently, however the crowd is almost always the same, Panda Global peeps and Tyroy, which like 2 others added in. Not only that, but and AND ANDBELOW PIKACHU. Yes, he has an opinion, we all do, however the opinions used when making a tier list should involve even the tiniest of reasearch, not just your experience. The players experience should always be a factor, however you lost to Teb, someone who did not even make it out of Round 2 pools, who used , then say now the matchup is only 55-45, is just ridiculous. Next up your place, wait a minute. I wonder what category falls into. He has a REALLY bad match up vs Rosalina, yet he is placed above Mewtwo. I would rant more, but wait, I WILL RANT MORE. neutral being bad is turning into a meme. 's placement just makes me sick, same with being not in the fatal flaw tier, or being too high. I am done.


EDIT: I also agree with a lot of things Emblem Lord mentioned in his post above, so there is that.

 

[DblCrest]

Emblem Lord
What do you mean by patch culture?

Vyrnx
While I agree with your points I actually DON'T think we get any meaningful discussion from discussing Esam's opinions these days.It just turns into the usual . 'Get a load of this guy' half the time =/ I doubt that will change until Esam places a lot higher than usual. Whenever someone gives him trouble in a tournament people are quick to jump at the opportunity even.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Patch (Nerf) Culture - A state in which the competitive community knows that the dev team is keeping close tabs on the tournament scene as well as public opinion. Thus when something is deemed too powerful, it is understood that with enough complaining and enough loud voices, the dev team will strike down any char deemed too powerful by the community at large. This can lead to metagame stagnation out of fear that if something with a char is discovered thats too strong, that character will be nerfed to oblivion and that char communities hard effort will be for nothing. This has the effect of players not investing as much time into a character or just not taking the metagame as seriously.

This is specifically nerf culture really. There are diff variations of patch culture.

SFV has patch culture right now where it is dependent on monthly updates to keep up interest. That's not a bad thing necessarily because it reintroduces hype, but it creates a community thats NEEDS its monthly "dosage" to keep going. Almost like a drug addiction.

 

[Vyrnx]

I was going to stay out of this discussion, but its strictly speaking not impossible to heavily punish Pika while he's recovering. 2-Framing with Ike's Eruption or ZSS's Down B Spike are death sentences at the right percents as examples. Sure a few other characters have moves like that. Or a true combo if say Fox has one off of a 2 Frame unto Usmash (I think he does?).

And even if you can't kill him off of the 2-Frame... if you're hitting him you are in fact still getting free damage on him. Which is what Mario766 was saying.

Pika's recovery is pretty good to be sure, but it ain't impossible to punish it. You're slightly overselling it. And I do mean slightly, no sarcasm there.

You're right and I shouldn't have used absolutes like impossible or whatever.
The fact, though, that Pika has so many mixups during recovery that it comes down to guessing which option he will take, and then having to rely on the 2 frame (but only if you guess he will go to the ledge) is a strength of Pika's recovery, not a weakness. The 2 frame is tough to hit of course, unless you are a floaty with a good lingering nair (@Nobie has mentioned before that Puff's nair is one of the best for catching the 2 frame, and he's right), otherwise, the character probably falls fast enough that that combined with Pika's up b timing mixups makes catching it very tough. The startup on most moves that hit below the ledge is high enough (usually just high enough to be significant), the variation on up b timings across the cast is great enough, that catching 2 frames from above stage becomes a guessing game pretty often, that the recovering character will probably win, and if the guesser wins, they usually get very little. The exceptions would be Ike's eruption, which could be where mario766 is coming from, and especially Fox's utilt, which is just so dang good.

 

[|RK|]

zero opinions throughout this gae have been very off most of the timeregardless of where esam put pikachu it would look bias either for (as in esam list) or underselling your main when everyone knows the are both good. *looks at zero* i never pay attention when players rate tier own mains it can be interesting to hear but i kinda just put it off to the side

Every top Diddy main thinks he's not the best. ZeRo freely admitted that Sheik was the best pre-nerf. But both chars clearly struggle at points.

 

[verbatim]

So do I.

My point had nothing to do with the substance of his video. You can say "I disagree because X" without calling someone delusional and weak.

 

[ARISTOS]

It's interesting seeing a top player not underestimating their main.

I don't think there is anything new to say about at this point, the cast around him has gotten weaker while he has stayed the same. This summer should give us a good indicator on where he stands.

 

[Emblem Lord]

I didn't call ESAM weak. That would be idiotic of me, since he is a very strong player.

However, what else do you call someone that denies reality, but delusional?

It's a descriptive adjective. My words were blunt, but accurate.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Idk where I'm going with this, but how would Mario change if his fireball was actually good (FAF 53 --> 37 or something)?

 

[TheGlove]

Just to set the record straight, what marios has esam lost to? So far I've got ally, who has proven to be a better player overall, anti, who has proven to be a better player overall, and teb who is an outlier. There are some external factors that may have played a part in the teb match but esam didn't use them to John the loss so I won't mention them.

Victories over Mario I know of are beating vic, beefy smash doods member I think, at beast and recently beating smasher1001 in pika mario. Anti has also recently stated that he does not think the match up is that in marios favor after playing captain L a much more defensive pika, a plays style esam has started to adapt into his own.

Furthermore can we sight some results of other relevant pika's getting stomped by mario. Nakat, Z, Captain l, shimitake, formerly cosmos, and pika pika perhaps.

I'm not debating the strengths Mario has in the match up, I just don't like it when people state things like esam is losing to every Mario or all pika's are getting stomped but I'm unable to find any hard evidence and none is provided.

Sorry for any errors I'm on a phone is greece

 

[C0rvus]

The big one was losing to Teb at... Big House? Genesis? One of those. Even then it was a close set, but an upset nonetheless.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Idk where I'm going with this, but how would Mario change if his fireball was actually good (FAF 53 --> 37 or something)?

In the name of all that is holy do not wish for such blasphemy.

But no seriously he would basically be even more braindead then the reputation he has already. Mid range would be stupid hard for his opponents and grabs would be darn near free.

 

[verbatim]

You did to people, in general. I'm not in their position, but I'd argue that if the smashboards community as a whole was a lot less toxic towards them, pro players would actually use it.

This isn't a fight. Going around calling people delusional is dumb and the reason why so many professional players don't share their opinions more.

 

[Sinister Slush]

I dunno why people are so surprised by this. ESAM has always been like this even in brawl days.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJLmgnFpJg8

 

[R3D3MON]

Idk where I'm going with this, but how would Mario change if his fireball was actually good (FAF 53 --> 37 or something)?

It is already good. Unless you were talking about the move in a vacuum (but even then the bounce from Mario's fireball is perfect for locking people into shielding and FH rising fireball is great because mario's fireball is affected by gravity and the FH cancels Fireball's endlag).

 

[~ Gheb ~]

People always talk about Mario when it comes to Pikachu's poor matchups.

What about Sheik? Pikachu's exceedingly poor record against her didn't go away just because ESAM hasn't played Void, Mr r, Vinnie, K9 or Zero in a while. The claim that Pikachu supposedly does 'well' against Sheik has been, and still is, entirely based on ESAM's claims which contradicts all observable data we have.
ESAM has a clear losing record against Larry's Fox and he lost to xzax's Fox as well. No matter how much you john about 'mental blocks' or Larry having 'ESAM's number', even the claim that Pikachu goes even with Fox is an optimistic one with our current knowledge.

No reliable data exists that Pikachu is better than even with Cloud [next to no data available], Bayonetta [ditto], Ditty Kong, Rosalina [Esam's 1-1 vs dabuz], Sonic, ZSS [often wrongfully cited as one of Pikachu's "defining" matchups, results don't support this claim at all], Mewtwo or Meta Knight [all we know is that Jband has beaten ESAM once].
So on top of Pikachu traditionally doing poorly against Mario and Sheik and at best going even with Fox, Pikachu has nothing in his favor that supports any claims of him beating anybody good right now. Pikachu still has a lot to prove, and that can't just be explained by his lack of representation. A lot of people would love to have their character repped by a player like ESAM.

 

[Zannabluke]

Idk where I'm going with this, but how would Mario change if his fireball was actually good (FAF 53 --> 37 or something)?

replace mario with doc and fireball with megavitamins
now it's a good question

 

[FeelMeUp]

Every single pikachu and fox player will tell you Pikachu wins the matchup.
why are you using results of a clearly inconsistent player that even says he's the one holding Pikachu back(also supported by non-ESAM pikachu players, mind you) to try and debunk MU ratios?

 

[BunbUn129]

People always talk about Mario when it comes to Pikachu's poor matchups.

What about Sheik? Pikachu's exceedingly poor record against her didn't go away just because ESAM hasn't played Void, Mr r, Vinnie, K9 or Zero in a while. The claim that Pikachu supposedly does 'well' against Sheik has been, and still is, entirely based on ESAM's claims which contradicts all observable data we have.
ESAM has a clear losing record against Larry's Fox and he lost to xzax's Fox as well. No matter how much you john about 'mental blocks' or Larry having 'ESAM's number', even the claim that Pikachu goes even with Fox is an optimistic one with our current knowledge.

No reliable data exists that Pikachu is better than even with Cloud [next to no data available], Bayonetta [ditto], Ditty Kong, Rosalina [Esam's 1-1 vs dabuz], Sonic, ZSS [often wrongfully cited as one of Pikachu's "defining" matchups, results don't support this claim at all], Mewtwo or Meta Knight [all we know is that Jband has beaten ESAM once].
So on top of Pikachu traditionally doing poorly against Mario and Sheik and at best going even with Fox, Pikachu has nothing in his favor that supports any claims of him beating anybody good right now. Pikachu still has a lot to prove, and that can't just be explained by his lack of representation. A lot of people would love to have their character repped by a player like ESAM.

Tyrant also beat ESAM 3-2 back at 2GG: ESAM Saga. Both the Tyrant and Jband sets were pre-1.1.5, so their relevance is debatable as up air strings played a non-trivial role in those matches, with Jband using the ladder combo to come back from a 130% deficit in game 4, and with Tyrant punishing at least two air dodges in a row with up airs before finishing with Shuttle Loop. The Pikachu match-up was in MK's favor back then, and maybe still is slightly, though I'm willing to believe it's even.

 

[Reapers]

Tyrant also beat ESAM 3-2 back at 2GG: ESAM Saga. Both the Tyrant and Jband sets were pre-1.1.5, so their relevance is debatable as up air strings played a non-trivial role in those matches, with Jband using the ladder combo to come back from a 130% deficit in game 4. It was in MK's favor back then, and maybe still is slightly, though I'm willing to believe it's even.

Adding to this, Tyroy also beat Esam 2-0 with MK at Midwest Mayhem 3 about a week ago. I think the match-up is still in MK's favor.

 

[Rizen]

Patch (Nerf) Culture - A state in which the competitive community knows that the dev team is keeping close tabs on the tournament scene as well as public opinion. Thus when something is deemed too powerful, it is understood that with enough complaining and enough loud voices, the dev team will strike down any char deemed too powerful by the community at large. This can lead to metagame stagnation out of fear that if something with a char is discovered thats too strong, that character will be nerfed to oblivion and that char communities hard effort will be for nothing. This has the effect of players not investing as much time into a character or just not taking the metagame as seriously.

This is specifically nerf culture really. There are diff variations of patch culture.

SFV has patch culture right now where it is dependent on monthly updates to keep up interest. That's not a bad thing necessarily because it reintroduces hype, but it creates a community thats NEEDS its monthly "dosage" to keep going. Almost like a drug addiction.

I agree to some extent but we do have the most balanced official SSB game ever where it's hard to choose a single best character and underdogs like Bowser can give the best players of high tiers a run for their money. The dev team knows what they're doing.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

It is already good. Unless you were talking about the move in a vacuum (but even then the bounce from Mario's fireball is perfect for locking people into shielding and FH rising fireball is great because mario's fireball is affected by gravity and the FH cancels Fireball's endlag).

It's not really. Good Projectiles don't become useless in certain MUs.

In the name of all that is holy do not wish for such blasphemy.

But no seriously he would basically be even more braindead then the reputation he has already. Mid range would be stupid hard for his opponents and grabs would be darn near free.

I think he would receive much more dimension than what he already has. He's a Rushdown character that has a limited amount of ways to do anything. Straight forward combos, straight forward moveset, and straight forward everything. Very boring character to play with (idk how ally and ANTI can stick with this square box).

 

[ARISTOS]

 

[BunbUn129]

Adding to this, Tyroy also beat Esam 2-0 with MK at Midwest Mayhem 3 about a week ago. I think the match-up is still in MK's favor.

Yeah but I have to go and rewatch the matches to see how both players handled the match-up. Right now the only thing I can remember is that game 2 ended with ESAM QA'ing right into Meta Knight's up smash.

Edit: both games were very close, and ESAM was just a hair away from capitalizing on a missed tech game 1, which would've given him the game. Then he also lost his first stock to Shuttle Loop OoS for throwing out Thunder without a set-up, for some reason. I wonder if Tyroy was specifically reading QA in game 2 with that up smash. We know Tyroy is a pretty good player so I don't think he was riding on the MU being definitively winning.
The main thing giving MK a slight advantage is Shuttle Loop set-ups.

 

[TheGoodGuava]

The Pikachu vs Sheik MU was almost even but still in Sheiks favor prepatch and considering the amount of games Esam ALMOST won against ZeRo and his winning record against most other top Sheik mains I agree with it being a 45:55 back then. Now we can only assume the MU has gotten easier for Pikachu and closer to even

 

[Das Koopa]

stupidly situational but definitely something to keep in mind i guess

 

[Foie]

And then there's jigglypuff.

I agree to some extent but we do have the most balanced official SSB game ever where it's hard to choose a single best character and underdogs like Bowser can give the best players of high tiers a run for their money. The dev team knows what they're doing.

 

[Das Koopa]

Smash.gg has these relevant tournies for this weekend

Supersmash Mania (El Paso)
KTAR XVIII (Tristate)
Smash n' Splash II (Illinois)

Possibly a British Columbia tourney called Rain City Smash (?) too if it garners enough more entrants, currently at 79.

Anything not on Smash.gg?

 

[Djent]

I mostly agree with Gheb, except where noted:

Rosalina [Esam's 1-1 vs dabuz]

I feel the need to mention their 10-game series that went convincingly in ESAM's favor. I mean it was online, and I kind of doubt Pika actually wins the MU, but there was still some good stuff on display there IMO.

Meta Knight [all we know is that Jband has beaten ESAM once].

We know a lot more. ESAM won his rematch vs. Jband at TGC6, has struggled (but usually come out over top of) Sect in NC, and recently lost 0-2 to Tyroy's tertiary MK. That's a lot of data suggesting Pika has a tough time in the MU. It's probably not terrible, and I think it got better in 1.1.5, but yeah it's still kind of rough.

 

[FeelMeUp]

I mostly agree with Gheb, except where noted:
I feel the need to mention their 10-game series that went convincingly in ESAM's favor. I mean it was online, and I kind of doubt Pika actually wins the MU, but there was still some good stuff on display there IMO.
We know a lot more. ESAM won his rematch vs. Jband at TGC6, has struggled (but usually come out over top of) Sect in NC, and recently lost 0-2 to Tyroy's tertiary MK. That's a lot of data suggesting Pika has a tough time in the MU. It's probably not terrible, and I think it got better in 1.1.5, but yeah it's still kind of rough.

Why would you doubt that Pika wins the Rosa MU if both ESAM and Dabuz have constantly said Pika wins it convincingly?

 

[TDK]

How many infinites does this character have?!

 

[Djent]

FeelMeUp because that's not how matchup ratios work ever? (The post I quoted contains a good example. ESAM and Larry both insist Pika wins the MU, but ESAM hasn't beaten Larry and also lost a MM to Xzax 0-3). Subjective impressions of difficulty don't perfectly track the actual thing, which could be a post of its own.

 

[L9999]

How many infinites does this character have?!

As much as Umeki's free time allows. In all seriousness, this is extremely situational. How often can Peach pull out Mr. Saturns?

 

[TDK]

As much as Umeki's free time allows. In all seriousness, this is extremely situational. How often can Peach pull out Mr. Saturns?

True. But if you do get one, you can do that or fish for shield breaks. Either one works.

 

[Shaya]

Dang, it's almost like every time I've talked about PIkachu it hasn't been referencing frame data, attributes, perceivable match ups and game mechanics, but rather just a post that says let's not talk about pikachu ever again.
Let's be real here. for a long stretch of time people who talk pro-pika didn't seem able to comprehend an alternative opinion that he's overrated. When "useless statistics" get brought up like no killing aerials, poor aerial mobility and average range (other than range, Diddy suffers this too; a solid reason to see him as overrated), the response one gets is a repeat of their previous statement, #_#. Talking about Pikachu has been much like talking to a wall (I'm not the only one experiencing this), hence why I've said as a running joke "let's never talk about pikachu ever again". Not like I've ever moderated people for just talking about Pikachu, but most would realise its rarely been a positive or healthy conversation.

I can see why people think Pikachu is good, why can't Pro-Pikas actually comprehend why people don't see the character as that good? Most will not even acknowledge the objective things which can be argued to hold him back.
First and foremost, talking about Pika here is the worst kind of awful circle jerk this thread has ever experienced, ON ALL SIDES and this has been happening longer than I've even been "Anti-Pika". I've purposely not participated in a lot of them because I accept I've personally pushed things in that direction (but when a small group of people spout delusional things in a thread that's meant to be above that/attempt to be objective, what do you expect?).
Someone like A10 has always been a positive force behind Pika, and I haven't seen anyone attack him for the information or fleshed out and justified opinions he provides in this thread - everyone should post like this to be quite honest, then we would live in a utopia of ultimate discourse and wouldn't have a building vitriol towards characters or players.

Of course, I've almost always noted the caveat which Pikachu could be a lot better than I actively rate him. I just very much doubt the average smash player is able to fully comprehend where his meta could go to push him that far (referring to those who think he's been top 4/2/1 since release...); and the continual denial of weaknesses or shortfalls (every top character has them, but they also have consistent showings of over coming them) makes it hard for me to NOT push the alternative perspective. If the spectrum of discussion around Pikachu wasn't so initially jaded to the far right (ESAM-opinions), I wouldn't have had to go so hard to the left for the purpose of sanity or bringing things back towards neutral.

If anything has been kind to Pikachu, it's been the patches affecting everyone else. The likelihood of him being 15th or worse about a year ago seems realistic. Pika was a character with good-great attributes but nothing that allowed him to be top tier (inb4 "edge guarding") - when the game was full of superior damage racking and kill confirms that Pikachu couldn't hold a candle to in tandem to his shortfalls.
Now, this character has a shot because of where the meta has gone. It doesn't seem farfetched to pose the question "how much worse is Pika compared to Sheik"? (ignoring range, frame data and other attributes sheik is superior in, but conversely remembering things Pika is superior in: raw KOs, hurtbox, pokes like down tilt/aerial tjolt, etc) but even then the answer to that question is feasibly not that much.

The top section of the tier list right now is pretty compacted with a few exceptions. Top 5 may be one thing, but there could be 20 different characters in top 10.
Also Pika's PP game is quite solid.

With that in mind though, holy cow Mario (the same amount of patch kindness he's received; not as a pika-jab).
Oh and, Pikachu's recovery is pretty awesome. One can intercept due to the aerial mobility and low up-b priority, but that's petty rare and limited to very few characters, Pika has the mix ups to generally avoid most attempts.

 

[ILOVESMASH]

ESAM's mindset on his character may be inaccurate, but his mentality is still miles better than that of most other top players, which is too underrate their character to no end to make their achievements seem all the more impressive. ESAM's opinions at least don't over glorify his achievements (if anything it does the opposite) and inspire newer players to pickup Pikachu and develop / understand his meta.