Official 4BR Tier List V3 - Competitive Insight & Analysis

[TDK]

Here's the top 8 for Dreamhack Denver tomorrow:

Winners:
ZeRo vs ESAM
Abadango vs Larry Lurr

Losers:
Javi vs Cosmos
Salem vs Karna

You can catch the stream here: twitch.tv/dreamhacksmash

 

[Lord Dio]

[QUOTE="The-Technique, post: 21856743, member: 371389i feel like people forget that the 3 best cloud mains have a minimum of 3 secondaries each[/QUOTE]Nitpick because it's bothering me a lil
Komo and tweek only have two (DK and bayo, sonic and roy), and in komo's case it's a dual main, not a secondary

 

[verbatim]

Well, her nair is the same as theirs startup wise. It's her fallspeed/gravity combination that makes her unable to use it nearly immediately after getting hit.

She also extends her hurtbox to put her foot out. Villager and Pacman probably have the best nairs specifically for combo-breaking because they tuck into a ball with the hitbox protroding all around it.

 

[Nobie]

Someone tell me if I'm crazy, but I've had a thought floating around my head the past couple of days:

"Fighting Bayonetta has made Smash 4 players better in general."

Looking at Samsora defeat top Meta Knights, once thought to be a horrific matchup (and still definitely not in Peach's favor by any means), I had to wonder what changed. Some things are that Samsora is better as a player, and that Peach's strong float-based neutral can fend off the linear mixup approach of MK. However, MK still has a kind of touch of death vs. floaties, so it's still a tall order.

But then I thought about how Bayo can touch-of-death a lot of characters, and as she becomes increasingly common in brackets it's become the responsibility of top players to know how to deal with her. What I'm considering is the notion that everyone having to fight Bayonetta, with her plethora of SCARY tools, has just made people better at neutral and just straight up steering clear of those danger scenarios. This, in turn, potentially translates to people being overall better at matchups where similar risks exist, like Peach vs. MK.

It might be sort of like Melee, where Fox is definitely the best character, but everyone knows how to fight Fox because he's so common.

 

[FeelMeUp]

I've said it before and I'll say it again.
Smash 4 players are not used to getting punished for being dumb.
Bayo makes you learn to not be dumb.
Her existence is bolstering the average user's skill level and weeds out all the bad players that cannot adapt.
For that, I appreciate her.

 

[R3D3MON]

Someone tell me if I'm crazy, but I've had a thought floating around my head the past couple of days:

"Fighting Bayonetta has made Smash 4 players better in general."

Looking at Samsora defeat top Meta Knights, once thought to be a horrific matchup (and still definitely not in Peach's favor by any means), I had to wonder what changed. Some things are that Samsora is better as a player, and that Peach's strong float-based neutral can fend off the linear mixup approach of MK. However, MK still has a kind of touch of death vs. floaties, so it's still a tall order.

But then I thought about how Bayo can touch-of-death a lot of characters, and as she becomes increasingly common in brackets it's become the responsibility of top players to know how to deal with her. What I'm considering is the notion that everyone having to fight Bayonetta, with her plethora of SCARY tools, has just made people better at neutral and just straight up steering clear of those danger scenarios. This, in turn, potentially translates to people being overall better at matchups where similar risks exist, like Peach vs. MK.

It might be sort of like Melee, where Fox is definitely the best character, but everyone knows how to fight Fox because he's so common.

If this wasn't obvious already, you must really have no idea what counterplay is.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

If this wasn't obvious already, you must really have no idea what counterplay is.

Obviously someone can't read

Bayo's existence makes eveyone better because she forces them not to play dumb. Not just in the MU, but in general.

 

[|RK|]

Bayo has certainly improved my gameplay. Learning how to drift to recover, SDI even common moves like G&W Nair, etc.

In either case, the loudest complaints probably came from people watching others deal with Bayo on the big stage.

Low & mid level players will still complain, but it doesn't carry as much weight by itself. As long as top players learn to deal with her - and they are learning - that means less upsets, and less weight behind the complaints.

Finally, a tangentially related point... The issue with X character being declared unstoppable or the best in the game is developing counterplay. Typically, a lot of the best evidence for a character being powerful or not losing any MUs is from someone heavily invested in that character. Problem is, you're not gonna sit around developing character Y's metagame to counter your strat.

Bayo vs Diddy is a perfect example. At first it was believed even, and then people thought she would eventually win that MU, too. And then it swung back in the other direction, and many believe it's even again - I've seen some say Diddy favor. Idk.

 

[R3D3MON]

Obviously someone can't read

Bayo's existence makes eveyone better because she forces them not to play dumb. Not just in the MU, but in general.

Once again, people have no idea what counterplay is.

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Once again, people have no idea what counterplay is.

Claims people are lacking knowledge.

Fails to elaborate.

Leave.


And I think we've talked about this before, and not just with bayo. we said how ryu, mk, bayo, and others really punishes you for making faulty mistakes and keeps you from playing sloppy. Though it was either multiple pages ago, or another thread.

 

[R3D3MON]

Claims people are lacking knowledge.

Fails to elaborate.

Leave.


And I think we've talked about this before, and not just with bayo. we said how ryu, mk, bayo, and others really punishes you for making faulty mistakes and keeps you from playing sloppy. Though it was either multiple pages ago, or another thread.

Why do I have to elaborate? You guys already did it for me.

 

[ARGHETH]

Why do I have to elaborate? You guys already did it for me.

Just say what you mean by counterplay and why Baby_Sneak is wrong before we have another twenty comment argument of absolutely nothing.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Why do I have to elaborate? You guys already did it for me.

Because this is a discussion forum, and this thread is specially demanding on purposeful posts.
You claimed you found an objection and didn't even attempt to explain your reasoning, that's a way to not contribute to the topic.


Also, as Zinoto said, you can learn to SDI Bayo's stuff, but the very best way to play around that is not to be in that position in the first place. She has a weak neutral (compared to other Top Tiers), so you should be able to exploit that. And yes, finding stuff that works might just carry over to the next matchup and prove useful there as well.

 

[HoSmash4]

Sheik nair is actually a decent combo breaker as it shifts her hurtbox as well as being a fast frame 3 move. Its situational but a lot less abusable than Luigi nair/villager nair since she also has the option to combo break with fair on reaction to the spacing

Results from the UK London Monthly:

Dat Blastzone 23 (81 Entrants)
https://smash.gg/tournament/dat-blastzone-23/events/wii-u-singles/brackets/164675
1.DKHO
2.IxisNaugus
3.Destany
4.Peli
5.SBF
5. Dat | Khanage
7. DAT | NGI | DX17
7. SCR7

 

[Rizen]

The 'ignore' feature is a useful thing, js.
________________

What's annoying about Bayo for a zoner is there are no safe pokes vs witch time. Against every other character things like Link's Zair, Utilt/Usmash from under a platform and Uair are safe even if they hit a counter. Spaced Fair, Nair, Ftilt and Dtilt are safe enough on shield to throw out. But not vs Bayo.

It's great she's teaching people to play safe but zoners have to completely adapt their gameplan.

_______________

IMO several (sub) tiers in ssb4 are fluid and shouln't be ordered. Bayo was dominating top tier for a while, then Diddy pulled ahead, now Cloud. It will keep shifting so we might as well count them as equals as the top 3.

 

[InfinitySoul]

HoSmash4 What are those untechable Nair you were talking about ?

 

[ElectricBlade]

There's a pretty cool video by Dark.Pch I found which was interesting to me, sure it's old but I think it's worth a watch since it wasn't seen by many people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeqC8KgYUPQ

For people who don't want to watch it. He went over various things Peach can do to be more optimal and safe. He says playing a style around not getting hit and only going for guaranteed punishes are what you should be doing to be optimal. He also says a lot of players in Smash 4 have a problem where they overcommit for kills and it makes their neutral much worse, and he plans to just keep playing his normal game at kill percent and let the kills come to him, or through putting them into a position of "lowest common denominator" as Emblem Lord puts it.

What do you all personally think is "optimal" play for your character? I'm personally a Cloud player, and I wanna hear your opinion on what optimal Cloud looks like.

 

[HoSmash4]

HoSmash4 What are those untechable Nair you were talking about ?

Untechahble spin animation

 

[Baby_Sneak]

There's a pretty cool video by Dark.Pch I found which was interesting to me, sure it's old but I think it's worth a watch since it wasn't seen by many people.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeqC8KgYUPQ

For people who don't want to watch it. He went over various things Peach can do to be more optimal and safe. He says playing a style around not getting hit and only going for guaranteed punishes are what you should be doing to be optimal. He also says a lot of players in Smash 4 have a problem where they overcommit for kills and it makes their neutral much worse, and he plans to just keep playing his normal game at kill percent and let the kills come to him, or through putting them into a position of "lowest common denominator" as Emblem Lord puts it.

What do you all personally think is "optimal" play for your character? I'm personally a Cloud player, and I wanna hear your opinion on what optimal Cloud looks like.

I personally don't like using the word "optimal" since being optimal is rarely attained when playing with all the variables (opponent, MU, condition during that moment in time, stage, in-game situations, personal strengths and weaknesses, etc...), but generally zard is patient and mobile. Wants his opponents to make a mistake and capitalize on it.

 

[TDK]

DreamHack Denver 2017 (280 Entrants) (Colorado)

1st: ZeRo
2nd: Salem
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Javi
5th: ESAM
5th: Abadango
7th: Karna
7th: Cosmos
9th: MVD
9th: Nero
9th: Dakpo
9th: BANG!
13th: Shoe
13th: Regulating_Mofo
13th: Candy
13th: Detta

Roy and Falco were used to sandbag in pools. Count them or not, it's up to you.

Also, Team Japan for Leo saga has been revealed. It consists of T , Tsu- , Raito , Shuton , Kameme , KEN ,and Kirihara .

EDIT: HIKARU too!

EDIT2: Think I've got the secondaries right now.

 

[Ark of Silence101]

DreamHack Denver 2017 (280 Entrants) (Colorado)

1st: ZeRo
2nd: Salem
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Javi
5th: ESAM
5th: Abadango
7th: Karna
7th: Cosmos
9th: MVD
9th: Nero
9th: Dakpo
9th: BANG!
13th: Shoe
13th: Regulating_Mofo
13th: Candy
13th: Detta

Roy and Falco were used to sandbag in pools. Count them or not, it's up to you.

Also, Team Japan for Leo saga has been revealed. It consists of T , Tsu- , Raito , Shuton , Kameme , KEN ,and Kirihara .

No Ranai? It's been a while since we seen him in the US.

 

[KakuCP9]

When did Larry use Falco? Did Larry manage to beat anyone him?

 

[Ark of Silence101]

When did Larry use Falco? Did Larry manage to beat anyone with him?

He sandbagged in pools with him. Same goes for ESAM's Roy who he dittoed in pools.

 

[Finh009]

No Ranai? It's been a while since we seen him in the US.

According to Vayseth, Ranai won't be able to compete as much anymore due to work. The same applies to 9B.

He hasn't retired though. He's already registered for Evo Japan, but we won't be seeing as much Ranai as we used to unfortunately.

​

Also HIKARU is also apart of the Team Japan.

 

[Ark of Silence101]

According to Vayseth, Ranai won't be able to compete as much anymore due to work. The same applies to 9B.

He hasn't retired though. He's already registered for Evo Japan, but we won't be seeing as much Ranai as we used to unfortunately.

​

Also HIKARU is also apart of the Team Japan.

Darn, feelsbadman.

 

[dakotaisgreat]

That is the best Team Japan ever, If I was able to hand pick any 8 japanese players those would be my picks.

Also, it's really disappointing to find out Larry didn't actually use Falco for anything and same with ESAM's Roy.

 

[MistressRemilia]

Who's Your Pappy 10 ( 177 Entrants ) ( Norcal )

1st: Tyrant ( Elegant )
2nd: Elegant ( Tyrant x2 )
3rd: Rich Brown ( Tyrant, Elegant )
4th: Shaky ( Rich Brown, Elegant )
5th: Vinnie ( Tyrant, Shaky )
5th: DSS ( Tyrant, Elegant )
7th: Charliedaking ( Rich Brown, DSS )
7th: Eon ( Elegant, Vinnie )
9th: Rideae ( SirReal [ ? ] , Vinnie )
9th: FuTure ( Lui$, Eon )
9th: Legit ( Shaky, DSS )
9th: Twan ( Shaky, Charliedaking )
13th: King Koopa ( Vinnie, Twan )
13th: Vermillion ( Charliedaking, FuTure )
13th: Zenyou ( Shaky, Rideae )
13th: Lui$ ( Vinnie, DSS )

Thought this tournament would have probably been missed despite its decent amount of relevant entrants & some fairly interesting results. I've seen a lot of doubts towards Meta Knight's legitimacy as a High Tier character given his less than stellar solo results & his rather poor theory ( Seen as supposedly having a kind of poor neutral, not the best matchups out there ) , so seeing a tournament like that is rather interesting. Not pretending that this serves as major proof against the aforementioned arguments ( I'd rather use the successful counterpicks done with Meta Knight towards character that he's been thought to be struggling with for a while, such as Diddy or Sonic: Nothing that big on Mario yet, but his decreasing relevance is certainly handy to MK ).

EDIT: Got something wrong: Tyrant got 3-0d by Elegant GF1, Thanks Game7a1

 

[Game7a1]

Who's Your Pappy 10 ( 177 Entrants ) ( Norcal )

1st: Tyrant ( Undefeated )
2nd: Elegant ( Tyrant x2 )
3rd: Rich Brown ( Tyrant, Elegant )
4th: Shaky ( Rich Brown, Elegant )
5th: Vinnie ( Tyrant, Shaky )
5th: DSS ( Tyrant, Elegant )
7th: Charliedaking ( Rich Brown, DSS )
7th: Eon ( Elegant, Vinnie )
9th: Rideae ( SirReal [ ? ] , Vinnie )
9th: FuTure ( Lui$, Eon )
9th: Legit ( Shaky, DSS )
9th: Twan ( Shaky, Charliedaking )
13th: King Koopa ( Vinnie, Twan )
13th: Vermillion ( Charliedaking, FuTure )
13th: Zenyou ( Shaky, Rideae )
13th: Lui$ ( Vinnie, DSS )

Thought this tournament would have probably been missed despite its decent amount of relevant entrants & some fairly interesting results. I've seen a lot of doubts towards Meta Knight's legitimacy as a High Tier character given his less than stellar solo results & his rather poor theory ( Seen as supposedly having a kind of poor neutral, not the best matchups out there ) , so seeing a tournament like that is rather interesting. Not pretending that this serves as major proof against the aforementioned arguments ( I'd rather use the successful counterpicks done with Meta Knight towards character that he's been thought to be struggling with for a while, such as Diddy or Sonic: Nothing that big on Mario yet, but his decreasing relevance is certainly handy to MK ).

According to the bracket, Elegant 3-0 Tyrant in Grands for the reset.
Speaking of Elegant, he also 3-0'd DSS. Given Elegant played against 2 different Meta Knights (one of which he lost to twice), I wonder, through the perspective of a Luigi main, the Luigi-MK matchup is like.

 

[Skeeter Mania]

Nice to see Shaky performing again! And quite well with 4th place and wins on Zenyou, Legit, and Vinnie.

 

[|RK|]

Re: Cloud as the best character

Don't forget this from June:

There was a problem fetching the tweet

If we count every tournament, yeah the results get muddied. But if you count just B-tier events or higher, Cloud is in a consistent place, with top players removed and without.

Could very well be the best character in the game, IMO. But, as stated - it's safest to just say Diddy/Bayo/Cloud in some order.

 

[Ziodyne 21]

From results and opinions. I think the top tier cam be organised like this. (In no particular order in each line)











What I am actullay more interested in as of late is what could possibly the the order of "high tier" characters. say around the 11-20 mark.

/ have always been thought of high tier characters for a while and we have also been seeing strong performances from and as well lately. I wonder if people think these or other viable characters are have are currently underrated and have a chance to grow or even move up in the meta?

 

[MercuryPenny]

what exactly is it about mk's neutral that sucks? he obviously can't play it like most swordies since he's got more of a kitchen knife and his aerials aren't very useful, but he has a handful of decent grounded pokes, forward smash, and an okay grab game. maybe i'm just missing something but he seems pretty middle-of-the-road in that regard

ehhhh...

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

I don't see anything wrong with Mario or Mewtwo at 9&10. Who else could you realistically put ahead of them?

Corrin? She's on a hot streak and has earned that 12th spot she's at right now but there needs to be more long term success before I would push her that far.

Ryu? Marthcina? While they haven't fallen off or anything I can't buy a argument over them being over Mario and Mewtwo just yet they've shown a bit more inconsistent than the former.

Only character I can buy is Corrin and I'm not totally convinced of her being over those two just yet, close but not quite.

 

[MercuryPenny]

i don't really disagree with 9/10, but top tier sounds like a bit of a stretch. there are only a handful of mewtwo mains doing anything; despite the plethora of mario players he only gets consistent top 24; and both of them have kinda stagnated since 2016. top of high sounds about right, imo they're closer to characters like luigi and marth than to fox or zss right now

 

[Skeeter Mania]

i don't really disagree with 9/10, but top tier sounds like a bit of a stretch. there are only a handful of mewtwo mains doing anything; despite the plethora of mario players he only gets consistent top 24; and both of them have kinda stagnated since 2016. top of high sounds about right, imo they're closer to characters like luigi and marth than to fox or zss right now

Keep in mind that list is a few months outdated.

 

[Frihetsanka]

Only character I can buy is Corrin and I'm not totally convinced of her being over those two just yet, close but not quite.

Yeah, let's not swing the pendulum too far. Corrin could potentially be around #12-14 or so, maybe even #11, but top 10? Or top tier? Eh. She's somewhere in high tier, I'd say.

As for Mario and Mewtwo in #9 and #10, sure, that seems plausible. Ryu could potentially be higher but who else would be? Perhaps Pikachu, if ESAM is to be believed (and a few other top players who hold Pikachu in very high regard).

 

[ARGHETH]

Yeah, let's not swing the pendulum too far. Corrin could potentially be around #12-14 or so, maybe even #11, but top 10? Or top tier? Eh. She's somewhere in high tier, I'd say.

Yes please, I like his position as high tier ish. Corrin really shouldn't be considered when talking about top tiers.

 

[my_T]

Olimar for high tier

 

[ぱみゅ]

Eh, I still believe in Mario, the theory points to him being bad, but in practice people make mistakes, Mario grabs you once and tears your stock apart. His meta isn't evolving because Ally isn't at his prime and ANTi is as much of a rollercoaster as ever, but then RON's results are getting better (though he also uses other characters).

 

[Baby_Sneak]

Eh, I still believe in Mario, the theory points to him being bad, but in practice people make mistakes, Mario grabs you once and tears your stock apart. His meta isn't evolving because Ally isn't at his prime and ANTi is as much of a rollercoaster as ever, but then RON's results are getting better (though he also uses other characters).

Speaking of a stagnant meta, do ally or anti or any high lvl Mario player ever use Dsmash like that? Frame 5 move? Fast as all his tilts? Also kills?

I think that move is real low key.