Official 4BR Tier List V4 - Competitive Insight & Analysis

[The_Bookworm]

But, strictly for the sake of discussion, how do we feel about Zelda taking over Puff's spot? The main reps I know for her are Purple Guy (who I thought stopped playing a while ago, but maybe I'm mistaken) and Onpu (who does okay every now and then). She certainly has some good tools (Faores Wind, anyone? DTilt, anyone?). But Zelda is fundamentally broken at the character design level in my opinion, and not at all in a good way.

Never heard of ven before? He is considered the best Zelda player in the world, especially after his performance at Battle for Vegas.
Purple Guy a sort of semi-active when the year started. She is a better character than Puff though lol, but the extent of her placement of her tier is best observed at Hyrule Saga.

 

[MarioManTAW]

Raito's results are very weird, almost end of 2017 Taiheita like. Having good peaks (like at Switchfest), but underperforms at some tournaments like this one.

Also, this tournament is still not counted in the PGR for some reason.

For the record, Raito has been known in the past to struggle in the ditto.

 

[Lord Dio]

how do you miss Big D?

Because as Yonder said, Big D's DDD is gone. Not to mention it never had any really notable wins.

...am I being wooshed here? Because the only wins Captain L has on Leo and Mr R are with Pikachu.

WHOOPS
my bad
I kinda just assumed he used puff for them
silly late night me

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

I've been saying Puff isn't the worst character in this game for a while now. I've seen Puff appear in results at better peaks than D3 or 1111 Mii Sword/Brawler along with getting actual wins here and there (Though that's not really a good metric character viability) Puff has a few MUs she's able to do fine in (Do Falcon players still believe they lose to Puff?) and I honestly can't say D3 or 1111 Mii Sword/Brawler have any MUs they could win let alone very many even ones.

Zelda, Puff, Mii Brawler, D3, Mii Sword are my order for worst five. It's a race to the bottom which isn't saying much for these characters but I don't think Puff is the worst.

 

[Iridium]

Raito's results are very weird, almost end of 2017 Taiheita like. Having good peaks (like at Switchfest), but underperforms at some tournaments like this one.

Also, this tournament is still not counted in the PGR for some reason.

I'm not sure about that. Some people say this is a B-tier tourney, unless the decision was changed.

 

[Minordeth]

Wow, an Umebura that Choco won that Aba also placed well at. What a complete surprise.


Actually wait, it’s also an Umebura that 2017 Eim showed up at. That’s pretty cool tho. I love watching Eim bring out that sleek, lightning fast Sheik.

 

[MarioManTAW]

Because as Yonder said, Big D's DDD is gone. Not to mention it never had any really notable wins.

Is Tyrant at Genesis 4 notable? (won with both D3 and Mario, I think it was). Also, I wouldn't be surprised if at least one win on Locus was with D3.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Is Tyrant at Genesis 4 notable? (won with both D3 and Mario, I think it was). Also, I wouldn't be surprised if at least one win on Locus was with D3.

Tyrant is a MK main. Plus he got 33rd there, which isn't too notable.

Edit: Did you mean Big D defeating Tyrant? Opps.

 

[Lord Dio]

Is Tyrant at Genesis 4 notable? (won with both D3 and Mario, I think it was). Also, I wouldn't be surprised if at least one win on Locus was with D3.

I mean..........kindof, yeah (but less and less each passing day rn imo), but as you said D3 wouldn't have been used for the whole set

 

[Iridium]

Wow, an Umebura that Choco won that Aba also placed well at. What a complete surprise.


Actually wait, it’s also an Umebura that 2017 Eim showed up at. That’s pretty cool tho. I love watching Eim bring out that sleek, lightning fast Sheik.

Remember, Choco's also going to have the chance to go to EVO 2018! We may finally see him in the US again in years!

 

[Prince Koopa Jr]

Remember, Choco's also going to have the chance to go to EVO 2018! We may finally see him in the US again in years!

That would be great, Choco is one of the best ZSS players and the best ZSS in Japan.

 

[J0eyboi]

I can agree with Puff being better than DDD, though it has absolutely nothing to do with Puff upsetting Kome (Out of curiosity, was that set recorded?). DDD just doesn't feel threatening in any way. He can't kill for ****, he has terrible mobility, and he gets completely bodied in disadvantage. The only thing about him that feels threatening is his damage, but again, he can't kill, so it hardly even matters. Puff actually has things that are threatening, and that alone puts her above DDD imo. As for 1111 Miis, I don't know if they're worse than Puff and DDD, but 1111 Swordfighter has the worst recovery in the game.

 

[The_Bookworm]

I can agree with Puff being better than DDD, though it has absolutely nothing to do with Puff upsetting Kome (Out of curiosity, was that set recorded?). DDD just doesn't feel threatening in any way. He can't kill for ****, he has terrible mobility, and he gets completely bodied in disadvantage. The only thing about him that feels threatening is his damage, but again, he can't kill, so it hardly even matters. Puff actually has things that are threatening, and that alone puts her above DDD imo. As for 1111 Miis, I don't know if they're worse than Puff and DDD, but 1111 Swordfighter has the worst recovery in the game.

Can possibly agree with this, although I am going to be patient myself to make a full-on opinion on Puff vs DDD.

Mii Sword's recovery is worse than say: Little Mac, Dr. Mario, Ganondorf, Roy, Cloud, Falcon? Even Brawler has a worse recovery. Sword's recovery is bad, but there are worse recoveries out there.

 

[J0eyboi]

Can possibly agree with this, although I am going to be patient myself to make a full-on opinion on Puff vs DDD.

Mii Sword's recovery is worse than say: Little Mac, Dr. Mario, Ganondorf, Roy, Cloud, Falcon? Even Brawler has a worse recovery. Sword's recovery is bad, but there are worse recoveries out there.

Yep. Stone Scabbard goes absolutely nowhere, won't sweetspot ledge on the way up, and has a terrible hitbox, his aerial frame data is pretty bad, his air acceleration is worse than Roy's, and Airborne Assault is less useful for recovering than Rollout.

Brawler's Up-B is horrible, but he has better aerial mobility, better aerial frame data, and a better double jump. Cloud's recovery is low-tier at worst, as is Falcon's. Roy's recovery isn't good, but how bad it is is significantly overstated. It easily escapes bottom 5. Little Mac at least has Side-b, Ganon at least has upair, and Doc has Mario frame data going for him, if nothing else (Though all of these 3 could be argued as worse than Sword's)

 

[Iridium]

Another weird thing about Umebura 32 was that although Choco won, he almost lost to gain 2-1 during pools in a pretty wacky set. How does this matchup play for players of both characters?

 

[The_Bookworm]

Another weird thing about Umebura 32 was that although Choco won, he almost lost to gain 2-1 during pools in a pretty wacky set. How does this matchup play for players of both characters?

It is trying to take advantage of ZSS's very wonky neutral game. I remember Nairo vs Alphicans set back in early SSB4.

Also Umebura 32 just got entered in as a B tier event!

 

[Iridium]

It is trying to take advantage of ZSS's very wonky neutral game. I remember Nairo vs Alphicans set back in early SSB4.

Also Umebura 32 just got entered in as a B tier event!

Finally! At least the Twitch chat did not lie. Anyways, I hope T can do better in eventual tourneys. It sucks to see him have to deal with the same demons (particularly takera this time) to place around 17th at big Japanese events. So far he has 4 PGR wins: 1 for Abadango, 1 for Kameme and 2 for Choco (assuming KVOxTSB 2018 counts).

 

[The_Bookworm]

Finally! At least the Twitch chat did not lie. Anyways, I hope T can do better in eventual tourneys. It sucks to see him have to deal with the same demons (particularly takera this time) to place around 17th at big Japanese events. So far he has 4 PGR wins: 1 for Abadango, 1 for Kameme and 2 for Choco (assuming KVOxTSB 2018 counts).

KVOxTSB 2018 is a C tier. It counts, but it is not as weighted. Nice to see players like Eim, takera, Gackt, and Shuton do well on a Japanese event that is more weighted on the PGR than normal (assuming that it will stay B tier and not pull a Midwest Mayhem on us).

 

[Iridium]

KVOxTSB 2018 is a C tier. It counts, but it is not as weighted. Nice to see players like Eim, takera, Gackt, and Shuton do well on a Japanese event that is more weighted on the PGR than normal (assuming that it will stay B tier and not pull a Midwest Mayhem on us).

Definitely. I look at T, Eim and other Japanese players who have not had a chance to go to the US at all the most though. There is Hyrule Saga however, but the only Japanese players that don't have a problem being funded or going as far I know would be T, Komorikiri and Onpu.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Karna and Whispy defeats Captain Zack and Lima, respectively.

[Edit: About to post something big. Can someone reply so I can avoid double posting warning?]

 

[Lord Dio]

Whispy

Diddy, right?
(there's your psot)

 

[The_Bookworm]

And now Karna just 3-0'ed Mistake, with a two stock victory on games 1 and 3. I never have seen anyone fight Bayo the way he does, or play Sheik the way he does. It is amazing!

And now Light the Lantern defeated Lima 3-1.

[Edit: And now Wispy defeats Captain Zack 3-2. Where are the Bayos going?]


A new C tier showed up in the list, and it just finished today.

Unrivaled X (58 Entrants) (C tier) (Florida)

1st: Salem
2nd: dyr
3rd: Manny
4th: RiotLettuce
5th: Kiki
5th: Myran
7th: Mr. Riddle
7th: ScAtt

Kiki notably 3-0'ed Salem in Winner's, but Salem brought it all back in Loser's.

 

[Lord Dio]

And now Karna just 3-0'ed Mistake, with a two stock victory on games 1 and 3. I never have seen anyone fight Bayo the way he does, or play Sheik the way he does. It is amazing!

Not surprised, considering that one time he murdered Lima in Grand Finals of their local, 6-0'ing poor Lima.
Still, good stuff

 

[Minordeth]

Karna, by his own admission on Twitter, didn’t really know how to SDI in general very well. He eventually worked on it, and grinded out defensive play for Bayo. The result was that he went positive on Lima for quite a while.

Before then, Lima had been basically dominating the region.

Karna’s a great player. I just wish he traveled a bit more.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Denti's Bizarre Adventure 8 (C tier) (85 Entrants) (Texas)

1st: Samsora
2nd: Mistake
3rd: Karna
4th: Whispy
5th: Captain Zack
5th: Light the Lantern
7th: Awestin
7th: Lima
9th: MageofSymphonia
9th: Muse
9th: Jibs
9th: Orex

13th: SaSSy
17th: Dakpo
17th: Dragonite
17th: P2P with Gibus

Samsora's Rosa is the real deal!

 

[TDK]

Meanwhile, in BC...

Big D 3-2 Larry Lurr
Captain L 3-2 Larry Lurr (won game 1 in Pika/Fox, lost the next two, two-stocked Larry's Fox with Puff, and then beat his Diddy too)

(mostly) Puff grabs a top 10 win, while none of the other bottom tiers have even come close.

 

[Prince Koopa Jr]

Meanwhile, in BC...

Big D 3-2 Larry Lurr
Captain L 3-2 Larry Lurr (won game 1 in Pika/Fox, lost the next two, two-stocked Larry's Fox with Puff, and then beat his Diddy too)

(mostly) Puff grabs a top 10 win, while none of the other bottom tiers have even come close.

L has really been utilizing Puff pretty efficiently, this could change player's opinions on her.

 

[Ordeaux26]

L has really been utilizing Puff pretty efficiently, this could change player's opinions on her.

I went to the tournament and Captain L believes Jigglypuff is a mid tier (I'm not joking)

 

[Illusion.]

The_Bookworm Jibs plays and Dragonite plays

 

[JustCallMeJon]

Vancouver Battle Royale Results (54 Entrants) (Non PGRed but Still noticable)

1st: Big D
2nd: Captain L
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Lemmon
5th: Grade
5th: sn0w

Yeah, I am late..

 

[FeelMeUp]

Karna, by his own admission on Twitter, didn’t really know how to SDI in general very well. He eventually worked on it, and grinded out defensive play for Bayo. The result was that he went positive on Lima for quite a while.

Before then, Lima had been basically dominating the region.

Karna’s a great player. I just wish he traveled a bit more.

Was a lot worse than this.
Before he and I talked about the Bayo matchup, Karna wouldn't DI Witch Twist at all and basically let the Bayo do whatever they want to him. Due to a prior hand injury and dealing with a completely worn down controller, the poor guy was dying almost every time he got hit by Witch Twist.
It wasn't until a certain SFC (the # of which I cannot remember) that Karna finally figured some things out (most notably realizing that you can ALWAYS dash attack dtilt on shield and ALWAYS nair Bayo's fair 1 on shield) did Karna start hard leveling up and beating the Bayos..
iirc, at that SFC he went either G10 or G15 with ShadowPR, taking his first sets and tournament off of him. Ever.
Guy had insane improvements in such a short period of time. Mad props.

 

[J0eyboi]

I went to the tournament and Captain L believes Jigglypuff is a mid tier (I'm not joking)

This is a prime example of how you can be incredibly good at the game and still have no idea what you're talking about.

Vancouver Battle Royale Results (54 Entrants) (Non PGRed but Still noticable)

1st: Big D
2nd: Captain L
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Lemmon
5th: Grade
5th: sn0w

Yeah, I am late..

Out of curiosity, who's sn0w?

 

[Minordeth]

Was a lot worse than this.
Before he and I talked about the Bayo matchup, Karna wouldn't DI Witch Twist at all and basically let the Bayo do whatever they want to him. Due to a prior hand injury and dealing with a completely worn down controller, the poor guy was dying almost every time he got hit by Witch Twist.
It wasn't until a certain SFC (the # of which I cannot remember) that Karna finally figured some things out (most notably realizing that you can ALWAYS dash attack dtilt on shield and ALWAYS nair Bayo's fair 1 on shield) did Karna start hard leveling up and beating the Bayos..
iirc, at that SFC he went either G10 or G15 with ShadowPR, taking his first sets and tournament off of him. Ever.
Guy had insane improvements in such a short period of time. Mad props.

Heh, I was being charitable, but thanks for the additional info. I remember Tweek(?) saying how hard a match is for a Bayo is entirely opposing player dependent. While this is, of course, applicable to anything, he strongly suggested it was more so true for the Bayo MU than anything else.

Karna is making huge strides. Taking down Mistake is massive although I don’t think he was quite ready for Mistake the second time. More so than any other Bayo, Mistake has an incredibly deep library of combo extensions and looks for defensive habits constantly. The rest of his game is still growing, but his ability to exploit what you tend to do in disadvantage is almost Zero-esque.

Side note:
While Bayo can certainly dish out absurd damage, her primary combo starters are able to be counterplayed harder than say, a combo throw. The amount of defensive options you have to screw up Wtw 1 follow ups greatly outstrips a binary DI choice post-throw.

While I don’t want to downplay this too hard, Bayo’s frame data is less... adaptable than say, Sheik’s. Top level Bayos are essentially running combo algorithms depending on what you did the previous time you got caught. It’s still ultimately an anticipation/prediction game. They can’t adapt on the fly as easily as Sheik or Fox can. The frame data on her buttons just isn’t there.

Did you SDI Wtw 1 straight up to get out? They may try to catch you in a different spot of the move, or attempt to go straight into Wtw 2 next time. But that is assuming that you won’t completely mix it up. If you SDI down and away and they use Wtw 2, suddenly they have used up an extra spell, are far higher up, and now are more limited for escape.

Honestly, and I’ll go in depth at some point lately, but the best player who does SDI/DI mix ups is probably Choco. Before he even figured out the MU in neutral, he was mixing up his SDI almost a year before it was widely disseminated in the West - post Genesis 5. It’s presumably why Aba started to go more Mewtwo than Bayo, for instance.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Vancouver Battle Royale Results (54 Entrants) (Non PGRed but Still noticable)

1st: Big D
2nd: Captain L
3rd: Larry Lurr
4th: Lemmon
5th: Grade
5th: sn0w

Yeah, I am late..

First big victory for Big D in a long time, even if it isn't PGR'ed.

Props on pulling off the random upset for Captain L against Larry Lurr. Jigglypuff is sometimes wacky, but fortunately matchup inexperience plays it's hand for Captain L. Reminds me of DJ Nintendo's Bowser back in the Melee days.

 

[Wintermelon43]

I love how as soon as people talk about Captain L never getting a big notable win using Jigglypuff, he immediatly gets one lol.

 

[Prince Koopa Jr]

I love how as soon as people talk about Captain L never getting a big notable win using Jigglypuff, he immediatly gets one lol.

Yeah, it's like he's monitoring this thread or something.

 

[The_Bookworm]

I love how as soon as people talk about Captain L never getting a big notable win using Jigglypuff, he immediatly gets one lol.

Captain L's Puff is giving me DJ Nintendo's Bowser flashbacks.

 

[Thinkaman]

Not (yet) worthy of its own topic:

As we pivot into the long road for Smash Switch, I've been thinking primarily on the topic of teaching people to play Smash. (Which will (or should) be our number one concern come December)

Historically most educational resources have focused on "damage makes people go farther" or "here is how to think about the neutral game", when 90% of players need something in-between.

I think it always has to be centered around Yomi; first introducing it as the atom of all (double-blind) gameplay, and how it emerges when you put (asymmetric) weights on RPS. (I like to teach this by playing RPS against Dwayne Johnson, whose Rock counts as 2 wins and wins ties--but he loses other ties. Then we bring it in-game with a dash attack/grab vs shieldgrab/attack moment.)

From there we have a roadmap in the form of the 4 questions which Yomi promises victory to anyone who can answer:

1. What determines which move wins?
2. What are all the moves available?
3. How are the rewards for winning moves evaluated?
4. Now that I am making informed Yomi decisions, how can I beat my opponent at Yomi?

Question 1 is just teaching mechanics and RPS triangles. It can probably be condensed into one meaty lesson/article, and it much better as a hands-on activity. People need to walk away with the mentality of time as the central resource that determines who wins each exchange.

Question 2 is also mechanics, but with more quantity and less density. It critically has to be framed as lists of options organized into states, with time costs associated with changing state. This probably has to be 3 lessons: If the first is covering state change costs, standing options, shield options, and running options, it can also including punishing evaluation. Aerial attacks have enough nuances to require segregation into a full second part, and ledge options + some misc restrictive stuff (like items, platform dropping) are important enough for a third.

Question 3 is pretty straight-forward, just needs a single lesson discussing kill %s, grab combos, and stage position.

Question 4 you can't do much with beyond Observation & Conditioning 101.


That is historically the rough outline of how I've taught various people to play Smash, with pretty solid results. It's not hard to get people to go from dash attacking shields to throwing out reverse bairs and mixing up ledge options.

Oh, and fun fact I've mentioned here more than once: I'm pretty confident that Dr. Mario is by far the most instructive Smash 4 character to teach new players with. Never let new players play their "mains", if for no other reason than needing to build focus on the new muscle memory.

In the long term this will probably congeal into a Smash Switch article series or something, still feeling it out.

 

[Krysco]

I've been saying Puff isn't the worst character in this game for a while now. I've seen Puff appear in results at better peaks than D3 or 1111 Mii Sword/Brawler along with getting actual wins here and there (Though that's not really a good metric character viability) Puff has a few MUs she's able to do fine in (Do Falcon players still believe they lose to Puff?) and I honestly can't say D3 or 1111 Mii Sword/Brawler have any MUs they could win let alone very many even ones.

Zelda, Puff, Mii Brawler, D3, Mii Sword are my order for worst five. It's a race to the bottom which isn't saying much for these characters but I don't think Puff is the worst.

Is the norm for Miis still restricted to 1111? I know size has pretty much never been allowed but I thought it was becoming more and more acceptable to not limit the character's who are entirely focused around customization. Granted, I don't think that alone would get Swordfighter out of bottom tier and it'd probably just be enough to get Brawler to just be low tier.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Not (yet) worthy of its own topic:

As we pivot into the long road for Smash Switch, I've been thinking primarily on the topic of teaching people to play Smash. (Which will (or should) be our number one concern come December)

Historically most educational resources have focused on "damage makes people go farther" or "here is how to think about the neutral game", when 90% of players need something in-between.

I think it always has to be centered around Yomi; first introducing it as the atom of all (double-blind) gameplay, and how it emerges when you put (asymmetric) weights on RPS. (I like to teach this by playing RPS against Dwayne Johnson, whose Rock counts as 2 wins and wins ties--but he loses other ties. Then we bring it in-game with a dash attack/grab vs shieldgrab/attack moment.)

From there we have a roadmap in the form of the 4 questions which Yomi promises victory to anyone who can answer:

1. What determines which move wins?
2. What are all the moves available?
3. How are the rewards for winning moves evaluated?
4. Now that I am making informed Yomi decisions, how can I beat my opponent at Yomi?

Question 1 is just teaching mechanics and RPS triangles. It can probably be condensed into one meaty lesson/article, and it much better as a hands-on activity. People need to walk away with the mentality of time as the central resource that determines who wins each exchange.

Question 2 is also mechanics, but with more quantity and less density. It critically has to be framed as lists of options organized into states, with time costs associated with changing state. This probably has to be 3 lessons: If the first is covering state change costs, standing options, shield options, and running options, it can also including punishing evaluation. Aerial attacks have enough nuances to require segregation into a full second part, and ledge options + some misc restrictive stuff (like items, platform dropping) are important enough for a third.

Question 3 is pretty straight-forward, just needs a single lesson discussing kill %s, grab combos, and stage position.

Question 4 you can't do much with beyond Observation & Conditioning 101.


That is historically the rough outline of how I've taught various people to play Smash, with pretty solid results. It's not hard to get people to go from dash attacking shields to throwing out reverse bairs and mixing up ledge options.

Oh, and fun fact I've mentioned here more than once: I'm pretty confident that Dr. Mario is by far the most instructive Smash 4 character to teach new players with. Never let new players play their "mains", if for no other reason than needing to build focus on the new muscle memory.

In the long term this will probably congeal into a Smash Switch article series or something, still feeling it out.

Cool to think about, although I think normal Mario is the most instructive character, for being a better character and being designed for newcomers. Dr. Mario, imo, works better as an instructive character in Melee (which SSBM Tutorials mentioned).

Is the norm for Miis still restricted to 1111? I know size has pretty much never been allowed but I thought it was becoming more and more acceptable to not limit the character's who are entirely focused around customization. Granted, I don't think that alone would get Swordfighter out of bottom tier and it'd probably just be enough to get Brawler to just be low tier.

Miis are still restricted to 1111, but un-restricting them is controversial because there is the whole size mechanic that the Miis have as well.

Swordfighter with customs is essentially a worse version of Link (I say around low tier), Gunner is around the same potency of Samus but it is difficult to test to see if it is true (I say around mid tier), but Brawler is potentially a high tier character with some arguing that it can even be top tier although I doubt it.