Official 4BR Tier List V4 - Competitive Insight & Analysis

[Meritocracy]

He wasn't active for a while, only entered some online events with Cloud.
It was fairly recent when he started attending again in his region.

Hm, I'd like to see some sort of Sonic round robin, featuring komo, KEN, JaKal, Supergirlkels and the like to see who the sonic supreme is.
To add to that, what other charecters do you see doing this? Charecters smaller than nor al, but large enough to graner about 5 top players.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Why dosen't KEN come to america again? I know he doesn't, but did he ever say why?

Don't know. I think he mentioned something about not traveling to America much when 2017 ended.

Anyways...

DreamHack Montreal 2018

1st: Larry Lurr
2nd: Ally
3rd: MVD
4th: ESAM
5th: SuperGirlKels
5th: CaptainZack
7th: Mistake
7th: ANTi
9th: Venom
9th: SDX
9th: Fwed
9th: Deathorse
13th: Blacktwins
13th: Blush
13th: Stas
13th: BreaD

 

[J0eyboi]

Very similar to July's results. Still confused to how Roy is that high in results.

Apparently, both Goblin(man) and TheFlow, the only remaining relevant Roys, have leveled up recently. Goblin obviously got 25th at Shine, but he's been doing consistently well at smaller events since around April, as has TheFlow. Not that it matters, though, because neither of them travel, meaning there are still precisely 0 Roy mains who attend majors with any form of consistency.

 

[Meritocracy]

Don't know. I think he mentioned something about not traveling to America much when 2017 ended.

Anyways...

DreamHack Montreal 2018

1st: Larry Lurr
2nd: Ally
3rd: MVD
4th: ESAM
5th: SuperGirlKels
5th: CaptainZack
7th: Mistake
7th: ANTi
9th: Venom
9th: SDX
9th: Fwed
9th: Deathorse
13th: Blacktwins
13th: Blush
13th: Stas
13th: BreaD

Hay, sgk llace at the same place as captianzack, good for here

 

[J0eyboi]

So about a week ago, Hyper posted a video to his Youtube channel about why Blazer alone will make Roy better than Chrom, seen below.

He may or may not be right, we really won't be able to tell until the game comes out, but that's not the important part here. The important part (at least to me) is the point he makes about Blazer's use as a recovery.

In case anyone's checking this thread on the bus or smth, here's a transcript of the relevant bit:

So, Roy's Blazer, as we all know, is his recovery move, and Roy's Blazer has this weird stereotype of being a bad recovery move for whatever reason. For people who've actually played against Roy, [it's] extremely hard to edgeguard, and the only time Roy's getting gimped is if the opponent has a counter, large disjoints, or just severely outplaying Roy offstage, and because of Roy's airspeed alone, Roy having the fourth best airspeed, he usually doesn't even have to spend the jump to recover. He can usually just drift to the stage and Up-B without having to use his jump, so even if he does get interrupted, he still has a double jump, so he can still make it back. The only time Roy's getting flat-out gimped, it's usually by some type of cheese or the other options I've mentioned. Roy doesn't just get randomly gimped, aside from cheese.

To be clear, I do not think Hyper is entirely correct here. Blazer has a fair number of flaws that he fails to acknowledge, and he conflates airspeed with air acceleration. In reality, it can often be hard for Roy to recover without using his jump, and there are some nasty character-specific things that really hurt in certain matchups(IMO if it weren't for Witch Twist edgeguards, Roy-Bayo would have an argument for even or better). That said, it got me thinking about how we judge recovery strength, and whether or not those methods are actually accurate (it also got me writing a rant about how much first impressions affect character perception, but that's besides the point). Thoughts?

 

[The_Bookworm]

So about a week ago, Hyper posted a video to his Youtube channel about why Blazer alone will make Roy better than Chrom, seen below.

He may or may not be right, we really won't be able to tell until the game comes out, but that's not the important part here. The important part (at least to me) is the point he makes about Blazer's use as a recovery.

In case anyone's checking this thread on the bus or smth, here's a transcript of the relevant bit:




To be clear, I do not think Hyper is entirely correct here. Blazer has a fair number of flaws that he fails to acknowledge, and he conflates airspeed with air acceleration. In reality, it can often be hard for Roy to recover without using his jump, and there are some nasty character-specific things that really hurt in certain matchups(IMO if it weren't for Witch Twist edgeguards, Roy-Bayo would have an argument for even or better). That said, it got me thinking about how we judge recovery strength, and whether or not those methods are actually accurate (it also got me writing a rant about how much first impressions affect character perception, but that's besides the point). Thoughts?

Sometimes, trading with Roy's up B (without a jump) may put Roy too far away to recover because he falls too fast. I have seen a few instances of his up B failing to grab the ledge altogether (no idea why that happens).

Although I do agree that Roy's recovery is going to be better than Chrom's, recovery alone isn't going to determine who is better. It is too early to tell yet.

Recovery is definitely getting overvalued in the eyes of people (I know that from experience).

 

[Prince Koopa Jr]

Chrom might have some advantages over Roy

 

[C0rvus]

Chrom having actual threatening hitboxes at range makes him safer on shield and more of an actual zoner. I think he'll certainly have his own place alongside Roy, if not outright being better than him. Roy's double edge dance with good hitboxes sounds sick.

 

[The_Bookworm]

They just announced Isabelle in Smash Ultimate! Apparently she is a semi-clone of Villager instead of being an echo fighter.
Going to update my other threads to reflect her being in the game.

 

[ArnoldPalmer]

good bye Roy vs Marth debates, hello Roy vs Chrom debates

 

[Dream Cancel]

Does anyone know if Ike's or Chrom'a recovery have super armor for the entire move? If so, it would be much harder to exploit besides taking some damage. Roy's recovery would also be more susceptible to ledge trumps, in my opinion, because his hitboxes on Blazer are much smaller than Aether. It would more difficult to avoid the hitbox in order to attempt a ledge trump.

Chrom/Ike could afford the luxury of not needing to recover at a set vertical distance, thus letting their sword protect them from trumps. I'm not sure, correct me if I'm wrong here.

 

[J0eyboi]

Does anyone know if Ike's or Chrom'a recovery have super armor for the entire move? If so, it would be much harder to exploit besides taking some damage.

They don't.

Roy's recovery would also be more susceptible to ledge trumps, in my opinion, because his hitboxes on Blazer are much smaller than Aether. It would more difficult to avoid the hitbox in order to attempt a ledge trump.

Chrom/Ike could afford the luxury of not needing to recover at a set vertical distance, thus letting their sword protect them from trumps. I'm not sure, correct me if I'm wrong here.

That's really not how ledgetrumps work.

 

[C0rvus]

There's really no getting around the fact that Aether is an awful recovery move. And without Quick Draw to patch things up, as well as presumably faster fall speed... Things aren't looking good for Chrom in the recovery department. It'll really be a matter of how much of an advantage his hitboxes are. At the end of the day, we're better off treating him like any other character on the roster. Where he stands relative to his original isn't particularly important, and I hope people don't get too hung up on it.

And for the record, Roy vs Chrom discussion is set to be the new Marth vs Lucina discussion. How exciting...

 

[Minordeth]

Basing the argument for Roy’s superiority over Chrom on Blazer is overly reductionistic.

Yes, recovery ability means more in a game where being offstage is more dangerous. But the degree of value that a good recovery gives is relative to the cast’s offstage performance as a whole, and must take into account how good onstage performance is.

By necessity, Ultimate restricts the casts’ capabilities to recover due to universal increases in onstage ability.

Basically, Chrom may be worse than Roy offstage. But a universal characteristic of Smash is that poor recovery can be easily exceeded by how good a character is on-stage.

You could call it the Spacies’ Law.

 

[The_Bookworm]

The SoCal Regionals 2018 tournament is very interesting due to it's international representation.
Here is the top 16 bracket.

Winners
8BitMan vs Tamushika
Raito vs AC
Elegant vs Eon
Tea vs BestNess

Losers
OCEAN vs Stroder
yeti vs Lui$
bt.yamato vs falln
UtopianRay vs Pandarian


Notable Upsets (A Lot!)
Nebula 2-1 K9sbruce
Tamushika 2-0 Ralphie
bt.yamato 2-0 Sinji
OCEAN 2-1 Charlie
Tea 2-0 falln
BestNess 2-1 Zenyou
Sol 2-1 Sinji (Out at 25th)
OCEAN 2-1 PiXL (Out at 17th)
Lui$ 2-1 Charlie (Out at 17th)
bt.yamato 2-1 K9sbruce (Out at 17th)
UtopianRay 2-0 Zenyou (Out at 17th)

The funny thing about Sinji's run is that he lost 2-0 to a top Little Mac player (bt.yamato), then immediately eliminated a different top Little Mac player 2-0 (pu55yk1ng), then immediately lost to another top Little Mac player 2-1 (Sol). I guess he is not a fan of McDonald's

 

[Game7a1]

The SoCal Regionals 2018 tournament is very interesting due to it's international representation.
Here is the top 16 bracket.

Winners
8BitMan vs Tamushika
Raito vs AC
Elegant vs Eon
Tea vs BestNess

Losers
OCEAN vs Stroder
yeti vs Lui$
bt.yamato vs falln
UtopianRay vs Pandarian


Notable Upsets (A Lot!)
Nebula 2-1 K9sbruce
Tamushika 2-0 Ralphie
bt.yamato 2-0 Sinji
OCEAN 2-1 Charlie
Tea 2-0 falln
BestNess 2-1 Zenyou
Sol 2-1 Sinji (Out at 25th)
OCEAN 2-1 PiXL (Out at 17th)
Lui$ 2-1 Charlie (Out at 17th)
bt.yamato 2-1 K9sbruce (Out at 17th)
UtopianRay 2-0 Zenyou (Out at 17th)

The funny thing about Sinji's run is that he lost 2-0 to a top Little Mac player (bt.yamato), then immediately eliminated a different top Little Mac player 2-0 (pu55yk1ng), then immediately lost to another top Little Mac player 2-1 (Sol). I guess he is not a fan of McDonald's

Tea plays Pac-Man, not Greninja. I think you're confusing Tea for someone else (maybe Lea).

 

[The_Bookworm]

Tea plays Pac-Man, not Greninja. I think you're confusing Tea for someone else (maybe Lea).

I just noticed that whoops. XD
Going to fix that.

 

[Heracr055]

Now that there's been some extra time and info, can we discuss Isabelle a bit more in depth? Her most interesting traits shown so far are her down B (which appears to be a trap similar to Snake mines mixed with Mega Man's Air Shooter which launches up with multi hits) and her fishing rod (which appears to be a command grab). In addition, it appears her fishing rod was confirmed by the Nintendo Smash blog to be a tether. This is fantastic because her u B (which appears to have the ability to be cancelled early, unlike Villager) appears to be very slow and susceptible to attack.
The stop sign up smash is likely just a hitbox above her that doesn't actually cancel momentum.
We also know she has a Cloud-esque up tilt, although it looks like the cooldown on it isn't so hot.
Lastly, here's a list of moves we don't know yet:

-Ftilt & jab (one of these is the red rubber hammer shown on her fighter page images)
-Dtilt
-All her aerials except for nair
-Fishing rod front and down throw angles & knockback

Overall I'm excited for what's in store for this character.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Now that there's been some extra time and info, can we discuss Isabelle a bit more in depth? Her most interesting traits shown so far are her down B (which appears to be a trap similar to Snake mines mixed with Mega Man's Air Shooter which launches up with multi hits) and her fishing rod (which appears to be a command grab). In addition, it appears her fishing rod was confirmed by the Nintendo Smash blog to be a tether. This is fantastic because her u B (which appears to have the ability to be cancelled early, unlike Villager) appears to be very slow and susceptible to attack.
The stop sign up smash is likely just a hitbox above her that doesb't actually cancel momentum.
Lastly, here's a list of moves we don't know yet:

-Ftilt & jab (one of these is the red rubber hammer shown on her fighter page images)
-Dtilt
-All her aerials except for nair
-Fishing rod front and down throw angles & knockback

Overall I'm excited for what's in store for this character.

You pretty much covered the character right here. lol
It is going to be interesting how this character plays in comparison to Villager. What I really want to know is if she has Villager's slingshot.

I also like the fact she is much more expressive than Villager, who is usually keeping that one same look all the time (cue Killager memes).

 

[Prince Koopa Jr]

Wonder if Sinji has a Mac problem.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Wonder if Sinji has a Mac problem.

It would be funny if that is the case, considering well Pac-Man does against Little Mac. However, I doubt it, considering that he beat pu55yk1ng 2-0 before falling to Sol. I just found it funny that he fought three top Little Mac players in a row.


Here is the results of the tournament:
1st: Elegant
2nd: Tea
3rd: Tamushika
4th: Raito
5th: Eon
5th: bt.yamato
7th: BestNess
7th: 8BitMan
9th: OCEAN
9th: yeti
9th: AC
9th: UtopianRay

The upsets were crazy, with falln and Raito getting upsetted paving the way for Elegant to win the event.


EVO 2018: "We have the most odd ball top 8 in SSB4 history!"
SoCal Regionals 2018: "Hold my beer."

 

[Iridium]

Tea was that close to the reset, and lost because of the attempted style. Either way, good on him for an amazing debut! Japan really showed up here (poor Songn though).

 

[The_Bookworm]

It has been a while since someone replied to this thread. I wonder when the official list v5 is coming out, or at least when voting starts.

 

[Cheryl~]

To spark some discussion, what are some changes you think will happen if/when they make the final tier list? (As in what characters would rise/fall in the tier list).

For me, I think a rise in Lucina’s ranking to be closer to Marth is pretty reasonable considering her better placements recently suggesting there isn’t really that much of a gap between them. I also think Duck Hunt could go up a few spots, while the Pits and Yoshi could go down a few spots.

 

[The_Bookworm]

To spark some discussion, what are some changes you think will happen if/when they make the final tier list? (As in what characters would rise/fall in the tier list).

For me, I think a rise in Lucina’s ranking to be closer to Marth is pretty reasonable considering her better placements recently suggesting there isn’t really that much of a gap between them. I also think Duck Hunt could go up a few spots, while the Pits and Yoshi could go down a few spots.

I have quite a few changes (not like an entire tier shift), but here are some of my main changes:

i feel that especially Duck Hunt, Peach, Mega Man, Ness, Wario, and Samus should rise up due to possessing some better consistent results. I think Samus could potentially rise up the most from the previous tier list.

However, quite a few characters have faltered in varying degrees due to either other characters outplacing them, lack of results compared to how they are currently ranked, or both.
Lucario, Bowser, Lucas, Pit / Dark Pit, Robin, and Palutena are the best examples. I feel that Diddy and Donkey Kong should drop too due to these reasons, but only very slightly.

 

[Thinkaman]

We're seeing a lot of revisionist anti-Bayo hysteria, much like how the anti-MK sentiment transitioned at the end of Brawl's life.

I keep hearing people espouse how Bayo's release caused Smash 4's numbers to immediately drop and the competitive scene to die. Yet nothing could be further from the case--Summer 2016 swelled Smash to its biggest numbers ever, with EVO 2016 as the biggest Smash tourney of all time.

Then both Smash 4 and Melee entered nearly identical gradual declines; today both games are healthy by historical and contemporary standards (scenes around 4x the size of 2012/2013 era, with far more viewers and content creation, and biggest than most other fighting games), but fallen from their 2016 heights.

 

[Heracr055]

So what pushed Melee into decline? Hbox/Puff? Or just the interest in it fell?

 

[The_Bookworm]

So what pushed Melee into decline? Hbox/Puff? Or just the interest in it fell?

A little bit of both.

I do have to admit that Melee is holding up better than SSB4 in the current moment, but it is mostly the SSB4 Community's (and partly Smash Ultimate's) fault on SSB4's recent decline.

 

[Sinister Slush]

It has been a while since someone replied to this thread. I wonder when the official list v5 is coming out, or at least when voting starts.

I genuinely don't think we're gonna have a 5th and last tier list.

 

[The_Bookworm]

I genuinely don't think we're gonna have a 5th and last tier list.

Why not? It has been almost an year since the last one, and the shift to Ultimate is near.

 

[ぱみゅ]

But there hasn't been many actual metagame changes; not many people switched mains and better reflect how strong they actually could be.

All that's been happening is the players having differences in performances due to their own skills and adaptations, or lack of them.
Which brings me to the next point: One single player/character making few splashes at consecutive tournaments isn't a basis for a Tier reconsideration.
IMO

 

[The_Bookworm]

But there hasn't been many actual metagame changes; not many people switched mains and better reflect how strong they actually could be.

All that's been happening is the players having differences in performances due to their own skills and adaptations, or lack of them.
Which brings me to the next point: One single player/character making few splashes at consecutive tournaments isn't a basis for a Tier reconsideration.
IMO

But as I kinda highlighted above, there are several notable movements among the characters. Some of the current character placings feels pretty outdated, again, as I listed above. I will not be satisfied if v4 is the last tier list. There must be at least one more imo.

There doesn't have to be a big metagame changes for a new tier list to be constructed.

 

[Prince Koopa Jr]

New tech is still being discovered in Smash 4.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Why not? It has been almost an year since the last one, and the shift to Ultimate is near.

Don't think it's the highest priority of the leaders of the 4BR to work on it. Shaya mentioned he wanted to work on one last list but nothing so far.

But there hasn't been many actual metagame changes; not many people switched mains and better reflect how strong they actually could be.

All that's been happening is the players having differences in performances due to their own skills and adaptations, or lack of them.
Which brings me to the next point: One single player/character making few splashes at consecutive tournaments isn't a basis for a Tier reconsideration.
IMO

But that's basically what's always been the case for some tier lists happening. Outside of doing it just cause a 9 month interval back then in brawl days, the hot topic of discussion was always big moves for characters like Sonic or Olimar back then.
Having a new list cause of Pac-man/DH having a good year and a few characters continuously not performing or falling off doesn't seem too out of the ordinary for a change in placings.

 

[Krysco]

Couple weeks behind but the posts are still on this page so whatever but Roy or Chrom being better than the other isn't as simple as saying balanced blade is better or that Aether is a better recovery.

Marth isn't better than Lucina JUST because he has powerful tippers but also because his sourspots can allow for combos into tippers that Lucina simply doesn't have access to. Sour landing uair into tipper uair and overall Dancing Blade. Same goes for Roy and Chrom. Chrom will get better safety at max range but misses out on some kill power and potentially combos since he can't land a sourspot into a sweetspot. Plus we know Blazer ledge snaps while we don't know if Chrom's Aether does or not. If it doesn't then all you have to do is jump up just above where he's going to spin before descending and spike him. He doesn't even have Quick Draw as a mix up option.

Kinda surprised talk of Ultimate is as common as it is here since this thread is focused on Sm4sh. Makes sense though with most posters from before being gone from here and Ultimate coming out in just over 2 months. As for the tier list discussion, I brought it up a while back and it would be nice to have one more tier list before Sm4sh effectively dies but I have no idea how warranted it actually is. Haven't been keeping track of results for this game. Most I can gather is that Bayo hasn't taken over the meta completely like Brawl MK and to a lesser extent Melee Fox.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Couple weeks behind but the posts are still on this page so whatever but Roy or Chrom being better than the other isn't as simple as saying balanced blade is better or that Aether is a better recovery.

Marth isn't better than Lucina JUST because he has powerful tippers but also because his sourspots can allow for combos into tippers that Lucina simply doesn't have access to. Sour landing uair into tipper uair and overall Dancing Blade. Same goes for Roy and Chrom. Chrom will get better safety at max range but misses out on some kill power and potentially combos since he can't land a sourspot into a sweetspot. Plus we know Blazer ledge snaps while we don't know if Chrom's Aether does or not. If it doesn't then all you have to do is jump up just above where he's going to spin before descending and spike him. He doesn't even have Quick Draw as a mix up option.

Kinda surprised talk of Ultimate is as common as it is here since this thread is focused on Sm4sh. Makes sense though with most posters from before being gone from here and Ultimate coming out in just over 2 months. As for the tier list discussion, I brought it up a while back and it would be nice to have one more tier list before Sm4sh effectively dies but I have no idea how warranted it actually is. Haven't been keeping track of results for this game. Most I can gather is that Bayo hasn't taken over the meta completely like Brawl MK and to a lesser extent Melee Fox.

Roy' sourspots isn't even that good for combo'ing (or at least it's damage output it isn't) due to the little hitstun it makes. I don't know if that will change in Ultimate (I really hope it does), but something to note.

The main reason why there isn't a lot of SSB4 talk right now is because there isn't much going on right now. There is a noticeable gap between Shine 2018 and Big House 8. Speaking of which, Big House is coming up this weekend. Any thoughts from you guys?

[Edit: Can someone reply so I can post something else?]

 

[Luco]

I came across Gunblade's Marth vs Lucina post on Twitter today and immediately thought of you guys. <3

What's interesting to me about this anti-bayo trend we're seeing is it feels like as Brawl vets we've kinda brought this upon ourselves, after the monstrosity of our dealings with Brawl MK new smash 4 players started to conflate the effects of Brawl MK and Smash 4 Bayo on their respective metagames (even though they weren't that similar, the *feelings* we had towards them were and it's the feelings that people remember) and now going into Ultimate they're going to have the 'justification' to tell Ultimate players that Simon Belmont "isn't even that bad" and begin the SS+ cycle anew.

On another note watching ESAM play Tweek at TBH was awesome, it really felt like ESAM had his MUs on lock and kinda just punished Tweek for jumping every single time. The top players of every game make those MUs look doable and even highly enjoyable. That and Yeti really re-ignited my passion for the game!

 

[Frihetsanka]

Bayonetta has several even MUs (5-7 or so, perhaps), it seems, which can't be said about Brawl Meta Knight, Melee Fox, or 64 Pikachu. In the end, I think not banning Bayonetta was the right decision. I hope Ultimate won't have any character at the same level as 64 Pikachu, Melee Fox, Brawl Meta Knight, or Smash 4 Bayonetta.

I think Bayonetta being the last DLC is a huge factor though. If she had been a release character or an early DLC then chances are she would've been nerfed to a more reasonable level (perhaps still #1, but less frustratingly so).

The top players of every game make those MUs look doable and even highly enjoyable.

I thought Bayonetta-Pikachu was likely even?

 

[Heracr055]

2 words from TBH8: YeTi

 

[The_Bookworm]

2 words from TBH8: YeTi

His run was amazing. Defeating Salem 3-0 with Toon Link is insane. His Mega Man beating VoiD and Darkshad is also insane as well.