Official 4BR Tier List V4 - Competitive Insight & Analysis

[JustCallMeJon]

Even though Kody (changed his tag to NovaOkami, now he is Nova) has gone on record saying he dropped Lucas, he still plays him at his locals. He just has a handful of other characters he loves to play too. Off the top of my head they are: Rosalina, Robin, and Corrin.

But yeah, Lucas can still fit in the about one main carrying his results category. Currently Mekos is the only travelling Lucas in NA that is known by the general audience, meanwhile Taiheita holds that spot for Japan.

I'm curious why Lucas and Ness are next to each. I read the spoiler tab about them being next to each other due to small point differences which I do not fully understand.

My question is, are they together because they share the same series, have similar special moves that share the same name, or is it because in general, players who do not play either character see them as one and the same?

Rambling now, but this has got me thinking that the Ness and Lucas Discords should merge again like they were in the beginning instead of the April's Fool's Joke that was pulled off this year which upset some members of Ness Discord to the point where they threatnened to leave the server.

Just give us a Marcina acronym for the fun of it.

Oh heck no, while Lucas is considered a semi-clone, both characters have very unique playstyles like Fox and Falco in Melee. The reason why they were so close is that there is a big debate whether Ness or Lucas will be the superior EarthBound character.

While right now, I claim Ness as superior by having good results and wins against top players, Lucas will eventually be superior in next year if Taiheita enter NA tournaments or Mekos does well..

 

[Frihetsanka]

I'm curious why Lucas and Ness are next to each. I read the spoiler tab about them being next to each other due to small point differences which I do not fully understand.

The way this works (aside from Dark Pit and Pit) is that people in the backroom vote by making their own tier lists, and then some sort of algorithm figures out the order. Ness and Lucas are next to each other because their scores are similar.

And to be honest, we have to remember that this list is likely still draws a lot from top level play. Leo still puts work in with Marth, but Lucina still rarely appears, or at least not in the same instances as Marth. Meanwhile, Corrin has also been showing up more these days, more than Lucina, so if we really break it down, who are we to say it's wrong that Marth and Lucina aren't ranked together? I am honestly pleased with this outcome overall.

Another alternative: Marth drops down a couple of spots so he'll be next to Lucina. I think Ryu is almost certainly better than Marth, and I think one could make a good case for Corrin being better than Marth as well. One could probably make a good case for Pikachu being better than Marth too, and perhaps also Corrin.

Let me ask you a hypothetical question: If MkLeo spent just as much time on Corrin as Marth, wouldn't his Corrin be considered near top tier as well? We've seen what Cosmos can do with Corrin, and other Corrin players such as Ryuga and Frozen also have some pretty good results, from time to time, arguably better than most Marth/Lucina players aside from MkLeo (and MkLeo is likely top 5 in the world). I don't think Corrin is top tier, but she might be better than Marth (Marth would drop two spots or so).

So, I think the issue might be that Marth is too high, not that Lucina is too low. Lucina is probably fine where she is (Pikachu might deserve to be ahead of her, potentially). Although this is kind of nit picking anyway since we're just talking about moving characters up or down a few spots, nothing that really makes a huge difference.

 

[Game7a1]

So I didn't see this asked (or answered) anywhere, but is there a reason why Cloud (2.49) and Diddy (2.51) aren't paired despite the difference of their average scores being less than 0.1 (it's 0.02)? Is it because they're in the highest tier or something?

 

[bc1910]

My question is, are they together because they share the same series, have similar special moves that share the same name, or is it because in general, players who do not play either character see them as one and the same?

Rambling now, but this has got me thinking that the Ness and Lucas Discords should merge again like they were in the beginning instead of the April's Fool's Joke that was pulled off this year which upset some members of Ness Discord to the point where they threatnened to leave the server.

Just give us a Marcina acronym for the fun of it.

I realise this is tongue-in cheek but I can understand why the Ness mains would be angry. The two play very differently, to the point where I would barely call them semi-clones.

I was disappointed to see them next to each other and to see Lucas below Ness when Lucas should be a few spots higher. You’ve got Ness as a grappler with surprisingly strong aerials, and Lucas as an effective zoner with greater combo ability and a significantly better recovery. He is a much bigger threat in this meta and far less linear.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

I realise this is tongue-in cheek but I can understand why the Ness mains would be angry. The two play very differently, to the point where I would barely call them semi-clones.

I was disappointed to see them next to each other and to see Lucas below Ness when Lucas should be a few spots higher. You’ve got Ness as a grappler with surprisingly strong aerials, and Lucas as an effective zoner with greater combo ability and a significantly better recovery. He is a much bigger threat in this meta and far less linear.

While I generally don't engage in these discussions at the risk of sounding biased or rude to Lucas players (Mother brothers are cool with me) People have been saying Lucas is better than Ness and has so much potential since 2015 yet this still hasn't been shown and it's getting to the point this is starting to sound like Yoshi story (so much hidden potential that never gets shown) now I used to believe this was the case when Lucas came out as well but I haven't for a while. And to be honest the two characters are so unlike that they shouldn't even be being compared but alas...

First Lucas does not have a better combo game than Ness. Those cool Footstool combos and locks while good if you can pull them off are not easy, requires you to read DI and more importantly requires you to grab the opponent first with a 12 frame grab that's very punishable on whiff, and Lucas lacks a way to actually approach you to threaten you with this outside of Zair. Unless you do something stupid on Lucas' shield you should not be getting grabbed by him that much. Outside of Footstool stuff he has some good aerial combos but those are easily escaped with SDI and do not rack up damage like Ness can. Ness can rack up a lot of damage very quickly with his much stronger and safer moves and much better grab.

Another thing you mentioned was linearity. Lucas is far more linear than Ness could ever be. Lucas has to zone because he doesn't have an approach option, he doesn't have the CQC game than Ness does to afford people being ontop of him so while he may do better than Ness against characters that prefer playing at a distance any character that forces his approach or can zone break well can completely mitigate his zoning options and expose what little tools he has after that, once Lucas is forced to approach it's so much more difficult for him to regain advantage than Ness especially on platform stages because he lacks a threatening vertical attack option, you see how helpless Mario looks when Bayo is plat camping him? Same deal with Lucas.

I'm not trying to trash Lucas but this notation he's better then Ness hasn't been proven yet and it likely won't ever because it's not a thing. Like I mentioned before both Ness and Lucas' top reps do not travel much at all but despite that Ness maintains much stronger results than Lucas and this has always been the case.

 

[|RK|]

I know we usually just talk about the list to start, but there's potentially a new Cloud kill confirm.

To explain as best as I can, I'll use Ruben's tweet:

Someone forgot to add the set weight/gravity/fall speed event on frame 17 hitbox of Finishing Touch which makes kill %s be weight and fall speed dependent not only fall speed dependent pic.twitter.com/gyLgWvA1Ey

— Ruben (@Ruben_dal) November 25, 2017

In short, using Finishing Touch this way - getting the frame 17 hitbox - can kill earlier. But recall that this is only training mode; what can happen if you add rage to the equation?

You get something along the lines of uair to FT at absurdly low percents, when Cloud is at about 100% rage. Evidently, the range that this works can go as low as... 5% iirc (Jiggs), and Sheik dies at about 15%.

So, the more relevant question for this particular thread - do you see this affecting Cloud's placement? Or is it just another come back factor thing that will leave him in a solid second place?

 

[NINTENDO Galaxy]

I find the Lucas vs Ness arguement amusing since it is usually started by players who play neither so misinformation is more likely to happen and in other character servers sometimes it gets heated.

Regardless, I enjoy conversations about Lucas and Ness.

Listen to Envoy of Chaos, he knows his stuff. His posts are one of the reasons I keep quiet on the thread when Ness and Lucas comparisons come up time and time again.

Can we try not to make assumptions on both characters including when we see them get destroyed on stream or lack thereof?

Or maybe try and play/lab both characters before coming to a conclusion?

 

[Rizen]

Ness>Lucas, been saying this for a long time.

I know we usually just talk about the list to start, but there's potentially a new Cloud kill confirm.

To explain as best as I can, I'll use Ruben's tweet:

Someone forgot to add the set weight/gravity/fall speed event on frame 17 hitbox of Finishing Touch which makes kill %s be weight and fall speed dependent not only fall speed dependent pic.twitter.com/gyLgWvA1Ey

— Ruben (@Ruben_dal) November 25, 2017

In short, using Finishing Touch this way - getting the frame 17 hitbox - can kill earlier. But recall that this is only training mode; what can happen if you add rage to the equation?

You get something along the lines of uair to FT at absurdly low percents, when Cloud is at about 100% rage. Evidently, the range that this works can go as low as... 5% iirc (Jiggs), and Sheik dies at about 15%.

So, the more relevant question for this particular thread - do you see this affecting Cloud's placement? Or is it just another come back factor thing that will leave him in a solid second place?

Wonderful. If any character needed a ridiculously low % kill move, it's Cloud /sarcasm

I don't think I'll ever understand why people think Shulk > Ike

I used to think Ike>Shulk but Shulk's jump/speed art mobility is a huge asset paired with his range. He can stall by alternating from those to shield and threaten anyone offstage. One thing results like Mario being so far above Dr.M and Duck Hunt doing well despite poor kill power, have showed is that mobility matters. Shulk has some pretty decent options to get around his horrendous frame data, although I do consider arts inconsistent throughout a game as the do expire and recharge.

Ike's still too good to drop from mid tier and ranked better than Roy. @ Ike doubters.

 

[Lavani]

I know we usually just talk about the list to start, but there's potentially a new Cloud kill confirm.

To explain as best as I can, I'll use Ruben's tweet:

Someone forgot to add the set weight/gravity/fall speed event on frame 17 hitbox of Finishing Touch which makes kill %s be weight and fall speed dependent not only fall speed dependent pic.twitter.com/gyLgWvA1Ey

— Ruben (@Ruben_dal) November 25, 2017

In short, using Finishing Touch this way - getting the frame 17 hitbox - can kill earlier. But recall that this is only training mode; what can happen if you add rage to the equation?

You get something along the lines of uair to FT at absurdly low percents, when Cloud is at about 100% rage. Evidently, the range that this works can go as low as... 5% iirc (Jiggs), and Sheik dies at about 15%.

So, the more relevant question for this particular thread - do you see this affecting Cloud's placement? Or is it just another come back factor thing that will leave him in a solid second place?

Using Bowser as an example for this is counterproductive to the point being illustrated; the flag set on frame 16 causes the move to consider all characters to have weight/fall physics similar to Mario. The flag being gone on frame 17 means Bowser dies later as a result. Most competitively viable characters weigh less than Mario though, so in most cases the later hit is an improvement.

With regards to Cloud's placement, I don't see a rage gimmick kill requiring limit moving Cloud to #1, particularly when the current #1 already does that without the attached strings. It does look more explosive and reproducible than most rage gimmicks though, and in a real match a likely-staled uair widens the combo range.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

While I generally don't engage in these discussions at the risk of sounding biased or rude to Lucas players (Mother brothers are cool with me) People have been saying Lucas is better than Ness and has so much potential since 2015 yet this still hasn't been shown and it's getting to the point this is starting to sound like Yoshi story (so much hidden potential that never gets shown) now I used to believe this was the case when Lucas came out as well but I haven't for a while. And to be honest the two characters are so unlike that they shouldn't even be being compared but alas...

First Lucas does not have a better combo game than Ness. Those cool Footstool combos and locks while good if you can pull them off are not easy, requires you to read DI and more importantly requires you to grab the opponent first with a 12 frame grab that's very punishable on whiff, and Lucas lacks a way to actually approach you to threaten you with this outside of Zair. Unless you do something stupid on Lucas' shield you should not be getting grabbed by him that much. Outside of Footstool stuff he has some good aerial combos but those are easily escaped with SDI and do not rack up damage like Ness can. Ness can rack up a lot of damage very quickly with his much stronger and safer moves and much better grab.

Another thing you mentioned was linearity. Lucas is far more linear than Ness could ever be. Lucas has to zone because he doesn't have an approach option, he doesn't have the CQC game than Ness does to afford people being ontop of him so while he may do better than Ness against characters that prefer playing at a distance any character that forces his approach or can zone break well can completely mitigate his zoning options and expose what little tools he has after that, once Lucas is forced to approach it's so much more difficult for him to regain advantage than Ness especially on platform stages because he lacks a threatening vertical attack option, you see how helpless Mario looks when Bayo is plat camping him? Same deal with Lucas.

I'm not trying to trash Lucas but this notation he's better then Ness hasn't been proven yet and it likely won't ever because it's not a thing. Like I mentioned before both Ness and Lucas' top reps do not travel much at all but despite that Ness maintains much stronger results than Lucas and this has always been the case.

Your right in this situation in results. Ness had a good year in 2017 comparing to Lucas. Although in attendance on results were inconsistent, his highest peaks were good. S1 placed 5th at B.E.A.S.T. 7 and 7th at Syndicate, both B-Tier tournaments. FOW placing 25th in Civil War (S tier) while beating Larry Lurr and placing 13th in Nairo Saga (S tier) while also beating Locus and Marss is no joke. TGG proudly placed 5th in an A tier tournament, Royal Flush while beating noticable players such as WaDi, Mr. E, Pink Fresh, and took a game off of Tweek, (He once did a close battle against Tweek in KTAR before in early 2017 at around 2-3) that is impressive. In EVO 2017, FOW have done a rather close match against ANTi's cloud despite having little to no experience against Cloud. NAKAT suprisingly used Ness more often than Fox in EVO 2017, defeating Locus and CaptainZack (Although at that time, they were very dominant.), and secure a top 13 placement with all Ness during top 32. Finally...there is Gackt. When I saw Gackt defeated ANTi, I was losing it. He defeated Locus, ANTi, Mistake (Not PGR but he'll be around top 20 in the next PGR), and nearly beat Raito, placing him at 17th at Big House 7 (Taiheita placed 17th a BH6 last year) Gackt also placed 5th at a random C-Tier Japanese tournament while defeating Abadango.

This shows that Ness is a force to be reckon with by his results and wins throughout 2017. He comparably have more results than other high tier characters such as Villager, Mega Man, etc. From this, I'm happy that Ness is now considered a high tier again.

However, Lucas is a different story. Many smashers claims that Lucas is better than Ness through his combo game although it's hard to execute. His results were mediocre, Mekos doesn't place well in tournaments and he place well only on doubles (Yet NAKAT and VoiD team and BestNess and Diablo team placed well in doubles). Taiheita have a mix bag of results in Umebura and Sumabato tournaments (Such as placing 65th at Umebura 26, 49th at Umebura Japan Major 2017, 49th at Sumabato 19, and 25th at Sumabato 21). However, while I do believe that Lucas is underrated, he's not underrated enough to be top 20 or better than Ness right now. I don't see it.

 

[Tizio Random]

I thought I was stupid because sometimes Cloud seemed to kill WAY too early considering aerial FT was nerfed in 1.1.5. I recall a set (don't remember which one) where a Cloud killed a Bayo at like 30% with aerial FT which is absurd even with max rage. I guess this explains why that happened and well, it's bonkers lmao.

 

[Emblem Lord]

Marth is better than Ryu.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

I still don't understand why Ryu is top tier again?? I mean his results were decent yet his match-up spread is pretty much high tier. Corrin, Luigi, and even Pikachu have a better chance as a top tier than Ryu imo.

 

[Frihetsanka]

I still don't understand why Ryu is top tier again?? I mean his results were decent yet his match-up spread is pretty much high tier. Corrin, Luigi, and even Pikachu have a better chance as a top tier than Ryu imo.

If you look at the voting data, you see a pretty big jump from Sonic to Mario. If I understand the data correctly, Ryu is closer to Corrin than Mario is to Sonic. One could easily make the case for Mario, Ryu, and Marth in high tier rather than top tier (if I understand the data correctly, Mario is about as close to Corrin as he is Sonic).

 

[JustCallMeJon]

Finally, Zero-Suit Samus is now in top 10. She is incrediably jank and deadly with rage.

 

[Heracr055]

I still don't understand why Ryu is top tier again?? I mean his results were decent yet his match-up spread is pretty much high tier. Corrin, Luigi, and even Pikachu have a better chance as a top tier than Ryu imo.

There are a few reasons. The first is that the ability to seal stocks is heavily favored in Smash 4 (this is part of the reason why Sheik fell to A tier). Ryu has that KO ability in spades. He also has one of the best kill confirms in light utilt/dtilt->TSRK. His weight allows him to live long enough to abuse rage for even earlier kills (if Ryu doesn't get his linear recovery abused, of course). Ryu is also a combo king. If he gets in, he can put between 40-60% off that neutral win (which can be done in, say, 3 hits). Not to mention he can nair string foes to dair offstage at low percents. Focus Attack gives Ryu an answer to single hit moves and improves his mobility for mixups and recovery. All these combine to make Ryu very tilting to play against, which is a potent psycological challenge for the foe. The last quality is Ryu's "potential." For some reason, he's valued in the sense that he's not being played to his best strengths yet. So the theoretical optimized Ryu probably boosts his tier placing (however, many Ryus see this as placebo).

 

[Bigbomb2]

Got to say, this list pretty well nailed the general consensus of where characters are at in the current meta. Except for a few oddballs it seems pretty good. I don't expect many large changes for a long while.

 

[Caryslan]

As a Lucina player, I am happy to see her so high on the tier list. When Smash 4 first came out, she was dismissed as the "training wheels Marth" who would never amount to anything and who was only played by people who could not handle Tippers.

While I have not played in a live tournament, I proudly played her online alongside my Ganondorf, and win countless matches with her even against Marth.

Now, the top players have seen her value and she's finally gotten the respect she deserves. She's better then Roy, Ike, and Robin, and numerous other characters on the tier list.

So, where are all the people who slammed her at launch and mocked her? Because her massive jump in the tier list last time was not a fluke, and she's not going anywhere.

Can she rise higher and maybe even surpass Corrin and Marth? Time will tell.

But one thing is certain, she's more than a "Training Wheels Marth" She's the 14th best character on the tier list and very close to breaking into the top tiers.

 

[Deleted member]

You know, I hope Luigi rises in the future. He has great utility and things he can do to attack his opponents. ( His Cyclone Gimp and many more ). I am not saying he is top tier, but Luigi should definitely get a raise in the future. I can not wait for Marth and Lucina to be reunited in the next tier list and for Ryu to fall some spots in high tier.

 

[Lord Dio]

I'm starting to think that Cloud may not be Top 2. All of his Top 3 mains don't even play him Solo (MKleo, Komo, Tweek)
When was the last time they won a major with just Solo Cloud? Major's almost always comes down to secondaries for them. The best Solo Cloud right now is MattyG and he may not even get PGR. The only place that Solo Cloud is truly been
dominant is Japan. A character that doesn't seem Solo mainable at top level usually doesn't indicate a top 2 character.

Look at anyone past Bayonetta and tell me they're solo viable.
Because they're not.
Mr regularly uses secondaries, as did ZeRo throughout this year (and according to some he might need to pull them out again).
The only real solo viable character in this game is bayo, and that can also be debated sicne salem's picking up Greninja, Mistake pulls out his ZSS sometimes, etc.

Will come back later to give my thoughts on the cloud kill confirm thing.

 

[Skeeter Mania]

Look at anyone past Bayonetta and tell me they're solo viable.
Because they're not.

Is that really a bad thing?

On the other hand, character loyalty as the result of genuinely wanting to push a character as far as possible seems to bring fairly positive results. I think this is why Japan has so many of the top character specialists.

There's also the fact that money usually isn't at stake at JPN tournaments, so there's not too huge of an incentive to win.

 

[Ziodyne 21]

Look at anyone past Bayonetta and tell me they're solo viable.
Because they're not.
Mr regularly uses secondaries, as did ZeRo throughout this year (and according to some he might need to pull them out again).
The only real solo viable character in this game is bayo, and that can also be debated sicne salem's picking up Greninja, Mistake pulls out his ZSS sometimes, etc.

Will come back later to give my thoughts on the cloud kill confirm thing.

Well what in your opinion makes Cloud not "solo viable", what makes Bayo solo viable than fellow members in S-Tier Cloud and Diddy?.

 

[bc1910]

While I generally don't engage in these discussions at the risk of sounding biased or rude to Lucas players (Mother brothers are cool with me) People have been saying Lucas is better than Ness and has so much potential since 2015 yet this still hasn't been shown and it's getting to the point this is starting to sound like Yoshi story (so much hidden potential that never gets shown) now I used to believe this was the case when Lucas came out as well but I haven't for a while. And to be honest the two characters are so unlike that they shouldn't even be being compared but alas...

First Lucas does not have a better combo game than Ness. Those cool Footstool combos and locks while good if you can pull them off are not easy, requires you to read DI and more importantly requires you to grab the opponent first with a 12 frame grab that's very punishable on whiff, and Lucas lacks a way to actually approach you to threaten you with this outside of Zair. Unless you do something stupid on Lucas' shield you should not be getting grabbed by him that much. Outside of Footstool stuff he has some good aerial combos but those are easily escaped with SDI and do not rack up damage like Ness can. Ness can rack up a lot of damage very quickly with his much stronger and safer moves and much better grab.

Another thing you mentioned was linearity. Lucas is far more linear than Ness could ever be. Lucas has to zone because he doesn't have an approach option, he doesn't have the CQC game than Ness does to afford people being ontop of him so while he may do better than Ness against characters that prefer playing at a distance any character that forces his approach or can zone break well can completely mitigate his zoning options and expose what little tools he has after that, once Lucas is forced to approach it's so much more difficult for him to regain advantage than Ness especially on platform stages because he lacks a threatening vertical attack option, you see how helpless Mario looks when Bayo is plat camping him? Same deal with Lucas.

I'm not trying to trash Lucas but this notation he's better then Ness hasn't been proven yet and it likely won't ever because it's not a thing. Like I mentioned before both Ness and Lucas' top reps do not travel much at all but despite that Ness maintains much stronger results than Lucas and this has always been the case.

If you know me at all you’ll know I don’t really care about footstool combos. Short of guaranteed locks from low height popups I do not see them as consistent enough, so Lucas’ Dthrow footstools do not impress me. That said, Lucas’ combo game far exceeds Ness’ with more reliable Dthrow combos, Dtilt setups, Zair setups and aerial combos. Ness’ combo game is not as strong and I fail to see how he racks up damage more effectively when he has a weaker advantage state and is worse at zoning. Also saying that Lucas lacks a way to threaten you with his grab outside of his best option (Zair) isn’t a fair assessment, by definition you are ignoring his best option. Not that this is true anyway, he has good ways to bait shield with his zoning.

Speaking of which, you say Lucas is more linear than Ness because he is forced to zone, but in fact he can mix up his neutral effectively between zoning and relatively safe Zair approaches. It’s not like Ness is particularly good at approaching. It is true that Lucas struggles against characters that can break his zone, but he at least retains retreating Zair and decent aerial escape options (Ness also has these) to attempt neutral resets. Ness might have better CQC, but it’s not so good that it gives him much more of a chance against the CQC monsters of top tier.

I do concede that Lucas’ lacklustre results throw relative strength into question. I don’t believe he is a hidden top tier or anything, just that his practical tools are superior to Ness’.

Having said that I also agree that Ness and Lucas are so different that comparing them doesn’t really accomplish anything. It’s like a less extreme version of arguing over the best Pokemon character just because they are Pokemon, when none of them are even semi-clones.

 

[Y2Kay]

I feel that Lucas is a similar character to Ryu in that his gameplan is spectacular at a certain range, but if you don't have to play them in their optimal range, things can fall apart fast.

 

[Heracr055]

As a Lucina player, I am happy to see her so high on the tier list. When Smash 4 first came out, she was dismissed as the "training wheels Marth" who would never amount to anything and who was only played by people who could not handle Tippers.

While I have not played in a live tournament, I proudly played her online alongside my Ganondorf, and win countless matches with her even against Marth.

Now, the top players have seen her value and she's finally gotten the respect she deserves. She's better then Roy, Ike, and Robin, and numerous other characters on the tier list.

So, where are all the people who slammed her at launch and mocked her? Because her massive jump in the tier list last time was not a fluke, and she's not going anywhere.

Can she rise higher and maybe even surpass Corrin and Marth? Time will tell.

But one thing is certain, she's more than a "Training Wheels Marth" She's the 14th best character on the tier list and very close to breaking into the top tiers.

The patch to Marcina helped them both. Marth and Lucina were both considered bad prior to that. And that perception of Lucina being worse than Marth rubbed off quite a while ago, with people requesting Marth and Lucina being combined into one entry.
You are very late in claiming victory for a stance nobody has anymore.

 

[Envoy of Chaos]

I find the Lucas vs Ness arguement amusing since it is usually started by players who play neither so misinformation is more likely to happen and in other character servers sometimes it gets heated.

Regardless, I enjoy conversations about Lucas and Ness.

Listen to Envoy of Chaos, he knows his stuff. His posts are one of the reasons I keep quiet on the thread when Ness and Lucas comparisons come up time and time again.

Can we try not to make assumptions on both characters including when we see them get destroyed on stream or lack thereof?

Or maybe try and play/lab both characters before coming to a conclusion?

Thank you for your kind words though feel free to drop any knowledge you have your much more knowledgeable about Lucas than I.

Look at anyone past Bayonetta and tell me they're solo viable.
Because they're not.
Mr regularly uses secondaries, as did ZeRo throughout this year (and according to some he might need to pull them out again).
The only real solo viable character in this game is bayo, and that can also be debated sicne salem's picking up Greninja, Mistake pulls out his ZSS sometimes, etc.

Will come back later to give my thoughts on the cloud kill confirm thing.

Okay now hold on, lets not get hasty plenty of characters in this game are solo viable the use of a secondary does not mean that character is not. People use secondaries for many reasons especially at higher levels, matchup inexperience, change of pace, player counter pick, etc. Especially at a high level when your opponent knows your character just about as well as you do sometimes it's just not going work. You don't really think A character that won Evo isn't solo viable because Salem decided to use Greninja do you? You think think the consistent eight placings by Cloud means he can't cut it on his own because Tweek decided to go DK down 0-2 so you? If the character can consistently achieve good results and doesn't have numerous MUs that are really bad they are solo viable and that encompasses a good bit of the cast.

If you know me at all you’ll know I don’t really care about footstool combos. Short of guaranteed locks from low height popups I do not see them as consistent enough, so Lucas’ Dthrow footstools do not impress me. That said, Lucas’ combo game far exceeds Ness’ with more reliable Dthrow combos, Dtilt setups, Zair setups and aerial combos. Ness’ combo game is not as strong and I fail to see how he racks up damage more effectively when he has a weaker advantage state and is worse at zoning. Also saying that Lucas lacks a way to threaten you with his grab outside of his best option (Zair) isn’t a fair assessment, by definition you are ignoring his best option. Not that this is true anyway, he has good ways to bait shield with his zoning.

Speaking of which, you say Lucas is more linear than Ness because he is forced to zone, but in fact he can mix up his neutral effectively between zoning and relatively safe Zair approaches. It’s not like Ness is particularly good at approaching. It is true that Lucas struggles against characters that can break his zone, but he at least retains retreating Zair and decent aerial escape options (Ness also has these) to attempt neutral resets. Ness might have better CQC, but it’s not so good that it gives him much more of a chance against the CQC monsters of top tier.

I do concede that Lucas’ lacklustre results throw relative strength into question. I don’t believe he is a hidden top tier or anything, just that his practical tools are superior to Ness’.

Having said that I also agree that Ness and Lucas are so different that comparing them doesn’t really accomplish anything. It’s like a less extreme version of arguing over the best Pokemon character just because they are Pokemon, when none of them are even semi-clones.

Lucas doesn't have a stronger advantage state hence why his game plan is to be a heavy zoner he's goal is to get a small win and reset neutral not press advantage unless he has a throw combo going. A simple Fair string from Ness is 26~30% and importantly puts his opponent off stage where Ness excels at ledge trapping and ledge guarding with Nair and PKT a simple up air-dthrow-Fair-Fair up air from Ness put Mario at 46% and above Ness where he can juggle quite well. Ness has so many more options for combos I cant list them all but all his aerials sans Dair combo out of throw or off each other and set up for locks, ledge traps or juggling that he is quite good at Ness has arguably a top 10-15 advantage state for a reason. Ness does not zone as well as Lucas no but that's not what he wants to do but that doesn't mean he can't with his fairly decent sized and more importantly safe aerials.

I get what your saying on his zoning game it's good yes but it can't be his only strength, zoning doesn't help when your not in the lead you have to be able to approach. Ness' approach options aren't the strongest no but again he can actually do it when he has to thanks again to safe and strong aerials that force shield which then condition for grabs and a safe dash attack. If all Lucas can do is Zair to approach that's incredibly linear and vertically challenged (meaning he can't cover anything above him either which is why plat camping can be hell)

 

[UnzipsCrogre]

Ryu to fall some spots in high tier.

I can agree with Ryu(and Marth tbh) falling to the very top of B tier, but who in B tier is better than Ryu? At this point he seems to have better results than Marcina & Corrin, other characters placed around his level. Absolute lowest I see Ryu going is 13th if Lucina gets fused with Marth.

 

[Nu~]

Part of me wants to agree with that Greninja placing.
Like...it just feels like his offense (and perhaps even half of his neutral) is a game of smoke & mirrors.
No pun intended :3

A character with the best overall mobility in the game and some of the worst aerial frame data in the game. It sounds like a cruel joke by sakurai at first.
Like why do I feel like I can be anywhere any time I want, but as soon as I get within a 3 meter wide bubble around my opponent, I feel like ganon. At least aerially. His grounded pokes are strong.
But a frame 16 Fair, frame 12 nair no SH AC aerials, 4 aerials with linear hitboxes...

It feels so, so gross lmao. Every approach is telegraphed if you haven’t tricked your opponent yet. Watching Venia, Lea, and so on... their neutral looks like one massive mind game and slip sliding around at the speed of sound until they capitalize heavily on one hit.


I may be wrong but the character seems held back from my perspective.


If shuriken didn’t exist i don’t see how he wouldn't be a low mid tier. It’s the only thing that sows his neutral together. Given how good that move is and how it allows him to force the approach in many matchups, I still have some faith in the char. However, against the top tiers who can force you to play in that “aerial blindspot” or can keep up with you/force you to approach them?

Like how is this character supposed to survive down the line?

Edit: I’m aware this sounds stupid considering the explosion of Greninja results lol but this is just my perspective on the character as a whole. Ignoring how well he’s done recently

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

Going over my thoughts.

* Surprised Mario's still top 10. Ally's season hasn't been that great, and I figured he'd be relegated to 11th at this point.
* Cloud should be 3rd. Until someone is taking ZeRo's space with Cloud, Diddy's still #2.
* I would still vouch Rosalina to be Top 3. But Top 5 is reasonable. S-Tier would be more appropriate, regardless.
* Lucina under Marth. Guessing this is because more people - like MKLeo - place using Marth.
* Pikachu's too high. I guess Esam's still doing good enough in bracket to keep him afloat, but I rarely see anything noteworthy from Pikachu.
* Luigi's FAR too low. Was this because most of Elegant's recent placings came fairly late in the season or what??
* Olimar is too low. Shuton has proven this.
* Why are DK and Bowser only two spaces away from each other? Based on what I last recall, Tweek and Konga have outdone themselves with DK more than Nairo has done with Bowser. LordMix has been inactive, and there hasn't been a "best Bowser" to fill that void in months. But from what I gather, largely to do with DK's placings and his kill percent, he's a tier higher than Bowser.
* Ness is too high. FOW is barely active. Besides Great Gonzales, who is placing with Ness? Lucas is much better.
* Link is too low. T has proven this on more than one occasion.

The good thing is the viability pool in this game is still high. Much of these placings would make more sense if they weren't ordered within tiers. But for the most part, for the examples given above, I believe certain characters should be placed one tier higher than their placing. Or in Bowser's case, one tier lower unless otherwise noted.

 

[Lord Dio]

Is that really a bad thing?

It's not a bad thing, which is the point I'm trying to make.

Well what in your opinion makes Cloud not "solo viable", what makes Bayo solo viable than fellow members in S-Tier Cloud and Diddy?.

He even gave reasoning, all the top clouds use secondaries, as does the best Diddy (the other two don't but they don't get as good results as often as the top clouds, top bayos, top sheiks who do use secondaries).

Okay now hold on, lets not get hasty plenty of characters in this game are solo viable the use of a secondary does not mean that character is not. People use secondaries for many reasons especially at higher levels, matchup inexperience, change of pace, player counter pick, etc. Especially at a high level when your opponent knows your character just about as well as you do sometimes it's just not going work. You don't really think A character that won Evo isn't solo viable because Salem decided to use Greninja do you? You think think the consistent eight placings by Cloud means he can't cut it on his own because Tweek decided to go DK down 0-2 so you? If the character can consistently achieve good results and doesn't have numerous MUs that are really bad they are solo viable and that encompasses a good bit of the cast.

While i do personalyl think bayo's the only possible solo viable, and won't get into that, I was trying to say that a character being solo viable or not shouldn't really affect where they place

As for the cloud kill confirm......hmmmmmmmm...............

 

[PK Bash]

If you know me at all you’ll know I don’t really care about footstool combos. Short of guaranteed locks from low height popups I do not see them as consistent enough, so Lucas’ Dthrow footstools do not impress me. That said, Lucas’ combo game far exceeds Ness’ with more reliable Dthrow combos, Dtilt setups, Zair setups and aerial combos. Ness’ combo game is not as strong and I fail to see how he racks up damage more effectively when he has a weaker advantage state and is worse at zoning. Also saying that Lucas lacks a way to threaten you with his grab outside of his best option (Zair) isn’t a fair assessment, by definition you are ignoring his best option. Not that this is true anyway, he has good ways to bait shield with his zoning.

Speaking of which, you say Lucas is more linear than Ness because he is forced to zone, but in fact he can mix up his neutral effectively between zoning and relatively safe Zair approaches. It’s not like Ness is particularly good at approaching. It is true that Lucas struggles against characters that can break his zone, but he at least retains retreating Zair and decent aerial escape options (Ness also has these) to attempt neutral resets. Ness might have better CQC, but it’s not so good that it gives him much more of a chance against the CQC monsters of top tier.

I do concede that Lucas’ lacklustre results throw relative strength into question. I don’t believe he is a hidden top tier or anything, just that his practical tools are superior to Ness’.

Having said that I also agree that Ness and Lucas are so different that comparing them doesn’t really accomplish anything. It’s like a less extreme version of arguing over the best Pokemon character just because they are Pokemon, when none of them are even semi-clones.

I disagree with Lucas' adv state being better. He is forced into inconsistent followups with moves like d-air out of dthrow to set up a tech chase situation, which he isn't all that great at playing out because he doesn't really fall fast enough to pull it off consistently and effectively. There's also the issue of d-air kind of sucking in this game. The hits don't link properly and this is something that can be abused by the opponent. If you want to go for more traditional combos you will only get one hit at most. Or at least, you SHOULD only be getting one hit at most.
Aside from that, his advantage state is basically just catching landings if he wants to extend his adv state beyond one hit out of dthrow. Like every character, Lucas has to guess what you'll land with/where you'll land but because of how committal his options here are and general lack of decent option selects/option coverage, if he guesses wrong there is nothing more he can do. He's back to neutral.
Other facets of his adv state are just not there. People like to hype up his PKT1 for edgeguarding/gimping and think it's better than Ness' because it goes through them. This is a misguided opinion imo because a) Lucas PKT is slow as hell, and has tighter turning circles - it covers/threatens much less space and is generally easier to play around for that reason; b) Lucas' PKT holds the opponent in their position and gives them time to think, unlike Ness' which forces people to fall immediately - obviously vastly preferable; c) Lucas PKT has a lot of endlag, meaning his pressure stalls when the PKT ends and you've got to start it up again from first gear. Lucas can also struggle to keep people on the ledge if they keep their getup obscure. Ness on the other hand has a far easier time covering multiple options due to hitbox size, duration, frame data sometimes, things like that. Ness ledgetrapping is scary as anything.
Ness' combo game is being optimised fairly slowly and although some of it is impractical as all hell (shoutouts to Flashwire's crazy Training Mode combos), a lot of it is actually very applicable in high-pressure situations (shoutouts to S1) and gives Ness a superior combo game imo, with more damage per hit to boot and the potential to set up some dangerous 50/50s to end stocks early, which Lucas just cannot do.
Ness tech chasing is stronger because he has more forgiving option coverage in this situation. Lucas has to guess correctly in order to get hits in because his options are slower. Ness can react with faster dash attack/grab to continue adv., as well as pressure an option with fast dtilts. Lucas does have his nair which is cool for this but it can be a little risky for my tastes and again, you really have to commit to it and hope you guessed right.
So yeah there's the counterpoint there. Ness' adv state is massively better than Lucas' imo.

To be fair though, I share your broad opinion, I do think Lucas is better than Ness at least in theory. His neutral is pretty nice and on paper his neutral tools are generally pretty conducive to Smash 4, minus inherent Smash 4 BS. Really good pokes, a strong GTFO option if he ever lets them get too close, and can force most characters in the game to approach. Lucas can't zone all game because PK Fire is a pretty awkward zoning tool (very unsafe unless you move backwards with it... which is obviously not ideal because positioning etc) but he's great at counterpoking/midrange so he has got that going for him.
I don't see the merit in zair to approach to be honest because it's very difficult to reliably follow up on it unless you're so close that it's not longer safe on block. Lucas is pretty awful at approaching. So is Ness, but Ness does at least have zone breaking potential and can play the CQC way better than Lucas. If an opponent is able to force Lucas to approach and can smother him in footsies, he's going to struggle. Ness has a few more options. His footsies options are inferior but his oos game, for example, is not, and trades will tend to benefit Ness; extending your adv on him is a lot riskier and Ness is kind of built to punish an opponent overextending.

Lucas quietly has some amazing players like Hakadama (so good, but he barely travels to show what he can do), Taiheita, Aghesama, PK Blueberry (again this man is so good, shame he never goes to anything), Mekos, Clade, Luco, Nova/Kodystri/whatever he calls himself now, etc etc ...
There are quite a few high-level Lucas players out there who would put in some serious work but there's a recurring theme here... barely any of them go to anything.

Ness rep on the other hand can be a bit hit and miss but whenever he's at anything, he always does well, sometimes fantastically well. When you put a dangerous character in the hands of one of these top players who can process so many possibilities very quickly, he's one hell of a force.

The problem is Ness is very obviously flawed and this stuff sticks. Lucas isn't that great but his weaknesses aren't as prominent (they're not as immediately glaring, but at higher levels and against better characters the cracks really start to show), but then again he doesn't really have any easy-bake BS to exploit to assert himself. (always ban FD.) So whether he can consistently match/exceed Ness in practical, high-pressure situations remains unclear.

I think that he could if given the opportunity though.
-----
@Above (not gonna alert you for the sake of a footnote) As for Nesses who are placing: S1, Poppt, Gackt, Taranito (seen less of him of late but he was around a fair bit early 2017), NAKAT (been using him a lot more), Shaky, FuTure, SS every now and then. (I miss MASA) I appreciate that many of these players don't solo him. And yes FOW is barely active but you can't just dismiss his results and wins at Civil War and Nairo Saga. With solo Ness, no less.
I'm not saying you have to be as optimistic about Ness as I am (when you've been playing him this long you need some hope to hang on to), but I think it's a bit unfair to say Ness is too high and Lucas is "much better" on the basis that Ness is lacking in representation... Lucas has the same problem multiplied by 10.

 

[Deleted member]

I feel that Lucas is a similar character to Ryu in that his gameplan is spectacular at a certain range, but if you don't have to play them in their optimal range, things can fall apart fast.

I agree with this. Ryu does very well when close to a character, he can up tilt or up special to kill at early percents. If Ryu is far away from the opponent, Ryu has to use his bad approach to get back in. That is why Samus and Villager win the match up against Ryu, as Villager can easily camp him with projectiles and his finishing - blow tree and Samus dealing some heavy damage to Ryu by repeating missiles and Charge Shots while staying back from Ryu.

Lucas also can be quite a threat if he gets a down throw on you. Threaten you with the likes of neutral air and other moves and take a stock quickly. However if Diddy Kong or Cloud take advantage of him in the air, he can die pretty easily.

 

[Onua]

What do you guys think forces players who play cloud to opt out for a secondary? Namely Leo, Komo, and Tweek. Like what stops him from being a totally solo playable char.

 

[Lord Dio]

What do you guys think forces players who play cloud to opt out for a secondary? Namely Leo, Komo, and Tweek. Like what stops him from being a totally solo playable char.

To quote Twitter Tweek:
"Every time ZeRo spikes me offstage I lose a year of my life"
Pretty much that
Also it feels nice being able to switch to a character who can actually recover.
Also if you just got completely dominated (a la Tweek vs Nairo's MM9 match going from swordie vs sammy to Godzilla vs King Kong)
Plus certain MUs (KEN, ZeRo, bayo)

 

[MH-Jin]

What do you guys think forces players who play cloud to opt out for a secondary? Namely Leo, Komo, and Tweek. Like what stops him from being a totally solo playable char.

It's mainly a recovery issue and players really knowing the matchup. Since Cloud is really common from low to high play, it's likely you'll run into someone who knows the matchup really well.

Players like Zero and Mr.R do really well against Cloud, being able to edgeguard and gimp them easily during a match. Same with VoiD as well.

That's part of why MkLeo goes Marth often against Sheiks, for the more reliable recovery and being able to wall out with Marth's great ground game.

 

[Shaya]

So I didn't see this asked (or answered) anywhere, but is there a reason why Cloud (2.49) and Diddy (2.51) aren't paired despite the difference of their average scores being less than 0.1 (it's 0.02)? Is it because they're in the highest tier or something?

sdfasdfdasgadttaesvzcvzcgefefwefafsf
eternal sadness.
It never happened >,<

I knew they were meant to be tied but somehow it slipped through. Bleh. Fixed now. Thanks!

Otherwise,
personally feel S is the only top tier designation.
A and maybe B could be high.
B is either the aforementioned or a borderline.

I have something either fun or catastrophic to bring up but I'll wait a little bit~ (numbers numbers)

 

[Frihetsanka]

Otherwise,
personally feel S is the only top tier designation.
A and maybe B could be high.
B is either the aforementioned or a borderline.

I was looking at the ssbwiki to see how people changed the descriptions of various characters and I noticed that someone (or some people) seem to be under the impression that C tier is high tier now.

"Regardless, Ness dropped once again on the fourth and current tier list, at 28th, now sharing the spot with Lucas, though due to the expansion of the tiers, he is now considered a high tier character rather than a mid tier character."

"[...]since the tiers were expanded, Donkey Kong has now become a high-tier character]...]"

"He [Lucas] would then see a very slight rise to 32nd on the third and current tier list, and then to 28th on the fourth tier list, now tied with Ness for the bottom of high tier."

"He [Bowser] then saw a slight rise to 24th on the fourth and current tier list; the expansion of the tiers have resulted on him now becoming a high-tier character, despite losing his status to the best super heavyweight to Donkey Kong once again."

Personally, I would be inclined to say that C tier is high-mid rather than high tier. Being ranked 27 out of 55 (or 58 if you include Miis) seems rather average to me.

 

[Rizen]

What do you guys think forces players who play cloud to opt out for a secondary? Namely Leo, Komo, and Tweek. Like what stops him from being a totally solo playable char.

Cloud is solo-viable. He just happens to be the best secondary due to ease of access, extremely strong core character and powerful punishes so he's often used as one. Playing multiple characters is more about mind games the way Leo does it than covering losing MUs.

 

[Shaya]

That's why we said we have no specific or official designations of top/high/mid/low/etc but for the sake of lowmid tier tournaments yada yada
Some folks decided to super misconstrue that into C being high tier when it quite obviously isn't, nor did we say it was in any capacity.

Idunno, let the ssbwiki people know.
Gunla , this is why I said 'potentially C' should be in that aside comment.
A COMMENT I DIDNT EVEN WANT TO MAKE

:sob:

 

[Jaguar360]

Part of me wants to agree with that Greninja placing.
Like...it just feels like his offense (and perhaps even half of his neutral) is a game of smoke & mirrors.
No pun intended :3

A character with the best overall mobility in the game and some of the worst aerial frame data in the game. It sounds like a cruel joke by sakurai at first.
Like why do I feel like I can be anywhere any time I want, but as soon as I get within a 3 meter wide bubble around my opponent, I feel like ganon. At least aerially. His grounded pokes are strong.
But a frame 16 Fair, frame 12 nair no SH AC aerials, 4 aerials with linear hitboxes...

It feels so, so gross lmao. Every approach is telegraphed if you haven’t tricked your opponent yet. Watching Venia, Lea, and so on... their neutral looks like one massive mind game and slip sliding around at the speed of sound until they capitalize heavily on one hit.


I may be wrong but the character seems held back from my perspective.


If shuriken didn’t exist i don’t see how he wouldn't be a low mid tier. It’s the only thing that sows his neutral together. Given how good that move is and how it allows him to force the approach in many matchups, I still have some faith in the char. However, against the top tiers who can force you to play in that “aerial blindspot” or can keep up with you/force you to approach them?

Like how is this character supposed to survive down the line?

Edit: I’m aware this sounds stupid considering the explosion of Greninja results lol but this is just my perspective on the character as a whole. Ignoring how well he’s done recently

You're right in the sense that Greninja highly benefits from trickery (I mean it fits the character's essence): confusing the opponent with movement and mixing players up has always been one of the keys to success with Greninja.

However, I get the sense that you're thinking of it as a crutch and I disagree with that. Salem and Stroder, for instance, mostly rely on fundamentals to succeed and focus on just using the right moves for each scenario. While Greninja's frame data isn't the best (though with buffs overtime, I don't think it's horrible), each move has characteristics that demand respect in either neutral or advantage. His f-air, for instance his slowest aerial apart from d-air at frame 16, but its range commands respect from absolutely everyone, it's huge and outranges most sword character's attacks. Combined with its damage output, I see it as a beautiful neutral tool. No tricks around it at all. And then his u-air and b-air at frame 7 and 5 respectively give him just the tools he needs to juggle and edgeguard. They're not crazy on their own, but when you put them on a character with Greninja's aerial mobility, his advantage state becomes really strong just at a fundamental level. Even on the ground he's got a respectable frame 3 jab, a really long f-tilt, a disjointed u-tilt that anti-airs well alongside f-tilt and can lead to big rewards with the strong hit, and a moderately long ranged and quick frame 5 d-tilt to take advantage of his crawl and low stature. And he's got a quick projectile another form of long-range control in Hydro Pump. Lack of "get-off-me" options aside, you have a character with a really complete kit with the attributes to take advantage of it. That does not sound like a character that needs smoke and mirrors to me.

Btw, I do appreciate that you took the time to watch these Greninja players and use them as references in your post. I feel too often that people who think lowly of Greninja just don't watch the right players, so it's interesting to see this perspective.