Official 4BR Tier List V4 - Competitive Insight & Analysis

[Lukingordex]

Lucas Fair is pretty potent and very much slept on based off of what i've read in a lot of posts.@Envoy of Chaos

It's definitely pretty good, look at the size of that thing

 

[Minordeth]

inb4 everyone calls Pac Man mid tier. Sinji 2-0'd Dabuz (and 2 stocked his Olimar). Dabuz never had good history with Pac Man, as Aba's Pac Man gave him trouble back in the day.

Yeah, which is weird to me.

Rosa isn’t super fun for Pac, as I recall. Sinji at least has it as a disadvantaged MU. Olimar doesn’t seem like he’d have a better time against Pac, but I’m not a Pacmain, so idk.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

It's definitely pretty good, look at the size of that thing

Still, never forget the devs who made Lucas's up-air hitbox. FeelsBadMan

 

[The_Bookworm]

Sinji won against Dabuz 2-0. This is a big upset!

But it is just a local nevertheless. Here is a little debate I am going to cook up. Taken from Smashwiki:
"Currently, Pac-Man remains on the 46th place on the fourth and current tier list, though despite this, there has been some debate within the community over whether Pac-Man should be ranked higher or even lower than he already is, as some within the community (most notably ESAM and Mr. R) view him as one of the worst characters in the game, while players have pointed out at great placings such as Sinji's 25th placing at Super Smash Con 2017."

Would you guys rank him higher or lower? Ever since the new tier list, I moved and to E-tier (low tier) and made go below . Considering the large boost of results from Sinji (especially from Genesis), I could use some input on where to place him. here is an excerpt of my personal list:
E-
*Low Tier*
F ..........

Uh, a little help with Roy please... lol

 

[The_Bookworm]

Still, never forget the devs who made Lucas's up-air hitbox. FeelsBadMan

I wonder if a salt compilation video has a Lucas missing a kill confirm because of "Sakurai's gift" and he ends up dying of it.
IT IS NOT EVEN ATTACHED TO HIS HEAD!!!!

Smashwiki:

Changes from Brawl

• 
  Up aerial has increased start-up lag (frame 5 → 7), a shorter duration (6 frames → 3), and a smaller hitbox (7u → 5.2u). Its hitbox is also no longer attached to Lucas' head during its animation.

 

[Nu~]

LOOOOOOOOL

This is like THE ultimate FU to all the people who still thought that Rosa beats Pac for free based on the Dabuz vs aba match at Apex.

But watch this get ignored tho

 

[The_Bookworm]

LOOOOOOOOL

This is like THE ultimate FU to all the people who still thought that Rosa beats oac for feee based on the Dabuz vs aba match at Apex.

But watch this get ignored tho

Aba's Pac Man took a set off of Dabuz before.

 

[Lukingordex]

But it is just a local nevertheless. Here is a little debate I am going to cook up. Taken from Smashwiki:
"Currently, Pac-Man remains on the 46th place on the fourth and current tier list, though despite this, there has been some debate within the community over whether Pac-Man should be ranked higher or even lower than he already is, as some within the community (most notably ESAM and Mr. R) view him as one of the worst characters in the game, while players have pointed out at great placings such as Sinji's 25th placing at Super Smash Con 2017."

Would you guys rank him higher or lower? Ever since the new tier list, I moved and to E-tier (low tier) and made go below . Considering the large boost of results from Sinji (especially from Genesis), I could use some input on where to place him. here is an excerpt of my personal list:
E-
*Low Tier*
F ..........

Uh, a little help with Roy please... lol

While i understand that majors does have an high impact on how we see a character according to it's performance, i don't see how shinji's win against Dabuz loses importance just because it happened in a local.

Also, shinji himself, as people have already stated in this thread, have been getting very impressive results with pacman lately. I don't really understand why people, knowing about this, still believe pacman should be in the same tier of characters such as falco, kirby or palutena who i honestly haven't heard of much lately. I do believe pacman deserves to be one tier above, even if he's the dead last character on it.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

I wonder if a salt compilation video has a Lucas missing a kill confirm because of "Sakurai's gift" and he ends up dying of it.
IT IS NOT EVEN ATTACHED TO HIS HEAD!!!!

Smashwiki:

Changes from Brawl

• 
  Up aerial has increased start-up lag (frame 5 → 7), a shorter duration (6 frames → 3), and a smaller hitbox (7u → 5.2u). Its hitbox is also no longer attached to Lucas' head during its animation.

This hitbox could be a meme...I'm sorry..

 

[Minordeth]

I’m down for analyzing more of this Odyssey Fox. He played super reactively against Anti. Walked more in those two games than I’ve seen from all the Foxes in the last three years combined.

Combine that with maxed space Ftilt, catching Anti’s landings hard, and occasionally literally standing standing after PSing fireball to counterbait Anti’s approach, and it seemed like Anti got lost.

And then he gets bopped making dumb Fox-fishing play against Raptor’s Yoshi.

 

[Lukingordex]

And then he gets bopped making dumb Fox-fishing play against Raptor’s Yoshi.

Yoshi becomes a pretty good character when people don't know the MU

 

[The_Bookworm]

This could be a meme...Might delete soon.

That is over-exaggerating it. It definitely sticks a middle finger to Lucas's fanbase though..... lol
Seriously can anyone tell me how to insert the swordsman Roy and not the koopaling.

I’m down for analyzing more of this Odyssey Fox. He played super reactively against Anti. Walked more in those two games than I’ve seen from all the Foxes in the last three years combined.

Combine that with maxed space Ftilt, catching Anti’s landings hard, and occasionally literally standing standing after PSing fireball to counterbait Anti’s approach, and it seemed like Anti got lost.

And then he gets bopped making dumb Fox-fishing play against Raptor’s Yoshi.

One player can do well against a top player because you are prepared for it, but still get bopped by someone you are unprepared for (especially against not only Yoshi, but one of Yoshi's best players).

 

[Minordeth]

Yoshi becomes a pretty good character when people don't know the MU

Raptor was playing the long game every time and did some excellent conditioning with jab. Plus, he kept baiting approaches with PP-shield, while keeping Odyssey in the corner. Odyssey seemed to get tilted and started throwing out Usmashes.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

I do not like when people push a character so hard just because the player who main that character made an upset against a top player and that's all. Pac-Man has decent strengths but he has some polarizing weaknesses. I fear that many people will place him around high tier after Sinji made that upset.

 

[The_Bookworm]

I do not like when people push a character so hard just because the player who main that character made an upset against a top player and that's all. Pac-Man has decent strengths but he has some polarizing weaknesses. I fear that many people will place him around high tier after Sinji made that upset.

Lucas (and basically any character largely considered underrated like Roy and Falco) in a nutshell. lol
It is good to push your character, although I agree that people's reactions to upsets is very overwhelming. When Mekos got the upset over Nairo, everyone reacted like he won the tournament. In the X-factor adjusted version of the PGR v2 (which has Smash Con 2016), Taiheita's PGR placement was 32nd (a.k.a. large X-factor).

Edit: You got an avatar pic just now?! Silently searching the Internet for one.

 

[Minordeth]

Yeah

I do not like when people push a character so hard just because the player who main that character made an upset against a top player and that's all. Pac-Man has decent strengths but he has some polarizing weaknesses. I fear that many people will place him around high tier after Sinji made that upset.

Like, no one is gonna do that. Outside of Twitter. Don’t even stress.



...

Listen, you guys, Light’s Fox is filthy.

An example:
John Numbers was at the ledge, both players on last stock. John loves the ledge. He really does. So he lets invincibility lapse. And stays there. Clearly baiting Light, who was about three character lengths away.

So what does Light do? Waits several seconds, then perfect pivot, reverse Dsmashes John on the ledge, killing him.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Yeah

Like, no one is gonna do that. Outside of Twitter. Don’t even stress.

You forgot about twitch chat tbh.

 

[Lukingordex]

Raptor was playing the long game every time and did some excellent conditioning with jab. Plus, he kept baiting approaches with PP-shield, while keeping Odyssey in the corner. Odyssey seemed to get tilted and started throwing out Usmashes.

Fox can't afford to overcommit and throw stuff at yoshi or else he gets destroyed.

The ideal way for fox to play this mu is to keep his movement on the ground and powershields on point. He will want to stay around a mid-range distance from yoshi where yoshi's jab don't hit him and at the same time is able to punish most of yoshis options from there.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

Lucas (and basically any character largely considered underrated like Roy and Falco) in a nutshell. lol
It is good to push your character, although I agree that people's reactions to upsets is very overwhelming. When Mekos got the upset over Nairo, everyone reacted like he won the tournament. In the X-factor adjusted version of the PGR v2 (which has Smash Con 2016), Taiheita's PGR placement was 32nd .

Edit: You got an avatar pic just now?! Silently searching the Internet for one.

Yeah lol
Lucas is a good character but people are pushing him too hard because of one upset from Mekos. Lucas is not the greatest in terms of representation and results, especially 2017 (Taiheita became a bit inconsistent and he dropped from 16th to 28th on JPGR), and imo, Lucas recently is slightly overrated, especially smashers who believed that every Lucas player is Taiheita (They're not ofc). However he is still a threat. He still a good borderline high tier/upper-middle tier by the way.

Also, I don't want to get a Ness vs Lucas discussions for a billionth time. Can we just settled this please? It's hurting the Ness and Lucas nation.

 

[Minordeth]

NYC has got some weird concentration of character specialists. You got arguably the best US Greninja with Venia, the best US Marcina with Mr. E, the best US Pac Man with Sinji, and the best Wii Fit with John Numbers.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

NYC has got some weird concentration of character specialists. You got arguably the best US Greninja with Venia.

Wait Venia is the best US Greninja?? I thought Stroder is!!

 

[JustCallMeJon]

Winners Finals: Sinji vs Light
Loosers Semis: Dabuz, vs Mr. E,

This is going to be interesting...

 

[Minordeth]

Wait Venia is the best US Greninja?? I thought Stroder is!!

Arguably.

Stroder has better placings, but Venia rarely travels out of state. Venia is lower on his regions PR, but his region is way stronger than AZ. In terms of actual play and fundamentals, I’d make the argument for Venia.

But he doesn’t travel. And Stroder does, so here we are.

 

[Y2Kay]

Speaking of Anti, he lost to Lea at EVO Japan. Don't think that was mentioned here.

Wait Venia is the best US Greninja?? I thought Stroder is!!

Oh hell no. We aint having this argument again.

 

[Minordeth]

Speaking of Anti, he lost to Lea at EVO Japan. Don't think that was mentioned here.

Oh hell no. We aint having this argument again.

Heh. I mean, clearly it’s Salem.


Lea beat ANTi tho? Yet another player that needs to travel more. :\

 

[Baby_Sneak]

sheesh. all these strong players not traveling. I'm so used to watching super majors and stuff, I just skip that type of footage.

Gonna have to look at local stuff then. That's really cool though. Makes each "section" valuable and not worth skipping.

 

[MarioManTAW]

Uh, a little help with Roy please... lol

4feroy

 

[NINTENDO Galaxy]

Well you guys hyped up the local for me. I'm about to watch the VODS. Is there a tourney that is suppose to happen in that region soon besides the local?

 

[Deleted member]

Winners Finals: Sinji vs Light
Loosers Semis: Dabuz, vs Mr. E,

This is going to be interesting...

I feel like Sinji has this in the bag then, but he will have to deal with the winning losers fighter as well, Mr. E or Dabuz. Sinji just knows Pac-Man to well, and he is probably a major reason why Pac-Man is not lower than he is today.

Yeah

Like, no one is gonna do that. Outside of Twitter. Don’t even stress.



...

Listen, you guys, Light’s Fox is filthy.

An example:
John Numbers was at the ledge, both players on last stock. John loves the ledge. He really does. So he lets invincibility lapse. And stays there. Clearly baiting Light, who was about three character lengths away.

So what does Light do? Waits several seconds, then perfect pivot, reverse Dsmashes John on the ledge, killing him.

Light is actually pretty good with the character. I feel like all fox mains love the ledge because of his good back air or forward air to death ability. Either way, fifthly.

 

[HoSmash4]

Speaking of Anti, he lost to Lea at EVO Japan. Don't think that was mentioned here.

Oh hell no. We aint having this argument again.

Honestly the problem with this is some get more exposure although this arguement works in both ways.

 

[Rizen]

You forgot about twitch chat tbh.

Add youtube comments to the list of melanoma patches on social media.

Congrats to Sinji; this is another example of how you can't sleep on anyone in SSB4. Pac has some crippling handicaps that keep him in low tier regardless. His grab game is abysmal; look at the grab bubbles on that 76 FAF thing (1:27):

He doesn't have a good way to threaten shields and lacks disjoint on most moves besides smashes. Pac's kind of like WFT in the sense he's a mobile character who can get creative with zoning/projectiles but ultimately is undertuned and struggles once he's figured out.

 

[JustCallMeJon]

I do like the character viability in Smash 4. In Melee and Brawl, so many characters that were in middle tier/low tier were considered unviable (Half the roster in Melee is unviable). In Smash 4, even some low tier characters such as Little Mac and Pac-Man can still dish out upsets and place well in tournaments. Balance patches definitely help balance over-powered characters and weaker-characters (Jigglypuff is still not buffed. FeelsBadMan). Match-up spread against Top Tiers weren't as painful as Melee and Brawl (Top Tiers in those games can easily dish out mid/low tier characters with chain-grabs, shines, or walling because they were overpowered.) and some mid-tier and low tier may have evens or slight adv against Top Tiers (Kirby vs Fox MU as an example).

I do believe that almost every character can potentially win tournaments in Smash 4

 

[Lukingordex]

I do believe that almost every character can potentially win tournaments in Smash 4

I think this statement is a bit exaggerated, but smash 4 indeed has the best balance out of all the smash games.
I feel like almost every character in the game does have at least some kind of use in the meta, even if it's like only a certain MU.

In past smash games literally anything mid tier or worse was usually already useless in the meta, while in Smash 4 it only seems to happen with the very worst characters (puff/zelda/ganon/etc)

 

[Baby_Sneak]

I think this statement is a bit exaggerated, but smash 4 indeed has the best balance out of all the smash games.
I feel like almost every character in the game does have at least some kind of use in the meta, even if it's like only a certain MU.

In past smash games literally anything mid tier or worse was usually already useless in the meta, while in Smash 4 it only seems to happen with the very worst characters (puff/zelda/ganon/etc)

Any character can win tournaments, he didn’t specify any particular. Locals is up for grabs, and Debatably regionals.

 

[Gamegenie222]

Finally caught up this thread woow. Also i need to see this footage of the NYC local later today of the shinji vs dabuz footage

I don’t know know how many of you play the Soul Calibur series, but this reminds me of a very similar issue that occurred when Soul Calibur 4 came out.

Basically, there was a character named Hilde that had a combo called the Doom Combo. It allowed her to ring someone out off of a single hit or have them eat a ton of damage. Despite unimpressive frame data, she was already a top tier character, with excellent evasiveness, and the ability to almost negate some characters options with her movement.

The addition of the Doom Combo pushed the
community into ban talk. Two Hilde’s were present at Evo 2009, and there was more than a little discontent and backlash. “Her players don’t deserve her wins” - for instance.

The SC4 community ultimately decided not to ban, but rather on their most prominent forum, they made a dedicated thread to combatting her and her options. Even her players offered specific things that combatted problem moves and situations for various characters, while detailing what she looked for in neutral.

That thread is still pinned on her character message board.

One thing that I think SolidSense mentioned, was a lack of clear information on what to do. Now thinking about it, I agree. You have to search all over the place on YouTube, in forums, and various other places to get a semblance of an idea.

Discord helps, but it’s more of a chat room, and less of something that you can use as a resource as you would a message board.

I don’t have a solution, other than making a thread to specifically address Bayo. The character specific boards have moved to Discord at this point.

There is so much that is character specific to dealing with her options.

this is slight off topic but Hilde was banned in SC4 right after evo and her stigma carried to her SCV version although she was fairly toned down to removal of moves, changed properties and how the game looked at button binds and multiple button presses. Algol was banned later down the road as well due to ToD bubble combos and other things his SCV version cannot do this but can get super close off some scenarios and full bar.

 

[The_Bookworm]

I think this statement is a bit exaggerated, but smash 4 indeed has the best balance out of all the smash games.
I feel like almost every character in the game does have at least some kind of use in the meta, even if it's like only a certain MU.

In past smash games literally anything mid tier or worse was usually already useless in the meta, while in Smash 4 it only seems to happen with the very worst characters (puff/zelda/ganon/etc)

Smash 64 is also pretty balanced. Two top 10 players, Wizzrobe and wangera, mains someone who is ranked 5th (Yoshi) and 6th (Jigglypuff), respectively. A Link player (just to remind you, Link is ranked 11 out of 12 in the game) is ranked 17th in the world.

 

[hartenbower]

Wait Venia is the best US Greninja?? I thought Stroder is!!

donquavious is pretty good (he 3-0 fatality once), but I know nothing about greninja lol

 

[Lukingordex]

Smash 64 is also pretty balanced. Two top 10 players, Wizzrobe and wangera, mains someone who is ranked 5th (Yoshi) and 6th (Jigglypuff), respectively. A Link player (just to remind you, Link is ranked 11 out of 12 in the game) is ranked 17th in the world.

I'm kinda ignorant when it comes to Smash 64 so i didn't think much about that game while making my previous post. I was taking melee and brawl into account mostly

Even then, it's important to remember snash 64 has only 12 characters so it's natural it wouldn't be too unbalanced. Smash 4 has almost 60.

 

[MistressRemilia]

Yeah, which is weird to me.

Rosa isn’t super fun for Pac, as I recall. Sinji at least has it as a disadvantaged MU. Olimar doesn’t seem like he’d have a better time against Pac, but I’m not a Pacmain, so idk.

Actually, about Olimar, one of the most pathetic reminders of Pac-Man's limitations happened in the Olimar/Pac-Man matchups, with Shuton vs Tea:

Tea may have managed to take a game off of Shuton, but as you can witness, Pac-Man is just not a threat anymore once Olimar manages to grab his fruit. It's really saddening just how much this character loses without his fruit, almost becoming hopeless against a zoner like Olimar. Shuton even managed to force him out of Pac-Man for Bayonetta, something i don't think i've ever seen since then. The ability to render Pac useless by grabbing his fruit may not be exclusive to Olimar, but given how much he can do with specials alone & without the need to release the fruit, this lets Pac at a nasty situation from which it'll be hard to recover.

 

[The_Bookworm]

Actually, about Olimar, one of the most pathetic reminders of Pac-Man's limitations happened in the Olimar/Pac-Man matchups, with Shuton vs Tea:

Tea may have managed to take a game off of Shuton, but as you can witness, Pac-Man is just not a threat anymore once Olimar manages to grab his fruit. It's really saddening just how much this character loses without his fruit, almost becoming hopeless against a zoner like Olimar. Shuton even managed to force him out of Pac-Man for Bayonetta, something i don't think i've ever seen since then. The ability to render Pac useless by grabbing his fruit may not be exclusive to Olimar, but given how much he can do with specials alone & without the need to release the fruit, this lets Pac at a nasty situation from which it'll be hard to recover.

Dabuz (or hardly a lot of top players) doesn't fight a lot of Pac Man (Pac Men?). Dabuz lost to Aba's Pac Man before, then after he switched to MK, Dabuz doesn't fight a lot of Pac Man players outside of For Glory. Either that he doesn't have hold of this info of holding his fruit, or Sinji played godlike (or both), but Dabuz could've played the matchup better.

Add youtube comments to the list of melanoma patches on social media.

Congrats to Sinji; this is another example of how you can't sleep on anyone in SSB4. Pac has some crippling handicaps that keep him in low tier regardless. His grab game is abysmal; look at the grab bubbles on that 76 FAF thing (1:27):

He doesn't have a good way to threaten shields and lacks disjoint on most moves besides smashes. Pac's kind of like WFT in the sense he's a mobile character who can get creative with zoning/projectiles but ultimately is undertuned and struggles once he's figured out.

I don't understand why the developers made the entire Galaga animation his grabbox. It would make more sense to the original game, and buff his grab.