Meta 4BR v4 Tier List [Discussion Thread]

[Shaya]

The Voting Thread: https://smashboards.com/threads/4br-v4-tier-list-voting-thread.450712/

Consider jumping on the discord if you haven't already: https://discord.gg/SbFcMGG
**If you believe someone outside of the 4BR would be especially keen for tier list discussion and beneficial to the process, bring them up with me - temporary/trial invitations into the discord is worth giving a shot! **

I'll start off by saying that V4 may take some time.

With the game virtually untouched for over a year and about to be three years old, we should find a way to move a solid step in the right direction. I believe a lot of this will come down to statistical inference and collecting samples.
Relying on MU charts is still a bit further away, but in the future such a thing should be very important to us.
The last of the BBR tier lists used a combination of tournament data, match up charts, a public vote and member votes to bring a tier list together.
A public vote would require substantial assistance from members (both in terms of automation or vote tallying [] and getting as many people to participate as possible). This may be a lot more difficult now than in the Brawl days due to the disbursement of the scene but between Reddit, Smashboards and advertising on twitter if we were to get several hundred votes that would be amazing. Incentivizing it by splitting up weight by regions perhaps?

Also bringing together Math/Stat enthusiasts to really discuss what the tournament data has shown us in the past 6 months to a year - can we separate character trends from meta development, 'player skill' or other factors?

As pointed out in the voting thread, an initial draft of votes coming in 2 weeks from now would be a great start as a discussion base. Hopefully until that point we have a lot of things to discuss along the way - including who/how/what people here can do for this.
For the outsider votes, you could probably start prodding friends now, they'll always take their time anyway

 

[Shaya]

Okay, so first draft date has passed and the idea now is for us to discuss how things are looking thus far - we're going to hopefully get more votes from members and outsider votes too (which I haven't included within these yet).
Please still submit a 'draft' list if you haven't, you will then have your tier list marked by a computer.

The list of below are technical outliers, values falling outside a range of 'median' values. Most are small outliers, listed anyway, but those with "~~~"/bolded in front are major, and ideally it's either you look to justify your position or you consider whether some alterations would be necessary.

I have exams to worry about next week so ideally I could focus on those rather than micromanaging the discussion too much - I will do updates of data if revelations are made or new votes come in. I'll likely also tally the japanese/aus votes thus far to discuss but not immediately.

Also for interest's sake, the V3 list decided it was it's own entity (it's nice what it points out)

Outliers

*** Bayonetta ***
~~~ @Kyo 2 ∉ [1.0, 1.0]
~~~ @tri 3 ∉ [1.0, 1.0]
^ this is hilarious, don't fret you two (yet) but you're either putting her at no.1 or you're a major statistical outlier right now

*** Luigi ***
@V3 List 26 ∉ [9.0, 25.0]
Our opinions of Luigi have shifted drastically.

*** Mewtwo ***
~~~ @Jucchan 18 ∉ [8.5, 12.5]
~~~ Myran 14 ∉ [8.5, 12.5]
~~~ @Espy Rose 17.5 ∉ [8.5, 12.5]
@Mav 8 ∉ [8.5, 12.5]
@Liberation 13 ∉ [8.5, 12.5]
@TheReflexWonder 8 ∉ [8.5, 12.5]
*** Mega Man ***
~~~ @V3 List 16 ∉ [21.0, 29.0]
~~~ @Espy Rose 33.5 ∉ [21.0, 29.0]
~~~ @TheReflexWonder 13 ∉ [21.0, 29.0]
~~~ @Luco 35 ∉ [21.0, 29.0]
*** Lucas ***
~~~ @Jucchan 20 ∉ [27.0, 35.0]
~~~ @Foxy 38 ∉ [27.0, 35.0]
@Luco 25 ∉ [27.0, 35.0]
Shaya 26.0 ∉ [27.0, 35.0]

*** Olimar ***
Myran 9 ∉ [11.0, 27.0]
~~~ @Espy Rose 33.5 ∉ [11.0, 27.0]

*** Roy ***
Myran 49 ∉ [31.75, 45.75]
~~~ @TheReflexWonder 23 ∉ [31.75, 45.75]

*** Mario ***
@V3 List 6 ∉ [6.5, 10.5]
Myran 11 ∉ [6.5, 10.5]
~~~ Sinister Slush 12 ∉ [6.5, 10.5]
~~~ @Mav 5 ∉ [6.5, 10.5]
@Catana 6 ∉ [6.5, 10.5]

*** Sheik ***
~~~ @Mav 9 ∉ [2.5, 6.5]
@CHOMPY 7 ∉ [2.5, 6.5]
*** Zero Suit Samus ***
@Catana 13 ∉ [3.0, 11.0]
@CHOMPY 12 ∉ [3.0, 11.0]
*** Ryu ***
@tri 17 ∉ [7.0, 15.0]
@TheReflexWonder 16 ∉ [7.0, 15.0]
*** Pikachu ***
~~~ @CHOMPY 27 ∉ [10.5, 22.5]
Shaya 26.0 ∉ [10.5, 22.5]
*** Lucario ***
@Catana 11 ∉ [13.0, 29.0]
*** Falco ***
~~~ @Jucchan 38 ∉ [42.0, 50.0]
*** Bowser Jr. ***
Myran 43 ∉ [44.0, 52.0]
*** Marth ***
@Foxy 20 ∉ [5.5, 17.5]
@CHOMPY 5 ∉ [5.5, 17.5]
*** Wii Fit Trainer ***
@CHOMPY 53 ∉ [44.0, 52.0]
*** Ganondorf ***
@Foxy 44 ∉ [44.5, 56.5]
*** Charizard ***
@Kyo 32 ∉ [35.25, 49.25]
*** Jigglypuff ***
Illusion. 51 ∉ [51.5, 55.5]
*** Duck Hunt Dog ***
Sinister Slush 24 ∉ [25.0, 41.0]
@Das Koopa 23 ∉ [25.0, 41.0]
*** Corrin ***
Myran 20 ∉ [10.0, 18.0]

Bayonetta | 1.18 | 0.529 | 8.77 | 0.281
Cloud | 2.41 | 0.507 | 8.63 | 0.504
Diddy Kong | 2.41 | 0.712 | 8.63 | 0.504
Sheik | 4.76 | 1.348 | 8.13 | 0.498
Fox | 6.24 | 1.562 | 7.81 | 0.459
Rosalina | 6.65 | 1.618 | 7.86 | 0.41
Sonic | 7.0 | 1.541 | 7.88 | 0.504
Zero Suit Samus | 7.24 | 2.513 | 7.78 | 0.403
Mario | 8.65 | 1.801 | 7.69 | 0.494
Mewtwo | 11.21 | 2.878 | 7.32 | 0.614
Ryu | 11.76 | 2.166 | 7.27 | 0.493
Marth | 12.03 | 3.309 | 7.12 | 0.629
Corrin | 13.97 | 2.375 | 6.71 | 0.665
Lucina | 15.56 | 3.674 | 6.48 | 0.656
Pikachu | 17.32 | 3.901 | 6.2 | 0.588
Luigi | 17.56 | 3.22 | 6.03 | 0.592
Meta Knight | 18.62 | 3.731 | 6.0 | 0.538
Peach | 19.32 | 4.134 | 6.05 | 0.569
Captain Falcon | 19.56 | 3.968 | 6.06 | 0.57
Olimar | 19.74 | 5.932 | 5.95 | 0.894
Donkey Kong | 20.15 | 4.322 | 5.7 | 0.796
Lucario | 20.5 | 3.929 | 5.88 | 0.655
Bowser | 22.44 | 5.006 | 5.51 | 0.673
Greninja | 24.56 | 4.038 | 5.46 | 0.75
Villager | 24.68 | 4.362 | 5.46 | 0.794
Mega Man | 25.03 | 5.161 | 5.46 | 0.792
Toon Link | 25.44 | 3.482 | 5.42 | 0.672
Ness | 26.76 | 5.486 | 5.1 | 0.831
Lucas | 30.5 | 4.146 | 4.68 | 0.902
Duck Hunt Dog | 32.35 | 4.447 | 4.48 | 0.73
Yoshi | 32.76 | 4.298 | 4.35 | 0.663
Link | 32.88 | 3.204 | 4.38 | 0.752
R.O.B. | 33.0 | 4.928 | 4.39 | 0.953
Pit | 35.24 | 3.788 | 4.21 | 0.589
Samus | 35.53 | 4.037 | 3.8 | 1.067
Shulk | 35.76 | 4.135 | 4.05 | 0.785
Robin | 35.82 | 3.976 | 4.01 | 0.874
Ike | 36.29 | 3.41 | 3.88 | 1.006
Wario | 36.82 | 4.75 | 3.82 | 1.004
Mr. Game & Watch | 37.88 | 4.17 | 3.63 | 0.891
Roy | 38.53 | 5.493 | 3.37 | 0.979
Charizard | 41.71 | 3.64 | 3.21 | 0.79
Palutena | 43.12 | 4.018 | 2.85 | 0.92
Little Mac | 43.29 | 2.208 | 2.8 | 0.653
Falco | 45.91 | 2.659 | 2.45 | 0.805
Pac-Man | 45.91 | 4.221 | 2.43 | 0.707
Bowser Jr. | 48.21 | 2.054 | 2.17 | 0.803
Wii Fit Trainer | 48.26 | 2.062 | 2.12 | 0.843
Dr. Mario | 48.32 | 2.157 | 2.21 | 0.861
Kirby | 48.62 | 3.831 | 2.0 | 0.967
King Dedede | 49.85 | 3.316 | 1.8 | 0.756
Ganondorf | 50.5 | 2.562 | 1.66 | 0.78
Zelda | 51.79 | 1.812 | 1.56 | 0.55
Jigglypuff | 53.38 | 0.928 | 1.18 | 0.272

 

[Shaya]

List thus far with strict grouping:





*




* Samus' mean is greater than shulk and robin, but her average group score is in the tier below.

 

[Illusion.]

Will these major outliers be excluded from the final vote if they are left unjustified, or did I misintepret? I actually wouldn’t oppose that.

Regarding my vote on , I didn’t do too much research considering this was just a draft, but I know she at least had a decent showing at Shine; characters such as haven’t done anything at all, at least to my knowledge, while they can also struggle to kill due to lack of setups or just bad mobility to execute those setups. On the other hand, Jigglypuff has superb aerial mobility (bad ground mobility, however) with a couple strong aerials, and others that lead into Rest. Confirms into a move that kills at roughly 40% is a big deal.

 

[Shaya]

Will these major outliers be excluded from the final vote if they are left unjustified, or did I misintepret? I actually wouldn’t oppose that.

Yes, I will likely look to discount major outliers (i.e. the bolded / ~ starting ones) from the final vote.

 

[Myran]

So I've already talked about Olimar time and time again so unless someone has questions I won't explain that. As for M2 and Mario I put them as low as I did for 2 reasons. 1 is that I feel that they're entire success revolves around the opponent not understanding how to deal with them and not being able to powershield semi consistently. Similar to Marthcina in that if you can match the rate they try to play at you can usually do very well. Also from what I've seen the success of these characters in a solo main aspect has gone down over time. Ally has been known to struggle a ton more these days and Anti has always been hit or miss. M2 also has been absent for a lot of stuff. Wadi has ROB when stuff gets hard, and he's just recently starting to pick back up in results. Abadango is always switching characters so he obviously doesn't have to much faith in his M2.

As for Roy I just don't think he's that good. He doesn't have a ton of good results, and I'm hard pressed to put my faith in a characters viability because of a local scene. For example how Hyper Kirby has beaten all of Georgia. When you run you're head into a wall enough times your bound to get through. I'm aware he's got some other solid wins and alright placings at a few tournaments, but over all solo Roy hasn't done to amazing at majors iirc. This is one I could budge on putting him slightly higher if someone could show me that his placings are better. I'm not informed enough to be discussing his potential viability. All I know is that he struggles with a lot of stuff and isn't nearly a top swordsman.

 

[---]

Am not the biggest character expert, so I was mostly looking at results/usage through the Rankings section. Bayonetta has an increasing presence in Top 16/8 but she is still in line with other High Tiers when it comes to taking tournaments. Salem's continued success I think is a sign as to where the meta might be going, but for now I don't think popular opinion has caught up with reality. Ryu I see in a similar position but with his results being even more inconsistent and general weaknesses more exploitable, at least for a ~Top 10 position in what is a crowded field of characters.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Oh I feel behind on this, is it ok if I can throw my vote in still?

 

[Shaya]

Oh I feel behind on this, is it ok if I can throw my vote in still?

Yes

 

[Myran]

#HBC | Red Ryu Could you please explain why you have Olimar so low? Even if you think he's bad his results far exceed the tier you have him in.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

#HBC | Red Ryu Could you please explain why you have Olimar so low? Even if you think he's bad his results far exceed the tier you have him in.

To put it bluntly, I don't know much about him and I put him there as a result of what I did know of results. Unless his results are better than where I put him.

He's a character I'm very limit in knowledge about.

 

[Myran]

To put it bluntly, I don't know much about him and I put him there as a result of what I did know of results. Unless his results are better than where I put him.

He's a character I'm very limit in knowledge about.

Myself and Shuton have very strong results. Shuton making top 8/16 at almost every event. Including top 3 at a Saga or two and beating people like Zero and Salem. Myself making at least top 32 at almost every national with wins on players like Tweek, Fatality, and more. His MU spread has only 2 real terrible MUs being Fox and Corrin too. His placings definitely have him at or above characters like Falcon/Pika.

I don't blame you for not knowing a ton about him, but when we're voting on a list that people look at for first impressions of a character rating him poorly when he's show to be much better does no good. I'd say it actually hurts public perception of him. Already enough poor info surrounding the character and his flaws.

 

[Sinister Slush]

Don't worry Myran, Olimar isn't the only special snowflake getting a couple of low votes. There's plenty of other outlier votes that exist that probably shouldn't and RR isn't the only one to rate olimar below top 25.

It can't be helped if there's going to be some people with differing opinions based on what they know and personal guesses on where any character stands in the meta if they don't know much on them.
Some placements are also heavily determined by some cause of their region having a player do well at their locals/regionals all the time.

 

[Myran]

You're not wrong. I guess I'm just a stickler for this type of thing. I know I do it to, but I gotta deal with terrible Olimar opinions all the time. Wasn't trying to get onto him. Just really hate when people do it to Olimar.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

It’s mostly my limited knowledge.

I’ve been dealing with family and other issues recently so my ability to research has been more limited for the vote. Next time I can see about being better informed on him.

I’ll get to that another time just can’t change my vote for this period. I should vote earlier then talk with people about it like I usually do but we’ll irl happened.

 

[Shaya]

Just as a note, but all outliers have been taken out of the 'final' voting data.
You came in with a late vote and missed out on getting 'marked' like the others and hence to adjust things that were out of place.

You had a few, but Oli was the only one approaching major outlier.

 

[Shaya]

Character|Mean (Placement)|Std (Placement)|Mean (Group)|Std (Group)|v3-v4 Diff
| 1.19 | 0.401 | 8.63 | 0.669|0
| 2.49 | 0.768 | 8.55 | 0.732|1
| 2.51 | 0.887 | 8.54 | 0.751|0
| 4.68 | 1.772 | 8.17 | 0.792|0
| 5.99 | 2.034 | 7.92 | 0.761|3
| 6.46 | 1.839 | 7.75 | 0.737|5
| 6.56 | 1.463 | 7.78 | 0.699|0
| 6.6 | 1.488 | 7.82 | 0.763|-2
| 9.81 | 1.732 | 7.5 | 0.685|-3
| 10.38 | 1.332 | 7.42 | 0.605|-1
| 11.54 | 1.705 | 7.14 | 0.705|-1
| 11.61 | 2.491 | 7.29 | 0.677|1
| 13.29 | 1.822 | 6.8 | 0.732|0
| 14.39 | 3.378 | 6.69 | 0.826|4
| 17.37 | 4.054 | 6.19 | 0.615|0
| 17.97 | 3.453 | 6.18 | 0.65|-2
| 18.41 | 4.662 | 6.11 | 0.881|2
| 19.07 | 4.325 | 5.96 | 0.675|8
| 19.25 | 3.876 | 6.07 | 0.778|4
| 20.14 | 4.063 | 5.96 | 0.761|1
| 20.68 | 4.871 | 5.8 | 0.754|6
| 20.82 | 3.958 | 5.78 | 0.875|6
| 23.31 | 4.244 | 5.58 | 0.816|-3
| 23.73 | 5.059 | 5.39 | 0.851|1
| 24.85 | 5.107 | 5.45 | 0.85|-8
| 24.96 | 4.711 | 5.44 | 0.723|-4
| 25.89 | 3.552 | 5.24 | 0.67|-11
| 28.62 | 4.522 | 4.93 | 0.753|-4
| 28.64 | 4.793 | 4.91 | 0.784|3
| 31.59 | 6.046 | 4.49 | 0.91|6
| 32.11 | 3.46 | 4.45 | 0.658|7
| 32.27 | 6.09 | 4.47 | 0.902|-2
| 32.96 | 4.615 | 4.35 | 0.711|-4
| 33.21 | 5.448 | 4.28 | 0.767|3
| 34.59 | 5.276 | 4.28 | 1.019|-3
| 35.11 | 4.167 | 4.23 | 0.817|-3
| 35.13 | 4.399 | 4.02 | 0.927|4
| 37.95 | 3.71 | 3.75 | 0.783|1
| 38.58 | 4.556 | 3.63 | 0.982|-5
| 39.12 | 5.07 | 3.6 | 0.963|-5
| 39.66 | 4.182 | 3.48 | 0.9|2
| 41.95 | 3.069 | 3.23 | 0.784|2
| 43.43 | 2.941 | 2.97 | 0.786|-1
| 43.96 | 3.846 | 2.92 | 0.784|-3
| 45.43 | 3.687 | 2.72 | 0.778|0
| 45.65 | 2.84 | 2.65 | 0.805|3
| 47.01 | 3.241 | 2.44 | 0.969|0
| 47.64 | 2.643 | 2.45 | 0.869|2
| 48.86 | 3.578 | 2.14 | 0.999|-3
| 49.32 | 2.972 | 2.11 | 0.901|-2
| 49.59 | 3.3 | 1.94 | 0.87|0
| 51.21 | 1.786 | 1.69 | 0.822|0
| 51.22 | 2.022 | 1.68 | 0.765|1
| 53.47 | 0.735 | 1.35 | 0.672|0

Grouping Methodology 1: Middle Points (9[.5]-8.5, 8.5-7.5, etc)
S:
A:
B:
C:
D:
E:
F:
G:
*Jigs is technically in her own tier with this method, but we tend to avoid single character tiers.

Grouping Methodology 2: Literal Groupings (9-8, 8-7, etc)
S:
A:
B:
C:
D:
E:
F:
G:

*Reason this might not be preferred is that group scores don't distinctively range between 9-1 but on average 8.75 to 1.25 - there was also some algorithm changes between v3 and v4 for group score calculation (Abadango's tier-less tier list [tongue twister potential?] blew me out of the water, hence the necessary change).
Ness/Lucas are in an awkward position group wise and are potentially worthy of a bump up.

Spoiler

S:
A:
B:
C:
D:
E:
F:
G:

For the sake of the diff list, characters were given tied placements if their placement difference was <0.1 -
the following characters are technically tied;
Cloud/Diddy
Fox/Sonic (could almost be a three way tie with ZSS)
Marth/Ryu
Ness/Lucas
Robin/Samus
Ganondorf/Zelda

 

[Shaya]

Oh and the following are the big movers - reflections and justifications of these changes would be good~

4
4
4
5
6
6
6
7
8
-11
-8
-5
-5
-4
-4
-4

 

[Sinister Slush]

Spoiler: Will edit randomly if needed if it's too long

While not as big of a drop as the likes of Megaman (-11) or Villager (-8). Yoshi still fell a fair amount by having the 4th most spots dropped, shared along with Ness and Greninja.
For a character that was believed to be Top 3/15 with great tools at the beginning, to being a jack of all trades master of none bottom of High tier, until the eventual fading out of existence with only a few extremely rare occurrences of a Yoshi popping up out of top 64 of a Regional or National and almost being bottom of Mid tier.

Yoshi as a character preyed mostly on MU inexperience in the early days, but eventually people slowly learned Yoshi's traits and weaknesses or patches made characters better than him along with DLC happening just making it far worse for Yoshi and his players.

His downfall can easily be linked, without question, to Bayonetta and Cloud's addition to the game. But what also hinders him is the drop of players attending less or plain retiring (Barakas/TheWall, Raptor, Firefly, Aiba etc.) The only Yoshi's to pay attention to thus far is Seth DIO and Ron, two of which mains different High tiers to deal with problematic matchups, DIO with Ryu and Ron with Mario/Luigi.
It's further exemplified for example the most recent tourney as of writing this, Midwest Mayhem 10, Seth (Current best Yoshi) got double eliminated by Tweek's Cloud and Ned's Cloud with Tweek deconstructing the MU and showing just how to pick apart at Yoshi.
Bayo/Cloud aside Yoshi also struggles with other popular Top/High tiers such as Diddy most notably, Rosalina, Mewtwo, Corrin, Meta Knight, Marth, and Ryu.

As Yoshi fell, players quit and his meta stagnated, other characters rose up to the occasion like Duck Hunt, Link, Samus, Shulk, DK and Luigi

 

[Illusion.]

If your first instinct to him dropping a few spaces is "he's too low, his meta and results have been stellar as of late," that is true. Unfortunately, the voting period ended just a few days before his sudden explosion of results. Some, Lea, Stroder, iStudying, and Elexiao have all been doing amazing lately, and there'd definitely be more results if players like Venia started traveling as well. A lot of other characters' metas have been successfully pushed as well, so there's a greater competition for higher spots on the tier list now.

I expect him to higher on the next tier list if these results continue.