An Analysis of Character Viability

[ae304]

After watching the latest Scar and Toph show featuring Darrell, I decided to collect and organize some data on what characters have seen success in tournament play. Before you start typing angrily, I made this not as an infallible display of what the tiers should be, but rather as a tool for understanding which characters are played by THE PEOPLE who win the tournaments. So characters like PEACH, PUFF, SHEIK, YOUNG LINK, and FALCON are over-represented, as they are only played semi-consistently played by one of the gods (Falcon is only on here when Mang0 got bored and Young Link is only on here for Armada v Hbox).

All data ranges from 2010 - Dreamhack Austin and was taken from SSBWiki



Not sure if this bad boy will embed

http://imgur.com/kmuTH2k

 

[Dolla Pills]

I actually had a big beef with the Scar and Toph show. What they didn't touch on that is very important is that nobody else other than the top 5 or 6 players is likely to win a major any time soon. When you look at Wizzy at Dreamhack it wasn't Falcon that held him back, it was the fact that he wasn't going to beat mango, m2k, and take two sets off Hbox because they are all better and more experienced players. So in my opinion talking about character viability is pretty silly when player viability skews things dramatically.

That being said, I think this data is interesting but I feel it's more of a reflection of the people than the characters. Also how did you factor in dual mains?

 

[ae304]

Dual mains were "double counted". So when Mang0 goes fox/falco and wins, they both get counted for that tournament. What you described is pretty much the reason I made this. Its a reflection of the characters that top players pick, not a reflection of what characters are the best. This is a fallacy constantly overlooked.