Are they focusing on slightly more on moves that are more basic, but more functional?

[ZTurtle]

Just something I noticed looking at the moves of some veterans. It sort of seems to me like a couple characters in this game have had their more flashy and/or character specific regular attacks replaced with more "basic" attacks, so to speak. Here are some examples:

Brawl Snake D-Smash: Buries a landmine. -> Ultimate Snake D-Smash: standard kicking forward and backwards, kinda like Zelda's.

Sm4sh Bowser D-Smash: Spins in his shell -> Ultimate Bowser D-Smash: standard slashing from side to side.

Brawl Wolf Dash Attack: a Backflip attack -> Ultimate Wolf Dash Attack: a basic kick attack, though it's admittedly not quite like other kicking dash attacks.

Brawl Wolf NAir: Spins in place -> Ultimate Wolf NAir: A standard Sex kick. (Spinning in place isn't flashy, but I included this because now he's more similar to Fox...)

Sm4sh Sonic Dash Attack: does a signature roll into a kick -> Ultimate Sonic: It's just the kick.

Admittedly, this is a small sample of moves, and other veterans did get flashier moves, like Squirtle having water particles for more attacks, and Kirby getting the Burning fireball dash attack instead of the Yo-Yo Breakdance kick. It could be just me, it's just something I noticed with a few of these guys.

Regardless of whether or not this is going to be a theme with a lot of veterans or only this handful, what are your thoughts on characters having more unique regular attacks replaced by more generic, but potentially more useful ones? For me, while I can understand that things like Bowser's new D-Smash will probably be way more useful, I'm really going to miss his shell spin D-Smash, even if it's sort of a worse version of his grounded Up-B.

 

[Fell God]

Perhaps it's to remove supposedly redundant moves? Snake already has explosives, Bowser already has a spinning shell move, Sonic already has a lot of rolling ball moves. As for Wolf, his old dash attack was awkward and dumb, and the new Nair seems to fit him better. Not saying these characters didn't have uses for these moves (especially Snake) but speaking from experience, Bowser's down smash can be inconsistent when launching people.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Bowser's down smash can be inconsistent when launching people.

It also doesn't help that the hitboxes for Bowser's old d-smash don't fully cover his body. Even the grounded Whirling Fortress was flawed with the way its hitboxes were set up.

 

[Luigifan18]

I found Snake's down-smash landmines far more practical than his C4, so I'm quite disappointed that they were removed.

 

[Quillion]

Bowser's down smash can be inconsistent when launching people.

It also doesn't help that the hitboxes for Bowser's old d-smash don't fully cover his body. Even the grounded Whirling Fortress was flawed with the way its hitboxes were set up.

Honestly, the problem with Bowser's d-smash and other multi-hit d-smashes is DI and SDI neutering them. I really don't understand why they still have to let powerful multi-hitters be as inconsistent as they are, and they already have the SDI multiplier to fine-tune the more problematic instances.

Anyway...

Regardless of whether or not this is going to be a theme with a lot of veterans or only this handful, what are your thoughts on characters having more unique regular attacks replaced by more generic, but potentially more useful ones? For me, while I can understand that things like Bowser's new D-Smash will probably be way more useful, I'm really going to miss his shell spin D-Smash, even if it's sort of a worse version of his grounded Up-B.

Honestly, I kinda support the idea of making the more "unique" attacks more basic. I know people like the super-faithful-to-canon characters in Smash 4, but I found a lot of them hard to get into because of their gimmicks. I almost never had this problem in Melee or Brawl because the characters generally followed basic rules that made each move work like expected (jab is weak keep-away tool, up-tilt and up-air are combo tools, f-smash is strongest, d-smash has biggest area of effect, etc.). But Smash 4's newcomers were so outlandish in their movesets that it was hard for me to pick them up (projectile normals on several characters, certain normals can bury, really unorthodox Smashes like Palutena's U-smash and Villager's F-smash). Even a few Brawl characters like Snake and Olimar were too much for me.

I'm glad that Ultimate is reining the more "weird" ones since not only does it make the characters easier to pick up, but it helps balance the characters better. I understand that some people like unique mechanics on new fighters, but for me, there's a point where it becomes "too new", you get me?

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

Honestly, the problem with Bowser's d-smash and other multi-hit d-smashes is DI and SDI neutering them. I really don't understand why they still have to let powerful multi-hitters be as inconsistent as they are, and they already have the SDI multiplier to fine-tune the more problematic instances.

It doesn't help if the looping hits don't rehit frequently enough, or do not use the Autolink angle. Of course, the latter is more effective against aerial targets.

 

[smashingDoug]

Yeah the attacks in Smash ha e lost some uniqueness to them.

 

[Mogisthelioma]

To answer your question, yes. And not only that, they're overall balancing frame data and hitbox sizes based on certain fighters/matchups/combos/setups so that every fighter has an equal chance against another.

Except for Bayo. But we don't talk about Bayo.

 

[Quillion]

To answer your question, yes. And not only that, they're overall balancing frame data and hitbox sizes based on certain fighters/matchups/combos/setups so that every fighter has an equal chance against another.

Except for Bayo. But we don't talk about Bayo.

I think Bayonetta is the only character in the whole series who is broken by design. Pikachu, Fox, and Meta Knight have all taken turns being overpowered, but they were overpowered by numbers and move properties, not by design.

I'm worried about nerfing Bayonetta since her ridiculous combo freedom is built into her design. How do you nerf her significantly without making her "not Bayonetta"?

 

[osby]

Not a problem for me. Even though I like Smash when it is experimental and flashy, in the end it's a fighting game.

EDIT: Though I'd argue last game did the same, even to a more drastic extend, removing tether recoveries, transformations, Waddle Dee Toss, some of Olimar's Pikmin etc.

 

[Idon]

I wish Ike would lose the unique part of him that's preventing him from getting a functional sword beam...

 

[osby]

I think Bayonetta is the only character in the whole series who is broken by design. Pikachu, Fox, and Meta Knight have all taken turns being overpowered, but they were overpowered by numbers and move properties, not by design.

I'm worried about nerfing Bayonetta since her ridiculous combo freedom is built into her design. How do you nerf her significantly without making her "not Bayonetta"?

Keep her combos but make them harder to get into and nerf her other properties.

It's not rocket science.

 

[Fell God]

I think Bayonetta is the only character in the whole series who is broken by design. Pikachu, Fox, and Meta Knight have all taken turns being overpowered, but they were overpowered by numbers and move properties, not by design.

I'm worried about nerfing Bayonetta since her ridiculous combo freedom is built into her design. How do you nerf her significantly without making her "not Bayonetta"?

Prime reason she made 4 such a mess. How do you nerf a character whose entire premise is easy bake high damage combos without making them terrible? And while I, personally, would be fine with them completely gutting her and making her the one on the bottom for once, that's not really balance. I was going to list off all of the nerfs I personally would make, but it's uncalled for (off topic) in this thread and I'm sure it's a little overboard anyway. Though one thing I'll say is I think they should take away some of what makes her unique in favor of making her easier to balance. And maybe her recovery should be nerfed, only one witch twist and one afterburner kick perhaps? Idk, not a game design expert (yet) like Sakurai and the squad.

 

[Mario & Sonic Guy]

One idea for nerfing a character who makes high damage combos is to reduce the amount of knockback that the fighters take. In theory, that would make the finishing hit less safe to use at low damage percentages.

However, as mentioned already, Bayonetta is a tough egg to balance. At least you can nerf Cloud's offense by making his sword hitboxes smaller.

 

[Quillion]

One idea for nerfing a character who makes high damage combos is to reduce the amount of knockback that the fighters take. In theory, that would make the finishing hit less safe to use at low damage percentages.

However, as mentioned already, Bayonetta is a tough egg to balance. At least you can nerf Cloud's offense by making his sword hitboxes smaller.

Perhaps another solution would be to have knockback scaling or hitstun decay. The former could slightly increase knockback with every hit in a combo, and the latter could slightly decrease hitstun with every hit in a combo. Maybe they could do both.

Anyway, this topic is getting off the rails. I'm honestly not too fond of Bayonetta's ABK working the way it does with its QCF motion. I'd like that to be kept exclusive to Ryu at the very least.