Balanced Brawl Standard Release

[rPSIvysaur]

Lolwut? So now Lucas had to rely on the opponent messing up to get the kill? It's not hard to space against Lucas' Fsmash at allthat it's actually hard to mess up because it's lack of range. I can tell you that Lucas shouldn't be realistically landing an fsmash in Marth, MK, Snake, ROB, Link and many other characters. So since they hardly even have to think about spacing Fsmash, how is Lucas supposed to kill them. Lucas has no OoS to punish what they do on shield b/c their range beats Lucas grab range b/c he's on the short end of the stick with having a tether. And Lucas can't go around throwing out smashes like Gdubs b/c Lucas' are horribly unsafe on shield. Lucas' killing power is seriously overrated.

 

[goombapatrol054]

hey, i've got a bit of a question.
i've got brawl+ installed on my SD card, would i need to remove it before adding this, or could i have both available to pick from on my card?

nice work, though, can't wait to try it!

 

[Lokee]

Really quick, in the code set was does "Custom Stage Select" "Frame Advance" do? When I open the text files in the codemanger there always there but unchecked was is their reason for being there cause Ive always left them off for good measure?

Also What other characters are we to expect changes?

 

[A2ZOMG]

I think you're missing what I was trying to say, especially bringing up Wario who is just irrelevant to the whole issue. I didn't say disjointedness is the only thing that can make a character work; obviously different characters rely on different things. I am saying that range and disjointedness are fundamentally very intertwined, and that the disjointedness half of that is a really big deal, probably a bigger deal than the range.

Disjointedness is a subtopic of range, and MUCH less important than what range actually is.

Mario himself relies on disjoints both on that very fsmash (a major reason Mario's fsmash is much easier to land than Ganondorf's) and dair (remembering all moves are somewhat disjointed, and for a move that has no real object/psychic spark/Snake involved, Mario's dair seems to be pretty good on that scale which is my explanation for its "surprisingly high priority"). Really, this stuff is one of the biggest reasons someone might want to use Mario instead of Luigi...

Being disjointed doesn't matter as long as the hitbox reaches somewhere you want it to reliably. Ganondorf's F-smash is only hard to land because it has ridiculously horrible startup (and it's massively laggy making it unsafe to use), but in terms of raw range and priority it can challenge even some sword based attacks and win due to where the hitbox is able to go.

The game is also a lot more complex than you're giving it credit for; to say Lucas cannot ever fsmash Meta Knight is being silly. Meta Knight has great, fast pokes and some long range disjointed moves of his own that do a great job of minimizing how often he'll get hit not only by Lucas's fsmash but also but a whole lot of things, but the more carefully he plays, the harder it is for him to get kills, and no matter how carefully he plays, he is still human and will inevitably not only leave holes but leave some big holes even if he happens to be a really good player. The number of situations that let Lucas hit with fsmash are too myriad to even bother to list; they're obviously not situations that Meta Knight wants to happen, but he just can't help it. It's just not possible to actually play an airtight game; remember the hype way back about how Olimar with "perfect camp" is impossible to approach? It's not a coincidence Olimar didn't jump to top tier and start dominating tournaments...

Metaknight has no trouble killing Lucas safely. He can simply poke Lucas until Lucas is offstage and then go for a gimp with D-airs and edgehog, and Lucas can do very little to counter this, especially since his Up-B has very telegraphed startup.

Lucas is simply NOT killing MK with a smash if MK is just playing a safe conservative game with tilts and D-smash, and his recovery is not versatile enough to avoid being gimped.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Lucas can recover super fast with those crazy glitches; Meta Knight is not gimping him. Very few Lucas mains can actually do those glitches 100% consistently and rely on them as such that they basically don't use Pk Thunder to recover, but they really should. They're why Lucas has a very good and virtually ungimpable recovery (I say virtually because sometimes he might get gimped in the same spirit that sometimes Meta Knight, Pit, and Mr. Game & Watch get gimped).

Also, every character has to rely on the opponent making a mistake to land any hit. I mean, if you played an opponent who truly didn't make mistakes, how would you hit them? They'd just be untouchable; I've never known any good player to intentionally let himself get hit by anything. Of course, different situations arise and getting hit by different things requires different magnitudes of mistake, but in general getting hit by Lucas's fsmash really isn't that big of a mistake. Conservative play is still not a panacea for Meta Knight's woes; he can play that way to make it pretty hard for Lucas to kill him and similarly hard for him to kill Lucas. Sounds fair to me.

 

[Ukemi]

Three things:
1) Yes! *hugs* Thanks so much!
2) Maybe you could look into items? (changing activation funcionality, e.g. pressing A to use mushroom, removing hit damage of pokeball, fixed spawn point(s), balancing certain pokemon and assist trophies, making certain items, like ray gun/fan less cheap in general)
3) The Yoshi and Temple demonstration video is private. Can we have a link to a different one maybe?

 

[Xeno~]

Hey, I'm having trouble with this program. I'm downloading the file and following the steps exactly but it's not working on my wii. Also, I am using a mac, should it work on a mac? I just wanna know why it wont work!
I deleted all of my stages on SD card and my wii too

 

[rPSIvysaur]

Lucas can recover super fast with those crazy glitches; Meta Knight is not gimping him. Very few Lucas mains can actually do those glitches 100% consistently and rely on them as such that they basically don't use Pk Thunder to recover, but they really should. They're why Lucas has a very good and virtually ungimpable recovery (I say virtually because sometimes he might get gimped in the same spirit that sometimes Meta Knight, Pit, and Mr. Game & Watch get gimped).

There is a one frame window to be able to Zap Jump. If you mess up you lose a stock. Relying on a one frame window is as hard as glide tossing with Game and Watch, sure you can do it most of the time, but if you mess up you die. Also, Lucas has a s*** load of lag after PK Fire rendering him helpless after Zap Jump to continue being gimped w/o a second jump. And Metaknight is gimping him, even on his best stage: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R43IywCZTIU&NR=1

 

[ぱみゅ]

I just realized something that AA should have said from the start: a conservative player will be out of the range of Lucas' Fsmash so he just won't get hitted; but stayig that far, also makes very hard (if not impossible) to that conservative player to kill Lucas. It's a long-run kind of fair... =S

As for Ike,I'd vote only to add some sheild pushback on Fair and Ftilt, that would fit on his overpower-like character style, and give him some safety, as the time doesn't change the matchup, the timings, brokenness, nor nothing.


btw, on the built, Lucas' PKFire gitch on Link/Tink doesn't work anymore, as well as Captain Falcon and MK's FinalSmashes doesn't crash.
But DDD could chaingrab (I didn't tested Falco nor Pikachu), and Timer is still having the same weird behavior.

@Ukemi: game has been though to be played in tournament, so items are going to remain the same, since they're irrelevant... unless AA says other thing...

 

[rPSIvysaur]

A conservative player staying out of Lucas' Fsmash range will be able to kill Lucas. Alot of F-smashes and F-tilts out range it. You also totally forget about vertical spacing where Lucas can't hurt you. (*cough* retreating aerials *cough*)

 

[A2ZOMG]

The problem with all those crazy glitches is that they require HUGE commitment. Sure, Lucas does get impressive raw distance, but he spends a lot of frames in lag when doing those ATs. MK is a character who can control the ENTIRE OFFSTAGE ZONE. If he doesn't suck, he can and will punish and gimp you on read/observation.

I consider myself an EXCELLENT player at recovery in specific, and yet I do get killed consistently offstage by characters with good edgeguarding when using Lucas. He just doesn't have a versatile enough recovery to really consistently make it back safely. For this reason on top of other problems, Jigglypuff also solidly beats him.

At any rate, probably the single most important thing to fix on Lucas is the fact he can't juggle crap. His inability to really set up a juggle into anything hinders him a lot at winning aerial exchanges, dealing damage, and setting up kills easily. He just can't threaten you in any realistic way when you're far above him. He has some decent ways of getting in and poking, but they all lead to nothing, and his more reliable stuff has pretty poor damage output, and he's very bad at comboing off of throws, which actually gives him one of the weaker grab games in Brawl on top of having below average grabs in general. Speaking of his throws, the angle on F-throw should be lowered, since his F-throw just sucks and doesn't do much of anything useful.

And lol no, it's easy to kill Lucas by staying out of his range. Like Ness, he has some of the worst range in this game, and his reliable approach/poke tactics really don't hurt you a lot.

Change of topic:

I don't like the change to Falcon's U-throw. I think it's very unnecessary and it changes the feel of the character too much. One of Falcon's better points is that he's very good at punishing high altitude airdodges, and that's kinda where the charm of U-throw is. Putting them up high above you and then forcing a high altitude airdodge.

 

[prOAPC]

And Metaknight is gimping him, even on his best stage: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R43IywCZTIU&NR=1

Tyr didn't use a single Zap Jump, nor Wave Zap, so that video doesn't show how MK gimps Lucas IF the Lucas is trying to recover safely

 

[Steeler]

i think jiggs could use a uthrow buff to either make it a better juggle set up or a better KO move. right now it's kind of stuck in between the two and doesn't accomplish either.

about lucas:

i think lucas is viable in bbrawl and a good enough character, but if we are going to talk buffs, i like making nair a better juggle setup and maybe giving angled up ftilt more vertical trajectory to accomplish the same thing. or angled down ftilt a lower trajectory to maybe set up some tech situations. a stronger fair maybe? it actually has pretty decent range when you consider lucas' aerial mobility.

we could also change dsmash so that the first two hits are weaker "link" hits that lead into the final, strongest hitbox.

 

[A2ZOMG]

That change to Lucas's D-smash would be nerfing it without some gay SDI adjustments.

It's supposed to be a kill move that owns spotdodges, and really, the main problem is just that the last two hits are meh.

 

[Steeler]

hmm that's something to consider. the electric stun gives you more time to SDI as it is.

also, how about changing jiggly dair to allow for more followups? according to the jiggly guide, dair has no knockback at all until 147% (not sure if this is on mario or what). this alone isn't a bad thing, but jiggs has almost 50 frames of cooldown after the final hit if you don't auto cancel the move...so you really are not getting much out of this if you aren't about to land anyway.

i know thinkaman was concerned about this move being totally broken but i think this would be an interesting thing to put in a test build (without the shield damage buff). considering jiggs' ground game is likely the worst in the game, i think her aerial game has to be very close to the best. i'd like to see dair behave more like wario's and squirtle's dairs.

 

[rPSIvysaur]

Tyr didn't use a single Zap Jump, nor Wave Zap, so that video doesn't show how MK gimps Lucas IF the Lucas is trying to recover safely

It's to show that even our top players are uncomfortable with the timing for Zap Jump. Not everyone posses your uber tech skill APC.

 

[Lokee]

i know thinkaman was concerned about this move being totally broken but i think this would be an interesting thing to put in a test build (without the shield damage buff). considering jiggs' ground game is likely the worst in the game, i think her aerial game has to be very close to the best in order for jiggs to be a truly viable character.

That makes sense on so many levels. In vbrawl Jiggs has the problem of being outclassed by the game's aerial aces like Wario and Metaknight who are master in the air yet still have good to above average ground games.

So yes making Jiggs the aerial/gimping queen wouldn't be so bad. The funny thing about balancing low tiers is that no one said they couldn't have matchups greatly in their favor (within the 40/60 range of course) Like why cant Jiggs have a 60/40 advantage against someone like Diddy Kong

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Has anyone seriously looked at how dair is working as it stands in that test build? It as a pretty non-trivial buff, and it has actual hitstun so it does lead into stuff (it doesn't send people flying at most reasonable %s, but that's probably a good thing).

Also, Jigglypuff probably does have that kind of advantage against Diddy Kong right now...

 

[Linkshot]

It's to show that even our top players are uncomfortable with the timing for Zap Jump. Not everyone posses your uber tech skill APC.

Except...when I was in Low Tiers at BISB, Steb was Zap Jump recovering left and right no problem.

Your logic is flawed.

 

[Steeler]

if you can buffer the zap jump, then it really should not be hard.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

The input for zap jump is just pressing two buttons simultaneously I believe. It seems hard because it has to be exactly simultaneous (being one frame off doesn't count), but it's much easier than, say, hitting one button and then hitting another exactly three frames later or something.

I'm honestly not sure how hard magnet pull is to do, but I know I've fought Lucas players who do it (and zap jump) consistently.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I can Zap Jump really consistently, and I have X set to specials for doing that among other random tricks that involve buffering specials out of jumps. It's cool and stuff...but it doesn't stop Lucas from getting owned when he recovers against characters with good offstage control.

Magnet Pull is really easy to do since all you need to do is gain backwards momentum from a PK Fire and then use PSI Magnet, which does weird things to your momentum...the hard part is Magnet Pulling out of Zap Jump, since that requires a B-reversal as I recall...or maybe worse, jumping in one direction and on the next frame doing a PK Fire in the opposite direction. I don't remember completely, except that it's stupidly hard to do that. And if you don't PERFECTLY Zap Jump into Magnet Pull, you lose some horizontal distance when Zap Jumping...which of course sucks massively if you're recovering against Metaknight/Jigglypuff/G&W/etc...

Basically his recovery is like G&W's, but a lot more ****ty due to actually being vulnerable and having exploitable commitment.

Now, if PK Fire had less ending lag, then that would be a different story.

Yeeeeah Lucas needs a lot of help for real. Outside of those few decent pokes and pressure options he does have, he just suuuuuucks and has either extremely situational or non-existent reward and a lot of situations he doesn't like being in due to his grab sucking, his recovery being balls, his range just being bad, and other things.

Yeah so changelist should be something like this for Lucas (bolded being most important):
F-air/U-air slight power buffs
N-air angle set to 90 degrees, knockback set to be close to constant and like Mario/Luigi's D-throw
All three D-smash hits kill
PK Fire ending lag reduced
F-throw angle down
U-smash no longer SDIable, probably increase damage as well
Buff to F-tilt applications?

THEN he will be a good character.

 

[Steeler]

i'm not convinced lucas needs all those buffs, maybe fair/uair power buffs since none of his current changes really address KO power. this could change depending on whether we can implement a change to jab locking that only allows one lock, since admittedly removing that KO setup does impact lucas in a non-trivial way. he might have problems recovering against mk/jiggs/gw but then again how many characters don't? notice that all three of those characters are also the lightest or close to it. KO buff makes sense, and/or the nair setup improved

 

[A2ZOMG]

Those are however matchups that he is clearly significantly disadvantaged to. And the idea is that Lucas suffers in those matchups since he can't get a kill easily, and because he gets easily killed himself.

Random thought, but the buff to the first hit of Ganon's D-smash means that there is no longer any reason for Olimar to DI Up...and accidentally get techchase D-aired for standing up lmao. And besides that...rPSI and I believe that Ganon's D-smash should be researched as to why it pulls people towards him on block. If that could be changed, that would really help Ganon quite a bit, giving him a safer Smash to throw out that doesn't have the fail range that U-smash does.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

His dsmash probably pulls people toward him on block because it hits that direction, and it hits in that direction so it leads into the second hit. I bet Toon Link's dsmash does the same thing; it's not really a bug.

Still, who has been messing around with this test version and the changes it contains? That's really the primary thing of interest right now.

 

[A2ZOMG]

His dsmash probably pulls people toward him on block because it hits that direction, and it hits in that direction so it leads into the second hit. I bet Toon Link's dsmash does the same thing; it's not really a bug.

No, what I asked is WHY DOES THE SECOND HIT OF GANON'S D-SMASH, the one you want to actually hit with, pull opponents towards you on block?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHAo9hlpn0M#t=5m14s

His D-smash would be a fairly decent move if it wasn't so unsafe on block. The ******** shieldpush however is ********...

 

[Eldiran]

No, what I asked is WHY DOES THE SECOND HIT OF GANON'S D-SMASH, the one you want to actually hit with, pull opponents towards you on block?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHAo9hlpn0M#t=5m14s

His D-smash would be a fairly decent move if it wasn't so unsafe on block. The ******** shieldpush however is ********...

That's not actually what you asked... <.<

However, it's still true -- oddly, Ganon's 2nd kick is angled inward, just like the first one. Also oddly, it is a Special Offensive Collision. Probably to make the knockback non-reversible, I'd guess.

I agree it'd be a nice buff to Ganon to have an angle change on Dsmash's second hit.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

Special offensive collisions do have a few poorly documented properties as well (reversibility is only one of the things they can do that normal offensive collisions can't). I'm actually curious what they are...

And, indeed, that is not what you asked... I should repost the really important thing though:

Still, who has been messing around with this test version and the changes it contains? That's really the primary thing of interest right now.

It's pointless to talk about future changes without knowing more about the changes already made public and playable.

 

[A2ZOMG]

That's not actually what you asked... <.<

However, it's still true -- oddly, Ganon's 2nd kick is angled inward, just like the first one. Also oddly, it is a Special Offensive Collision. Probably to make the knockback non-reversible, I'd guess.

I agree it'd be a nice buff to Ganon to have an angle change on Dsmash's second hit.

Sounds like the developers originally had Ganon's Melee D-smash in mind but slapped on some last minute change lmao.

 

[Rykoshet]

So yeah ADHD definitely Powershielded the hell out of 80% of my fairs last time I played his ICs with Ike. Now that I think of it so did mintyflesh. Garbz tier?

 

[Steeler]

i know this doesn't do anything for powershielding but i really like the idea of giving most of ike's moves some additional shield damage value, like jiggs pound and marth shield breaker

(but not that extreme)

or you could just speed up fair, idk

 

[Stealth Raptor]

idk if this would help or is even possible, but perhaps make certain moves unpower shieldable. like make it so that if you power shield say ikes fair, it acts like it hit the regular shield

 

[A2ZOMG]

So yeah ADHD definitely Powershielded the hell out of 80% of my fairs last time I played his ICs with Ike. Now that I think of it so did mintyflesh. Garbz tier?

I personally say third worst character in standard Brawl.

Ike doesn't need his F-air changed, he needs his B-air changed. Ike is laughable in that he can't do two aerials in a fullhop, and besides that, his B-air isn't even safe on block without RIDICULOUS retreating or if the opponent falls for a fullhop QD -> B-air crossover.

Ike's B-air doesn't even kill particularly early(114% center of FD with no DI is frankly not good enough)...it's basically just 50x worse than Snake's B-air, which can be used twice in fullhop, is more powerful, has sex kick properties, yeah.

Oh yeah besides that, his N-air should be changed so that Ike doesn't autosuicide when he N-airs offstage.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Change Nair timings also means change its autocancel timings...

I think his Bair is good, not broken, but decent; but anyways, why would he needs to use 2 aerials on a fullhop? he's already known for slow... I really think he needs some different addressings, like, +1% on Dair (sweet and sourspot), tweaks on Nair and more shieldstun, or something. I don't think timing changes are necessary at all...

And btw, I already reported what I observed on the test, but I couldn't test the Dtilts fixes.

 

[rPSIvysaur]

Change Nair timings also means change its autocancel timings...

I think his Bair is good, not broken, but decent; but anyways, why would he needs to use 2 aerials on a fullhop? he's already known for slow... I really think he needs some different addressings, like, +1% on Dair (sweet and sourspot), tweaks on Nair and more shieldstun, or something. I don't think timing changes are necessary at all...

Timing changes don't change AC timings, you can set AC timing in PSA.

PS'able on reation, that is sad, Ike needs timing changes.


Edit:
I just tested Lucas' changes. If you're going to use the Jab Lock code I made, get rid of the changes you made to Lucas d-air now, Lucas' D-air in this build is HORRIBLE. Also if you do use the Jab Lock code I made, change his d-tilt back to vBrawl, but just add maybe 5 or 6 to the BKB so it can force get-up but doesn't have a large disadvantage on hit.
Testing other characters now.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Change Nair timings also means change its autocancel timings...

I think his Bair is good, not broken, but decent; but anyways, why would he needs to use 2 aerials on a fullhop? he's already known for slow... I really think he needs some different addressings, like, +1% on Dair (sweet and sourspot), tweaks on Nair and more shieldstun, or something. I don't think timing changes are necessary at all...

And btw, I already reported what I observed on the test, but I couldn't test the Dtilts fixes.

Ike is the worst juggler in the game, in that he has the fewest options for really punishing you consistently when you're descending above him. Before he got the QD buff, he was also the most easily juggled character as well. And he still really can't do anything when you pressure him in the air.

He's just a horrible slow limited character that has next to no depth or mixup in his game. He is by far the most predictable character in Brawl and he could have easily been the worst character in standard Brawl, besides the fact that Zelda and Ganondorf miraculously manage to be worse than this pile of competitively useless fail.

He really can't follow up in any realistic way when he whiffs, which is easy to do since he telegraphs everything. I mean heck, Ganondorf is allowed to juggle you when you're above him since he can actually follow up with multiple moves at once in the air. ROB anyhow has little fear of Ike since he just destroys Ike on the ground and Ike can't do much to take advantage of ROB when juggling.

Snake is a pretty slow character, but Ike manages to be EVEN SLOWER. That's just unbelievably wrong and terrible beyond comprehension.

I do believe that in the test build Ganon might be slightly better than Ike thanks to the F-air buff.

 

[ぱみゅ]

for juggling... have you tried, like, wait for you opponent on ground?
Usmash has great range, and Fsmash and Ftilt somehow could be useful as mixups (that's why I only proposed shieldstun). Use QD for either approach or retreat (and jab for punish mistakes?).
I really agree with Thinkaman's perspective of "change timings when REALLY necessary only", and I'd only vore for testing.


Another thing about the built: haven't tested, but, Thinkaman said that Jiggs' Nair buff was for gimp sace animals... not sure if it still can be done, or ig Dair buff compehensate it... =/

 

[A2ZOMG]

for juggling... have you tried, like, wait for you opponent on ground?
Usmash has great range, and Fsmash and Ftilt somehow could be useful as mixups (that's why I only proposed shieldstun). Use QD for either approach or retreat (and jab for punish mistakes?).

This is just a fundamental option that is applicable to EVERY PLAYER. If all Ike can do is just rely on player tactics to get by, he's really sucking. He already is failing by missing out on the option of consistently forcing airdodge traps since you know what he's going to do when he jumps at you and because he has no god**** followups.

As for those moves, Ike however telegraphs everything there and more, and if you don't suck at saving your jump/B-reversal and as long as you're not playing another complete garbage character that has next to no options for doing anything, he really really can't juggle you at all. He has to trick his opponent into making a mistake in order for them to actually get hit by whatever he throws out for juggles. Nobody else seriously lacks any real reactionary options for creating followups to the extent Ike does.

Ike SORELY needs a timing change because he's actually lacking fundamental competitive options. He can't juggle, implement vertical spacing, and he seriously lacks good followups in general (although now he can realistically edgeguard with QD).

 

[Mr. Escalator]

Ignoring the silly Ike talk to post this video for anyone who hasn't yet tried out the current test build:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wj2YjpJbYS0&fmt=22
Your mileage regarding how much faster the transformation time is will vary from Wii to Wii.

Haven't gotten to test the new turtle much at all beyond some cursory checks in training mode. The decreased shield stun from the tip could be a problem...

 

[ぱみゅ]

I main Zelda, so I obviously tried it, I just didn't thread it. Anyways, it feels pretty like sakurai's true attempt for transformations, but he didn't realized that Wiis could be damaged to not actually read properly. It's really smooth, and feels awesome not have to wait for the wii to read it, because now can be measured! (and helps with switch confidence, as a side effect...)

As for Ike, I'm actually tired of discuss it. Why don't just try both versions? There's poeple with PSA experience that could help with that.