Balanced Brawl Standard Release

[A2ZOMG]

4) Mario seems to be really good, as has been mentioned. However, I have yet to try the Mario/G&W or Mario/MK or Mario/Marth matchup. Any and all of them could still hold Mario back. Otherwise, he is solid enough to be a contender for high tier, if not top.

I've actually played the MK matchup against a friend offline, and our consensus is that it is pretty even. I'm not going to argue that it is in Mario's favor, but this matchup is quite winnable.

What Mario can do to MK reliably that he can't do nearly as easily to Marth or G&W is force him to approach/defend. MK's transcendent priority works against him when Mario is fireball camping. Mario also KO's MK SOOOOOOOOO early. Up-smash KOs at like 97%, which is simply amazing. MK can't kill Mario very easily without getting a gimp with fresh D-air, as it takes like at least 150% for Mario to get killed by D-smash. B-throw KOs MK at like 105% from near the edge. Seriously, Mario can KO MK so fast in BBrawl, on a blow per blow basis (it's not impossible to trade hits), Mario hands down wins. The only way MK can win this is by playing extremely carefully, which of course is one of his best strategies, but the extent to which MK is forced to do this is pretty high.

G&W still clearly beats Mario for the same reasons he did in vBrawl. G&W is one of the hardest characters for Mario to land a KO move on safely. The only really "safe" way is a perfectly timed Up-smash out of shield, which can fail easily if G&W spaces well and doesn't get baited easily. G&W is also the hardest character for Mario to land F-smash on, due to the disjointed and low lag nature of his Smashes and D-tilt. G&W's F-air as usual is the best edgeguard tool against predictable recoveries, so while Mario can at least claim to be able to keep up better in terms of KO%s, he's at a disadvantage the whole time as long as he's trying to get in range.

Marth was also hard in vBrawl in high level play due to Marth having the superior spacing/zoning game, and being able to work around fireball camping pretty easily. However, Mario benefits a lot in this matchup from the removal of RCO lag and increased KO power in general. Still, Marth is still able to outdamage and outKO Mario with well-timed tippers.

Against Marth and G&W however, they must fear Mario's Jab cancel game, which only got a lot more scary, since I'm very certain that Jab cancel D-smash is unblockable against those two characters.

5) A lot of people were concerned about the Ganon/Samus matchup, saying Samus' buffs push the already 30/70 or 20/80 matchup even farther away from even. I disagree. Thinkaman and I discussed Samus' buffs, and they really don't come into play much in this particular matchup. Watch out for Samus' Dtilt and you're OK. However, the matchup is still in Samus' favor, and I won't say it isn't potentially a real counter. Too early to tell for sure.

Increased knockback of throws, more damage on projectiles, F-smash that GIMPS, seriously?

Flame Choke D-tilt doesn't work on her either.

 

[prOAPC]

[Directed at APC] However, MK hasn't lost any priority, and I'm not sure I buy that Luigi is top tier. In my personal experience, Peach fits your description of Luigi better.

i hate Peach, now, i hate you for saying that (jk)

everything he said

talking about Lucas' dtilt lock:
1) He's a bad character, he needs any tool that makes him a viable character
2) Don't compare Lucas' lock with Falco's and Ice Climbers', Lucas' can only start after 70% on every character, is not a 0-death combo like IC's and is not a long distance lock like Falco's. I mean, with Lucas you have to try hard to lock your opponent, is not as easy as using one grab or just pressing B if you opponent miss a tech
3) Lucas only needs 1 dtilt, then follow up with any smash, Lucas players won't abuse the infinite combo
4) C'mon, jab locks against walls aren't that common
5) i would be happy if dtilt forces a get up, just like it does in Brawl+

 

[TP]

Complaining about Lucas' Dtilt is nonsense. Thinkaman was able to beat my Ganon with his Lucas, all thanks to the new Dtilt. He would Dtilt me and I was like "****, there's 40%." Seriously, stop worrying about guaranteed stuff when your positional advantage is so large that you are in complete control of the match.

 

[prOAPC]

Thinkaman was able to beat my Ganon with his Lucas, all thanks to the new Dtilt. He would Dtilt me and I was like "****, there's 40%.

just press and hold your shield, you will power shield the second dtilt, then just grab
Lucas' dtilt is used to stop slow attacks, but shield and 2 frames or faster attacks beat it

 

[Thinkaman]

Actually only 1 frame attacks can interrupt it. (So nothing but Squirtle and ZSS jab1) It has a consistent 2-frame advantage for Lucas.

I almost never have d-tilt powershielded, because by the time they react I'm already done with 2 or 3. Not only can it trip and be impossible to block, but it also has an easy mixup into a grab... and Lucas pummel and throws are nothing to scoff at.

 

[daisho]

i hate Peach, now, i hate you for saying that (jk)


talking about Lucas' dtilt lock:
1) He's a bad character, he needs any tool that makes him a viable character
2) Don't compare Lucas' lock with Falco's and Ice Climbers', Lucas' can only start after 70% on every character, is not a 0-death combo like IC's and is not a long distance lock like Falco's. I mean, with Lucas you have to try hard to lock your opponent, is not as easy as using one grab or just pressing B if you opponent miss a tech
3) Lucas only needs 1 dtilt, then follow up with any smash, Lucas players won't abuse the infinite combo
4) C'mon, jab locks against walls aren't that common
5) i would be happy if dtilt forces a get up, just like it does in Brawl+

Hes not comparing them... if you want to take the others out you have to take that one out.

 

[prOAPC]

Actually only 1 frame attacks can interrupt it. (So nothing but Squirtle and ZSS jab1) It has a consistent 2-frame advantage for Lucas.

I almost never have d-tilt powershielded, because by the time they react I'm already done with 2 or 3. Not only can it trip and be impossible to block, but it also has an easy mixup into a grab... and Lucas pummel and throws are nothing to scoff at.

maybe i did something wrong but i tested it at 1/4 speed, and by just holding shield, the other character could shield, after the first dtilt hit, both dtilt+dtilt and dtilt+jab
is there a frame by frame test involved?

 

[Linkshot]

I would never test at 1/4 speed because I'm quite sure there are extra frames added to smooth animations. :/

Also, human reflexes, on average, are about 15 frames.

 

[Thinkaman]

I test everything normal speed frame-by-frame.

 

[Crescens]

I have a somewhat off topic question for Thinkaman, or anyone else who happens to know.

Do you know the frame data for perfect shielding? How many frames does it take to put up? How large is the window for perfect shielding? After perfect shielding, how long until you can do another move, including another perfect shield? Mostly, I'm just curious how feasible it is to perfect shield jabs or multi hit attacks.

Also, Ivyr is just ridiculously useless against Samus still. Not that I'm complaining - Squirtle more than makes up for it. PT feels like one of the stronger characters; primarily due to his ability to pick his own matchups. ZSS' Dsmash feels better now. Not much else to say about her. The dtilt has got to be her best ground move in most options. She's still an inherently predictable character, though. As an opponent learns to deal with her, she becomes easy to read. Though she's great at putting people in the air, she really suffers when trying to predict and punish air dodges due to her fast fall speed and inability to keep up with the opponent's DI while returning to the ground.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Perfect shielding is well...pretty gay. The window is from like 8-10 frames if I recall starting from frame 1. And there is no shield drop lag (although shield hitlag still factors into the equation before you can drop shield if I recall).

 

[hotgarbage]

iirc it's something like 5 frames. I've forgotten exactly. 8-10 sounds way too high. And there is shield drop lag for movement, but none if you decide to attack/jump.

EDIT: tested it; the ps window is only 3 frames in Brawl

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

1/4 speed is really useless because it adds frames to things and changes how some follow ups work when things are tight enough that single frames matter.

As per jab/tilt/laser/ice block locks, the point is that they're all the same mechanically. Fixing any of them requires fixing all of them. They are really quite bad gameplay wise on some stages; basically everyone with a jab lock can way too easily uthrow to jab lock on Luigi's Mansion if you aren't quite careful with teching. I mean, it's not broken, but it's obviously bad game design that you have to worry about it. Anything that is an actual infinite on walls is not acceptable to me (all the dtilt traps do eventually end at least), and leading people off walk-offs isn't really better since these stages really do matter now. I know Lucas is bad in standard Brawl, but we don't feel as though it's okay to leave in abusable tactics even on bad characters. Instead, the idea is to remove them and make the character at base actually good... which I feel we've definitely done with Lucas. Lucas's new dtilt is seriously a way better move than the old one regardless; it's an all around a good tilt now instead of being a mostly useless move that is only safe on hit when abusing the jab lock mechanics.

As an aside, I would never rely on anyone to voluntarily not abuse anything. In designing this, we expected all player to play to win to the extreme which means abusing literally anything you can to win. A lot of people (including me actually) follow this mentality. If you have an infinite or a long chaingrab that really just ruins the gameplay, we fully expect you to do it to win at every opportunity. A big part of our challenge is to design the game not to have that mentality ever actually hurt gameplay; the abusable stuff that makes the gameplay really lame in some matchups should just not exist. That way, the maximum potential of the game can really shine through best as all sides play to win, an important quality of any competitive fighter.

Lucas is not the only character to trade away stupid stuff for new and better stuff either. Yoshi and Bowser got a lot out of grab release in standard Brawl, but we (to no small amount of complaining) took that out and instead made them far more potent characters in general. Link was one of the original biggest benefactors of jab locking anyway, but any Link main would happily trade that away for what we gave him (which is about a million times better). Ike lost his wall infinites and chaingrabs in general with his throws (granted, his new f/b throws are completely awesome in their own ways). I know there is a natural impulse as the main of a character to want them to have everything good they can possibly have, but isn't it really most desirable if your main does not have to rely on that sort of gimmick and instead has the tools to win "normally" instead?

To disclose a bit about Lucas, A2ZOMG believes Lucas to be bad. Literally everyone else I've seen who had an opinion on Lucas believed him to be in the top half of the cast with one person actually placing him as high as #5 (which is in top tier). Just looking at Lucas as a whole picture, he doesn't seem to be in a bad situation at all to me.

To cover a bit about shielding, shields come up on frame 1 and can powershield at that point, and powershielding the later hits of mulit-hit attacks in general is completely impractical unless you are a robot and only sometimes even possible (Luigi's standard Brawl dash attack is an exception since it's so bad).

 

[Linkshot]

AA.

Bad memories of Impossible Ganon (Melee).

He powershields your everything and then jabs out of it. You blow up instantly.

 

[Fox Hater]

I have a somewhat off topic question for Thinkaman, or anyone else who happens to know.

Do you know the frame data for perfect shielding? How many frames does it take to put up? How large is the window for perfect shielding? After perfect shielding, how long until you can do another move, including another perfect shield? Mostly, I'm just curious how feasible it is to perfect shield jabs or multi hit attacks.

Pwer shield is gay. Just hold the shield button when ur rolling and u get perfect shield almost always.

I thought that details like these were going to be fixed in BBRAWL

 

[clouddude345]

I want to start off by thanking those who started this project and are still watching it.

After playing balanced brawl for a few weeks with some other friends of mine there's one reoccuring move that keeps being debated and called overpowered or too strong and that's Link's arrow.

I personally main link with sheik and marth as seconday chracters and personally like the change to Link's arrow and removing jab locks, but my friends feel the angle of his arrow should not push oponents downward but instead simply push them away. Chracters like lucas when hit with links arrow have almost no chance of returning to the stage when hit in the air (they claim) because of the downard angle.

They consistently play C.falcon, Lucas, Kirby, Samus, and ZSS as mains.

Sorry if this has been debated already on the thread but after reading 21 pages through I decided just to post about it.

 

[Fox Hater]

^^^^^ true. the downside angle is too good. it should be fixed

 

[rPSIvysaur]

but w/o the downward angle it can't be teched on stage XD

 

[TP]

Guys, Thinkaman told me he would not even start to think about possible changes for the next version until November at the earliest, let alone actually MAKE changes. It really doesn't accomplish anything to post about changes that should be different. This is the game we have.

 

[Thinkaman]

I'm pretty sure the power shield window is exactly 4 frames. Other fun windows:

U/D-Smash window: 4 frames
Initial dash window: 6 frames (used for f-smashs, dash dancing, ect.)
Turn around window: 1 frame (True pivot)
Backwards aerial special window: 20 frames
B-reversal window: 3 frames
Pivot Grab window: 5 frames (2 before turn - 2 after turn)

Edit: Lucas Zap Jump Window: 1 frame

 

[PKNintendo]

To disclose a bit about Lucas, A2ZOMG believes Lucas to be bad. Literally everyone else I've seen who had an opinion on Lucas believed him to be in the top half of the cast with one person actually placing him as high as #5 (which is in top tier). Just looking at Lucas as a whole picture, he doesn't seem to be in a bad situation at all to me.

I don't he's top either but a middle of middle spot seems fair. I mean the only way he can go is up right?

 

[Thinkaman]

Remember, the important thing isn't ranking... there will always be a best and worst character. The important thing is how big the gap between the characters is, aka how their matchups are.

Let's imagine that most characters have 3 of each 60:40 matchups and 40:60 matchups. (and maybe like 6 each 55:45 and 45:55 matchups) If there is just one character that has 4 40:60 matchups and only 2 60:40 matchups, they might be the "worst" character. However, that's so close to everyone else that no one in their right mind would complain; I'd be happy to play that character myself. This is even ignorign that if the characters are that close, no one is going to be able to agree on the worst anyway.

 

[hotgarbage]

I'm pretty sure the power shield window is exactly 4 frames.

I'm getting 3 in Brawl frame-by-frame mode.

Backwards aerial special window: 20 frames

Huh, that explains stuff. I wish it weren't so large

 

[JOE!]

Remember, the important thing isn't ranking... there will always be a best and worst character. The important thing is how big the gap between the characters is, aka how their matchups are.

Let's imagine that most characters have 3 of each 60:40 matchups and 40:60 matchups. (and maybe like 6 each 55:45 and 45:55 matchups) If there is just one character that has 4 40:60 matchups and only 2 60:40 matchups, they might be the "worst" character. However, that's so close to everyone else that no one in their right mind would complain; I'd be happy to play that character myself. This is even ignorign that if the characters are that close, no one is going to be able to agree on the worst anyway.

exactly. Bowser has like, across the board 40/60s, but he is still mid-tier

 

[A2ZOMG]

To disclose a bit about Lucas, A2ZOMG believes Lucas to be bad. Literally everyone else I've seen who had an opinion on Lucas believed him to be in the top half of the cast with one person actually placing him as high as #5 (which is in top tier). Just looking at Lucas as a whole picture, he doesn't seem to be in a bad situation at all to me.

More accurately, he's not nearly as impressive as other characters. That's why he's "bad" compared to everyone else. He was always mediocre in vBrawl not because of getting grab released, but because the fundamentals of his options are just not up to par with what Brawl demands.

It's very simple. He doesn't have any really easy way to land KO moves that are safe, and relatively short range on most moves (being disjointed to some extent doesn't mean crap if your opponent has no trouble trading hits and when your F-smash is just as laggy as Ganondorf's). His camp game is one of the more gimmicky ones due to the telegraphed nature of his stuff he can use to camp, and he doesn't have anything that resembles an astoundingly good approach on defenses. The characters that I think are actually good DO have something that is astoundingly good on defenses and significantly safer ways of landing good KO moves. Mario has D-air (and D-smash is safe on block). Samus has Z-air (and D-tilt and Charge Shot are safe KO moves). Everyone knows what Marth and G&W has on defenses. Metaknight and Snake still have their hitboxes and speed. Lucas has...D-tilt at best, which doesn't cover that many options in comparison.

At any rate, his spotdodge buff makes him not worthless, since you can do a lot of stupid stuff with 20/22 spotdodges. He probably could be mid tier with that buff, if I forgot that so many other characters ahead of him also got some significant buffs.

 

[Linkshot]

I stopped reading when you said Lucas' fSmash is as laggy as Ganon's.

You've lost all credibility.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I stopped reading when you said Lucas' fSmash is as laggy as Ganon's.

You've lost all credibility.

Want data on that?

Lucas
Fsmash:
Total: 46
First hits on frame 14
Advantage: -28

Ganondorf
Fsmash
Total: 57
Hit: 21-26
Advantage:-30

Yes, it's THAT punishable.

You could tell me Ganondorf's is slower, but it also has more range and pushback.

 

[rPSIvysaur]

sadly, it is THAT laggy...

The thing is with Lucas, to many characters can enter his blind-spot too easily. His blind spot is diagnally above him, due to the lack of ranged u-tilt and quick u-smash. I think a change to his up-tilt hitbox would be better for him, but due to the nature of BBrawl, that won't happen.

 

[Mr. Escalator]

So pretty much he says he doesnt care about the rest of your post because you said Lucas' Fsmash is as laggy as Ganons, and then you provide frame data proving he is right and you wrong? Lol.

 

[PKNintendo]

On the case of the Fsmash. It's pretty laggy. The startup is decent but the ending lag is a bummer. Still, it's a pretty **** good move for the damage it does and it's range is great. I don't think it's bad at all and it supersedes many Fsmash's. Like Mario's regular Fsmash. (non stutterstepped)

I don't really thinks thats accurate data bros. Use PSA much more accurate.

 

[rPSIvysaur]

PSA only tells you about the hitbox timing, not the animation timing

 

[A2ZOMG]

So pretty much he says he doesnt care about the rest of your post because you said Lucas' Fsmash is as laggy as Ganons, and then you provide frame data proving he is right and you wrong? Lol.

2 frames is a big difference when you're already around the 28-30 frame negative advantage ballpark. Seriously. Do the math.

Average lag is more like 20-25 frames. Anything after that is ridiculously terrible.

You can punish this on reaction so easily. I've actually played this matchup a fair bit in tournament. <_<

 

[Mr. Escalator]

Use Frame-by-Frame mode.
Also you claimed it was JUST as laggy, but clearly it is not the same.

edit: Why even mention that last bit in your post? The Lucas of vBrawl is no more, and even then, using your personal experiences isn't really something you should be factoring in when saying Lucas is poor. Not like I care, though.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Use Frame-by-Frame mode.
Also you claimed it was JUST as laggy, but clearly it is not the same.

It is virtually the same. Lucas's F-smash is out for like 2 frames, while Ganondorf's is out for 5 frames, so the total ending lag for both is about 31 frames.

 

[Swoops]

Lucas has incredibly laggy kill moves, which are his only kill moves. His f-smash ends on frame 58, which it says right on the frame data thread in the lucas boards. Ganon's f-smash ends on frame 57. Considering Ganon's starts like 6 frames after lucas' and has more range and pushback, yea lucas' f-smash is just as laggy, if not more.

 

[Mr. Escalator]

However, it isn't JUST as laggy. A2ZOMG said it was just as laggy, which it isn't. He should of said it's practically as laggy.

Also, Lucas' Fsmash is obviously pretty good (much better than Ganon's piece of crap Fsmash).

 

[A2ZOMG]

However, it isn't JUST as laggy. A2ZOMG said it was just as laggy, which it isn't. He should of said it's practically as laggy.

Also, Lucas' Fsmash is obviously pretty good (much better than Ganon's piece of crap Fsmash).

No, Ganondorf's F-smash is slightly better.

Has more range, and KOs earlier.

You're not landing either out of shield or from spotdodge when your opponent has good spacing. In fact, Ganondorf can COMBO into his F-smash with techchasing.

 

[rPSIvysaur]

Lucas tech-chasing would be laughable...
What happened is, is that he used to be able to d-air to d-tilt lock to f-smash, which was great
But now it's gone, and it's really hard to KO...

 

[PKNintendo]

Good lord he's right. The fact's are all there. Curses A2.
Well played. Well played indeed.

 

[Mr. Escalator]

Lucas' Fsmash may have SLIGHTLY less range and less knockback, but you are failing to mention that it has reflection properties, hits behind him, is actually able to be led into from Dtilt's tripping, AND has better startup. The startup is really important; hitting on frame 14 is a lot better than 21, even though it seems small.

Ganon's fsmash is a joke. You can consistently powershield that, whereas Lucas' is just under typical Smasher's reaction time, so it wont be always powershielded simply on reaction alone.