Balanced Brawl Standard Release

[Mr. Escalator]

Side B is the anti shield. A single flame choke in BBrawl is so ridiculous on some characters, such as G&W.
Ike is really pretty good in vBrawl, thats the impression I am under. Ike is mid tier, and he has a lot of frame advantages from his throws and jab as well as sheer power to back up this good source of damage dealing that arent worth ignoring. Jab canceling and Bthrow->Dash attack are really solid, and mending his poor recovery really rounds Ike out to being a great character.

He isnt without weakness in BBrawl, but he's a lot more sturdy.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Side B is the anti shield. A single flame choke in BBrawl is so ridiculous on some characters, such as G&W.

SideB first grabs on frame 16, meaning against an opponent in a neutral state, it can, and WILL be spotdodged on reaction.

Moreover, characters can GRAB him out of it if they have good timing.

SideB is also extremely hard to land against characters that benefit a lot from throwing out attacks, like G&W and Marth.

In low level play, Ganondorf is complete ****.

In high level play once things start getting more cautious, Ganondorf's stuff starts looking more gimmicky.

Ike would be better if he could easily get kills resulting from throws and Jab, but he can't 99% of the time, and everything else he has is terrible on shields.

 

[NintenJoe]

In the words of M2K, why is Ness horrible? "He only has F-air and B-throw!" That's always been the reason why he's never been good. You can get away with a bad recovery and grab release combos if your movepool has great combination speed/range/safety/power (Olimar and Wario can attest to this).

You forgot Dair and the new (and improved) PK Fire. Ness has safety and range, but not speed nor power. Two versitile projectiles that are great for edgeguarding and 3 or so solid killing moves. If you see reason to continue buffing Ness, so be it. I wouldn't mind getting another approach besides Fair. Ness feels a lot like Hakumen from Blazblue in vBrawl.

 

[A2ZOMG]

You forgot Dair and the new (and improved) PK Fire. Ness has safety and range, but not speed nor power. Two versitile projectiles that are great for edgeguarding and 3 or so solid killing moves. If you see reason to continue buffing Ness, so be it. I wouldn't mind getting another approach besides Fair. Ness feels a lot like Hakumen from Blazblue in vBrawl.

D-air is unsafe on block. PK Fire is easily powershielded and unsafe in midrange.

That's all that really needs to be said.

By the way, Hakumen sucks.

 

[Amazing Ampharos]

I think people are too absolutist when thinking about Ganondorf. He has basically no safe options. He's slow in every way. He's generally easy to camp and abuse. It is not an absolute that he has to be bad because of this. For instance, you bring up the Ganondorf vs R.O.B. matchup. From a neutral position, how many hits does R.O.B. need to land to kill Ganondorf. How many hits does Ganondorf need to land to kill R.O.B.? Well, Ganon's hits do about triple damage, Ganon has way better follow-ups than R.O.B., and Ganon kills about twice as low. That's extreme. Unless it is so much easier for R.O.B. to land hits than Ganon that matches tend to end with R.O.B. having 3 stocks remaining and at 0%, which everyone knows is not true, Ganondorf is a threat to R.O.B. since that means he does tend to land hits, and they are rewarding.

Playtesting agrees with me on this point actually. Ganondorf has done consistently well in real play. Feel free to hold shield; it just wears down. Ganondorf can just hit you when you're not shielding, and even though you hit him out of a neutral position so many times more than he hits you, he can still win anyway. That Ganon 0-death on G&W in the demonstration video wasn't choreographed; that happened in real play. G&W took the first hit, and Ganon predicted the techchase twice. That is... terrifying; I think it's silly to write off such a character no matter how extreme his disadvantages are.

 

[NintenJoe]

D-air is unsafe on block. PK Fire is easily powershielded and unsafe in midrange.

That's all that really needs to be said.

By the way, Hakumen sucks.

Dair for spikes and mindgames on stage. PK Fire is still pretty crappy, but have you seen/tried FH PK Fire into another retreating PK Fire/aerial? It's not safe, but it's an improvement that helps PK Fire be safeer.

Hakumen does suck. That was my point. He has 1 good approach. Failure.

 

[A2ZOMG]

AA, What does your statement have to do with anything about Ganondorf not being the worst character in this game?

I've actually played Big O's Ganondorf quite a bit, and besides wifi, I've played as Ganondorf in BBrawl in offline matches, and my consensus is that his weaknesses can be consistently exploited by good players and this makes him suck.

Flame Choke in high level play is honestly very difficult to land against many characters, and if that's all Ganondorf is relying on to hold him up in matches, that's horrible.

If you're not speeding up anything Ganondorf has, I'm going to point out things that could be improved otherwise.

Wizkick seriously doesn't have enough knockback to be a kill move.

Jab's reward is piss poor. It's a one hit move, and only does 9 damage at most. It's the only Jab in the game that gets punished a lot by spotdodges as far as I know.

 

[18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11]

I have considered it. As for your specific example, I disagree.

Snake always used u-tilt to rack damage anyway. It's not as if Snake mains ever tried to kill Link main's vertically. If anything, the -1% nerf on f-tilt 1 and the jab knockback nerf hurt Snake in this match-up. On the other hand, Link's arrow canceling and camping game is better than ever. It definitely halts a DACUS attempt from Snake.

After all that however, I see no immediate advantage Link has over Snake. Snake's ground game is still good as ever, Snake can still somewhat compete with Link in camping with grenades (it's not as if Link has an extremely spammable projectile that can clank with Snake's nades consistently. Arrows do not clank with Snake consistently.)

At most, I'd put this at 50-50. But I wouldn't be surprised if it was to be found that it's 55-45 or even 60-40 Snake's favor. Link's recovery still hasn't improved, Snake has no problem facing Link on the ground ,and Snake's jab still has decent knockback.

LOL
Snake fails at killing Link horizontally, and zair/bomb spam >>>>>> grenade spam.
I can't remember the last time a Snake used his third jab and hit me with it.

 

[NO-IDea]

I think it's silly to over-estimate a character's abilities. First, Ganon has to land the side+b. Then he has to properly tech chase?

We've already discuss how hard it can be to land the choke in the first place, especially against certain characters. In the showcase, even if it wasn't choreographed, at high level play, with both players knowing the match-up and what Ganon can do, G&W would have never put himself in the situation to get choked.

This isn't to say he cannot win. This is to say Ganon has no match-ups in his favor. Because every character has enough defensive capability to counter Ganon. The shield is very powerful in brawl, and hasn't changed at all in balanced brawl. And playing off reaction, I have to agree again with A2Z that you can avoid the choke.

It doesn't necessarily mean we'll hold the shield down either. No legitimate player holds their shield down that long without deciding to use an OoS option or rolling away. The OoS option can be countered, and so can the roll (Wizards Foot.) But it won't be countered by his side+b, which is the move that leads to most of the significant damage Ganon can land.

Characters either approach Ganon with proper spacing and caution, or if they cannot safely approach, can wait all day, play defensively and wait for Ganon to. And, even when the choke does occasionally land, it's hit or miss with the tech chase. That, by itself, is inconsistent and therefore can not legitimize Ganon as a good character alone.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Christ, Ganondorf's Jab IS terrible.

Ivysaur's new B-air does 9%. <__________<

 

[NO-IDea]

LOL
Snake fails at killing Link horizontally, and zair/bomb spam >>>>>> grenade spam.
I can't remember the last time a Snake used his third jab and hit me with it.

If you're close enough for z-air spam, you're close enough to get hit by Snake's u-tilt. And if you're close enough to throw the bomb at Snake, you're close enough to risk getting DACUS'ed in the face. (He can catch the bomb, it's a legit counter to silly bomb spamming, which you can't even spam because it doesn't come out as fast as his other projectiles. It would be me saying I'm going to spam super missiles all day. It's not a legit strategy.)

A legit Link player would outcamp Snake with arrows and boomerang, sparingly using Bomb and only using z-air if Snake got too close or if Link was trying to approach. This isn't to say Snake won't perfect shield it either. Pulling out a grenade-->shield-->OoS option can counter a z-air approach and giving him a nade to boot.

You sound like a Link fan or are simply over-estimating Link/under-estimating Snake. Good job, you can SDI out of the third jab though?

I whole-heartedly agree that Link has improved and Snake has been hurt in this version. But Snake can and will eventually pressure you off stage (yes I've considered DI, Link's DI is amazing and his vertical survivability is amazing, but it will happen) and him spamming mortars and edge-guarding won't help Link's already bad recovery.

 

[daisho]

Anybody up for some friendlies now?

 

[Big O]

Yeah Ganon's jab does suck. It has a niche as a guaranteed followup after Dtilt/flame choke but otherwise it is outclassed by Dtilt/Ftilt.

Edit: We could have some more friendlies if you'd like to daisho.

 

[18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11]

I think it's silly to over-estimate a character's abilities. First, Ganon has to land the side+b. Then he has to properly tech chase?

I think it's silly to underestimate a character's abilities. Ganon's Side-B isn't even hard to land. -.- It's a lot easier than, say, IC's grabs.

We've already discuss how hard it can be to land the choke in the first place, especially against certain characters.

Uh, where. lol

In the showcase, even if it wasn't choreographed, at high level play, with both players knowing the match-up and what Ganon can do, G&W would have never put himself in the situation to get choked.

That's not very humanely possible... -.-

This isn't to say he cannot win. This is to say Ganon has no match-ups in his favor. Because every character has enough defensive capability to counter Ganon. The shield is very powerful in brawl, and hasn't changed at all in balanced brawl. And playing off reaction, I have to agree again with A2Z that you can avoid the choke.

You can't always play on reaction. The instant you input a button, your reaction time goes down. Reaction really only matters when you're sitting there waiting for the choke, which is basically completely unpractical.

It doesn't necessarily mean we'll hold the shield down either. No legitimate player holds their shield down that long without deciding to use an OoS option or rolling away. The OoS option can be countered, and so can the roll (Wizards Foot.) But it won't be countered by his side+b, which is the move that leads to most of the significant damage Ganon can land.

Why? lol

Characters either approach Ganon with proper spacing and caution, or if they cannot safely approach, can wait all day, play defensively and wait for Ganon to. And, even when the choke does occasionally land, it's hit or miss with the tech chase. That, by itself, is inconsistent and therefore can not legitimize Ganon as a good character alone.

So... much... theorycraft... so... vague... *_*

If you're close enough for z-air spam, you're close enough to get hit by Snake's u-tilt. And if you're close enough to throw the bomb at Snake, you're close enough to risk getting DACUS'ed in the face. (He can catch the bomb, it's a legit counter to silly bomb spamming, which you can't even spam because it doesn't come out as fast as his other projectiles. It would be me saying I'm going to spam super missiles all day. It's not a legit strategy.)

lol? Snake's utilt is kind of like a right triangle, it's range isn't as good higher up. DAC isn't really much of a counter for anything, since Link can zair with a bomb in hand, plus if you miss (i.e. you think Link is going to throw the bomb, but he doesn't) then Snake just left himself open for a free hit.

A legit Link player would outcamp Snake with arrows and boomerang, sparingly using Bomb and only using z-air if Snake got too close or if Link was trying to approach. This isn't to say Snake won't perfect shield it either. Pulling out a grenade-->shield-->OoS option can counter a z-air approach and giving him a nade to boot.

Zair is good against grenades since it explodes the grenade on Snake's shield (but misses Link), giving him extra hitstun and less grenades.

You sound like a Link fan or are simply over-estimating Link/under-estimating Snake. Good job, you can SDI out of the third jab though?

It's not really SDI as much as it is holding the analog stick. lol

I whole-heartedly agree that Link has improved and Snake has been hurt in this version. But Snake can and will eventually pressure you off stage (yes I've considered DI, Link's DI is amazing and his vertical survivability is amazing, but it will happen) and him spamming mortars and edge-guarding won't help Link's already bad recovery.

Just roll onto the stage, lol. Nobody expects it. X3

 

[Rykoshet]

Ganon's jab singlehandedly keeps him below zelda, who is still within the bottom 4 characters in B or Vbrawl.

 

[Mit]

I think a lot of the consistent down-talk towards certain characters should be brought up briefly and then dropped. I'm tired of reading "this character sucks and can't get better" over and over again. Why? Because this mod just came out, and because people are taking these characters that suck so bad apparently, and ****** with them. AA has said plenty of people are doing fine with Ganon, and I believe him. I've been playing around with him a loooot in the large amount of friendlies (ahem, offline friendlies, to all the people talking crap that barely play offline), and he is not that bad. It feels like it sometimes. But I've had 96% on a stock compared to my opponent's 0%, and proceeded within a few seconds to rally him up to an equal amount of damage and kill him. Ganon has to land like, 3-4 hits before hitting you with a very strong move and you're dead. And he can hit you. No one is completely unable to be hit in Brawl. Getting punished for hitting shields, getting camped, whatever, it doesn't matter. Because Brawl is a game where it's perfectly possible to constantly dodge and punish. Bait and punish. Play safe. Change it up. There isn't some consistent formula that's going to determine a match every time.

I will, however, say that Samus can **** pretty hard against heavyweight characters with poor range >_> I'm sure her matchups against them have always been pretty good.

Anyways, I think BBrawl's doing fine, and I think this current build is great. I really hope it starts popping up more in smash scenes across the globe, and tournaments start popping up. I'd love to play in a BBrawl tournament. I'd love the increased variety. BBrawl adds so much depth to the game. Before tourneys were mostly about being able to play certain matchups well (ie: against all the high tier characters), or being able to develop unbeatable strategies for your top tier character (the same two characters who win every tournament). Now you have to learn many more matchups against characters you'd never expect to see in a tournament, and be prepared to fight in new stages as well.


I still don't think I've played enough to provide much valuable feedback, however. I'm sure I've played more than most of the people in this thread (I've easily logged over 20 hours of offline friendlies in 1.0 already), but I don't consider that enough time to give a more accurate judgment of certain characters and matchups, especially with how developed vBrawl is. BBrawl should similarly have a ton of new metagame to discover, especially across a lot of characters who weren't that heavily focused on before. I haven't, however, come across any unbeatable matchups, and have never felt a matchup was highly in my opponent's favor. If a match goes really bad, it's probably because I'm trying new characters and am not very good with them at all yet.

So I say bravo. I don't think there are going to be too many major changes come 6 months when we're looking at a new release of BBrawl.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I think it's silly to underestimate a character's abilities. Ganon's Side-B isn't even hard to land. -.- It's a lot easier than, say, IC's grabs.

The IC grabs in high level play are about as easy to land, if not easier to land than Ganondorf's Flame Choke. The Ice Climbers have semi-existent setups into them on a neutral position opponent, and then there is the occasional shieldgrab.

That's not very humanely possible... -.-

It's very humanly possible to not get grabbed by Ganondorf's Flame Choke. It comes out slower than a lot of smash attacks.

You can't always play on reaction. The instant you input a button, your reaction time goes down. Reaction really only matters when you're sitting there waiting for the choke, which is basically completely unpractical.

Why are you even trying to bother saying reaction doesn't matter? The point is if Ganondorf's opponent doesn't screw up, he's screwed. There is no arguing against this, and this is why Ganondorf fundamentally sucks. He has to play on people making stupid mistakes.

Why? lol

It takes a lot to get me pissed off, but I'm sorry, I am wondering if you have a brain. In competitive play, the goal is to always abuse the best option against your opponent. Ganondorf's best options are all very punishable if the opponent blocks them or spotdodges them.

So... much... theorycraft... so... vague... *_*

You really don't have a brain...the arguments that have been stated are very precise and to the point. Ganondorf sucks because he can't do anything reliable to people who shield as he starts up attacks. Yes, Flame Choke can grab people out of shield, but people can spotdodge that on reaction very easily since it comes out slower than most smashes.

Ganondorf has no consistent way of doing anything to a defensive opponent. He has to bait his opponent to get stuff done, and quite frankly, he's one of the worst characters in this game at baiting due to his lag and low speed on most stuff.

I'm one of the better Ganondorf users here keep in mind. I know more about this character than most of you and I've actually tried to use him competitively. Even with the BBrawl buffs, he still has his crippling weakness that makes him terrible. Nothing has changed to make him a safer character on stage.

 

[Mit]

blah Ganondorf sucks blah

I'm not going to dwell on this long, but you really seem to believe in high level play that if an opponent plays safely, it's impossible for Ganon to hit him, unless he messes up.

Since when do you have to mess up to have your move predicted? Since when do you have to mess up to fall victim to a mindgame? These are two of the most major components to landing hits in Brawl, and Ganondorf's opponents are no less susceptible to them than he is.

"If Ganondorf hits a shield he's toast". Why is Ganondorf hitting a shield? Are we automatically assuming that when a Ganondorf player plays all he does is mess up and hit shields and get spot dodged? Sounds like someone needs to play a better Ganondorf, or get better at him themself. Ganondorf mains know the consequences of messing up. They know what happens when they hit a shield or their opponent is able to spotdodge their attack. That doesn't mean they keep doing it anyways.

Just wait and see what happens with Ganondorf in the future. It's really too early to just rule him out like this because of initial impressions.

 

[18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11]

The IC grabs in high level play are about as easy to land, if not easier to land than Ganondorf's Flame Choke. The Ice Climbers have semi-existent setups into them on a neutral position opponent, and then there is the occasional shieldgrab.

Ganon's Flame Choke has like 100x the range, and it also has setups - dtilt, uair sourspot, dthrow, etc.

It's very humanly possible to not get grabbed by Ganondorf's Flame Choke. It comes out slower than a lot of smash attacks.

Keyword: never.

Why are you even trying to bother saying reaction doesn't matter? The point is if Ganondorf's opponent doesn't screw up, he's screwed. There is no arguing against this, and this is why Ganondorf fundamentally sucks. He has to play on people making stupid mistakes.

SSBB is more based on prediction than it is on reaction. There are way too many things that are very difficult to react to, and the choke is one of them, provided that you're not waiting for it i.e. predicting it. Also, to say "doesn't screw up" is a contradiction to human nature. >_>

It takes a lot to get me pissed off, but I'm sorry, I am wondering if you have a brain. In competitive play, the goal is to always abuse the best option against your opponent. Ganondorf's best options are all very punishable if the opponent blocks them or spotdodges them.

"The OoS option can be countered, and so can the roll (Wizards Foot.) But it won't be countered by his side+b, which is the move that leads to most of the significant damage Ganon can land."
I'm just wondering why his side-b is singled out as something that can't punish.

You really don't have a brain...the arguments that have been stated are very precise and too the point. Ganondorf sucks because he can't do anything reliable to people who shield as he starts up attacks. Yes, Flame Choke can grab people out of shield, but people can spotdodge that on reaction very easily since it comes out slower than most smashes.

The only way someone can shield just as a character is starting up the attack is if that attack is predicted. And in that case this would apply to every character not named Ganondorf. -.-
I'm not saying that Ganondorf should approach with the choke (as is what you appear to assume I am saying), all I'm saying is contrary to what appears to be common belief, it's not impossible to land hits as Ganondorf, even at top levels (lol).

Ganondorf has no consistent way of doing anything to a defensive opponent. He has to bait his opponent to get stuff done, and quite frankly, he's one of the worst characters in this game at baiting due to his lag and low speed on most stuff.

lol, this is Brawl, no character has a consistent way of doing anything to any defensive character. Some of Ganondorf's aerials autocancel, his usmash has ridiculous IASA frames, and his tilts (not utilt XD) aren't particularly slow, so I don't see where lag/low speed really factors in, unless he's being juggled (even then, he has down-b for a surprise hit).

 

[Big O]

Anyone here want some BBrawl wifi matches? I'm sure it would be more fun (and probably more productive) than arguing.

 

[A2ZOMG]

I'm not going to dwell on this long, but you really seem to believe in high level play that if an opponent plays safely, it's impossible for Ganon to hit him, unless he messes up.

It's not that it's impossible to hit your opponent. It's that you get punished waaaaaaaay more for doing stuff than the other way around. Ganondorf isn't the only character who can shieldcamp, and he actually has trouble doing that since his grab range sucks and because many of his hitboxes are situational.

Since when do you have to mess up to have your move predicted? Since when do you have to mess up to fall victim to a mindgame? These are two of the most major components to landing hits in Brawl, and Ganondorf's opponents are no less susceptible to them than he is.

In case you forgot, there are these things called safe attacks that can be thrown out and then linked to another defensive technique. For example, Ganondorf literally has no real way of punishing G&W on reaction if G&W just decides to randomly run towards him with Up-smash, and then run away after the Up-smash ends. Sure, you can argue he could try to predict it, but the window to punish it is very small, and the risk is huge due to the insane strength of G&W's Up-smash. And to further make this more troublesome for Ganondorf, G&W could counterpredict and throw out D-tilts or F-airs/B-airs to shut down whatever Ganondorf originally wanted to use to punish Up-smash.

That's a more obvious example, but for other characters, usually they have some way of comboing Ganondorf after he whiffs on them.

I should emphasize, the baiting game is usually not in Ganondorf's favor. He has good range, but his priority isn't spectacular, and his mobility and attack startup/ending lag is not impressive at all. If you're going to try to factor in prediction, Ganondorf loses here too in covering options with prediction.

"If Ganondorf hits a shield he's toast". Why is Ganondorf hitting a shield? Are we automatically assuming that when a Ganondorf player plays all he does is mess up and hit shields and get spot dodged? Sounds like someone needs to play a better Ganondorf, or get better at him themself. Ganondorf mains know the consequences of messing up. They know what happens when they hit a shield or their opponent is able to spotdodge their attack. That doesn't mean they keep doing it anyways.

This wouldn't be so much a problem except for the fact that many characters have at least one move that is consistently safe on block when used correctly, meaning Ganondorf is a lot more susceptible to shield pressure than the other way around. Furthermore, let me remind you that Ganondorf's attack speed is rather low. There is such thing as blocking on reaction.

Just wait and see what happens with Ganondorf in the future. It's really too early to just rule him out like this because of initial impressions.

I totally wish that I was wrong about my analysis of Ganondorf, but ever since Captain Falcon's reward became existent in the transition of BBrawl, pretty much Ganondorfhas fallen behind as the one character in this game who doesn't have any real way of mixing up on shield that can't be punished by a smart player.

Everyone in BBrawl now can get great reward on their movepool. The question is how safely they can do it.

Oh I lied, Ganondorf has one attack that is safe on block. Up-smash. Good luck landing that every time you need to pressure shields.

The only reason I'm being so hard on Ganondorf is for the same reason SaltyKracka is too. We both want Ganondorf to be a better character.

 

[Lokee]

18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11 and Mit have very valid points on Ganon. Fundamentally there is no "Worst" character as of yet (or ever) only mildly disadvantaged characters and Ganondorf is certainly not one of them.

 

[NO-IDea]

@18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11

ICs grabs have far better rewards than Ganon's side+b if you can do the infinite consistently. Ganon, on the other hand, can't tech chase consistently. Nor can he land it easily. It is very possible to avoid the choke hold if you shape your playstyle to avoid it. Which you should change your playstyle anyway to each character match-up. I don't know who you're playing, but even the best Ganons will land maybe 4-5 of these a match (not including side+b used in tech chase, just individual landings). If you could ensure you would land the tech chase each of those 4-5 times, then fine. But you can't.

(If you have videos exemplifying Ganondorf being able to land side+b more than what I said, please post them so I can laugh at the clear tells of when the Ganon goes for it. Or the clear mistakes the player made that allowed it to occur. Seriously, no reason it should land that much.)

As far as theorycrafting, spacing and zoning is not theorycraft. Nor is playing smart. Honestly, start playing to win and stop spouting that this is theory. Spacing requires practice and knowing your character's hitboxes. Some characters can approach well, some are better off camping or playing defensively. All three of these styles crush Ganon. If Ganon could side+b OoS well, it'd be different. But he can't, and it's not hard to buffer a side-dodge upon landing an aerial on his shield. Nor is it hard to play the waiting game, knowing that Ganon has very little options in approaching you. That's hardly unpractical.

Overall, Ganondorf is high risk, high reward. He's too inconsistent to even claim he's better than even the mid tier of balanced brawl. This does not mean he's unplayable however. The difference in tiers has decreased dramatically in this version. But don't try claiming he has good match-ups. At best it's 50-50.

And concerning the Link vs. Snake match-up... you have to reach the edge before you roll back on. lol

And I've already said Link can outcamp Snake (not the way you described it, you're not going to outcamp anyone spamming bombs.) Z-air is good, but even then, I've never seen a great Link beat a good Snake outright. Not even concerning the great Snakes that exist. There's a small advantage in Snake's favor in vBrawl, so I'd say it's probably even at most here. I could see a tinge of favor towards Link, but I'd have to see it to believe it.

Let me see results of Link being victorious over Snake and I'll change my mind. Otherwise, you're just theorycrafting now. =P

 

[NO-IDea]

(sorry if this is a double post)

One more thing I'd like to mention. I emphasize a lot on Ganon's side+b mostly because most of his other moves you won't land. Perhaps jab every once in a while (which the jab is horrendous still) but you won't land smashes without side+b, down+b can be punished, and f-air has horrible start-up lag.

The only matches I've seen Ganon do well were those of which he tech chased well. Meaning he landed the side+b too. And while I continue to say tech chasing is inconsistent (even if you're pro at mind reading,) I also say that in those matches, clear mistakes were made in allowing the side+b to land.

 

[A2ZOMG]

Ganondorf's SideB seriously needs Super Armor frames on startup or something. At least that would let you be aggressive to some extent.

Not forgetting though that Ganondorf in general needs something not named U-smash that is safe on block (B-air doesn't count, it doesn't even hit most grounded characters).

 

[JOE!]

@NO-Idea

Arrows > Snake's recovery

Link may have a bad recovery, but who has the better gimping ability in this matchup?

 

[A2ZOMG]

Not to kill the hype for Link, but Link can only land Arrows on Snake's recovery if they're charged enough, and if Snake recovers low enough.

 

[18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11]

@18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11

ICs grabs have far better rewards than Ganon's side+b if you can do the infinite consistently. Ganon, on the other hand, can't tech chase consistently. Nor can he land it easily. It is very possible to avoid the choke hold if you shape your playstyle to avoid it. Which you should change your playstyle anyway to each character match-up. I don't know who you're playing, but even the best Ganons will land maybe 4-5 of these a match (not including side+b used in tech chase, just individual landings). If you could ensure you would land the tech chase each of those 4-5 times, then fine. But you can't.

That's true, and I never denied it. You just make it sound like the choke is impossible to land. lol 4-5 times is a lot btw, considering how hard ganon hits.

(If you have videos exemplifying Ganondorf being able to land side+b more than what I said, please post them so I can laugh at the clear tells of when the Ganon goes for it. Or the clear mistakes the player made that allowed it to occur. Seriously, no reason it should land that much.)

Nope, I agree.

As far as theorycrafting, spacing and zoning is not theorycraft. Nor is playing smart. Honestly, start playing to win and stop spouting that this is theory. Spacing requires practice and knowing your character's hitboxes. Some characters can approach well, some are better off camping or playing defensively. All three of these styles crush Ganon. If Ganon could side+b OoS well, it'd be different. But he can't, and it's not hard to buffer a side-dodge upon landing an aerial on his shield. Nor is it hard to play the waiting game, knowing that Ganon has very little options in approaching you. That's hardly unpractical.

Uh, I do play to win. >_> Anyways, it's not like Ganon has an impossible time countering approaches (Uair, Usmash against aerial approaches, Dtilt, Usmash, Pivot Choke/Pivot grab against grounded approaches), or a significantly harder time finding openings in defensive/camping (Shield/AD and iDA work well here) play comparative to the rest of the cast.

Overall, Ganondorf is high risk, high reward. He's too inconsistent to even claim he's better than even the mid tier of balanced brawl. This does not mean he's unplayable however. The difference in tiers has decreased dramatically in this version. But don't try claiming he has good match-ups. At best it's 50-50.

How is he inconsistent?

And concerning the Link vs. Snake match-up... you have to reach the edge before you roll back on. lol

Spin attack cuts through mortars, so getting back on isn't a problem... Air dodge - tether basically counters Snake's attempts to jump out and hit hit Link further out with an aerial (and it reverses the ledge position to Link's advantage)... Snake just isn't very proficient at gimping Link. lol

And I've already said Link can outcamp Snake (not the way you described it, you're not going to outcamp anyone spamming bombs.) Z-air is good, but even then, I've never seen a great Link beat a good Snake outright. Not even concerning the great Snakes that exist. There's a small advantage in Snake's favor in vBrawl, so I'd say it's probably even at most here. I could see a tinge of favor towards Link, but I'd have to see it to believe it.

Let me see results of Link being victorious over Snake and I'll change my mind. Otherwise, you're just theorycrafting now. =P

I'll update shortly with vids. :3

 

[NO-IDea]

I will, however, say that Samus can **** pretty hard against heavyweight characters with poor range >_> I'm sure her matchups against them have always been pretty good.

So true. I can honestly say that match-ups against DK and Bowser were always either for Samus or even (in DK's case) back in vBrawl.

Now in Balanced Brawl, DK and Bowser are both disadvantaged (not severely of course) as well as D3 with no chain grab on her (D3 can still tech chase, but it's much better than what the match-up used to be with chain grabbing across the stage, or worst, standing chain grabs.) Even Snake has to fear Samus now. I can definitely see it going 50-50 or even in Samus's favor for both of those match-ups.

Samus still beats Link (Samus could always outcamp Link, arrows do nothing to change the resourcefulness of her z-air in this match-up.) And I can't think of any other heavyweights right now.

Samus is the heavy-weight killer of Balanced Brawl IMO. (I'm slightly biased, but I can provide facts for my beliefs! XD)

 

[JOE!]

It is stage dependant A2, its not liek its allways Final D

 

[Steeler]

pokemon trainer is the best character in the world

 

[A2ZOMG]

I was aware of that JOE!, it's just that your arrow has to be charged/fresh enough so that it does greater than 7%, otherwise it's not knocking Snake off his Cypher.

 

[NO-IDea]

Ganon is inconsistent because tech chasing is inconsistent. You will not always guess correctly. The showcase, like I said earlier, was an extreme example of how rewarding tech chasing from side+b can be. Which is good, since the showcase was to highlight the buffs of Ganondorf.

And if you do play to win, you will agree that knowing Ganondorf's explosive follow-ups from side+b, you will never ever play recklessly or even give the slightest chance of falling into that. Simply minimizing the chance of it landing, stacked the the chances of Ganon guessing correctly for the tech chase makes that character inconsistent! It's not theorycraft! It's common sense! XD

For the Snake vs. Link off stage thing... I mean mortars--> edge hog. Meaning Link's only chance of survival are bomb to open the ledge or recovering onto the stage... so Snake can get back on and b-throw you off again (because of landing lag on Link's up+b). lol

No character has to be proficient at gimping to gimp Link. They just have to find a way to knock him off stage without sending him flying high. Link gimping Snake is extremely situational compared to Snake gimping Link.

Again, you will find yourself off the stage and crying as you hope to get back on. XD

With all this said, again I will say the match-up is only slightly in Snake's favor or even. I don't think Link has an advantage (until proof is shown otherwise)

 

[Linkshot]

I should emphasize, the baiting game is usually not in Ganondorf's favor.

That's why the Fishing Rod makes Ganondorf do that!

 

[SaltyKracka]

I haven't, however, come across any unbeatable matchups, and have never felt a matchup was highly in my opponent's favor.

Then shall I provide you with some?

MK vs. Ness
Ganondorf vs. MK
Ganondorf vs. DDD
Ganondorf vs. Falco
Ganondorf vs. ROB
Ganondorf vs. Olimar
Ganondorf vs. Samus

 

[A2ZOMG]

Salty, I'm just going to say, Ganondorf vs DDD is fine in BBrawl. King DDD has no safe tactics besides shieldcamping (still annoying to deal with, but he doesn't have too many attacks he can throw out safely unless they are spaced at maximum range), and it takes forever for him to kill anything without a lucky edgeguard or smash. And without his chaingrab, he's much less threatening.

Up-Bing his recovery is probably well worth it in that matchup.

 

[18.15.2.15x12.9.14.11]

Ganon is inconsistent because tech chasing is inconsistent. You will not always guess correctly. The showcase, like I said earlier, was an extreme example of how rewarding tech chasing from side+b can be. Which is good, since the showcase was to highlight the buffs of Ganondorf.

And if you do play to win, you will agree that knowing Ganondorf's explosive follow-ups from side+b, you will never ever play recklessly or even give the slightest chance of falling into that. Simply minimizing the chance of it landing, stacked the the chances of Ganon guessing correctly for the tech chase makes that character inconsistent! It's not theorycraft! It's common sense! XD

I don't think anyone expects to 0-death anyone from a single side-b, that's why it's so amazing if it happens. If anything, the 0-death would be the inconsistency. XD

For the Snake vs. Link off stage thing... I mean mortars--> edge hog. Meaning Link's only chance of survival are bomb to open the ledge or recovering onto the stage... so Snake can get back on and b-throw you off again (because of landing lag on Link's up+b). lol

No character has to be proficient at gimping to gimp Link. They just have to find a way to knock him off stage without sending him flying high. Link gimping Snake is extremely situational compared to Snake gimping Link.

Again, you will find yourself off the stage and crying as you hope to get back on. XD

With all this said, again I will say the match-up is only slightly in Snake's favor or even. I don't think Link has an advantage (until proof is shown otherwise)

This doesn't work because Link can use his spin attack at any time below the ledge, similar to how marth can dolphin slash extremely near the edge or a lot lower. Granted, Link can't DB to stall, and his recovery isn't as fast, but it's not very effective nonetheless. This means that if you grab the ledge to early, Link can wait out your invincibility and recover, and if you grab the ledge too late, Link will already be there. There's no perfect time to grab the edge. And even if Snake bthrows, Link can DI up at higher percentages so that he won't even need to spin attack to grab the ledge next time. Also, when Link overshoots the ledge, if Link predicts Snake's return to the stage, Link can opt for the ledgegrab anyways to avoid the bthrow (though it's rather risky). >_>

Anyways, here are the videos I dug up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBB17IKozTY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8jHCKPyOGE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HmCRl4AfV70&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aglJFyCMjSk&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiPaUGP2EDc&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACaWvNoCjj4&feature=related

Not to kill the hype for Link, but Link can only land Arrows on Snake's recovery if they're charged enough, and if Snake recovers low enough.

lolarrows

 

[SaltyKracka]

One notes that shieldcamping is one of the things in Brawl that absolutely derails Ganondorf. As well, much of DDD's playstyle involves edgeguarding and gimping, and he can still do it to Ganondorf very easily, almost as easily as he can just WoP him into the blastzone. While I agree that his lack of a chaingrab makes him much less threatening, as far as I'm concerned, the only real effect that has on the MU is that it will take much longer for DDD to get Ganon into kill range, assuming he's trying to KO at all, and not just stalling.

And yes, while Raeping him out of his recovery might be worth it, it still won't work as a very good edgeguard tactic.

EDIT: Randomnumbersguy, I have two things to say about those vids. First, the simple fact that they're all Japanese indicates to me that no real high-level American Snakes have been losing to Links. Also, the Snakes in those videos are obviously not as skilled as the Links are.

 

[A2ZOMG]

One notes that shieldcamping is one of the things in Brawl that absolutely derails Ganondorf. As well, much of DDD's playstyle involves edgeguarding and gimping, and he can still do it to Ganondorf very easily, almost as easily as he can just WoP him into the blastzone. While I agree that his lack of a chaingrab makes him much less threatening, as far as I'm concerned, the only real effect that has on the MU is that it will take much longer for DDD to get Ganon into kill range, assuming he's trying to KO at all, and not just stalling.

And yes, while Raeping him out of his recovery might be worth it, it still won't work as a very good edgeguard tactic.

EDIT: Randomnumbersguy, I have two things to say about those vids. First, the simple fact that they're all Japanese indicates to me that no real high-level American Snakes have been losing to Links. Also, the Snakes in those videos are obviously not as skilled as the Links are.

Yes, fundamentally Ganondorf sucks because a basic thing like shieldcamping owns him, and because he sucks at the baiting game.

King DDD is comparatively horrible at baiting and is forced to shieldcamp in any given matchup. You can at least know that in this matchup King DDD doesn't have random offense that he can spam on you safely, so likewise if he moves and whiffs, he gets punished.

Yeah, I'm not suggesting Ganondorf wins this matchup at all. I'm just saying this is one of few matchups that got a lot better for Ganondorf.

 

[Linkshot]

Another unwinnable matchup:

Olimar VS Sonic. 100:0 Olimar's favour.

Ness VS MK is very much 50:50. Ness doesn't care about MK's priority, and can kill him very early.