Brawl - More balanced than Melee? Lie or truth?

[ShadowLink84]

It means you are a n00b and are annoying so please go away and spare what little IQ points everyone has left.


I request this topic be closed.

 

[Redson]

It means you are a n00b and are annoying so please go away and spare what little IQ points everyone has left.


I request this topic be closed.

I wouldn't say to close the thread. A lot of the people in here express great points. It may be starting a flame was among some of the lesser more intolerant individuals who insist that their opinion is the right one, but lets just say this topic has my interest.

Then again, I'm a sucker for intelligent arguement, but thats just me.

 

[RDK]

so whats your point? what are you trying to tell me? and what the heck do you mean by mind games? in battle you do have alot of situations. yeah you over think stuff abd you will make mistakes. but what does that have to do with balance. so please do clarify what it is exactly you are trying to get by.

There's more of an emphasis on mindgames and prediction in Brawl because there's close to zero technical aspects of the game.

Also, I don't mean to be rude, but nobody cares how many times you beat your friends with Marth or Link in Melee. Your friends could be the worst Smashers in the world. Unless you're actually tournament notable, your experience probably don't amount to anything.

Saying the game's more balanced because you're better at more of the characters is a ridiculous fallacy.

 

[ShadowLink84]

The issue though isn't that there is an intelligent argument, its that there is no argument here at all.
Stating that Brawl is more balanced in melee makes no sense.
Simply because in comparison to melee, Brawl is much more imbalanced.,

While the amount of viable characters has increased, the ratio of viable to non viable characters actually decreased.

Not only that but in melee, the top tier characters while having advantages against most other characters, were not hard advantages, they could still be beaten.

however in this game if a snake/mk is half as skilled as a Bowser that Snake/MK will win 100% of the time. The only time a Snake/MK would lose to any other character other than DK,ROB, Pika is if hat Snake user was much less skilled.

Where as in melee where a low tier had to work X as hard to beat a top tier.
Now they have to work 5x as hard to win.

Link could win against Marth in melee.

Now Link has a lesser chance of winning against Marth in Brawl. Simply because the gap is that much larger and because character matchups have a greater impact.

No longer can pure skill and mindgames equate to a low tier character beating a top tier character.
I've actually faced Snake who I know are less skilled than me by a good amount and I would still lose because the advantage that Snake has over the cast is just too great.
Only a handful of character can face him
only one of which is considered a possible hard counter.
the others of which most likely being soft counters that could possibly be overcome.

In Melee the only time you were guaranteed a loss, is if you faced a character who countered yours hard.
\In Brawl they don't need to use a hard counter to net an easy win.

That alone should point to something.

Not to mention the lack of hitstun/shieldstun means a low tier character can't make up for the disadvantage and exploit a mistake.
If they exploit a mistake they can net at most maybe around 30%.
Far from something like 0-70% if a Marth whiffed an Fsmash.
Nor can pressure be maintained either so again those inherent disadvantages hit harder again because any advantage gained by the low tier character is lost very quickly so they can't maintain the advantage they would need to win.

That and Snake has an *** better than Samus that should not be happening.

 

[TehBo49]

^In addition to the lack of punishment, some characters punish much better than others (chaingrabbers). Whereas normal characters can get about 20% at best, chaingrabbers can get as much as 70%.

 

[ShadowLink84]

You can say brawl dictates the tiers on something like this

A) Ability to approach
B)Ability to set up a KO
C)Ability to rack up damage via combos/strings

Some characters can KO really well (Ike and Bowser) but they have few approaches or setups for the KO.
Not can they rack up damage very easily or have a large amount of reliable strategies.

Then you have characters like Sonic who can rack up damage, approach and have good strategies but they cannot set up for a KO since its very difficult for them.

It basically breaks down to who can do what and to what extent.
Which is why MK and Snake stick out because they can do all of this with relative ease.

Meanwhile characters like Marth who can do all three can't do it to the same extent.
There is nothing like wavedashing or L canceling to speed up characters like Ike, Bowser and Ganondorf and improve their ability to punish and approach.

 

[IrArby]

so whats your point? what are you trying to tell me? and what the heck do you mean by mind games? in battle you do have alot of situations. yeah you over think stuff abd you will make mistakes. but what does that have to do with balance. so please do clarify what it is exactly you are trying to get by.

My point for those who cannot put two and two together, Mindgames are made possible by Dashdancing, WDashing, Dash canceling, etc and when used in tandem with smart play they let Taj, Gimpy, Azen, etc along with the other ATs win against high tiers with lower tiers.

People keep saying that Brawl focuses on mindgames. I don't see how. Camping is not a mindgame nor is ridiculous priority or invisible hitboxes. Someone please explain how Brawl has any potent mindgames or I'll just conclude that Brawl's lack of them is yet another thing that stops Low tiers from being tournament viable.

Oh yea the breakdown for Bomber7;4804715: Mindgames lets Low Tier play gooder against Higher Tiers. When Low tiers are competitive with the higher tiers the game are more balance.

 

[Fawriel]

You can say brawl dictates the tiers on something like this

A) Ability to approach
B)Ability to set up a KO
C)Ability to rack up damage via combos/strings

Some characters can KO really well (Ike and Bowser) but they have few approaches or setups for the KO.
Not can they rack up damage very easily or have a large amount of reliable strategies.

Then you have characters like Sonic who can rack up damage, approach and have good strategies but they cannot set up for a KO since its very difficult for them.

It basically breaks down to who can do what and to what extent.
WHhch is why MK and SNake stick out because they can do all of this with relative ease.

Meanwhile characters like Marth who can do all three can't do it to the same extent.
There is nothing like wavedashing or L canceling to speed up characters like Ike, Bowser and Ganondorf and improve their ability to punish and approach.

Don't forget the ability to survive. Link is a pretty okay character, except that he's one of the handful who can still easily be edgeguarded in a game where edgeguarding can barely be considered a viable option anymore.

gooder

Added to the tags.

 

[SamuraiPanda]

Snake/MK are very beatable characters. The fact that you cant beat them only means that you are too inexperienced in playing against them. It took awhile, but its evident that they aren't overpowering to the point of being in a tier above everyone else. For example, if you take a look at the midwest, you'll see very few (if any) tournaments have had Snake/MK coming out on top. We usually have Pikachu (Anther), G&W (NoJ), or ROB (Overswarm), among others, who consistently place high and win tournaments. Sometimes we'll only have one Snake or MK present in the top 8, if at all.

Snake and MK are not an excuse for claiming Brawl to be unbalanced. Doing so makes you look bad at the game.

 

[ShadowLink84]

Snake/MK are very beatable characters. The fact that you cant beat them only means that you are too inexperienced in playing against them. It took awhile, but its evident that they aren't overpowering to the point of being in a tier above everyone else.
For example, if you take a look at the midwest, you'll see very few (if any) tournaments have had Snake/MK coming out on top. We usually have Pikachu (Anther), G&W (NoJ), or ROB (Overswarm), among others, who consistently place high and win tournaments. Sometimes we'll only have one Snake or MK present in the top 8, if at all.

Snake and MK are not an excuse for claiming Brawl to be unbalanced. Doing so makes you look bad at the game.

Of course they aren't in a tier above everyone else nor are they unbeatable.
I have beaten Snake and MK's with my Sonic.
The issue isn't the fact that they are too good or that they are unbeatable, its the fact that because of the way brawl is made, the advantage that they have over characters is that much stronger.
Yeah Snake and MK have their weaknesses, but how many characters can actually exploit the weaknesses? How many can exploit those weaknesses well?

The people that you mentioned as well as the characters they used have all been mentioned to due well against Snake.
Does this not point out toards a greater imblance?

While Link in melee wasn't prone to to win a tournament it could still occur, he would still be capable of beating out a Marth, Fox, Falco or other characters above him to net 1st place.

Yet in Brawl you have the character so you mentioned, Pikachu, G&W, ROB, character who can do well against Snake.

Snake and MK aren't the excuse for Brawl being imbalanced.
however they are among the best examples, simply because in comparison to melee, these characters just do that much better than the top tier characters in melee did.

They aren't better, but their performance in comparison to the others is greater than the others and the rankings reflect that and probably will always show them netting the most wins.

As I mentioned earlier how a Link can beat a Fox and Marth in melee.

if Link faced a Marth, good projectile usage as the key in winning the battle as well as knowing how and when to apply pressure as well as maintaining the location of where they were fighting on stage.

The only character in the top tiers that could be said to shut him out was Sheik.

However if you look at Brawl if Link faces off against a Marth this no longer can occur. The inherent disadvantages Link has against Marth are more difficult to overcome.

This is not to say that Link cannot win the match up but he has to work much harder than he did in melee.

Snake doesn't have many disadvantaged matchups, the matchups aren't the main issue either. Fox, Marth, Sheik didn't ahve many disadvantaged matchups either.

However it is the strength of those matchups that are the reason for complaints not the lack of disadvantaged matchups.
If they have an advantage, those advantages are stronger.
The advantages that Marth had over Link weren't as powerful.They didn't influence the matchup as greatly.


Not only that but i mentioned how the overall game of Brawl has created a greater imbalance.
in Melee you had AT's that were universal, while they did make the top tier character better, they are also what helped make the middle tier, low tier characters viable characters.
Ganondorf could move more quickly, punish more powerfully, approach better.

However in Brawl you don't have anything to help these characters. Many of the exploits are character specific.
Ganondorf can't spinshot through the air.
Link cannot glide toss at all.

What universal AT's we do have are limited and while they do help (autocanceling for example) the effects of those AT's are not as effective as they need to be. None of the AT's are as influential as Dashdancing and L canceling nor as useful.

No one is saying that Snake and MK are the reason of imbalance.

The fact that the tier gaps are greater is another reason.
From bottom to top is just that much greater.
In melee yeah the gap was big but in brawl its greater.

Lack of hitstun means less combos, less punishment.
Any advantage gained during the match doesn't last long.
If Fox whiffed the Fsmash against Link in melee, boom that was 70%, it made up for his disadvantage.
You just don't have that in Brawl.
If Fox whiffs an Fsmash Lik cannot do much to Fox that would go beyond he 30% mark.

Zair~Bomb~slightly charged Usmash
Thats really it.

Its sort of like a tug of war match.
I am Link you are Fox.

You have the advantage and start off with me being closer to the hole.
in melee I could give one massive pull and educe that advantage so that things are evened out and I could still win.

In Brawl I am Link and you are The Zohan.
Even if I give one massive pull it doesn't even out things. If anything it only pull you forward a bit at which point you just keep pulling me closer to the hole.
Nor can I maintain that little advantage I worked so hard to obtain.

Any advantge gained during hte match does not last long, its lasts even shorter if you are at a natural disadvantage.
if I face off against Marth as Link and he gained the advantage, I had a good chance of gettin knocked off the stag and edge guarded.
If I gain the advantage he suffers some damage maybe gets hit off the stage but I would have little method of maintaining that advantage.

Granted this was true in melee but not to such a great extent as it is in Brawl.

 

[Nigerian Star Storm]

Snake/MK are very beatable characters. The fact that you cant beat them only means that you are too inexperienced in playing against them. It took awhile, but its evident that they aren't overpowering to the point of being in a tier above everyone else. For example, if you take a look at the midwest, you'll see very few (if any) tournaments have had Snake/MK coming out on top. We usually have Pikachu (Anther), G&W (NoJ), or ROB (Overswarm), among others, who consistently place high and win tournaments. Sometimes we'll only have one Snake or MK present in the top 8, if at all.

Snake and MK are not an excuse for claiming Brawl to be unbalanced. Doing so makes you look bad at the game.

?Now if only other regions could catch on to this. I'm looking at you NE and MD/VA (And maybe Cali)

 

[SamuraiPanda]

Sorry, but I don't have the time to respond to much of your post. It was quite long. But I want to address one specific issue that seems to be the central point to your argument (well, the part of your argument relavant to the topic at hand): Bad matchups.

I was talking to Dope the other day while playing with him, and he said something interesting that I mostly agree with. He said, "I don't believe in matchups." Meaning, he doesn't believe that certain characters innately have a disadvantage against other characters. However, there ARE bad matchups between playstyles. For example, my Snake was able to beat a very good ROB in the last tournament I went to. He told me that he's never lost to a Snake before. How did I beat him? My Snake is rather unusual, and I have a unique playstyle with him. Apparently, my playstyle was able to best his ROB, despite ROB supposedly being the most hard "counter" to Snake. However, when I play against Overswarm's ROB, I get my *** handed to me. Another example is when I play against Anther. Anther (sux, btw) says that Pikachu has a hard matchup against Snake, but many other people say that Pikachu destroys Snake. Anther also often points out to me that Cort also says that Snake is good against Pikachu. Personally, I've tried many times to best Anther's Pikachu but I've found that task to be ridiculously difficult if Anther isn't sandbagging. And I've recently realized that its not just Anther's Pikachu that I have trouble with. My specific playstyle with Snake makes fighting Pikachu, in general, to be extremely difficult.

Here is yet another example. I'm currently enjoying Kirby thoroughly, and I've used him in many friendlies recently. I've been able to beat Snakes with my Kirby. Snakes that are actually pretty good. Yet I go into the Kirby matchup topic and see that they gave Snake something like a 70-30 advantage over Kirby. Do I think thats true? Absolutely not.

In the same example you gave about Link vs Marth, you point to the exact same thing. Depending on your playstyle, how you adapt to the opponent's character, and how you handle the advantages of the opponent's character, you can do well even in matchups that most people consider to be quite bad. You need to change your mindset when it comes to this game, because you seem to think that _____ vs _____ is set in stone between players of equal skill, when in reality this isn't true at all. I used to think the same way. But now, I've realized that no matchup is truly unwinnable. Its just that the most common playstyle of, say, Pikachu is able to best the most common playstyle of Snake. But there are always exceptions to that rule, especially between good players.


Also, Snake/MK have very few unqiue ATs. ATs do not factor into the greater "imbalance" of the game. Pit has like 20 ATs. He is far from being the best in the game. And the rest of your post was actually quite irrelevant to the topic at hand, IMO.

 

[Bomber7]

My point for those who cannot put two and two together, Mindgames are made possible by Dashdancing, WDashing, Dash canceling, etc and when used in tandem with smart play they let Taj, Gimpy, Azen, etc along with the other ATs win against high tiers with lower tiers.

People keep saying that Brawl focuses on mindgames. I don't see how. Camping is not a mindgame nor is ridiculous priority or invisible hitboxes. Someone please explain how Brawl has any potent mindgames or I'll just conclude that Brawl's lack of them is yet another thing that stops Low tiers from being tournament viable.

Oh yea the breakdown for Bomber7;4804715: Mindgames lets Low Tier play gooder against Higher Tiers. When Low tiers are competitive with the higher tiers the game are more balance.

Thank you for that explaination.

 

[Bomber7]

It means you are a n00b and are annoying so please go away and spare what little IQ points everyone has left.


I request this topic be closed.

If you request this subject be removed, then why must insist on taking part in it? Let us debate here. as Redson said; many people are bringing up good points. Besides I am interested to see the outcome of this debate.

 

[IrArby]

For the record Fawriel the "gooder" you so quoted was not a typo it was a subtle insult to the guy I was talking to which is why I used dumbed-down language like "gooder". I will not be made fun of again for not being able to spell and other such typos.

 

[Redson]

Sorry, but I don't have the time to respond to much of your post. It was quite long. But I want to address one specific issue that seems to be the central point to your argument (well, the part of your argument relavant to the topic at hand): Bad matchups.

I was talking to Dope the other day while playing with him, and he said something interesting that I mostly agree with. He said, "I don't believe in matchups." Meaning, he doesn't believe that certain characters innately have a disadvantage against other characters. However, there ARE bad matchups between playstyles. For example, my Snake was able to beat a very good ROB in the last tournament I went to. He told me that he's never lost to a Snake before. How did I beat him? My Snake is rather unusual, and I have a unique playstyle with him. Apparently, my playstyle was able to best his ROB, despite ROB supposedly being the most hard "counter" to Snake. However, when I play against Overswarm's ROB, I get my *** handed to me. Another example is when I play against Anther. Anther (sux, btw) says that Pikachu has a hard matchup against Snake, but many other people say that Pikachu destroys Snake. Anther also often points out to me that Cort also says that Snake is good against Pikachu. Personally, I've tried many times to best Anther's Pikachu but I've found that task to be ridiculously difficult if Anther isn't sandbagging. And I've recently realized that its not just Anther's Pikachu that I have trouble with. My specific playstyle with Snake makes fighting Pikachu, in general, to be extremely difficult.

Here is yet another example. I'm currently enjoying Kirby thoroughly, and I've used him in many friendlies recently. I've been able to beat Snakes with my Kirby. Snakes that are actually pretty good. Yet I go into the Kirby matchup topic and see that they gave Snake something like a 70-30 advantage over Kirby. Do I think thats true? Absolutely not.

In the same example you gave about Link vs Marth, you point to the exact same thing. Depending on your playstyle, how you adapt to the opponent's character, and how you handle the advantages of the opponent's character, you can do well even in matchups that most people consider to be quite bad. You need to change your mindset when it comes to this game, because you seem to think that _____ vs _____ is set in stone between players of equal skill, when in reality this isn't true at all. I used to think the same way. But now, I've realized that no matchup is truly unwinnable. Its just that the most common playstyle of, say, Pikachu is able to best the most common playstyle of Snake. But there are always exceptions to that rule, especially between good players.


Also, Snake/MK have very few unqiue ATs. ATs do not factor into the greater "imbalance" of the game. Pit has like 20 ATs. He is far from being the best in the game. And the rest of your post was actually quite irrelevant to the topic at hand, IMO.

Words cannot describe the awesome you have just obtained.

I agree wholeheartedly with this comment.

Redson approved.

 

[Redson]

For the record Fawriel the "gooder" you so quoted was not a typo it was a subtle insult to the guy I was talking to which is why I used dumbed-down language like "gooder". I will not be made fun of again for not being able to spell and other such typos.

If you don't want people to insult you, lay off of others. I may be new here, but I'm more or less POSITIVE we don't need useless flame in the forums. Though I'm not surprised a debate such as this could spark anger, try to control yourself, as well as your flame. For all you know, that person could be a highly intelligent individual.

Which is why I find it somewhat hypocritical how you don't want to be made fun of for your mistakes, and yet you find it perfectly acceptable to insult others.

Don't we all love IRONY?

 

[MaxThunder]

i've made up my mind about this now... brawl is more balanced. the whole thing is relying on difference in the skill of the player. like playstyle, adaption to the opponents playstyle and adaption of the environment of the stage is what makes the difference between the good and the bad... not the character.

 

[Revolutionary1804]

i had to add the bomberman tag hehe. also it is true that the balance in brawl is not in the character itself but in the way you play the characters.Melee on the other hand has a more balanced cast, i guess but some of the matchups in that game are much harder to break then matchups in Brawl and the Marth vs Ness is just an exception.

 

[IrArby]

If you don't want people to insult you, lay off of others. I may be new here, but I'm more or less POSITIVE we don't need useless flame in the forums. Though I'm not surprised a debate such as this could spark anger, try to control yourself, as well as your flame. For all you know, that person could be a highly intelligent individual.

Which is why I find it somewhat hypocritical how you don't want to be made fun of for your mistakes, and yet you find it perfectly acceptable to insult others.

Don't we all love IRONY?

The real irony is I did not make a mistake. My supposed mistake was purposeful. Several other people flamed the guy and didn't bother to explain thoug I did so lay off me. He didn't even say anything about it when he responded thus my post=not very offensive flame. Also, I might add that a little flaming is good for discussion since it makes the argument more personal. At leasts that how I operate and if you don't think personal conflict makes for better competition than you shouldn't be playing Smash. Ah the irony.

SamuraiPanda: I think what you were refering to about ATs in this thread is more concerening how ATs helped to make Melee more balanced. No one in Brawl has ATs so Snake/MK don't need them, they own without them. I think thats what you were referencing but if not then disregard this paragraph.

Also, could you be more specific about what playstlye defeats you with what characters and vice versa. I don't see a lot of variance in playstyles amongst say most MK users out there so I'm a little skeptical about this playstlye>tiers argument. Granted, Matchups trump tiers as do skill(for the most part) but tiers are concerned with the characters potential at the highest levels of play. If the playstyle that somone is using is losing them matches to an inferior character that has a bad matchup against them, then its very possible that they're not using the potential of that character effectively. Either that or the lower tiered player is using his potential very effectively. Either way, playstlye would to a large extent fall under skill (not tech skill but How to Play Well skill) which as I said trumps tiers and matchups for the most part.

However, different playstyles in different matchups become part of each characters metagame over time. Melee Marth has to adapt alot depending on which characters he's versing whereas Fox would usually have to adjust less. Style becomes part of the metagame and thus part of what goes into their placement on the tier list. Therefore by my calculations Playstyle NOT > Tiers but rather Playstyle is yet another factor in making the Tiers. The ability to for character to adjust their playstyle is yet another factor.

 

[Zankoku]

Following is a whole lot of opinion, don't take it as authoritative or anything of the sort:

Brawl lacks a lot of ability to combo. You can do several low-% combos that actually make it to around 40-60%, but past that what you're doing is just winning an RPS situation. To that degree, a character's "goodness" can pretty accurately be determined by the following criteria:
How many mistakes he/she can make in a stock
How many mistakes he/she has to exploit to get a KO
How late a window of time the character has before something becomes a mistake

For example, Snake can make plenty of mistakes due to his weight and recovery; doesn't need to win as many RPS encounters to score a KO, due to his particularly high knockback power; and has a solid window of time to answer since his important attacks come out relatively quickly.
Meta Knight can make significantly fewer mistakes since he's far lighter; he also doesn't have as strictly powerful KOing capability as Snake, though he does have some attacks with very gimpy knockback trajectories; and he has a VERY late window of time before acting wrongly or not acting at all actually becomes a mistake.
Meanwhile, Captain Falcon can make only an average number of mistakes because of his only slightly above average recovery distance, and is prone to giving the opponent even more RPS points on recovery since it follows such a predictable path; he has to score a pretty decent amount of hits; but his biggest problem is that he's got such a tight window of timing that the opponent throwing off your timing will easily cause the situation to be your loss.

There can be some power changes in situational matchups (i.e. Dedede being able to infinite DK, suddenly reducing the number of mistakes the DK can make per stock a HUGe amount), but taking all those into account will give you a character's approximate spot on a tier list.

There's also Panda's little anecdote about player style matchups - this isn't a strict advantage one may have over another so much as it is a certain style simply not meshing with the other player, causing him to make a lot more mistakes as a result. If ROB is some great anti-Snake character and you're losing just because the Snake player's doing a bunch of different things and not falling for your usual traps, that's not the Snake player proving character matchups not existing, that's just repeated failure on your part to deal with all your preconceived notions about certain actions in certain situations all being wrong. Playing style winning is just a combination of being relatively unpredictable that your mistakes go unpunished (rock vs rock) while still being a solid enough style to properly accomplish the win.

Fox and Falco were in a tier of their own in Melee, yet they weren't completely dominating the environment. It works about the same way with Snake and Meta Knight; they aren't so amazing that they'll win every tournament everywhere no matter what, but they are that good to be pretty much at the top for the moment.

In the end, that's how it goes. Prediction/reaction are easily the two greatest parts of Brawl, and characters are definitely not created equal - those who need far fewer correct predictions and reactions to win, or far more incorrect ones to lose, or a combination of both, will have a pretty visible advantage over the others.

I'm sorry about breaking Brawl down into a glorified set of lots and lots of rock-paper-scissors games, but that's how I see it. Melee and a lot of fighters are the same way, except they also test your technical ability by determining how severely you're able to punish a mistake (combos), which sort of lessens imbalance - since a bunch of characters can, at some point, punish mistakes approximately equally, one criteria to determine overall power (how many mistakes you need to punish/how many RPS games you need to win) is effectively negated.

Now the rest of you have fun, because I just spent half an hour typing this instead of getting dinner and now I'm hungry.

 

[Redson]

The real irony is I did not make a mistake. My supposed mistake was purposeful. Several other people flamed the guy and didn't bother to explain thoug I did so lay off me. He didn't even say anything about it when he responded thus my post=not very offensive flame. Also, I might add that a little flaming is good for discussion since it makes the argument more personal. At leasts that how I operate and if you don't think personal conflict makes for better competition than you shouldn't be playing Smash. Ah the irony.

SamuraiPanda: I think what you were refering to about ATs in this thread is more concerening how ATs helped to make Melee more balanced. No one in Brawl has ATs so Snake/MK don't need them, they own without them. I think thats what you were referencing but if not then disregard this paragraph.

Also, could you be more specific about what playstlye defeats you with what characters and vice versa. I don't see a lot of variance in playstyles amongst say most MK users out there so I'm a little skeptical about this playstlye>tiers argument. Granted, Matchups trump tiers as do skill(for the most part) but tiers are concerned with the characters potential. If the playstyle that somone is using is losing them matches to an inferior character that has a bad matchup against them, then its very possible that they're not using the potential of that character effectively. Either that or the lower tiered player is using his potential very effectively. Either way, playstlye would to a large extent fall under skill (not tech skill but How to Play Well skill) which as I said trumps tiers and matchups for the most part.

I know you didn't make a mistake, I know it was intentional. If it was a mistake, I would have been able to respect you a bit more.

In all my years of forum community experience, I have NEVER seen a thread where flame made things better. Unless you count 4chan.

Flame NEVER helps. It just makes you look like an ***.

On a note more relavant to the thread, I agree with Samurai Panda. The skill of a player is important in any videojamagame out there. The existence of TIERS only shows what characters have the most capabilities in a tournament style situation. It's up to the players themselves to use what existing capabilities the character have, and that all is shown in their playstyle.

(Man I hope I read that post right. :\)

 

[Bomber7]

>>>to Ankoku
I see where you are getting at, to a certain extent. Though while reading your thoughts, this came to mind: we all in this thread have taken sides about is meele or brawl more balanced? I for one beleive that Brawl is more balanced. Though heres a thought that came to mind. Do people consider brawl more balanced because of the chance of winning despite the character match up as compared to the meele win-lose statistic.

Now I have to admit I have never competed in an open competition so my knowledge of how the win-loss ratio was for the whole SSB community. If someone could tell me if there was a gap(huge or small) between the top players and the bottom players. Note that this is just a thought. from my game play experience of both games it almost seems that there is a pretty decent gap betweeen the ability to win and lose depending on your character. Now for Brawl, I find it easier to win and lose even with my best meele character- Marth. Yes I can see and feel the difference in the characters I play as. I'm sure everyone has a feeling for their characters that they play as. But anyway, one again this was just something that came to mind. If anyone has something to add to this, speak up.

 

[Yuna]

Alright, maybe even Luigi but I don't think you can go any farther than that.

Luigi is above Link, though. So if you're willing to include Link, then he's the furthest down.

Maybe not catostrophic matchups but you start thinning down in good matchups the farther you go down. I am pretty sure that is how it works with most games. Roy didn't have too bad of a matchup versus fox (mainly due to chaingrab and edgeguarding). One of the things I have noticed is weighing matchups can be a difficult task at times. Obviously it is more important to have good matchups against the upper crust but you can't ignore bad matchups that the lower ends provide. Maybe something in the future that needs to be looked into more.

Obvious stuff is obvious.

I was merely pointing out how you're not automatically a High Tier character just because you might have one or two good or even matchups against the Tops if you have catastrophic ones against a lot of other characters, as in your example of if someone from Low randomly had a good matchup against Snake, they'd automatically be tourney viable. Oh no, Yoshi main, your main gets countered by 6 of my mains, secondaries, tertiaries and quarternaries while you can only muster up a 5-5 against Snake. So, no, no tourney viability for you (hypothetically speaking)!

I wish you gave me larger room to work.
Anther
Azen
KoreanDJ
Boa
Phoenix

Why do you so many top players have to play lucario? Lucario seems to get 5th or so in a lot of different people's hands though.

Umm... "Lucario generally gets, at most, 5th in the hands of some of the best players in the nation"... umm... OK. Now imagine all of those people playing Snake, Meta-Knight, Zelda, Pit, Mr. Game & Watch, Marth, Pikmin & Olimar or Toon Link instead. What would they place then, pray tell? A few people managing to place 5th sometimes prove bupkis.

Azen has been placing Top 3 with Low Tiers for years. Lucario isn't even that low. It's not random proof of superior balance if some of the nation's very best players can place well with Low Tiers, especially when they were doing that in Melee as well.

A lot of top level players play snake. Cort, PC, Chillen, DSF, Forward, and tapion to name a few. The people I don't recognize who play snake seem to generally place fourth or below. Snake and Metaknight do make up the majority of the tournament scene. Yes they are the best but I don't think that some of the upper character have really been given their chance to show their greatness.

Funny, I see tons of other Snakes placing high or possibly even winning tournaments all the time.

It is not like Snake and Metaknight are insta win characters though.

No character is insta-win. You still have to work for your victory. Even Akuma players lose in Japan because the Top are just better than those pesky new players who jump in with Akuma. Even Sheik could lose to Bowser in NTSC Melee where the matchup was a 10-0 in Sheik's favour.

It still doesn't change the fact that the odds are heavily in Snake's favour.

Yes we all know. Azen is too good, so we see him win with Ike or someone mention how he won with Ike we generally disregard it as Azen just being Azen.

Exactly. Do not bring up Azen placing high with a Low Tier as evidence of how that Low Tier must not be Low Tier or how the game must be more balanced than Melee.

OK, so maybe you can argue that Low Tier isn't really a Low Tier. But saying "Azen just placed high using a Low Tier, thus Brawl is more balanced than Melee!" is a catastrofically flawed argument because Azen did that for years in Melee as well.

Well the one with 69 people in which he came in 7th had DSF and Forward. The person just above him was a Marth main, go figure.

Azen placed 3rd or something using Luigi once in Melee... above many of the nation's top players using Top Tiers. Also, number of total participants is irrelevant if only 3 or so of them are any good. I'm not saying that's what happened, I'm saying "69 people participated!" tells me nothing about the skill level involved. There have been 64+ people tournaments where none of them could even DI (no really, there have!).

So the tourney had DSF and Forward. I'm assume they took Top 3. So who else of note were there and were beaten specifically by Timotee? There are people who'd managed to make Top 8 on luck alone since they didn't have to face really good people in the brackets.

Also, maybe Timotee is actually quite a good Brawl player (though maining a pretty bad-ish character)... and everyone below him were worse than him.

The 40+ one in which he won I don't really recognize anyone. There was a pretty diverse top 8. Of course much higher tier characters were in the top 8.

Players of lower skill usually aren't worth mentioning in discussions such as these as they aren't skilled enough for us to point at and go "Hey, a Yoshi made Top 5!". Guess what, everyone else just sucked too much to destroy that Yoshi halfway through.

This is why we should not stare blindly at tournament results and look for elusive exceptions where blatant Low Tiers place well. Guess what, player skill trumphs Tier lists and individual matchups.

One bad matchup doesn't just instantly kill your tier placement. It hurts but it doesn't suddenly drop you to bottom. Ness moved down at most four spots from the respectable tier list I have seen. He wasn't even that high to begin with. I believe before the whole incident he was upper-low to mid-low.

It's not so much a bad matchup as a pretty unwinnable one. Dropping 4 spots on a list of 39 characters, not really surprising considering we just uncovered a 10-0 matchup for him. In the grand scheme of things, that was pretty proportionate, especially since Ness was at best a Mid Tier where everyone is pretty equal. Uncover a 10-0 matchup and you're bond to drop down several spots since your placing was kinda shaky, with you only being sliiiiiightly better than the people behind you to begin with,

In the one in which he got 7th, I am assuming he lost to a Marth since that is the character above. The one he won he seemed to use Ness all of the way. The other one had him using Wario also. The rest I really can't answer unfortunately.

Again, not proof of balance. One Ness managed to place 7th in a tournament with two named good players and 66 players of no notority. Umm... yay? I've hosted tons of tournaments at anime conventions here in Sweden because I'm a part of that "circuit". We've had 64-man tournaments where random Low Tiers have placed Top 5. The only people of importance were me and maybe one or two other good Smashers.

Guess what, random exceptions in a sea of tourney results mean bupkis.

I am pretty sure I have heard from a wide variety of people that the matchup was still not good for Ness. You make a valid point about even some large tournaments still having bad players. Ankoku seems to give large tournaments more weight so there must be a reason.

"Not really that bad" (though not bolded in my original reply). It's not a 7-2. It's just a matchup in which he has the disadvantage. He can still win it.

Large tournaments do not ensure a high skill level. Large tournaments with lots of good players do.

Also Zelda is considered good and metaknight isn't even her worse matchup. I am not entirely sure where Zelda stacks up to Metaknight though. Zelda mains have real trouble agreeing on anything.

Zelda is Top Tier or High Tier material, yes. But just because I beat 3 Meta-Knights in a row (2-0 on all of them except for one of them who managed to take one match off me when I went Pit) does not mean Zelda is better than him or that she's got a good matchup against him.

I was merely illustrating the point that personal skill level trumphs Tier lists and individual matchups (though depending on the matchup, your level might have to be leaps and bounds above that of your opponent's).

I believe Neo beat Ken's Marth with Roy. He beat up and coming Fox and Falco's quite a bit. Anther wiped the floor with the upper tier characters. It is just skilled players doing what they do. It occurs in all games.

Then why did you even bring up some people doing well with Lucario at all, when you acknowledge that a limited few people doing well with Low Tiers mean nothing?

He suffers from being average in a game of greats. Mario may go even with almost the entire cast but those above him have favorable matchups against the rest of the cast.

Inconsequential. Fox has more favourable matchups than Mario... and? If the Mario is any good, he's got even matchups against everyone. Statistically, he's got an even chance against everyone, even the Top Tiers.

He's, therefore, quite viable and capable of winning tournaments (on paper).

Hmm, more similarities between brawl and melee. Quite interesting.

99% of the things you talk about apply to both games.

I don't remember ever saying I didn't know which matchups were good or bad, or that I couldn't find out which ones were good or bad. I just stated that we don't have number values. I can't say that Snake has a 3-5 versus R.O.B. Pika and Falco and that he has a 4-5 versus olimar now could I? What has been formulating if not establish are that some matchups are bad, some are really bad, some are good, some are really good, and some are neutral. For example it has been well established since the early part of the game that Olimar ***** Falcon hard. I couldn't tell you if Olimar has a 5-3, a 5-2, 5-1, or a 5-0 though.

"All I can say is the neutrals". I took this to mean that you were only certain of which matchups are neutral.

Same with the Ness thing. I know it is an awful matchup but I am not sure what number value it would be because the number values haven't even started to be worked out yet.

Ness vs. Marth should be a 10-0 or close to 10-0.

If I had posted a link to Ivan's chart would it make you laugh?

How can I know that without having looked at it?

Does that mean this discussion degenerates into nothing more than speculation, and can only be fully discussed in a year or so?

No. We can still discuss it. But you need to back up your argument with more than "I have this chart with highly unverified matchup data compiled through the opinions of mostly random people who aren't even that good" (or quite possibly just one or two good people, in which case the chart is probably flawed as well).

I think there are some established facts already. It is subject to change if something is discovered, but Melee could change also.

You have yet to use many of them in this thread though as they were easily refuted. If these facts are established and relevant, please bring them up, quite possibly sourced so we can evaluate them.

You must be nicer than I am. I am on another site trying to explain to them why Falcon has no chance versus Snake.

I'm nice to those who deserve it. Apparently, a lot of people left Smashboards for "that other site" (AllIsBrawl) because I was less than 100% friendly towards some of the less intelligent former members here on SWF.

Good riddance, I say.

It is understandable that neither game is balanced and never will. I just get sick and tired of hearing, "Mewtwo is a soft counter to Fox thus more balance," or "More characters were tournamently viable." Which is really the spear head for all of this. So many assumptions that needed to be re analyzed.

Only, I haven't brought up "Mewtwo is a soft counter to Fox" as an argument, now have I? I've merely, in passing, mentioned how Mewtwo vs. Fox wasn't anywhere near as hard as Snake vs. Ganondorf, Captain Falcon, Yoshi or Jigglypuff (quite possibly all 4 at the same time).

From top to bottom, Melee is probably more balanced. However as I attempted to point out both top and bottom in both games have their similarities. Brawl has a larger cast which it makes it even harder to properly balance. 20, give or take a few, viable characters is decent and maybe even respectable. A percentage above 50% to me is also decent.

Yes, it's harder. And?

The thread is not about how hard it is to balance a game (and we know it's possible to balance a game because, hello, Guilty Gear). It's about which game is more balanced. I don't care if Sakurai had to work harder to balance Brawl. The only thing that matters is how well he managed to balance it (at least in this thread).

As I've already said, there are different levels of viability. The bottom half of "The Viable ones" have quite hard matchups against the Tops and Highs, making them mostly viable against each other but not the Tops and Highs,

I think I mentioned early that things like this need to be addressed when constructing a tier list. Matchups have to be weighted but it has to be done methodically and carefully.

I was wondering when I would get to mention D3. Did you know many people consider Dededee to have awful matchups? I think even the SBR mention this. I also believe someone mentioned that M2k stated Dededee wasn't that great just some had some exploitable perks. From what I have seen, Dededee doesn't really stack up against many if any of the upper tier characters. That doesn't stop him from being speculated to be around the level of Metaknight and Snake even by the SBR. He tears up in tournaments though. So obviously something more than matchups decide a tier list. Otherwise Dededee would be looking at mid tier.

In fact scattered throughout high and Mid tier are characters that counter higher tier characters. Anyway for the most part those that can handle the uppers don't do to bad with those around them and those below them.



I never liked fighting the ice climbers.




I am pretty sure Snake vs. Metaknight is more than 5-4 otherwise Metaknights would have a lot more tournament wins and a lot more points. Snake I believe almost double Metaknight in wins. Also Metaknight I believe makes up as much if not more of the tournament seen than Snake. I have seen several people state that you should have your main and then Snake to deal with Metaknight.




So as we have established both games have counterpick cycles. We could get nitpicky and discuss the stems that each one has.



They have to be considering that Brawl is still young. We can only definitively make points about melee. This does us little good since we are comparing the two.




I just want to clear up that I am not talking about a player but rather Ganondorf's properties as a character. His advantage is his hard his and early KO's. I am almost positive that this carries with him for every matchup regardless of how bad. This advantage holds decent weight, because in Brawl it takes longer to KO and Ganondorf can tank it out longer than many opponents. When played right is really Ganondorf just using what he does best to win. Also matchs between two equally skilled opponents cannont be played perfectly which will mean that the Ganondorf player has to win even just once and a while. Exploiting a mistake or getting lucky is still around and can affect a match. I am sure as a Peach main you knew this. Did not getting a bob-bomb, beam sword, or the grandfather turnip have the ability to turn a match around or seal the deal?




A perfect tier list is beyond what anyone person or group is capable of especially when two contenders are so close.



Pray tell what is the big picture? She seems to have the most 5-2, 5-1's, and 5-0's out of all of them.




I get my information from character discussion boards. With the exception of a handful most of them have much better info than what is on the tactical and general.

You have a point, then again some actually do have those big advantage matchups. We will just have to wait and see.




I think you mentioned earlier that it is contributing factor. How can you have a balanced game if only one character can win and has no bad matchups and few even ones. At some point someone needs to be able to contend with the best to really even consider balance. It doesn't matter if the rest of the cast are extremely balanced if one character trumps them all hands down.




You just don't really see videos where players comment on how they lost the double blind pick. I think I saw a video of Sirlin playing where he mentions that he lost the double blind. I think it would be quite interesting if more people played...well...the Azen way.



Taken right from other sources, just simple math from there.




The thing is though that even amongst top level players their opinion on who was good differed fairly vastly. I found a tier list that was stated to be agreed on most then when I watched some matches the pro player would talk about how so and so was so much better than the others. Of course tiers aren't popularity contest. A lot of research and data collection goes into any good tier list. However if people stopped playing as Snake, what would happen? His tournament ranking would go down and tier list constructors would quote this as reason to knock snake down a bit. So although tier list aren't popularity contest they can indirectly affect aspects of the game.




Even non tournament players can know stuff about a game?




It is probably quite similar if not the same.




I have seen so many times that MvC2 is balanced because everyone is broken to a degree and that there is so much variety that proving its inbalance becomes impossible. So broken it is fair.

Magnetto, Sentinel, Storm, and someone else that I just can't remember where the four God characters. Almost every match had some infinite executed in it.





If you look at any of the Smash games hard enough you can really see that the games were put together almost haphazardly. Mewtwo as a slow character when he is the fastest pokemon. Roy having no advantage over Marth. Clone characters with almost no variation.

In Brawl you have Ganondorf with his sword but he doesn't use it even though fans have been asking about it for years. He finally decides to give a heavy character some speed. The fastest characters in the game have laggy attacks. Snake can hit people with his tilts without touching them.

In SSB64, you have invisible hitboxes and crazy combos.

I really think a better designer needs to be put on the Smash project.

Gotta go. WIll reply to this part later tonight.

 

[Zankoku]

Stop breaking the boundaries, Yuna. :V

Even my 1920 pixel resolution can't fit that gigantic run-on line of broken IMG Tag code you set up.

 

[Redson]

That was terrifying, Yuna.

...A post of CLOVERFIELD proportions.

 

[Yuna]

Alright, maybe even Luigi but I don't think you can go any farther than that.

Luigi is above Link, though. So if you're willing to include Link, then he's the furthest down.

Maybe not catostrophic matchups but you start thinning down in good matchups the farther you go down. I am pretty sure that is how it works with most games. Roy didn't have too bad of a matchup versus fox (mainly due to chaingrab and edgeguarding). One of the things I have noticed is weighing matchups can be a difficult task at times. Obviously it is more important to have good matchups against the upper crust but you can't ignore bad matchups that the lower ends provide. Maybe something in the future that needs to be looked into more.

Obvious stuff is obvious.

I was merely pointing out how you're not automatically a High Tier character just because you might have one or two good or even matchups against the Tops if you have catastrophic ones against a lot of other characters, as in your example of if someone from Low randomly had a good matchup against Snake, they'd automatically be tourney viable. Oh no, Yoshi main, your main gets countered by 6 of my mains, secondaries, tertiaries and quarternaries while you can only muster up a 5-5 against Snake. So, no, no tourney viability for you (hypothetically speaking)!

I wish you gave me larger room to work.
Anther
Azen
KoreanDJ
Boa
Phoenix

Why do you so many top players have to play lucario? Lucario seems to get 5th or so in a lot of different people's hands though.

Umm... "Lucario generally gets, at most, 5th in the hands of some of the best players in the nation"... umm... OK. Now imagine all of those people playing Snake, Meta-Knight, Zelda, Pit, Mr. Game & Watch, Marth, Pikmin & Olimar or Toon Link instead. What would they place then, pray tell? A few people managing to place 5th sometimes prove bupkis.

Azen has been placing Top 3 with Low Tiers for years. Lucario isn't even that low. It's not random proof of superior balance if some of the nation's very best players can place well with Low Tiers, especially when they were doing that in Melee as well.

A lot of top level players play snake. Cort, PC, Chillen, DSF, Forward, and tapion to name a few. The people I don't recognize who play snake seem to generally place fourth or below. Snake and Metaknight do make up the majority of the tournament scene. Yes they are the best but I don't think that some of the upper character have really been given their chance to show their greatness.

Funny, I see tons of other Snakes placing high or possibly even winning tournaments all the time.

It is not like Snake and Metaknight are insta win characters though.

No character is insta-win. You still have to work for your victory. Even Akuma players lose in Japan because the Top are just better than those pesky new players who jump in with Akuma. Even Sheik could lose to Bowser in NTSC Melee where the matchup was a 10-0 in Sheik's favour.

It still doesn't change the fact that the odds are heavily in Snake's favour.

Yes we all know. Azen is too good, so we see him win with Ike or someone mention how he won with Ike we generally disregard it as Azen just being Azen.

Exactly. Do not bring up Azen placing high with a Low Tier as evidence of how that Low Tier must not be Low Tier or how the game must be more balanced than Melee.

OK, so maybe you can argue that Low Tier isn't really a Low Tier. But saying "Azen just placed high using a Low Tier, thus Brawl is more balanced than Melee!" is a catastrofically flawed argument because Azen did that for years in Melee as well.

Well the one with 69 people in which he came in 7th had DSF and Forward. The person just above him was a Marth main, go figure.

Azen placed 3rd or something using Luigi once in Melee... above many of the nation's top players using Top Tiers. Also, number of total participants is irrelevant if only 3 or so of them are any good. I'm not saying that's what happened, I'm saying "69 people participated!" tells me nothing about the skill level involved. There have been 64+ people tournaments where none of them could even DI (no really, there have!).

So the tourney had DSF and Forward. I'm assume they took Top 3. So who else of note were there and were beaten specifically by Timotee? There are people who'd managed to make Top 8 on luck alone since they didn't have to face really good people in the brackets.

Also, maybe Timotee is actually quite a good Brawl player (though maining a pretty bad-ish character)... and everyone below him were worse than him.

The 40+ one in which he won I don't really recognize anyone. There was a pretty diverse top 8. Of course much higher tier characters were in the top 8.

Players of lower skill usually aren't worth mentioning in discussions such as these as they aren't skilled enough for us to point at and go "Hey, a Yoshi made Top 5!". Guess what, everyone else just sucked too much to destroy that Yoshi halfway through.

This is why we should not stare blindly at tournament results and look for elusive exceptions where blatant Low Tiers place well. Guess what, player skill trumphs Tier lists and individual matchups.

One bad matchup doesn't just instantly kill your tier placement. It hurts but it doesn't suddenly drop you to bottom. Ness moved down at most four spots from the respectable tier list I have seen. He wasn't even that high to begin with. I believe before the whole incident he was upper-low to mid-low.

It's not so much a bad matchup as a pretty unwinnable one. Dropping 4 spots on a list of 39 characters, not really surprising considering we just uncovered a 10-0 matchup for him. In the grand scheme of things, that was pretty proportionate, especially since Ness was at best a Mid Tier where everyone is pretty equal. Uncover a 10-0 matchup and you're bond to drop down several spots since your placing was kinda shaky, with you only being sliiiiiightly better than the people behind you to begin with,

In the one in which he got 7th, I am assuming he lost to a Marth since that is the character above. The one he won he seemed to use Ness all of the way. The other one had him using Wario also. The rest I really can't answer unfortunately.

Again, not proof of balance. One Ness managed to place 7th in a tournament with two named good players and 66 players of no notority. Umm... yay? I've hosted tons of tournaments at anime conventions here in Sweden because I'm a part of that "circuit". We've had 64-man tournaments where random Low Tiers have placed Top 5. The only people of importance were me and maybe one or two other good Smashers.

Guess what, random exceptions in a sea of tourney results mean bupkis.

I am pretty sure I have heard from a wide variety of people that the matchup was still not good for Ness. You make a valid point about even some large tournaments still having bad players. Ankoku seems to give large tournaments more weight so there must be a reason.

"Not really that bad" (though not bolded in my original reply). It's not a 7-2. It's just a matchup in which he has the disadvantage. He can still win it.

Large tournaments do not ensure a high skill level. Large tournaments with lots of good players do.

Also Zelda is considered good and metaknight isn't even her worse matchup. I am not entirely sure where Zelda stacks up to Metaknight though. Zelda mains have real trouble agreeing on anything.

Zelda is Top Tier or High Tier material, yes. But just because I beat 3 Meta-Knights in a row (2-0 on all of them except for one of them who managed to take one match off me when I went Pit) does not mean Zelda is better than him or that she's got a good matchup against him.

I was merely illustrating the point that personal skill level trumphs Tier lists and individual matchups (though depending on the matchup, your level might have to be leaps and bounds above that of your opponent's).

I believe Neo beat Ken's Marth with Roy. He beat up and coming Fox and Falco's quite a bit. Anther wiped the floor with the upper tier characters. It is just skilled players doing what they do. It occurs in all games.

Then why did you even bring up some people doing well with Lucario at all, when you acknowledge that a limited few people doing well with Low Tiers mean nothing?

He suffers from being average in a game of greats. Mario may go even with almost the entire cast but those above him have favorable matchups against the rest of the cast.

Inconsequential. Fox has more favourable matchups than Mario... and? If the Mario is any good, he's got even matchups against everyone. Statistically, he's got an even chance against everyone, even the Top Tiers.

He's, therefore, quite viable and capable of winning tournaments (on paper).

Hmm, more similarities between brawl and melee. Quite interesting.

99% of the things you talk about apply to both games.

I don't remember ever saying I didn't know which matchups were good or bad, or that I couldn't find out which ones were good or bad. I just stated that we don't have number values. I can't say that Snake has a 3-5 versus R.O.B. Pika and Falco and that he has a 4-5 versus olimar now could I? What has been formulating if not establish are that some matchups are bad, some are really bad, some are good, some are really good, and some are neutral. For example it has been well established since the early part of the game that Olimar ***** Falcon hard. I couldn't tell you if Olimar has a 5-3, a 5-2, 5-1, or a 5-0 though.

"All I can say is the neutrals". I took this to mean that you were only certain of which matchups are neutral.

Same with the Ness thing. I know it is an awful matchup but I am not sure what number value it would be because the number values haven't even started to be worked out yet.

Ness vs. Marth should be a 10-0 or close to 10-0.

If I had posted a link to Ivan's chart would it make you laugh?

How can I know that without having looked at it?

Does that mean this discussion degenerates into nothing more than speculation, and can only be fully discussed in a year or so?

No. We can still discuss it. But you need to back up your argument with more than "I have this chart with highly unverified matchup data compiled through the opinions of mostly random people who aren't even that good" (or quite possibly just one or two good people, in which case the chart is probably flawed as well).

I think there are some established facts already. It is subject to change if something is discovered, but Melee could change also.

You have yet to use many of them in this thread though as they were easily refuted. If these facts are established and relevant, please bring them up, quite possibly sourced so we can evaluate them.

You must be nicer than I am. I am on another site trying to explain to them why Falcon has no chance versus Snake.

I'm nice to those who deserve it. Apparently, a lot of people left Smashboards for "that other site" (AllIsBrawl) because I was less than 100% friendly towards some of the less intelligent former members here on SWF.

Good riddance, I say.

It is understandable that neither game is balanced and never will. I just get sick and tired of hearing, "Mewtwo is a soft counter to Fox thus more balance," or "More characters were tournamently viable." Which is really the spear head for all of this. So many assumptions that needed to be re analyzed.

Only, I haven't brought up "Mewtwo is a soft counter to Fox" as an argument, now have I? I've merely, in passing, mentioned how Mewtwo vs. Fox wasn't anywhere near as hard as Snake vs. Ganondorf, Captain Falcon, Yoshi or Jigglypuff (quite possibly all 4 at the same time).

From top to bottom, Melee is probably more balanced. However as I attempted to point out both top and bottom in both games have their similarities. Brawl has a larger cast which it makes it even harder to properly balance. 20, give or take a few, viable characters is decent and maybe even respectable. A percentage above 50% to me is also decent.

Yes, it's harder. And?

The thread is not about how hard it is to balance a game (and we know it's possible to balance a game because, hello, Guilty Gear). It's about which game is more balanced. I don't care if Sakurai had to work harder to balance Brawl. The only thing that matters is how well he managed to balance it (at least in this thread).

As I've already said, there are different levels of viability. The bottom half of "The Viable ones" have quite hard matchups against the Tops and Highs, making them mostly viable against each other but not the Tops and Highs,

I was wondering when I would get to mention D3. Did you know many people consider Dededee to have awful matchups? I think even the SBR mention this. I also believe someone mentioned that M2k stated Dededee wasn't that great just some had some exploitable perks. From what I have seen, Dededee doesn't really stack up against many if any of the upper tier characters. That doesn't stop him from being speculated to be around the level of Metaknight and Snake even by the SBR. He tears up in tournaments though. So obviously something more than matchups decide a tier list. Otherwise Dededee would be looking at mid tier.

If you have some awful matchups, you cannot be Top Tier, especially if those awful matchups are numerous. Tell me, are the people who speculate that he's got awful matchups the same as the people who speculate he'll be Top Tier? Not all SBR users know everything about Smash and not all SBR-uses agree.

They're not one single hive mind and also they can be wrong about Smash.

In fact scattered throughout high and Mid tier are characters that counter higher tier characters. Anyway for the most part those that can handle the uppers don't do to bad with those around them and those below them.

Do not use the term "counter" lightly. A counter is a matchup where one character has a huge advantage. A 4-5 advantage against a Top Tier =/= Counter. The Tier List is decided mostly, almost entirely, on the sum of one's options, i.e. the sum of, among other things, one's matchups.

I am pretty sure Snake vs. Metaknight is more than 5-4 otherwise Metaknights would have a lot more tournament wins and a lot more points. Snake I believe almost double Metaknight in wins. Also Metaknight I believe makes up as much if not more of the tournament seen than Snake. I have seen several people state that you should have your main and then Snake to deal with Metaknight.

Or maybe the best of the best just play Snake instead of Metaknight. For years Ken won almost every single tournament he attended despite there being numerous Sheiks in the same tournaments. The Tier List and individual matchup chart are not the be-all and end-all of tournament results.

So as we have established both games have counterpick cycles. We could get nitpicky and discuss the stems that each one has.

I did not bring up "There's counterpicking!" as proof of either game's superior balance. I merely pointed out counterpickings exists in Melee as well, thus, the point is moot unless you can prove counter-picking is hugely more important in Brawl in such a way it proves superior balance, otherwise, this discussion point needs to be dropped (at least at the moment as it's irrelevant to the discussion at hand).

They have to be considering that Brawl is still young. We can only definitively make points about melee. This does us little good since we are comparing the two.

I'm sick and tired of "Brawl is too young!". If that's the case, then no discussion is possible on the depth of Brawl... at all. Because it's too young, everything might change tomorrow. We can discuss Brawl with everything we know insofar. In everything changes tomorrow, so be it.

6 months into the game, I believe there's been enough time to at least see some of the balance in the game, even if we might be inaccurate.

I just want to clear up that I am not talking about a player but rather Ganondorf's properties as a character. His advantage is his hard his and early KO's. I am almost positive that this carries with him for every matchup regardless of how bad.

Only you're wrong because he cannot combo. There are characters who hit hard, KO early (in fact, earlier than Ganondorf) who can also combo well, most notably into KO moves. And they do not suffer from the same disadvantages as Ganondorf.

Ganondorf is huge, thus, a huge hitbox. Combos that wouldn't work on others work on him because he's just so big it's hard to miss him. He is also not super floaty, making it easier to combo him than "True Floaties". One huge disadvantage is his super-bad recovery. Besides 2nd jumping onto the ledge, he's only got one option: Up B. And it's mightily bad. Sure, it's a Command Throw, but outrange it and it won't be very good. It's also slow and predictable. And most of all: It makes him a sitting (or rather Up B:ing) duck.

He's slow and therefore largely unsafe on a lot of things. He hits hard, yes. But he has to actually hit. Because he is so slow, he has a hard time hitting fast characters who can hit him before he can do anything but maybe a jab. Let's not even begin to talk about projectile camping and hit-and-running him.

Even when sweetspotting the ledge from below, he has to go slightly above the ledge, allowing everyone and their mother to easily edgeguard him with various aerials and smashes. Peach vs. Ganny? Ground-float at the edge and do a Dair to a Nair. Marth? D-tilt or Fsmash tipper. Sheik? D-tilt into Fair. And the list goes on.

He lags tremendously when he lands on solid ground after Up B so those who prefer can just edgehog him to force him to recover onto the stage, get up and then Smash/aerial him into infinity. Fox edgehog into Upsmash anyone?

This advantage holds decent weight, because in Brawl it takes longer to KO and Ganondorf can tank it out longer than many opponents. When played right is really Ganondorf just using what he does best to win. Also matchs between two equally skilled opponents cannont be played perfectly which will mean that the Ganondorf player has to win even just once and a while. Exploiting a mistake or getting lucky is still around and can affect a match. I am sure as a Peach main you knew this. Did not getting a bob-bomb, beam sword, or the grandfather turnip have the ability to turn a match around or seal the deal?

No, Ganondorf does not have equal opportunities in all matchups nor is he equally viable in all matchups nor is he a "good, solid character" vs. everyone. He's got major flaws easily exploited.

A perfect tier list is beyond what anyone person or group is capable of especially when two contenders are so close.

And it speaks volumes about Brawl's balance when it's so easy to already at this stage mark out where each character is going to end up.

Pray tell what is the big picture? She seems to have the most 5-2, 5-1's, and 5-0's out of all of them.

The big picture is that she has a harder time winning against the characters who count, the ones who are among the best in the game. Who cares if she can beat Bowser into a pulp easier than Fox can? They both statistically beat him. But against the Tops, Highs and Mids, Sheik's got a harder time winning, thus ensuring her a harder time to victory.

Overall dominance among the worst characters in the game does not make you a better character than one who also dominates the Low Tiers, though to a lesser degree, but who dominates the High Tiers more.

I get my information from character discussion boards. With the exception of a handful most of them have much better info than what is on the tactical and general.

A lot of the information floating around the character discussion boards is still flawed. I'm just saying, don't blindly trust anything you read on Smashboards. Try it out and research it first before presenting it as evidence/fact.

I think you mentioned earlier that it is contributing factor. How can you have a balanced game if only one character can win and has no bad matchups and few even ones. At some point someone needs to be able to contend with the best to really even consider balance. It doesn't matter if the rest of the cast are extremely balanced if one character trumps them all hands down.

Ummm... yes? This is one of my main points why Brawl is less balanced than Melee.

You just don't really see videos where players comment on how they lost the double blind pick. I think I saw a video of Sirlin playing where he mentions that he lost the double blind. I think it would be quite interesting if more people played...well...the Azen way.

Why is this important? Why must they mention "It was a Double Blind Pick"? Double Blind Picking has been a staple in Smash tournaments. You talked as if it's rarely ever used or even obscure. I pointed out that every single tournament of note employs it. The fact that players might choose not to use it is inconsequential.

The thing is though that even amongst top level players their opinion on who was good differed fairly vastly. I found a tier list that was stated to be agreed on most then when I watched some matches the pro player would talk about how so and so was so much better than the others. Of course tiers aren't popularity contest. A lot of research and data collection goes into any good tier list. However if people stopped playing as Snake, what would happen? His tournament ranking would go down and tier list constructors would quote this as reason to knock snake down a bit. So although tier list aren't popularity contest they can indirectly affect aspects of the game.

No. Illogical. Tier Lists have never and will never be popularity contests.

Tier Lists are not decided by how many people play each character and only partially decided by how many people place well with said characters. How many Marios and Doctor Marios are there, at all? Now how many of them place well? Yet they're above Ganondorf, despite Eddie, among others, consistently placing high as him. Logic?

If people randomly stopped playing Snake, he'd just be less common at tournaments. It's still be quite obvious to anyone who analyzed the game that Snake has a distinct advantage against virtually everyone in the game. Thus, his place in the Tier List would remain.

Tournament placings give us an indication of the Tier List. They give us something to start with. "Why are X and Y characters consistently placing well? Let's take a deeper look!". We don't go "Meta-Knight places well consistently. He's 2nd on the Tier list, no more discussion necessary!".

Even non tournament players can know stuff about a game?

And even tournament players can know very little about the game. But the fact remains that threads where everyone is allowed to put in their two cents will invariably have some less intelligent posts. Threads on Tier Lists and matchups where everyone can influence the final results will invariably have skewed results.

It was much less so in the "Olden Days" where the forums were dominated by mostly Competitive and at least quasi-knowledgable players. Nowadays, Casuals players dominate SWF and as such, a thread open to everyone will probably have more Casuals putting in their 2 cents than Competitive players.

Also, Casual players might think they know the game. They might play the game a lot and have learned a lot about it on their own. But unless they research the game, look deeper, speak to others and read up on the game engine, chances are, they might just be wrong. What they think is X might be Y. What they think is good might not be so good, etc., etc., etc. It's because some things aren't immediately apparant. Some things aren't even apparant after a long while.

You need to play the game or at least know the game on a deeper level to grasp certain things.

I have seen so many times that MvC2 is balanced because everyone is broken to a degree and that there is so much variety that proving its inbalance becomes impossible. So broken it is fair.

6 characters out of 50 =/= Everyone. The game is balanced in a way. But since a vast majority of the cast is completely useless in Competitive play, it's not balanced.

Magnetto, Sentinel, Storm, and someone else that I just can't remember where the four God characters. Almost every match had some infinite executed in it.

4 characters out of 50.

If you look at any of the Smash games hard enough you can really see that the games were put together almost haphazardly. Mewtwo as a slow character when he is the fastest pokemon. Roy having no advantage over Marth. Clone characters with almost no variation.

Sakurai's intentions are inconsequential. Nobody cares what he wanted to do. We can only care about and discuss what he did do.

I really think a better designer needs to be put on the Smash project.

So do I.

 

[Yuna]

Meh SWF.

10 shotalinks.

 

[Yuna]

Stuff.

You obviously have never heard of this trick called DI. So what if you just hit Snake? Unless he doesn't DI, he can just Up B again and easily make it back. He can take a few hits as long as he makes it back since it takes a lot to throw him off the stage to begin with.

He can even cancel his Up B once he knows he'll be able to make it back in order to defent himself against your edgeguarding. His Up B is far from one of the best in the game. But it's hardly "easily gimped" or bad. It's just one thing he's not "one of the best in the game" at.

You assume the Snake's opponent is comptent while the Snake is not. With a competent player playing Snake, he's far from easy to gimp.

I dunno. Maybe he went up against someone that was just really good as Ganondof or Samus and could assume that if they could do it, anyone could. :\

No. Sakurai and his beta-testers are clearly incompetent. Anyone with insight into game balance would imemdiately be able to tell that Brawl is far from balanced. A good Smasher would be able to tell that Ganondorf has to work 29 times as hard as Meta-Knight to win and go "Wait a minute. This is imbalanced!".

No matter what happened, Brawl's balance shows Sakurai and his Merry Band of Beta-Testers are clearly unqualified for estimating game balance. And yes, I personally do believe that I could do better.

Id like to be optimistic and say: most low tier characters have untapped potential, which I truely believe is true for some characters, but in reality, it probably isnt.

I think the brawl scene needs 2 things.

One unbeatable dominating champion (a la ken) and several mid/low tier rogues who place surpringsly well in tournaments.

What would this accomplish? The champion would spark REAL competition (dethrone the king) and the rogues would give hope to low tier chars and inspire others to play them...

But then they wouldn't be true Low Tiers. If they have untapped potential, we obviously do not know the "Real Them" yet. We do not know the best way to play them. If someone finds out a revolutionary way to play Ganondorf that lets him win tournaments, then he clearly is not Bottom Tier material.

The tiers are unmoving and unyielding. The tiers exist even without us writing down a list. The tiers are static unless the game is changed. It's only our perception of them that might be off.

I agree that it's to quick to tell. However, I certainly feel like Brawl characters are more different. Whether this is good or bad, i cannot say. there's no clones like Roy and Marth, so there's really no character that is completely superior compared to it's clone (or vice versa). That said, it also means that some characters may become extremely broken. but right now, there's no fox, falco, or sheik-like juggernauts, so i'd say it's more balanced.

Umm... clones? How is that relevant at all?

Of course there will be stronger characters. but so far, those characters can't infinite grab, shine, and combo like fox or falco or sheik could. snake is not fast, and metaknight has not projectiles. Snake has little range up close, and his cypher can be grabbed or bitten, thus gimpimg his recovery. Metaknight has good recovery, gut still dies at early percentages.

What kind of Snake players do you play that random Up B right in front of people to grab or bite? Also, if grabbed or bitten, he still gets his 2nd jump back. He can also still C4 himself for a new Up B IIRC. Sure, you can punish him if he Up Bs improperly... but then again, you can say that about anyone.

Also, it speaks a lot of Brawl's balance where there are characters with infinites and super-combos that aren't even Top Tier because there are characters who are better than them despite lacking infinites and whatnot.

And, still, Snake does have an infinite. It's just very situational (must be near and facing the ledge). And what game are you playing where Snake has little close-combat range, anyway?

Cause snake has invisible weapons D:

He hides them on his huge butt when he doesn't need them.

Do not insult his sexy butt!

Stuff

It's not impossible and it has been done before. The Guilty Gear XX-series says "Hi!". Sammy isn't even that large a company, especially not when they started making the GGXX-series. Good developers employing good beta-testers (I believe Sammy uses the oft-used technique of actually employing, among other people, some of Japan's best players to beta-test their games by releasing early betas for them to play) can balance a game very, very well.

In GGXX, the three Bottom Tiers all managed to win at least one major tournament each. Now imagine Brawl Ganondorf winning a major tournament. Keep imagining... keep imagining... keep imagining.

It's not impossible and it's not even that hard. It's not easy but it's not like you need 5 years to do it since each iteration of GGXX is released within 1-2.5 years of its predecesser.

Snake/MK are very beatable characters. The fact that you cant beat them only means that you are too inexperienced in playing against them. It took awhile, but its evident that they aren't overpowering to the point of being in a tier above everyone else. For example, if you take a look at the midwest, you'll see very few (if any) tournaments have had Snake/MK coming out on top. We usually have Pikachu (Anther), G&W (NoJ), or ROB (Overswarm), among others, who consistently place high and win tournaments. Sometimes we'll only have one Snake or MK present in the top 8, if at all.

Snake and MK are not an excuse for claiming Brawl to be unbalanced. Doing so makes you look bad at the game.

Um... we haven't been saying Snake and Meta-Knight are in a tier of their own. But Snake and Meta-Knight are clearly Top Tier material and two of the best characters in the game. They're relevant to the discussion at hand about game balance and they are clear examples of bad game balance when compared to a lot of other characters. Obviously, they're not the only imbalanced characters.

 

[Redson]

Lol whoops?

 

[ShadowLink84]

Sorry, but I don't have the time to respond to much of your post. It was quite long. But I want to address one specific issue that seems to be the central point to your argument (well, the part of your argument relavant to the topic at hand): Bad matchups.

Part of it yes.

I was talking to Dope the other day while playing with him, and he said something interesting that I mostly agree with. He said, "I don't believe in matchups." Meaning, he doesn't believe that certain characters innately have a disadvantage against other characters. However, there ARE bad matchups between playstyles. For example, my Snake was able to beat a very good ROB in the last tournament I went to. He told me that he's never lost to a Snake before. How did I beat him? My Snake is rather unusual, and I have a unique playstyle with him. Apparently, my playstyle was able to best his ROB, despite ROB supposedly being the most hard "counter" to Snake. However, when I play against Overswarm's ROB, I get my *** handed to me. Another example is when I play against Anther. Anther (sux, btw) says that Pikachu has a hard matchup against Snake, but many other people say that Pikachu destroys Snake. Anther also often points out to me that Cort also says that Snake is good against Pikachu. Personally, I've tried many times to best Anther's Pikachu but I've found that task to be ridiculously difficult if Anther isn't sandbagging. And I've recently realized that its not just Anther's Pikachu that I have trouble with. My specific playstyle with Snake makes fighting Pikachu, in general, to be extremely difficult.

I disagree. There are bad matchups simply because regardless of the playstyle used it does not remove those disadvantages that your character has in the matchup.
No matter how uniquely played a Bowser is played that won't prevent Sheik, or Marth, or Fox from exploiting his weaknesses.

Yes this would mean it becomes less difficult for the Bowser user in the matchup but again he is still at a disadvantage. Yes he may catch his opponent off guard but would that really remove the fact that Fox can combo Bowser so very easily? Would it remove the fact that MK gimps Link easily or that Snake has issues with campers?

If it is the play style is really removing these disadvantages to the point that one playstyle is destroying another then it would possibly mean that either you were more skilled at that point and therefore overcame those disadvantage,s or that the matchup is closer to a neutral end.

If both you and your opponent were capable of changing the way you used your respective characters can you say that ROB still has an advantage over Snake?

Not only that we are comparing ROB and SNake, two character who are already high up on the tier list. So maybe its because they are so good that those advantages/disadvantages to each other are not as great?
Because I've noticed that when moving from bottom tier low tier there is a greater difference than when moving from high tier to top tier.

So could it possibly be said that the gaps between the tiers are greater at some points and lesser than others?

I do agree that there are play styles that do matchup poorly with other styles, but I don't think that the playstyle should be creating such a great difference. I could see it working in melee where the disadvantages didn't hit character as hard. And I could se eit if its between high tier and top tier characters because maybe the gap between them is and so because they are so good their disadvantages aren't as great as people think.

Or it frankly may be a neutral matchup after all.

Here is yet another example. I'm currently enjoying Kirby thoroughly, and I've used him in many friendlies recently. I've been able to beat Snakes with my Kirby. Snakes that are actually pretty good. Yet I go into the Kirby matchup topic and see that they gave Snake something like a 70-30 advantage over Kirby. Do I think thats true? Absolutely not.

Have they beaten you?
How often?
When they beat you how great was the difference between you and your opponent?
When you beat your opponent was it very close or far?
Did you feel that your opponent had to work as hard or harder?

Maybe its because they just don't have much experience vs Kirby users.

ganondorf users used to think he could mash Sonic into a blue paste but that changed drastically. It may change now.

In the same example you gave about Link vs Marth, you point to the exact same thing. Depending on your playstyle, how you adapt to the opponent's character, and how you handle the advantages of the opponent's character, you can do well even in matchups that most people consider to be quite bad. You need to change your mindset when it comes to this game, because you seem to think that _____ vs _____ is set in stone between players of equal skill, when in reality this isn't true at all. I used to think the same way. But now, I've realized that no matchup is truly unwinnable. Its just that the most common playstyle of, say, Pikachu is able to best the most common playstyle of Snake. But there are always exceptions to that rule, especially between good players.

Oh no don't misunderstand I don't think that at all.
But I do think that the matchups do affect the difficulty of the match.
I can see a Sonic beat a Snake and I can see Sonic beating out a DK (I have had very close matches with good DK mainers).
However, Sonic is a character who not only has different playstyles but different playstyles that remain effective.

The playstyles for Snake an ROB wile differing are still quite effective. It can't be said that one playstyle is better than the other.
Same for Snake.
So perhaps this is why you have an issue with overswarm but not with Dope.

In my example of Link vs Marth I also pointed out the contrast between melee and Brawl.

I shall go in greater depth to get the point across better.
IN melee we have seen Aniki beat Ken's Marth with his Link.
We have also seen that certain playstyles are effective against Marth.

Yet remember we also have the fact that we had L canceling, CCing and Dash dancing.
We had methods of speeding up Link's gameplay. L canceling really helped him in punishing Marth and dash dancing was a greatmethod of speeding up and mindgaming the opponent.

Yet in Brawl while we still have those same playstyles, we have an issue because we can no longer actually keep up with Marth.
Or if we ignore that, we have the issue with Link's bad recovery so that when Marth gets that pressure on Link he's really going to have to focus on staying on the arena more so while fighting Marth since he can easily die at low percents.

And we also have the issue that we can no longer punish Marth as harshly in Brawl like we could in melee.

If you look at melee videos you'll notice that whenever Aniki attacked Ken and started a combo he could usually do significant damage. And even after the combo he could still retain an advantage and keep the pressure.

Yet in Brawl such a thing no longer occurs. once a combo is done (if any) its done and any advantage gain is very quickly lost.
Link just can't punish Marth as he could in melee, he needed that ability to punish in order to cover his weaknesses and make up for them. Not that they were removed but they didn't affect him as greatly.


Now returning to Snake vs ROB.

Both character are good at maintaining an advantage and even when they lose the advantage, are adept at regaining it. So most likely if ROB does have an advantage, Snake is capable of making up for it depending on what playstyle he uses.

however in Link vs Marth no matter what playstyle is used Marth would still win. Simply ebcause once Marth gains the advantage he can hold it while if Link gains the advantage, he can't.
So the amount of punishment delivered varies much more between the two characters than it did in melee.
A playstyle could change things around.

yet in Brawl you have certain playstyles that are effective and playstyles that aren't effective at all.
A defensive Link will always beat an offensive one, and you will never see Link go on the offensive against little more than a handful of characters.

ROB and Snake are very versatile yet Link this time around doens't have as much versatility and a unique playstyle would most likely get shutdown just as the more common one would.
Simply since they aren't as effective anymore.


(while I was typing this I forgot what I was gonna say twice.)

Also, Snake/MK have very few unqiue ATs. ATs do not factor into the greater "imbalance" of the game. Pit has like 20 ATs. He is far from being the best in the game. And the rest of your post was actually quite irrelevant to the topic at hand, IMO.

I disagree. AT's do factor into the imbalance.
Before L canceling Ganondorf and Bowser had little chance in the world of competing.
Once L canceling as introduced Ganondorf and Bowser were capable of much more.
When DDing was used their speed went up.

The AT's do factor but it depends on how effective those AT's are.
L canceling, Dash dancing, crouch canceling, Wavedashing were all universal AT's that were influential and helped make the characters viable.

The number of AT's isn't the factor, its how effective that AT is.

How much of an impact it creates.

DAC is similar, it really sped up Snake's game and gave Link a viable approach.
Yet the benefits from DACing with Link and Snake are greater than DACing with Snake, Sheik, Zelda, peach etc etc.

Its universal but it does little to help out in the ways L canceling did.

Its why everyone bemoans the loss of L canceling, characters like Ganondorf and Bowser have a much tougher time without it while characters like Marth and Fox could care less.
Its why attributes to the imbalance, because the loss of that one AT hit some characters much harder than it did others.
Snake would benefit sure but he isn't an aerial character to begin with, meanwhile characters like Bowser who cannot stay stuck on the ground unless they wish to get camped to death miss it most.

This doesn't even take into account the nerfs/buffs the vets received. (Seriously I want my semispiking spin attack with actual range and recovery ability. Or at least the long shot I mean seriously)

 

[RDK]

Here is yet another example. I'm currently enjoying Kirby thoroughly, and I've used him in many friendlies recently. I've been able to beat Snakes with my Kirby. Snakes that are actually pretty good. Yet I go into the Kirby matchup topic and see that they gave Snake something like a 70-30 advantage over Kirby. Do I think thats true? Absolutely not.

Although I disagree with what most of the Kirby matchup topic has to say, your point about there being no such thing as a bad mathcup is ridiculous. Dope's opinion that it's all in someone's playstyle does not make it invariably so. Characters do have advantages over other characters, which is the whole reason for being when it comes to matchup charts and tier lists. Unfortunately the nature of these things makes it possible for matchup charts and tier lists to be flawed and sometimes heavily dependant on opinions and personal experience.

Point being, if you think Snake and MK don't have inherent advantages over the rest of the cast, then you're a loony.

In the same example you gave about Link vs Marth, you point to the exact same thing. Depending on your playstyle, how you adapt to the opponent's character, and how you handle the advantages of the opponent's character, you can do well even in matchups that most people consider to be quite bad. You need to change your mindset when it comes to this game, because you seem to think that _____ vs _____ is set in stone between players of equal skill, when in reality this isn't true at all. I used to think the same way. But now, I've realized that no matchup is truly unwinnable. Its just that the most common playstyle of, say, Pikachu is able to best the most common playstyle of Snake. But there are always exceptions to that rule, especially between good players.

The winnability of a match isn't solely determined by just the character or just the player. In Melee, it was mostly about the player, but the imbalance of the roster made it easier to see that better players would obviously do better with better characters. However, with Brawl, the situation is even worse. While the playstyle attributed to the characters do matter greatly, the emphasis on choice of character is so heavy in Brawl that it's ridiculous. Instead of being a healthy balance between character and player, it's become more about character than how you play him / her.

 

[Kiyosuki]

lol

whoa

 

[Yuna]

I'm sorry, SamuraiPanda, but I vehemently disagree with you (and Dope). There are bad matchups.

No matter how "creative", "unusual" or "different" you play a character, if the matchup is bad, you're statistically supposed to lose it if going up against a player of equal skill with knowledge of his own character and yours. No one has ever said a matchup is set in stone and that you'll lose no matter what, except the people arguing DeDeDe's infinites make it impossible for DK and friends to win against him, but that's not even in this thread. Yes, you might be able to surprise people by playing your character in a way they're not accustomed to, hence making them mess up more and ultimately lose...

But you can do that in everything. If they're not familar with your character/play style, that's an advantage. It's always like that. It's like someone who's really good as Marth vs. everyone but Zelda going up against his first good Zelda. Chances are, he'll probably lose due to unfamiliarity with the matchup and playing style.

You can adapt in order to do well with the character with the bad matchup? What's to say the other player won't adapt himself to your adaptation? When giving one player an option the other player can employ as well, one must give the other player the same option. You adapt, so does your opponent. Who will statistically win? The one with the good matchup, if both players are of equal skill. Of course, human error also plays a part. Even top level players can make huge mistakes randomly and lose.

But statistically speaking and on paper, bad matchups exist. In real practice, they exist as well. Don't tell me Sheik vs. Bowser in Melee isn't a bad matchup.

But bad matchups do exist. It's all in the programming. Let's say Zelda's everything beats Ganondorf's everything. Umm... ok. How is Ganondorf supposed to win? It's like you vs. Peter DeGrassi (or what's his name) in Tennis. You can be creative and different and unusual and try to throw him off. But he's just that much better than you at Tennis so I'd bet a million bucks on him winning.

 

[LavisFiend]

@Yuna: I did say Street Fighter and GG were the series to look at to see how a roster is truly balanced did I not? =P

But reading over my post again I can see where the confusion was. I didn't directly specify that I was back to talking about Brawl with the whole 100-200 people trying to balance 40 fighters in the span of a few years.

Smaller teams can have an easier time constructing and balancing each individual character when there is no distraction to deviate them from doing so.

Yeah, Sammy has a small team, but that small team is dead set focused on crafting and tweaking the fighters to as balanced as they can, and to use one of your points, they even supposedly hire professional players to ride the characters hard to the core to expose any flaws if there are any to be found.

But with a game like Brawl, where they just loaded so much stuff into the game, it's easy to assume that they only really cared about Quantity instead of quality.

Cause it shows.

 

[ShadowLink84]

Hi RDK.
10hookshots

@lavis: I say we all play GG or rather, we play Mugen and place all the GG characters in it. >.>

Then again I like my Sonic and, yeah.

@Yuna: hi

 

[LavisFiend]

@ShadowLink 84: Nah, let's play F-Zero GX instead. XD


Doesen't get more crazy than that one I am afraid.

It is like, the melee of racers... =O

 

[ShadowLink84]

I never played it sadly.
Is it really that beautiful?

 

[Yuna]

@Yuna: I did say Street Fighter and GG were the series to look at to see how a roster is truly balanced did I not? =P

Street Fighter, not so much.

 

[LavisFiend]

I never played it sadly.
Is it really that beautiful?

Let's just say Melee is at least nice enough to let you win once in a while.

F-Zero GX? Yea, good luck with that. The Diamond cup on master is enough to make you want to stab an old lady.

Hey if you like to get your *** kicked, give it a try man. I will tell you this much; the game is endless in content, and it is what, 4-5 years old?

@Yuna: I edited in some more to elaborate on my original post in the very same post you quoted, if I got you confused or anything.

Also, if we of course exclude Akuma...SF is still balanced more than many fighters.

I would say Tekken Tag Tournament too, but I haven't played that in forever, god knows how that is going along.