Official Character Competitive Impressions - Tourneys, Tiers, Theories, Tactics

[Browny]

A lot of characters can do disgusting things off a missed ground tech and it requires half as much effort to end your stock.

 

[Dre89]

Bowser gets more reward for outplaying his opponent. If you were going to beat your opponent before, you will beat them harder.

How many normal grabs do people allow Bowser to get?

Not necessarily true

Bowser allows you to beat people that you might not be able to with more complex characters not only because his reward is high, but because earning that reward is simple because of how many options dash grab beats.

And as for how many grabs he should be landing, if he knows how to space it he'll be landing a lot.

If the opponent is near the ground, dash/pivot grab are always the best options because they net the highest reward. Not only that, but are also the easiest moves to land due to their massive range without extending his hurtbox as much as other moves, and because they beat shields. If you don't want to move Bowser whilst spacing, just jab instead and it'll combo into grab anyway. Upb is for when you need something faster than those options as a GTFO.

That's how simple this character is now. You never need to chase people in the air now because punishing their landing with dashgrab was always easier to do but now nets much higher reward than anything else he can do in that situation.

 

[FullMoon]

It really doesn't take all that much effort to get things done with Greninja.

He has good damage per hit in his combos, top tier mobility, top tier recovery, one of the best projectiles, one of the best dashgrabs, a kill throw, good range on his moves, small size...

Greninja can be really obnoxious if he wants to by abusing shurikens and his mobility to avoid approaching. It's not exactly a difficult thing to do either, I legit almost timed out a Villager last tournament I went to and only didn't because I got an Up-Smash in.

If the thing Greninja has going against him other than lack of representation is that he's "good but doesn't excel at anything" wouldn't that place him at the same power level as Pit?

 

[Nu~]

I'm still confused as to why opponents don't challenge hydro pump.
Sure the move is pretty fast, but an attack with good duration can really mess up greninja's day. Or just good timing.

I know I can abuse this with Pac-Man's hydrant, Nair, and Dair all day vs greninja.
Don't see why characters like Mario, luigi, pikachu, Kirby, and others with long duration aerials refuse to use their tools to make greninja's hydro pump tame.

 

[FallofBrawl]

Do people still think footstools are hard?

 

[Dre89]

Fun Fact: A Bowser main in Melbourne got 33rd at the last tourney before the patch, and then won the first tourney after it.

And as for the DK v Bowser debate, the best DK in Australia is already getting better results with Bowser than DK. He didn't play Bowser before the patch but is already bodying people harder with Bowser than with his DK, who he's played in tourney since the Ding Dong patch lol.

 

[Nu~]

Fun Fact: A Bowser main in Melbourne got 33rd at the last tourney before the patch, and then won the first tourney after it.

And as for the DK v Bowser debate, the best DK in Australia is already getting better results with Bowser than DK. He didn't play Bowser before the patch but is already bodying people with Bowser than with his DK, who he's played in tourney since the Ding Dong patch lol.

Which one would you say is better:
DK's follow ups out of his "Ding Dong" or Bowser's follow ups out of "showtime/Shell shock" (Hell yeah I'm still pushing shell shock )

 

[Dre89]

Which one would you say is better:
DK's follow ups out of his "Ding Dong" or Bowser's follow ups out of "showtime/Shell shock" (Hell yeah I'm still pushing shell shock )

Depends on what you mean. DK technically can get higher % combos and can kill earlier out of it.

But Bowser's grab % is effectively higher because he'll get so many more grabs than DK. In terms of killing, Bowser kills later but doesn't lose the window like DK does.

If you factor in ease of getting grabs, Bowser's overall grab game is significantly better, it's not even close. DK's had clear counterplay, Bowser's doesn't. Dashgrab beats everything, and you can't camp it out like you can against DK because Bowser doesn't have a small % window to kill like DK.

 

[Browny]

It really doesn't take all that much effort to get things done with Greninja.

He has good damage per hit in his combos, top tier mobility, top tier recovery, one of the best projectiles, one of the best dashgrabs, a kill throw, good range on his moves, small size...

Greninja can be really obnoxious if he wants to by abusing shurikens and his mobility to avoid approaching. It's not exactly a difficult thing to do either, I legit almost timed out a Villager last tournament I went to and only didn't because I got an Up-Smash in.

If the thing Greninja has going against him other than lack of representation is that he's "good but doesn't excel at anything" wouldn't that place him at the same power level as Pit?

Pits ability to prevent people from landing with uair/usmash alone is a top-tier trait and one that is worth a lot more than many may give it credit for.

 

[S_B]

but because earning that reward is simple because of how many options dash grab beats.

What options do you think dashgrab beats?

Dashgrab's range is good, but it's not that good, and furthermore, if there was a hitbox present a moment before a grab connects, the grab is typically going to get broken as the hitbox registers a moment later.

Pivot grab is amazing, sure, but it's dirt-easy to read. Is Bowser running away from you? Then don't chase him with an aerial because he's obviously going for a pivot grab.

And as for Bowser catching landings, if you're trying to land and Bowser is running at you, throw out ANY hitbox and you beat dashgrab.

You act like Bowser has a tether grab or something...

Fun Fact: A Bowser main in Melbourne got 33rd at the last tourney before the patch, and then won the first tourney after it.

Probably because people have been sleeping and sleeping HARD on Bowser this entire time and didn't put much thought into how to fight him, and now they suddenly need to.

They'll adapt in time, though, and then any non-Bowser main trying to cheese with Bowser is going to get destroyed...

Also, no good Sheik/ZSS/Rosa/Sonic players? Really?

 

[Luco]

I'm putting this out there with some reservations that it could go awry, but I'm interested - someone a little while ago mentioned they felt the characters who are the most complex should be at the top of the tier list. This comment got me thinking. It's been mentioned several times that a heavy being near the top would be the end of all days (unless they were good for mostly other reasons like ), but I wonder what kind of character archetype people would prefer as a 'best character' if there had to be one. The fast and furious like Sheik? The slow and tanky likes of DK and Bowser? The campy campers of Villager and Link? Complexities of Ryu and Bayonetta (well we can discuss later if she's actually that complex but from first impressions...)? Hard punishers like MK and ZSS? Etc...?

 

[Routa]

Do people still think footstools are hard?

I don't think people think that they are hard to do. The thing is that most of the time they are rather "risky" (unless you are Kirby or Mii Swordfighter) due to lack of any kind of hitbox. Usually you are better off with any aerial than footstool while edgeguarding.

 

[Big-Cat]

That's how simple this character is now. You never need to chase people in the air now because punishing their landing with dashgrab was always easier to do but now nets much higher reward than anything else he can do in that situation.

You shouldn't be chasing people in the air in the first place beyond showtime followups with Bowser anyway. His aerials are too risky to just throw out. He's a character where you must use your aerials wisely.

You may see he's simply, but he still has to work to get in. I still hold that the Smash community is only good with playing/dealing with rushdown and zoning - not footsies and punisher characters as well.

 

[S_B]

If you factor in ease of getting grabs, Bowser's overall grab game is significantly better, it's not even close. DK's had clear counterplay, Bowser's doesn't.

DK and Bowser have the exact same counterplay to their grab games, the same that exists for counterplay to ZSS's grab game: when they go to grab you, hit them with something so they can't.

Or roll, or spot dodge, or jump. If you're landing, throw out an aerial so the grab gets beaten.

Bowser doesn't have a banana peel to guarantee his grabs, and jab 1 > grab isn't actually guaranteed, especially if you spotdodge upon landing or have a character with a fast Nair.

And unlike with banana peels, when Bowser whiffs that grab, he just committed, bigtime, and can get hit by most fsmashes as a followup.

Yes, grabbing is less committal than pretty much the entire rest of his laggy-as-**** moveset, but even going for a grab is massively punishable as Bowser (I swear, he stands there looking at his empty hand for a goddamn eternity...).

And the best "counterplay" to Bowser is just camp him out with projectiles. He's fast on the ground, but his airspeed is awful and will have a very hard time chasing you into the air if you just want to jump over him and run to the other side of the stage.

The same counterplay that has always worked on Bowser will continue to work. You just need to actually be wary of getting grabbed now whereas before it was a minor inconvenience at worst...

 

[Baby_Sneak]

I'm putting this out there with some reservations that it could go awry, but I'm interested - someone a little while ago mentioned they felt the characters who are the most complex should be at the top of the tier list. This comment got me thinking. It's been mentioned several times that a heavy being near the top would be the end of all days (unless they were good for mostly other reasons like ), but I wonder what kind of character archetype people would prefer as a 'best character' if there had to be one. The fast and furious like Sheik? The slow and tanky likes of DK and Bowser? The campy campers of Villager and Link? Complexities of Ryu and Bayonetta (well we can discuss later if she's actually that complex but from first impressions...)? Hard punishers like MK and ZSS? Etc...?

Probably complex. I would prefer there to be very few easy to use top tiers. Put in the work to use those top tiers and then make top play look interesting. Not to mention the freedom from those characters.

 

[C0rvus]

Complex characters being good is nice. Much better than complex and difficult characters being middling or bad ( immediately comes to mind). Being big and heavy isn't exactly the winning formula. You need some overtuned tools or enough strengths to outweigh the weakness of being slow and easy to combo, and at that point I think we would need to question the character design.

 

[Nu~]

I'm putting this out there with some reservations that it could go awry, but I'm interested - someone a little while ago mentioned they felt the characters who are the most complex should be at the top of the tier list. This comment got me thinking. It's been mentioned several times that a heavy being near the top would be the end of all days (unless they were good for mostly other reasons like ), but I wonder what kind of character archetype people would prefer as a 'best character' if there had to be one. The fast and furious like Sheik? The slow and tanky likes of DK and Bowser? The campy campers of Villager and Link? Complexities of Ryu and Bayonetta (well we can discuss later if she's actually that complex but from first impressions...)? Hard punishers like MK and ZSS? Etc...?

Thank you for this segue.
This is a very interesting topic that I've been thinking about for a little while now.

I would love to see the All-Arounders make up the bulk of our top tiers. Characters that don't have one binary goal every match. The terror that keeps me awake at night is the realization that we have a top tier saturated with characters (but definitely not all of them) that all essentially have the same goal in a match.

-To pursue
-To overwhelm
-To eliminate

They have different ways of doing it, but they share these (perhaps a little vague) procedures to victory.


An ideal top tier to me would be composed of characters that have no concrete gameplan. They require the player to mold one for them. That way we would see much greater enthusiasm for player innovation and highly diverse top level play. It would put all of the choices in the hands of the players. Giving them the tools and allowing them to build their own city.
Or maybe I've been playing too much and listening to @Wintropy 's speeches


Then again...this same goal could probably be achieved through having a top tier where every character has a different playstyle. The goal here is diversity. What will make the game better in the long run is having characters that are all unique in terms of their game plans.

Which is why it's such a bitter shame that customs are gone...but that's a topic I probably shouldn't start.

Complex characters being good is nice. Much better than complex and difficult characters being middling or bad ( immediately comes to mind). Being big and heavy isn't exactly the winning formula. You need some overtuned tools or enough strengths to outweigh the weakness of being slow and easy to combo, and at that point I think we would need to question the character design.

He's nowhere close to bad when you look a little deeper fam .
When you throw the inefficient gimmicks out the window and realize what pacman is truly about, you can see how his game plan comes together.
His traps and tricks are truly scary when optimized. Continuously pushing you into a bubble until he can pounce and tear you up.

Gimmicks should not be relied on. Their use comes in the form of scare tactics and surprise attacks.

 

[Dre89]

What options do you think dashgrab beats?

Dashgrab's range is good, but it's not that good, and furthermore, if there was a hitbox present a moment before a grab connects, the grab is typically going to get broken as the hitbox registers a moment later.

Pivot grab is amazing, sure, but it's dirt-easy to read. Is Bowser running away from you? Then don't chase him with an aerial because he's obviously going for a pivot grab.

And as for Bowser catching landings, if you're trying to land and Bowser is running at you, throw out ANY hitbox and you beat dashgrab.

You act like Bowser has a tether grab or something...



Probably because people have been sleeping and sleeping HARD on Bowser this entire time and didn't put much thought into how to fight him, and now they suddenly need to.

They'll adapt in time, though, and then any non-Bowser main trying to cheese with Bowser is going to get destroyed...

Also, no good Sheik/ZSS/Rosa/Sonic players? Really?

No, Bowser's grab beats out attacks because it outspaces hitboxes, unless they're super disjointed. I have done this countless times with him. People basically teleport into his pivot grab.

Running? Why the hell would you ever commit to a run? Grabs should be used for burst out of other movements. The only time you should ever get a grab out of a run is if you read a backroll or something.

 

[Dee-SmashinBoss]

Complex characters? What about THE most complex in the game(some consider )
And everybody knows how good she is.

 

[Ffamran]

So, went through and added Cloud's recovery and throw frames... Here's the updated thread with links: http://smashboards.com/threads/throw-and-recovery-frame-data-update-cloud.424510/.

Notes: I think, but I don't really know, but some? jabs might have a property where if you repeat them, like jab 1 to jab 1 which is commonly known with characters like Captain Falcon and Little Mac or jab 1 and 2 which was infamously known with Fox and Link. This explains why Cloud's jab 1 and jab 2 recovery look really bad, but in practice they link into each other or back into each other much faster. sixriver suggests it takes 11 frames for jab 1 to repeat and 13 frames for jab 2 to lead back into jab 1 unlike what the recovery frames say of 24 and 26 frames.

Spoiler: Why does Cloud not have throw setups? And some other stuff...

Answer: His recovery sucks. Really, that's all to it. Cloud's throws are in a way, Ike's, but if they were "too strong". For example, all of Ike's throws are 2-hits and all do 7% that always end with a 4% throw hit while Cloud's are a 3-hit U-throw, 2-hit F- and B-throw, and a 1-hit D-throw. Adding in different knockback values as Bowser, DK, Link, and Robin have kindly showed us what happens when you reduce knockback (and in some cases, total frames), Cloud's throws are just "too strong" and too slow. Ike can use D-throw to setup at lower percents; at later percents, its much higher knockback growth, 120, turns it more into a kill throw than a setup throw. Cloud's D-throw does 8% and also has high knockback growth, 110. That poses a problem... Oh, and lets add the fact it takes 26 to Ike's 18 frames to recover - an 8 frame difference.

Cloud's U-throw is kind of like a ZSS U-throw where it looks like it should be a setup throw, but it's not... Seriously, Cloud's kicking you up and already looking like he can spring up and starts batting away, but it takes 36 frames for him to recover, the same as ZSS's... Weirdly enough, F-throw takes 27 and it looks like it should be pushing Cloud backwards with that kind of kick and logically - ah, my old nemesis -, Cloud should take more time to recover from a maneuver like that. Likewise, ZSS's doing an axe kick like that should be that quick. Hell, knowing how acrobatic she is - Flip Kick, anyone? -, ZSS should be able to setup with both U-throw and D-throw while Cloud should at least be able to setup with U-throw... or hell, D-throw like a ton of other characters since animation-wise, it's Captain Falcon and Ganondorf's slam and jam... For Minerva's sake, Cloud! You're superhuman! Slamming someone like that should take you little effort if some has-been F-Zero racer and an old guy can move faster than you. You even said the Buster Sword isn't even heavy! Speaking of which...

Cloud's moves aren't bad in anyway when it comes to recovery outside of Finishing Touch's 60 which even then beats Little Mac's KO Punch in recovery; 85 on the ground and 63 in the air for Little Mac. It really does go with how Cloud said the Buster Sword isn't heavy; looking at startup, recovery, and total frames, Cloud swings fast and takes little time recover. The only outliers to that are his Up Smash, Side Smash, and Fair, and Finishing Touch. Even then, Cloud's other moves don't exceed frame 12 with the closest being his Bair and Dair at 11. On paper, Cloud doesn't really seem have issues like Captain Falcon, Greninja, and Ike having moves making their frame data seem slower or making select options more situational or risky. Cloud's also the only character so far to have a 0 recovery frame move with Limit Charge. Kind of makes sense since it'd be stupid for it to have even 5 frames of recovery. Oh, Cloud's Blade Beam angers me... I swear if they don't even drop 1 frame from Falco's Blaster total frames!

Warning: Obviously contains Falco complaints. It wouldn't be a post from Ffamran if there weren't any Falco complaints.

Spoiler: Cloud and Falco or: The Influences of Melee Falco.

Falco-related or rather, Melee Falco-related. Some of Cloud's moves could be compared to Melee (and Brawl) Falco's. A notable one is Dair. Melee Falco's Dair was a monster of a move that did 12% clean, 8% late, hit at frame 5-24, 20 active frame, 25 recovery, and 49 total frame move. It had 18 landing frames and auto-canceled before frame 4 and after 30. Yeah... the PAL release toned it down so there was a non-spike late hit at... I don't know. Brawl also toned it down with a late hit happening at frame 8-21, so it became a 10% clean, 8% late, frame 5-7 clean, 8-21 late, 15 total active frame, 28 recovery, 49 total frame move with 12 landing lag - why? - and auto-cancel windows before 4 and after 27. So, why's Cloud involved? Cloud essentially has a "fair" version of Melee & Brawl Falco's Dair. Cloud's doing 15% spike, 13% clean, 8% late, being frame 11-13 clean, 14-35 late, 25 total active, 24 recovery, 60 total frame with 26 landing and auto-cancels before 5 and after 43.

It's a little over twice as slow as Falco's meaning it's not stupidly fast and strong - still fast, but not stupidly fast. For who Cloud is, a fighter with a much lower jump and worse recovery (moves) than Falco, having a fast compared to everyone's Dair spikes isn't that crazy. On Falco who in this game is known for his edgeguarding capabilities? Insane. Hell, it was already insane in Melee and Brawl. Anyway, Cloud's Dair, like Falco's Dair, allows him to setup with its vertical hit angle. Unlike PAL Melee, Brawl, and Smash 4 Falco's Dair, both clean and late hits send people up at a vertical angle to Falco's more horizontal 361 angle. So, this lets Cloud setup with both clean and late hits unlike Falco who can sort of setup with the late hit, but would probably use that more for resets than anything.

Things that are debatable with Cloud's Dair: its strength, safety, and even its speed. In a game where most Dairs... where almost all Dairs are bad, Cloud having a good Dair would probably anger people. For one, Roy players probably don't like how Cloud's Dair not only is much faster, but still ends up having lower landing lag when all Roy does is land with his sword on top of the ground while Cloud plants its into the ground. Likewise, Link and Toon Link players probably are questioning why Cloud gets to have that kind of landing lag and auto-cancel windows when they're using much lighter weapons. And Ike players coming from Brawl probably don't like how theirs no longer lingers like a fiend, but Cloud gets that and it's much faster. With a massive hitbox, it's as fast as Lucina, Luigi, Marth, the Pits, and Palutena's while lasting much longer, being a large disjoint, and doing more damage where it's doing 1% more or 5% more. It's just slightly slower than Ryu's, but is just as strong, lasts much more, and has a much better, naturally disjointed hitbox. Remember, this is not a complaint, but an observation...

Back to Cloud: Blade Beam. Cloud's Blade Beam is more like Wolf's Blaster which is basically a 64 Fox Blaster with a melee hit and a better hitbox. Like Wolf's, it covers the ground, but unlike Wolf's it covers below the ground and has a taller hitbox. Oh, and it's green. How's Falco involved? What was Falco's greatest and most infamous asset? His lasers. Cloud can zone and in a way where it's not really annoying nor game-breaking unlike in Melee and definitely in Brawl. Cloud can also edgeguard with Blade Beam where in his case, he's either going to kill you with a Limit Break Blade Blade or force you to recover low because of Blade Beam's large hitbox. In a way... well, you could consider pretty much all projectiles in Smash 4 - hello, Hadouken! -, Blade Beam is kind of what Falco's Blaster should have been... at least in Brawl. It's a strong zoning projectile that lets Cloud control his zone and force people to fight in his range kind of like what Falco was doing... except Falco was approaching with his Blaster which takes his good projectile to borderline broken in Melee and broken in Brawl... With more and more projectiles being introduced or working better... It's going to be questionable when Falco's Blaster remains bad - there's no word you can describe it other than bad. Bayonetta's Bullet Arts are like a Fox Blaster and in a FFA match, would work much better to kill steals when they don't interfere with an enemy's momentum and Bullet Climax sort of has a Shakunetsu and charged Needle Storm going on where it'll have higher active frames and cause more hit stun than Falco's Blaster, so conceptually, Bayonetta beats Falco in two modes. Cloud handles zoning much better since he trades the ability to fire continuously and a reflect for a better hitbox, lower recovery, and better mobility like how Ryu trades the same thing for the ability vary his Hadouken's speed and properties. In customs, Fox beats Falco there where he trades range, the ability to fire continuously, and some damage for much lower recovery and having higher mobility means Fox can just run while Falco would get caught not the mention how not doing anything to Falco's Blaster means Burst Blaster is utter crap to Fox's default Blaster.

So, of course, Falco complaints, but looking at it more, Cloud really does seem like a Melee Falco. Dair's similar function and properties, Blade Beam being Cloud's answer to Falco's Blaster, and recovery-wise, Cloud's Climhazzard is Falco's Fire Bird except it "becomes" Marth's Dolphin Slash with Limit Break. Hell, you could even stretch it and say that Cloud's Limit Charge cancels are his versions of Falco's platform canceled Falco Phantasm and instant aerial Phantasms. Or through an analogy, Cloud's Limit Charge is his answer to Melee Falco's Reflector; it's his key to his game plan as Falco's Reflector/Shine was a key to his game plan. Oh, and for more stuff, Ryu's Dair is basically Melee Marth's Dair where both can setup their Dairs through aerials. Funny how throwbacks or similar concepts come back, but in unexpected ways... Melee Fox's U-throw to Uair was an early example with Smash 4 Falco's U-throw to Uair setup.

 

[Sonicninja115]

What are you meaning by complex? I feel that term is sorta thrown around. For example, I could say Mewtwo is complex because of his diverse combo/punish game, movement mix-ups and 50/50ies, but others might not consider those things as making a character complex.

Plus he has some cool ATs.

 

[Luco]

It's difficult for me right now to elaborate properly on it for some reason. Probably the closest definition I can give is technicality that evokes more / different viable options for that character. A lot of characters in the game have this, but you have to think relative about who has more, and how much that affects their game.

Lucas has plenty of different ways to approach a followup after a Dthrow, but is he really incentivised to use anything other than a Nair x2 --> Uair if he's assured he can get away with it? How often will these different followups actually present themselves as a critical part of his gameplan?

This might be opposed to someone like Shulk, where knowing what monado art will allow you to do x, y and z followups off a grab is really really important and can affect your 'optimal' play at any given moment.

Ryu needs his FACs for burst movement in the air, and his traditional inputs allow him to vary his neutral / punish game at will. You'll see he needs to be technical in different ways to achieve his goals.

Few characters have that many options and have to think that much.

 

[LancerStaff]

Just thought I'd share some numbers on Electroshock Arm now that I've gotten them on three major positions without DI. All on Mario, max freshness, best and worst positions have Mario a roll away from the ledge with the middle being dead center. Rounded a bit (3% max) to keep things simple. Former number is rage, later is Mario's damage.

Best

0% 80%
50-70% 75%
90% 70%
110% 65%
130% 55%
150% 45%

Middle

0% 110%
50% 105%
70% 100%
90% 90%
110% 85%
130% 80%
150% 75%

Worst

0% 145%
50% 135%
70% 125%
90% 120%
110% 115%
130% 105%
150% 95%

So basically, it's not super positional like you'd think it would be. Even if forced to launch somebody across the stage it'll still kill at reasonable percents factoring rage, and for the most part it does kill sooner then Pit's Upperdash, which kills somewhere around 140%. Dark Pit can cheese a kill with it from a 25% deficit in the middle, which is nothing to scoff at. And it's not like he's easy to just close in on either, since he has a decent projectile, great grounded mobility, and multiple cross-up options.

Yeah... Feel sorry for the poor souls who struggled to kill a Dark Pit and ended up going from winning by 50% to losing the match.

 

[Nysyr]

I think this is because a lot of the community widely agrees that most of the buffs and nerfs so far have been reasonable and fair. While some characters like Duck Hunt and Jigglypuff have been glaringly glanced over, those that have been touched by Sakurai's magic finger have had adjustments made to them that they they needed and there haven't been too many nerfs/buffs where you people say "why the hell was this changed?" Even as far back as the summer, I've made posts talking about how a lot of characters were garbage when the game first came out but have since have been mostly fixed or even become viable in the process. have all had some nice adjustments with nearly half of this list becoming either viable or borderline viable thanks to them while (and then arguably buffed to viability again later) have gotten nerfs I would define as reasonable.

Not exactly sure how you would call Lucario's nerfs reasonable over the course of 1.0 -1.1.3...

- Fsmash/Dmsash was already one of the laggiest in the game, but they gave them an endlag nerf
- Extremespeed is one of the more difficult recoveries to use, but they decided that 30 frames of endlag was too little and doubled that unless you land it perfectly and not in special fall.
- Don't care for the sheild trap change - you could escape it anyways and you were probably bad for getting stuck in it at the ledge against a character with subpar neutral.
- ASC -> Upsmash still works at kill %s, but it removed Bair comboing out of it when not landed on the center of their character where upsmash wouldn't work. Stupid change and completely unnecessary.

 

[Halifax?]

Thank you for this segue.
An ideal top tier to me would be composed of characters that have no concrete gameplan. They require the player to mold one for them. That way we would see much greater enthusiasm for player innovation and highly diverse top level play. It would put all of the choices in the hands of the players. Giving them the tools and allowing them to build their own city.
Or maybe I've been playing too much and listening to @Wintropy 's speeches


Then again...this same goal could probably be achieved through having a top tier where every character has a different playstyle. The goal here is diversity. What will make the game better in the long run is having characters that are all unique in terms of their game plans.

What effective styles exist now and what could happen to foster them? Maybe SSB4's so young and offense just developed first. Maybe defensive play just takes longer to develop. Maybe defensive play is truly inferior and is relying on the last balance patch. If I found a time machine first thing I'd do go to Genesis 5 to see how Smash 4 meta developed.

 

[bc1910]

Is that so? I'm a betting man, make an offer on Greninja

I think Pac-man is the only one capable of that. The only thing brawl Olimar did differently over his life was become increasingly more obnoxious and refuse to approach even when losing and people getting better at his recovery. Pac-man can do the same as his recovery is pretty much top tier anyway.

I probably seem like some anti-Greninja hater on this forum but I have nothing against him, I like all the pokemon characters. Greninja though to me just feels like a character that will always require too much effort for not enough reward. There's just nothing Greninja can rely on to clutch out wins or get easy KOs he has to work for everything. Most of the top tiers can end your stock pretty quickly, combo you for free or wall you out with safe attacks. Greninja just seems good at everything but about the only thing he excels at is gimping a handful of characters with Hydro pump.

Perhaps after the Xmas period my finances will have settled down and I'll hit you up

I happen to agree with you - Greninja doesn't have a clutch to rely on in the same way as, say, ZSS, besides Hydro Pump in certain MUs. He doesn't have reliable 40% KO options so falling behind with him is never desirable. I also agree that there's nothing immediately obvious that he excels at like ZSS' roof combos, Rosalina's walling, Sheik's neutral + Fair chains etc. Hydro Pump and Usmash's airdodge frame traps used to fit that bill but both are significantly worse now (though Hydro Pump is still pretty clutch in some MUs, as you said).

Where I think Greninja "excels" is in having a combination of strengths that few, if any, other characters have. His fantastic mobility and top tier projectile create a character that is difficult to approach or hit, and he has a very strong advantage state on top of this. Hit for hit, I can often do more damage with Greninja than Sheik. Hydro Pump is also really overlooked in terms of getting out of disadvantage; Greninja has trouble escaping tight strings due to a lack of a f3 aerial, but any attempt of any extended juggle should result in him Hydro Pumping away, or onto the nearest ledge. Hydro Pump's startup is only about 5 frames more than Quick Attack's and it provides more distance.

He's most similar to Sheik in his combination of strengths but there are differences between the two that make him worth using, such as his easier time getting KOs and Hydro Pump in some MUs.

I guess I'm saying that of all the traits you mentioned his walling ability is the closest to what we'd consider "top tier", though it's not exactly walling; just being slippery. His strength is being a slippery character who you also don't really want to get hit by. While he is an all around "solid" character, I think he's gonna get more solid over time. His neutral and advantage could both get pretty scary.

Pits ability to prevent people from landing with uair/usmash alone is a top-tier trait and one that is worth a lot more than many may give it credit for.

Incidentally this is something Greninja can do as well with Uair, Usmash and dashgrab. I feel it's a very powerful trait that many overlook.

 

[Jamurai]

To be honest I feel like most viable characters have good tools for pressuring someone trying to land, and even many not-so-viable ones, so it's not that special. That's why having bad landing options is a horrible weakness to have (DK, Bowser are held back by this trait, although Bowser fares better thanks to his command grab), and why having things to counter this by mixing up landings or threatening their pressure with hitboxes or movement of their own is extremely desirable; Sheik and ZSS's down-Bs say "**** you" to landing traps for example.

 

[DanGR]

At least bowser has mixups in disadvantaged states. DK just flails around helplessly until the opponent messes up.

 

[bc1910]

His mixups are saved by Klaw. If a Bowser isn't using Klaw for landing you can pretty much hold shield where you think he'll land and roll away from Bowser Bomb on reaction if necessary. Klaw beating shield outright is really nice though. You can roll away from Bowser getting really close to you on reaction, which is the only time he'll ever use Klaw, but then he's landed safely.

Headbutt isn't too bad of a landing mixup for DK in the same vein. Requires them to have a slightly damaged shield already though.

 

[Pazzo.]

I'm putting this out there with some reservations that it could go awry, but I'm interested - someone a little while ago mentioned they felt the characters who are the most complex should be at the top of the tier list. This comment got me thinking. It's been mentioned several times that a heavy being near the top would be the end of all days (unless they were good for mostly other reasons like ), but I wonder what kind of character archetype people would prefer as a 'best character' if there had to be one. The fast and furious like Sheik? The slow and tanky likes of DK and Bowser? The campy campers of Villager and Link? Complexities of Ryu and Bayonetta (well we can discuss later if she's actually that complex but from first impressions...)? Hard punishers like MK and ZSS? Etc...?

For sake of theory, I'd like to see a meta where heavies/superheavies are the top teirs.

Would the meta be campy? Punish-heavy? How would heavy characters change under these situations?

 

[Nobie]

~Lucario Thoughts~

1) (Almost) no one wants to see Lucario be Top Tier, because of how dangerous Aura is as a mechanic, in terms of competition, gameplay, and audience. Somewhere between high tier and mid tier is fine.

2) Would Lucario players trade their continuously growing Up B for one that's safer and harder to punish?

3) I have never seen a high-level Lucario vs. Lucario match. Is there usually only like one Lucario per region or something?

 

[S_B]

Complex characters being good is nice. Much better than complex and difficult characters being middling or bad ( immediately comes to mind). Being big and heavy isn't exactly the winning formula. You need some overtuned tools or enough strengths to outweigh the weakness of being slow and easy to combo, and at that point I think we would need to question the character design.

Complexity can be borne of a variety of different sources.

There's no reason heavy characters cannot have complexities as well, and for SSB, Bowser and DK's current throw followups are much more "complex" than who the game was really designed for. Heavies can have traps, attacks that follow up into other moves, etc. but I suspect that we won't see truly complex heavies until SSB5, since most of the competitive designing of SSB4 seems to have happened after the fact through patches.

No, Bowser's grab beats out attacks because it outspaces hitboxes, unless they're super disjointed. I have done this countless times with him. People basically teleport into his pivot grab.

Yeah, his PIVOT grab, sure, the same pivot grab that's hideously telegraphed.

His dash grab is nowhere near as good as you're making it sound. If an enemy has a hitbox out when you go to dash grab, you're going to get hit by it and the grab will break (if it connects at all).

Running? Why the hell would you ever commit to a run?

Because that's the only way Bowser is going to "trap landings" when the opponent is smart enough to land on the other end of the stage.

Also, do you have some videos of these Australian tournaments?

At least bowser has mixups in disadvantaged states. DK just flails around helplessly until the opponent messes up.

Which mixups do you mean? (legitimately curious)

 

[Coffee™]

Honestly with shieldstun changes and the buffs he got during this game's patch history, Greninja is easily better than he was on release. If he isn't top tier now, then he surely wasn't on 1.0.0.

Silly Up-Smash and Hydro Pump can only get you so far.

I still wouldn’t say Greninja is better than he was on release. You're really underestimating the nerfs this character got here.

• The Water Shuriken nerf was inarguably his worst and changed the character’s playstyle considerably, forcing him to rely on other generally lackluster options to compensate. (the shuriken buff helped quite a bit, but it’s still nowhere as good as it was on release)

• His kill power was reduced substantially on the moves he most often scored kills with (fair and uair)

• Shadow Sneak landing lag cancels were insanely good mixups that he could also secure kills with.

• Usmash was stupid.

• Hydro Pump was equally as stupid.

The buffs he has gotten since those nerfs helped the character remain solid but they definitely don’t really compensate for losing all the above.

 

[Thinkaman]

I think this is because a lot of the community widely agrees that most of the buffs and nerfs so far have been reasonable and fair. While some characters like Duck Hunt and Jigglypuff have been glaringly glanced over, those that have been touched by Sakurai's magic finger have had adjustments made to them that they they needed and there haven't been too many nerfs/buffs where you people say "why the hell was this changed?" Even as far back as the summer, I've made posts talking about how a lot of characters were garbage when the game first came out but have since have been mostly fixed or even become viable in the process. have all had some nice adjustments with nearly half of this list becoming either viable or borderline viable thanks to them while (and then arguably buffed to viability again later) have gotten nerfs I would define as reasonable.

got big dodge buffs a few patches ago, and a nair landing lag buff before that. Also jab/f-smash buffs.

has received a steady stream of buffs, particularly to down b.

got some small knockback buffs in the first patch. Later he got his lock removed.

got some very small positive tweaks.

also got buffs here and there.

all got a mix of nerfs and buffs.

also got improvements to blaster, d-throw, and shine, alongside his jab nerf.

got a buff to d-throw, but nerfs to up-b, especially up-b 2.

got a few endlag nerfs in the first patch, but then eventually got a few buffs here and there.

also got a jab fix, even if it pales in comparison to his nerfs. He also got improvements to d-smash and usmash in the tourney mode patch.

also got a Raptor Boost buff.

was also nerfed in the first patch iirc, and then later got nerfs to bair and fair.

got nerfs to weight (!), throws, and smashes.

got nerfs to Smashes and hydrant HP (increased) in the first patch.

got a 0.5% nerf to u-tilt in the first patch. We all laughed because we all knew Mario was bottom 5.

got nerfs to PK Thunder spam and d-throw damage. However, he also got a down-b lag decrease and a dair hitbox size increase.

got nerfs to Paralyzer and Usmash startup, on top of her superior landing lag from air dodge being fixed.

got a throw nerf.

got a few nerfs in the first patch.

got a handful of small nerfs + PP fix. Then he later got buffs to fair, jab, and some specials.

has gotten a handful of very slight changes in both directions.

Final lists:

Buffed: (30)


Mixed: (12)


Nerfed: (10)


Unchanged: (4)


This isn't counting stuff that is obviously just bug fixes, nor global changes, including ramifications of system changes. (Vectoring, shield stun changes)

Now if you really want to have some fun, go check out the Smashboards Rankings based on tourney results. Dedede and PAC-MAN aside (who were only nerfed in the first 3DS patch), there is a very tight correlation, as you'd expect any sane patches to have.

 

[NachoOfCheese]

At least bowser has mixups in disadvantaged states. DK just flails around helplessly until the opponent messes up.

^ this. Honestly the only matchup I know of where Up B as a combo breaker is even relevant is Mario, since it can easily break his bread and butter. But Shiek? ZSS? Ryu? Meta Knight? Even Luigi. If you get touched you're eating a lot of damage or losing your stock. With his Hoo hah, it usually goes both ways, though. It's why matches with a DK usually either go by real quick or he gets camped out the whole match, making it take forever.

DK is really poorly designed lol. He's a giant pre-patch Luigi without a stupid Nair

Nerfed: (10)

 

[Wintermelon43]

Unchanged:

Stupidist game design choice ever

 

[HFlash]

Wouldn't we say that are in the mixed category? The shield damage nerfs on their respective side B's took away alot of usefulness from those moves imo.

Edit: I present to you:

 

[NachoOfCheese]

Stupidist game design choice ever

I don't know about you but I don't need a good Jigglypuff again

 

[thehard]

got big dodge buffs a few patches ago, and a nair landing lag buff before that. Also jab/f-smash buffs.

has received a steady stream of buffs, particularly to down b.

got some small knockback buffs in the first patch. Later he got his lock removed.

got some very small positive tweaks.

also got buffs here and there.

all got a mix of nerfs and buffs.

also got improvements to blaster, d-throw, and shine, alongside his jab nerf.

got a buff to d-throw, but nerfs to up-b, especially up-b 2.

got a few endlag nerfs in the first patch, but then eventually got a few buffs here and there.

also got a jab fix, even if it pales in comparison to his nerfs. He also got improvements to d-smash and usmash in the tourney mode patch.

also got a Raptor Boost buff.

was also nerfed in the first patch iirc, and then later got nerfs to bair and fair.

got nerfs to weight (!), throws, and smashes.

got nerfs to Smashes and hydrant HP (increased) in the first patch.

got a 0.5% nerf to u-tilt in the first patch. We all laughed because we all knew Mario was bottom 5.

got nerfs to PK Thunder spam and d-throw damage. However, he also got a down-b lag decrease and a dair hitbox size increase.

got nerfs to Paralyzer and Usmash startup, on top of her superior landing lag from air dodge being fixed.

got a throw nerf.

got a few nerfs in the first patch.

got a handful of small nerfs + PP fix. Then he later got buffs to fair, jab, and some specials.

has gotten a handful of very slight changes in both directions.

Final lists:

Buffed: (29)


Mixed: (11)


Nerfed: (10)


Unchanged: (6)


This isn't counting stuff that is obviously just bug fixes, nor global changes, including ramifications of system changes. (Vectoring, shield stun changes)

Now if you really want to have some fun, go check out the Smashboards Rankings based on tourney results. Dedede and PAC-MAN aside (who were only nerfed in the first 3DS patch), there is a very tight correlation, as you'd expect any sane patches to have.

I would throw Toon Link in buffed (less n-air landing lag, faster grabs, other small improvements) and Olimar into mixed (nerfs and buffs to Pikmin). If you really want to be finicky, Roy got a mixed change on Blazer too.

 

[Thinkaman]

Me: Hey look, there's a 95% alignment between the balance changes and our cumulative recorded high-level tourney results over a year later on the other side of an ocean.

People: WELL WHAT ABOUT THE OTHER 5%?!?


I don't even drink, and some days I worry that going into game development is going to make me an alcoholic.