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

[NachoOfCheese]

Hey guys, you know who is in the top half of cumulative Wii U tourney placements reported to Smashboards?

Even though he got his nerfs before the Wii U version even came out?

Who happens to be the second-highest performing heavyweight, after DK?

Who is known to be considered better in Japan, on wi-fi, and in FFAs?

(Don't look at me, I think this character sucks. But I can't argue with the data.)

But Thinkaman ! Villager isn't a heavy!
(jokes)

 

[buzzard]

Could you elaborate? I hear some Zelda mains say she's not nearly as bad as people think, and a few QoL changes would put her in a good place.

On the other hand, I've never heard one good thing about Jigglypuff. Well, except edgeguarding, I guess.

There are many reasons really, but to simplify, every single thing she does is punishable, because of the incredible high startup or endlag on most moves (in some cases both), she has a lot of kill power but relies on hitting with sweetspots (she has about 10 moves with sweetspots), if you miss you simply don't kill and you will be punished and killed very early because she is one of the biggest and lightest characters in the game, much like Mewtwo except that he has moves that are actually good.

Her ranged moves are useless so she has to fight at close quarters but she has the worst toolkit in the game for that role, and I believe that that says it all really.

 

[BSP]

Something to think about when it comes to seemingly small buffs/nerfs.

Let's say a move does 10% damage and gets increased to 12%. "Who cares," right?

Let's say you land that move 10 times during a stock. whereas before you did 100% damage (ignoring staleness for the sake of convenience), now you've done 120%. Or to put it differently, now you only have to land the attack 8-9 times instead of 10 to achieve the same damage.

What difference can one attack make? Well, think about the idea of "last stock, last hit." Situations that wouldn't have been last stock, last hit now are. One less attack required can be the difference between victory and defeat.

When you see small buffs like that, on Shulk or Zelda or whoever, they're not meant to turn tier lists upside down or dramatically transform losing matchups into winning ones. They're meant to take edge cases and push them ever so slightly further into common ones, and uncommon scenarios into edge cases. This is because attacks can add up.

There's also the fact that +1% of damage roughly translates to KO'ing 10% earlier. A 2% damage buff on a move would be huge.

 

[TTTTTsd]

There's also the fact that +1% of damage roughly translates to KO'ing 10% earlier. A 2% damage buff on a move would be huge.

This is the entire reason Doc Dsmash is so good.

It has a 1.2% damage increase over Mario's. And yet it kills FIFTEEN PERCENT earlier. That's INSANE! But it's probably the best example of what damage does to a move in this game I can think of on a comparative level.

 

[ParanoidDrone]

So Shulk's more or less global +0.5% damage buff translates to killing roughly 5% earlier? I can dig that.

 

[Nobie]

So Shulk's more or less global +0.5% damage buff translates to killing roughly 5% earlier? I can dig that.

5% earlier + technically being able to get to that point a bit more easily over the course of a match.

 

[LancerStaff]

Sonic got a weight adjustment? Now there really is 0 excuse on why Sakurai can't bring M2 to his Melee weight and make him an insta-mid character.

FFAs, mate. Note that Sonic only got nerfed by a single point, (IIRC,) you're asking for them to move him up like a third of the list... And people think he's a mid tier already.

 

[Vipermoon]

Like it was said before, it won't suddenly make Shulk viable.

Lucina got a similar 0.5% increase across the board plus a few much larger increases in future patches and it didn't do that much for her. Her damage output was unbalanced in comparison to Marth (who also has damage output issues), now it's in line.

 

[Radical Larry]

Like it was said before, it won't suddenly make Shulk viable.

Lucina got a similar 0.5% increase across the board plus a few much larger increases in future patches and it didn't do that much for her. Her damage output was unbalanced in comparison to Marth (who also has damage output issues), now it's in line.

But Link gets a damage buff on his F-Air and that makes him KO far faster.

There's also the fact that +1% of damage roughly translates to KO'ing 10% earlier. A 2% damage buff on a move would be huge.

So you equate Link's F-Air having 3% buffs as 30% earlier KO potential?

 

[C0rvus]

There has to be more to it than that. Ike's dash attack went from crap to a solid kill move. I don't think they just buffed its damage, did they?

 

[TTTTTsd]

There has to be more to it than that. Ike's dash attack went from crap to a solid kill move. I don't think they just buffed its damage, did they?

I think they changed its KB and angle too but I could be wrong. The damage was buffed MASSIVELY though. You saw how 1.2% made Doc Dsmash kill 15% earlier?

Ike DA got 4% stronger. That's CRAZY on its own.

 

[Man Li Gi]

I hope they do that damage buff to DK Nair and even his uair and hair. Still missing that strong Kong dong power from Brawl. With all his assets, he just doesn't feel like a tried and true giant. Maybe I'm asking for much, a damage buff would be loved (especially on his most used moves).

 

[Jamurai]

Increasing Mewtwo's weight would strip him of his main weakness which is nonsense, frankly. He has very good neutral and advantage games (especially after the buffs) but his 'very big + light' status keeps him in check and is a major balance factor of his.

 

[Thinkaman]

I will never, ever, ever understand the train of thought "I want them to make Mewtwo more like he was in Melee!"

Melee Mewtwo was an embarassment, the most sloppy character in the series. Pichu was a joke, Ice Climbers was a doomed design, Melee Kirby was underpowered beyond belief, Brawl DDD's cg was inexcusable, but it was Melee Mewtwo that was the worst. He was poorly designed, he was buggy, he was poorly balanced; if we're 100% honest he probably should have been cut from the game, but I'm happy he was included and that people got some enjoyment out of him in spite of him basically being unfinished.

Melee was made in essentially 10 months, and it's incredible that they cranked out 20 non-clone characters and Mewtwo was the only true dud.

This is why I was so lukewarm on Mewtwo returning to Smash 4. "Oh great. The return of the lemur. Just what we all wanted." But then thankfully they finished Mewtwo, properly. They re-invented him as a new identity with similar animations, as this crazy glass cannon.

Instead of THE AMAZING FLOATING LEMUR that no one ever wanted, he's now bizzaro Ganon. Redesigned jab and d-throw did wonders, but it was really the duality of Shadow Ball and Confusion that gave birth to Smash 4 Mewtwo.

Yes, Mewtwo would live longer and be better if he was heavier. So would ****ing everyone!

If we could just go one week without starting a page on petition.org to make Mewtwo heavier, or Robin faster, or Little Mac better recovery, or Duck Hunt more KO power, or [not Mario] [more like Mario], that would just be super.

This workplace has gone like 50 days without anyone taking hostages and demanding jumpsquats be normalized, so if we could keep that record going, that's be great.

</holiday rant>

 

[Lavani]

So you equate Link's F-Air having 3% buffs as 30% earlier KO potential?

Depends on where you're measuring from. Starting point on 3DS FD vs Mario, it's more like 20%, with reduced growth partly to blame.

For the first hit it's more like a 45% increase, but that's due to the higher growth and BKB buff as well. Amusingly the first hit kills earlier than the second now, and kills pretty early at that (~115% in the aforementioned example). Finally has fitting power for a frame 14 aerial.

 

[Nobie]

I will never, ever, ever understand the train of thought "I want them to make Mewtwo more like he was in Melee!"

Melee Mewtwo was an embarassment, the most sloppy character in the series. Pichu was a joke, Ice Climbers was a doomed design, Melee Kirby was underpowered beyond belief, Brawl DDD's cg was inexcusable, but it was Melee Mewtwo that was the worst. He was poorly designed, he was buggy, he was poorly balanced; if we're 100% honest he probably should have been cut from the game, but I'm happy he was included and that people got some enjoyment out of him in spite of him basically being unfinished.

Melee was made in essentially 10 months, and it's incredible that they cranked out 20 non-clone characters and Mewtwo was the only true dud.

This is why I was so lukewarm on Mewtwo returning to Smash 4. "Oh great. The return of the lemur. Just what we all wanted." But then thankfully they finished Mewtwo, properly. They re-invented him as a new identity with similar animations, as this crazy glass cannon.

Instead of THE AMAZING FLOATING LEMUR that no one ever wanted, he's now bizzaro Ganon. Redesigned jab and d-throw did wonders, but it was really the duality of Shadow Ball and Confusion that gave birth to Smash 4 Mewtwo.

Yes, Mewtwo would live longer and be better if he was heavier. So would ****ing everyone!

If we could just go one week without starting a page on petition.org to make Mewtwo heavier, or Robin faster, or Little Mac better recovery, or Duck Hunt more KO power, or [not Mario] [more like Mario], that would just be super.

This workplace has gone like 50 days without anyone taking hostages and demanding jumpsquats be normalized, so if we could keep that record going, that's be great.

</holiday rant>

It was amazing to me how many people just saw Mewtwo as a double jump-cancel fairing, down throw-chain grab-comboing machine as if that is what should define a character. "Boohoo, we may have gotten a working Confusion and a better Disable, but who needs that when we don't have down throw 0 to deaths!!!"

Like Mew2King literally won't give Mewtwo the time of day until he gets down throw combos. I understand where he's coming from when he's all about those super optimized combos but c'mon.

Also I played Melee Mewtwo again recently and I say good riddance to stubby arms and a roll that took 5 years.

The only thing I really miss is that old voice of his. Did you know Mewtwo's original actor was a Broadway-style theatre actor?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUS2o0ln6pE

 

[Thinkaman]

I'm imagining that this is how the monitor team discussion goes down:

They see the SHI-G tier list, and say "Yeah, that about matches our internal thoughts and the For Glory numbers. But let's check what the other regions are saying."

And so they google "Smash 4 Tier List", and click the first result, the paragon of competitive Smash play known as eventhubs, and say:

"What the **** is this ****?"

Then someone suggests ignoring the crazy Americans who think Roy is the #1 character, and balancing the game based on just the Japanese and For Glory. Everyone agrees, and that's what they do.

And thank God.


Speaking of, does anyone have the latest SHI-G tier list?

 

[adom4]

I will never, ever, ever understand the train of thought "I want them to make Mewtwo more like he was in Melee!"

Melee Mewtwo was an embarassment, the most sloppy character in the series. Pichu was a joke, Ice Climbers was a doomed design, Melee Kirby was underpowered beyond belief, Brawl DDD's cg was inexcusable, but it was Melee Mewtwo that was the worst. He was poorly designed, he was buggy, he was poorly balanced; if we're 100% honest he probably should have been cut from the game, but I'm happy he was included and that people got some enjoyment out of him in spite of him basically being unfinished.

Melee was made in essentially 10 months, and it's incredible that they cranked out 20 non-clone characters and Mewtwo was the only true dud.

This is why I was so lukewarm on Mewtwo returning to Smash 4. "Oh great. The return of the lemur. Just what we all wanted." But then thankfully they finished Mewtwo, properly. They re-invented him as a new identity with similar animations, as this crazy glass cannon.

Instead of THE AMAZING FLOATING LEMUR that no one ever wanted, he's now bizzaro Ganon. Redesigned jab and d-throw did wonders, but it was really the duality of Shadow Ball and Confusion that gave birth to Smash 4 Mewtwo.

Yes, Mewtwo would live longer and be better if he was heavier. So would ****ing everyone!

If we could just go one week without starting a page on petition.org to make Mewtwo heavier, or Robin faster, or Little Mac better recovery, or Duck Hunt more KO power, or [not Mario] [more like Mario], that would just be super.

This workplace has gone like 50 days without anyone taking hostages and demanding jumpsquats be normalized, so if we could keep that record going, that's be great.

</holiday rant>

Honestly i didn't think they could make Mewtwo work without making him heavier, i'm glad they proved me wrong, his buffs were spot on.

 

[Sonicninja115]

I'm imagining that this is how the monitor team discussion goes down:

They see the SHI-G tier list, and say "Yeah, that about matches our internal thoughts and the For Glory numbers. But let's check what the other regions are saying."

And so they google "Smash 4 Tier List", and click the first result, the paragon of competitive Smash play known as eventhubs, and say:

"What the **** is this ****?"

Then someone suggests ignoring the crazy Americans who think Roy is the #1 character, and balancing the game based on just the Japanese and For Glory. Everyone agrees, and that's what they do.

And thank God.


Speaking of, does anyone have the latest SHI-G tier list?

i hope that is exactly what happened...

Hey, slight news, Bill Trinen is going to Genesis!

(It says news is okay in the topics OP, sorry if I am wrong)

 

[Peppermint1201]

Umebura 20 VODs are up on Shi-Gaming's Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpu15uRsvI2opP78cdslj3A

 

[FullMoon]

Ok I might main the character and all but seeing Some SD with D-Air at the end of his set with Lean was pretty funny, especially with the reaction from the commentators.

 

[Sonicninja115]

Umebura 20 VODs are up on Shi-Gaming's Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCpu15uRsvI2opP78cdslj3A

Is there a free way to watch the Aba vs. SH GF?

 

[Mario766]

There has to be more to it than that. Ike's dash attack went from crap to a solid kill move. I don't think they just buffed its damage, did they?

4.

Damage.

and


faster


4.

DAMAGE. There's no move in the game that got buffed by FOUR DAMAGE. *AFAIK* It's to the point that no rage Ike will kill Mario at ~100 at the ledge.

It's also a 70 BKB 78 KBG move. Compare that to other dash attack moves that kill. Pikachu's is only 12 more KBG, but Pikachu's does 10, which is what it used to do.

 

[Dre89]

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

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.



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).



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?



Which mixups do you mean? (legitimately curious)

You really shouldn't be talking about Bowser if you think running is how he gets grabs lol.


Are you honestly trying to say that you can only get pivot grabs out of a run? Really? That is normally the least likely way to land them. I can see why you think getting grabs is hard now. Clearly whatever Bowser experience you have, be it playing it vsing him is incredibly sub optimal. Running grabs are so bad except for niche circumstances that I can't believe you thought that's what I was talking about.


Pivot grabs are only for punishing landings if you're already under them. They're mainly for punishing burst movements and spaced attacks. They can also be used to punish ledge get ups and ledge rolls. But you should almost never be doing it out of a run. Dashgrab is much better for punishing landings because it'll beat hitboxes if spaced correctly. But you'd have to be stupid to try do it out of a run lol.

And yeah I've outspaced attacks with dashgrab tons of time. If you're not doing it you're just not spacing properly.

 

[Jams.]

Is there a free way to watch the Aba vs. SH GF?

The VODs on Dabuz's Twitch channel are probably your best bet. He was watching the event to analyze the matches on Saturday, so I'd imagine he watched GFs.

 

[Ffamran]

So... guessing the Sonic weight nerf was a lie... The court hereby concludes that Thinkaman is a liar, a goon, and that his mother was a hamster and his father smelt of elderberries.

Speaking of nerfs, I would kill for a severe nerf to Falco's Dair damage and knockback... in exchange for its startup being at most, frame 11. The irony is that Brawl got Falco's Dair damage and knockback? right, but not its speed while Smash 4 slowed it down way too far and returned its damage to something closer to Melee. Consequently, it became more generic like pretty much everyone's slow spike Dairs except for godplayer Cloud and Ryu's with good and also fast spikes for Luigi, the Pits, and Villager which extends to just fast spike Dairs that include them, Lucas, Lucina, Marth, Pac-Man, and Palutena. And then you have the all-around good Dairs of Fox, Lucario, (Dr.?) Mario, Meta Knight, Peach, and Wario. After that, you tread into much slower Dairs that while some are good like Bowser Jr., Kirby, Mii Swordfighter, ROB, Rosalina, and Zelda, they're noticeably slower than the good Dairs and those fast, good Dairs are like 20% of the rest. Then you have questionable Dairs like what's the point of Roy and Wii Fit Trainer's? The lines of Dairs are like good, fast Dairs that can setup or be setup followed by fast Dairs and then the rest. With other moves, there isn't anything like that. Other moves generally are grouped tighter like even though Ganondorf and Zelda's jabs are slow or lackluster, they're not that bad compared to the gap between good Dairs and bad Dairs. A bad jab is still going to be more useful and less risky than a bad Dair.

Most characters... All characters kill vertically up or horizontally with some preferring one like Fox prefers vertical kills while Falco prefers horizontal kills. Vertically down, we only have like Ryu and ZSS who we can truly say kills vertically down as Cloud's current advancement on Dair is more like how Melee Falco would use Dair to launch people up for followups while Ryu and ZSS have actual setups into a downwards kill. Characters who can gimp usually end up actually killing at the sides like Falco or just make it so you're way too far away to get back up and not actually dunking you down to death like Sonic gimping with Spring Jump doesn't actually kill you, but rather just gimps you. I get it, going down is likely going to be rough for all characters compared to dying up top or on the sides where you have a chance to drift back and down to the stage. Down? You're just going to hell, buddy. I also get that a downwards attack, especially aerials, should seem like they should send you down, but really? Out of the current 56 characters, only Bowser Jr., Dr. Mario, Fox, Jigglypuff, Lucario, Mario, Meta Knight, Pac-Man, Peach, Pikachu, Wario, and Yoshi have Dairs that don't spike outside of certain situations like auto-link shenanigans. That's 12 characters. 21% of the current cast has a Dair that isn't just a spike. And funny enough, all of them would be considered for having good Dairs. Yes, even Yoshi's which is hella slow and considered hella overrated. Can you say that for other moves? Can you legitimately say that for Up Smash, only 20% of them are good while the rest are bad? At worse, it's probably 50% are good and 50% are bad with probably 25%, so half on each side, being borderline good and borderline bad. Dairs? Hell no.

Y'know, it's funny how people complain about dying early... Happened with Little Mac, Diddy, Luigi, ZSS, Ryu, and now, Cloud. So, what if Dairs were more usable? Come on! Let's make this game dumb as **** while still being relatively "balanced". Dair spikes like what if Samus's Dair was frame 9 now instead of 17 and spiked on frame 11? We know her Dair is good, she makes use of it for setups and her floaty nature lets her drift around with it. With some adjustments... Welp, looks like she's most likely going to gimp most of the cast at 50% now and much more efficiently. Hell, some characters might not even care if they lose a spike. For example, Falco. Yeah, staple thing of Melee and Brawl Falco was to land spikes for kills and kill horizontally while the staple of Smash 4 Falco is to kill almost purely horizontally through kills and gimps. The staple of Falco in general is to vertically combo. So, why not make it so his Dair can't spike anymore, but the clean hit sends people up? Reduce the damage and knockback and there you go, Falco has a weird as hell Dair that mimics Melee Falco's Dair and lets him do... I don't know... Falco just does stuff. If you can setup with it, then Falco can and will do something out of it even if it's as stupid as a pointblank Blaster and that's stupider than going deep off-stage to use KO Punch with Little Mac. Falco already can use his Dair to setup or from a setup, but it's much slower and much more risky than say Cloud, Luigi, and Ryu's.

I just realized that I ranted about Dairs for about the 10th time.

 

[Sonicninja115]

So... guessing the Sonic weight nerf was a lie... The court hereby concludes that Thinkaman is a liar, a goon, and that his mother was a hamster and his father smelt of elderberries.

Awesome quote.

The VODs on Dabuz's Twitch channel are probably your best bet. He was watching the event to analyze the matches on Saturday, so I'd imagine he watched GFs.

Apparently he only watched winners, not grand finals... I could have gotten misinfo though.

 

[Djent]

Is there a free way to watch the Aba vs. SH GF?

Only with commentary by Dabuz (skip to around 2:30:00).

 

[Kofu]

I hope they do that damage buff to DK Nair and even his uair and hair. Still missing that strong Kong dong power from Brawl. With all his assets, he just doesn't feel like a tried and true giant. Maybe I'm asking for much, a damage buff would be loved (especially on his most used moves).

NAir, okay, sure.

But BAir is part of an elite set of aerials in Smash 4 that can be used twice out of a low jump and yet incur low landing lag. The move is a fast, powerful sex kick. UAir already is powerful and kills fairly early for a move of its speed. It also has (IIRC) a very lenient autocancel window. I really don't think buffing either of those aerials' damage would be a wise idea.

I dunno, maybe I'm just jaded because my main, despite his disjoints, still has to play super cautiously against the heavyweights thanks to his light weight, bad landing lag, overall mediocre startup time on attacks, and the heavies' power and range. Also DK's air speed is superior to Game & Watch's which annoys me to no end.

DK's BAir is a better poke than anything in Game & Watch's arsenal tbh.

 

[KuroganeHammer]

So Shulk's more or less global +0.5% damage buff translates to killing roughly 5% earlier? I can dig that.

It's probably higher when you count Smash as a thing.

Shulk is difficult to balance because Monando Hearts is so volatile.

 

[C0rvus]

BUFF DK's back air? Bruh.

You don't want that. I don't want that. That move is godlike as it is.

 

[Dre89]

I hope they do that damage buff to DK Nair and even his uair and hair. Still missing that strong Kong dong power from Brawl. With all his assets, he just doesn't feel like a tried and true giant. Maybe I'm asking for much, a damage buff would be loved (especially on his most used moves).

DK's damage on-hit is already very good relative to his range and frame data. He does not need damage buffs. Especially when uthrow-nair-upb works on the entire cast and already does around 48% or so.

 

[S_B]

If Dedede were stronger I would vouch for him being the most complex heavy. Gordos have cool properties and he can really trap and corner people at the ledge with a plethora of coverage options. He also lacks the kill setups that his buddies all got. I'm seriously praying that Dedede gets similar treatment. I find him much more fun than DK and Bowser.

Yeah, both DK and Bowser are very linear in comparison to D3 right now.

What I wish they had done for Bowser was give him some kind of shieldbreak trap, something that isn't as straightforward as bombing onto someone's shield (which will never work on a good opponent anyway), but allows a smart Bowser player using good positioning to trap someone in FB or something and force a shield break.

Ultimately, you're still going to need to use all of Bowser's other tools to successfully get kills against good opponents, but the real point is that the fear of being grabbed can make opponents put themselves in more compromising positions that will allow Bowser to better use the remainder of his toolkit.

I've already seen LeTroof get some Dtilt kills on the ledge because people are scared to come up for fear of getting grabbed.

It's not like his D-Throw can followed up by either N-Air, U-Air, WizKick or Dash Attack. Heck, it's not like it can be followed up by Wizard's Dropkick at high damages.
That'd be stupid.
On second thought, the fact that you ASKED for Ganon to have a throw follow up even though he already has it is very...uninformed.

I'm perfectly aware that both D3 and Gdorf have throw followups...at low percentages.

When I say "Throw follow up", I mean something that can take stocks.

I guess I should clarify that, though MOST of the cast has a throw follow up of some kind but relatively few have one that can actually kill like Ding-dong/Shell shock...

D3 actually HAD a kill followup early in the game but they nerfed it for some reason. :\

You really shouldn't be talking about Bowser if you think running is how he gets grabs lol.

/facepalm

I pointed out that no smart opponent is going to land NEXT to Bowser, instead they're going to land on the other side of the stage, where Bowser would need to RUN to intercept them...which won't work because dash grabbing after running that distance is horribly telegraphed.

Are you honestly trying to say that you can only get pivot grabs out of a run? Really?

First of all, no, I never said that. Stop strawmanning, please.

Second, LeTroof gets plenty of pivot grabs by dashing toward, then away from an opponent, tricking them into trying to aerial him.

Dashgrab is much better for punishing landings because it'll beat hitboxes if spaced correctly.

And as I said, no smart opponent is going to be landing close enough to Bowser that he can do this (unless they're Sheik or ZSS and their low-lag Nairs will beat everything Bowser can throw out).

But yes, if you powershield an aerial, a dashgrab is pretty much going to be the only way to really punish it.

And yeah I've outspaced attacks with dashgrab tons of time. If you're not doing it you're just not spacing properly.

On which attacks? And are you sure you're not just getting the dashgrab right after the hitbox ends?

Beyond that, if certain attacks like some jabs and whatnot don't outrange Bowser's dashgrab, it's the job of the opponent to know which attacks will stop it and which ones won't.

Every character forum spends time on each individual matchup, and I know they spend copious amounts of time on high tiers and how to beat them. It shouldn't be too much to ask for these matchup threads to spend some time figuring out which attacks from that character are going to stuff Bowser's dashgrab.

I've spent a lot of time figuring out exactly when any given attack's hitbox ends so I know when to dashgrab or counterattack. When you do it right, it usually looks like you're running through part of the attack because the hitbox usually ends before the animation does.

Also, I still want to see some videos of this tournament you mentioned...

 

[meleebrawler]

I hope they do that damage buff to DK Nair and even his uair and hair. Still missing that strong Kong dong power from Brawl. With all his assets, he just doesn't feel like a tried and true giant. Maybe I'm asking for much, a damage buff would be loved (especially on his most used moves).

Ever since they introduced Bowser (and Ganondorf too I guess), DKs schtick has always been being faster than the average super-heavy (he's bigger, FASTER, and stronger, too). Though at first they went too far in compensating his newfound speed, is the one that's weaker than he should be.

You want a pure heavy DK, play .

It was amazing to me how many people just saw Mewtwo as a double jump-cancel fairing, down throw-chain grab-comboing machine as if that is what should define a character. "Boohoo, we may have gotten a working Confusion and a better Disable, but who needs that when we don't have down throw 0 to deaths!!!"

Like Mew2King literally won't give Mewtwo the time of day until he gets down throw combos. I understand where he's coming from when he's all about those super optimized combos but c'mon.

His Smash wiki page in a nutshell.

Don't forget losing the shadow ball charge damage (complete with Lucario scapegoat).

Also I played Melee Mewtwo again recently and I say good riddance to stubby arms and a roll that took 5 years.

And 10-year techs/ukemis. And getting shield-stabbed with a full shield.

 

[Luco]

Wait, 1% damage buffs usually equate to 10% earlier kills?

Because, wasn't WFt buffed for like 2% on nearly everything? Were her KB values altered or did she seriously just start KO-ing 20% earlier than she used to?


I can only imagine the horror if Ness' bthrow was buffed by 1%. Imagine killing Jiggs at 52% of a grab!! Everyone would be dying at 85%! ... Well a multitude of percents mostly ranging from 80-110

I need to not think evil thoughts.

 

[Ffamran]

The hilarity of it all is that Zelda's Fair and Bair could do 6% more, from 20% to 26%, and it might not make a major difference for her. Sure, it would let her kill like maybe at like 60% on Bowser and Triple D, but the problem is landing them - the reliability of her moves. She would need something like instant shield breaks with sweet-spotted Fair and Bair to have a major effect on her game plan. Speaking of which... why not just give her something like +10% extra shield damage for Fair and Bair? The "ripping" nature of her Ftilt kind of makes me wish it did extra shield damage. It would scare the hell out of people compared to now where perfect shield or not, Zelda's not scary.

 

[AnEventHorizon]

While the subject of Shulk is still around, something else to notice is the results of the +.5% damage and 2 less frames of landing lag on his Nair.

Before the patch, the Nair was frame neutral against shield drop but only in the most optimal conditions. You had to land 1 frame after the attack hit and hit with the beam.
Shulks Nair actually deals the most damage on the beam rather than the blade, and landing with the beam would put you out of range to use Shulks jab/grab (and being Shulk without jab available is like being at a frame disadvantage against anyone regardless).

Now however hitting with either blade or beam is actually 2 frames positive on shield drop (if you wanted to drop straight on an opponent like Geninja Nair rather than crossup). In Buster, Shulk can act almost before shield stun even ends, let alone the shield drop frames. Not bad for a character with some fairly damaging grabs.

Also importantly, because of the damage decrease in speed, its now neutral against shield drop with the blade Nair rather than being at frame disadvantage as it was before


As for the other landing lag reductions + damage increases, I haven't been able to get much more out of them (they're safer but not safe, there's FF uair into uair but its hard to hit with).

The 1-2 frame reduction on Ganondorf's landing lag is what I still don't understand. Nothing became safe or close to safe, the only thing I saw coming out of it would be an easier Gungir footstool combo.

 

[DunnoBro]

Speaking of Duck Hunt, I think he is the second worst character in the game. He is just so underwhelming that I really wonder why they don't buff him. Like, his smashes don't connect properly, one of the worst recoveries in the game, mediocre projectiles and frame data, can' t kill in general, no kill throws, few combos...

DHD might lack in thous parts, but very few characters can set out as good traps as DHD can. But I think I should let DunnoBro explain. He is our go to guy when it comes to DHD.

Nah, he's about right. Duck hunt is bar none the worst character in the game at killing by a fair margin, and with the goal of the game being to kill your opponent... That puts him pretty far down overall. He has some quirks, but nothing that comes even close to matching that weakness.

IMO, Duck hunt is clearly the overall worst character in the game. Palutena is God(des)-like in customs, as she was designed. Zelda also functions great in doubles. Both these characters are worlds superior to DHD in Free for Alls AND dubs, which DHD can't really function in (unless it's customs)

While in singles he probably functions better than those characters, it isn't by much.

Mewtwo, Lucas, and Bowser were in the running for worst character too but... Well, we know what happened to them.

Unless he was also designed for customs (which I find very possible considering how perfectly zigzag functions with his kit) then I find it kind of odd he hasn't received buffs. Only explanation would be early 3ds impressions of the character.

 

[Y2Kay]

if mewtwo's weight was even close to accurate (something like Falcon's weight) he'd be really OP. I mean REALLY OP!

As of now, mewtwo has:
great mobility
spacing abilities
super strong projectile
a great reflector
plenty of kill power
good recovery
awesome kill throw

Do you want a monster like that living longer? I love mewtwo to death, but I wouldn't wish an abomination like that onto the meta-game.

Also, as general rule of thumb when asking for buffs, If you have to change the character's trophy descriptions to get the buff, you will not get it!

Mewtwo puts its psychic powers to great use in this game. Not only does it have floaty jumps, but its telekinesis gives its attacks extra reach and its throws added power. However, its light body makes it easy to launch, so if you're willing to risk getting in close, it might just be worth it!

Lastly, if I got a dollar for every time someone called Mewtwo floaty, I'd be using gold bricks as toilet paper.

 

[Yonder]

I sure as heck don't want anything 2 from Melee EXCEPT his weight. Gameplay wise, M2 is perfect. (Well, u tilt hitbox still isnt fixed though)

For those saying M2 is mid tier, he isn't...yet. He just has no tourney results to justify it. At all (Trelas 1st place or whatever long ago is outdated) . M2 is much better than before , Easily the best low tier sides Doc maybe. When I see usage from him at tournies though, he will be mid tier no doubt. It's really close, he only has room to go up.